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

What’s the hottest the Earth’s ever been?

climate.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 67 posts

Re: What’s the hottest the Earth’s ever been?

#11

Post by skywal_l »

egberts1 wrote: post #6

I often wonder about terraforming (on places like Mars planet). Earth obviously had the leg up on water accumulation during its accretation stage (Hadean period). Perhaps we can start generating oxygen early over there on Mars using a one-step CO2->O2+C catalyst. This comes to mind: https://www.pnas.org/content/109/39/15606

I wonder if terraforming is possible, not because of technological limitations but just because of the limitation of humanity's ability to execute such large scale projects.

Given an unlimited amount of raw materials and energy, terraforming a planet like mars would probably take decades (centuries?).

Private funded projects usually have a TTL of a couple of months to at best 4/5 years and are driven by short to medium term profits. Public funded projects are on a longer timeframe. Taking a recent example, according to Wikipedia, "serious planning" for James Webb started in early 90s. So that's ~30 years.

But do we have example, in modern times, of project lasting more than a century? I have Notre-Dame in mind, any other? The construction of Notre-Dame was driven by religious fervor. I wonder if we could muster the same amount of will based only on a profit motive.

Re: What’s the hottest the Earth’s ever been?

#12

Post by samwillis »

Helmut10001 wrote: post #10

It is strange why many politicians and countries (Germany included) appear to close their eyes and still promote or work on the 1.5 °C goal, which seems pretty unrealistic at this stage. Maybe it is to calm the public, besides knowing better. Instead, there is a need for more realistic plans to model and prepare for 3°C or 5°C increase of average temperature by 2060 (or 2100). Looking at these bigger swings in temper…

Trouble is most politicians are incentivised to think in the short term and are increasing just in a perpetual campaigning mode. They are thinking about their careers and re-election. They cannot except and talk about bad news, and a 3-5degC increase is bad news.

On top of that you have had climate activists pushing for very large change to happen incredibly quickly (arguably needed). But it’s an incredibly hard sell to the public who won’t except a negative impact on their quality of life.

Basically:

1. People are unwilling to make changes that they perceive as being a net negative to their quality of life.

2. Businesses are unwilling to make changes that they expect to have a net negative to their bottom line.

3. Politicians are unwilling to ask for either of the above to happen because they want to be re-elected.

Re: What’s the hottest the Earth’s ever been?

#13

Post by isoprophlex »

egberts1 wrote: post #6

I often wonder about terraforming (on places like Mars planet). Earth obviously had the leg up on water accumulation during its accretation stage (Hadean period). Perhaps we can start generating oxygen early over there on Mars using a one-step CO2->O2+C catalyst. This comes to mind: https://www.pnas.org/content/109/39/15606

There's like... six millibars of pressure on mars? Admittedly almost all of those six millibars are CO2, but still. Turning all that into O2 might still not support ~photosynthesis~ bootstrapping plant life, let alone humans breathing.

Edit: also sorry to be a party pooper but I studied organocatalysis for a while and you must understand that these research papers about catalysts are almost always so incredibly far away from industrial viability. The ligands take long to prepare, the metals are expensive... and whilst these things might be solvable with enough money, the fact remains that they have turnover numbers that are finite.

(The TON is the amount of substrate the catalyst can transform before becoming deactivated)

Even with a TON of 1.000 (paper quotes < 10) you'd be able to produce 1.000 moles (32 kg) of O2 from one mole (has 100 g Ru, 2000 USD) of this expensive ruthenium gizmo. Oh and it's an electrocatalyst so better get some planet-scale power generation in place, first.

Re: What’s the hottest the Earth’s ever been?

#14

Post by matkoniecz »

isoprophlex wrote: post #13
egberts1 wrote: post #6

I often wonder about terraforming (on places like Mars planet). Earth obviously had the leg up on water accumulation during its accretation stage (Hadean period). Perhaps we can start generating oxygen early over there on Mars using a one-step CO2->O2+C catalyst. This comes to mind: https://www.pnas.org/content/109/39/15606

There's like... six millibars of pressure on mars? Admittedly almost all of those six millibars are CO2, but still. Turning all that into O2 might still not support ~photosynthesis~ bootstrapping plant life, let alone humans breathing. Edit: also sorry to be a party pooper but I studied organocatalysis for a while and you must understand that these research papers about catalysts are almost always so incredibly far a…

Turning C02 into 02 would not help supporting photosynthesis.

For photosynthesis oxygen is a waste product, it needs C02.

Re: What’s the hottest the Earth’s ever been?

