Seven tenths of the earth's surface is still as rich in metals as when the earth was new. — karl stone
Change isn’t always comfortable, Jake, but it is inevitable. — praxis
I'm not an anti-natalist because I don't accept the central plank in their platform that "having children under any and all circumstances guarantees continued suffering". I have no desire to see our species vanish. — Bitter Crank
By "resting place" I merely meant that you have gone as far as you can in the logic of promoting H production at sea by solar power. Once you've proved that 2+2=4, people have to either accept the fact or ignore it. There are quite a few examples of 2+2=4 that people seem quite capable of ignoring. Just a simple example here: — Bitter Crank
Take Uranium as an example of a metal with a limited supply: the available unmined reserves of uranium are reported in "millions of pounds" not millions of tons. Were the world to use nuclear fuel heavily, we would find the supply far short of needs. — Bitter Crank
The opposition to nuclear energy is exactly that: an ideology. And this ideology can drive us to worse energy policies than otherwise.It's quite difficult to explain, but it's an example of how - for ideological reasons, we cut across the grain of nature. I express the argument very poorly, but solar/hydrogen is implied by the grain of nature in a way that nuclear power is not. — karl stone
(See article)Germany’s plan is to shutter all of its nuclear units by 2022 and to have renewable energy provide 40 to 45 percent of its generation by 2025 and 80 percent by 2050[ii]—up from 30 percent in 2025. Replacing nuclear power with renewable energy has proven difficult, however, mainly due to the intermittency of wind and solar power. When wind and solar are not available to generate electricity, German power buyers turn to coal. In fact, Germany opened over 10 gigawatts of new coal fired power plants over the past 5 years.
Don't forget the sea floor. There are quite a lot of raw materials there too. I can just imagine how a big of a ecodisaster we can make to ocean life once we start to mine the ocean floors at an industrial pace.True, there may be tiny bits of gold, tin, zinc, silver, rare earths, aluminum, nickel, and so on scattered around the globe, but if they were not concentrated a billion years or two ago (or more) then the chances of us getting our hot little hands on lots of it are exceeding small. We aren't going to run out of iron or aluminum tomorrow, but the reachable supply is by no stretch of the imagination inexhaustible. — Bitter Crank
Most of the culture, led by the cultural elites, is determined to cling blindly to a relationship with knowledge straight out of the 19th century.
This is a philosophy forum. I'm arguing that our philosophy needs to be updated to match the technological environment, that we need to adapt philosophically to the new reality. And the group consensus says, "No, no, no and no, we're intent on staying in the past!". — Jake
Knowledge can be used for human flourishing or selfish and unsustainable hoarding of wealth and power, depending on the underlying values of the users. — praxis
And so there is no escaping the question, how much power do we want to be available when people have bad motives, or fail to fully think through the consequences of well intended uses? — Jake
Say more about that, would you, please. — Bitter Crank
The opposition to nuclear energy is exactly that: an ideology. And this ideology can drive us to worse energy policies than otherwise. — ssu
The real people killer is coal. Just in China annually coal power plants kill about 300 000 people. Yet somehow the facts and especially the magnitude of difference on the impact is many times not understood. The simple fact is that we have been using for ages coal ...and firewood. How dangerous smoke from fire can be isn't something that rattles peoples minds like the "invisible death" from radiation. And who understands radiation? Simply when nuclear power is discussed, the first image that comes to many peoples mind is Hiroshima. Unfortunately the misinformation (or basically disinformation) has taken root in this area, hence people believe whatever fictional statistic on the perils of nuclear energy. — ssu
Globally we get roughly 40% of electricity from coal and in places like China it's still roughly 60%, which has come down from 80% in 2010. Their plan has it's problems: even if China is making a huge investment in alternative energy resources, it is basically using energy from coal (and other fossil fuels) to catch up the industrialized West. The idea simply is to use the coal now to transform to other energy resources. That's the idea. Yet the reality is that coal power plants are still built (see Satellite intelligence shows China in a vast rollout of coal-fired power stations) and what better thing is to sell the coal power plants to other countries when they come to be too dirty in China (see here and here). — ssu
However much we build solar and wind power, it's still problematic. For example in 2016 in Germany (one of the leaders in Photovoltaic Power) increased solar power production as it has done year after year, yet the actually gigawatts produced fell. There was a natural reason: it wasn't so sunny as the year before. And the main point is the following. The real danger is that if we run down nuclear energy, we in the end and out of the media limelight, replace nuclear with fossil fuels and especially coal. The ugly fact seems to be that Germany in it's Energiewende, of going off nuclear, has exactly done this. — ssu
The hydrogen economy is a proposed system of delivering energy using hydrogen. The term hydrogen economy was coined by John Bockris during a talk he gave in 1970 at General Motors (GM) Technical Center.[1] The concept was proposed earlier by geneticist J.B.S. Haldane.
