No, that would just break it up and make it worse. Some fragments might be accelerated sideways enough to miss the earth, but more will be accelerated forward or backward along the asteroid's current path.
If it were accelerated forward along the asteroid's path, it would get to The Spot early. And Earth wouldn't be there yet. Miss.
If it were accelerated backwards along the asteroid's path, it would get to The Spot late, and Earth would already have moved along past that point. Miss.
There are no doubt velocity changes that could be imposed on a body that would result it in it hitting earth anyway, but they are much less likely than one might think.
Actually the old Nike Zeus/Spartan antiballistic missle from the late 60s early 70s might have the range and speed. But it is unlikly that it chould it hit far enough away to make a big difference.
Seems contradictory - it has the range, but couldn't hit it far enough away as to make a difference. If it can't hit it far enough away, it doesn't have the range.
Actually, Nike X had trmendous acceleration, but not enoug deltaV to reach orbital speed, much less escape speed. So, no, they didn't have either the range or the speed.
That said, we could probably build something that would conveniently fit in a Shuttle Cargo bay that could exceed escape speed and carry a nuclear weapon as a payload.
Re:yeah, you're right
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Re-Pet a Reality
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So yeah, you're right. Maybe we should voluntarily control our population growth [populationconnection.org] for a better future instead of birthing 3 or 4 kids per family to then cart around in our Chevy Suburbans.
You seem to be a bit out of touch with the present.
It might interest you to know that, with the exception of immigration, both the USA and Europe have populations in decline. The population growth isn't happening in wealthy societies, it's happening in dirt-poor ones.
And if WE decide to control THEIR populations, then "voluntary" isn't quite the correct word...
look at the way parents of five will change their parenting style between the first and fifth child
As someone once said "when your first kid swallows a dime, you take him to the emergency room. By the time your fifth kid does it, you say "that's coming our of your allowance"...
San Diego? Not sure if that was that month, or the month before.
Have you been to NYC, before or since?
Before, yes, Since, no.
Or any 2M+ American city in a real crisis, like the 2003 NE Blackout?
Assuming Atlanta has 2M+ people, yes. Not sure what the numbers are, but 2M for the entire metro area sounds about right. Not too much panic in that particular case (an ice storm that shut the City down - LOTS of people stranded, since the storm happened while people were at work). I spent some time moving stuck cars off the hghways.
Interestingly enough, the opposite happened in my family. My then five year old daughter wanted to know why I drank beer. I offered her a taste. Thirteen years later, she still won't touch the stuff.
Which is to say, it worked out exactly as I had hoped.;)
I obviously missed the part about only shutting down AFTER an attack. Funny thing, when I reread the article, I missed it again. I believe the phrase "national crisis" was used, but I don't think they mentioned "after a terrorist attack"....
You quite correctly point out that my scenario is not the totality of possible scenarios. Your's are equally suspect. The Ohio firetrucks won't be worried about gas/diesel in Manhattan for many hours after the hypothetical attack. There is no reason to believe, even if one believes we'll only shut the system down AFTER an attack, that it'll still be shutdown that long after an attack.
There is also little reason to suspect that "many lives, and national/global security, all depend on everything going right" will ever be much of a factor. When you are doing disaster planning, you do NOT plan on everything going right. You plan assuming a great many things can go wrong, and you still solve the problem. Just like the military does.
Your assumption of global/national panic is, I think, unwarranted. People would have to depend on GPS to even notice it was down, much less panic over it. And very few depend on GPS. Airplanes? Sure. but in such a scenario, they'd be ordered to ground at the nearest airport before the system was disabled. Ships at sea? They have alternate means of navigation, and are likely to be ordered away from the USA, so aren't much of an issue.
If you read the article, you notice that they're not talking about shutting the entire system down. Just the part of the system that needs to be shut down to deal with the problem.
Note also that at no point do they say, or even suggest, that shutting down GPS will be a standard response to any crisis. Presumably, they're bright enough to only shut it down in a situation where doing so would accomplish something worthwhile.
