Instead of climate change, a real risk to the planet

[Ryan Coke]

Cosmic impact funding

The National Academy of Sciences issued a report this week claiming little is being done to defend Earth from the threat of smaller asteroids, which, if they hit the planet, could cause significant destruction.Photograph by: Courtesy, Don Davis, Reuters Archive, ReutersT he United States is doing little to defend the planet against potentially devastating asteroids and is not doing the basic searches that Congress has ordered, according to a report released on Friday.

While most of the really big and obvious threats are being found, almost nothing is being done to find the smaller objects that are arguably a more likely threat, the strongly worded report from the National Academy of Sciences said.

"It means we are not looking for the small ones which can cause huge damage on Earth," astronomer Mike A'Hearn of the University of Maryland, who helped chair the committee that wrote the report, said in a telephone interview.

Instead of sending billions to developing (and often corrupt) countries in the name of a dubious and unproven climate science, this is a real risk for mass damage and potentially the end of our current civilization. It wouldn't cost nearly as much, and our ability to actually prevent it is fairly substantial.

[jolinar of malkshor]

I guess they are playing the odds. And the odds are that one hitting us while humans are around are fairly small.

[blankall]

Originally Posted by jolinar of malkshor

I guess they are playing the odds. And the odds are that one hitting us while humans are around are fairly small.

If the technology to take out a huge asteroid was developed, the much much greater risk would be humans using the technology on themselves here on Earth.

[RougeUnderoos]

Aren't these the same "scientists" who believe humans are causing this climate change nonsense?

If these alarmist jokers are worried about asteroids, I have to question if asteroids even exist. I've been around for a while, and I ain't ever been hit by an asteroid. That's gotta count for something.

[Ryan Coke]

Blankall. Good point.

Rouge--the difference right now is there is no money in pushing an asteroid agenda. Unlike AGW.

[worth]

Originally Posted by Ryan Coke

Blankall. Good point.

Rouge--the difference right now is there is no money in pushing an asteroid agenda. Unlike AGW.

bingo. You can sell environmentally friendly light bulbs, can't really sell asteroid friendly light bulbs.

[octothorp]

Originally Posted by Ryan Coke

Instead of The Taliban, a real threat to the earth

Instead of sending billions to developing (and often corrupt) countries in the name of a dubious war, this is a real risk for mass damage and potentially the end of our current civilization. It wouldn't cost nearly as much, and our ability to actually prevent it is fairly substantial.

Fixed.

[RougeUnderoos]

Originally Posted by Ryan Coke

Blankall. Good point.

Rouge--the difference right now is there is no money in pushing an asteroid agenda. Unlike AGW.

So they are doing this asteroid stuff pro bono?

The point actually is these very same scientists and the organization you quoted happen to believe that people are negatively affecting the earth's climate

So are they wrong (and for sale) on the climate issue and right (and noble) on the asteroid thing?

[MarchHare]

Originally Posted by RougeUnderoos

Aren't these the same "scientists" who believe humans are causing this climate change nonsense?

If these alarmist jokers are worried about asteroids, I have to question if asteroids even exist. I've been around for a while, and I ain't ever been hit by an asteroid. That's gotta count for something.

The last meteorite impact that caused significant damage (but no human fatalities) was the Tunguska Event of 1908. According to a quick search on wikipedia (consider the source), there hasn't been a single documented case of any human dying from a meteorite strike. In fact, the last time an impact resulted in massive animal fatalities was when the dinosaurs were wiped out 65 million years ago. Clearly from this data we can determine that we're currently in a period of declining Earth impacts, not one of increased risk, contrary to what these alarmist so-called "scientists" would have us believe. The only reason they're postulating end-of-the-world scenarios is so they can secure billions of dollars worth of funding for their research.

[sclitheroe]

I'm pretty sure I'm more likely to die in a car accident. I literally have smaller things to worry about than asteroids.

[TheSutterDynasty]

This should really be one of the last things on the agenda that we have to protect people from.

It would require a 10 km wide asteroid to wipe out a significant portion of the world's population. The chances of one this size colliding with us have it occurring once every 100 million years. I like those chances.

Waiting 50 years for techonology to develop a little more before worrying about this problem means waiting only 0.0000005% of that time period.

