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Muons are naturally generated by cosmic ray protons colliding with atmospheric molecules and creating pions, which then rapidly decay to muons and muon neutrinos.

So in theory they could exist anywhere in the universe somewhat close to a star, if the relevant particles in our atmosphere are around that star? That's what I meant about the density distribution: are they spherically distributed around (all) stars, or are they only present in very specific situations?

These themselves then decay into a bunch of other things.

I thought they had a small selection of possible decay products. Not particularly relevant to me at the moment, though.

As you say, with a mean lifetime of 2.2 nanoseconds, they shouldn’t be able to hit the surface of the Earth, but because at relativistic speeds time dilation occurs from our frame of reference (or, equivalently, in the muon’s inertial frame, it sees the distance it has to travel be radically shortened via length contraction), they do end up hitting the earth.

I mistyped the mean lifetime, it's actually 2.2 microseconds. That's three orders of magnitude different, but from a (non-relativistic) view it would still only travel about 66 centimeters. I'm missing too much information to try to solve the length contraction equation (I don't know its length, or its velocity) for the observed length. I'm curious here because they're able to travel on the order of roughly 50 meters into the Earth, and from what I can find they disappear there due to absorption from the many atoms they pass through on that path. So that leads me to a question: If there is not relatively dense earth to get in the way and attenuate the muon, such as if it were produced by a gas cloud beside a star, how far would it realistically be able to travel? Since the muons on Earth "die" from absorption rather than lasting long enough to decay via weak force, they would, in open space, surely be able to travel far enough without enough collisions such that they do end up "dying" by decay.

Thanks for the reply, I am curious here about something that I don't have enough knowledge to answer for myself.

Your comment doesn't make any sense.

The fundamental forces are physical forces.

It is feasible for consciousness to be something like a force (more accurately, perhaps, a field) and as such it would be by definition a "physical" force. The use of the modifier "physical" on force doesn't make much sense here: all forces are physical, as are all things that actually exist. It could be useful to consider the objects of consciousness as emergent, and the force of consciousness as fundamental; I don't know enough about this line of thought to say much on that.

Consciousness is not a force, as far as we know.

That's literally what the comment you're replying to says. Emphasis on "as far as we know". There's no obvious way to dismiss it outright as not being a force, it's just that as far as we know currently, it isn't a force.

I don't personally have a well thought out stance on the matter.

the worth of the guns and tanks and other things we’ve been giving them that were just collecting dust over here?

Use of reserves motivates replacement. Just because you're giving them weapons that were produced in the past, and therefore whose (production) cost has already been incurred, doesn't mean that occurs in a vacuum. With stock running low, contemporary money goes in to replenishing that stock. In effect, there's no difference whether you send old or new equipment, because both incur costs in the present.

No actual money was involved and so didn’t really cost us anything.

It cost you exactly the amount it cost to produce them. Just because it was produced in the past, doesn't mean it was free. You paid for it X years ago, and are only now seeing it used. You paid for it. Moreover, you're now going to pay to replace it.

Tangentially related but I can't seem to find the answers and I have a couple questions that perhaps someone can answer:

1. Do stars actually generate muons directly? From what I understand the muons on Earth are a result of cosmic rays colliding wtih particles in the atmosphere.
2. If they do, how far do they travel before decaying? Even if they travel at relativistic speeds, they have a mean lifetime of 2.2 ns, so the math seems to say they don't travel very far at all on average.
3. Either way, are there any other sources of muons in the universe? I'm curious what the muon density distribution in the universe would look like.

They're obviously not fascist, and you'd know that if you were being honest about it and bothered educating yourself both on what fascism is, and on the realities of the PRC.

Also, it's not "state capitalism". They do use a market economy in addition to a planned economy, as part of the overall socialist economic system. It's not a binary either-or; using a market economy doesn't mean it's capitalism, and planned economy (intervention) doesn't mean it's socialism. They're structural terms, and relate to purpose: capitalism's purpose is to maximally extract profit and concentrate wealth; socialism's purpose is to better the lives (materially and culturally) of its people. China, as a socialist system, takes advantage of the benefits that a market economy can offer (efficiency, competition, resource allocation, demand and pricing signals) but doesn't use it to extract and concentrate wealth: instead, it uses the net benefits of the market economy to benefit the people. Similarly, a purely planned economy can be very stable and fair but is prone to stagnation and slow progress. By using both systems simultaneously, taking the relative advantages of each, China is able to benefit from efficiency and stability. There's also no pure free market economy: every capitalist economy has degrees of government intervention (another name for planned economy), especially in times of crises.

Congratulations citizen! You have been awarded with a 600 FICO score for promulgating sinophobic nonsense. If you also prove that China is the Big Evil, you can get an additional 250 FICO score.

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I don't think you see the irony in using the dead trope of "Social Credits" when an actual credit score exists in FICO and can be used to deny you housing, loans (and therefore access to education), jobs, and more. And if you think it's just financial transactions, try looking at what companies like LexisNexis have on you that it coalesces into things like "RiskView", or how much of a profile skip tracing agencies have on everyone. Then you have the profiles built on you by several government domestic (and foreign) surveillance agencies. And you have the profiles built on you by several big tech companies. Just because there's not a single, unified, government-sponsored surveillance and consumer rating agency doesn't mean the tangible effects of such disparate systems aren't identical to what you claim happens in China (i.e., denial of services and access). It doesn't matter if it's 50 different entities controlling parts of the system if the end result is identical.

I don't think you know what "fascist" means.

Moreover, people will happily complain that Chinese/Russian "propaganda" is allowed to exist, especially on the internet. They will demand that Chinese/Russian "propaganda" is removed from social spaces. And, then they somehow they have a problem with other countries (esp. China/Russia) wanting to do the exact same thing. The premise is that the propaganda being put out is misrepresenting the truth to influence public thought: when it comes from China/Russia, people want it blocked and removed; when it comes from the West, blocking and removing it is some sort of "free speech" issue (or, as you wrongly claim here, "fascism").

In this particular case, I don't personally know hardly anything about the movie, and I do strongly disagree with using "promoting homosexuality" as an excuse to ban something. But in general, countries wanting to put a damper on other countries' propaganda is near universal.

Call that tin foil hat syndrome or whatever.

Racism. It's racism and xenophobia.

Lovely racism!

If you support the death penalty then you believe either:

• The government's judgements are infallible and it would never falsely execute an innocent person, OR
• You are okay with the government executing an innocent person.

I definitely don't think they're infallible, as there are loads of cases where people are exonerated only after serving decades in prison, or after their death. And I'm definitely not okay with the government executing an innocent person.

There was also evidence that these balloons had equipment on board that did not line up with what is expected on a weather balloon.

Do you mind sharing your evidence? Because that's not what was officially reported by the Pentagon. It was reported that it had off-the-shelf components (i.e., exactly what you'd expect on a weather balloon), and didn't collect or transmit anything.

Chinese spy balloon didn’t collect intelligence as it flew over US: Pentagon:

The Chinese spy balloon that was shot down over the Atlantic Ocean in early February was built, at least partly, using American off-the-shelf parts, a U.S. official has confirmed to ABC News. [...] Later Thursday, Pentagon press secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder said that the balloon not only did not transmit data back to China -- it never collected any.

You'll note that media still insists on using the phrase "spy balloon" when it was just a weather balloon. They even said as much, and they still use fearmongering phrasing because they know it serves their narrative.

horseshoe crabs are always referred to with the word horseshoe in front

They weren't in this case, so that "always" seems to be a stretch.

if one cares about communication.

It's made clear in the article. If one cares about communication they're reading past a headline.