27 replies to this topic

[Dauth]

After seeing Kenny's post in the general discussion about the 62nd anniversary of the Nuclear bomb being used, i was wondering which will come sooner a good or bad day for humanity.

Some days i consider good,

invention of penecillin (saved thousands of lives)
mastery of electricity, and even better standardising it across a country
becoming sedantary as opposed to nomadic, (allowed greater technology and development)

bad days for humanity
dropping the nuclear bomb, (whether in the case it was good or not, it set a precedent that as a species we will vapourise others with such a weapon)
the day aids first infected a human (circa 1959)
when we grounded concorde for the last time

The next good day i can see is when the middle east runs out of oil, it would then mean that the nations of the world would not be over a barrel (no pun intended) to in some cases a meglomanic dictator

the next bad day i reckon will be sooner and that will be caused by an escalation of tensions between the UK and Russia after the Andrey Litvenjenko poisoning

[Areze]

Knowing the ways of human greed, I'd say we'd have a bad day next. Likely involving either North Korea, Iran, Russia, the UK, and the USA. But I could be pleasantly surprised. But the bad is way more likely.

[Crazykenny]

I say a good day. Maybe we finally find a effective cure against cancer.

[narboza22]

I'm not sure why the Middle East running out of oil would be a good thing, especially since billions of people would be screwed over, and almost every Middle East country would lose their source of income, that seems a little sadistic imo to call that a good day.

Anyways, TODAY is a good day for humanity because the heatsink for my new computer is finally coming and I will be able to get my new Q6600 rig up and running

[Whitey]

I'd say we've just about run out of good days to have.

So bad day.

[Golan]

Every bad day holds potential for a good dawn to follow.

[Whitey]

Here's my view on that

Bad days can lead to good days, but they can also lead to worse days.
Good days can not lead to good days, but can lead to bad days.

Therefore, probability says it will be a bad day on the next roll of the dice.

[spiderspag]

 Crazykenny, on 8 Aug 2007, 5:33, said:

I say a good day. Maybe we finally find a effective cure against cancer.

I say bad day. Human beings are too stuck in their short-sighted ways to have any sort of awakening without first experiencing some kind of tragedy. Even if we invented a cure for cancer, this would only take out one of the elements that is stopping the population from sinking the world- and let's not forget that upon the invention of such a cure it would be made so that it costs an arm and a leg to administer.

I have great hopes for the human race, but no faith in it.

spiderspag

[General]

An exterior effect from the space will begin to effect humanity but I am not sure if it should be in bad or good way... but I am sure it should be something massive ...

[Strategia]

 Dauth, on 7 Aug 2007, 21:05, said:

when we grounded concorde for the last time

I don't agree with this. Concordes were fuel-guzzling polluters with no chance of ever making a proper profit. Personally I only see SSTs taking off (no pun intended) with commercial spaceflight, orbital installations and lunar/planetary colonies, when they can be used to ferry people to and from orbital stations/ships or even to the colonies themselves (eventually). Concorde was a great idea, it just came a few eras too soon to be worth its while.

[Whitey]

I disagree. Concorde was a quick way to travel, not the most efficient, but quick. I liked the supersonic transport, was a pretty bird. A shame it was grounded. =(

[Overdose]

 narboza22, on 7 Aug 2007, 16:37, said:

I'm not sure why the Middle East running out of oil would be a good thing, especially since billions of people would be screwed over, and almost every Middle East country would lose their source of income, that seems a little sadistic imo to call that a good day.

Anyways, TODAY is a good day for humanity because the heatsink for my new computer is finally coming and I will be able to get my new Q6600 rig up and running

Nope. First of all, a lot of middle eastern countries are corrupt not that much money go to the people. It all goes to the wealthy few who don't even hire local labor to infrastructure and maintain their assets. With a huge supply of black gold you don't exactly see all or even a substantial part of the Middle East swimming in riches don't you?

