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This is not a place of honor

wipp.energy.gov

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Re: This is not a place of honor

#201

Post by vonmoltke »

vilhelm_s wrote: post #196
tinco wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're not thinking on the 10.000 year timescale. So you hide it, after 1000 years someone starts digging there and finds it anyway, they see the messages and stop, and then the site is left unhidden for the next 9000 years, what should it look like? Also even if poisoning people was ethical, how would the poison last 10,000 years? And how would you prevent people from using the poison as the potent weapon it clearly…

> even if poisoning people was ethical, how would the poison last 10,000 years? Leave a fraction of the radioactive unshielded and buried less deeply, to ensure that wannabe grave-robbers die of radiation poisoning before they uncover much of the cache?

Nobody is going to die from radiation poisoning off the 10,000-year water unless they ingest it, and the hot stuff will be too cool in a couple hundred years at most.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#202

Post by JoeAltmaier »

vonmoltke wrote: post #201
vilhelm_s wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> even if poisoning people was ethical, how would the poison last 10,000 years? Leave a fraction of the radioactive unshielded and buried less deeply, to ensure that wannabe grave-robbers die of radiation poisoning before they uncover much of the cache?

Nobody is going to die from radiation poisoning off the 10,000-year water unless they ingest it, and the hot stuff will be too cool in a couple hundred years at most.

The entire premise is that this waste is going to be toxic for 10,000 years. So we're not allowed to posit 'cool in a couple hundred years'.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#203

Post by JoeAltmaier »

jtolmar wrote: post #119

Contrary to many of the comments here, I think they did a good job of considering what it takes to make something foreboding without sounding like "here be treasure." The pseudo-mystical messages sound hokey, but they're effectively a backup system in case the straight-up "This is atomic waste, here's a description of atomic waste" descriptions are incomprehensible to future generations. And the more primitive commun…

The pyramids were covered in a beautiful coat of white limestone, which was robbed within a century of their construction.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#204

Post by grimaceindex »

ccvannorman wrote: post #95
frostirosti wrote: post #72

http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/ten-thousand-years/ 99pi did an awesome about this. I thought the most interesting idea was that culture permeated much deeper than anything else. So seed our world with these stories of cats that changed color near radiation or something like that would do best. Since symbols meaning change but oral tradition or old wives tales last much longer.

Cats that change color as a geiger counter? Shut up and take my money!

The suffering of animals is amusing entertainment to you?

Re: This is not a place of honor

#205

Post by JoeAltmaier »

I worry an elaborate structure will attract unwanted attention. Think about it - would you be interested in visiting it? Aren't you already interested? Why would future-people be any different. I know, the average shmoe would hear about this thing in the desert and think "Whatever" and go back to eating cheetohs and screwing. But what about an architect? A philosopher? An engineer? A historian? An artist? Pretty much any intellectual would be fascinated.

It could become the 'intellectual' version of a 'predator trap'. Like the LaBrea Tar Pits attracted more apex predators than most any other ancient formation (because of all the grazers trapped and dying, predators were captured in greater numbers than anywhere else in the fossile record).

Its almost a mechanism for ensuring that Idiocracy comes to pass - a trap that kills or reproductively damages smart/curious people only, draining the gene pool and leaving an ever-duller population of humans stuck in some post-apocalyptic dark age with no hope of getting themselves out.

So yeah I'm against it.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#206

Post by someguydave »

danieltillett wrote: post #57
someguydave wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you really think that option is feasible? Even the ancient Romans were unsuccessful at damning the memories of their enemies.

How do you know this? We know almost nothing about anyone or anything that happened during Roman times - the fact that a few scraps have survived is hardly an indication that most knowledge deliberately destroyed managed to escape.

Well, there's this guy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domitian re: damnatio memoriae "Yet the order of the Senate was only partially executed in Rome, and wholly disregarded in most of the provinces outside Italy."

I think it's possible that a similar effect would happen with attempting the same thing to the knowledge of nuclear fission...

Re: This is not a place of honor

#207

Post by bbcbasic »

rjsw wrote: post #146
bbcbasic wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Definitely the Nazi* architecture does that. I remember seeing thee very intimidating military towers in Berlin. It was like the tower wanted to start a war itself. (*Yes I said the magic word, it is now one of THOSE threads!)

I'm guessing that you saw some of the flak towers [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flak_tower

Ha ha yes maybe it was Vienna. Been on too many trips.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#208

Post by someguydave »

ageofwant wrote: post #68
greglindahl wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's one of many ways that you could do that, yes.

Those other ways do not get rid of a potentially serious environmental contaminant. Or do you prefer if those "waste dumps" remain unused and potentially dangerous. It both serves as a very valuable source of rare energy and at the same time gets rid of the "waste" of old redundant processes, what's not to like ?

I suspect that Mr. Lindahl is against nuclear power for ideological - not practical - reasons.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#209

Post by rdiddly »

Hondor wrote: post #115
krkoch wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not so sure. Primitive mining in e.g. Røros, Norway goes back to 1740. Dynamite were introduced to the mine in 1870. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R%C3%B8ros

Only 40 years before the invention of the Geiger counter. If future primitive people have dynamite, it probably won't be long before the know about radiation too. This whole project seems to be being treated as far more important than it really is. It's only to protect a very small group of people in a very narrow window of technological advancement and only if civilization had somehow already been destroyed yet ther…

...assuming it's still a desert in 10,000 years.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#210

Post by agentgt »

It seems like one of the problem is that the place "is not a place of honor".

In modern civilization memorials and/or historically significant places are continuously safeguarded and most importantly remembered.

Yes they can be targets of attacks but they get rebuilt. That is their significance is remembered and protected. It seems like a bad idea to make a dangerous place forgettable.

So instead of hiding I propose a solution might be an extremely conspicuous stone like edifice built on top of the land with information about what is underneath etched in stone (I am assuming the land above is tolerable). Maybe even make it look nice so you know it gets protected. It could even become a cultural landmark.

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