The two asteroids were going in opposite directions, so were not related.
While everyone was expecting and watching Asteroid 2012DA14, which missed Earth by 26,000 km (17,000 miles), another asteroid blasted through the atmosphere in Russia, injuring more than 1,000 people (mostly by shards of glass caused by the sonic boom). One estimate makes it out to be a 10 tonner (seems a bit small), traveling at 30 kilometers a second. Another astronomer, Margaret Campbell-Brown, claims ultrasound stations show it was 15m wide and around 40 tonnes. Nature quotes the same researcher talking about 15m and 7,000 tonnes. You can see we have a good grip on what happened. [UPDATE: Now it’s 10,000 tons and 55 feet wide and stone. The largest object to hit in a century. WUWT. What about the ones that fell over the ocean wonders Jo? How would we know?]
It left a “contrail” and a flash that could be seen for 700km (see these videos –why are people filming while they drive?). It only “missed” by 30 – 50 kilometers and nobody knew it was coming. How little we know. One part of it broke off and smashed into a frozen lake, leaving a 6m hole.
The other asteroid (2012DA) was about 60m (150ft) and 140,000 ton or “Tungusta-size”. The 2012DA was headed northwards. The surprise bolide in Russia was travelling south.
So we are watching for the next one?
Have we got these priorities straight? NASA in total gets about $18 billion a year. Though the annual federal allocation for “planetary defense” is only $5.8 million or so (with a proposal to increase it to $20m). But it’s not like there are many objects to watch: “In 2008 NASA’s Near Earth Object Program spotted a total of 11,323 objects of all sizes.” (#&!)
Watts Up posts a quote from the Wall St Journal:
The chance of another Tunguska-size impact somewhere on Earth this century is about 30%. That isn’t the likelihood that you will be killed by an asteroid, but rather the odds that you will read a news headline about an asteroid impact of this size somewhere on Earth. Unfortunately, that headline could be about the destruction of a city, as opposed to an unpopulated region of Siberia. . . .
What are the odds we’ll be hit with man-made deadly weather? Not much according to the evidence, but the US government spends 6785 times as much trying to prevent that:
“Spending to reduce emissions which contribute to climate change was $38 billion” [Energy Budget and Climate Change, 2012, PDF]
See the photos and videos of the Russian explosion. Compare it the observatory view of 2012DA from Gin Gin (1 hour north of Perth, Australia). What a difference a few thousand kilometers makes… To put the astronomical sizes in perspective, 2012DA was about as far away from us as the Earth travels every 14 minutes. (See the WUWT link above).
Twitter. @AsteroidWatch will let you know any time a space rock gets within a few lunar distances. More information on asteroids is available a new NASA/JPL “Asteroid Watch”.
Simon Goodwin, an astrophysics expert from Britain’s University of Sheffield, said that roughly 1,000 to 10,000 metric tons of material rained down from space towards the earth every day, but most burned up in the atmosphere. [Reuters]
“The Russian meteorite may take second place for size in a century”
RT.com: “Scientists have compared the incident to the century-old Tunguska event, a huge explosion allegedly caused by a fragment of a comet or meteor.
“It looks like it was something like Tunguska – a 60-meter diameter cosmic body, which fell into the Tunguska taiga in 1908,” said Professor Oleg Malkov, Head of the Star Clusters Physics Department at the Russian Science Academy Institute of Astronomy, as cited by Komsomolskaya Pravda daily.
According to estimates, the energy of the Tunguska blast may have been as high as 50 megatons of TNT, equal to a nuclear explosion. Some 80 million trees were leveled over a 2,000-square-kilometer area. The Tunguska blast remains one of the most mysterious events in history, prompting a wide array of hypotheses on its cause, including a black hole passing through Earth and the wreck of an alien spacecraft.
It is believed that if the Tunguska event had happened four hours later, due to the rotation of the Earth it would have completely destroyed the city of Vyborg and significantly damaged St. Petersburg.”
Watch the shockwave hit people in this office (at 25 seconds)
There is a blind spot from the Southern Hemisphere
The “we” in the headline above means the United States (thanks to US taxpayers). Here in Australia, this could be the only space program we could match funding for. Let’s suggest it. Apparently it’s desperately needed. How about some real political vision?
Three NASA-supported observatories with modest telescopes in the southwestern United States and in Hawaii are making more than 95 percent of near-Earth object discoveries. Because of budget limitations, an observatory at Siding Spring, Australia, the only one looking for these objects in the Southern Hemisphere, has reduced its operations to only occasional observations, leaving a blind spot for unknown objects approaching from the southern skies. [ New York Times]
Volunteers found the 2012DA asteroid
2012 DA14 was discovered in February last year by a group of amateur astronomers at La Sagra Observatory in southern Spain. Jaime Nomen, a dental surgeon who dabbled in astronomy, said his group bought a high-powered telescopic camera and software with the help of a $7,695 grant in 2010 from the Planetary Society, a group founded in 1980 by Carl Sagan to promote space exploration.
“why are people filming while they drive?”
They are using a “dash-cam” which is on full time, great help to sort out liabilities after an accident.
Some also use a rear facing camera.
One has to live there to understand, the driving (drinking) habits are unbelievable.
140
Corruption is not uncomming in Russia. Police are poorly paid. It’s not unheard-of that some will use their position to obtain a cash bonus on a trumped-up offence.
So dash-cams are a popular vehicle accessory; especially when negotiating a lesser “penalty” at the roadside.
120
One reporter actually asked her correspondent in Russia why so many drivers were using dashboard cams and the answer was that police corruption, especially among the traffic police was so bad that drivers were using them as a defense against a shakedown.
It’s fortuitous because it captured so many good views of the event. If something like this happened around my hometown there wouldn’t be all those cameras running.
50
As a result of this preponderance of dash cams, Russia supplies the vast majority of car crash videos. Their country driving on icy roads is quite terrifying.
There is also a “sport” of throwing yourself onto the bonnet of a near stationery car, presumably to get some sort of payout for the “accident”. Dash cams help protect against that.
22
A red thumb for that?
20
It is the picture I think.
20
I don’t think paper cuts count as road injuries.
00
So the “detox diet” is not popular in Russia? 🙂
I heard Russia has strict laws on blood alcohol levels while driving. Any level less than 0.05% and you pay a fine to Stolichnaya. 🙂
Hey, when driving like this could happen at any time, vodka is the only way to remain calm in winter traffic.
100
Okay sorry for making fun of Russia, back to the meteorite videos.
Here’s another dashboard camera which was not looking at the fireball but it does show that the whole area was lit up brighter than the sun for a few moments. (Start around 1m:07s)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=lUKpHMS3Nlw#t=67s
Here is a dashcam angled with the meteor coming straight at the car!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Qu8EhM8Bw18
Other small meteors were seen burning up over San Francisco, USA (video) and over Cienfuegos, Cuba (news report).
20
Thanks, Andrew, that line about Stolly just made my day! But really, the Pentagon had a good look at the research back when 1989FC made its very unspectacular flyby. About 0.5km or more in diameter, missed us by 6 hours, and we only noticed about 6 days later. As an Apollo asteroid, we would never have seen it coming, even if it had hit us bang on. Would have been one helluva bang, too. Hence , the plethora of “meteor movies” over the next few years, and no amount of research dollars can protect us against a large Apollo asteroid, Jo. So just keep your fingers crossed, and enjoy living life on the edge.
30
They have a lot of dash cams around Toronto too. There is a lot of insurance fraud there. People stop in front of you and when you stop, they back up and hit your car and then claim you rear ended them.
00
Space exploration is or was a great catalyst for inventions and ideas that have benefitted the human race and hopefully will continue to do so,the only result of CAGW funded research has been the discovery of various forms of Uranus and it’s usual products.
120
You would think that if we were all condemned and meant to suffer under AGW, asteroids threats would be right up the alarmists’ alley. I’m sure they can be attributed to the same cause and funds can be provided. They just need a little more time…
60
The suggestion has already been made SD.
20
Jo, you ask,
Apparently it is for protection would-be conmen using a traffic “accident” to get money from the driver. They are fixed car cameras, not requiring any manual operation while driving. One scam is to reverse and ram the car behind you at the lights and get your car fixed and money for compensation for “whiplash”. Hence people drive with car cameras to have evidence of what actually occurred.
As Jo points out. Do not think of it as a miss by 26,000km. Think of it as a miss by about 15 minutes in terms of the Earth’s orbit around the Sun. That represents a miss of less than 0.003%.
Still even a Tunguska size event is hardly going to destroy all life on the plant. Any such strike is about 8 or 9 times more likely to hit an uninhabited part of the planet that it is to hit a population centre. Probably the worst case scenario is for an ocean strike and the tsunami that it could cause. Even then it depends on where it hits. The more distance the tsunami has to cover the smaller and weaker that it becomes.
The real worry is a very big rock or even a cluster of rocks. That really will be catastrophic, much more than a 20% increase in a 0.04% gas (of which 97% is naturally occurring) will ever be.
40
How’s this for a hypothesis.
We got these two asteroids in one day, travelling in opposite directions according to the report above. If that is true, then what are the chances the asteroids were collision debris from the same parent body? Say some big asteroid got hit by an object approaching the sun, the asteroid gets split in two down the middle, and the two pieces fly apart at 90 degrees to each other, then they go on an orbit around the sun at the same major/minor axis distances but opposite directions and pass each other twice every orbit (once at the halfway mark and again when they return).
What if one of those pieces is what hit Siberia, and the larger piece (2012DA) is still out there only now a bit lonelier than before?
Dear 2012DA,
I was saddened to hear of the recent loss of your travelling companion. Please be assured our planet meant them no harm, it was an accident.