Oil is pollutive and dirty, it's also a part of the huge reason why there's so many wars there lately. And no billions of people wouldn't be screwed over as long as their move on to the 21st century and find superior sources for their fuel needs that are more efficient, cheaper and cleaner.

Edited by Overdose, 09 August 2007 - 07:30.

[Dauth]

Firstly the saidist comment, that would only be true if the countries did distribute the wealth of the oil, since that doesnt happen a corrupt reigeme will run out of money and be overthrown, (armies like money) hopefully in favour for a democracy.

Concorde was one of the finest inventions of the last century, think about it, they in 1970 wanted to make a plane to go over mach 2 for 2 hours, land be cleaned and ready to turn around 4 times a day. the only planes that went that fast then were high tech military jets piloted by very fit healthy and extensivly trained men. The pilots wore g-suits to stop blackouts but you couldn't force that on the populace so it had to be safe for people in t-shirt and shorts. 10% of the power from the engines was used for air con, adn speaking of the engines te technology had to be such that the wall of air (since thats what you get over mach 1) doesnt destroy the very fine Rolls Royce Olympus jets.

[Overdose]

 Dauth, on 9 Aug 2007, 7:29, said:

Firstly the saidist comment, that would only be true if the countries did distribute the wealth of the oil, since that doesnt happen a corrupt reigeme will run out of money and be overthrown, (armies like money) hopefully in favour for a democracy.

A democracy doesn't change anything. You'll just have more politicians stealing the whole shibang in even parts. Besides even with a clean slate government, that doesn't stop invaders for finding an excuse and start a war for your oil. Less than 10% of the whole Middle Eastern population actually reaps the rewards. So there's entire millions not making any coin from something it's theirs by right, not generating enough jobs and a reason that has caused war there for the last 50 years.

[Dauth]

the advantage of a democracy is the rate at which it can be changed, if the country doesn't like a dictator you have to wait for them to die, a democratic leader can be voted out next week if he's hated enough.

anyway back to topic, good day? or bad day and what caused it?

[Cryptkeeper]

the invention of artificial gravity would be a great day for me along with fusion or antimatter powerplants

Edited by cryptkeeper, 11 August 2007 - 03:44.

[spiderspag]

 Dauth, on 10 Aug 2007, 22:40, said:

the advantage of a democracy is the rate at which it can be changed, if the country doesn't like a dictator you have to wait for them to die, a democratic leader can be voted out next week if he's hated enough.

anyway back to topic, good day? or bad day and what caused it?

But the disadvantage is that the average person is usually so easily manipulated that change dosen't occur unless those with the money and the power want it to- or unless people are shocked into action. Democracy is overrated.

[Dauth]

Gonna have to quote Chruchill, Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those which have been tried and failed.

I am all ears for something better than democracy.

@Crypt, Antimatter powerplants cannot exist, producing antimatter takes more energy than it releases, however you could store energy as antimatter in spaceship, but for my sanity please remember the difference between a source of energy and a store of energy.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Quote

becoming sedantary as opposed to nomadic, (allowed greater technology and development)

Who says that makes people happy? All it did was coup us up into smaller places which in itself created problems that the technology gained still hasn't solved. If chickens could comprehend happiness, which one do you think would be happier, the one couped up but provided with better feed and shelter, or the wild one?

Quote

@Crypt, Antimatter powerplants cannot exist, producing antimatter takes more energy than it releases, however you could store energy as antimatter in spaceship, but for my sanity please remember the difference between a source of energy and a store of energy.

What if we found naturally occuring depoits of antimatter in space? It would probably take more energy to produce coal than what could be gained by burning it, however we burn it because it is pre-made.

On-topic: I guess I'd predict some of the worst days in history(End of Oil) followed by many gradually improving good ones(New Energy Technology).

Edited by The Outsider, 13 August 2007 - 09:44.

[Dauth]

I never said happy, i intended of benefit to the species, tbh i think as a race we are better off with the sedentary lifestyle, it has doubled the life expentancy of the race in just 10000 years.

