Oh come on, can't you recognize when someone's just trying to get a rise out of you.
Being trolled isn't something I expect to happen in a conversation of this sort, no. I notice that some people have modded you 'insightful' so obviously your trolling was either not obvious to them, or it's okay to broadly denigrate a large group of people here on Slashdot by posting untruths. Because it's fun?
So - no.1 is the argument that you propose as "the truth"?
Percentage is a perfectly valid way of measuring CO2. Anyone with any understanding of math can convert it to PPM at will. Scientists can operate perfectly well with either number, and will use whichever is most convenient at the moment.
I'll take that as a yes.
If indeed, you already understood that
(a) the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere was only 270ppm prior to the industrial age and 400ppm now and
(b) this represents a percentage increase on baseline of 48% and
(c) since you yourself can calculate the concentration in CO2 as a percentage (0.007%) and
(d) You readily accept that CO2 contributes some 25% of the total geenhouse effect (30 degrees c)
How is it that you can claim It's hard to believe such a small change could make any noticeable difference at all, and I've heard people say AGW is impossible because it is so small, just like you are saying it's obvious because it's so big.? Are you incompetent? Are you being a little dishonest?
Lovely. Truthiness. Which of these things then, is the truth?
1. CO2 concentration is measured in ppm and always has been since the days of Fourier/Tyndall.
I honestly hope you one day discover how silly you are for posting this. I hope when you figure it out, you are wildly entertained.
So - no.1 is the argument that you propose as "the truth"?
Lovely. Truthiness. Which of these things then, is the truth?
1. CO2 concentration is measured in ppm and always has been since the days of Fourier/Tyndall.
2. It's "hard to believe" that adding millions of tons of CO2 and measurably raising CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere would lead to climate change.
Well, you post a lot of contradictory material, I chose a position that wove through it. Don't like it, don't claim several contradictory things at once.
And they're / we're doing that because all of the global warming extremists want to wreck prosperity in pursuing actions that will not work.
You are basically admitting that the contrarian case is denial. "We don't like the consequences of anthropogenic cliamte change, so we'll pretend that there is a problem with the science".
Why don't you come out and say it: climate change is real, but you don't want to do anything about it. If you think you position is defensible, why not state it in the clear? What are you afraid of?
If you _ever_ outline a course of action that will _increase_ prosperity and solve the problem at the same time, then you MIGHT have a chance of getting the plan approved by all.
If you think the current plan doesn't work, the most helpful thing to do would be for you to suggest a plan that does.
And we don't need the plan to be approved by you. To a limited extent, some discussion can be entered into around phasing in alternate energy sources, although why anybody would want to keep coal plants is beyond me, I guess they support the buggy whip manufacturers. However, you have removed yourself from the table by disputing the science. This is an absurdity - nobody is going to negotiate for a new 'mutually acceptable' view of the science. It is what it is, you don't vote on it.
No, I specifically meant through that parenthetical remark that it would draw a different brand of crazies out of the woodwork.
You parenthetical remark asked a question which wasn't rhetorical unless the listener is ignorant and naive enough to accept without question that pastors or people who firmly believe in a deity are crazy. Assuming your audience is naive is a mistake.
As far as why I used it, it's perfectly valid to compare various unjustified beliefs, and note the behaviors those that distribute and profit from them.
By doing so you draw attention to your own unjustified beliefs.
Except in that religion is treated with more respect by deference to it's claimed state of "the most important thing" to believers.
I'd guess from the outset that you've incorrectly drawn the bounds of what comprises "religion" so your statement is pretty meaningless outside the bound of your own blinkered worldview.
In many other democracies, similar provocations from the government would have the people out on the street in mass protest. Why is this not happening in the US? I think the problem is people who lay claim to some violent overthrow of the government. Perhaps they do it inadvertently, perhaps encouraging compliance with the regime is intentional. But whatever the motivation:
(a) Claiming that legal access to small arms makes the US somehow exceptional as a democracy and strengthens the democratic process is nonsense. If the need for violent overthrow comes to pass, the legality of your gun is not really a headline issue.