20
That’s about the same required accuracy as a Melbourne train 😉
30
Jo, this posting is displacement activity. It is clearly more important to
wasteinvest large amounts of other people’s money proving how dangerous are homeopathic amounts of plant food in the atmosphere than filling a gap in the global wayward rock early warning system. You must get your priorities right. Just in case, /sarc60
Question: What is the difference between a deadly meteorite strike and catastrophic anthropogenic global warming?
Answer: A deadly meteorite strike is possible.
531
Unfortunately you have missed the point. The relative near misses by the asteroids are due to climate change (or in Australia Tony Abbott and climate change) dso money spent on studying global warming will help protect us all from destruction by asteroids (and if you live in Australia from Tony Abbott as well). Prof Lewandowsky is probably at this moment polishing up a proposal to the ARC to study if more climate change sceptics than alarmists think asteroids (and if you live in Australia Tony Abbott as well) are a hoax. You think I’m joking don’t you. I bet Prof Lewandowsky doesn’t.
100
Perhaps you can convince professor Lewandowski to get interested in the “psychology” of asteroids directly. After all, that’s a completely untouched field of research just waiting for some brave soul to dive in and explain why asteroids do what they do. He could even get a legitimate reputation from the work. And it might keep him busy enough that he wouldn’t need to bother with skeptics. 😉
90
And it makes as much sense as his current research!
40
Plus he could go on a field trip to study his subject.
20
why are people filming while they drive?
Because they feel free to do so or they beleive they’re skilled enough to do both with no incident.
The first reason requires no Government interferance the second is a individual judgement.
Neither of which we have here!
23
Where exactly?
10
It was explained above by others.
The video camera is fixed to the inside windscreen and records every journey.
There are loads of them to choose from on Ebay, about 50 USD upwards.
30
The police also use cameras fitted to their windscreens “nick”…….
00
Nick
What do you mean by :
“Neither of which we have here!”
?
Government interference Or Individual judgement?
KK
20
Hmm,
Fly-by troll?
30
Probably. Now if only we could get the other Trolls to burn out so spectacularly. And there’s bound to be a well funded research project in looking at “Troll burnout and the responsibility of Tony Abbott”. To be conducted either at the University of WA or the safety of a waterside block on the Hawkesbury [before the seal level rises 8 stories of course].
40
The trolls are like shooting stars … fast, spectacular enlightenment, and then burn out to nothing !
30
There is a political problem with “Asteroids” as opposed to the very useful “Climate Variation” vehicle that has been taken up by our political masters.
Asteroids are infrequent and cannot be taxed, nor is there any scenario under which a tax on Asteroids could be foreseen.
“Climate Variation”, on the other hand, has already gone through several mutations of focus to enable continued access, by the elites, to our Taxation Revenue.
So successful has their scam been that they have even been able to use “future tax income” to guarantee additional borrowings in our name, to solve this manufactured problem.
You can’t get that sort of leverage out of an Asteroid!
Man Made Global Warming, of course, is a gigantic con based on the immutable invariability of nature which we have disturbed, only recently, by our avaricious combustion of Fossil Fuels.
I submit the following piece of scientific evidence for consideration and to induce some perspective about the likelihood that we have achieved anything at all in Disturbing the Earth’s well being.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Five_Myr_Climate_Change.svg
The Earth’s temperautre has been dropping over the last 5 million years and for the last three quarters of a million years the fluctuations have been very predictable and based on a period of about 100,000 years.
The entire effect strongly suggests two things:
1. The Earths has an overall cooling pattern which happens when, dare I say it, hot things are located in a cold environment
and
2. The more recent periodicity change from 41,000 year cycles to 100,000 cycles suggests that orbital mechanics is the location we should be directing any efforts to explain cycles of hot and cold here. Orbital decay anyone. The very difficult scientific concept here, for warmers, is that spinning things, like the Earth and sun eventually run out of steam and topple over.
To see just where we are at the moment, this graph shows the current rise in the last 20,000 years on the RHS:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f7/Five_Myr_Climate_Change.svg/2000px-Five_Myr_Climate_Change.svg.png
In summary: We aren’t going to FRY , we are going to FREEZE.
1. Long term , the Earth is cooling.
and
2. The orbital period seen will probably increase meaning that the next Ices Ages will become LONGER.
Good luck all.
100
The oscillations prior to the obliquity driven 41k yr world look to be more frequent. Perhaps they were precession driven at about 21k yrs.
So perhaps after a period on the 100k yr glaciation cycle we will move to the next Milankovich cycle and find ourselves experiencing 400k yr glaciation cycles.
The Earth will likely become a snowball Earth many millions of years before the Sun expands into it’s death throws and vapourises the Earth in 3 to 5 billion years time, round about the time that the milky way collides with the nearest galaxy.
40
Hi J
Since writing that have come across an item that details the 26,000 and 41,000 and 100,000 year cycles.
All belong to the topic of orbital mechanics.
At times each has taken a turn at being the most prominent even though all three are present and continue to act .
Did I say that right?
KK
00
Live for the day?
KK
00
Or maybe.
Sufficient unto the day is the Evil thereof.
In this case the latter is UNIPCCCCC sponsored Klimate Science.
KK
00
Oh come on KK! Surely they can put an entertainment tax on watching the event — very high if you’re an eye witness, lower for each view of any video.
You just aren’t thinking creatively enough. 😉
30
True.
10
KK
I think you have a spelling mistake.
Surely you meant, “… our political musterers”, as in mustering the “sheeples”, before fleecing.
20
As some of you may be aware, I am a huge fan of the Australian Author Arthur W Upfield, who wrote the 29 Crime Fiction novels dealing with the half aboriginal Detective Bony (Napoleon Bonaparte) and I have a very large section at my home site detailing these novels and in depth analysis of them.
Upfield also did other things and one of those was leading the Australian Geographic Society exploration to the Wolfe Creek Crater site in North West WA in 1948, after it was first found during an aerial survey of the area in 1947.
The crater measures 875 metres in diameter and is 60 metres from the rim to the (present day) floor of the crater.
It is estimated to have been caused by the impact of a meteorite weighing in the vicinity of 50,000 tons, although that weight is subject to conjecture. The impact has been estimated at 30,000 years ago, and again, that also is subject to conjecture as well.
There are actually a number of Aboriginal Dreamtime stories associated with this particular impact.
The following link is to an image of the crater itself, and actually Australia is pockmarked with a number of quite large impacts. The link has a small gallery of images and the sixth image details what happens during impact.
Link to Wolf Creek Crater Image
Tony.
100
Fascinating stuff Tony.
Have been looking for a while to find a source of commentary on Aboriginal custom; the summary headings of your notes suggest I may have some reading to do.
KK 🙂
10
Thanks Keith,
I was actually asked to put it all there, as I only had it done in document format on my word processor here at home. It actually took me some years to compile, and Months to then transcribe.
I learned more about Aboriginal Culture from those Bony novels than from anywhere else, and you would be astounded how much Upfield really did have as insight into their culture. The PC crowd got onto him in the 70’s and he suffered from that, but one of the most activist of all aboriginal activists, Gary Foley, was actually one who said (and said quite stridently) that when it came to aboriginal culture, Upfield actually got it right and was in fact maligned by some of the stuff that was said about him.
Upfield was actually detailing intricate aspects of aboriginal culture right from his very first novel in the series, which was written in 1929.
Something surprising turned up with every one of those novels.
One really interesting thing from The Widows Of Broome highlighted something of real interest.
Upfield wrote this novel in 1949, and in that novel he detailed how a growing problem among the aborigines in that area was ….. petrol sniffing. So, this isn’t something recent, but has in fact been around since the end of WW2.
First published in 1950, this one novel has some history very few, if any, Australians would know. This novel, The Widows Of Broome sold more than a million copies.
Upfield wrote 8 of those Bony novels between 1929 and the start of the War, almost one a year. In the Post war years he wrote 21 of them at the rate of one a year and even more, up until he died in 1964. Doubleday’s in the U.S. just could not get enough of them. Right now, and for the past 12 to 15 years, he’s huge in Germany, and in fact, there are German Tour Companies who have tours organised around Upfield novels setting sites.
His novels sell well throughout Europe to this day. However, try to find one here in Oz. Most recognised second hand book dealers have waiting lists for Upfield novels, and most of them they do get hold of come from deceased estates.
There (somewhat) plenty of them at sites like Biblioz and others, but again, they are relatively difficult to come be here in his (adopted) homeland.
A much forgotten Australian author, sadly.
Tony.
60
Amazon.uk have some Boney stories in stock. Some are collectors items at silly prices, but there are a few used books which are not too expensive. On your recommendation, tony, I’ve ordered a couple to try.
20
Kevin,
you can’t go wrong with any of them, except one, Bony And The Kelly Gang. That one is pretty corny really, and has nothing whatsoever to do with the original Ned Kelly.
While a reasonable yarn, it’s nowhere on the same page as the others.
His last novel, The Lake Frome Monster (a camel) lacks the polish of the others but only because that was ‘finished off’ by two other authors after he passed away from, written from his notes and manuscript.
If you like your crime fiction like the Americans with guns a plenty, you will end up being very sad indeed, because they figure so minimally as to be almost invisible.
It’s almost as if Upfield wrote the novels for Bony, because while the clues are almost so obscure, you don’t even realise they are clues until he wraps it up at the end.
Best crime fiction I have ever read, and in most cases the murder is almost incidental. It’s also almost along the lines of Cold Case as well, because when Bony finally does arrive, the original crime is long over, and all but forgotten.
Tony.
50
I’m more Brother Cadfael than Mike Hammer. Sounds like I’ll be fine.
