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Scientists Blocking out the Sun
Ashtangiman writes to tell us The New York Times is running an article about geoengineering in which many solutions to global warming include decreasing the amount of sunlight that the planet sees. The ideas are not new, many have been around for quite some time, however they have been relegated to the fringes of science and many have never been published because of this. From the article: "Geoengineering is no magic bullet, Dr. Cicerone said. But done correctly, he added, it will act like an insurance policy if the world one day faces a crisis of overheating, with repercussions like melting icecaps, droughts, famines, rising sea levels and coastal flooding."
Isn't this already happening?
The only thing I hate more than hypocrites are people who hate hypocrites.
Given that the most reasonable "something-other-than-humans-caused" global warming hypothesis I've heard so far is that the sun's energy output is increasing, (incindentally, this would also explain Martian global warming, which by some evidence matches terrestrial warming), this seems like exactly the way to go. A more direct and exact correction could not be found (if this is, in fact, the cause of global warming) without changing the energy output of the sun manually, which is to my knowledge impossible.
I used to carry a bottle of whiskey for snake bite. And two snakes. -Nefarious Wheel
that plants now receive far less light. Less light, means slower growth, less uptake of CO2, etc.
Off hand, all the solutions (CO2 sequestering,etc) that allow us to keep our oil/coal dependancies will probably come back to bite us. Far better to bite the bullet now, and switch to nukes(fission and fusion) and alternatives.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
The geo-terrorists can use science too.
A threat to disperse a fine layer of soot over the polar ice would do the trick. The black layer increases the heat absorption, and in a few years the sea level is a hundred metres higher.
Paid Q&A/Research
It was also in Highlander 2
Rather than making the sunshade orbit earth, wouldn't it be easier to put the shade at some point between the sun and the Earth? Say at one of the Lagrange points?
It wouldn't have to be a solid shade, either -- just truck a lot of water out there and spray it out through a nozzle, and create a cloud of ice crystals. They'd diffuse the incoming light rather than blocking it completely, and as a "fail safe," perhaps you could put them in a slightly unstable orbit, so that over time they'd stop shadowing the planet. If the system wasn't refreshed every few years, it would stop working. (Or maybe the solar wind would push it out of the Lagrange point and cause it to fail eventually...?)
I'm sure there's probably some better fluid to use than water (maybe something lighter?), I was just using it as an example. Maybe even we could use a material that absorbs at particular wavelengths -- diffusing infrared while letting visible light through?
We're only trying to block light here, it seems like a solid shade would be overkill. Why not make a cloud? They do a good job at blocking light inside the atmosphere.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Perhaps it is. Perhaps human civilization isn't supposed to continue. Ultimately I for one don't care much about supposed to. There are rather serious consequences for us if the earth does continue its current—and unprecedented in the history of human civilization—rapid and accelerating warming.
I don't mind at all that people are researching potential ways to prevent those disastrous consequences before they materialize. Some of them might have unintended consequences, but that's more, rather than less, reason to investigate them as far in advance of the need to implement as is possible.
Its not about "loving" evolution. People who acknowledge the demonstrated reality of evolution are, however, unsurprisingly also likely to recognize that drastic changes in environment can be very bad for life forms that are very successful in the old environment.
OTOH, people that believe in invisible fairies devoted to protecting them from all material harm as long as they clap hard enough—a kind of immature religious faith that is sadly common in the US—are prone to ignore the facts and just ask everyone else to just clap harder.
Photons are enegy packets. If an object absorbs it, it heats up. If that object were a baseball bat, I'd pummel you with it. Then I'd find any moderator who marked this 'Interesting' and percussively sterilize him with it.
It's one thing to say something ignorant; it's another to raise that stupidity above my reading threshold.
Bemopolis
"I guess the moral of the story is, don't paint your airship with rocket fuel." -- Addison Bain
I play Nerd-Folk!
I have to admit that I didn't read the article (yet)... but this begs the question... what about "global dimming". Haven't heard of global dimming? most people haven't. For a good overview, visit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_dimming
Reducing the amount of sunlight that hits the earth is already happening with some negative side effects.
Scott Dowdle
www.MontanaLinux.Org
No, being human is about making intelligent, forward-thinking decisions. Ignoring the billions-year-old balance of life that we depend on for our gadgets sounds robotic to me!
I can't believe this kind of trite unreasoning nonsense gets modded 'Insightful'.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
Well not exactly the reverse, but how about using a series of lenses to warm up the northern hemisphere during winter? Them equator types probably wouldn't mind missing a bit of heat during December and we Ohioans could use an extra 20 degrees 3-4 months of the year.
A certain amount of the flora and fauna of the north depends on low temperatures, as I've understood it, and there are repercussions in that regards. On the other hand, it's a relatively easy sell environmentally--a 20 degree increase in temperature for the Northern United States (during winter) would reduce the resources used to heat homes and offices significantly--thereby reducing the accompanying pollution.
No, it is about creating artificial scarcity for a naturally abundant resource - sunlight - so you can then sell it at premium prices. Imagine a giant shader that only lets enough sunlight through for plants to grow if the owner of a field paid a suitable extortion price.
And if you think that this is unlikely, just watch what kind of laws the copyright conmen have gotten through. After all, it is only right that the people who regulate Earths energy input benefit a little for the effort, right ? Think of the children !
When sunlight is outlawed, only outlaws will have suntan. And remember, if you don't pay for daylight, then the communists have already won. Free sunlight is socialistic, and that is the source of all evil !
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
The gravity of the situation becomes crushing ?-)
Well, what actually happens is that the BH will vaporize into pure energy near-instantly due to Hawking's radiation. This creates an explosion whose size depends on the mass of the hole.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.