Gila makes a very valid point.
The other stuff, yeah, but that specific paragraph, methinks that was a TAD out of line. If it was someone else saying that you could bet their ass would be grass.
I dunno about that. Ren was making some pretty absurd statements.
Originally posted by MegamanX2K
Does anyone else besides me think that’s dangerously close to flaming? If not flaming?
Its not flaming because its true. It was unbacked, unscientific, opinionated bullshit which he was advertising as fact. Telling someone to shut up for spouting mindless propaganda and telling em its annoying is not flaming unless your threshold is the side of a split honey roasted peanut.
Flaming would’ve been more personal and a whole lot more directed to him as a person than at his inexistent argument. Flaming is going “you stupid god damn mother fucking piece of shit dripping out of an asshole, get the fuck off this fucking message board, you turd. We don’t need the disgusting half digested diarrhea dribbling from the sewage pipe hanging off that excuse for a fucking mouth of yours. FUCK YOU”. NOW THAT would’ve been good flaming. Saying please shut the fuck up, you’re annoying, is nowhere as bad as what we’ve let countless people, even yourself, slide for.
The reason the paragraph wasn’t out of line is that the previous statements were directed at statements in general and the final paragraph wrapped things up in terms of what was wrong with his argument in the first place. Very little personal attack ended up being done in the particular quote you pointed out. Not being politically correct doesn’t qualify as flaming.
Oh and I made a mistake. I wrote trillion when I meant billion. I was thinking of the creation of the universe for some reason o_O
:too bad; Sin took the fun out of this thread ;_; :too bad; :too bad;
There. Unfortunately you can only read it on your computer after buying this stuff online. I suggest going somewhere else and buying them in paper. I subscribe and I have these in paper. I read them whole. In the first one you will see an article on the possibility of “adubating” phytoplankton in order to make it absorb more carbon from air. In the second one, GM introduces you to the hydrogen fueled cars.
You people tell me I don’t post my sources, but you guys didn’t too. I tire of being flamed and considered to be always wrong without further thinking from your part simply because I am not being biased towards plants’ well-being.
Just because you read it in a magazine doesn’t mean it is 100% accurate. That’s crap about hydrogen cars being cleaner. Using logic and basic knoweledge of chemistry you can point out a significant flaw.
To begin: If people get serious about hydrogen cars, we will need a significant supply of hydrogen to run them. If not, the difference will be minimal and we can just stop there. Since hydrogen isn’t there waiting for us to pump it of the earth, we have to produce by breaking down other compounds in large quantities.
Chances are high that the #1 source will be water. In the reaction powering the car, one of the waste products will be water. Here comes a basic chemistry idea: the change in energy in the reaction 2 H20 -> 2 H2 + 02 = the opposite of the change in energy in the reaction 2 H2 + O2 -> 2 H20. Simple enough?
Now, since the second reaction is powering the motion of a car, and on both ends a decent amount of energy is lost (as heat, light, etc.), According to the law of conservation of energy, the difference has to be made up somewhere. And it will be made up in the first reaction, and the energy will likely come from fossil fuels, similar to what now powers most automotives. Unless of course the oil industries for some reason allow solar, hydro, wind, or nuclear power to be used (this I find very unlikely until the wells go dry). So hydrogen powered cars don’t really do too much to help the environment, they only move the source of the pollution to a concentrated location as opposed to more dispersed but ubiquitous pollution.
Dude, I know it’s not clean. Hydrogen came into the thread when I said hydro cell making generates O2 as a side product. I never said it would be clean. This makes me think you didn’t even read my previous posts.
I did, but I prefer to point out fallacies that I can back up. I have no knoweledge on that use algee to generate enough air to breathe idea. I know it’s bogus, but can’t prove it, hence I don’t say anything about it and make myself look like an idiot.
Edit: and it was more a demonstration to show that you shouldn’t believe everything imediately. Some people will leave out major facts if it will help their argument. I know I do.
My sources: Biology 5th ed. by Solomon, Berg, Martin. A variety of university professors such as Drs Micheal Rose and Art Weis, Chemistry, 8th edition by Brown, LeMay, Bursten. Organic Chemistry 4th, Micheal Loudon. Most importantly: common sense and a skeptical approach to how to solve the worlds problems (ie not hoping they’ll go away through some miracle of God in the future). Refuting whatever claims you have is very easy because all I need is to fetch common undergraduate biology and chemistry books to slam your argument into the ground. Now, if I really wanted to, I could go in my university’s databases and extract research papers, but that would take a fucking long time and considering how basically wrong your assumptions are, useless.