20
I have 2 on the shelf: Bony buys a woman, and Bony and the Mouse..
As you say, very interesting stories. A good read. 🙂
Thought I had a couple more, oh well.
10
AndyG55,
hey, if I was to list perhaps four titles from the full list of 29, they would be two of them, and here it shows how Political Correctness was alive and well in the US as far back as those original publishing dates for these novels.
As I mentioned, his novels were immensely popular from mid WW2 onwards in the US, and more often than not, Doubleday’s had first call on the original publishing.
Bony Buys A Woman was Upfield’s preferred title, and he had to change it pre publishing at Doubleday’s request to The Bushman Who Came Back. This happened with a few of Upfield’s novels for sale into the U.S.
Bony And The Mouse was retitled Journey To The Hangman, because American’s were perceived as being unable to grasp the analogy of the way a cat plays with a mouse prior to its capture.
Cake In The Hat Box was changed to Sinister Stones, because American’s were again perceived as being puzzled as to why money was referred to as cake, as in ‘more cake than Croesus’, eg richer than Croesus.
Bony And The Black Virgin was changed to The Torn Branch.
However, the classic has to be Mr. Jelly’s Business which was changed to, drum roll, Murder Down Under.
In Bony Buys A Woman, there is a couple of sections that are perhaps some of the most evocative reading in Oz literature, and deals with the way floodwaters begin to flow into Lake Eyre after a flood many Months earlier.
The mud starts to liquefy and becomes unstable, and Bony has to stay on well worn dingo paths where the mud is somewhat harder to keep from getting sucked into the moving mud, and he wears specially made shoes, somewhat similar to snow shoes to walk across the lake and back to safety.
In this novel, Upfield also actually has some guns, in this case rifles, and he explains the advantage Bony has with a Savage 22 while the bad guy, firing into the lake Bony is attempting to escape as the flood approaches, has a Winchester 44. The advantage is that Bony’s Savage has a longer range, so he can effectively stand off, and not risk being shot at.
It’s a truly wonderful yarn.
Tony.
20
And hey, imagine my surprise here.
In three of the novels Upfield wrote in the 30’s, he specifically mentions young men wearing the new fashion, wearing baseball type caps with the peak reversed.
Tony.
20
Tony
None of the local second hand bookstores have any and they are snapped up when they come in.
Online is a nightmare dealing with small dealers in America who don’t ship to Oz.
KK 🙂
10
Got some.
Now the test.
KK
00
Part way thru Death of a Lake.
OK so far, very readable.
KK
00
We really enjoyed the Boney TV Series from some years ago.
Like many good Australian TV series it seems to be impossible to find on dvd……..
00
Tony
The Wolfe Creek crater is the place where the sky serpent left the ground and joined the morning star according to the Aborigines. The crater also has interesting radioactive element anomalies associated with it, which I have somewhere in my archives. I wrote an article on it, possibly on the Thunderbolt.info site, but I’m not sure.
However I regard it as an electrical discharge crater rather than a bolide impact site.
People should note the observed trajectory of the Russian meteorite – that trajectory could never ever cause a Wolfe Creek Crater type structure.
60
More Wolfe Creek photos and information here.
20
I’m just waiting for some numpty to blame the meteor strike on global warming.
I’m sure there are many people right now desperately trying to find a way to weave it into their pathetic scare.
C’mon, I have the popcorn ready -it’s gonna be just as good as when some numpty claimed Global warming was going to create more earthquakes and other tectonic activity.
Or the claim frakking causes earthquakes.
It’ll probably be the same numpties.
60
I think it has been suggested that the expansion of the atmosphere caused by nasty selfish people such as me is causing an extra critical drag on earth satellites. If you can stretch a bow that far you could claim that the earth now presents itself as a larger target and that damage in Russia from the collision of rock and atmosphere was greater than it otherwise would have been. Maybe three or four bandaids could have been saved. Maybe hundreds. Maybe a sheet of glass in a window was pushed beyond it’s tipping point.
70
Perhaps the shockwave damage is greater because of the extra CO2 in the atmosphere?
30
And there could be good(godly) CO2 and bad(human born in sin caused) CO2.
40
I keep looking for short pithy summaries of the Global Warming Phenomenon.
That’s a beauty Rod!
KK 🙂
10
KAAAA CHING!!!!!
Woddya know here is one of those numpties trying right here in this video.
I must be a psychic or something.
And it was CNN – Not Fox, just for the record…
70
How dumb must she be?
40
Contender for the dumbest question of 2013 I should think. It certainly proves that none of this is off topic.
10
I recon it’s an effect of global warming all right. Just not the one she’s thinking about. She’s not dumb, she’s brain-dead… …excuse me… …brainwashed.
30
Roy and Mark,
I guess that’s what happens when people are encouraged to believe in a scientific theory.
I wonder if she is a flat earther?
20
Gee, don’t you think you are being a bit OTT?
011
Don’t like it, don’t come back….
Your alarmist brethren will use ANY tactic to push their religion, even if it means blaming a random asteroid strike with CAGW.
Example : see MadJak’s example at 10.2 above.
PS. 55:45 How’s that feel?
50
No sense of humor I guess.
It’s your life, Maxine so do as you want to. But I go for a laugh wherever I find it. It makes everything a whole lot easier.
And yes, we’re off topic. But there’s a lot of on topic stuff if you’re looking for more serious reading. For openers you can start with what Jo wrote. Then you can let us know what you think: Maxine on global warming vs. safety from flying rocks. There’s a lot of material in there, maybe even a degree thesis for you if you need extra credentials.
50
The topic is the stupidity of AGW believers. The idiot at CNN is right on topic.
Actually asteroids have a profound effect on climate.
But unfortunately the asteroidal effect on climate does not fit with the green narrative so this real and dangerous climate factor has been neglected due to the hysteria about the scam of AGW.
30
I didn’t say anything yet
01
Maybe but even without assistance from CO2 these chunks of living rock are part of the eco-system of the universe and are to be worshipped in their own right, preferably as Goddesses. For example the one that did so much harm to humans in Russia is called Julia.
10
Ships, airplanes, anything one treasures and depends upon are also female and refereed to as “she”. I wonder what that means about us humans.
Oh nuts! I’m forgetting that it’s only we men who do that. Even hurricanes were female until there was a big hue and cry about it. Yep! The men did it again.
Maybe that makes it even worse.
Or maybe it means that we treasure and respect our women a whole lot more than we’re given credit for?
10
Yes Roy, but have you noticed how extreme the weather events became AFTER they mixed the male gender names in?
🙂
20
Yes, I see what you’re getting at, Mark. Maybe we can provide a chaperone or two, much like a High School dance. What do you think? 😉
00
Was that an asteroid? I thought it was the promised budget surplus crashing and burning
100
Maybee it was a North-Korean rocket aimed at USA?
30
That’s another reason they can’t repeal the carbon tax.
Just ask Peter Garret. ♫ Nothing’s as precious as a hole in the budget! ♫
Funny how the hole in the ground is now rather precious indeed.
40
@Jo Nova
Because “comprehensive” car insurance is Russia is inordinately expensive and subject to vociferous, never-ending disagreement in the event of a collision. In the black ice conditions currently prevailing, filming is very prudent indeed … it’s difficult enough in good weather, although not as scary as Chinese cities in any weather. Australians are in general pretty poor drivers but merely mediocre compared to these countries
30
Sigh, to a first approximation Earth doesn’t have a space program or any space defences.
Fortunately it wouldn’t take long to organise one. Just dig out the archived papers from Project Orion(the real one not the stupid NASA capsule). When the US was trying to launch satellites weighing a few kilograms, Freeman Dyson, Ted Taylor and friends were planning on 4000 tons to orbit. They’d have been happy if a customer wanted 4 million tons as the concept works better then. Spaceships are a LOT easier to build when you can get a submarine builder instead of an aircraft manufacturer to build the hull. Side benefit is it makes greenies upset.
20
The problem of a roid strike is a cheap and easy fix, there are ointments available for it.
However CAGW is a complex problem requiring billions upon billions of dollars, countless resources and restrictions of individual freedoms to even make a dent in it in decades time.
Self centred, children hating, nature abhorring right-wing nutters should get out of the way of the selfless, caring people who are trying to save the world, the solar system, the galaxy and the universe.
And all that’s required is to stop mining coal and oil and stop building new homes.
Why can’t you big oil funded, narrow minded racist bigoted red necked heathens understand that?
Why do you FORCE US to spend billions on new research to prove that CAGW is real?
Why do you FORCE US to write thousands of pages of legislation, rules and regulations? When all that’s required is for you lot to voluntarily reduce your carbon footprint just like Obama Gillard Gore Hansen Flannery Karoly Pachauri Mann Jones and countless other wonderful contributors to human society have done.
Please wake up to yourselves, the future of humanity depends on it.
150
Oh NO!!!
Baa has turned, he’s a fifth columnist!
Now I’ll have to put an upturned black bucket over the head of my model of him, and put a black cape over his “Spiderman” outfit and give him a laser sabre. I’ll take him away from my model of Jo Nova in her “Wonder Woman” outfit and put him next to the evil trio of Mattb and John Brookes, led by “Frankenstein” Ross James.
Oh it’s sooo hard keeping such a tenuous grip on reality.
Still, I have TonyfromOz as “Thor”. Hmmm, now where did I put my Rereke and my KK?
30
Where is Ace when you need him?
10
Careful – I look terrible in tights
20
Here we go again. Does anybody remember the Spaceguard debates, what 20 odd years back, on the Cambridge network? I think Benny Peisner (sic) may have been involved.