If we found it how would we mine it? on that concept however i am forced to agree, antimatter if it is provided can be very powerful but it is not a viable fuel source on planet earth

[NanSolo]

Sedentary lifestyle has lengthened life expectancy, but now it's shortened it. People are too sedentary: they eat too unhealthily and don't do enough exercise. With the rise in heart problems, type two diabetes and pretty much everything else asociated with obesity I wouldn't be surprised if life expectancy for current 10 year olds is lower than current 40 year olds.


As for the next good day, mentioned all ready but a new viable way of generating energy. It doesn't particularly matter if it's environmentally friendly or not, just as long as it's cheaper than oil people will become a lot less interested in the middle east once oil becomes useless.

[spiderspag]

 NanSolo, on 13 Aug 2007, 21:54, said:

It doesn't particularly matter if it's environmentally friendly or not, just as long as it's cheaper than oil

Firstly, that's an incredibly irresponsible and short-sighted attitude to have. You have to realize that the way things work at the moment is that if whoever controls the supply of a given resource can get away with making it more expensive, (be it Arabs, Asians or Americans,) then they WILL DO SO. Everything is profit driven. And so even though your new-fangled, environment-raping, but CHEAP resource may start out that way, who's to say that twenty years down the track when they are charging you for the very air you breathe because it is scarce enough to justify putting a price tag on that as well (and sadly I don't believe that we are too far away from this) that this resource won't be just as expensive as oil is today?

It ain't as if oil is scarce today. It ain't as if we can't keep up with the demand. And it ain't as though there aren't enough viable alternative resources running around to lower the price or demand for oil- it's just that those who control it (and I don't just mean OPEC) want to milk it for all its worth whilst they still can. And it would and will be the same for any new resource that comes along. Man the human race pisses me off.

[NanSolo]

Any new energy resource has to be dirt cheap to push oil off the market. Everything is set up to run on oil: power plants, transportation, everything. If you get a new energy source that is only marginally cheaper than oil, I don't care if it saves the environment, it's not going to catch on because you'd have to build new power plants, everyone would have to buy a new car, the airlines and the military would need to replace every plane...can you imagine how much that would cost? Do you really think everyone in America is going to buy a new car overnight and throw away their gas guzzlers because an environmentally friendly energy source that costs the same as oil comes along?

Any new energy resource has to be incredibly cheap to offset the costs of upgrading the worlds technology away from oil, and it's got to stay like that for a long time or we'll just start going back to oil.

As for me not caring about it being environmentally friendly or not, it's not like our current energy consumption is helping the planet so it would at least be nice to find an energy resource which kicks oil out of the market, helping to stabilise the middle east region.

[Nerdsturm]

It wouldn't have to be cheaper than oil if it was just reasonablly cheap, since in places like the US there is a push for independence from forgien sources of fuel, especially OPEC (We still don't like them because of that whole embargo deal), and governments would probably just make it illegal to produce goods that used oil after a certain amount of time, as they did when phasing out Freon-12 and other CFCs. Also, the idea that monopolies raise prices is relativly unfounded because they realize that it if they raise prices too high, people will begin looking for alternatives to their product or be unable to buy it. Still, it isn't likely there will be another penicillin-type miracle for energy, and if any new, clean, and effecient source is found it will almost certaintly be through long, hard work and won't be a surprise when it comes.

Edited by Nerdsturm, 14 August 2007 - 20:35.

[Overdose]

Current energy and fuel alternatives are already cheaper, more efficient and more abundant than oil (let's not forget cleaner). There's no more reason to scrape the bottom of the barrel for cheaper alternatives. Ethanol, natural gas, hydrocarbon or whatever else is in being researched and to appear in the future because anyone can afford those with ease. But this whole "I don't care of the consequences because it doesn't concern me" attitude is about 100 years too late.

The way the Planet is now, we'll be reaping every single ecological mistake we madk within 10 years and it will just get worse with time. It's time to wake up gentlemen, wake up and smell the ashes of our environment. That way there may still be a morning for us to wake up in the future.

Edited by Overdose, 14 August 2007 - 23:30.