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What kind of disaster that wipes out humanity on the Earth, even closed habitats, that will be recovered from in only a 100 years do you envision?

First of all, there are no operational closed habitats on Earth right now. Nuclear bunkers are not sealed off and their supplies are slowly consumed, not renewed. They're also not permanently manned, which means sudden events could wipe out their potential users before they even come into the picture.

There's at least one hollowed out mountain in Colorado, designed to withstand multiple nuclear blasts, with basically a cities population permanently there. Being an ultimate nuclear bunker, have to assume it is sealed off, or can be quickly sealed off, with a lot of supplies and capabilities of becoming as self-sufficient as any space colony.
Here's a list that not only includes Mt Cheyenne but another 2 very large bunkers, https://www.oddee.com/item_991... . While true that they're only designed for a couple of months of self-sufficiency, it would be a lot easier to make one self-sufficient for the long haul then building a self-sufficient space colony.
Who knows what other nations have, I'd guess at least Russia and China are also well setup.

As for scenarios, I'll defer to Wikipedia's page. Risks from AI, bioterrorism, volcanism or asteroids are all limited to Earth. Machines controlled by AI would stop working a few decades after all of the mechanics are killed off. Superviruses also need human hosts to survive. Volcanism might last anywhere from a few decades to a few millennia. And asteroid impacts only affect Earth for a few decades.

The only scenario that might affect space colonies is alien invasion. But even then, aliens would have a much easier time locating a habitable planet than a comparably tiny space colony.

There's also the possibility of several of them happening at the same time, e.g. asteroid impact putting a heavy strain on society, leading to war and bioterrorism. Aliens might also use an asteroid or bioweapons to avoid revealing themselves.

Most all those, while civilization ending, are unlikely to wipe out humanity, and the ones that might, are also likely to wipe out a space colony. Viruses that can wipe out humanity are likely to also affect the colony, there's going to be lots of traffic. Ai, could hunt down the colony and even a large enough metoeriite is likely to blast a lot of rock into space making the whole inner system dangerous. Even Aliens that can destroy the Earths eco-system would be just as capable of destroying space colonies.

As for closed habitats in space, there is always going to be leakage.

There's ways to minimize leakage such that it's not a real concern for millennia, for example by building a double-hulled vessel. Entrances could be welded shut for decades at a time and only cut open to perform exterior maintenance. Building bigger also helps, since being 10 times as large increases the surface area by 100x and the volume by 1000x.

I think your being very optimistic about leakage through solid rock and metal as well as not considering what you're going to do for power. How long is nuclear fuel good for before needing reprocessed?

And while it might be possible to live for generations without advanced technology, it is going to be needed at some point, if only to re-colonize the Earth.

Since they don't need it for almost their entire stay, it can be stored at the beginning and left alone until they need it. Machinery generally don't degrade in a freezing vacuum.

Good luck getting a civilization that has had generations of not using technology up to speed in building space craft etc. Just think of how much things have changed on Earth in a couple of hundred years.

There's lots of reasons to go into space and attempt colonization but enough self-sufficiency to survive the end of the world is along ways down the timeline.

fewer school shoots

The death rate from school shootings in the US is ~20/year. (For comparison, the school-age population is 64,000,000.) That's above the crushed-by-vending-machine death rate (~3/year), but below the killed-by-dogs death rate (34/year), and far below the texting-while-driving death rate (6,000/year). (All figures for US only.)

If the risk of school shootings is a serious factor in motivating you to move to another country, you should be *far* more motivated to move to a country that lacks mobile phones.

(Numbers: 151 total deaths from school shootings in the 2010s thus far. 64,000,000 students in primary or secondary education. 1 in 112 million annual death rate from vending machines. Other death rates for dog attacks, texting while driving, etc.)

Wonder how this could go wrong.....

What I want to know is if any supporter of major terrorist organizations has ever labelled their money transfer as "ISIS Donation"/"Bomb Fund"/"Al-Qaeda". Just give me one person in the history of the world stupid enough to do that, and there is at least some argument to me made for this ridiculous sounding policy.

Well...
http://www.oddee.com/item_9894...
"10 Of The Dumbest Terrorists Ever"

Do you think these guys belong in the women's bathroom? How about sending these women into the men's room until they've had the big snip?

just a few years ago considered aberrant by the vast majority of people

It's been a lot longer than just a few years, you might not have noticed but it's not the 1950s any more.

