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What the hell is going on with the weather!!

Sh!t if worse comes to worse we'll just live in domes and never worry about rain, snow, or hail :p Only thing I'll miss is football games in muddy terrain :( I don't think this is a huge deal. I'd keep an eye on it but I wouldn't lose sleep over it. We've all been scared to monumental proportions before and sh!t has been as bad bad as they said. Remember the Y2K scare ? Such a big fuss and nothing happened.

BTW, let's fix our border's, public schools, and the cluster fvck in Iraq and Afghanistan because if we don't then the possibility of global warming will be minor in comparison.
 
Iron Warrior said:
Sh!t if worse comes to worse we'll just live in domes and never worry about rain, snow, or hail :p Only thing I'll miss is football games in muddy terrain :( I don't think this is a huge deal. I'd keep an eye on it but I wouldn't lose sleep over it. We've all been scared to monumental proportions before and sh!t has been as bad bad as they said. Remember the Y2K scare ? Such a big fuss and nothing happened.

BTW, let's fix our border's, public schools, and the cluster fvck in Iraq and Afghanistan because if we don't then the possibility of global warming will be minor in comparison.
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Without a life sustaining planet......
Its not that hard to cut down on emissions.
 
The planet will always be fine...even if the climate gets bad enough to wipe us out, another species will take our place.
 
BigVrunga said:
The planet will always be fine...even if the climate gets bad enough to wipe us out, another species will take our place.
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That's true, the planet will eventually rebound and then eventually be consumed in a cosmic orgasm or fire. But I think it's important that we look at things on a human time scale. Think not only of the future that you must live in, but the future of your offspring generations down the road.

Funny thing is, about the decimation of the planet, is that little of it has anything to do with the average person. I read a stat the other day about water usage. Now we all know that there is very little drinkable water (in comparison to total water) on this planet--and more and more is being contaminated--but ~90% of a state's water usage is actually used by industry (paper mills, car manufacture, etc). The remaining 10% is then divided up by commercial (car-washes, golf courses, etc) and residential usage (showers, drinking, you know...). So municipal water sources are thought to make up ~5% of a state's total water usage. That trend seems to be in every facet of pollution where the VAST majority is perpetrated by industry. It just kind of annoys me to know this fact and yet "the people" are always the ones called upon to reduce water usage or electricity usage while their contribution to resource usage is just about nill compared to industry. That is what I call ****ed up!
 
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That is ****ed up! Also quite alarming that the modern world has been industrialized for what, only ~150 years? And already we're looking at serious consequences.

Like I mentioned before though, serious steps arent going to be taken until we have to recover from a serious catastrophe. It just seems to be the way humans are. Look at the World Trade Center attacks and 9/11? How many years did we have to put an end to terrorist bull****? No one did anything about it until we got bit in the ass.

BV
 
Its always been the same the people with the money make the decisions, if the people dont like it, the powerful lie and people buy it. terrorism is by no way dealt with, its worse than ever and will continue to gain popularity. the only thing that has changed is peoples sensitivity to it. Daily many lives are lost we just stopped listening/speaking about it.
 
Hey, you're not the only ones who fear the return of Marduk and Enlil. But maybe a modern Gligamesh will protect us. :ntome:
 
Aeternitatis said:
That's true, the planet will eventually rebound and then eventually be consumed in a cosmic orgasm or fire. But I think it's important that we look at things on a human time scale. Think not only of the future that you must live in, but the future of your offspring generations down the road.

Funny thing is, about the decimation of the planet, is that little of it has anything to do with the average person. I read a stat the other day about water usage. Now we all know that there is very little drinkable water (in comparison to total water) on this planet--and more and more is being contaminated--but ~90% of a state's water usage is actually used by industry (paper mills, car manufacture, etc). The remaining 10% is then divided up by commercial (car-washes, golf courses, etc) and residential usage (showers, drinking, you know...). So municipal water sources are thought to make up ~5% of a state's total water usage. That trend seems to be in every facet of pollution where the VAST majority is perpetrated by industry. It just kind of annoys me to know this fact and yet "the people" are always the ones called upon to reduce water usage or electricity usage while their contribution to resource usage is just about nill compared to industry. That is what I call ****ed up!
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I absolutely agree. So much credence and attention is given to the Primary Input-Output ratio of Petroleum and its products, and not even so much of a cursory thought is given to the use of fresh water. Society as a whole, as in the totality of industry and populus, takes for granted the amount of water needed to produce practical use products. Whilst Politicians and and the 'average Joe' clammor for alternative fuel sources (which, ironically enough, have a poorer primary input-output ratio than Gasoline at this stage), they simultaneously take for granted the one element absolutely required to sustain life.

