Rare coin found

Each country on the Euro currency strikes its own coins and this was one of the small issue struck by Cyprus. What makes it rare is the fact that it is struck in two languages, greek and turkish, as you can see above. Cyprus itself is claimed by both Greece and Turkey. Worth keeping? To make it interchangeable and usable in automata throughout the Euro zone, size and weight are standardised.

Soon the Euro may be the smallest denomination we have. It is planned to no longer strike one, two, and five cent coins as they each cost more than their face value to strike. Then we will round up or down as Scandinavia does.

Comments(3)
Billions of Versions... wrote " Back in the 40s and 50s when a penny was worth something, we had .5 cent and .1 cent plastic coins. I still have some around here somewhere. I'll try and find them and post some pictures." Plastic? I did not know that, Mike. BTW, of interest for your Thursday Trees perhaps, I have a photo of a tree cloned from the one which dropped an apple on Isaac Newton's head. I'll blog that soon for you.
Ed asks "What or where is Cyprus?" It is an island in the Med, about 80km south of Turkey and 100 km west of Syria, claimed by both Greece and Turkey.
Cop Car wrote " Great find, Stu. Interesting tale. The plastic coins were among tokens called “mills” (to indicate denominations in thousandths of one US dollar) useful in paying tax on sales. As I recall, the 0.1 cent was red while the 0.5 cent was green – in the State of Missouri. In other states, tokens took various forms – in plastic, cheap metals, or pressed wood or paper. [See Wikipedia for more information: Sales tax token - Wikipedia.] I still have a few mills – probably in my safe deposit box with other odd coins." I also once had a large coin, maybe 4 inches across, made of pure silver, which I bought in South America (Ecuador?). Bought because it had a detailed engraving of the Red Baron and his WW1 triplane :-).

Copyright ^© Ole Phat Stu on March 18, 2025 permalink Comments Email

Pi-day

Copyright ^© Ole Phat Stu on March 14, 2025 permalink Comments Email

Heaven is hotter than Hell

In the old testament Isaiah 30:26 tells us “Moreover the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold, as the light of seven days,...". i.e. 49 times more radiant energy than ours. From experiments in physics we know by the Stefan–Boltzmann law, that the total energy radiated per unit surface area per unit time is directly proportional to the fourth power of the temperature. Our average daylight temperature is 15° C which is 288° Kelvin. Now the fourth root of 49 (i.e. 7*7) is 2.64575... So the temperature of Heaven is 488° C according to Isaiah 30:26.

But we are told in Revelations 21:8 that Hell consists of boiling pits of sulfur whose boiling point is 444.7°C so we can conclude that Heaven is 43°C hotter than Hell. Quod est demonstrandum.

In Islam we are told that Jahannam is the place of punishment for evildoers in the afterlife, or hell. This notion is an integral part of Islamic theology. The same conclusion can be drawn.

Judaism offers a range of views on the afterlife, including some parallels to the concepts of heaven and hell familiar to us from popular Western (i.e., Christian) teachings. There are, however, several biblical references to a place called Sheol. The average dead Jew descends to a place of punishment and/or purification, generally referred to as Gehinnom. Generally I would say though that they do not believe in Hell.

Non-Ahabramistic religions do not share a concept of Hell afaik. Neither do we Atheists. YMMV.

Comments(4)
Cop Car wrote " I disagree. We Atheists in the USA are in Hell, these days. " As are we all, thanks to tRump/Vance.
Billions of Versions... wrote " This isn't the same joke that proved your point that I've seen before. So you have a backup joke out there proving your point. Heaven wins!" Since neither exists, it does not matter who wins.
Anon notes "Nice proof". Thanks.
Finding life hard? wrote " I understand that most Jews play down the idea of an afterlife if they believe in it at all. That how they live life guided by faith is what is important. Which is the same sort of thing that I believe – that Jesus came so we should have life to the full – except I do believe in an afterlife, and I’ll find out what it’s like when I get there." Okay, you may believe what you want, Liz. I am not forcing my atheism down your throat.

Copyright ^© Ole Phat Stu on March 10, 2025 permalink Comments Email

PWR GRL

So let me say thankyou to all you lady bloggers, for keeping up the good work. Assuredly, it IS appreciated.

As for me, I am blogging less. Probably due to early onset rigor mortis ;-)

Comments(1)
chacko wrote " I have heard that the first time women were given the same pay as men, was in the Air Transport Auxiliary, where Pauline Gower insisted that the women pilots were paid the same as the men." New to me, Thanks.

Copyright ^© Ole Phat Stu on March 8, 2025 permalink Comments Email

Seeing Saturn unaided

This was what the rings looked like to the naked eye.

And this is them using my reflector telescope.

Copyright ^© Ole Phat Stu on March 6, 2025 permalink Comments Email