Ciao
John
10
I mentioned this in another thread recently. Why is it that so little attention is given to the one real form of climate disruption that is likely in the near future? It won’t wipe us out, and we shouldn’t exaggerate, but won’t we look silly with out solar panels and whirlygigs when some of this action starts going down:
http://volcano.oregonstate.edu/education/gases/laki.html
http://volcano.oregonstate.edu/education/gases/tambora.html
http://volcano.oregonstate.edu/education/gases/krakatau.html
They say it’s the drawn out, high sulphur, basaltic eruptions like Laki you have to watch, more than the silicate biggies like Krakatoa. Not that Krakatoa would be any fun if its cooling and dimming effects were added to a coldwave such as India experienced this winter.
Of course, our Green Betters have better things to do. James Hansen is trying to get himself chained to Daryl Hannah for his next arrest. First things first for the head of NASA Goddard!
90
Mt Fuji is a bit of a concern in general at the moment as well I hear.
People will have some real things to be concerned about rather than having to make things up. The Greens will continue to shriek anyways.
It must suck to be one of those people who put their stake on the imaginary problem rather than the real problem with a historical guarantee of it’s occurrence.
40
James Hansen has apparently overdone his medication.
He is now talking about Global Dimming — a decrease in solar energy reaching earth — caused by all of the particulates humans have put into the atmosphere through burning coal.
He points to this, as the reason why his predictions about global warming have failed so spectacularly.
[I would give a reference, but the article is so appallingly written, (it was them chemtrails wot dun it mlaud), I don’t want to give the author any airspace.]
40
Rereke,
I think the global dimming thing has been going on for a long time now. The long and the short of it is that the catastrafarians want it both ways and it all leads in one direction – command economics.
30
Hmm mm! Global dimming, you say? That may explain why one bulb after another has dimmed across the globe. It’s everywhere; they’re all affected by it, from scientists to talking heads to elected leaders their lights are going dark one-by-one — dim bulbs all.
I never understood it until now. 😉
20
I have found a correlation between the dimming of lights with the dimming of people – particularly the dimming in the political classes.
They both correlate quite well, however, I am reminded that correlation does not necessarily prove causation.
30
Yes, I agree.
The only reason I mentioned it was because it is still on the conspiracy theory “Top Twenty” chart, and now appears to have moved back up a few places.
20
“What are the odds we’ll be hit with man-made deadly weather? Not much according to the evidence, but the US government spends 6785 times as much trying to prevent that:”
The environment and the climate have been politized as means to implement leftist ideology and solutions natioanlly and globally.
They are not using 6785 times more to prevent AGW. They are using 6785 times more to promote AGU or AGS etc..?
30
Anthropogenic Global Unity and Socialism?
30
OT but I couldn’t let this go unread by members here.
It’s an article the Byron Shire Echo by their Editor: (retired recently I think)
710
If he’s only recently retired then he may live long enough to see cooling set in and realise what a brainwashed naive fool he’s been.
70
Gads! Another freaking shrieking alarmist writer.
I wonder why you get thumbs down for posting this?
40
Climate science is not the same as physical science. Gravity is demonstrative. You can drop a hammer and test the speed, etc. Climate science is computer modeling and probabilities. No hammer to drop.
60
Let me correct that for you: climate “science”.
Better.
It doesn’t take a great deal of thought to realise that “computer modeling and probabilities” is not science at all, it is statistics. Unfortunately, statisticians have a very very poor record of accuracy.
We do however have a very good record of global temperatures going back millenia. Statistically, the globe is actually cooling 🙂
80
What of quantum mechanics then? So much of it is math, probabilities and inference? Does that count as science? I’m just curious where you would place this field.
30
What a brilliant work of satire !!! 🙂
20
What an excellent piece of propaganda, that is. The man is obviously very skilled, either by training, or through natural talent.
I shall keep that (suitably footnoted and annotated, of course) for use in future training exercises.
Thank you Janama.
20
Janama; I can’t imagine why you are getting the thumbs down for this; perhaps people think you wrote this sanctimonious tripe!
20
I think the thumbs down refer to the article, not me.
40
We loved Byron in the 80’s and 90’s.
Unfortunately it has been destroyed by drugs,alcohol, violence and general anti social behaviour.
http://www.couriermail.com.au/travel/australia/opinion-why-i-dont-like-byron-bay/story-e6freqwx-1226570722528
A place to be avoided at all costs!
Such a shame……
10
With just 2% of the earth’s land mass actually populated, there’s a bit of a lower probability for a hit on a population center. However as soon as the bugger gets big enough, close counts.
20
Question: Where is the best place to be, if a nuclear war breaks out?
Answer: At ground zero of the first explosion!
20
If the “event” happened four hours later it would have missed Earth by a fair distance.
20
Why has outer space got it so in for Russia ?
20
Possibly because outer space is laissez faire libertarian?
10
Just guessing here,
Maybe because Russia is so sprawled out from east to west, unlike most other countries. Also the former USSR has 1/3 of the worlds land mass (If I remember correctly).
I think any country that is spread across in the same direction as that of the earths rotation is probably a bit prone.
I’ll now mull this statement over for a while to figure out whether it’s a load of cobblers or not.
00
Whilst you are thinking, here is a little riddle for you to think about.
The largest known real land-based impact crater did not happen in any country at all.
heheh.
00
…then what about some hours earlier?
Or a day?
Ians point is that it was a close shave.
10
What it really means is that if the orbit of the Tunguska object was displaced by a distance equivalent to that in which the Earth moves along its orbit in four hours, then those cities would have been wiped out. Of course that sounds nowhere near as dramatic!
Yes Ace, Earth has many close shaves every year.
10
Hasn’t the asteroid strike been blamed on global warming yet..?
What a missed opportunity…
10
It was a heat seeking asteroid. 🙂
40
Though impacts in populated areas are unlikely, the issue with big ones is that ocean impacts will produce immense tsunamis and ground impacts huge shockwaves. The shockwaves would be devastating but the tsunamis are a terrifying prospect. Whole coastlines up to many miles inland could be inundated. I heard astronomners on the BBC say a billion deaths is not unrealistic.
HOWEVER…
….there is abslutuely nothing anyone can do to prevent it and it is highly unlikely there ever will be.
The only preperation possible is for recovery afterwards.
The chances of it occurring in our lifetimes is vanishingly small (indeed, smaller than your budget surplus returning to Earth). But it does happen astronomers say on certain reliable frequency. A bunch of them had it out at WATTSUP . They had examples of mind bogglingly huge known craters and impact areas.
20
“The chances of it occurring in our lifetimes is vanishingly small.” Correct.
As I note in my comment (#26) the claim that there is a 30% chance of a Tunguska event this century is false.
Smaller and more frequent impacts would still be catastrophic, but as you say, there is no way to prevent them, unlike the problems caused by anthropogenic global warming.
05
And what problems might they be, Philip?
50
Philip,you miss my deliberate emphasis on “in our lifetime”.
Events occuring outside that window mean nothing to me and ought not to you…unless you have children. In which case you have done vastly more to “harm the planet” already than anyone here who has not will ever be capable of.
On the other hand, if events in a hypothetical future after you are dust concern you, then there certainly will be asteroid impacts, possibly a stall in the Earths core (which would result in the atmosphere being blown away by solar wind) arrival of output from a Gamma Ray Burster, or, if none of that sufficiently dwarfs your puny “climate change” the certainty that the Earth is going to eventually be engulfed by the expanding sun.
Altogether your position seems a bit futile.
20
Sheer nonsense. The technical framework for moving asteroids is already in place. We have nuclear explosives and technical expertise in space operations which will get better the more we do. That is most of what you need. I’m not talking about blowing up an asteroid although I think that may work better than the politically correct view that is common seems to think it will but ablating one side of an asteroid will shift its orbit. We just need to find them soon enough and get started. That, or sit at the bottom of a gravity well and cower just waiting for the end.
See Project Orion and also read the late Oriana Fallaci’s letter to her father reporting her interview with Ray Bradbury.
It would be a bad epitaph for the human race, written by beings of the Galactic Survey ” They were clever monkeys, but lazy”
61
Mike…I never said there were no technical possibilities, only that they will never be realised. Why? Money mainly. After Apollo, what happenned, nothing basically. The collection of world space programmes and the poxy ISS are pathetic. But its not just money, its all manner of things that mean the Space Age came and went in my childhood and is now firmly over.
Your example of Orion only illustrates this. In 1960 the technical means of building a booster with a payloado f 10,000, even 100,000 tonnes to orbit was proven. But the nuclear test ban treaty put an end to it, just like that. No such vehicles will ever be built now. Chemical boosters are pants. The biggest boosters conceived are a POS. A hundred tonnes to orbit. Poxy. Each launch costing The Earth.
Moreto the point, todays engineers havent the ability to finish anything they start. The X43, what an incredible joke! After yearsof trying and howmany billions they simply gave up: they couldnt fabricate the fuel tank the design depended on. When choosing an engine for the new US manned vehicle you would think they could improve onthe SSME, but no, they have actually decided to use the Pratt & Whitney J2, designed 50 years ago andused in Apollo. To construct this “J2X” they actually had to wheel surviving engineersout ofretirement to show them.
Everyone dreamsof a reusable spacplane. Well NASA had that sixty years agp in the X15. They aint got nothing like it now. After dozens of aborted projects, they aint likely to. NASA only keeps the pilot light of spaceflight alive to keep the gravy flowing. There aint enough to do anything forreal. Its all dreams.
China will land people onthe Moon. India probably will. Uncle Tom Cobbley and all will take their turn. Then thats it. Nada. No sequels.
There aint ever going to be an interplanetary police forceto play snooker with asteroids.
I didnt say it was not physically possible. Its physically possible to give every ugly a facelift but that aint going to happen either. The number of things that are physically in our capability but will never be done is quite literally infinite.