The only way that hydrogen fuel production becomes practical is if it doesn’t cost other forms of fuel to make it. See, energy is lost when you do those kinds of reaction, so making a lot of hydrogen, you’d waste a lot of fuel in the process. That’s why you need renewable sources of power like wind and solar, which of course, is good, but not the fastest way to go, esp considering our energetic needs. If the demand is too high (I would cry if they made H2 powered SUVs -_- - though at least they’d “polute” less), and production is still pretty hard, then we’ll have another interesting problem with H2 powered cars: the cost of fuel. Notice how people freak when the cost of gasoline goes up a nickel. Heh. H2 powered cars are somewhere in the future, just not near the immediate future for A LOT of reasons.Also, keep in mind, certain magazines that aren’t research journals kinda try to sex things up a bit to get make some sales.
“Again, I believe 90% of the oxygen we breath comes from phytoplankton. There is a lot of data on that. Some say it is responsible for 50% of the oxygen generated by photosynthesis, some say 70%, some say 90% and so on. This is still a lot of discussion on this. Pick one. I stay with those who say 90.”
1- You have therefore absolutely no basis in your argument since all it is is an opinion based on facts which you don’t know of.
2- SURE!!! Creatures DID generate all the oxygen which we’re breathing right now - BILLIONS of years ago, when the Earth’s atmosphere was transformed by stuff like CYANOBACTERIA! Nowadays, the oxygen we breath is the oxygen readily available. Plants serve more of a role as a carbon sink, not an oxygen generator. As I said earlier, considering how stable the amount of oxygen is in the atmosphere considering the atmosphere fills up miles of space around the entire Earth, we don’t really have a “shortage” of oxygen. Its the other stuff we don’t want, like CO2, because that is adding NEW modifiers to a system, modifying the atmosphere. Its easier to plug stuff in than take stuff out when you’re dealing with quantities of stuff as immense as the atmosphere.
"That said, for the subject of greenhouse, my belief is that we could cope with the loss of all plants despite all the damage. I’m not imposing a truth here and I don’t discard the possibility that we might all die because of it, but I think we would survive through the losses. "
Another science fiction belief. No plants = no basis for all other higher organisms to survive. They gather energy from the sun via photosynthesis, which is then convereted into different forms of energy like glucose and vitamins, which we then use to power and build our system. Sure we could kinda generate energy to make industrial glucose HYPOTHETICALLY, but right now we can’t and its not worth the trouble because of how incredibly complicated it is. Anyone who’s taken organic chemistry knows that forming carbon rings and plugging stuff onto them requires a decent amount of energy. Plants have “enzymes” and that kinda shit to help em along. Labs aren’t always the best way to go, esp when nature already has a way to do it. Without plants, the atmosphere world wide would probably start looking like Mexico City within a short amount of time because the CO2 from the highly productive areas will spread and start contaminating other places. The Chernobyl accident’s radioactive particles ended up in Europe, for example.
And as a note, I don’t need to ask my dad about how the hydrogen stuff works. Its not that complex and I already learned about it. The thing is, you finally said something right in another paragraph: our current fuel sources are inadequate and will run out. When, I don’t know though. However, that’s not the point. People will still need electricity and they won’t use electricity for their homes via burning hydrogen because that would be inefficient since making hydrogen is not a 1:1 ratio of hydrogen to solar or wind power that is used to make the hydrogen.
" This is about the only one in which I might be dreaming, but nowadays saying that creating food out of minerals is impossible is being like those people from some centuries ago who said that machines heavier than air would never fly. It is perfectly possible to recombinate atoms, and the only thing keeping us from creating sugar out of coal and water is the obscene cost involved. However, as technology (in this case, specially nanotech) develops, we get more fine and efficient control over such things. It will eventually be possible, and when it is, if it isn’t common it’s because there is another better way to make sugar."
Yes it is a dream and depending on dreams in the future is foolish. Because we can dream is no excuse to not do things which we can do right now so we don’t have to only resort to that dream in the future IF it comes. I already addressed the problem with making nutrients. Take an ochem class with an ochem lab, you’ll see how hard and demanding making organic (carbon based) compounds is.
