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cancer boy 977 posts |
Jul 14, 2004, 17:58
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>If there isn't enough land to grow biodiesel for all our vehicles, there's no way there's enough shit to power them. A couple of things spring to mind: 1) We don't need all our vehicles, the current rate of consumption is totally unnecessary and that's what's brought us to this unhappy scenario 2) We already have a centralised infrastructure for dealing with human poop (assuming the "goodness" hasn't gone out of it by the time it reaches a treatment works 3) If a bit of everything (non fossil electric, methane/hydrogen from poop, biodiesel/expensive real diesel) could support enough for a basic transport infrastructure isn't it worthwhile to investigate it? Diversity rather than a "replacement" for oil. I always think of those wartime rationing posters - "Is your journey really necessary?". If we can't fly down to Rio for the weekend or have a burn up down to the drive through at Burger King it seems a small sacrifice. I mean, what's the alternative, we just sit here crying until the end of the world? NB That's not a personal attack on anyone! I just mean there may be a window of opportunity between now and when the doo-doo hits the fan as we don't know how many years it will be, and if people just say "that's it, we're doomed" then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. If a technology doesn't work now, that doesn't mean it's not worthy of investigation. For instance, Warwick University have recently managed to double hydrogen yields extracted from poop compared to the prior techniques up to 40% efficiency. Also, maybe getting rid of all those smelly BMWs could be a positive step in the long term, although I realise much of the future pressure on oil supply will come from the developing world. Another random thoughts: anyone remember "Roger And Me" by Michael Moore? You would have thought he would have supported the invasion of Iraq to help keep Mid-West 'Murca building those gas huffers.
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Ether 104 posts |
Jul 14, 2004, 18:28
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Grufty, what do you think about Col Thomas Bearden (www.cheniere.org) ? He writes a lot about cold fusion, zero point, and something called scalar electromagnetics. I don't know enough about physics to be able to say whether or not he's bullshitting or there's genuinely something there.
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cancer boy 977 posts |
Jul 14, 2004, 18:35
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(Didn't see this until I'd clicked send due to using the "new" website - d'oh) No argument from me on those points, I certainly don't think there's any way to preserve the current status quo unless someone pulls a hitherto unimaginable scientific discovery out of the hat, but we poop anyway so we may as well try and milk said poop for all it's worth. According to the (probably highly inaccurate) calculations of that obnoxious person on Top Gear it took four cows to produce the requisite poop to run a car for a year. If you use the poop to run a tractor instead it makes a bit more sense.
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grufty jim 1978 posts |
Jul 14, 2004, 18:37
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PS: as a complete aside; I earn a (meagre) living as a freelance programmer. the language I specialise in happens to be called "ColdFusion". It makes conversations like this distracting in a difficult-to-define way.
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TomBo 1629 posts |
Jul 14, 2004, 19:15
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<we should note that NOT all important scientific discoveries have come from "beyond the fringes"> Yes, I take your point there, I realised I'd put it too strongly pretty soon after posting. Thanks for putting the 25 million in perspective, too, I've no idea how much is "usual" for spending on scientific research. I've no axe to grind, I'm neither a believer or disbeliever in cold fusion, I simply don't know. And as I said, it's obviously no good for us to pin our hopes on it as the answer to the oil crisis.
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TomBo 1629 posts |
Jul 14, 2004, 19:24
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I stand by my point about the scientific establishment's conservatism, mind, it's hostility to ideas that seem to contradict the current model of the universe. My worry is that because of this conservatism perfectly good ideas are sometimes made to appear crazy by very "respectable" scientists. Often in the early days of a discovery the phenomenon in question is hard to notice and repeat - Marconi, for example, had to listen incredibly carefully to hear the first radio broadcast through the static and noise, and the Wright brothers initial flight was about as impressive as me throwing a paper aeroplane. Like I say, though, I dunno if that's the case with cold fusion - it sounds like the evidence is thin on the ground, to say the least. Let me finish by repeating myself: it may well be a red herring and surely isn't worth pinning our hopes on: praying for a technological fix is clearly not the answer. But you never know, eh?