#15

Post by matkoniecz »

skywal_l wrote: post #11
egberts1 wrote: post #6

I often wonder about terraforming (on places like Mars planet). Earth obviously had the leg up on water accumulation during its accretation stage (Hadean period). Perhaps we can start generating oxygen early over there on Mars using a one-step CO2->O2+C catalyst. This comes to mind: https://www.pnas.org/content/109/39/15606

I wonder if terraforming is possible, not because of technological limitations but just because of the limitation of humanity's ability to execute such large scale projects. Given an unlimited amount of raw materials and energy, terraforming a planet like mars would probably take decades (centuries?). Private funded projects usually have a TTL of a couple of months to at best 4/5 years and are driven by short to medi…

Sagrada Família is under active construction since 1882, 139 years ago (with some pauses due to civil war etc).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagrada_Fam%C3%ADlia (it is much better inside than outside)

Re: What’s the hottest the Earth’s ever been?

#16

Post by isoprophlex »

matkoniecz wrote: post #14
isoprophlex wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's like... six millibars of pressure on mars? Admittedly almost all of those six millibars are CO2, but still. Turning all that into O2 might still not support ~photosynthesis~ bootstrapping plant life, let alone humans breathing. Edit: also sorry to be a party pooper but I studied organocatalysis for a while and you must understand that these research papers about catalysts are almost always so incredibly far a…

Turning C02 into 02 would not help supporting photosynthesis. For photosynthesis oxygen is a waste product, it needs C02.

Hehe oops you're right, i meant "plant life"

Re: What’s the hottest the Earth’s ever been?

#17

Post by ftrobro »

egberts1 wrote: post #6

I often wonder about terraforming (on places like Mars planet). Earth obviously had the leg up on water accumulation during its accretation stage (Hadean period). Perhaps we can start generating oxygen early over there on Mars using a one-step CO2->O2+C catalyst. This comes to mind: https://www.pnas.org/content/109/39/15606

First we would need to create a huge magnetic field protecting Mars from the solar wind that has blown away the atmosphere Mars previously had.

https://www.sciencefocus.com/space/how-did-mars-lose-its-atm...

https://astrobiology.nasa.gov/news/how-to-give-mars-an-atmos...

Re: What’s the hottest the Earth’s ever been?

#18

Post by dav_Oz »

samwillis wrote: post #12
Helmut10001 wrote: post #10

It is strange why many politicians and countries (Germany included) appear to close their eyes and still promote or work on the 1.5 °C goal, which seems pretty unrealistic at this stage. Maybe it is to calm the public, besides knowing better. Instead, there is a need for more realistic plans to model and prepare for 3°C or 5°C increase of average temperature by 2060 (or 2100). Looking at these bigger swings in temper…

Trouble is most politicians are incentivised to think in the short term and are increasing just in a perpetual campaigning mode. They are thinking about their careers and re-election. They cannot except and talk about bad news, and a 3-5degC increase is bad news. On top of that you have had climate activists pushing for very large change to happen incredibly quickly (arguably needed). But it’s an incredibly hard sell…

Update after 2 years of 'crisis management':

The social fabric of the western societies had been severely damaged.

Trust in science is at an all time low. The absurdly rich are absurdly richer. Not few people are now flirting openly with the idea to simply abandon those bulky civil liberties of the 20th century (2nd half) in order to save the world in the long run. So, in order to satisfy 2. ("green washing") and 3. ("emergency state") 1. (civil liberties) is the obvious pawn "sacrifice".

Re: What’s the hottest the Earth’s ever been?

#19

Post by White_Wolf »

samwillis wrote: post #12
Helmut10001 wrote: post #10

It is strange why many politicians and countries (Germany included) appear to close their eyes and still promote or work on the 1.5 °C goal, which seems pretty unrealistic at this stage. Maybe it is to calm the public, besides knowing better. Instead, there is a need for more realistic plans to model and prepare for 3°C or 5°C increase of average temperature by 2060 (or 2100). Looking at these bigger swings in temper…

Trouble is most politicians are incentivised to think in the short term and are increasing just in a perpetual campaigning mode. They are thinking about their careers and re-election. They cannot except and talk about bad news, and a 3-5degC increase is bad news. On top of that you have had climate activists pushing for very large change to happen incredibly quickly (arguably needed). But it’s an incredibly hard sell…

Quality of life is one thing but what happens with the bottom 20%-30% earners? Would they be able to afford living after a sudden change like this? Everyone pushed for a change but I've never seen one(so far) that talk about those that can barely survive as it is.

Re: What’s the hottest the Earth’s ever been?

#20

Post by eCa »

matkoniecz wrote: post #15
skywal_l wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if terraforming is possible, not because of technological limitations but just because of the limitation of humanity's ability to execute such large scale projects. Given an unlimited amount of raw materials and energy, terraforming a planet like mars would probably take decades (centuries?). Private funded projects usually have a TTL of a couple of months to at best 4/5 years and are driven by short to medi…

Sagrada Família is under active construction since 1882, 139 years ago (with some pauses due to civil war etc). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagrada_Fam%C3%ADlia (it is much better inside than outside)

As awesome as it is[1], I don’t think it is ’based only on a profit motive’ as the gp implied they were looking for.

[1] Both the building and the project.

Post reply on HN