[Knut]

[Stumptown]

Phil Plait, in Death From the Skies, puts the odds of being killed by an impact, large or small, at 1 in 700,000. Those odds are really not that low. There are thousands of objects with Earth-crossing orbits, and many of them are large enough to cause significant damage. If we know about a potential impactor well enough in advance, we do have the capability to avoid the collision. Isn't that worth spending some time and effort on?

[Stumptown]

Originally Posted by MarchHare

The last meteorite impact that caused significant damage (but no human fatalities) was the Tunguska Event of 1908. According to a quick search on wikipedia (consider the source), there hasn't been a single documented case of any human dying from a meteorite strike. In fact, the last time an impact resulted in massive animal fatalities was when the dinosaurs were wiped out 65 million years ago. Clearly from this data we can determine that we're currently in a period of declining Earth impacts, not one of increased risk, contrary to what these alarmist so-called "scientists" would have us believe. The only reason they're postulating end-of-the-world scenarios is so they can secure billions of dollars worth of funding for their research.

You cited two cases. That does not "clearly" imply that Earth impacts are declining. Those are just two that we know something about, one because it was observed, the other because it left a lot of evidence of the event. Earth gets hit by objects hundreds of times a day. Most of them are tiny, and burn up in the atmosphere. There is no statistical evidence to indicate that just because we haven't been hit by a big object in a while, that we won't in the future. In fact, it's the opposite. There is a 100% chance that Earth will be hit by a large object at some point in the future.

[blankall]

Originally Posted by Stumptown

Phil Plait, in Death From the Skies, puts the odds of being killed by an impact, large or small, at 1 in 700,000. Those odds are really not that low. There are thousands of objects with Earth-crossing orbits, and many of them are large enough to cause significant damage. If we know about a potential impactor well enough in advance, we do have the capability to avoid the collision. Isn't that worth spending some time and effort on?

I'm going back to my original point. What the odds of that technology being turned on man if it is developed?

Significanly greater than 1 in 700,000.

In other words the last thing people are more ways to blow really big things up.

[Stumptown]

Originally Posted by blankall

I'm going back to my original point. What the odds of that technology being turned on man if it is developed?

Significanly greater than 1 in 700,000.

In other words the last thing people are more ways to blow really big things up.

Very slim. The best methods to keep large objects from hitting us don't involve blowing them up. Blowing them up would just create lots of smaller impacts, the gross effect of which would be just as bad as the larger single impact. The best techniques being proposed involve attaching rockets or other propulsion systems to the object to move the object out of the way. No technology there that we haven't already been using for 50 years. See the B612 Foundation for more info.

[MarchHare]

Originally Posted by Stumptown

You cited two cases. That does not "clearly" imply that Earth impacts are declining. Those are just two that we know something about, one because it was observed, the other because it left a lot of evidence of the event. Earth gets hit by objects hundreds of times a day. Most of them are tiny, and burn up in the atmosphere. There is no statistical evidence to indicate that just because we haven't been hit by a big object in a while, that we won't in the future. In fact, it's the opposite. There is a 100% chance that Earth will be hit by a large object at some point in the future.

Next time somebody posts that using green text to denote sarcasm isn't necessary, I'm going to refer them to this post.

[Stumptown]

Originally Posted by MarchHare

Next time somebody posts that using green text to denote sarcasm isn't necessary, I'm going to refer them to this post.

I obviously spend way too much time arguing with crackpots on the Internet, because your intentional sarcasm was several degrees more logical than a lot of stuff I've responded to that was intended in complete earnestness.

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by blankall

If the technology to take out a huge asteroid was developed, the much much greater risk would be humans using the technology on themselves here on Earth.

Stop thinking about nukes and laser beams. Maybe it's a rocket powered giant fishnet?

[RougeUnderoos]

I'm not a sceintist, but wouldn't it be easier to move the earth instead of deflecting an asteroid that is travelling at the speed of light?

Put some massive rocket boosters on Africa. And I mean massive, like Eiffel Tower big. Then, if we see something coming, fire them up and blow us just slightly off course and the thing will fly right by.

Of course that's a slippery slope and we could end up playing Frogger with the earth or maybe getting so out of whack that we get too close to the sun, or maybe too far away, and it'd all be for not anyway.