Just imagine for a moment the kind of shit that would erupt if these trans women used a female restroom.

I just don't understand how a man born a man or a woman born a woman thinks they have a right to use the bathroom of the person they "think" they are, when one's plumbing defines the correct bathroom.

Well, now, son, that's where you went astray. This law doesn't require people to use a bathroom that matches their plumbing, it requires them to use a bathroom that matches the plumbing their birth certificate indicates, even if their own plumbing has been changed. Given the skill of the surgeons and other doctors who do gender realignment procedures, this law requires individuals who literally look like Playboy centerfolds to use the men's room. And men who look like professional body builders to use the women's bathroom.

If that makes sense to you, then, please, move to North Carolina. And stay there.

I just don't understand how a man born a man or a woman born a woman thinks they have a right to use the bathroom of the person they "think" they are, when one's plumbing defines the correct bathroom.

Well, now, son, that's where you went astray. This law doesn't require people to use a bathroom that matches their plumbing, it requires them to use a bathroom that matches the plumbing their birth certificate indicates, even if their own plumbing has been changed. Given the skill of the surgeons and other doctors who do gender realignment procedures, this law requires individuals who literally look like Playboy centerfolds to use the men's room. And men who look like professional body builders to use the women's bathroom.

If that makes sense to you, then, please, move to North Carolina. And stay there.

New Zealand might be a better idea... or some other place in a different hemisphere

That won't help, because like... the atmospheres of the two hemispheres are connected.

You need to go someplace where that Trump can't affect you.

I don't think that's possible. I mean, the sea will be poisoned, the air will burn, famine and pestilence will be everywhere... it'll just be a mess.

You might try that apocalypse condo in Kansas, and see if you can wait things out.

This assumes, of course, that Earth systems can recover and there will be a future time when you can walk outdoors alone and unaided. Then again, there will probably be a lot of others who had to turn to feral cannibalism to survive.

It doesn't look good for you, even the Earth's microorganisms are starting to wonder whether they will survive.

You can avoid a lot of needless pain and suffering if you think things through.

You might ask yourself the question: do you *really* want to live in a world post-Trump?

The difficulties presented by bartering have historically led to the introduction of an alternative currency instead.

We have natural caves on earth big enough to hold the great pyramid, so with the lighter gravity of mars, it would be expected to find even bigger caves. And then there are cave systems with hundreds of kilometers of passages.

The original design was not faulty - it worked fine for years, until people's habits changed to carrying so much junk on their keychains. It would be the same as if people, instead of just hanging a pair of fuzzy dice from their interior rear-view mirror started hanging their purse or pack-sack from it and complaining that it broke off after a bump.

We have way too many common-sense fails nowadays, such as "This plastic bag is not a toy" and "Objects in mirror are closer than they seem" and "6PCS Precision screwdriver set not to be inserted into penis" and "Do not eat Ipod shuffle" (found on apple's website) and "Do not use for personal hygiene" (on Scrubbing Bubbles Fresh Brush) and many many more.

How can you have 1.5 children per household?

2 children in one household and 1 in another. Even so, I wonder how it felt for photographer Kevin Michael Connolly or acrobat Jennifer Bricker or Jeanie Tomaini or plenty of others to grow up as the .5 child.

Peak acceleration (given in multiples of g) is relevant. Humans can survive impacts involving accelerations up to around 100g -- much over that and there is "no" survival (I think the peak estimate for a documented survival is around 105 g) and to survive that very much depends on how it is experienced -- uniformly good, non-locally over your body bad. Under that, a few people survive, usually damaged, with damage that reduces on average until you reach forces spread out enough and slowly acting enough that they can bring you to rest with accelerations on the order of 10g (100 m/sec^2) that most people can survive without more than bruising if the forces that produce them are spread out enough on the body. This is order of the forces/accelerations involved in surviving a car crash with seat belt and air bag and collapsible front end of a car.

There are actually howtos on the subject:

http://www.wikihow.com/Survive...

These are based on both experiences/circumstances of survivors, plus analysis of the physics. There are actually lists and well-documented accounts of survivors:

http://www.oddee.com/item_9696...

(plus many others). As the first of these two links suggests, water is marginally better than concrete, and frothy, air-bubble-filled water is better than flat, calm water. Landing behind a large, heavy object (falling directly into the splash) helps enormously.

rgb

Fog: Either dry ice in water, or a fog machine.

Maybe a Plasma ball

Various chains have some potentially amusing decorations.