Originally posted by Sinistral
Oh and I made a mistake. I wrote trillion when I meant billion. I was thinking of the creation of the universe for some reason o_O
Big Bang happened “only” 13.5 billion years ago. Trillions of years have never happened. Just FYI.
On the subject of environmentalism…you folks should all talk to my friend, the Objectivist. He’s fun. All things should serve man (phrased differently), so we should have no compunction about doing whatever the bloody hell we want to the planet. And, in case something does go wrong, Free Trade would take care of it anyway.
I don’t buy into it, but it’s at least more sensible than crackpot hippy reasons.
Originally posted by RPG Knight
Although I’m careful with the environment, I’d like everyone to know that there’s not much we can do to damage the environment.
There’s a near-unanimous scientific consensus that we can, that global warming is occurring and the ozone layer is being depleted. The only reason those things haven’t been moving at a <i>really</i> tremendous rate is that scientists sounded the alarm early enough for most if not all countries to ban those chemicals that were most responsible. You should thank them instead of dismissing their work. And that doesn’t even get into the effects of environmentally harmful substances on <i>people</i>, which is the first and foremost reason for environmental regulation. For instance, there’s a reason why factories that process lead have to keep their lead emissions low - because it would otherwise cause enormous health problems for everyone in the vicinity. Not just people who work at the factories, even, but literally everyone in nearby towns.
Originally posted by RoguePaladinTrian
I don’t buy into it, but it’s at least more sensible than crackpot hippy reasons.
Which is to say that it doesn’t make any sense at all. Not only does it contradict basic economics, history, and common sense, it unilaterally forces most people to suffer risks to their health and well-being, without giving them any choice about it, under a hypocritical guise of individualism.
Originally posted by Sephiroth Katana
The only reason those things haven’t been moving at a <i>really</i> tremendous rate is that scientists sounded the alarm early enough for most if not all countries to ban those chemicals that were most responsible.
Exactly, now that most of those chemicals have been gone, our Earth is being destroyed at a much slower rate. It would be a huge investment to slow it down even more, and as I said, the world revolves around money. However, I did NOT say that we shouldn’t at least try not to speed it up. I do realize I overstepped my boundaries of what I was saying, sorry. It’s more like there’s not much we can do to the environment that would cause us to benefit our society in the meantime, except on a larger scale which (surprise!), individually, we may not control.
Big Bang happened “only” 13.5 billion years ago. Trillions of years have never happened.
The Big Bang Theory is not neccesarily true. Many of the side effects of it could have occured from other sources, and there are many reasons that the big bang theory does not work (I read it somewhere, but I can’t remember what. Sorry. I’m ashamed of myself).
All things should serve man (phrased differently), so we should have no compunction about doing whatever the bloody hell we want to the planet.
That’s what the bible tells us, though a lot of it was meant to be taken as a metaphor.
Again, I believe 90% of the oxygen we breath comes from phytoplankton. There is a lot of data on that. Some say it is responsible for 50% of the oxygen generated by photosynthesis, some say 70%, some say 90% and so on. This is still a lot of discussion on this. Pick one. I stay with those who say 90.
If all sources disagree, it means that many people are not entirely sure, and for this reason these statistics are not necessarily true and thus, not meant to be taken 100% true.
Dude, I know it’s not clean. Hydrogen came into the thread when I said hydro cell making generates O2 as a side product. I never said it would be clean. This makes me think you didn’t even read my previous posts.
If it’s not clean, that means it’s not very useful. The idea behind what we’ve been trying to do is find an inexpensive, virtually unlimited and CLEAN source of power. Otherwise it’s almost pointless. And we’re not saying you said it was gonna be clean, we’re saying that there are more cons than pros. So there. And you must realize that if we comment on your posts, we MUST have read them.
Take an ochem class with an ochem lab, you’ll see how hard and demanding making organic (carbon based) compounds is.
I didn’t even know it was possible. Aren’t we still having trouble understanding where life came from? There’s no proper explanation.
I am going to be making comments regarding a number of previous posts, in no particular order.
Conservative doesnt equal republican, conservatives just tend to be on the far right of the republican agenda. there are even conservative democrats and liberal republicans, though the are the minority.