Here is a biased, though informative, link on the water input ratio for common products

Invalid Link Removed
 
Mulletsoldier said:
I absolutely agree. So much credence and attention is given to the Primary Input-Output ratio of Petroleum and its products, and not even so much of a cursory thought is given to the use of fresh water. Society as a whole, as in the totality of industry and populus, takes for granted the amount of water needed to produce practical use products. Whilst Politicians and and the 'average Joe' clammor for alternative fuel sources (which, ironically enough, have a poorer primary input-output ratio than Gasoline at this stage), they simultaneously take for granted the one element absolutely required to sustain life.

Here is a biased, though informative, link on the water input ratio for common products

Invalid Link Removed
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What do you mean by input-output ratio?
The ratio of pounds of water per pount of mogas produced??

Theoretically, a refinery shouldn't really use water. They'll recycle it around in cooling towers and use it to make steam, condense the steam, separate from hydrocarbon if said steam is used in a steam stripper (you don't want water in your gas....), and make more steam. The material balance of water in a refinery should be pretty good I would think.
 
jmh80 said:
What do you mean by input-output ratio?
The ratio of pounds of water per pount of mogas produced??

Theoretically, a refinery shouldn't really use water. They'll recycle it around in cooling towers and use it to make steam, condense the steam, separate from hydrocarbon if said steam is used in a steam stripper (you don't want water in your gas....), and make more steam. The material balance of water in a refinery should be pretty good I would think.
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As in Input of the primary resource (in this case water) to the amount of product produced, or conversely, amount of energy able to be used by the final product.
 
I suppose you could make the case that water is the primary component to make on-spec gasoline with regard to steam usage in distillation towers. (I.E. without boilerfeed water to make steam to power the reboilers in the columns, you couldn't separate the wrong molecules out of the gasoline pool.)

But - there are so many other aspects to the production of gasoline that it's hard for me to think of water as the most important.

That is a good way to think of different forms of energy though - that is comparing apples to apples (by using a ratio). There is some data out there that ethanol acutally uses energy than it is able to provide to an engine (whereas gasoline gives more energy than takes to make a gallon of it).
 
BTW, I read an article a couple weeks that said the Navy had succesfully replicated the mysterious Cold Fusion. Honestly, this kinda scares me. If it's true, then cold fusion lends a nearly infinite supply of energy to the world... which will drastically speed up our self-annihilation.

I was one of the ones that looked forward to the end of oil. I was hoping that the end of such an abudant and easy energy source would spell the end of civilization. Well, aside from the fact that new studies suggest oil is actually a renewable resources (hmmm), now there's the real possibility of cold fusion. So much for my dreams.
 
Are you serious Aet????

I thought that was practially impossible to do on Earth (but would work in space on a shuttle - or something).
 
jmh80 said:
I suppose you could make the case that water is the primary component to make on-spec gasoline with regard to steam usage in distillation towers. (I.E. without boilerfeed water to make steam to power the reboilers in the columns, you couldn't separate the wrong molecules out of the gasoline pool.)

But - there are so many other aspects to the production of gasoline that it's hard for me to think of water as the most important.

That is a good way to think of different forms of energy though - that is comparing apples to apples (by using a ratio). There is some data out there that ethanol acutally uses energy than it is able to provide to an engine (whereas gasoline gives more energy than takes to make a gallon of it).
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Here is, roughly, the useful energy output compared to energy input of Gasoline:

The ratio of useful energy output to the total energy input.
E.g. Internal combustion engine in car

Energy in 1 litre of gas: 6500 kcal

Energy output from engine
consuming 1 litre of gas: 1300 kcal

Energy efficiency: 1300 = 0.20 = 20%
6500

Ethanol's is slightly better, though it still has a negative ratio, obviously. Simply because of thermodynamics you are never going to be able to have a 100% ratio, as energy degrades from useful to less useful forms (but I suppose that may now change because of this Cold Fusion business), however the key to Sustainable Development is matching energy sources. Such as, using Wind or Solar power to heat a living space, and Electricity for Industrial Welding.
 
