M.I. Lastman's Blog, page 22
January 19, 2015
Aforementioned: aphorisms and questions for 2015
Science imagines things: Digital immortality.
And where will that be Mr. Kurzweill?
Information is not immaterial.
Will your digitized self escape the gravity of the Earth, or live on past the destruction of the biosphere?
And where will that be Mr. Kurzweill?
Information is not immaterial.
Will your digitized self escape the gravity of the Earth, or live on past the destruction of the biosphere?
January 18, 2015
Aforementioned: aphorisms and questions for2015
Jan. 18 Science imagines things: Meet the energy needs and feed 9 billion American - style humans. Yeah right! And where will anything non-human live?
Here is one of many articles that tackle this issue. They all have one thing in common: the only thing that matters is human welfare. Good luck.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/can-we-feed-the-world/
Here is one of many articles that tackle this issue. They all have one thing in common: the only thing that matters is human welfare. Good luck.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/can-we-feed-the-world/
Aforementioned: aphorisms and questions for2015
Jan. 17 Science imagines things: Win the microbe race.
Generations for microbes = 120 per day
Generations for humans = 3 times per century
Some microbial life could potentially evolve one million, four hundred and forty-five thousand, four hundred times faster than humans. Science is teaching them how.
Terrible odds - We’re loosing.
Generations for microbes = 120 per day
Generations for humans = 3 times per century
Some microbial life could potentially evolve one million, four hundred and forty-five thousand, four hundred times faster than humans. Science is teaching them how.
Terrible odds - We’re loosing.
January 16, 2015
Aforementioned: Aphorisms and Questions for 2015
Science imagines things:
Control evolution in our own interest (man’s) And what does God have to say about this? Was Nature asked? Were you asked?
George McDonald Church and Ed Regis - two very nice guys - have written a book about this.
They see no reason to ask God, Nature, or you. Everyone should read Regenesis and think about what it would mean for terminally destructive mankind to control evolution.
http://www.regenesisthebook.com/
Control evolution in our own interest (man’s) And what does God have to say about this? Was Nature asked? Were you asked?
George McDonald Church and Ed Regis - two very nice guys - have written a book about this.
They see no reason to ask God, Nature, or you. Everyone should read Regenesis and think about what it would mean for terminally destructive mankind to control evolution.
http://www.regenesisthebook.com/
January 15, 2015
Aforementioned: aphorisms and questions for 2015
Science imagines things.
Dam the rising oceans.
Yeah right! Long live the Netherlands, New York City, the Maldives, southern Florida, etc. etc. etc. http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/09/rising-seas/if-ice-melted-map
Dam the rising oceans.
Yeah right! Long live the Netherlands, New York City, the Maldives, southern Florida, etc. etc. etc. http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/09/rising-seas/if-ice-melted-map
January 14, 2015
Aforementioned: aphorisms and questions for 2015
Science wishes things. Geo-technology to draw down the greenhouse gasses from the atmosphere. This is about as difficult to actually bring off as greening the Red Planet or getting to a superhabitable earth any time soon. For the pessimistic view, read the great Australian ecologist Tim Flannery, The Weather Makers, chapter 27, engineering solutions
http://www.amazon.com/The-Weather-Makers-Changing-Climate/dp/0802142923
For a good synopsis of this argument you might go here:
http://www.treehugger.com/corporate-responsibility/important-why-carbon-sequestration-wont-save-us.html
Flannery doesn't really believe that geo-engineering holds much promise. The trouble that he overlooks is that with the greenhouse gasses that we have already released into the atmosphere, with our continually mounting energy mounting demands per capitata, and our rapidly increasing population the atmosphere will continue to warm dramatically and the storehouses of frozen methane will be released into the skies and the oceans with a terminal result for life on earth. Let us imagine that by a miracle of human determination, likely engendered by sheer terror, we succeed in halting the release of greenhouse gasses to the atmosphere from energy sources; let us say that our population has begun to fall; let us say that we have given up on most of our artificial energy demands all by the year 2030 - in other words, no new anthropogenic green house gasses. Even then the atmosphere and the oceans would continue to warm and the release of the methane would be unstoppable. Those who die in that year would die knowing that they had left to their grandchildren(our great grand children the horrors of the final collapse of the biosphere. That is not something that Tim Flannery or James Hansen, for example, would deny. Given the degree of certainty that this suggests, I can't see how we can avoid talking openly about geo-engineering.
Probably, the only feasible solution we will find is one that enhances Nature's own processes: vast, stable green-growth on land and sea, along with soil and sea bed sequestration. Nature does not provide quick fixes. We need to start now.
http://www.treehugger.com/corporate-responsibility/important-why-carbon-sequestration-wont-save-us.html
Flannery doesn't really believe that geo-engineering holds much promise. The trouble that he overlooks is that with the greenhouse gasses that we have already released into the atmosphere, with our continually mounting energy mounting demands per capitata, and our rapidly increasing population the atmosphere will continue to warm dramatically and the storehouses of frozen methane will be released into the skies and the oceans with a terminal result for life on earth. Let us imagine that by a miracle of human determination, likely engendered by sheer terror, we succeed in halting the release of greenhouse gasses to the atmosphere from energy sources; let us say that our population has begun to fall; let us say that we have given up on most of our artificial energy demands all by the year 2030 - in other words, no new anthropogenic green house gasses. Even then the atmosphere and the oceans would continue to warm and the release of the methane would be unstoppable. Those who die in that year would die knowing that they had left to their grandchildren(our great grand children the horrors of the final collapse of the biosphere. That is not something that Tim Flannery or James Hansen, for example, would deny. Given the degree of certainty that this suggests, I can't see how we can avoid talking openly about geo-engineering.
Probably, the only feasible solution we will find is one that enhances Nature's own processes: vast, stable green-growth on land and sea, along with soil and sea bed sequestration. Nature does not provide quick fixes. We need to start now.
Aforementioned: aphorisms and questions for 2015
Jan. 13 Science imagines things: Superhabitable planets http://www.astrobio.net/news-exclusive/super-habitable-world-may-exist-near-earth/ We can get to them anytime within the next 1000 years? And we can get to them in time to save ourselves from the total destruction that we and our science are brewing at home? Easter Island?
Aforementioned: aphorisms for 2015
Jan. 12 Science imagines things. @GreeningMars We can do this without destroying life on earth in the process? http://goo.gl/Vt45xP
And we can get this done anytime soon? Will it be in time to save ourselves from the total destruction that we and our science are brewing back home? Will there be palm beaches on Mars? How about ski resorts? Easter Island?
And we can get this done anytime soon? Will it be in time to save ourselves from the total destruction that we and our science are brewing back home? Will there be palm beaches on Mars? How about ski resorts? Easter Island?
January 13, 2015
Aforementioned: aphorisms and questions for 2015
Jan. 11 Science imagines things: Astro-biology Except for keeping ourselves entertained , this is good for what?