If you want to talk about a "real war", that is different.
POint is, a Real War (tm) will likely result in GPS being shutdown. If it will cause massive worldwide panic to shutdown, then we'd better start preparing for the panic in case of war. Because a war isn't a case of "we'll shut it down to prevent its misuse", it's a case of "Well, crap, Russia just took out the entire GPS constellation" - an event over which we have no control.
Military threat to the USA? There is none. Terrorist threat? There's not much of one. Will this always be true? Only a fool would think so. And military planning (and disaster planning in general) is based on what COULD happen, not on what is likely to happen. So if your First Responders are so dependent on GPS that they can't deal with its lack, they'll be worthless come the day that the enemy shuts the system down, not the government. Which will be the day we REALLY need them.
One of the "holes in security" you mention is the possibility of making a GPS-based autopilot for what is essentially a cruise missile - a small plane loaded with explosives. Given that I knew someone was planning such, but couldn't locate them in time, shutting down GPS (and thus, the controller for the aerial topedo) seems like a reasonable approach.
I think you overestimate the adverse effect of disabling GPS temporarily. While it certainly could be an issue, in certain situations, I think, on balance, it is likely to be isignificant.
One obvious test of the idea - plan a drill, but don't tell the first responders it's a drill. Shut down GPS, issue a call to the first Responders to come to Yankee Stadium (obviously, you don't call the Mets fans), and see how much longer than usual it takes them to get there. It's just possible such a test would show that First Responders are complete idiots who can't find Yankee Stadium without GPS (or, alternatively, that they're all Mets fans). If so, reconsider the plan, and hire some competent First Responders.
After all, in case of, for instance, a REAL WAR (tm), an attack on the USA might very well include knocking the GPS Sats down. I know if I wanted to make war on the USA, they'd be high on my list of "things that had to go to make victory possible".
Umm, my "normal GPS use" is to locate myself when I go hiking. And that not much, since I generally stick to trials. I said I *have* one, I don't use it when I drive.
The assumption that GPS use is routine for much of America (and the world) is a false picture. Ships and planes use it routinely (along with other navigational means, at least as of 10 years ago, the last time I worked for a company providing positioning services), but 99.9% of Americans (and at least that large a fraction outside the USA) don't use GPS for anything. Most who have GPS receivers got them for the Gee-Whiz factor, not the utility.
Come to that, that's why I got mine. Because it was a neat tech toy. I didn't need one to hike before, and really don't need one to do it now. In fact, I'm not entirely sure just where it is now. In my glove-box, likely, but might be on my desk in that jumble of stuff I haven't gotten around to putting away.
Tell me, do YOU routinely use GPS to find your way around? Would you be lost and confused if your GPS failed? If so, consider seriously becoming less dependent on your tech toys.
I drive a fair amount, and have a GPS receiver as well. But I've never been "strended" because the batteries wore out. Mostly because I use, well, signs. If you've never tried it, they're usually big and green, with letters on them saying things like "Pensacola next five exits", or "I 59" (with an arrow pointing toward the right or left).
There are even smaller signs with things like "Causeway Boulevard" on them. Hint: they tell you what street you are on, or what street you are crossing, depending on orientation.
It really is amazing how easy it is to get around without EVER using GPS.
Now, emregency workers might be a bit more of an issue. Of course, if you announce an explosion at Yankee Stadium, it's fair to say that every First Responder (who isn't a Mets fan) knows exactly how to get there even if his GPS is disabled.
Same for the Superdome in New Orleans, though there are prolly some First Responders so embarrassed by the Saints that they'd PRETEND they didn't know where the Dome was, just to disassociate themselves.
Or an other serious target. After all, we're not all that worried by the possibility of terrorists attacking the City Hall of West Bumfuck, South Dakota....
Article 29 (2) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.
is enough of a qualifier that you could get away with most anything, if you were to make a serious effort.
