There's a story that I read at some point several years ago, but I can't remember when or where. My best guess is that it was either in an out of print book of older SF stories (probably 30+ years old) or it was an online post someplace (probably less than 10 years old).  The premise, as best as I can remember it, is that galactic civilizations have decided (at some point in the distant past) that humanity is too dangerous and have effectively quarantined our solar system. But a couple of aliens are wondering just what could possibly be so scary about us. So they decide to build a laboratory environment that would be absolutely impossible to escape from and abduct one single human being and stick him in it, in order to observe him.  There are multiple levels of security ensuring that there's no way to possibly escape. But it turns out that the thing that distinguishes humans from all other intelligent beings in the galaxy is that they just can't comprehend the concept of something being "impossible". So, despite the fact that there's no chance of success, the human insists on repeatedly trying time and again to get out.  Of course, he eventually succeeds. And steals the aliens' ship. And they realize that they've made a terrible, terrible mistake.  Does anyone else remember this story? One thing I do know is that it's not "With Friends Like These..." by Alan Dean Foster (I checked that one already).
I always thought the book was Manifest Destiny but its not. The story that sticks in my head was a human in a cage over a pit? Aliens walk in and discuss how dangerous humans were. He eventually escapes. Man I miss this book. wish I wouldve written down every book I ever read. Ugh
Show that there are $ a,b \geq 0 $ so that $ |f(x)| \leq ax+b, \forall x \geq 0.$ Quote unquote (or end-quote), unseparated by the actual quotation Is it unethical to cite a paper or book that you have never looked at? Suppose I see that Book X is cited by several papers with reference to some particular Fact Y. I wish to cite Fact Y. As far as I know, Book X is the only reference for Fact Y.   I have never looked at Book X. Nonetheless, I cite it like this:  'Fact Y' (see Book X)  My question is: Is this ethical, given that I've never looked at Book X?  More context for my question. I am NOT asking whether this is good scientific practice. I am NOT asking how a good scientist should actually go about citing Fact Y. I am NOT asking if this could undermine your credibility as a scientist.  Instead, I am asking this question because it seems to be a somewhat-common practice. And moreover, as far as I know, no scientist has ever been issued even an official rebuke (much less fired) for engaging in such practice. This would suggest to me that this practice is not considered to be unethical.   Of course, it is not binary as to whether a practice is unethical. But I would simply like to know whether the academic community in general considers this to be even a mildly unethical practice. Or if it is perhaps very slightly unethical, but not a big deal. Or if it is not in the least bit unethical. Orbiting a specific point - Orbiting Camera How would I create a camera that with the mouse, it allows you to orbit around a specifc position, with the camera always facing that point? I would also like it to be able to always be at a constant distance from the point, and be able to orbit around it in every direction.   Any ideas? Im trying to run the following code  \documentclass[border=10pt]{standalone} \usepackage{pgfplots} \pgfplotsset{width = 7cm, compat = 1.8} \begin{document} \begin{tikzpicture} \begin{axis}[domain = -2:2, domain y = 0:2*pi] \addplot3[contour gnuplot = {output point meta = rawz, number=10, labels=false}, samples = 41, z filter/.code=\def\pgfmathresult{-1.6}] {exp(-x^2) * sin(deg(y))}; \addplot3[surf, samples = 25] {exp(-x^2) * sin(deg(y))}; \end{axis} \end{tikzpicture} \end{document}   and I'm getting the error  Package pgfplots Error: sorry, plot file{Utitlled_contourmp0.table} could not be opened   through a quick search I found out that contour maps require pgfplots and gnuplot to talk to each other. In theory the way to make them interact is adding  !TEX option = --enable-write18   or   %!TEX option = --enable-escape   at the top of the file. Unfortunately this has not worked for me. Any suggestions? How can I get rid of those little white dots? I am using Blender 2.70a. This is the terminal message I keep getting when trying to update via: sudo apt-get update  $ sudo apt-get update [sudo] password for petros: Reading package lists... Done E: Could not get lock /var/lib/apt/lists/lock - open (11: Resource temporarily unavailable) E: Unable to lock directory /var/lib/apt/lists/   How can I solve it? What's the projective limit of these polynomial rings ? Define an inverse system of polynomial rings over a commutative ring $k$ by the canonical projection $k[x_1,...,x_n] \to k[x_1,...,x_m]\;(m&lt; n)$.   Question: What is the projective limit $\varprojlim_n k[x_1,...,x_n]$ ? I tried to get the number of available brew packages by running  brew search | wc -l   but I don't know how accurate this really is. What do I need to take into account to get a more correct number?  PS: macports lists 19,889 packages online We are a team with three orgs. Development, UAT and Production.  We are trying to move away from changesets and manual copying and use various deploy mechanisms or scratch orgs but we cannot deploy org wide email addresses since it is not supported in the metadata api.   The problem is that since addresses cannot be deployed, workflows referencing them cannot either. And if we dont deploy all workflows some tests will fail and the environment will be wrong.  I would appreciate any help with this issue, thanks Convergence of $U_n=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2n\sigma^2}}\left(\Sigma X_j-\Sigma Y_j\right)$ - central limit theorem Suppose that $U_n=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2n\sigma^2}}\left(\Sigma X_j-\Sigma Y_j\right)$,  where $X_1,X_2,\ldots$ and $Y_i,Y_2, \ldots$ are i.i.d. sequences of random variables with mean $\mu$ and variance $\sigma^2$ and the sequences $\{X_i\}$ and $\{Y_i\}$ are independent.  