Some grocery chains are currently featuring what for most Americans would be exotic fruits, such as dragon fruit, Buddha's Hand, horned melons, rambutan, and others. A number of things you could do with those. If you eat them, make sure it's the right part. ;)

Maybe some Halloween Sound Effects

Remote controls - always handy.

Perhaps some party lights.

Remote speakers.

Have fun.

Here are 11 hilarious examples of false advertising.
http://www.oddee.com/item_97929.aspx

Here are 14 False Advertising Scandals That Cost Brands Millions
http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-09-16/strategy/30164309_1_false-advertising-false-claims-marketing-policies

Everybody should read the WP entry to see if they missed something.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_advertising

If you haven't heard, smuggling items into prisons is pretty fucking big business. And they get downright creative about it.

The statesman article is about convicts in prison, not about suspects in jail - big difference.

Also, so what if you have have stuff in jail? Designating harmless things as contrabrand and then declaring a problem does not wash. A deadly weapon, yes, but then who is going to jaywalk with a revolver up his ass?

The theoretical implications of the Canadian approach seem worse than the US approach, however I think in the practical world they work out much better.

Right up until you piss off the $cientologists, or the Mormons, or the Muslims, by saying something about their "prophet" that they interpret as derogatory (which you may well have intended as same) and they start to sue and harass you in court for "hate speech."

Meanwhile, the idea of being strip-searched before being put into prison seems to be an unfortunate side effect of the way we run prisons. If you haven't heard, smuggling items into prisons is pretty fucking big business. And they get downright creative about it. So if you're running a prison, then yes, you turn out to have a vested security interest in strip-searching anyone who comes in, whether they're there doing 10-to-20 or they're in for a short stint on failure to pay traffic tickets.

It sucks, and it's humiliating for those who are strip searched due to minor crimes or worse yet, court system fuck-ups (which is part of what this case had going for it to make a sympathetic plaintiff) but the alternative is the crime and drug gangs just having a few guys whose job it is to get arrested for running enough stoplights to smuggle stuff in to the leaders on a 30-day pass and pass messages back and forth from the outside too.

have the damn funniest names...."Payne & Fears"..."Allen, Allen, Allen & Allen"... "Weiner & Cox"

For those not visiting grocery stores in the State of California (USA), you don't have the privilege of seeing these signs posted everywhere...

WARNING: This product contains chemicals known to the State of California to cause cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm.

This is because of a silly law created by lawyers called Prop 65. So as a totally defensive measure, grocery stores sellling food in CA all have these signs which apparently do three things:

1. Satisfy the "inform the consumer" portion of the law to help the store avoid liability (aka CYA).
2. Give no information at all about what the specifics or scope of the problem with a particular product or how to avoid it.
3. Train consumers to ignore the warning such warning signs.

Since there is no penatly to post the sign even if the chemical exposure is minimal or none, all stores post this to satisfy #1. This would be funny, if it wasn't just all sad...

I think this Prop 65 label is essentially equivalent to the proposed Violence in Video Games Act labeling requirements. Lots of political grandstanding, no actual effect. I predict all games published by large, even those that might be "EC" will include this label to avoid lawsuits, and it'll just become one of those things that are generally ignored.

For example, who pays attention these warnings on the Nintendo Wii...

1. Sit or stand as far from the screen as possible.
2. Play video games on the smallest available television screen.
3. Do not play if you are tired or need sleep.
4. Play in a well-lit room.
5. Take a 10 to 15 minute break every hour.

Don't worry, people have to endure all sorts of extraneous labeling requirements without causing the end of civilization. A link to some these to cheer you up... This link has some pretty good ones too...

Go drive here, I heard it's better after a few drinks.

15 Stupidest Warning Labels: http://www.oddee.com/item_88437.aspx

How many of them have been photoshopped to make the photo look worse?

http://www.oddee.com/item_96803.aspx
http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/farid/research/digitaltampering/

There was a website dedicated to outing such photos but I can not find it.

As linzeal said, it's non-functional.

From the linked page, 12 Coolest Steampunk Gadgets:

Unfortunatly, this awesome set of Steampunk headphones that you see pictured above is actually just a non-functional model. Pretty cool anyways.

And a commentor BobG said:

Put a tiny blue gas lantern on it, and make it a Bluetooth headset.

Mentioned here, along with the cat bomb, anti-tank dog and exploding rat (no, really):

http://www.oddee.com/item_91684.aspx