(b) Most people, including most americans, aren't going to side with violent revolution unless the situation becomes dire. When faced with joining a violent revolution and killing their friends, the children of their friends, destroying the economy, promoting the interests of violent radicals, they will judge that a slightly less democratic government is a favorable option. And fair enough. So the group who constantly advocate for violent revolution ignore the fact that power is removed from the people by increments, not all at once. By constantly laying claim to some non-democratic means of restoring democracy, they dissipate the anger needed to get people on their feet to act.
There are around 300 million firearms in the United States.
Of which, only about what 1000 can be expected to rise up in rebellion, and be summarily put down.
But by all means, keep serving the myth that america is more free because small arms are widely available. By believing this myth you support the continued reign of the oligarchs and their attempts to suppress the rule of the people. After all, why do the hard work of protesting when you can just claim that your freedom is upheld by guns you will never use? Continue to comfort yourself with the lie.
Sudden evacuation might be problematic. But with less serious problems, the lower transit time to Mars vs. Europa might be advantageous.
Evacuate to where? Depending on time, Earth is months to years away in terms of transit time from Mars, even then there is the huge, obvious problem of how to get down from orbit, if you achieve orbit once you arrive. And this is assuming that there is a craft there on Mars, fuelled and maintained.
But with less serious problems, the lower transit time to Mars vs. Europa might be advantageous.
At those scales, it doesn't seem to make much difference.
Radiation is a problem, though. Shielded habitats would be a high priority. Either underground, or possibly by using water (produced on-site) as shielding.
Unless you land near the poles, there are only trace quantities of water left on Mars in the soil (most of it having sublimated off in the low atmosphere. To extract those quantities of water from the ground (that is, 20000 litres per habitat) would require a facility the size of a longwall open cut mine.
To dig an underground habitat you would need a machine, or you could chance it with a shovel, but then if there was subsidence there is no concrete and no iron to or handy blocks of wood to stay your habitat, you would need to take an inner shell with you and somehow dig a hole and construct the shelter from parts, and make it air tight, sufficient such that no atmosphere at all escaped, or I suppose you could shotcrete the inside by bringing the shotcrete with you - including of course the water or water equivalent, and you would need to be pretty good at shotcreting to guarantee air tightness. Sounds chancey.
And you would still need some sort of facility to grow plants or algae to eat. On earth the average is what? An acre to feed a human? Let's say technology allows us to halve that, and then multiply for the difficult conditions on Mars (plant physiology is unlikely to adapt any better than our own suffering physiology, maybe 2 acres, optimistically, per cosmonaut (let's say 6), that's 12 acres. I doubt you could manually dig and shotcrete a facility covering 12 acres underground.
Europa is too far. The Moon or Mars would be better in the short term, especially for trial and error. If something goes wrong, we're far closer and more able to do something and learn from it. A disaster on Europa would have no possibility of rescue from Earth
If something goes wrong on Mars, you're dead. There's no rescue. You're dead anyway within about 24 months from the lower gravity and radiation (or suicide, if sickness doesn't get you first). The same, but to a lesser extent, would apply to the moon.
What is this obsession with sending canned meat to other planets and satellites?
Conditions under the ice on Europa would be harsher than the harshest prison on earth. It's dark, you would never see a natural light. There is nothing to see but the inside of the craft and possibly the underneath of the ice sheet through a monitor. It would be cramped (The pressure under 20km of ice would be something like 92 earth atmospheres, making the building of such a craft/habitat a challenge). Contact with Earth would be tenuous to impossible, you would probably have to physically cable through the ice, which is 20km of cable. The surface is somewhat more appealing, if you have a need for water you could melt the ice, and you would need some frankly spectacular radiation shielding, but that is a small price to pay for the containment and light issue. Plus, a view.
It does compare favorably to Mars - but that isn't saying much, there's nothing on Mars. Neither compare favorably to simply living in space inside a vehicle, you have to be self sufficient with food, air and water in any case. Plus, most importantly, you get to come home.
Fission is just not going to cut it. It might be possible to build a drive that would be more efficient than chemical rockets and with a high nozzle velocity. However, 'exploding bombs' behind the ship would mean that most of the thrust goes in vectors other than the one you need, plus huge amounts of energy are lost in heat, radiation etc. But most importantly, it is simply not energy dense enough - fissile materials are very heavy and fission does not give off enough energy to enable it to be used in a star drive.
