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Insects Are in Serious Trouble

theatlantic.com

111–120 of 168 posts

Re: Insects Are in Serious Trouble

#111
post #67

Years ago when I lived in suburban Texas with a typical suburban house with a back yard that had open space behind it I had a terrible insect problem. Exposed skin would get a mosquito bite-per-minute, the dogs were coming inside covered in fleas, etc. So I went to Home Depot and bought this yard spray that promised to kill mosquitos, fleas, ticks, etc. and I hosed down the back yard in a desperate attempt to reclaim…

I think a much better way to get rid of mosquitos in a local area, but not of everything else, would be a laser turret ... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosquito_laser Unfortunately not market ready, yet ... edit: bat boxes, water-fish traps and having birds around will certainly reduce mosquito population ... but there will be still lots of them around. A laser can take them (allmost) all out ... Oh and about the wa…

TLDR: mosquitos hate air current. Just buy a few electric fans. No chems and relatively cheap.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/16/science/a-low-tech-mosquit...

Re: Insects Are in Serious Trouble

#112
post #86
post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Remember fireflies? They've all but disappeared in cities because of mosquito spraying.

Yes - when I was a kid living in Arkansas we had them all around our house each season. Haven't seen any in Texas or California, where I live now.

Drought has been the major issue for Texas over the years. They really like damp environments, and most of the state has been incredibly dry for the past couple of decades. They're starting to rebound a bit, with the reasonable amounts of rain we've had for several years in a row now.

I never saw them growing up in Texas, but now I live in a house with a creek right behind it, and they're active all summer. I still get really excited about seeing them!

My friends who grew up in Houston find it completely unremarkable, though, due to how wet it is down there. Apparently a very common occurrence.

Re: Insects Are in Serious Trouble

#114
post #67

Years ago when I lived in suburban Texas with a typical suburban house with a back yard that had open space behind it I had a terrible insect problem. Exposed skin would get a mosquito bite-per-minute, the dogs were coming inside covered in fleas, etc. So I went to Home Depot and bought this yard spray that promised to kill mosquitos, fleas, ticks, etc. and I hosed down the back yard in a desperate attempt to reclaim…

I think a much better way to get rid of mosquitos in a local area, but not of everything else, would be a laser turret ... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosquito_laser Unfortunately not market ready, yet ... edit: bat boxes, water-fish traps and having birds around will certainly reduce mosquito population ... but there will be still lots of them around. A laser can take them (allmost) all out ... Oh and about the wa…

How about bat boxes?

Re: Insects Are in Serious Trouble

#115
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like growth. I want to be wealthier or be able to work less (which is really just an aspect of being wealthier). I want everybody else to be wealthier too. I want my children to be better off than I am. The problem is growth without care for the consequences. Making some people wealthier at the expense of killing the planet is a bad plan. But I think that it goes too far the other way to turn around and say that gr…

I have thought about that often. The conclusion I have reached is this Earth's way of keeping the population of a species at a natural state - droughts, plagues etc... At first this appears harsh based on our preconceived notions of humanity. Many people will die due the environmental conditions in which they live - regardless of pollution levels. Earth does not have a bias towards one species, such as political/econ…

> the strongest/fittest will survive

Most able to adapt, most responsive to change. Not the strongest / fittest.

It's an extremely important distinction.

Wealth isn't the ultimate strength or source of power. It's #2 on the list behind political power, which is backed up by armies in most cases. Just ask rich people in authoritarian nations who is in charge (in recent times see: China, where rich people are routinely disappeared, or Russia where their wealthiest person was put in a gulag for opposing their dictator; all Russian oligarchs are universally terrified of said dictator).

Does anyone actually question whether Xi Jinping is weaker than Jack Ma? He could disappear Jack Ma tomorrow and nobody would do anything about it. Just look at what has been done to Wang Jianlin, his business is being diced up piece by piece by edict of the State (which arbitrarily cut off bank funding access for his business, forcing Wanda Group to being liquidating its holdings).