Most republicans believe that people are the most important thing on earth, which I cannot totally disagree with, but some of there methods and conclusions offend me. The have no objection to companies ruining the environment, because it helps people in the short-term, which to them is the higher priority. It is a reasonable beginning, but the end result is tragic.
As to the big-government republican argument, that is total bullshit. The statement exists merely as a talking point and has no validity. Every republican has increased the size of government and beauracracy, not decreased it. Under Clinton, it was the smallest (per capita) it had been in over 100 years. Under a moderate democrat, many government employees switched to the private sector. Under Bush, the governemt has increased by over half a million people, including the unfunded homeland security department. which takes existing jobs, and gives them more managers and paperwork.
Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the univers, and is very easy to come by. It is also highly combustible, hence its use as a fuel, it comes up from the ground in many places worldwide. Its what they filled blimps with pre WWII, when only the US could produce helium. The famous Hindenberg was hydrogen filled.
We have had the technology to build hydrogen cars for some years now, which is why the oil companies bought up all the patents to them. Though there are a few individuals with home-made ones.
The Big Bang theory has a lot of support, but there have been conflicts. We have dated some stars as being older than the universe, so it is very hard to estimate when the universe formed.
The earth’s oxygen comes from the following sources (roughly) 48% Oceanic Micro-organisms, 40% plants (both land and sea) with the rest being made up of a number of smaller sources.
I may have more to say, but I cant remember anything else at this moment.
Its not because hydrogen is abundant that is readily available and easy to use. Jesus christ -_-.
Originally posted by Dark Knight
The Big Bang theory has a lot of support, but there have been conflicts. We have dated some stars as being older than the universe, so it is very hard to estimate when the universe formed.
Please site these conflicts. As far as my knowledge goes, the star age/universal age conflict was taken care of when whoever came up with enough evidence to re-figure the Hubble Constant to put the universe’s age at around 13.5 billion years. At least I think that’s how it went. Astronomy has a lot of lingo that I tend to mix it up. X, seeing as he seems to know the subject, might be able to correct me if I’m wrong.
Originally Posted by RPG Knight
The Big Bang Theory is not neccesarily true. Many of the side effects of it could have occured from other sources, and there are many reasons that the big bang theory does not work (I read it somewhere, but I can’t remember what. Sorry. I’m ashamed of myself).
No, it may not be true, but it’s the generally-held-by-consensus theory.
uhh, what was the question? Age of the universe? Roughly 15 billion or so, although new theories and such could always contest that.
Yeah, Astronomy (but more specifically Astrophysics) is an interest of mine. I have no skill in stargazing so I’d have a hard time pointing Beteljuice out for you but I can tell you for a fact that said star’s diameter is larger than the orbit of Mars. (and is also red, incidentally). I’ll also pull a Sin on people who start spouting shit on how the earth/universe is only 6,000 years old (people who say that Creation is true but that the first six days may ahve been billions of years are exemt) or people who think we faked teh moon landing.
As for the Big Bang Theory, it is the most popular and accepted explaination of all that is. Rathar than someone else coming along and “OMG UR THEORY SUX0RS LOLOLOL” and offering an alternative, usually new discoveries annotate and enhance it. Much like how Einstein’s theories enhanced Newtonian physics.
Originally posted by Dark Knight
Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the univers
Stars are way massively larger than planets, right? And therefor contain much more mass and matter, right? And the primary element that composes stars is hydrogen, right? Guess where all that hydrogen comes from dude.
From stellar nurseries that formed the star systems. Possibly Supernovae do this; in fact, our own star system is probably the result of a bigass supernova that created all the heavier elements, especially heavier than Iron (which is the flip point for fusion in stars; above it, fusion can’t be done with a profit).
Anyway, this thread is now officially the Super Happy Fun MegamanX2K Astronomy Fun Facts Hour, so give me your donations and I’ll give you something other than a kick in the asteroids, bitch.
umm, I meant it rhetorically, but that works for my purpose. Well, here’s something for your “Super Happy Fun MegamanX2K Astronomy Fun Facts Hour”: Photon Decay. It’s really insanely complicated, but if you can start understanding it, it will blow your mind. It accounts for the red shift observed by the Hubble telescope by the decay of photons, meaning that the universe is not necessarily expanding. There are all kinds of things in there if found to be true would render at least a number of Einstein’s theories obsolete (but that had/has to happen eventually). I can’t understand a lot of it, but it’s interesting if you’re into that kind of science.