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grufty jim 1978 posts |
Jul 14, 2004, 20:15
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I totally agree that in those places where we can make use of existing organic waste to lessen our fossil fuel use, we should do so. And with haste. And though I know this can make me seem very negative (even though I'm quite a nice person to be around... I think... errr... back me up on that someone), I do make a point of countering the "cornucopian" view presented by a lot of the media. I've seen too many news items about the latest hydrogen car that'll get us 200 miles between fill-ups and emit nothing but water vapour (cue: clip of mercedes CEO drinking water condensed from the tailpipe of the prototype car). "It's cleaner than tapwater" he announces truthfully. But this 3 minute piece of industry propaganda masquerading as "business news" paints a future where we need do no more than ensure we can afford a new hydrogen-car when they go on sale. It says "Business As Usual (just a bit more space age)" in big neon letters. (You need your "They Live!"-shades on to see it.) And that's a dangerous lie. Of course i'm not talking about you or I discussing the possibilities here; wondering "what if...?" I'm talking about the hundreds of millions spent marketing this lie in order to keep consumers consuming. *That's* the big dangerous lie. And though I didn't see the Clarkson thing, I bet it heavily implied the 'business as usual' message throughout the whole segment (or am I doing Jezza an injustice?) In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if it ended with a shot of Clarkson talking to camera. "So it may not outperform petrol, but at least there'll always be plenty around..." (camera pulls back to reveal he's in a field next to a cow) "... so long as Daisy keeps producing her brown gold." (dubbed-in squelchy "cow-shitting" noise to punctuate). Sorry. The scene was so vivid in my mind, I had to share it. I'm sure the segment wasn't really so crass. My point (I did have one) is that something like biodiesel could be a great, even necessary, tool in bringing about a "soft landing" (as opposed to a crash). It may allow, e.g., some agricultural tasks to remain mechanised (at the expense of an increased input of human labour in the fuel production process). Where appropriate, wind/solar power could be used to run efficient communal refrigeration centres where people could store their food (for a percentage of the produce stored... for those maintaining the centres). The absence of large distribution systems will mean far more people growing smaller quantities of food than currently. But the energy wasted having an inefficient fridge in each house is unsustainable. Anyways, there's a million specific applications appropriate for different alternative energies. But people need to grasp that the wealth of energy offered to us in the form of fossil fuels is vast. Completely without precedent. It's what allows us to live this opulent lifestyle. And when it starts running out, we're not going to be able to replace *most* of what it currently provides. If planned right, that doesn't have to be a terrible thing. If we just stumble into it, though, I can't imagine it being anything other than a terrible thing. What we squandered in our quest for a planetful of plastic shite, was one of the most powerful tools we've ever had access to. Spent wisely it may have taken us to the stars. It could have solved world poverty in a snap. All it needed was the will, and the organisation. The resources we had. Now though, we desperately need that will and organisation just to prevent a catastrophe. Because we've done other stuff with our wealth. Blew it on a very loud, intoxicating party (formerly the emphasis was on party, latterly it's mostly been toxic). And while far from the end of humanity (unless some idiot in a lab somewhere fucks up), we have to accept that modern civilisation (for want of a better word) is coming to an end in its current form. Clarkson's enthusiasm for cowshit notwithstanding.
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cancer boy 977 posts |
Jul 14, 2004, 20:49
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>(You need your "They Live!"-shades on to see it.) :-D >And though I didn't see the Clarkson thing, I bet it heavily implied >the 'business as usual' message throughout the whole segment (or am I >doing Jezza an injustice?) <snip> >Sorry. The scene was so vivid in my mind, I had to share it. I'm sure the >segment wasn't really so crass. You're only doing him an injustice in that it was presented by James May (the Daily Telegraph motoring correspondent who fills his column inches with articles bemoaning the poor availability of American Hard Gums as other travel sweets drop icing sugar on the upholstry of his Bentley) and Richard Hammond (the one who acts like a refugee from That's Life). Other than that you were right on the money about the tone of the piece... It was presented as a jokey potential cost saving measure if the price of petrol went up. Still interesting though if you could tune out their tedious antics. The idea of communal refrigeration's an interesting one, certainly food production & distribution needs to become more "local". Shame we've made a lot of our native fruit and veg varieties practically extinct in the pursuit of standardisation. Speaking of which, here's a hypothetical situation - if Monsanto could make a GM rapeseed that offered vastly improved oil yields compared to the regular kind, would it be worth it?