30
Ace: I had not fully appreciated your agreement with Loius XV’s “Apres moi le deluge” outlook. Frankly being something of a cynic and childless I have some sympathy for it. And yes in the very long run the human race is inevitably doomed. As Keynes said “In the long run we are all dead.”
However most people do have some concern for humanity in the forseeable post mortem.
I am not advocating any particular attitude to this, futile or otherwise, just questioning the timetable given here for catastrophic impacts.
02
Yes Philip, I have a pretty gloomy way of assessing things and whilst I do not accept there is any basis for attempted action in either case I accept the distinction between the two. But in my view that distinction is academic and your way of putting it came accross as an advocate of “action” in the AGW instance, which I cannot agree.
As for the rest of humanity, I am far more concerned by the genital mutilation of millions of female children in the world, now, very seldom reflected in the media. Or the persecution of Christians (at least 100,000 people a year are killed for being such whilst many more are oppressed), or half a billion women treated as chattels, or…the list goes on. Real suffering right now that could be ended by a choice to end it. Not fantasies of perpetual survival of imagined unborn future generations. AGW zealots are like a man letting his family starve by spending all their resources on a futile attempt to invent a means of immortality.
20
Big Asteroids have hit the planet so many times in the past why would we spend a cent looking for something that is good for the planet. Who would rather we still had t-rex? Hello anyone?
21
There is some merit to not looking for them. Imagine the panic that would result if the “big one” was found to be coming in. I think we’d be safer not knowing. (well, up until the impact that is)
20
I have heard astronomers say that most planetary water also arrived by comet (something that boggles the imagination) and theres an opinion around that life did too (“panspermia”).
But surely…if none of that had happened, “The Planet” would have been a perfectly contented lump of lifeless rock. And thats what you would prefer isnt it?
Meanwhile, had not the dinos died mammals would still be little critters down holes (although its disputed as to whether a meteirite was responsible anyway) and humans wouldn’t be here. Which again, surely Mat, would be your preference anyway? Were’nt dinos morally superior to humans in your book?
40
Boggles credibility too!
30
I thought it rained and rained for millions of years and that was how we got the oceans. Maybe the comets brought the rain?
40
Matt,
Who can say with a straight face the he knows an asteroid wiped out the big fellas, thereby leaving earth safe for mammals and eventually you and me? Can you?
I cannot. Theories may fit what evidence we have at the moment. But tomorrow is another day.
40
Prepare to be demonized. You are violating the most precious of scientific traditions, knowing what we cannot know. Next thing you’ll be saying crazy things like evolution might not be right. 😉
20
Hi Sheri
There’ is one part of my life that I feel has been a let down.
Anger management has largely been an unproductive exercise for me and one of the triggers in recent times of course has been the Climate Change scam.
What follows close behind is the more general entrainment of the human mind by verbal effusion based on beliefs of which Creationism seems to be a leading light.
So I just cant let a sentence like this go past without inquiry:
” Next thing you’ll be saying crazy things like evolution might not be right ” .
Always exploring, I just wonder what is behind that?
Have briefly read an out line of creationism and also looked for viable alternatives to Darwinian Evolution theory without success.
The front runner seems to be DE.
I’m not sure what is behind the work being done to sideline Darwinian Evoln but can guess.
As a scientist all I can say is that if I want to explore DE for myself I go to the local beach, pick up some rocks, smash them open and look at the fossils.
If I want to explore Creationism I would need to go talk to the local C of E or Catholic Archbishop.
I keep seeing references to the idea that DE is flawed and ” not all there” but I have never seen a refutation of it?
Yours, Eternally Curious,
KK 🙂
30
It was not my intent to cause you discomfort. I find that reading blogs and attempting to respond rationally and kindly to all suggestions is a good way to work on anger management. (This does not include yours–you are communicating very well your discomfort. Had you said “you flaming idiot, there is no justification for that remark”, then you would qualify.) This has the advantage that when you have had enough of the insanity and trying to control your rage, you can walk away for now. 🙂
My emoticon did not apparently convey my sarcastic tone. DE is the best theory we have for now. My only objection is when it is declared to be the absolute truth, not the best theory. Unless we can travel in time, we can never know precisely how the earth came into being and what changes occurred along the way to the present. Look at the changes in theories about dinosaurs–from cold blooded to warm blooded to bird-like to whatever the latest is. This is a result of new fossil finds and so forth. It is appropriate. It’s not to say the theory is wrong, only that it is not complete because we keep learning new things.
As for creationism, I am not comfortable with the church injecting itself into science any more than I am with science injecting itself into religion. I don’t think one can disprove the other.
50
Hi Sheri
I noticed before that I have had trouble interpreting your posts correctly.
I think it is because patterns of speech, which includes sarcasm, are very local and require some level of acclimatisation, to get it straight away.
Given that sarc can often be misinterpreted even within your own family it is no wonder that I don’t get things straight away when you are in the US and I’m here in the land of Oz.
KK 🙂
20
I will try to remember to use the /sarc tag.
Yes, being in two different countries certainly adds to the level of difficulty in interpreting comments. I am glad people will let me know what they interpret my having said so I can clarify it. 🙂
30
We should also be clear here. Evolution is the observation. Natural selection is Darwin’s proposed explanation.
01
Oh ye of little inquisitiveness. Prepare to do battle!
I say the universe is just a digital simulation in some super computer somewhere. How will you refute that? Could we tell if is? Could we tell if it’s not? How? How would we be able to tell the difference?
I further assert that just before the appearance of the first humans is time zero of this simulation. Refute the assertion that time does not extend backward prior to our beginning. Refute the assertion that the simulation was set up with an existing history that never happened. Oops, there goes Darwin along with a lot of sacred cows. Really sorry about that!
Give that some thought. And never challenge a software engineer to a duel. Never!
And watch out for the power cord while you’re working around the computer. Don’t trip over it and pull the plug.
I know, I know, I’m nuts. My wife says it too. So :-(, 🙂 or 😉 as you prefer.
30
I won’t refute the digital simulation in a super computer theory because I have always believed that to be the case. Proving it or refuting it seemed useless because I figured we couldn’t tell the difference. Sometimes if I am bored I ponder it, but it gives me a headache if I think about it too much.
Again, I’m okay with the time line starting with the first humans. Time not extending backward gets into that pesky question of is time to infinity in one direction the same as time to infinity in both directions, since an infinitely long line would encompass all of infinity, or may not. Except in math, where a line can go to infinity in one direction. So long as we don’t go to infinity and beyond as did Buzz Lightyear.
You are not the first to suggest a made up history. If we are in a simulation, it’s really quite possible. Someone once suggested God put fossils on the planet just to give us something to wonder about (I’m thinking this was to get around the 4.5 billion year old earth versus 6000 year old earth) but I really figured God had better things to do. After all, we seem to find all kinds of ways to get in trouble without any made up history. If we aren’t in that simulation.
The power cord is completely safe. Now the computer itself is probably in danger, the keyboard and the peripherals. OOPS! There went my Pepsi! Watch out keyboarjlk;dkf;aksd;lfka;kf
I will defer to your wife and you as to your mental state!
20
Touché!
00
But it is an interesting little mental experiment. How would we know the difference? I don’t believe we could.
00
I reckon things were created to evolve. 🙂
00
G’day Roy. The problem with your “Never challenge a software engineer to a duel” concept is that some of us more basic creatures see a duel as being fought with “real” weapons not “simulated” weapons and you can point your simulation at me as much as you like but it has nowhere near the consequences as my 7.62mm real argument. But then I guess my 34 years in uniform has programmed me a tad differently to a software engineer. Having said that I love your post.
10
David,
Your 7.62mm argument definitely has a lot of weight and I don’t ever want to see the business end of one pointing at me.
I’ve made that digital simulation argument to several people to see what their opinion would be but I never used it quite that way (a challenge for the fun of it) before. Sheri knew exactly the right way to respond to my nonsense — just agree and knock all the wind right out of my sails.
My greatest fear is that so many “duels” — if that’s the right word — are having the winner decided by the weight of authority or threat of retribution. Not many are interested in looking at the scientific (or legal) and logical merit of the other guy’s argument. It makes any real progress a lot harder.
I’m glad you enjoyed what I said. Are you military or police? Both might carry a 7.62mm around.
Roy
00
Roy-
Serious response to: Could we tell if we are living in a simulation? SciFi loves this idea and bounces it around periodically. If the simulation were 100% contained (as in no one gets out or in), then, no, I don’t think we could tell. In order to know you were in a simulation, you would have to be able to view things from outside the simulation.
00
Sheri,
Serious response to your serious response: If you were outside the simulation looking in then you would not be part of the simulation. You can get information out of it. Otherwise why do it? And you can provide for your input to it like a flight simulator allows you to “operate” the controls. But the simulation is self contained and self defining.
00
With the simulation self-contained and self-defining, then I see no way we could know if we were in the simulation or not. (I wasn’t clear in what I typed–If you were in the simulation but could escape the simulation, you could discover you were in a simulation. Since escape is not possible, that isn’t relevant.)
00
G’day Roy,
Re your question Military or Police? Both, hence 34 years in uniform. I showed your post to a friend who is software savvy and writes the stuff for a living and he thought it brilliant. His only question was about the maximum calibre byte one could bring to the duel as he also tries to stay clear of the 7.62mm argument. Some of the technical stuff on Jo’s site goes way over my head but I have learnt a lot from visiting and the posts are often brilliant in their humour. And one must not forget the Trolls – they are priceless in their stupidity at times.
20
The reason you can’t get outside the simulation is that the simulation defines you. You quite literally do not exist outside the simulation. It’s the same with a simulated airplane; it doesn’t exist outside the simulator.