Then, for all real numbers $x$, show that, as $n\to \infty$,  $$\mathbb{P}(U_n\leq x) \to  \int_{-\infty}^{x} \frac{1}{(\sqrt(2\pi))} \:e^{-\frac 12{u^2}}\mathrm du $$ Approach  I tried to carry out the integration on the right, but this does not integrate nicely. It ends up involving an error function, so I figured this was the wrong was to go.  Should I be looking at convergence in probability to answer this question? Is Chebyshev's inequality relevant here? If so, how and how does that relate to the integral? I've been trying to wrap my head around the basic concepts of category theory, and I thought I would attempt to illustrate what I understand with the category of sets, probably the easiest example. Particularly, I've been trying to prove that $id_A$ (the identity morphism on $A$, for all $A \in Obj(\mathbf{Set})$) is $1_A \colon A \rightarrow A, x \mapsto x$.  This is a very intuitive and reasonable statement, and it's trivial to prove that $1_A$ is indeed an identity morphism on $A$, and I suppose uniqueness of $id_A$ can be demonstrated analogously to uniqueness of the identity element in a monoid (considering the subcategory which has $A$ as its only object, and endofunctions on $A$ as its only morphisms).  In this manner, it is not hard to prove that the proposition in the title is true, but this demonstration requires to make an assumption or guess as to what could $id_A$ be. Specifically, the scheme of the proof is: assume $id_A$ = $1_A$, see that it works with the definition of an identity morphism, show that the identity morphism is unique, and, in conclusion, $id_A$ can only be $1_A$. What I'm looking for, nonetheless, is a somehow more direct proof, that doesn't assume $id_A$ = $1_A$ at the start. I want to place myself in a state of little or no knowledge about sets and functions, and under this assumption, why would I assume $id_A$ = $1_A$ at first? Why not try with $id_\mathbb{Z}$ = $f \colon \mathbb{Z} \to \mathbb{Z}, x \mapsto x^2 + 1$, for example? It wouldn't work, but I don't have any reason to think that $1_\mathbb{Z}$ is a better guess for $id_\mathbb{Z}$.  I suppose that the proof for which I'm asking would work for categories of sets with additional structure, and probably for posets as well, although I'm not clear as to what modifications it would require to work.  Thanks. How to change desktop background from command line in Unity? I have a script that updates my desktop background every day with the NASA APOD. Since upgrading to 11.10, that script stopped working, presumably because I'm using gconftool-2 to actually update the desktop background. Is there a new way to do this under Unity? Prove that the equation: $c_0+c_1x+\ldots+c_nx^n=0$ has a real solution between 0 and 1. Let $c_0,c_1,c_2,\ldots ,c_n$ be constants such that :  $$c_0+\frac{c_1}{2}+\ldots+\frac{c_{n-1}}{n}+\frac{c_n}{n+1}=0$$  I have to prove that the equation: $$c_0+c_1x+\ldots+c_nx^n=0$$  Has a real solution between 0 and 1.  Didn't know how to start...I thought that maybe I could use something about derivative...But I'm lost... Any help,much appreciated!!! Is there a way to capture the viewport in Blender the same way as it is on 3DS Max? I know that by default I can render the viewport and everithing that is in the viewport to be the same as in the render. But, when comparing 3DS Max to Blender, I have certain limitations. In Blender I can render the view-port with vertices/edges/faces to be shown, to be selected, but not the reflections, shadows and such.  Is there a way to render the viewport in Blender as it is in 3DS Max?  Here's how I can do it in 3DS Max:  Viewport look    Render result of the viewport    Here is how I can do it in Blender:  Viewport look:      Render result of the viewport Quote.class doesn't return the Quote type, but Account.class does. Why? I'm trying a library that acts like an object factory. It works with serialization, so it is possible to specify formula fields without DML, which is pretty handy with tests.  My issue is that I'm trying to write a class that requires the Quote type. The apex compiler throws me the following error when using Quote.class:     Invalid field class for SObject Quote   But Opportunity.class, Account.class and even QuoteLineItem.class work just fine. Any idea why? Is it not possible to get the quote type? Or is there another way of doing it? Are there any disadvantages to using your companions for transporting Power Armor Suppose $f$ is a differentiable function over $\mathbb{R}$ satisfying $f(0) = 0$. Show that if $f'$ is strictly increasing, then $\frac{f(x)}{x}$ is increasing over $(0,\infty)$.   Attempt:  Since $f'$ is increasing we know that $f'' &gt; 0$ for all $x$. Now let $g(x) = \frac{f(x)}{x}$ and thus $f(x) = xg(x)$. Then we wish to show that $g'(x) &gt; 0$ on $(0,\infty)$ and so since $f'(x) = xg'(x)+g(x)$ and $f''(x) = xg''(x)+2g'(x) &gt; 0$, we have $g''(x) &gt; \frac{-2g'(x)}{x}$. I am not sure how to use this though to prove the statement. Zero search results when searching for [tagOne] [or] [tagTwo] score:-2 I'm able to search for the newest questions tagged with [xcode] and [ios] and score >= -2.    But I see 0 results when searching for the newest questions tagged with [xcode] or [ios] and score >= -2. Prove that $\frac{a_1^2}{a_1+a_2}+\frac{a_2^2}{a_2+a_3}+ \cdots \frac{a_n^2}{a_n+a_1} \geq \frac12$ Let $a_1, a_2, a_3, \dots , a_n$ be positive real numbers whose sum is $1$. Prove that $$\frac{a_1^2}{a_1+a_2}+\frac{a_2^2}{a_2+a_3}+ \ldots +\frac{a_n^2}{a_n+a_1} \geq \frac12\,.$$  I thought maybe the Cauchy and QM inequalities would be helpful. But I can't see how to apply it. Another thought (might be unhelpful) is that the sum of the denominators on the left hand side is $2$ (the denominator on the right hand side). I would really appreciate any hints.