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Merrick 2148 posts |
Jul 14, 2004, 21:20
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>if Monsanto could make a GM rapeseed that >offered vastly improved oil yields compared to the >regular kind, would it be worth it? You mean to let loose a completely new form of pollution - one that self-replicates and mutates into things we've not planned for - that's likely to become an indestructible widespread weed across great swathes of our arable land? And that we have to obliterate large amounts of wild land and the life it supports to grow this crop (current food land will still be needed for food; in fact more of it, as oil fertilisers/pesticides become expensive and yeidls drop)? And all so we can keep driving a ton of metal with us every time we want to go somewhere? I think I'd be likely to be in the 'no' camp.
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grufty jim 1978 posts |
Jul 14, 2004, 21:25
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I don't know anything about Bearden specifically, but a glance at his website creates a strange sense of déja vu. I haven't read his stuff in any depth, but *if* my first impression is correct, then I'd have to suggest that the guy is barking up - not so much the wrong tree - but a lamp-post perhaps, or a belisha beacon. There's fringe science. Really out-there theoretical stuff... 11-dimensional superstring theory. Or quantum teleportation or whatever. Rooted in understood scientific principle, but pushing at the boundaries. Or perhaps magnetic fusion research; pushing at the edges of our understanding and also testing the limits of our engineering abilities. Then there's the *seriously* fringe stuff. Your cold fusions. Your anti-gravity research. Areas which require serious rewrites to the way we think things work. That's not inconceivable; but it actually happens *very* rarely, contrary perhaps to popular opinion. Euclid, Galileo, Descartes, Newton, Einstein. That represents (*I* would argue) the total number of times in western science where the kinds of shifts in understanding required by cold fusion (for example) have occurred. Not out of the question. But let's not pin our hopes on it. And then. Well, then there's zero-point energy. Now, don't get me wrong; I'm no Euclid, Galileo, Descartes, Newton, or Einstein; but - save for a bit of forehead scrunching - I don't have too much trouble understanding their work. Sure, sure... so Gaussian coordinate systems foxed me for a while. It took so long for me to realise that the grid wasn't arbitrary in the sense of "an arbitrary grid on this object surface", but rather in the sense that the object is *itself* the arbitrary component, whose unique surface properties define a *non*-arbitrary grid with respect to the object, but an aribrary grid with respect to the external world. And suddenly all was clear! Ahem... forgive the unseemly pride in my own maths-geekdom, but it took me an age to get my head around that. And I was dead chuffed when I did. With zero-point energy though, I start to get a headache about 5 minutes in to any explanation. Usually about the stage that the phrases "time-energy" and "compressed-energy" start to get used interchangeably. Pretty damn early on in Bearden's intro it turns out. At some point with zero-point energy, and it's always difficult to pin down precisely where, the explanation subtly shifts from the physics that *I* understand into a Star Trek universe where faster-than-light sub-space travel is but a few dilithium crystals away. Now, I acknowledge the possibility that maybe I'm just not smart enough to get my head around zero-point energy. I accept that. But I know quite a few very smart people who also start to get the same headache after a few minutes. That "uhhh.... what!?" expression steals over their faces too... the one that looks especially comical on smart people. Anyone proposing zero-point energy needs to be taken _cum grano salis_. Especially if they claim that a contraption they knocked up in their shed from components bought at radioshack can generate as much matter as exists in the entire observable universe out of one cubic centimeter of vaccuum. I'm not saying that zero-point energy is just nonsense. But I'll be putting my faith in benevolent aliens giving us a helping hand, energy-wise, before I count on zero-point. That's just me. And maybe my research is biased or flawed or incomplete. Please do your own before making up your mind.
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