I've proposed a global scale approach based on a common agreement that science is true, and therefore authoritative - — karl stone
3) is a purely technical problem - entirely subject to a technological solution. — karl stone
It may be helpful if you can distinguish between science, and science culture, i.e. the group consensus of the scientific community regarding their relationship with science. A fact developed by science can be reasonably declared authoritative, while at the same time the culture which decided to develop that fact can be declared misguided.
As example, it's scientifically true that the atom can be split. That's an entirely different matter than leading scientists agreeing to work on the Manhattan project, and agreeing to further develop these weapons etc. Repeatedly chanting "science is truth" doesn't really solve much. — Jake
Thus, the Manhattan Project is not a truly scientific endeavor. The motives are purely ideological. The scientists were employees of ideological interests. — karl stone
It is the difference between science as a tool box, and science as an instruction manual. We've used the tools, but failed to read the instructions. That's what's wrong - with everything! It's why we're burning rain-forests to clear land for palm oil production, and cattle ranching. It makes sense ideologically - but in terms of a scientific conception of reality, it's insane, unnecessary, and ultimately fatal behavior. — karl stone
The question is moot because enough power to ruin the world is already available to people with bad motives or those who are too shortsighted.
— praxis
And so we should build even MORE such power, as fast as possible. That is the logic, or rather illogic, of the group consensus. — Jake
Right. The Manhattan Project was very "scientish" but was essentially a tremendous technological nuts and bolts project. There was, of course, an ideological goal. The Manhattan Project was intended to build an atomic weapon before Germany did. Germany could have, maybe, built an atomic weapon, but they decided they couldn't produce conventional weapons and atomic weapons at the same time. We didn't know that in 1942 (when the project was conceived). By the time the Manhattan Project was finished, Germany was no longer a threat. — Bitter Crank
Exactly.
"Read the instructions as a last resort". Now that we have made a colossal mess of things, we've opened the manual and discovered the really bad news. — Bitter Crank
And how many people have been killed due to nuclear accidents compared to the hundreds of thousands being killed every year by coal power plants and fossil fuels? Fukushima? 0 deaths. Chernobyl? Here's the conclusions that the United Nations, WHO and IAEA among other came to:I'd agree there's widespread ignorance and fear - but that fear is not entirely baseless. Radiation is dangerous, and in the event of a nuclear accident - can be carried a long way by the wind, contaminating vast swathes of land with a toxin that continues to be hazardous for a long time. — karl stone
See from UN homepages, CHERNOBYL: THE TRUE SCALE OF THE ACCIDENTA total of up to 4,000 people could eventually die of radiation exposure from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant (NPP) accident nearly 20 years ago, an international team of more than 100 scientists has concluded.
As of mid-2005, however, fewer than 50 deaths had been directly attributed to radiation from the disaster, almost all being highly exposed rescue workers, many who died within months of the accident but others who died as late as 2004.