00
Roy,
the FSM was the one that created the computer. Both are good reasons to not bother ever thinking about anything.
01
Roy: I understand. It’s like on Star Trek with the holodeck, if you watched Star Trek.
00
Sheri,
I must have watched every existing episode of Star Trek at least once. It’s great fun. The writers had a lot of fun with that holodeck and also with Data.
But like my simulated universe, it only exists on the TV or movie screen and now of course, on the computer monitor.
00
I of course know it’s not real. I originally nixed the idea of using the reference, but sometimes fiction serves to explain a concept that otherwise would be very lengthy or help clarify if we are talking about the same thing. I took a chance.
00
Sheri,
I get it completely. It was a chance well taken.
By the way, I still like the original late ’60s Star Trek series if I can find it.
00
A word of advice. If you want to raise doubts about AGW, do not make comments about evolution.
It doesnt matter what you believe (I totally subscribe to evolution but see no incompatibility between that and religious belief) but it DOES matter for the debate about AGW to NOT hand Ecos a device to exploit against us.
If you want to discuss your doubts about evolution, please do that on forums devoted to that topic. There must be some.
10
Ace,
If that’s aimed at me — it appears to be — then I need to say something. Both evolution and AGW are sacred cows to their acolytes (maybe devotees is a better term), something no one is allowed to even question, much less disagree with. And that’s their privilege to be sure. But that’s an attitude I don’t adopt for myself.
I have never stated a position about evolution, creationism or any other alternative. It’s completely fruitless to argue about because no one can prove any position. In my opinion it’s become a club anyone can use to beat those they disagree with over the head endlessly without fear of ever having to stop. And it simply is not that important in the grand scheme of things except to those whose field of research must consider it. My daily life doesn’t need to consider it and I don’t go there (yes, I’m curious but that’s a different matter).
AGW on the other hand, is something sucking money out of my pocket right now for no better purpose than to use that same money against me. That I will fight. But I am not fighting evolution.
With that clarified — if I kid someone about evolution and anyone is offended by that, I intend to leave it to be their problem. I’ve the right to speak on any forum where it comes up. I’m not required to go brain-dead simply because of the subject matter. I don’t intentionally offend anyone. And if someone says something I find offensive I usually just stay silent. I always assume we’re all adults who come here to see what others may have to say.
Most important of all: Ecos don’t operate on good judgment; they operate on prejudice and worse. It’s of no value to cater to that.
I hope we can disagree as friends and not let our difference of opinion get between us.
Roy
00
No Roy, it definitely was not aimed at you. It was aimed at Sheri. But as I have noticed to my aggravation here before a reply to a comment commonly appears at the foot of other replies thereby making it impossible to tell who is replying to who.
Now this reply to your reply to the long list of replies may appear at the top of that list (Ive seen it happen, where someone said “nice one Ace” to an earlier remark and my remark in response to myself appeared ABOVE that so I could have said ANYTHING and it would have looked like they approved)and then nobody will have a flying frying pan of an idea who is replying to who.
I also find theres something wrong with the coding of this site. EVERY time I load a page or acomment (and I do mean every time) I get a warningsaying there is a slow running script on this site that will jam my PC if I dont agree to stip it, which I usually do).
If other sites prove difficult to load I dont bother with them. Its only the presence of folk like yourself Roy that keeps me coming back.
And of course our hostess herself!
10
Ace-
No matter what I say someone will pick it apart and use it against me. I am not going to “sanitize” my comments. In reality, the Ecos will find something to use in name-calling and ad hominem attacks one way or another. They will tie you to oil (never mind their guys get oil money), they will tie you to conspiracies (while preaching their own conspiracies), they will say you live in your mother’s basement and should get out and learn about nature (a comment leveled against me for disagreeing with someone on another forum). Trying to avoid this is futile. My response to these people is to repeat that the data is all that matters–not who said it, not who paid the people who said it, not if the great-uncle of the person who said once got $1.50 postage paid by Big Oil. We are talking science.
I cannot control what other people think, say or do. I won’t even try.
(I find the same problem with the comment “tree”. At a certain level, there is no reply available and you have to go up a level. It can be confusing.)
10
Ace,
I’ve done the same thing trying to get a comment in the right place to make sense. No offense taken.
If you’re using Internet Explorer I can offer you my sympathy. It has been fixed until it’s permanently broken. I inherited a computer at work when someone left and it had Google Chrome on it. After I got it all set up to use for testing I tried Chrome and it’s lean and fast. It has all the necessary features but it doesn’t lock me up if I do something at a time it doesn’t like. It’s just harmless. Go to google.com and the search start page should offer you a button to install it.
There are other options too but I’ve not used any of them.
00
Sheri, I dont think you understand. Its not “what I say…” that you should be concerned with or what people think of you…its how AGW scepticism as a whole is presented and weak links or loose cannons on deck. My parents generation were taught to repeat a certain expression: “Loose lips sink ships”.
The government psyop mavens who made that up meant it most literally. In ome example, a celebrated psychic was imprisoned (in solitary I believe) for the remainder of the war because she said something at a seance that happenned to coincide with a supposedly secret mission by a navy vessel at that time. An unfortunate “hit” for her but illustrating the importance of not offering what Thatcher later called “comfort to the enemy”. Tens of thousands of people were party to knowledge that had they “loose lips” could have lost the war. Even my humble father, a carpenter, worked on a maximum security project which was crucial to the invasion of France. Had he and his mates gone yapping about it down the pub it would not have helped the war effort (though I dont know if any of them actually knew what they were building, gigantic concrete boxes as far as they were concerned).
When we post comments we arent going to sink any friendly ships cos, we dont have any. EVERYTHING is against us: politicians, media, agitators, The Left, anarchists, fascists, Big Eco corporations, academia, you name it. They have all the ships. All we can sdo is hope to persuade those who have an open mind of just one thing. That they should think twice about AGW.
Thats a big enough task. As you say, the AGW NAZIs will try saying everything, we are oil stooges, we are OLD, we are NUTTERS, we are Deniers, etc, etc, etc….but all of that sounds like what it is, desperate name calling. WHEREAS, as soon as they say AGW sceptics ALSO express disbelief in evolution…then…if people like you keep your loose lips babbling your anti-science crap…WELL THEY WILL BE RIGHT WONT THEY!
So every time you or others rattle off about evolution…thats another how many, hundreds, thousands, maybe more possibly open persuadable minds chilled off and sealed to accepting the AGW narrative, that sceptics are nutters who believe in “intelligent design”. As though God, and God forgive me speaking on His behalf, but as though HE were a bloody plumber or a software designer (and bearing in mind that biology is riddled with flaws that would indicate make any intelligent designer cringe with embarrassment at oversights I dont think The Omniscient can be capable of).
You ARE welcome to doubt evolution, that the pyramids were built by humans or if there were really Moon landings, or anything you like. But if you want to convince others of anything, you have to do it one difficult thing at a time, not try to sell them a total bill of goods. If we want people to re-think AGW then for pity’s sake dont ask them to ALSO reconsider everything else at the sametime.
So, it really doesnt matter what you believe or what people think or say about you, I have no idea who you are and dont give a monkeys. What matters is not helping the enemy. Loose lips float their ships!
Gottit!
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…Sheri, sorry if I seem a bit hot under the collar, but as I say, its not about you or aimed at you. Everything any of us say on these forums is liable to be read by very many more people than actually post such comments.What we say can be cited by anyone. I try always to be mindful of this and find it a let down when others seem not to pay heed to it.
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I can’t really answer much of what you say without “aiding the enemy”. Your “anti-science crap” label is disturbing. I really thought science was about learning and questioning. If we can’t express genuine questions and concerns, I don’t see how we are any different than SkS where you can only quote from the “proper” journals. That’s all I am going to say. If you want further discussion, my email is on my blog (warning: the blog contains materials that you probably will find aiding the enemy-read at your own risk).
And no, I don’t “Gottit”.
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Hi Ace
A good comment above- or below or wherever it ends up.
Many of the issues and concepts appear to be country specific.
For example, here in Australia we have the Left saying that Fracking is evil and should not be used.
I have to agree with them because there is so little consideration given by some mining companies in cahoots with Government to acting cautiously for the good of all that any and all damage is possible.
Locally we have been denied dams by the Left and now they have us significantly dependent on what is effectively filtered ocean water suppressed by rain water runoff (through sandbeds) that means that any Fracking accident could be catastrophic.
Having said that, I’m sure that there are geologically stable situations where fracking could be appropriate.
So locally The Greens and Left are associated with Anti Coal, Anti CO2 and Anti Fracking.
In America , and this is just a superficial media impression , it seems that Obama and left are In Favour of Fracking ? because it “reduces” CO2 pollution?
Have I got that right?
Also with the Evolution and Creationism clash it seems to have originated in the US and doesn’t figure so large here in Australia. There seems to be very very significant religious overtones to the idea of Creationism that are not evident in Australia.
Basically different thing mean different things to different people.
I’m not sure where I was going with all this but I feel it essential to push and shove at politicians of all stripes to make them work for the better good of all: not just the Left or the Right, Labour or Liberal (oz) or Democrat or Republican (USA).
Each of the above groups has good and bad points in their past and any and all will go off the rails towards self interest if the vigilance of voters and taxpayers becomes lax or sloppy.
To this end they will all use the media to control and direct our thoughts.
Be wary.
KK 🙂
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Ace
Have left out comment on the UK because I know you lot are now Governed by The Eurozone head office in Bruxelles and would be very happy if you could actually get a chance to vote on who goes there.
Remember names such as Labour and Tory but apart from that all I know about Britain is that has the same problems with politics that we all have.