Including this. I think any lawmaker worth his salt could make this an issue of "public order and the general welfare" without too much trouble.
That's the trouble with Rights with qualifiers attached - it's so easy to stretch those qualifiers, an inch at a time, till they cover the whole elephant.
Big Oil (which is also Big Gas) would love a new market that looks green, but isn't (that carbon has to go someplace)
Big Oil would love a new market. Period. They're not intrinsically opposed to "green", they're indifferent to it. Make "green" profitable, and they'll be on it like white on rice. Make it MORE profitable, and they'll drop gasoline so fast your collective head will be spinning.
As to the carbon going somewhere. That's certainly true. It'll be CO2 if natural gas is cracked into H2 and other stuff. Doesn't actually have to be, but that's the way to bet (since it is currently the easiest, most profitable, way).
The big question is what happens to the socio-political-economic climate of the world when fossil fuels are unnecessary as a fuel?
You assume herein that fossil fuels will become unnecessary as fuels if practical fusion exists. This may be true, but I doubt it in the near future.
However, to answer the question:
The Middle East becomes hugely ignorable. The area breaks out in more or less continuous warfare (similar to parts of Africa today) that most people don't notice, and even fewer care.
Nigeria, same. Just another African country that noone cares about.
Venezuela, ditto. Though it'll probably turn into an alternate source of cocaine.
Alaska's state government will find itself in quite the pickle, dependent as it is on oil revenues.
Ditto for most of the oil-producing states, though to a lesser degree - no other state is quite so dependent on oil revenue.
Net effect: everyone becomes somewhat more insular - we're all less dependent on imports (especially Europe and Japan, the USA to a lesser extent, but still significant (( note that our trade imbalance rights itself automagically, as a huge chunk of it is foreign oil )) ).
Note that fusion should not be equated with "unlimited cheap power". It won't be unlimited, and it won't be cheap. It'll be expensive. It'll produce radioactive wastes - lots of neutrons irradiatting the containment will produce a pretty fair amount of medium-long halflife radioactive metal. It'll produce waste heat. All of these things will cause environmentalists to scream bloody murder, especially since they have always thought that fusion would save them from the evils of nuclear waste and such.
Of course, we got something for that billion-plus per day. We got heat, and light, and the power to run these computers we're reading this one, etc.
What, exactly, did we get for the $17B we spent on fusion?
Mind you, I've been annoyed since before many of you were born that we haven't made a serious effort to develop a working fusion plant. And achieve energy independence. And a permanent presence on the Moon. And a Mars mission or three. And...
However, one must admit that we haven't really gotten much worthwhile out of our fusion research money yet. And telling the guys with the money "We blew that last $17B, but if you give us another $6B, we GUARANTEE we'll spend that too. What? Useful power? Well, I wouldn't go THAT far just yet. Still too soon to say..."
This should read "some nuclear waste has a half-life of 25,000 years." Some of it has a half-life of 25,000 seconds, too.
I think its just plain irresponsible behaviour to produce something that imposes such a long-lived danger.
You are aware that the mercury dumped into the atmosphere from a coal-fired plant has a half life of forever, right? The danger won't EVER go away on that stuff.
It defines Fair Use. It is not meant to imply that copying a movie is, by definition, Fair Use. The betamax decision extended Fair Use to making personal copies of TV for time-shifting purposes, but in no way created the legal concept of Fair Use.
Note further that the quote above includes the phrase "such as", implying quite strongly that these are meant to be EXAMPLES of Fair Use, not an exhaustive set of possible "Fair Use".
Which allows plenty of room for the Courts to come along later and say "After careful consideration of the four characteristic meaasures of 'Fair Use' specified in law, this procedure in question fits within the definition of 'Fair Use'".
The Mississippi doesn't flow by New Orleans due to "purpose" by the Mississippi. Nor does it flow there due to "natural cause". It flows there by direction of the Corps of Engineers, who have been preventing the "natural" effect from occurring for some decades.