I was one of the ones that looked forward to the end of oil. I was hoping that the end of such an abudant and easy energy source would spell the end of civilization. Well, aside from the fact that new studies suggest oil is actually a renewable resources (hmmm), now there's the real possibility of cold fusion. So much for my dreams.
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Why do you want civilization to end? For all the things that suck about modern humanity, there's plenty of cool stuff too. Stuff that would disappear if we were suddenly thrust into MadMax-type anarchy and turmoil.

BV
 
Well, hell - if we are headed to Mad Max and the Thunder Dome here in the next few years, I'm gonna start making a run to sleep with as many Playboy models as I can now - because I'm not Alpha enough to live long in the Mad Max environment.
 
Well, hell - if we are headed to Mad Max and the Thunder Dome here in the next few years, I'm gonna start making a run to sleep with as many Playboy models as I can now - because I'm not Alpha enough to live long in the Mad Max environment.
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Na, it would be OK. Everyone from AM.com could build a fortress around the Nutraplanet warehouse. We'll lift all week and party all weekend, and destroy all who oppose us.:)

BV
 
If we can just get JBlaze back to the board - he'd save the day!!!

And then provide mascara and lipstick for us all.
 
Mulletsoldier said:
Ethanol's is slightly better, though it still has a negative ratio, obviously. Simply because of thermodynamics you are never going to be able to have a 100% ratio, as energy degrades from useful to less useful forms (but I suppose that may now change because of this Cold Fusion business), however the key to Sustainable Development is matching energy sources. Such as, using Wind or Solar power to heat a living space, and Electricity for Industrial Welding.
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To an extent, but sustainable development is an oxymoron. There is much more to the equation than just energy. One simply cannot continue to extract resources and release pollutants indefinitely. The only thing that would make development sustainable is either a drastice drop in population (let's say approx. 4-5 billion people killed off as per our government's own recommendations) or some super technology like a replicator... but as far as I know replicators won't be available until at least the year 2400.
 
BigVrunga said:
Why do you want civilization to end? For all the things that suck about modern humanity, there's plenty of cool stuff too. Stuff that would disappear if we were suddenly thrust into MadMax-type anarchy and turmoil.

BV
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I doubt anarchy would look like Mad-Max. But the reason is because, honestly, I hate the modern world. I've had a few tastes of what it is like to live like an Indian before the settlers came to America, and it is a sweet life. Very sweet. But this really is nothing new. When you read the records from back with the wars between the US gov. and the Indians, you'll find that many white people that became "prisoners" of the Indians, did not want to return to their society when liberated by other whites. There are stories of men having to be dragged away from their Indian "captors" because they wouldn't leave willfully... and eventually many of those men ran away from their society to re-join the Indians. Eventually a law was passed that made this kind of behavior punishable by death because too many whites were choosing to live the free Indian life-style.

As an interesting piece of WA history, you can see how the gov. layed out detailed plans of genocide to eradicate the Indians from various files during the early 1900's. One of the most effective things they did was to build damns on major rivers in WA therefore choking out the salmon and Indian's most important food source.
 
BigVrunga said:
Na, it would be OK. Everyone from AM.com could build a fortress around the Nutraplanet warehouse. We'll lift all week and party all weekend, and destroy all who oppose us.:)

BV
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Boo yah! Like savages. :good:
 
I doubt anarchy would look like Mad-Max. But the reason is because, honestly, I hate the modern world. I've had a few tastes of what it is like to live like an Indian before the settlers came to America, and it is a sweet life. Very sweet. But this really is nothing new. When you read the records from back with the wars between the US gov. and the Indians, you'll find that many white people that became "prisoners" of the Indians, did not want to return to their society when liberated by other whites. There are stories of men having to be dragged away from their Indian "captors" because they wouldn't leave willfully... and eventually many of those men ran away from their society to re-join the Indians. Eventually a law was passed that made this kind of behavior punishable by death because too many whites were choosing to live the free Indian life-style.

