Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Really Big One

newyorker.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

241–250 of 286 posts

Re: The Really Big One

#241

Post by eru »

lexcorvus wrote: post #240
eru wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't a lower interest rate cause us to value the future more? (Or you mean, the natural interest rate should be higher?)

Lower interest rates increase your relative propensity to spend by lowering the opportunity cost of consumption. For example, if you have $10K and can get only a 1% annual return, you might as well take that trip to Vegas. If you could get a 15% return, though, you might rather stay home and rake in the interest.

OK, you basically have to compare your own internal discounting rate of consumption with the public rate of interest offered on savings.

If your own internal rate is higher than the public one, then indeed you should borrow to consume (or put off saving).

Companies only care about the public rate---if they have a higher rate of reliable return internally, they can keep borrowing money to invest until there's an equilibrium. A low interest rate makes companies more forward looking.

Re: The Really Big One

#242

Post by chrismcb »

facepalm wrote: post #33
edgyswingset wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think a tsunami is going to flatten the city. A wave has a lot to go through (peninsulas, narrow straights, etc) before it could reach the city, all of which would likely lessen its impact significantly. Where the area will get hit hard, though, is liquifaction and landslides.

Tsunamis are not like normal waves. I think they might be more like a really big rise of the tides.

Tsunamis are in fact a lot like waves, just real big ones. Tsunamis move quickly, a tide does not.

Re: The Really Big One

#243

Post by tempestn »

Gustomaximus wrote: post #232
tempestn wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, my understanding from what you wrote is that it may indeed be possible to slowly release the accumulated pressure, but we don't really understand how that occurs naturally yet, let alone how to trigger it artificially.

Fracking seems to trigger/create quakes. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/apr/24/earthquakes-fra...

Right, but there's a big difference between triggering a quake and triggering a slow, controlled quake that relieves pressure in the intended fashion.

Re: The Really Big One

#244

Post by InclinedPlane »

nordsieck wrote: post #177
rfugger wrote: post #167

I was in New Orleans in October 2002, and this guy was on the front page of the main newspaper predicting that within 20 years a category 5 hurricane was likely to whip around Florida and strike the city head on. He said the levies weren't high or strong enough, and that downtown New Orleans would be under 20 feet of water: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/earth/predicting-katrina.html I remember reading it with interest…

Lots of people predict lots of catastrophes. The trick is identifying the correct ones ahead of time. This is much more difficult than you are implying.

In this case that observation is unwarranted. There are some disasters which are difficult to predict and uncertain. There are others which are blindingly obvious or inescapable. Warning people that if a large hurricane hit a particular heavily populated city would be disastrous is not exactly extremely insightful when that city happens to live in one of the most heavily hurricane prone regions of the entire planet. As it turned out, Katrina was not even the worst case scenario, as it was not a Cat-5 when it hit New Orleans. Had it been, things would have been vastly worse. Similarly, a Cascadia subduction zone earthquake is not a question of whether it will happen but when. It absolutely will happen, and on a timescale similar to the age of the United States. That demands prudent planning and mitigation efforts.

If you live in Japan you can't merely shrug and say "oh, who can predict when an earthquake will come? nobody knows", no you live in an earthquake prone area, you need to plan. Similar if you live in tornado alley in the US you can't shrug and say "nobody can predict a tornado". You need to prepare.

In this case, it's not at all difficult.

Re: The Really Big One

#245

Post by agarden »

jsprogrammer wrote: post #59
nkoren wrote: post #27

I used to live in Portland, and thought about this impending catastrophe a lot. Once -- under the influence of intoxicants, most likely -- I came up with a way of dramatically reducing its impact. It's a batshit crazy solution which will never actually happen -- but even when I'm sober, I still think it would work. Here's what I'm thinking: the major problem with a disaster like this is the uncertainty surrounding it…

If you are now fully retrofitted to survive a 9.0, why do we absolutely have to set off this earthquake now using hundreds of nuclear bombs?

Because if you wait for it to happen on its own time, there will only be ninety seconds of early warning, and then only half an hour before the tsunami hits. Not much time to escape. If you set it off on schedule, everyone knows where they ought not to be that day and will have had plenty of time to make other plans.

Re: The Really Big One

#246

Post by ido »

ryanmarsh wrote: post #216
nosuchthing wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An omnious quote from an article on l0phet: Wysopal offered this grim precedent: Cities were once vulnerable to disastrous fires, which raged through dense clusters of mostly wooden buildings. It took a giant fire in Chicago to spur government officials into serious reforms, including limits on new wooden structures, a more robust water supply for suppressing blazes and an overhaul to the city’s fire department. “The…

Ironically enough, the architecture of the French Quarter in New Orleans is exactly an example of this. The way it was explained to me the French used wood until a mayor or some such proclaimed that all new buildings would use stone because the Spanish inspired buildings were the only ones left standing each time the city burned down.

Can we build relatively fire-resistant wooden buildings today, using modern technology?

Re: The Really Big One

#247

Post by kenferry »

It would be nice if they'd cite their sources. This looks to be one of the main ones:

http://www.crew.org/sites/default/files/cascadia_subduction_...

But this is not nearly as dire. For example, "the Pacific Northwest’s largest population centers and ports, including Portland (OR), Seattle and Tacoma (WA), and Vancouver (BC), are not expected to experience any significant tsunami impacts."

Re: The Really Big One

#248

Post by [deleted] »

CrackpotGonzo wrote: post #175
rfugger wrote: post #167

I was in New Orleans in October 2002, and this guy was on the front page of the main newspaper predicting that within 20 years a category 5 hurricane was likely to whip around Florida and strike the city head on. He said the levies weren't high or strong enough, and that downtown New Orleans would be under 20 feet of water: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/earth/predicting-katrina.html I remember reading it with interest…

Shocking really. Curious to hear rationale from someone that knew about the odds before moving to the PNW.

[deleted]

Re: The Really Big One

#249

Post by fudged71 »

yclept wrote: post #222
anigbrowl wrote: post #219

Meanwhile the barrier to a proper early warning system for the west coast is a whopping $15.6 million a year, of which California has managed to get a whole $5 million from Congress so far - http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-quake-early-wa... Honestly, I'm a little unclear as to why we are even going to Congress for this, instead of the governments of CA, WA and OR agreeing to divide up the sum based on p…

How about a kickstarter?!

That's an incredibly good idea

Re: The Really Big One

#250

Post by [deleted] »

kragen wrote: post #183

So how can you escape from a 10-meter tsunami, like the 11-meter Tohoku tsunami that wrecked Fukushima Dai-Ichi, assuming you have years to prepare? You could build buildings that could withstand the water flowing around them, as the nuclear reactor center itself did; but windows that can survive not just ten meters of water pressure but also cars and trees being dashed against them by the tsunami are going to be les…

[deleted]
Post reply on HN