Sounds similar to a bussard ramjet - which unfortunately does not work, because the ship needs to accelerate the exhaust matter to a higher velocity than what the ship is moving at, and the fuel as it enters the scoop, is at zero (relative to the ship), so if it were possible to scoop enough fuel to react the momentum needed to accelerate the fuel is greater than what you can gain from fusing it and extracting the energy.
Having all of humanity stuck on a single planet in a single solar system leaves mankind open to extinction from a rare planet ending or even a more rare solar system ending event.
We'll go extinct anyway. Not to put it too harshly, but suck it up. Humanity is a collection of individuals, and when our time comes, it comes, no individual will be remembered long after they die. So too, for this particular iteration of homo sapiens.
Next year an asteroid could crash into the Atlantic and kill everything except the cockroaches.
Then develop a system to detect and divert nasty asteroids: Costs of the order of 1 x 10e-09 the cost of building a fanciful ship with fanciful drives. Oh, and 7 billion people don't die! Win!
Or a nuclear war could result in the same fate.
Don't have a nuclear war. Cost: zero. Oh, and 7 billion people don't die! Win!
Or in 60 years we could find the planet largely uninhabitable due to a combination of accelerated global warming and overpopulation.
Halt global warming and don't overpopulate the planet (which is kind of a self governign problem anyway): cost: 2-4% GDP. Oh, and 10 billion people don't die! Win!
It's cute to think that the sun's death is the most immediate problem to worry about; but as I've demonstrated there are indeed far more immediate concerns.
I'd say... not.
If you don't want to go into space, please stay here naysaying. I'd try not to laugh and yell "I told you so" too loudly when the planet dies with you and those like you still on it.
You won't be laughing, you'll be dead. You're on earth.
Slashdot Mirror
Oh I don't disagree that it is a strawman. But the subject of the strawman is revealing.
?? Is there a particular reason to lob bags of meat into space?
Oh come on, can't you recognize when someone's just trying to get a rise out of you.
Being trolled isn't something I expect to happen in a conversation of this sort, no. I notice that some people have modded you 'insightful' so obviously your trolling was either not obvious to them, or it's okay to broadly denigrate a large group of people here on Slashdot by posting untruths. Because it's fun?
So - no.1 is the argument that you propose as "the truth"?
Percentage is a perfectly valid way of measuring CO2. Anyone with any understanding of math can convert it to PPM at will. Scientists can operate perfectly well with either number, and will use whichever is most convenient at the moment.
I'll take that as a yes.
If indeed, you already understood that
(a) the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere was only 270ppm prior to the industrial age and 400ppm now and
(b) this represents a percentage increase on baseline of 48% and
(c) since you yourself can calculate the concentration in CO2 as a percentage (0.007%) and
(d) You readily accept that CO2 contributes some 25% of the total geenhouse effect (30 degrees c)
How is it that you can claim It's hard to believe such a small change could make any noticeable difference at all, and I've heard people say AGW is impossible because it is so small, just like you are saying it's obvious because it's so big.? Are you incompetent? Are you being a little dishonest?
Lovely. Truthiness. Which of these things then, is the truth? 1. CO2 concentration is measured in ppm and always has been since the days of Fourier/Tyndall.
I honestly hope you one day discover how silly you are for posting this. I hope when you figure it out, you are wildly entertained.
So - no.1 is the argument that you propose as "the truth"?
Learn to read.
1. CO2 concentration is measured in ppm and always has been since the days of Fourier/Tyndall.
2. It's "hard to believe" that adding millions of tons of CO2 and measurably raising CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere would lead to climate change.
Well, you post a lot of contradictory material, I chose a position that wove through it. Don't like it, don't claim several contradictory things at once.
And they're / we're doing that because all of the global warming extremists want to wreck prosperity in pursuing actions that will not work.
You are basically admitting that the contrarian case is denial. "We don't like the consequences of anthropogenic cliamte change, so we'll pretend that there is a problem with the science".
Why don't you come out and say it: climate change is real, but you don't want to do anything about it. If you think you position is defensible, why not state it in the clear? What are you afraid of?
If you _ever_ outline a course of action that will _increase_ prosperity and solve the problem at the same time, then you MIGHT have a chance of getting the plan approved by all.
If you think the current plan doesn't work, the most helpful thing to do would be for you to suggest a plan that does.