As an interesting piece of WA history, you can see how the gov. layed out detailed plans of genocide to eradicate the Indians from various files during the early 1900's. One of the most effective things they did was to build damns on major rivers in WA therefore choking out the salmon and Indian's most important food source.
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I dont doubt it one bit man. The amount of separation between most modern humans and nature is downright alarming. The sad thing is, we still can have all this cool modern technology and not destroy the planet at the same time. Its just easier to rape and pillage - and because humans by nature take the path of least resistance...well we're all headed for the universal **** pile.

BV
 
Aeternitatis said:
To an extent, but sustainable development is an oxymoron. There is much more to the equation than just energy. One simply cannot continue to extract resources and release pollutants indefinitely. The only thing that would make development sustainable is either a drastice drop in population (let's say approx. 4-5 billion people killed off as per our government's own recommendations) or some super technology like a replicator... but as far as I know replicators won't be available until at least the year 2400.
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True, there exists more variables in the equation, however it can eventually be boiled down to energy efficiency. Pollution, for example, is merely inefficient ways of accomplishing a task, the waste is a byproduct of that inefficiency.

Although I can see your point as S.D being an oxymoron, and be that as it may, it is a goal which we must work to obtain. As you stated, neither of those solutions (completely revolutionary technology/massive population drop) are going to present themselves anytime soon. As development is obviously not going to travel in a negative fashion, we must find ways in which to balance Environment, Economy and Society. Despite your disdain for modern existence, these entities of our societies do not necessarily have to be exclusively conflictual.
 
The thing we have to come to terms with is that our very infrastructure and way of life relies on taking massive amounts of resources from an outside source. So, in order for us to continue to American Way of Life (or that which 1st worlders live), someone or something will have to be pressed into subjugation. High tech cities--a cornerstone of modern cicivlation--produce nothing that keeps people alive, ie, food, water, clean air. So, these most necessary resources must be taken from somewhere else and more often than not, this "harvesting" is through coersion or pure force.

For example, back in like the 1970's a massive fruit distributor--today it's one of the big one's Dole or Del Monte--suddenly ran into a problem when a heavy fruit producing country is S. America said, "You know, we aren't going to grow food just for export to the US anymore. We want to rely on ourselves and grow food for our own country." The desires of the people were backed by the gov. there, and suddenly the big international fruit distributor lost a major source. ...and then they complained about it to the US gov.

So the USA goes into this country and overthrows the elected governement and plants their own hand picked regulators who are basically stooges for the fruit company. By this they put new laws into place and basically forced the country to once again grow fruit for export to the USA and other first world nations.

Sorry some of the facts aren't clear, I'm trying to find them right now but my books and papers are all over the place. I'll come back later with more details.
 
Oh, I completely agree. Rather than illiterate here, take a look at this link:

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Where I am arguing exactly the thing you are now. The historical context of Western development is exactly why attention needs to be payed to Sustainable Development. The actions of lobbyists, environmentalists, activists, etc., are not going to change the fundamental principles on which Western Society operates, I realize this. However, practical application in these fields is not beyond our reach.
 
Aeternitatis said:
The thing we have to come to terms with is that our very infrastructure and way of life relies on taking massive amounts of resources from an outside source. So, in order for us to continue to American Way of Life (or that which 1st worlders live), someone or something will have to be pressed into subjugation. High tech cities--a cornerstone of modern cicivlation--produce nothing that keeps people alive, ie, food, water, clean air. So, these most necessary resources must be taken from somewhere else and more often than not, this "harvesting" is through coersion or pure force.

For example, back in like the 1970's a massive fruit distributor--today it's one of the big one's Dole or Del Monte--suddenly ran into a problem when a heavy fruit producing country is S. America said, "You know, we aren't going to grow food just for export to the US anymore. We want to rely on ourselves and grow food for our own country." The desires of the people were backed by the gov. there, and suddenly the big international fruit distributor lost a major source. ...and then they complained about it to the US gov.

So the USA goes into this country and overthrows the elected governement and plants their own hand picked regulators who are basically stooges for the fruit company. By this they put new laws into place and basically forced the country to once again grow fruit for export to the USA and other first world nations.

Sorry some of the facts aren't clear, I'm trying to find them right now but my books and papers are all over the place. I'll come back later with more details.
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I think the sequel is out too!!
 
lmao... I was wondering who would recognize it. One of the best books on the environment and society I've ever read... heck, one of the best books I've ever read in ANY genre.
 
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