This is not a place of honor • Hacker News Board

Re: This is not a place of honor

#241

Post by DanBC » Tue, Jun 07, 2016, 4:02 PM UTC

AnonymousPlanet wrote: post #238

Is there any kind of science fiction or fantasy that includes such a place marked with repulsive myths and symbolism to repel explorers from nuklear waste?

There's "Deep Storm", about a crashed alien ship that warns humans about the dangerous technology by using impossible or nonsensical mathematical equations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Storm

(it's not, in my opinion, a good book.)

There are others where division by zero is used as a warning of a dangerous place.

I'm not sure if there are any where it's humans doing the warning; or where they're warning about nuclear waste.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#242

Post by turkeybone » Tue, Jun 07, 2016, 4:03 PM UTC

amk_ wrote: post #2

Holy shit. Dieter Ast was my landlord in college. This explains so much about my basement. To those who haven't read the article yet, the real title is Judgment on Markers to Deter Inadvertent Human Intrusion into the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant. Prof Ast was the material scientist on one of the multidisciplinary teams tasked to design warning symbols for 10,000 year nuclear waste storage sites. He used to go around…

Hello, fellow Dieter tenant!

I was one of his last tenants in 2013. I always enjoyed conversing with him.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#243

Post by jacquesm » Tue, Jun 07, 2016, 4:06 PM UTC

vonmoltke wrote: post #217

jacquesm wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A school within line of sight of a smokestack burning dioxins is something that should not even exist.

An incinerator outgassing smoke toxic to surrounding people is something that should not exist. Proximity to a school is irrelevant, except for irrational fearmongering.

I disagree. Developing tissue will have to live for much longer than older folks and any kind of cumulative toxins or hard to break down toxins have a lot more chance to do harm in children than in adults.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#244

Post by dsl » Tue, Jun 07, 2016, 4:12 PM UTC

vectorjohn wrote: post #156

proactivesvcs wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Society can lose information as time progresses. Modern medicine is only just starting to re-discover how important state of mind is when packaging, describing and using drugs. That's the case despite the fact there haven't been any large-scale catastrophes that caused the information to be lost. In 10,000 years who knows what we might have forgotten?

Not nuclear waste.

Lets say tomorrow we figure out how to drill down and tap the geothermal from the core of the planet. Pretty much overnight the coal, gas, and nuclear industries become obsolete.

Nobody will be continuing studies in the field of nuclear. Knowledge will be lost.

Heck, 5,000 after the pyramids were built we still don't know how.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#245

Post by gambiting » Tue, Jun 07, 2016, 4:15 PM UTC

proactivesvcs wrote: post #144

kbart wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Additionally, I don't think the "no marker, anonymous patch of ground" plan is sound. 10000 years is a long time, which will hopefully be inhabited by peoples more advanced than us, and they could do a lot of digging in that time." If these people are more advanced, there's no point to teach them the dangers of radiation as they will be well aware of that already.

Society can lose information as time progresses. Modern medicine is only just starting to re-discover how important state of mind is when packaging, describing and using drugs. That's the case despite the fact there haven't been any large-scale catastrophes that caused the information to be lost. In 10,000 years who knows what we might have forgotten?

To me, it seems like the answer to the problem is to bury the radioactive waste in incredibly deep shafts - say 5000m below ground? Any society advanced enough to retrieve something from that depth would also have to be advanced enough to know about radiation, surely?

Re: This is not a place of honor

#246

Post by zackbloom » Tue, Jun 07, 2016, 4:16 PM UTC

rm_-rf_slash wrote: post #239

felipeerias wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We still haven't opened the tomb of the first emperor of China, which has been closed for more than two millennia. One of the main reasons is the presence of enormous amounts of mercury. Whole rivers of it, according to tradition. There's your poison.

Even if we could enter the Qin emperor's tomb unharmed, we should leave it untouched out of respect for the dead.

I don't agree with this. My respect for the dead says we should unearth the remains with care and treat the body with respect, but I certainly have no allegiance to having my body remain in the ground indefinitely if future scientists could gain value from it.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#247

Post by jcl » Tue, Jun 07, 2016, 4:19 PM UTC

korethr wrote: post #65

Honestly, reading this, I kept thinking to myself, "Man, this is just waiting to be turned into science fiction short story." It could go in different directions, future humans discover such a site, humans discover an alien analogue of such a site on $planet, aliens discover such a site crafted by humans on $planet, etc. Either way, there's potential for a good story there.

It's actually not that dissimilar from the plot of "Alien". Or "Prometheus". Or "At the Mountains of Madness".

Re: This is not a place of honor

#248

Post by dragonwriter » Tue, Jun 07, 2016, 4:28 PM UTC

dsl wrote: post #244

vectorjohn wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not nuclear waste.

Lets say tomorrow we figure out how to drill down and tap the geothermal from the core of the planet. Pretty much overnight the coal, gas, and nuclear industries become obsolete. Nobody will be continuing studies in the field of nuclear. Knowledge will be lost. Heck, 5,000 after the pyramids were built we still don't know how.

> Nobody will be continuing studies in the field of nuclear.

Unless they are interested in powering things that aren't tethered to the surface of the earth. Which, you know, is something humans have been interested in...

Re: This is not a place of honor

#249

Post by kbenson » Tue, Jun 07, 2016, 4:37 PM UTC

dsl wrote: post #244

vectorjohn wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not nuclear waste.

Lets say tomorrow we figure out how to drill down and tap the geothermal from the core of the planet. Pretty much overnight the coal, gas, and nuclear industries become obsolete. Nobody will be continuing studies in the field of nuclear. Knowledge will be lost. Heck, 5,000 after the pyramids were built we still don't know how.

Incentives will shift and realign, but nuclear will still have some development. There's a reason it's used in submarines and aircraft carriers, and geothermal isn't going to solve that, even with vastly increased battery technology.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#250

Post by dragonwriter » Tue, Jun 07, 2016, 4:37 PM UTC

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #103

djsumdog wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the most interesting thing about this is the underlying assumption that warnings and containment must survive .. the death of our current civilization and States. These researchers are talking the long path .. how do we warn people who make not have any knowledge our civilization exists in its current form? Too many people today think this will last forever; that we're in a golden age that we cannot easily re…

It's especially interesting to see a government body doing this sort of thing. Politicians don't usually care much about what kind of world they're leaving for their own children, let alone random citizens of the far future. Is anyone actually following these suggestions? My cynical assumption is that they'd be laughed out of the house by the people who actually hold the construction purse-strings.

> Politicians don't usually care much about what kind of world they're leaving for their own children, let alone random citizens of the far future.

Politicians probably care about this a lot much than they are given credit for; while plenty are actually short-sighted and narrowly selfish (just like plenty of non-politicians), no doubt a lot of the perception of that comes from people who disagree with them on what is best for the future portraying the politicians disagreement as disinterest. (This frequently happens when the disagreeing parties are not politicians, as well.)