And we don't need the plan to be approved by you. To a limited extent, some discussion can be entered into around phasing in alternate energy sources, although why anybody would want to keep coal plants is beyond me, I guess they support the buggy whip manufacturers. However, you have removed yourself from the table by disputing the science. This is an absurdity - nobody is going to negotiate for a new 'mutually acceptable' view of the science. It is what it is, you don't vote on it.
and I've heard people say AGW is impossible because it is so small
I assume you challenged those people to learn some mathematics? Hint: CO2 levels are measured in ppm (that is parts per million).
Since when were you in the habit of making arguments for anthropogenic climate change? Wonders will never cease.
Who said they were the crazy ones. Hint: it's you. Your [sic] the crazy one. Not them.
... I'll bear that in mind.
And I'm really sorry you're wrong, and believe in something with no credible justification. Don't take it out on me.
And what, exactly, is this thing that I believe without justification
No, I specifically meant through that parenthetical remark that it would draw a different brand of crazies out of the woodwork.
You parenthetical remark asked a question which wasn't rhetorical unless the listener is ignorant and naive enough to accept without question that pastors or people who firmly believe in a deity are crazy. Assuming your audience is naive is a mistake.
As far as why I used it, it's perfectly valid to compare various unjustified beliefs, and note the behaviors those that distribute and profit from them.
By doing so you draw attention to your own unjustified beliefs.
Except in that religion is treated with more respect by deference to it's claimed state of "the most important thing" to believers.
I'd guess from the outset that you've incorrectly drawn the bounds of what comprises "religion" so your statement is pretty meaningless outside the bound of your own blinkered worldview.
In many other democracies, similar provocations from the government would have the people out on the street in mass protest. Why is this not happening in the US? I think the problem is people who lay claim to some violent overthrow of the government. Perhaps they do it inadvertently, perhaps encouraging compliance with the regime is intentional. But whatever the motivation:
(a) Claiming that legal access to small arms makes the US somehow exceptional as a democracy and strengthens the democratic process is nonsense. If the need for violent overthrow comes to pass, the legality of your gun is not really a headline issue.
(b) Most people, including most americans, aren't going to side with violent revolution unless the situation becomes dire. When faced with joining a violent revolution and killing their friends, the children of their friends, destroying the economy, promoting the interests of violent radicals, they will judge that a slightly less democratic government is a favorable option. And fair enough. So the group who constantly advocate for violent revolution ignore the fact that power is removed from the people by increments, not all at once. By constantly laying claim to some non-democratic means of restoring democracy, they dissipate the anger needed to get people on their feet to act.
Yes - lot's of things suddenly become trivial if you assume magic.
Some people from Falun Gong would like a word.
Just like most pastors firmly believe in god(why did I have to go there?)
Because you felt an urge to construct an image which reinforces the notion that
(a) some beliefs are more rational than others and
(b) Where your beliefs are more rational than others and
(c) Where other beliefs can be lumped together in a single basket with a single value and the beliefs you cling to are treated as distinct.
There are around 300 million firearms in the United States.
Of which, only about what 1000 can be expected to rise up in rebellion, and be summarily put down.
But by all means, keep serving the myth that america is more free because small arms are widely available. By believing this myth you support the continued reign of the oligarchs and their attempts to suppress the rule of the people. After all, why do the hard work of protesting when you can just claim that your freedom is upheld by guns you will never use? Continue to comfort yourself with the lie.
Sudden evacuation might be problematic. But with less serious problems, the lower transit time to Mars vs. Europa might be advantageous.
Evacuate to where? Depending on time, Earth is months to years away in terms of transit time from Mars, even then there is the huge, obvious problem of how to get down from orbit, if you achieve orbit once you arrive. And this is assuming that there is a craft there on Mars, fuelled and maintained.
But with less serious problems, the lower transit time to Mars vs. Europa might be advantageous.
At those scales, it doesn't seem to make much difference.
Radiation is a problem, though. Shielded habitats would be a high priority. Either underground, or possibly by using water (produced on-site) as shielding.
Unless you land near the poles, there are only trace quantities of water left on Mars in the soil (most of it having sublimated off in the low atmosphere. To extract those quantities of water from the ground (that is, 20000 litres per habitat) would require a facility the size of a longwall open cut mine.
