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Meteor Over Midwest
bigpat writes "According to this story in the Chicago Tribune or this article, a meteor estimated to be the size of a 'Volkswagen bug' exploded over the Midwest around midnight yesterday morning. The resulting small meteorites hit homes causing some damage. The largest meteorite collected was 7.5 pounds. So why do astronomers always compare the size of meteors to Volkswagen bugs?"
The trillions of dollars spent on SDI and later the Patriot system would have been better spent on such protection.
And given the "success" of those projects, would you feel any safer?
Actually, it's because the VW Bug is a common object in American culture, and probably elsewhere in the world as well. When you say "VW Bug", it doesn't take a whole lot of scrabbling around in ones memory to come up with an appropriate mental picture of how large the asteroid is. If someone said 'The size of a Toyota Camry', it would be a bit more difficult--and "The size of a small car" is a tad too open to interpretation. Because the design of the bug (size-wise) has remained consistent for a LONG time, the mental image people get will be consistent with the image astronomers/the media want people to get.
Most people can relate better to an image of "A meteor the size of a volkswagon bug impacted with the moon" rather than "A x ton meteor impacted with the moon". The relationship to a physical object that most people have encountered in their lifetime rather than an abstract measurement of weight, elicits the desired emotional response from people. Awe. If you say "A x-ton meteor", it won't be quite as impressive as saying "A meteor the size of the empire state building", no matter how many tons "x" is.
For abstract numbers, people need a sense of scale. "The new budget for executive toenail clippers is equivalent to the salaries of 1200 secretaries." It's more likely to bring about anger at the stupidity of the budget than a number is.
-Sara
Ok, I'm calling bullshit on this one.
Trillions of dollars? You realize that the US economy is about $10 trillion a year. Do you really think that we spent that much on the patriot system and SDI research?
Secondly: Maybe I am really uninformed. I can't remember anyone that I know every being hurt my a meteor. I can't even remember any friend of a friend type stories. Is it really that serious? Worth spending a significant portion of the GDP (trillions) on?
Maybe I am just nieve and my grandma was really hit by a meteor and didn't have a stroke. Maybe the stroke was caused by a meteor?
Sorry, DC, I'm afraid I don't quite agree with your detective work there...
Meteor strikes like these are not as uncommon as one may think, it's just that the information is rarely released in such a public fashion. Who wants to release news that may create mass hysteria?
Meteor falls are quite rare, actually. There are typically about 50 recorded per year for the entire planet.
Do you really think that stories on meteor falls are being suppressed by the media? Really? I just can't believe that anyone would think that the media would not pounce on such a story. And to give as justification that they are worried about causing mass hysteria is just laughable. (A) the news media lives and breathes by ratings, and disaster stories create high ratings; (B) where is the "mass hysteria" that this event (which the Chicago Tribune so foolishly refused to suppress) caused? There isn't any, because people understand that these are rare events. So when they occur, they are regarded as an interesting novelty, not as a portend of coming doom.
With more public acknowledgement of the problem, we could develop something like the Patriot missile defense system for extraterrestrial bodies so things like this would not happen.
God, what a phenomenal waste of effort and money that would be. Who gives a damn about this class of meteor fall? Are you truly suggesting the government invest trillions so that some dude's bedroom mirror doesn't get broken by a falling rock? Get some perspective, man, there are far more dangerous things to worry about than falling VW-sized rocks.
Liberal (adj.): Free from bigotry; open to progress; tolerant of others.
You know what's great fun??? Going through an archive of Art Bell shows.
Yes, all the 'psychics' with '98% accuracy' look like incredibly fucking morons when dozens of things they were 'absolutely sure' were going to happen... didn't.
It works for just about everybody... Anyone that says they were abducted almost inevitably says they know the date when aliens are going to come to take over the planet, or something else equivalent.
Yes, if anyone has some recorded predictions (that aren't incredibly vague) that have held up, I'd like to know... I'll be damn skeptical, but I'd still like to know.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
Historically there have been a few killed by meteors. More have been killed by ball lightning and it's extremely rare. The bigger issue are the large ones. The smaller ones tend to break up and burn up. The larger ones ......Well can anyone remember the last time you saw a live dinosaur.