536 was ‘the worst year to be alive’ (2018) • Hacker News Board

Re: 536 was ‘the worst year to be alive’ (2018)

#361

Post by AtlasBarfed » Sun, Jun 21, 2020, 7:44 PM UTC

politelemon wrote: post #108

klyrs wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Edit: don't take my word for it, apparently this is a popular myth Read up on Yellowstone, for example -- AFAIK it's "due for a big one" but it blows up so infrequently and so catastrophically that there's no real plan other than "maybe think about not living in North America." But hey, volcanic ash is a coolant for the climate -- a few well-placed eruptions could do some good, on a global scale (sorry about the loca…

I looked it up, but according to this, it isn't due for a big one, it's merely media hyperbole. >Although fascinating, the new findings do not imply increased geologic hazards at Yellowstone, and certainly do not increase the chances of a 'supereruption' in the near future. Contrary to some media reports, Yellowstone is not 'overdue' for a supereruption. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowstone_Caldera#Volcanoes www…

"large eruptions that took place 2.1 million, 1.3 million, and 630,000 years ago"

I mean, it's not like it's due in a decade, but it is every 650,000-700,000 years, and it's been... 630,000 years.

Supervolcanoes are a phenomenon entirely different than human history has encountered. Krakatoa is a very small fraction of the ejecta of a supervolcano eruption.

Re: 536 was ‘the worst year to be alive’ (2018)

#362

Post by MagnumOpus » Mon, Jun 22, 2020, 9:42 AM UTC

throwaway4666 wrote: post #359

vxNsr wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An appeal to authority how fallacious of you. In fact I’m getting this from the source. My own family lived there for most of their lives. Only left in the late 80s.

Well of course if you're an emigrant you're going to have a poor opinion of it. Meanwhile the majority of Russians have a positive view of Lenin.

The fact that there were a sufficient number of emigrants that they were prevented from leaving by travel prohibitions, walls, barbed wire, minefields and snipers should tell you about living conditions by itself.

The majority of people in every place where media is tightly controlled will believe what parents, teachers, papers and TV tell them. North Koreans have a positive view of Kim Jong Il, mainland Chinese have a positive view of Mao. That doesn't mean that either of them weren't objectively horrible in terms of competent leadership or morality.

Re: 536 was ‘the worst year to be alive’ (2018)

#363

Post by rabidrat » Mon, Jun 22, 2020, 11:24 PM UTC

AtlasBarfed wrote: post #356

rabidrat wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OTOH nuclear weapons decay and we're rapidly losing the tacit knowledge required to make new ones (at least here in the US). If the Test Ban stays in place and is enforced, it may only be a few more decades until we as a species would have to do another Manhattan Project to rebuild them. This takes about 4 years of concerted effort within military and industry, and the only shortcut is the tacit knowledge that nuclea…

We have the ability to model nuclear explosions and desings in supercomputer simulations. I don't think it would be difficult to re-engineer nuclear warheads, even if all the original engineers are dead.

This paper runs contrary to your opinion. Simulation is not sufficient. https://www.jstor.org/stable/2782506

Re: 536 was ‘the worst year to be alive’ (2018)

#364

Post by ClumsyPilot » Wed, Jun 24, 2020, 6:21 PM UTC

iso1631 wrote: post #303

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does not require dereg, it requires investment. Just lile renewables do.

The UK is building a new nuclear plant and new offshore wind. The nuclear plant has a strike price twice as high as the offshore wind.

And the nuclear plant will produce at 100% of its capacity in any weather. Meanwhile wind will jave average capacity of like 30%

Re: 536 was ‘the worst year to be alive’ (2018)

#365

Post by pfdietz » Fri, Jun 26, 2020, 12:47 AM UTC

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #354

pfdietz wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuclear might have been an answer ten years ago, but one cannot make the case today that it is the answer. The raw economics have pushed nuclear out of the picture now.

Go on, so what do you propose for baseline power - more gas fired power stations?

Renewables + storage. For long term storage and covering rare extended dark windless periods, the key is hydrogen, for which the cost per kWh for underground storage can be far lower than for batteries (efficiency is lower, but that's ok.)

If you go to https://model.energy/ and optimize such systems in various places, using real weather data, you find nuclear (called "Dispatchable 2" in the advanced options) get optimized to 0%. It's just too expensive. That site uses plausible cost numbers, except electrolysers are already cheaper than their target cost for 2030.