Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2011 February 24

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February 24

Paulownia Fortunei tree

Paulownia Fortunei flowers

Hello, I have a neighbour who is growing this tree two feet from my fence. I'd like to know if the root system will be a problem to my property as the tree grows. My house is just a few feet from my side of the fence, and roughly 6 ft from the tree. I've searched the internet and cant seemt to find out about the root system. thank you Matthewsdiane (talk) 04:07, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Here's a link for those who, like me, have never heard of this tree (actually, we don't have an article about it, this is just the genus): Paulownia Fortunei. Dismas|^(talk) 04:26, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

The Wikipedia article Root say that tree roots normally grow outward to about three times the branch spread. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 09:26, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I would think that would be highly dependent on the species involved. Googlemeister (talk) 15:37, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes. Isn't that why the question is being asked --or am I missing something? This sounds like another case, where a neighbours (or Neanderthal) (or both) is saying U prove it grunt I'll be gone by the time damage appears and the new owners can waist their money defending themselves in court for what i did –grunt, grunt, grunt”--Aspro (talk) 16:50, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

An' not to labour the point... Who else (that isn't one prong sort of being a garden fork), would plant a tree two metres from a house?--Aspro (talk) 17:01, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

You need to find out the law in your country/state quickly and nip this in the bud. [1] (also, let him try to prove it is safe in order to stay out of court)--Aspro (talk) 10:28, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

There is a general discussion here on tree roots that cross a boundary. If you are concerned, you might want to consider vertically burying a non-rusting, 6 ft wide x 16 ft long sheet metal on your side of the fence. Also, the Paulownia Fortunei flowers are going to drop in your yard. I can't imagine that these flowers will be easy to rake up like leaves. The flowers might even leave stains. -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 13:17, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

WikiPage Title - change

I accidentally typed "Hines industries" when I meant to type "Hines Industries" (note the use of lower case i in the first instance). I want the page to be called Hines Industries. How do I fix this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Chines57 (talk • contribs) 06:03, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

That problem is actually easy to solve, but you have a much worse problem: the text in the article is copied straight from the company's web page, which shows a copyright with "all rights reserved". That puts Wikipedia in the position of violating the copyright, which we are not allowed to do. To handle this, you either have to write the article as original text, or send official permission to use the text to Wikipedia's office -- see WP:COPYRIGHT for more information. Looie496 (talk) 07:53, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

If you want to build muscle..

I purchased a book named " The Book of Muscle" by Lou Schuler. At the back of cover page there's a little statement, which says "If you want to build muscle then please improve your sex life". I asked someone about this statements and he replied, "it means you have to masturbate on regular basis". But I am still confused. Here, what does this statement actually mean? --180.234.60.95 (talk) 20:12, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Wasn't it the other way round? If you want to build a sex life then please improve your muscles? 212.169.190.188 (talk) 23:46, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

"The doctors conducting the study concluded that intercourse is good exercise." Clarityfiend (talk) 00:57, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Uranium investing

I want to invest in uranium: I expect the price to go up so I'd like to buy now and sell in 5-10 years. I understand that the simplest way to do this to buy uranium futures traded at someplace like NYMEX, but I don't have access to a commodity futures trading account (I can only do stocks & mutual funds). Any advice on how I can make a similar investment in the usual stock/funds markets? I'd rather not put money into individual companies, which individually may perform differently from the price of the commodity itself. 24.60.54.68 (talk) 23:16, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Is it even legal to own uranium?Sumsum2010·T·C·Review me! 00:00, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

I can't think of any reason it would be illegal to own uranium in a commodities account (though, strictly speaking, I don't actually know either way). You might not be allowed to take physical delivery of it, without a license (and good luck getting that sort of license!). --Trovatore (talk) 00:04, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

I doubt you could get delivery of any element in the actinide series. Sumsum2010·T·C·Review me! 00:06, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Unenriched uranium is perfectly safe; I can't see why owning it would be illegal. Enriching it is extremely difficult, especially enriching it to weapons grade. --Tango (talk) 00:10, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Well, I seem to recall that some guys at some point made kind of a big deal about someone supposedly getting a supply of, not even uranium metal, but just yellowcake uranium ore, and there were certain repercussions to the whole affair. I think you're right that there's not too much mischief you could do with a few pounds of natural uranium, but get enough of it together, and some of the boys in black suits are probably going to want to know what your plans for it are. --Trovatore (talk) 00:35, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

You could invest in several uranium mining companies, which would smooth out the risks associated with individual companies. There may be suitable exchange traded funds, I don't know. --Tango (talk) 00:10, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Looks like there are, actually. [2] Qrsdogg (talk) 01:50, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

For those speculating (aimlessly) about whether you could own uranium under US law: you can. Owning unenriched uranium is perfectly legal. This guy is an easy place to buy it, though at the moment he is a bit out of stock. If you are a state that is a member of the NPT and you are trying to buy lots of uranium while under sanctions, and after having failed once at making a bomb, then yeah, it would attract some international attention. (Even if said documents were forged anyway.) But even if you bought very large quantities of unenriched uranium, that would probably not raise too much attention unless you were buying a lot of other, dubious stuff as well (like centrifuge rotors).

There are some regulations on what the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 (as amended) calls "source materials" (unenriched uranium or thorium) — you can't export or import it across national lines without a license, unless it is in "unimportant" quantities (which I believe is defined as three tons). Now before you say, "so what if I take that source material and put it into a reactor or centrifuge...?" ... then you'd be falling under other aspects of the law, for sure. But the ownership of uranium ore, per se, would not be a problem. (Enriched uranium, or plutonium, are both considered "special nuclear materials" and can only be owned with permission of the government.) --Mr.98 (talk) 02:24, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Surely in a Futures contract of the kind the OP is asking about (a commodity such as Uranium), the individual private investor is very unlikely to opt for settlement by physical delivery and will in practice opt for a cash settlement well before the contract expiry. The OP would therefore never actually own the Uranium, just something saying they had the obligation to buy the Uranium at the specified price on the specified date. They would sell that contract before the specified date, hopefully at a profit. However, the biggest proble would appear to be that Uranium is not one of the traded commodities, though that article may not be complete; perhaps the OP can subscribe to Metal Bulletin to find out for sure if a futures market for Uranium exists. Astronaut (talk) 05:33, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree 100%. I was merely addressing the back and forth up there regarding private, physical ownership. --Mr.98 (talk) 12:44, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

OP here (different location)- of course I do not want to invest in uranium by physically obtaining and stockpiling it in my home. I have a nice mattress and don't want to damage it by putting lots of stuff under it. Astronaut is a good voice of reason, FYI uranium is a traded commodity, symbol UX at NYMEX. Like I said in my OP, I don't have a commodities futures trading account, so I want some alternative to this. Qrsdogg seems to have found one for me. Thanks- 64.202.81.136 (talk) 14:52, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

At the risk of sounding stupid, may I ask, if you want to do futures trading in commodities, why not open an account? --Trovatore (talk) 07:15, 26 February 2011 (UTC)