Evolution is a "natural effect". It cannot be stopped or constrained - every species WILL evolve. Which direction they evolve is open to speculation at any given moment, but the evolution itself is not open to question - all of us do our bit for evolution when we choose our spouse, no matter the criteria we had for picking said spouse.
On the other hand, the Mississippi River is constrained by a not-so-natural force - the Corps of Engineers. Which is why the Mississippi Delta is in such a sad state today.
The Mississippi is, in other words, a poor analogy for evolution.
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If it were accelerated forward along the asteroid's path, it would get to The Spot early. And Earth wouldn't be there yet. Miss.
If it were accelerated backwards along the asteroid's path, it would get to The Spot late, and Earth would already have moved along past that point. Miss.
There are no doubt velocity changes that could be imposed on a body that would result it in it hitting earth anyway, but they are much less likely than one might think.
Seems contradictory - it has the range, but couldn't hit it far enough away as to make a difference. If it can't hit it far enough away, it doesn't have the range.
Actually, Nike X had trmendous acceleration, but not enoug deltaV to reach orbital speed, much less escape speed. So, no, they didn't have either the range or the speed.
That said, we could probably build something that would conveniently fit in a Shuttle Cargo bay that could exceed escape speed and carry a nuclear weapon as a payload.
You seem to be a bit out of touch with the present.
It might interest you to know that, with the exception of immigration, both the USA and Europe have populations in decline. The population growth isn't happening in wealthy societies, it's happening in dirt-poor ones.
And if WE decide to control THEIR populations, then "voluntary" isn't quite the correct word...
As someone once said "when your first kid swallows a dime, you take him to the emergency room. By the time your fifth kid does it, you say "that's coming our of your allowance"...
Yes, that would meet the definition of VTOL, wouldn't it?
Someone arrest this guy for impersonating a Nerd! He's an obvious fake!
/sighs Valentine Michael Smith, from "Stranger in a Strange Land" by RObert Heinlein. He was the guy from Mars, aka Archangel Michael.
New Orleans, as I recall.
How about later in the month?
San Diego? Not sure if that was that month, or the month before.
Have you been to NYC, before or since?
Before, yes, Since, no.
Or any 2M+ American city in a real crisis, like the 2003 NE Blackout?
Assuming Atlanta has 2M+ people, yes. Not sure what the numbers are, but 2M for the entire metro area sounds about right. Not too much panic in that particular case (an ice storm that shut the City down - LOTS of people stranded, since the storm happened while people were at work). I spent some time moving stuck cars off the hghways.
Which is to say, it worked out exactly as I had hoped. ;)
This is a common misconception.
The Government has NO RIGHTS!
The People have RIghts. The Government has Powers. There is a difference. Specifically, that Rights are inalienable, and Powers are revocable.
Theoretically. Your actual mileage may vary. The Tree of Liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of Patriots and Tyrants.
You quite correctly point out that my scenario is not the totality of possible scenarios. Your's are equally suspect. The Ohio firetrucks won't be worried about gas/diesel in Manhattan for many hours after the hypothetical attack. There is no reason to believe, even if one believes we'll only shut the system down AFTER an attack, that it'll still be shutdown that long after an attack.
There is also little reason to suspect that "many lives, and national/global security, all depend on everything going right" will ever be much of a factor. When you are doing disaster planning, you do NOT plan on everything going right. You plan assuming a great many things can go wrong, and you still solve the problem. Just like the military does.
Your assumption of global/national panic is, I think, unwarranted. People would have to depend on GPS to even notice it was down, much less panic over it. And very few depend on GPS. Airplanes? Sure. but in such a scenario, they'd be ordered to ground at the nearest airport before the system was disabled. Ships at sea? They have alternate means of navigation, and are likely to be ordered away from the USA, so aren't much of an issue.
If you read the article, you notice that they're not talking about shutting the entire system down. Just the part of the system that needs to be shut down to deal with the problem.