Was Sergey Brin more powerful than Barack Obama while Obama was president? The notion is laughable. Obama was not an especially rich man when he took over the Presidency, his power was entirely political in nature.

If you want a convenient example in the West, see what happened when tech companies ran up against the US military in the form of the NSA. They all lost universally across the board. All were forced to comply, or else. If the military didn't get what they wanted up front, they illegally circumvented the front door and tapped the link between data centers anyway. Qwest's CEO was put in prison when he attempted to disobey. Yahoo was threatened with vast fines [1] over trying to resist PRISM (they could trivially destroy any given tech company in this manner). It's clear who has the greatest position of power: the people with the stealth bombers, tanks and FISA court.

[1] https://www.wired.com/2014/09/feds-yahoo-fine-prism/

Re: Insects Are in Serious Trouble

#116
post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The sun can supply an awful lot of power. Humans use something like 10 or 20 terawatts of power (constantly), the sun smacks the earth with ~100 petawatts of power.

Does your estimation take into account the energy absorbed by the plans we farm?

No, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_energy_consumption

We spend a lot of that sun on meat and other livestock products though:

https://ourworldindata.org/yields-and-land-use-in-agricultur...

(the numbers in the second figure)

Re: Insects Are in Serious Trouble

#117
post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Remember fireflies? They've all but disappeared in cities because of mosquito spraying.

I just moved from California to Tennessee and only recently got to experience fireflies for the first time in my life. They're incredible :) I don't see them in the city, but that doesnt surprise me... there are tons once you leave downtown, though.

I went to Pennsylvania for the first time in my mid twenties. When I saw fireflies, it affected me in a way writing about it can only hint at. A sense of surprise and wonder that I haven’t experienced since childhood - maybe not even then. I haven’t experienced anything like it again, and I suspect I never will.

Intellectually, I knew they were ‘a real thing’, but that in no way prepared me for the reality.

Since then, it’s always been reassuring to look back and know that such wonder can still be felt by a grown adult.

Re: Insects Are in Serious Trouble

#118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a much better way to get rid of mosquitos in a local area, but not of everything else, would be a laser turret ... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosquito_laser Unfortunately not market ready, yet ... edit: bat boxes, water-fish traps and having birds around will certainly reduce mosquito population ... but there will be still lots of them around. A laser can take them (allmost) all out ... Oh and about the wa…

How about bat boxes?

Sure it works... but now you need snakes or raccoons to keep bats in check.

Next you need badgers to keep snakes and raccoons in check etc etc. Soon enough you will need elephants and lions and whatnots.

Maybe easier to just live with mosquitoes.

Re: Insects Are in Serious Trouble

#119
post #80
post #67

Years ago when I lived in suburban Texas with a typical suburban house with a back yard that had open space behind it I had a terrible insect problem. Exposed skin would get a mosquito bite-per-minute, the dogs were coming inside covered in fleas, etc. So I went to Home Depot and bought this yard spray that promised to kill mosquitos, fleas, ticks, etc. and I hosed down the back yard in a desperate attempt to reclaim…

We do know how to control insects in ways that only target the insects we actually want to get rid of, and leave everything else alone, but we aren't willing to put in the effort. There are two major categories of ways to kill an insect. 1. Attack it with chemicals that interfere with its biologically processes in such a way that it dies. 2. Physically attack its body causing sufficient damage to kill it, such as by…

[deleted]

Re: Insects Are in Serious Trouble

#120
post #105

I wonder what this comment section would like if this study was released during last year's Zika panic.

I would like to think this comment section would have a more informed opinion than average, I was seeing/reading about this during the panic and even then many people were speaking out against arial spraying [0]. It decimated the insect populations [1], people describing "total silence" like another commenter except it was over huge areas.

[0] http://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/harvard-zika-expert-naled-... [1] http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/florida-keys...

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