Good luck.
KK
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KK…I think Fracking is opposed by the Left everywhere. Its utility doesnt enter into it. They oppose anything that means access to oil. Thus they oppose the XL pipeline even though the same oil will go to China instead. So much of it is posturing identity politics. They need to show themselves to care. Which means they real issues you raise in respect of some locations get drowned out. A real caseof “cry wolf”.
The hard Eco position is to oppose dams as well, the reasons theyve concocted being abstruse. Basically they oppose any realistic method of sustaining industrial society. Because that is their real target. They know damn well no windmills or solar will ever be viable. They offer that as a deception to cover their real intention which is de-industrialisation.
Sheri, you have a blog then you should use it and promote your views and you are welcome to disagree with my distinction between AGW and evolution, that one is pseudo-science and the other is real science. But as I see it if you want to promote one idea you should be tactical about dragging others into it. One thing at a time.
I dont want to be patronising, but I dont think you should publish your e-mail in a context such as this. Who knows who might abuse it. To get at ME even. If someone comes here, reads the above and then sends you an abusive E-mail how would I ever prove it wasnt me? Its like those people who leave their phones laying around untended in public. That means if it gets stolen, everyone who is there gets turned into a suspect. Ones own security affects others too.
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Ace: I promise if someone sends an abusive E-mail with your name on it, you will not be held accountable.
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Oh, and Ace–the email address was a test.
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Cool vids on that website – cheers.
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When something hits that literally bowls people over you get to thinking about your own mortality. Something could get you at any time. There’s no escaping this conclusion. And there is simply no life insurance policy available.
It sounds wonderful to go looking for things flying at us through space at thousands of miles an hour. Something could do real damage. But what can we do about that big one if we do discover it? Absolutely nothing, that’s what.
Needless to point out I think but I’ll do it anyway: The one we knew about did no harm that we know of. The one we didn’t know about actually hurt people and did a lot of property damage. And in neither case could we have prevented anything.
If it misses then it wasn’t there. If it hits I’ll know about it (maybe) and I’ve no choice but to take what comes at me. I want to be spending my money and attention preventing or avoiding dangers I really have a chance to prevent or avoid.
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I know what you mean. At the same time, though, I’d rather not have the massive waste of money, time and effort devoted to CAGW in all its forms. I don’t much care where the money goes instead – if we were to spend it on just about anything, it would be better spent. I want to see the Greens GONE and the green constant bullying-messages (EVERYWHERE nowadays) gone with them. It’s time to stand up and say NO to these people, and keep saying NO until they get the feakin’ message and are kicked out everywhere.
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Amen to that!
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The claim that the probability of a Tunguska like event occurring in the next century is 30% is wrong, and based on a misreading of this article:
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/phenom_jan95.html?c=y&page=1
It says that an event capable of knocking down trees occurs once in every 300 years, or once every 1000 years over land. It does not say how far those trees would be from the point of detonation of the asteroid and how large the asteroid would be.
The Tunguska event was equivalent to a 12 megaton (700 Hiroshima bombs) detonation at an altitude of 6 miles and knocked down trees over an area covering 850 square miles.
If a Tunguska event occurred once every 300 years, the historical record and oral traditions of pre literate cultures would be littered with such events and it is not.
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap071114.html
02
More nonsense. How many people lived in the middle of the Atlantic or Pacific oceans or lots of other places? There is geological evidence for large volcanic explosions that only indirectly and vaguely can be inferred from written history or oral traditions. Oral traditions BTW are worth only the paper they are written on.
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My main point is that the figure of 30% change of a Tunguska like event in the next centuy is based on a misreding of the actual data. I looked that up because skepticism told me that such an event occuring once every 300 years could hardly have escaped notice. And reading of the original article shows that it is indeed a misreading.
Such a meteor landing in the middle of the ocean would have caused a tidal wave that would have made the Japanese or boxing day 2004 disasters look like ripples on a pond.
Catastrophic events have an immense impact on even pre literate societies and become part of the oral tradition. Legends are commonly known by archeologists to be based on very significant historical events, whether the biblical flood stories, (common in middle eastern literature, including the Sumerian Gilgamesh), Atlantis, (the eruption of the island of Santorini in the Mediterranean), the Trojan war,(a preHomeric event passed down by word of mouth) or as Tonyfromoz points out at #9 the Wolf creek crater.
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I don’t think a Tunguska type airburst would cause a tidal wave or tsunami. See American nuclear tests in the Pacific in the 1950s. So most would have gone unnoticed.
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Well here’s what the article says:
“Smaller objects would do catastrophic damage locally. Chris Chyba of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy said that the comet or asteroid that exploded over Siberia in 1908 was about 200 feet across and exploded with the force of 12 megatons of TNT set off six miles above the ground. It blew down all the trees within 850 square miles, an area about the size of Washington, D.C. and neighboring counties. The strength of shock waves required to blow down trees, Chyba pointed out, is that needed to explode frame houses. He estimated that such objects hit Earth about once every 300 years. Over land, he added, it happens once every thousand years.”
Seems clear enough to me.
Ivy Mike was 10 to 12 megatons TNT equivalent and a surface burst. No mention of Pacific wide tsunamis here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivy_Mike
The article also mentions the nuclear method of changing asteroid orbits. Seems to be a good idea to get out there and start learning more about them.
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It is not clear that the author of the article, John P Wiley jr, who is reporting the remarks by Chyba at a conference is not conflating two ideas presented by Chyba,
1. That asteroids causing pressure waves sufficient to knock down trees occur every 300 years (Such events do not have to be as catastrophic as the Tunguska event),
2. The Tunguska event knocked over trees covering an area of 850 square miles.
Chyba may have been saying that Tunguska like events occur every 300 years, but it is not certain from the quoted passage that is what he means. I have tried to find his own direct writings on the subject rather than the second hand report of what he said at a conference, but unfortunately his Nature article, which may have had a reference to the frequency of the event is paywalled.
It is unfortunate that the opinions of the other scientists on this are not canvassed in the article as they are on other impacts.
I was overestimating the tsunami effect of a Tunguska like event, confusing this with the effects of the much larger meteor held responsible for the end of the dinosaurs, but the Nasa link above notes that a Tunguska impact would put coastal cities at risk.
The Castle Brava detonation occurred on an island, which makes comparisons with the tsunami effect of an asteroid impact into the ocean or airbursting six miles up iffy. Nuclear weapons are airburst precisely because they are more destructive than a ground detonation.
I own and have read Richard Rhodes’ book Dark Sun on the development of the H- bomb. Other comparisons with the Castle Bravo test are interesting. The Tunguska event knocked people over at 60 km and blew them into trees at 30 km. The Castle Bravo test was only supposed to be 5 megatons, but a miscalculation meant it “ran away” to 15 megatons. Thus observation ships were much closer (20-30 miles) than they should have been, many of the crews were on deck, and although a number of crew members suffered radiation burns, there are no reports of them being thrown about.
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Mate, when you detonate a 15 megaton nuke on a small atoll you no longer have an atoll. Would it have made any difference detonated on a barge?
The latest estimates I’ve seen of the Chelabysk event are 500 kT equivalent. Fortunately pretty high up as the entry trajectory was shallow. They were lucky. This time.
You have a weird idea of English comprehension.
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A couple of years ago I wrote on here that asteroids were a real problem c.f. CO2 hysteria. Every day asteroids are observed and catalogued. Over 1000 are presently said to be
This according to the site
http://www.spaceweather.com/
You have to remember that asteroids are almost coal black. This is like the Moon. Only the sunlight reflection makes them visible. So they are often only sighted a few days away. In fact, if you follow the site daily you will get a surprise how many are found AFTER they have passed by at a close range.
There are ways to divert asteroids. Probes have visited them and landed on them. But a lot of money would be needed to have a READY system to divert an incoming asteroid of size. This could not be set up in just a few days.
10
That’s a great site Elva. Thanks for posting the link.
00
world bank at work:
16 Feb; AFP: Climate change real economic risk, World Bank tells G20
The president of the World Bank on Saturday warned the finance chiefs of the world’s leading economic powers that global warming is a real risk to the planet and already affecting the world economy in unprecedented ways.
Adressing the G20 finance ministers at their meeting in Moscow, Jim Yong Kim called on the world powers to “tackle the serious challenges presented by climate change.”
“These are not just risks. They represent real consequences,” said Kim, calling the lack of attention to the issue by finance ministers and central bank chiefs “a mistake”…
“Damages and losses from natural disasters have more than tripled over the past 30 years,” said Kim, giving as examples the $45 billion of losses from the 2011 floods in Thailand, whose effects “spread across borders disrupting international supply chains.”
“Years of development efforts are often wiped out in days or even minutes,” Kim said, asking the G20 to “face climate change, which is a very real and present danger.”…
http://www.france24.com/en/20130216-climate-change-real-economic-risk-world-bank-tells-g20
obviously a climate expert:
Wikipedia: Jim Yong Kim…is a Korean-American physician and anthropologist who has been the 12th President of the World Bank since July 1 2012.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Yong_Kim
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It’s a well known fact that magnetic fields increase in strength as temperatures increase. An excellent example of this is the Sun, which is much hotter then earth, has a much stronger magnetic field than earth.
Therefore, as planet earth warms from global warming it’s magnetic field increases in strength thus attracting more meteorites to it in turn causing more impacts with planet earth.
So you see there is a well reasoned argument for claiming global warming is the cause of the Russian impact.
And if you believe this you probably believe anything Al Gore says.
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I am really glad you included the last paragraph.
I was just about to go into attack mode.
20
Nice
Nice
Who else could have written that?
