Things you always wanted to know the answer to [Vol. 5]
Discussion
SpeckledJim said:
glazbagun said:
Dr Jekyll said:
What 2020 car would look as out of place in 1990 as a DeLorean would look in 1955?
Toyota Prius. Hybrid electric and looks like it fell from space and landed badly.Even got DeLorean-style doors.
Dr Jekyll said:
What 2020 car would look as out of place in 1990 as a DeLorean would look in 1955?
What a brilliant question.I'd say the majority of modern cars would be as startling in 1990 as the DMC was in 1955.
Cars seemed to get smaller between '55 and '90, in the US at least (I'm assuming this is a Back to the Future sort of question) but they massive now, bigger than they look at makers have done a good job keeping them proportional but parked side-by-side I think it would be staggering.
Even mundane stuff like the current crop of Skodas and Seats have those tight creases in their body work that you just couldn't make in the 90s,
That's before you even get into the interior, even the time machine in BTTF was pretty much electromecanical looking with a few old school LED displays, it would be familiar enough to anyone in the 50s, if you turned up in 1990 with a 8" HD touchscreen with CarPlay etc they'd burn you at the stake.
If the question was what would be the MOST out of place... i8 is a very good shout, but it's not like the world hadn't seen Gulwing doors in '55, the SL came out in 1950.
It's probably something like the Twizy. It's electric of course. It doesn't look massively different to the BMW C1 which came in 2000, well apart from the number of wheels of course,and they looked mental in 2000.
glazbagun said:
With a lottery of, say, ten million tickets repeated every week, do you have higher odds of winning if you buy 52 tickets for one lottery, or one ticket for each of the 52 lotteries in a year?
Winning just once, or winning once or more?For the best odds of winning just once, you're best lumping 52 tickets on one draw. For the best odds of winning once or more, you're best spreading them out at one ticket per draw.
Cliftonite said:
SpeckledJim said:
Winning just once, or winning once or more?
For the best odds of winning just once, you're best lumping 52 tickets on one draw. For the best odds of winning once or more, you're best spreading them out at one ticket per draw.
The odds are the same, for each scenario.For the best odds of winning just once, you're best lumping 52 tickets on one draw. For the best odds of winning once or more, you're best spreading them out at one ticket per draw.
To test the principle, say that instead of 14m combinations, there were only 52.
If you go for all one one draw, then you guarantee one win, and guarantee only one win, not more.
If you spread them out at one a week, then you are likely to win, and may win a few times if you’re extremely lucky, or you may not win at all.
They two situations aren’t the same, and when you multiply it back up to 14m combinations of course the two options converge, but they don’t become exactly the same.
glazbagun said:
With a lottery of, say, ten million tickets repeated every week, do you have higher odds of winning if you buy 52 tickets for one lottery, or one ticket for each of the 52 lotteries in a year?
All in one week is better.Make it 100 tickets total just to keep the numbers simple.
All your tickets in one go: 52 tickets / 100 sold => win chance 52/100= 52%
One go a week. Chance of not winning each week is 99%. Cumulative chance of not winning is 99% x 99% x 99%... 52 times, so 99% ^ 52 = 0.593
Chance of winning is 1 - the chance of not winning => 1 - 0.593 = 0.407 = 40.7%
(This assumes that one win is guaranteed at each draw, so it is more like a raffle ticket than a euromillions lottery).
ambuletz said:
Does anyone know what determines if roads are named street, road, lane, avenue, crescent and place? I can't think of any other ones.
i.e
mayfair road
mayfair street
mayfair lane
mayfair avenue... you get the idea.. how do they decide on the ending?
Not an answer, but if I find myself lost in a complicated housing estate I find a thoroughfare called something road or preferably something lane and follow it, on the basis that it probably predates the estate and leaves it while something crescent or something avenue is probably part of the estate.i.e
mayfair road
mayfair street
mayfair lane
mayfair avenue... you get the idea.. how do they decide on the ending?
I think roads were generally major routes while lanes often evolved from goat tracks rather than built to get from A to B. Although when 'street' ceased to be trunk routes like Watling street and became short urban stretches I don't know.
There is a village in Hertfordshire called Newgatestreet and a road towards it called Newgatestreet road.
Dr Jekyll said:
Not an answer, but if I find myself lost in a complicated housing estate I find a thoroughfare called something road or preferably something lane and follow it, on the basis that it probably predates the estate and leaves it while something crescent or something avenue is probably part of the estate.
I think roads were generally major routes while lanes often evolved from goat tracks rather than built to get from A to B. Although when 'street' ceased to be trunk routes like Watling street and became short urban stretches I don't know.
There is a village in Hertfordshire called Newgatestreet and a road towards it called Newgatestreet road.
There is a road in Cobham called Between Streets.I think roads were generally major routes while lanes often evolved from goat tracks rather than built to get from A to B. Although when 'street' ceased to be trunk routes like Watling street and became short urban stretches I don't know.
There is a village in Hertfordshire called Newgatestreet and a road towards it called Newgatestreet road.
It delights the local American residents.
Clockwork Cupcake said:
V8mate said:
No. It's because a standalone satnav has all the maps loaded into its memory. There used to be a very good mobile satnav app for Windows phones where you could download full maps for various regions.
They're not nearly as bad as they used to be though. I now use Waze and the data usage is negligible.
Quite. Plus your phone satnav is getting real time traffic updates. A standalone satnav is more like a road atlas.They're not nearly as bad as they used to be though. I now use Waze and the data usage is negligible.
Incidentally, Google Maps does allow you to download map data for an area, although obviously if will still use a small amount of data to report back your speed and position to the Google hivemind.
SpeckledJim said:
MartG said:
Clockwork Cupcake said:
Rostfritt said:
SpeckledJim said:
I can see how triangulating from three satellites will give two potential positions. But once there's 4 satellites in range, then it's isolated to one true position, I think?
That would be true. My old Garmin would tell you relatively useless info about the GPS signal. Usually it had about 8 satellites in view if you were out in the open.It's because the satellites are way up in orbit looking down on us. So any position below them has a corresponding position above them.
Say I'm somewhere in a huge bowl.
If three satellites are anywhere on the surface of the bowl, then the triangulation will tell my sat nav two things - exactly where I am inside the bowl, and (erroneously) exactly where I might be if I was outside the bowl.
If you put a fourth satellite on the surface of the bowl, then the erroneous external-to-bowl result can be definitively ruled-out with the timing reading from the 4th satellite. Because the timing reading for that position wouldn't line-up with the earlier three, because it's not in the same 2D plane as they all are.
Can't it?
98elise said:
Are you sure? I've used off line maps for the US a number of times. Never had any issues with using the Google Maps with mobile data turned off.
Sorry, yes, I should have clarified that Google Maps can run in full "offline mode" in which case you do not get the traffic data etc. Indeed, in "not spot" areas you will sometimes get an announcement "You are back online" when you get signal again. What I was referring to was running in online mode but with previously-downloaded map content, in which case you will not be using data for map content but will still be using a tiny bit of data for traffic info (both feeding info into the hivemind, and also benefiting from it).
Edited by Clockwork Cupcake on Saturday 29th August 10:14
Halmyre said:
Dr Jekyll said:
The Mad Monk said:
Europa1 said:
ambuletz said:
Does anyone know what determines if roads are named street, road, lane, avenue, crescent and place? I can't think of any other ones.
BoulevardWay
Passage
Wynd
Court
Reach
Rise
Loan
Parkway
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