Note also that at no point do they say, or even suggest, that shutting down GPS will be a standard response to any crisis. Presumably, they're bright enough to only shut it down in a situation where doing so would accomplish something worthwhile.
If you want to talk about a "real war", that is different.
POint is, a Real War (tm) will likely result in GPS being shutdown. If it will cause massive worldwide panic to shutdown, then we'd better start preparing for the panic in case of war. Because a war isn't a case of "we'll shut it down to prevent its misuse", it's a case of "Well, crap, Russia just took out the entire GPS constellation" - an event over which we have no control.
Military threat to the USA? There is none. Terrorist threat? There's not much of one. Will this always be true? Only a fool would think so. And military planning (and disaster planning in general) is based on what COULD happen, not on what is likely to happen. So if your First Responders are so dependent on GPS that they can't deal with its lack, they'll be worthless come the day that the enemy shuts the system down, not the government. Which will be the day we REALLY need them.
I think you overestimate the adverse effect of disabling GPS temporarily. While it certainly could be an issue, in certain situations, I think, on balance, it is likely to be isignificant.
One obvious test of the idea - plan a drill, but don't tell the first responders it's a drill. Shut down GPS, issue a call to the first Responders to come to Yankee Stadium (obviously, you don't call the Mets fans), and see how much longer than usual it takes them to get there. It's just possible such a test would show that First Responders are complete idiots who can't find Yankee Stadium without GPS (or, alternatively, that they're all Mets fans). If so, reconsider the plan, and hire some competent First Responders.
After all, in case of, for instance, a REAL WAR (tm), an attack on the USA might very well include knocking the GPS Sats down. I know if I wanted to make war on the USA, they'd be high on my list of "things that had to go to make victory possible".
Umm, my "normal GPS use" is to locate myself when I go hiking. And that not much, since I generally stick to trials. I said I *have* one, I don't use it when I drive.
The assumption that GPS use is routine for much of America (and the world) is a false picture. Ships and planes use it routinely (along with other navigational means, at least as of 10 years ago, the last time I worked for a company providing positioning services), but 99.9% of Americans (and at least that large a fraction outside the USA) don't use GPS for anything. Most who have GPS receivers got them for the Gee-Whiz factor, not the utility.
Come to that, that's why I got mine. Because it was a neat tech toy. I didn't need one to hike before, and really don't need one to do it now. In fact, I'm not entirely sure just where it is now. In my glove-box, likely, but might be on my desk in that jumble of stuff I haven't gotten around to putting away.
Tell me, do YOU routinely use GPS to find your way around? Would you be lost and confused if your GPS failed? If so, consider seriously becoming less dependent on your tech toys.
I drive a fair amount, and have a GPS receiver as well. But I've never been "strended" because the batteries wore out. Mostly because I use, well, signs. If you've never tried it, they're usually big and green, with letters on them saying things like "Pensacola next five exits", or "I 59" (with an arrow pointing toward the right or left).
There are even smaller signs with things like "Causeway Boulevard" on them. Hint: they tell you what street you are on, or what street you are crossing, depending on orientation.
It really is amazing how easy it is to get around without EVER using GPS.
Now, emregency workers might be a bit more of an issue. Of course, if you announce an explosion at Yankee Stadium, it's fair to say that every First Responder (who isn't a Mets fan) knows exactly how to get there even if his GPS is disabled.
Same for the Superdome in New Orleans, though there are prolly some First Responders so embarrassed by the Saints that they'd PRETEND they didn't know where the Dome was, just to disassociate themselves.
Or an other serious target. After all, we're not all that worried by the possibility of terrorists attacking the City Hall of West Bumfuck, South Dakota....
In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.
is enough of a qualifier that you could get away with most anything, if you were to make a serious effort.
Including this. I think any lawmaker worth his salt could make this an issue of "public order and the general welfare" without too much trouble.
That's the trouble with Rights with qualifiers attached - it's so easy to stretch those qualifiers, an inch at a time, till they cover the whole elephant.