KK 🙂
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Brilliant! Because as Al Gore told us before, the inside of the Earth is millions of degrees innit!
00
Earth accretes hundred of tons of material from space each year.
Earth and other planets in the Solar System formed by, and continue to accrete debris from, the explosion of the Sun five billion years (5 Gyr) ago [e.g., 1-4].
In 1983 Nature finally suggested it was time to to re-examine established dogmas on the formation of the Solar System.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10640850/Demise_of_Dogma-NATURE_303_(1983)_286.pdf
Closed-minded dogma on the Solar System’s origin and source of heat continued until finally exploding as Climategate in 2009
Fred Hoyle and George Orwell were key players on the stage of life when the dogmas were put in place in 1945-46:
http://omanuel.wordpress.com/about/#comment-2204
Those dogmas still dominate modern science.
– Oliver K. Manuel
Former NASA Principal
Investigator for Apollo
http://www.omatumr.com
1. “Xenon in carbonaceous chondrites”, Nature 240, 99-101 (1972): http://www.omatumr.com/archive/XenonInCarbonaceousChondrites.pdf
2. “Strange xenon, extinct super-heavy elements, and the solar neutrino puzzle”, Science 195, 208-209 (1977): http://www.omatumr.com/archive/StrangeXenon.pdf
3. “Isotopes of tellurium, xenon and krypton in the Allende meteorite retain record of nucleosynthesis”, Nature 277, 615-620 (1979): http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v277/n5698/abs/277615a0.html
4. “Solar abundances of the elements”, Meteoritics 18, 209-222 (1983): http://tinyurl.com/224kz4
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What happened to the “Precautionary Principle”? Could have used that with Qld floods too.
Just seems its cherry picked what we have to be cautious about. Me, I worry about the economy. Would love to see the Aussie Gov. exercise a bit of “Precautionary Principle” there and save a few tax dollars rather than spending them before they are even collected.
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This “Precautionary Principle” should be used for this “country destroying” COAL SEAM GAS MINING……….
Aquifers polluted, carcinogenic chemicals released into the wate supply, huge water usage, enormous volums of salt produced etc etc……….
The only message the public gets is the BULLSHIT & LIES from the CSG companies !!
http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/Dear-Coal-Seam-Gas-this-thing-just-isnt-working-out/
http://www.governmentnews.com.au/2013/01/02/article/Coal-Seam-Gas-under-pressure/KHFOQUGBLU
http://voiceofthepeoplelobbygroup.com/2013/february/coal_seam_gas_overview_by_our_en.htm
http://voiceofthepeoplelobbygroup.com/2013/february/details__of__chemicals.htm
Not forgetting……..
DETAILS OF CHEMICALS USED IN FRACKING FLUIDS IN AUSTRALIA FOR COAL SEAM GAS MINING
http://voiceofthepeoplelobbygroup.com/2013/february/details__of__chemicals.htm
And this…….
COAL SEAM GAS – Monk flaming water bore
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMe59e9Lcco&html5=True
02
Enough with the propaganda. Well water near coal bed methane flames on it’s own. Even if it just started “when the coal seam mining” went it, that does not prove CASUALTY. Bad things happen all by themselves.
Mining like this has been going on for decades in the US. All of the sudden, when people learned “chemical=evil” and free water wells and systems could be had, it became a problem. I blame environmental “do-gooders” and a “get rich by suing” mentality.
The chemicals: propanol-used in pharmaceuticals (its an alcohol), butoxyethanol-used in cosmetics, acetic acid–used to rinse fruit so it won’t spoil as easily, ammonium persulfate-hair bleach, boric acid–at one time used as an eye wash on infants (great for canker sores but hard to get sometimes) though not now. Yes, these are truly scary chemicals that should be BANNED everywhere. Ban manufacturing since even nastier chemicals are involved in making the computer you are typing on.
ANYTHING can contaminate water wells. They are not big water bottles in the ground. Any new well, a crack in the casing, etc. Anyone else with a well on the same water table can contaminate the well. The owner can contaminate the well. Just like everything else whiney people believe, it can never just be bad luck that the well is unusable. I am in the very, very sad position that my well casing cracked in an earthquake. I can’t find a lawyer to sue nature, so I’m just flat out stuck. Now, with all this “oil is evil” crap and having lived within 10 miles of an oil field, I could try the “oil company evil bad and should pay route”. On the other hands, maybe it was those pesky wind turbines. All that vibration. Just so many options if I was a whiner……
00
Apophis will be interesting in 2036.
http://www.deepastronomy.com/apophis-asteroid-video.html
20
Thanks Scaper.
in 2029 at 36000 kilometers it could clean up some geosynchronous satellites. The Russians want to put a becon on it.
http://rt.com/news/apophis-radio-beacon-mission-908/
00
An interesting bit on the asteroids from Roy Spencer.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2013/02/exploding-russian-meteor-an-asteroid-fragment/
00
It is obvious to the initiated that asteroid proximity and meteors are caused by AGW ( and probably Tony Abbot ).
10
I think someone out there has just heard Bob Brown’s earthian speech and is throwing rocks at us..
10
Nah, it is the Galactics at their base in the asteroid belt whose job it is to bring the human race to maturity. They are tossing rocks as a warning as we seem to have lost our way after reaching the Moon. It was such a promising start and they want new people to talk to.
Asteroids are Nature’s way of asking “how’s that space program coming along?”
00
‘why are people filming while they drive?’
I know a number of professional drivers (truck companies etc) use digital video recorders that run continuously so they have evidence (in the event of an accident) of just how stupid the driver of the vehicle in front had been..
People often edit/collate these, put together the ‘best-of-bad-drivers’ and post them on YouTube..
eg. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtHzaeTpYB0
10
“The chance of another Tunguska-size impact somewhere on Earth this century is about 30%. ”
Might have already happened for all we know. Could have landed someplace in the Pacific or Antarctica with nobody around to see/hear it.
20
Is there a reasonable way to estimate the tsunami that might be generated by a Tunguska magnitude hit in the middle of the Pacific or Atlantic?
The question of mass vs. velocity comes to mind. If it comes in faster it does as much damage as a slower but more massive object as a general rule. But I think hitting water would change this dynamic. Anything coming in is accelerated by Earth’s gravity at the same rate, no matter its mass. But what do we have to tell us about the velocity it already had before it became “fatally attracted”?
Then there’s angle of incidence to consider.
I couldn’t resist the pun. But the question is serious.
10
A close encounter /cum closest approach Check out to know more about Asteroid DA14 :-http://vikramadittya.wordpress.com/2013/02/15/close-encounterapproach-with-meteorite-da14/
11
[…] Russia. There was even a fireball over San Francisco Friday night. JoNova asks a good question: are we watching for the next one? Someday, one of these is going to come down in a populated area, with horrific casualties likely. […]
00
Damn 21st century pessimism. We can do something about space rocks and we should — soon, before we lose a city or the lot.
20
Yes, it’s a real danger. But humans have been “exploring space” for over 50 years and we don’t have anything even close to what it would take to reliably detect all the incoming stuff, much less have we any way to destroy or even divert something if we had to. And I see rather incredible difficulty to get to where we could stop the loss of a city.
Setting pessimism aside for a moment, if you think we can do it would you please elaborate and tell us all what your proposal is? 🙂
00
An interesting read about the asteroid from Mr Bolt……..
Unlike warming, a real danger from the heavens:-
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/unlike_warming_a_real_danger_from_the_heavens/
11
Well never mind global warming, if you want to really save the planet, this week is the week to make your pitch!
Seems every scientist and her dog is now talking up ideas for preventing the next Asteroid Armageddon.
e.g one Guardian article “Scientists unveil new detectors in race to save Earth from next asteroid“:
I like the DSI proposal. It could be privately funded and operated because it may expand mineral rights into space. And it can save the planet regardless of whether it makes money for its investors.
00
DSI’s little spacecraft are called “Fireflies”. Seriously cool! Fans of the TV series and Serenity will know what I mean.
10
So to summarise this post by analogy, “Why should I give up smoking when I could be killed in a car accident at any time?”
02
It’s more: “Why should I buy nicotine gum at six thousand times the price of a defensive driving course – when I have never smoked.”
50
Superb.
20
Robert and Andrew
It is, and I’m just reading it over and over to make sure it is what I think it might be.
KK 🙂
10
Saint Brookes…what makes you think you need to be killed by a car? Arent you going to die otherwise? You are immortal already issit!
20
What is it with you global warming scam sympathisers and making analogies about smoking?
Can’t you come up with something original? The smoking analogy is completely worn out.
20
“Fly by the seat of your pants” risk assessment or are have you compared smoking versus traffic deaths? For you personally, it could be true. You said you ride a bike and in bike versus car, bike loses most of the time. Still, an actual count of both sets of numbers would be good. Accurate risk assessment is such an uncommon thing. (It’s very useful in this asteroid discussion.)
10
Gee whiz! Why do accurate risk assessment when you can just jump in head first and create a whole new cottage industry that will live forever?
Think about it. If the global warming industry had done accurate risk assessment there wouldn’t be a global warming industry. Then what would we have to worry about?
So let’s take the plunge one more time. After all, it’s only money.
10
Is it possible that with enough political interference, scientific fraud and media complicity we can convince about half the population that global warming is attracting these asteroids towards us.
Seriously though, if you can convince people that you can catastrophically heat the planet with more of a type of gas you can convince most people of anything.
Hey Maxine? What do you think? Are rocks the fault of people?
10
Bill Nye the science guy assured us global warming is not causing the asteroids to come close to earth. That settles it.
10
I would find it remotely funny if we were hit by a serious asteroid.
At least we would be saved from global warming!
10
It looks like the UN heard ya Jo.
00