The Kilogram Has Excess Mass, Could Cause Scientific Havok

[Guest]

There is concern that the original kilogram does not represent the mass of the original kilogram anymore.

The Kilogram Has Excess Mass, Could Cause Scientific Havok : Read more

 

[cats_Paw]

Oh my god! A kilogram cilinder that noone cares about now is 10 micrograms smaller, how can we ever live with this?!

And really, do they even use that thing?

Its a funny trivia no doubt, but science news?

 

[yialanliu]

Live Science posted this on the 6th Toms...
Why do we keep seeing old news?

 

[manofchalk]

[citation][nom]Baxtergate[/nom]Abolish mass now! L Ron Hubbard has frequently been critical of these unelected eggheads dictating their nonsense to us. Scientology is the true way forward, and will abolish this nonsense, and set you on the bridge to total freedom![/citation]
I suppose Xenu will have a faultless unit of mass waiting when we arrive?

The near-universal unit of Mass is slightly off, that cant be good. Dont suppose it could as simple a fix of making a set of scales accurate enough to record exactly 1kg, then just using that as a template to make more of these?

 

[yeungl]

Since mass cylinder is a master of standard, how can we use less accurate instrument to calibrate the master standard. That violate the fundamental rule of metrology.

If the calibration is performed with more accurate standard, why not we switch to the better one?

 

[brianvan]

wait, there are 40 replicas! So just use one of the other 39 in the meantime! Why would we make a big deal of this? That's why we have redundant standard units. I'm going to hold my panic for now.

 

[w1zz4]

cats_Paw : It's heavier not lighter

yeungl : They didn't weight it, they look at it with a microscope and found new hydrocarbon depot which certainly effect it's original mass.

 

[xpeh]

[citation][nom]Baxtergate[/nom]Abolish mass now! L Ron Hubbard has frequently been critical of these unelected eggheads dictating their nonsense to us. Scientology is the true way forward, and will abolish this nonsense, and set you on the bridge to total freedom![/citation]

lol

 

[LORD_ORION]

I was hoping for something more interesting... like the mass of platinum, everywhere, was mysteriously changed by unknown forces in the universe.

 

[frombehind]

Lol I wish a "suntan" would remove my excess mass =D that's one lucky cylinder.

 

[bak0n]

Anyone else read this news on yahoo about a month ago?

 

[juanc]

That's so cool. Now I've lost weight... no exercise needed... just recalibrate your scales.

 

[yeungl]

[citation][nom]w1zz4[/nom]cats_Paw : It's heavier not lighteryeungl : They didn't weight it, they look at it with a microscope and found new hydrocarbon depot which certainly effect it's original mass.[/citation]

They quantified the change is "tens of micrograms" , also, the standard mass is stored in a double vacuum . Where is the contamination come from?

Although using UV and ozone may correct the hydrocarbon problem, will it introduce oxidation?

 

[einheriar]

[citation][nom]yeungl[/nom]They quantified the change is "tens of micrograms" , also, the standard mass is stored in a double vacuum . Where is the contamination come from?Although using UV and ozone may correct the hydrocarbon problem, will it introduce oxidation?[/citation]

Nope, Platinum is too noble a metal to get oxidised under room temperature.. Exactlly the reason why they were made of this alloy in the first place.. But the ozone and UV will oxidise the hydrocarbons, and you will in principle get CO2 out of it..

 

[jake2447]

[citation][nom]frombehind[/nom]Lol I wish a "suntan" would remove my excess mass =D that's one lucky cylinder.[/citation]

you probably wouldnt notice the missing micrograms

 

[DRosencraft]

This is similar to last summer when scientists thought they were able to accelerate atoms past the speed of light by just a tiny bit. In the aggregate it's a tiny difference that doesn't make much matter to most people. But when you start doing complex, macro level calculations for things like studying distant celestial bodies, you're talking about redoing really big, difficult, mathematics that originally took years to get right.

 

[ddpruitt]

Old news. This thing keeps on getting heavier and heavier (infinitesimally of course). The question is why. Could unlock secrets of the universe we never knew about.

If you don't think it's important remember this, radioactivity was discovered when a photographic film left under a lump of uranium was exposed, a mundane observation most would have discounted, not a scientist.

 

[cookoy]

And in the world of commerce, a kilogram is the weight according to the scale of the seller. Accept it or you don't buy anything.

 

[Kand]

but the americans and other british related copuntries still use pounds for mass and FEET for lenght.
the FEET didn`t change it`s length?

 

[deksman]

One of the issues with society at large (which hopefully will continue to diminish with time) is the lack of ability to critically think/actively question established theories/laws/regulations.
Seems to me too many people are discredited and laughed at for merely even posing the question: 'what if its wrong?'
This kind of approach to life is dogmatic.
Science was founded on the notion that anything and everything should be subject to change at any given time (therefore notions such as 'belief', 'faith', 'truth', 'facts' etc. in whatever form are non-applicable to science).
We may have temporary explanations that can explain certain things at any given time, but that doesn't mean those things are 'facts' or not subject to change.

People in general should be actively questioning all theories and laws presented for the purpose of actively disproving it, but not in a negative sense, rather for the purpose of scientific advancement and expansion of our knowledge - same goes for scientists.

 

[dameon51]

[citation][nom]yialanliu[/nom]Live Science posted this on the 6th Toms...Why do we keep seeing old news?[/citation]
I haven't read this yet. Why do you think we all go to the same news sites you do? Keep your mouth shut and let us that haven't read the story yet read it.

 

[susyque747]

Must be that man made global warming. I'm sure they will want a hefty research grant to examine how this happened and to never allow it to happen again. The tax payers can cough up more cash for the grant.

 

[Non-Euclidean]

Oh no!

I'll bets its those Red Lectroids from the 8th dimension trying to mess us up again. Tread carefully.

 

[whyso]

I don't quite get why they don't define a kilogram by a specific number of atoms of some isotope of an element, say carbon.

 

[hapkido]

Is this Kilogram actually used to calibrate anything? I doubt it. And it's not like they can't create new Kilogram prototypes anyway.

That fact that this Kilogram is accumulating mass is a non-issue. It doesn't change the definition of a kilogram and it doesn't suddenly invalidate any scales.

edit: To the down-thumbers, this isn't The Kilogram that's stored in Paris. Even then, it's not like they arbitrarily made a ball of metal and said, "Welp, that's a kilogram, hopefully it never changes mass or we're effed." A kilogram is the mass of 1.000025 liters of water at 4C. In otherwords, it's possible to recreate a kilogram.