To dig an underground habitat you would need a machine, or you could chance it with a shovel, but then if there was subsidence there is no concrete and no iron to or handy blocks of wood to stay your habitat, you would need to take an inner shell with you and somehow dig a hole and construct the shelter from parts, and make it air tight, sufficient such that no atmosphere at all escaped, or I suppose you could shotcrete the inside by bringing the shotcrete with you - including of course the water or water equivalent, and you would need to be pretty good at shotcreting to guarantee air tightness. Sounds chancey.
And you would still need some sort of facility to grow plants or algae to eat. On earth the average is what? An acre to feed a human? Let's say technology allows us to halve that, and then multiply for the difficult conditions on Mars (plant physiology is unlikely to adapt any better than our own suffering physiology, maybe 2 acres, optimistically, per cosmonaut (let's say 6), that's 12 acres. I doubt you could manually dig and shotcrete a facility covering 12 acres underground.
All in all I would say, not well thought out.
Europa is too far. The Moon or Mars would be better in the short term, especially for trial and error. If something goes wrong, we're far closer and more able to do something and learn from it. A disaster on Europa would have no possibility of rescue from Earth
If something goes wrong on Mars, you're dead. There's no rescue. You're dead anyway within about 24 months from the lower gravity and radiation (or suicide, if sickness doesn't get you first). The same, but to a lesser extent, would apply to the moon.
Conditions under the ice on Europa would be harsher than the harshest prison on earth. It's dark, you would never see a natural light. There is nothing to see but the inside of the craft and possibly the underneath of the ice sheet through a monitor. It would be cramped (The pressure under 20km of ice would be something like 92 earth atmospheres, making the building of such a craft/habitat a challenge). Contact with Earth would be tenuous to impossible, you would probably have to physically cable through the ice, which is 20km of cable. The surface is somewhat more appealing, if you have a need for water you could melt the ice, and you would need some frankly spectacular radiation shielding, but that is a small price to pay for the containment and light issue. Plus, a view.
It does compare favorably to Mars - but that isn't saying much, there's nothing on Mars. Neither compare favorably to simply living in space inside a vehicle, you have to be self sufficient with food, air and water in any case. Plus, most importantly, you get to come home.
Fission is just not going to cut it. It might be possible to build a drive that would be more efficient than chemical rockets and with a high nozzle velocity. However, 'exploding bombs' behind the ship would mean that most of the thrust goes in vectors other than the one you need, plus huge amounts of energy are lost in heat, radiation etc. But most importantly, it is simply not energy dense enough - fissile materials are very heavy and fission does not give off enough energy to enable it to be used in a star drive.
Sounds similar to a bussard ramjet - which unfortunately does not work, because the ship needs to accelerate the exhaust matter to a higher velocity than what the ship is moving at, and the fuel as it enters the scoop, is at zero (relative to the ship), so if it were possible to scoop enough fuel to react the momentum needed to accelerate the fuel is greater than what you can gain from fusing it and extracting the energy.
Having all of humanity stuck on a single planet in a single solar system leaves mankind open to extinction from a rare planet ending or even a more rare solar system ending event.
We'll go extinct anyway. Not to put it too harshly, but suck it up. Humanity is a collection of individuals, and when our time comes, it comes, no individual will be remembered long after they die. So too, for this particular iteration of homo sapiens.
Next year an asteroid could crash into the Atlantic and kill everything except the cockroaches.
Then develop a system to detect and divert nasty asteroids: Costs of the order of 1 x 10e-09 the cost of building a fanciful ship with fanciful drives. Oh, and 7 billion people don't die! Win!
Or a nuclear war could result in the same fate.
Don't have a nuclear war. Cost: zero. Oh, and 7 billion people don't die! Win!
Or in 60 years we could find the planet largely uninhabitable due to a combination of accelerated global warming and overpopulation.
Halt global warming and don't overpopulate the planet (which is kind of a self governign problem anyway): cost: 2-4% GDP. Oh, and 10 billion people don't die! Win!
It's cute to think that the sun's death is the most immediate problem to worry about; but as I've demonstrated there are indeed far more immediate concerns.
I'd say... not.
If you don't want to go into space, please stay here naysaying. I'd try not to laugh and yell "I told you so" too loudly when the planet dies with you and those like you still on it.
You won't be laughing, you'll be dead. You're on earth.