Earth's internal heat regulation is such an underrated hero in the climate story. Half of Earth’s heat comes from internal sources, constantly driving plate tectonics and helping regulate CO₂. Venus lacks that it’s like a pressure cooker with no release valve.
Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?
151–160 of 358 posts
Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?
#152> For a time, the mantle would get hotter, since the shell around it would trap heat generated by radioactively decaying compounds inside it. As heat accumulates in the interior, the Earth in Kane’s simulations would experience an uptick in volcanism lasting for about 15 million years. That totally surprised to me. I had no idea radioactive decay played such a role for earth. It turns out I must have fallen sleep in…
> It turns out I must have fallen sleep in one of the classes when that was explained.
Unless you've studied this at a post-secondary level, I'm afraid that it's quite likely that you've never had it explained to you. My highschool discussed at length the role that the sun, the greenhouse effect, oceans, forests, agriculture, mountain ranges, etc, play on weather and climate, but never actually went through the exercise of energy accounting to determine what keeps the Earth warm.
Which is understandable, because that exercise is non-trivial, and will not actually be convincing to anyone who doesn't have a calculus education.
Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?
#153Earlier quoted context omitted.
How do you deorbit Venus is such a way that your inflatable balloon city comes to a gentle stop, 30 miles up, and just floats there? Worse still, when people need to leave and return to Earth, how do you launch a rocket from the balloon city and return to orbit? How do visitors or pioneers deorbit and land at the floating city? If there aren't materials to effect a repair, how long until it sinks down into the hellzo…
> such a way that your inflatable balloon city comes to a gentle stop, 30 miles up, and just floats there? Literally how floating works. > Worse still, when people need to leave and return to Earth, how do you launch a rocket from the balloon city and return to orbit? By launching your rocket from the ballon city and returning to orbit. (I'm struggling to see the novel problem.) > Where are materials manufactured for…
> By launching your rocket from the ballon city and returning to orbit. (I'm struggling to see the novel problem.)
I think Newton’s third law may cause trouble-but I’m no physicist.
Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?
#154Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Plus, it's nice to split our eggs into multiple planetary baskets. Multiple baskets is good, but why planetary?
Too many dickheads with a bright idea of putting nuclear warheads on submersibles with a dead man’s switch on this planet.
> Too many dickheads with a bright idea of putting nuclear warheads on submersibles with a dead man’s switch on this planet
If we're nuking each other on Earth, I find it unlikely we wouldn't aim a nuke or two at that group's colony on Mars.
The only thing a Martian colony is a hedge against is ecological collapse on Earth. Because we did something exceptionally stupid accidentally. Or because a rock came by to say hi.
Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
> such a way that your inflatable balloon city comes to a gentle stop, 30 miles up, and just floats there? Literally how floating works. > Worse still, when people need to leave and return to Earth, how do you launch a rocket from the balloon city and return to orbit? By launching your rocket from the ballon city and returning to orbit. (I'm struggling to see the novel problem.) > Where are materials manufactured for…
> By launching your rocket from the ballon city and returning to orbit. (I'm struggling to see the novel problem.) I think Newton’s third law may cause trouble-but I’m no physicist.
> I think Newton’s third law may cause trouble
No more than for a floating platform on the ocean. (Or frankly any sea or airborne firing platform.)
If your launch mass is a significant fraction of station mass, and you can't counterweight, you could float it off to the side and then have the baloon detach when its engines fire. But none of this is in even the top thousand problems that come with colonising Venus.
Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?
#157Earlier quoted context omitted.
Agree. But my understanding is the main idea is Mars is supposed to be a "backup" for humanity in the event of a very-low-probability catastrophic event on earth (total nuclear war, solar flare, meteorite collision). In our lifetimes, unlikely. Over the next 1 million years? Maybe.
Yeah, it's full-on fantasy. Why would we as a species waste time terraforming a planet proven to let its atmosphere evaporate into space? Why waste energy to drag materials from Earth there instead of spending the same energy and materials to fix whatever problems Earth has? At least in a billion years we can expect we would be either extinct already from our own actions, or hope to be advanced enough as a species to…
> Why waste energy to drag materials from Earth there instead of spending the same energy and materials to fix whatever problems Earth has?
One of these is a challenge at the frontier, the other an exercise in stewardship. They attract different personalities.
Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?
#158Earlier quoted context omitted.
Too many dickheads with a bright idea of putting nuclear warheads on submersibles with a dead man’s switch on this planet.
> Too many dickheads with a bright idea of putting nuclear warheads on submersibles with a dead man’s switch on this planet If we're nuking each other on Earth, I find it unlikely we wouldn't aim a nuke or two at that group's colony on Mars. The only thing a Martian colony is a hedge against is ecological collapse on Earth. Because we did something exceptionally stupid accidentally. Or because a rock came by to say h…
> The only thing a Martian colony is a hedge against is ecological collapse on Earth. Because we did something exceptionally stupid accidentally. Or because a rock came by to say hi.
Even then, Mars is colder than the Antarctic, drier than the Sahara, has lower air pressure than the top of Mount Everest, has soil poisoned like a superfund cleanup site, has no meaningful ozone layer, has no magnetosphere protecting against CMEs, has half our solar irradiance level, and occasionally has planet-spanning dust storms, so the bare minimum for colonising Mars must be able to survive worse than any possible thing we can possibly do to Earth and also some of the bigger rocks coming by to say hi.
Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?
#159> For a time, the mantle would get hotter, since the shell around it would trap heat generated by radioactively decaying compounds inside it. As heat accumulates in the interior, the Earth in Kane’s simulations would experience an uptick in volcanism lasting for about 15 million years. That totally surprised to me. I had no idea radioactive decay played such a role for earth. It turns out I must have fallen sleep in…
> It turns out I must have fallen sleep in one of the classes when that was explained. Unless you've studied this at a post-secondary level, I'm afraid that it's quite likely that you've never had it explained to you. My highschool discussed at length the role that the sun, the greenhouse effect, oceans, forests, agriculture, mountain ranges, etc, play on weather and climate, but never actually went through the exerc…
Proving the equilibrium requires calculus but simply writing it down doesn't? It's not different from these "water flows into and out of the pool" exercises.
Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?
#160Earth is hell also...