Was Black Dust - Nobody knows

of

Then I will have to respectfully suggest that the answer must be 42.

Yes, but, what was the question?

idea

What do you get when you mulitiply six times nine?

Kevin

On Fri, 26 Sep 2003 03:50:03 GMT, Kevin Kilzer Gave us:

What the f*ck is "mulitiply"?

Never mind the fact that 6 times 9 is 54

It's what you do when you multiply 6 * 9 and get 42, I would have thought that was obvious!

Mike Harding

........... Phil

On Fri, 26 Sep 2003 15:56:21 +1000, "Phil Allison" Gave us:

Though he never used the non-word "mulitiply".

Also, his 6 by 9 wasn't about math.

Not always...

Sadly missed.

Mike Harding

Quote from JH ....

Yeah (sing the song brother...) Now if uh, six uh, huh, turned out to be nine Oh I don't mind, I don't mind uh ( Well all right... ) If all the hippies cut off all their hair Oh I don't care, oh I don't care. Dig.

............. Phil

In base 13 it's 42. D'oh!

Rob

F*ck, here we go again............

On Fri, 26 Sep 2003 16:24:55 +1000, "Phil Allison" Gave us:

I guess that you didn't notice that the traffic lights had turned from green to red...

You really seem to like that wrod.

Kevin

........ Phil

Like most of the really long threads, the correct explanation was posted quite a few times, but as with some of the easily resolved urban legends, there will be always people who will believe something utterly incredible to be going on, then proceed to debate their fantastic belief to an almost comical extent.

Take a look at soume of the UFO threads for an example of this, or "The Philadelphia Incident" as another.

Early in the game some of these threads can be fun, but they do tend to grow stale very fast...particularly when people that cannot support their point with science based arguments resort to a series of ad hominem attacks directed against anyone challenging their "knowledge".

Harry C.

I tried some web searching to settle this. The web seems to be unexpectedly lacking an explanation of this one!.

A significant hit of a page attempting to explain scientifically what causes this is

Although written by someone claiming impressive scientific credentials, the author seems to be seriously grasping at straws in terms of the science of the subject at hand. As an example, he claims that TV screens are negatively charged, while in actuality they are positively charged in order to accelerate electrons toward themselves. The author of that page proposes that this dust is metallic oxides.

However, it is to be noted that the author of that page notes that sometimes the dust accumulating on the outer surface of a TV screen is pitch black, in a thread on a "Mad Sci Network" message board about "Why the dust on the TV screen is jet black?".

Along with that 2-message thread's previous message,

That should weigh against arguments in "The Big Thread" that the black stuff normally only occurs on the inside (of TV sets and monitors), and specifically is found at/near and therefore formed by the flyback transformer, in order to support a claim that the black dust is carbonized outgassed fumes of interior parts.

I will soon collect some from a TV that I was about to toss so that I can analyze it in various ways. I will post results, even if such results weigh against arguments that I have made in the "Big Thread". For one thing, I am expecting the stuff to be somewhat of an insulator, which indicates that soot content (which I propose gives the stuff its color) is not the whole story.

Tests I will do:

1. Burn the stuff in an electric arc. I have diffraction gratings, and I am familiar with the spectra of the common metals, so if there is a significant amount of any common metal or oxides or other compounds thereof, I will see it.

1. See if a clump of the stuff burns and does so with a yellow flame. If that happens, then it means organic compounds are a major component. I have at times proposed grease/tarry particles being part of this stuff.

2. Dump the stuff into acetone and filter it with a coffee filter and see if there is a black component that does not pass through the coffee filter and is somewhat electrically conductive when bunched up. If that happens, carbon is a candidate, although such an experiment would not support nor weigh against various arguments as to how carbon would accumulate there.

Maybe use a solution of lye to remove food grease from a possible mixture of food grease (or similar stuff) and whatever else such as maybe carbon particles.

I will post results!

- Don Klipstein ( snipped-for-privacy@misty.com)

On 30 Sep 2003 12:24:36 -0700, snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com (Harry Conover) Gave us:

If you are so informed, why don't you declare for us all who was correct, when and who was incorrect as well?

I say it is airborne particulate, corona, and non-conductive "moist" substances that do it.

It certainly isn't some "soot" exuding from a component in the cabinet, or from the cabinet itself, as some have claimed.

Pity you never managed to produce a shred of evidence to substantiate your claim about the explanation yourself.

Just proclaimed it.

And you never did manage to explain why electrostatic precipators used in the same environment dont end up with just the JET BLACK SOOT seen inside monitors. They end up with just the common dust instead.

Thats nothing like science.