Big Oil would love a new market. Period. They're not intrinsically opposed to "green", they're indifferent to it. Make "green" profitable, and they'll be on it like white on rice. Make it MORE profitable, and they'll drop gasoline so fast your collective head will be spinning.
As to the carbon going somewhere. That's certainly true. It'll be CO2 if natural gas is cracked into H2 and other stuff. Doesn't actually have to be, but that's the way to bet (since it is currently the easiest, most profitable, way).
You assume herein that fossil fuels will become unnecessary as fuels if practical fusion exists. This may be true, but I doubt it in the near future.
However, to answer the question:
The Middle East becomes hugely ignorable. The area breaks out in more or less continuous warfare (similar to parts of Africa today) that most people don't notice, and even fewer care.
Nigeria, same. Just another African country that noone cares about.
Venezuela, ditto. Though it'll probably turn into an alternate source of cocaine.
Alaska's state government will find itself in quite the pickle, dependent as it is on oil revenues.
Ditto for most of the oil-producing states, though to a lesser degree - no other state is quite so dependent on oil revenue.
Net effect: everyone becomes somewhat more insular - we're all less dependent on imports (especially Europe and Japan, the USA to a lesser extent, but still significant (( note that our trade imbalance rights itself automagically, as a huge chunk of it is foreign oil )) ).
Note that fusion should not be equated with "unlimited cheap power". It won't be unlimited, and it won't be cheap. It'll be expensive. It'll produce radioactive wastes - lots of neutrons irradiatting the containment will produce a pretty fair amount of medium-long halflife radioactive metal. It'll produce waste heat. All of these things will cause environmentalists to scream bloody murder, especially since they have always thought that fusion would save them from the evils of nuclear waste and such.
What, exactly, did we get for the $17B we spent on fusion?
Mind you, I've been annoyed since before many of you were born that we haven't made a serious effort to develop a working fusion plant. And achieve energy independence. And a permanent presence on the Moon. And a Mars mission or three. And...
However, one must admit that we haven't really gotten much worthwhile out of our fusion research money yet. And telling the guys with the money "We blew that last $17B, but if you give us another $6B, we GUARANTEE we'll spend that too. What? Useful power? Well, I wouldn't go THAT far just yet. Still too soon to say..."
This should read "some nuclear waste has a half-life of 25,000 years." Some of it has a half-life of 25,000 seconds, too.
I think its just plain irresponsible behaviour to produce something that imposes such a long-lived danger.
You are aware that the mercury dumped into the atmosphere from a coal-fired plant has a half life of forever, right? The danger won't EVER go away on that stuff.
Note further that the quote above includes the phrase "such as", implying quite strongly that these are meant to be EXAMPLES of Fair Use, not an exhaustive set of possible "Fair Use".
Which allows plenty of room for the Courts to come along later and say "After careful consideration of the four characteristic meaasures of 'Fair Use' specified in law, this procedure in question fits within the definition of 'Fair Use'".
I refer you to "Exploration of Space by Means of Reactive Apparatus" by Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky, written in 1896. That was 108 years ago...
Title 17, Chapter 1, section 107: Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use.
I won't bother to paste it in, you can look it up yourself. But, yes, the USA has Fair Use as part of its Copyright Law.
Evolution is a "natural effect". It cannot be stopped or constrained - every species WILL evolve. Which direction they evolve is open to speculation at any given moment, but the evolution itself is not open to question - all of us do our bit for evolution when we choose our spouse, no matter the criteria we had for picking said spouse.
On the other hand, the Mississippi River is constrained by a not-so-natural force - the Corps of Engineers. Which is why the Mississippi Delta is in such a sad state today.
The Mississippi is, in other words, a poor analogy for evolution.
Never assume familiarity with any gun that you haven't fired before. And I'm not talking model of gun, I'm talking individual gun.
"Dread Pirate Roberts" == Bartholomew Roberts, aka Black Bart. Probably the most successful pirate in history.