Wrong. They are building new coal power stations. Period. That the share renewable electricity has grown doesn't at all refute this fact. See from June of 2018 this article: Germany still constructing new coal power stations. Naturally the German government and it's media doesn't want to highlight this. And of course one thing they have turned to is to import electricity from Poland. Germany still has alongside Poland a huge coal power plant infrastructure and some of the biggest polluting coal power plants in Europe, that can be seen from the emissions.I disagree. In Germany, the share of renewable electricity rose from just 3.4% of gross electricity consumption in 1990 to exceed 10% by 2005, 20% by 2011 and 30% by 2015, reaching 36.2% of consumption by year end 2017. They are not reverting to coal. — karl stone
See article "Mixed Mandate: Germany’s new coal commission struggles to balance environment and jobs" from June 2018.Wind, solar and other forms of green energy now regularly fulfill over a third or more of Germany’s electricity demand. However, the country remains the world’s largest lignite (brown coal) miner and burner. Overall, coal produces some 40% of the nation’s electricity while employing around 30,000 workers. Moreover, this cheap, domestically sourced lignite also produces 20% of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions. If Germany is serious about its pledge to cut its greenhouse gas emissions to half of what they were in 1990 by 2030, then lignite simply has to be phased out. That’s not politics, economics or wishful thinking: it’s simply physics.
See from UN homepages, CHERNOBYL: THE TRUE SCALE OF THE ACCIDENT — ssu
And how many people have been killed due to nuclear accidents compared to the hundreds of thousands being killed every year by coal power plants and fossil fuels? Fukushima? 0 deaths. Chernobyl? Here's the conclusions that the United Nations, WHO and IAEA among other came to: — ssu
Yet the fact is that even if we take the WORST estimates that surely are propaganda, the simple fact is that nuclear power doesn't produce carbon emissions (which actually not many do know), and still is far safer than coal. — ssu
Thus, the Manhattan Project is not a truly scientific endeavor. The motives are purely ideological. The scientists were employees of ideological interests. The was no scientific rationale for developing nuclear weapons — karl stone
Nuclear power doesn't produce carbon emissions, but it takes half the energy a nuclear power station will ever produce - to build a nuclear power station. All that concrete and steel is incredibly energy intensive to produce, and that's almost certainly going to be fossil fuel energy. — karl stone
Could we say that the pure science was hijacked by ideological interests? — Jake
Ok, true enough, but the Manhattan Project was possible because somebody doing pure science discovered that the atom could be split, right? Could we say that the pure science was hijacked by ideological interests? Would that work for you? — Jake
If yes, then before we rush headlong in to more and more and more pure science shouldn't we be figuring how to prevent such ideological hijackings from occurring? And if we can't come up with a reliable mechanism for preventing such hijackings is it not logical that we should therefore at least slow down on the pure science research? — Jake
This is part of the problem that James Howard Kunstler points out: a lot of chemicals go into making solar and wind power and all the associated equipment--chemicals derived from petroleum. Once petroleum becomes too scarce and expensive to obtain, it will be very difficult to replace all the infrastructure that was made from and with petroleum: plastics, lubricants, solvents, raw chemicals, finishes, and so on. Things wear out, break, burn up, are smashed, and so forth.
It isn't that nothing will or can be done in the future; it's just that manufacturing will have to re-invented for many products (if it can be).
Making the essential ingredients of concrete, like calcium obtained by heating limestone to a high temperature -- are very energy intensive and extensive. I don't see making the large amounts of portland cement with solar or wind.
There is a reason why we used so much coal and oil: It takes a hell of a lot of energy to build all the infrastructure you see around you. We can not rebuild all of it, or even half of it, on a meagre energy budget. We'll get along, but it will be on much different terms than we operate with now. — Bitter Crank
We need to do now what we should have done 400 years ago - and that is, accept that science is the means to establish true knowledge of reality, and honor that knowledge - particularly as a rationale for the application of technology. — karl stone
We could say that the pure science took place in a setting that was inherently ideological: — Bitter Crank
So the question would be - how do you put a cork in that kind of intellectual curiosity? — karl stone
Where is the evidence that this utopian vision is possible? To me, this part of your message is equivalent to the utopian vision "once we all become good Christians then we will live in peace". These utopian visions might be true IN THEORY, but it's not going to happen, so... — Jake
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