Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2018 March 8

= March 8 =

science
properties of different plastic — Preceding unsigned comment added by Amohamed7001 (talk • contribs) 03:18, 8 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Did you see Plastic? Then you can also look at individual plastics articles like Polyethylene. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 04:15, 8 March 2018 (UTC)

Goldfinger
I know that "skin suffocation" is not real and that having your entire body painted gold would not, by itself, kill you; HOWEVER, given that the paint DOES interfere with the body's thermoregulation, in the particular case of Jill Masterson, would it have been plausible for her to die from heatstroke, given that the scene takes place in Miami, which can get very hot and humid? (There has indeed been at least one case, back in Leonardo da Vinci's time, when a boy died after having been painted gold (although the actual cause of his death was hypothermia), which is probably where Fleming got this idea in the first place.) 2601:646:8E01:7E0B:71B8:6856:E929:5E71 (talk) 09:46, 8 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Is the question "Is death by gold paint possible?" or "Would Jill Masterson have died if painted?"
 * You don't need much thermoregulation, even in Florida, to lie still on a bed. Heavy exercise might be another matter. Then the main human method of thermoregulation is sweating, which is an effective paint remover  (to see it in action, watch Newportograd-based band musika Rogora Khart performing, in whiteface makeup). Humans can also, like hairier mammals such as dogs, regulate by panting.  Then, in the Masterson case, the problem is that she's supposed to have lain there passively (a Bond girl's main role) whilst being first painted, then dying - without doing anything about it. Note that (in the book at least) the whole body painting thing is a fetish of Goldfinger's and he does it first with all his women, so it's survivable through exercise. The McGuffin is that "leaving the little patch unpainted" is the difference between survival and developing an unanticipated, fatal heatstroke (which isn't though an unusual prognosis for heatstroke).
 * So it's not about body painting (neither reality nor story claim the lack of most body thermoregulation would be harmful), it's all about that unpainted patch. Which is pure invention. Also, as with all Bonds, do read the book - they have so much more depth than the films. Andy Dingley (talk) 10:47, 8 March 2018 (UTC)
 * So the answer in her case is "probably not"? Thanks! 2601:646:8E01:7E0B:71B8:6856:E929:5E71 (talk) 12:41, 8 March 2018 (UTC)


 * . -- Jayron 32 12:59, 8 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Just in case, I should point out that painting can be lethal if a toxic solvent is used in the paint -- and many solvents that are ordinarily little inconvenience, like toluene, can be fatal with sufficient skin coverage. This isn't relevant to the McGuffin, but a body-painting project should be approached with some caution. Wnt (talk) 15:37, 8 March 2018 (UTC)

Danger of eating raw eggs
Was salmonella in eggs less common when Rocky ate them raw? Was it more common to eat eggs raw back then? --Hofhof (talk) 18:04, 8 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Presuming you mean the first movie, probably less common for the first question. says  The first movie was set in 1975, so it was likely at the beginning of this time, if not before. The CDC in the US recommends pasteurised eggs if you don't want to cook them (or only lightly cook them) [//www.cdc.gov/features/salmonellaeggs/index.html]. These are evidently widely available there. (I don't think pasteurised eggs as opposed egg products are at all common, if they even exist, here in NZ.) Nil Einne (talk) 18:26, 8 March 2018 (UTC)
 * BTW, probably not the best source for learning about that kind of thing (I came across it when looking for something else) but this source has some discussion of the various serotypes if you're wondering if it's likely other ones were a big problems with eggs before [//www.mpi.govt.nz/dmsdocument/9506-risk-profile-salmonella-non-typhoidal-in-and-on-eggs]. Nil Einne (talk) 18:39, 8 March 2018 (UTC)
 * See also /[//www.cnbc.com/id/39303208], & . The history part of the last source in particular seems to support the view that human Salmonella infections from eggs (or chickens) were a lot less common then. Nil Einne (talk) 18:56, 8 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Great reference work Nil, thanks! SemanticMantis (talk) 21:23, 8 March 2018 (UTC)
 * In The UK, raw eggs were off the menu from Dec 1988 (Salmonella in eggs controversy) until Oct 2017 . --catslash (talk) 13:35, 9 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes, my read of the sources that in a number of countries definitely including the UK, Salmonella risk from raw eggs peaked sometime in the 80s, 90s, 2000s or maybe 2010s and has been going down since then. I think this includes the US, although the risk still seems relatively high there, but anyway if you are talking about one of the later Rocky movies it may get complicated. Nil Einne (talk) 02:27, 10 March 2018 (UTC)
 * UK eggs declared safe 30 years after salmonella scare (Oct 2017). Alansplodge (talk) 00:03, 11 March 2018 (UTC)

What's the next Bayer star to cross an official constellation border by proper motion? What was the previous?
(using the fiction that they've always existed even though the borders are only roughly a century old) Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 23:54, 8 March 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't see an article for Bayer star. What are you talking about? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 00:14, 9 March 2018 (UTC)
 * See Bayer designation and Table of stars with Bayer designations. Looie496 (talk) 01:57, 9 March 2018 (UTC)
 * A star's Bayer designation is also it's most common "name" except for the dim ones in the table with numbers and the very few that link to their names. (i.e. Polaris) Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 02:42, 9 March 2018 (UTC)
 * You will be interested in http://orbitsimulator.com/constellations/constellationProperMotion.html where each constellation has an animation in .gif form and you can see stars moving in and out of constellations. Alpha Centauri crosses very quickly. But some constellations have stars right in a corner, like Andromeda, so these come in or out fast. Hydrus has a star that only entered about 1000 years ago. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 03:32, 9 March 2018 (UTC)