Earth = Dying?

[~Niko~]

2012!

hah

[The Geologist]

Okay, lemme make this super easy:

After a nuclear weapon is detonated, in addition to the bomb vaporizing a very large area, it also causes an EMP.

What is an EMP?

EMP, or Electro-Magnetic Pulse, is an incredibly strong surge of energy, that can intensely increase the voltage in anything electrical until that thing is fried.

HYPOTHETICAL:

Now, a solar flare is essentially like a gigantic, super-powerful EMP that will affect the entire Earth, not just one location. Anything with a microchip will be gone. Computers, printers, vehicles, calculators, cell phones, air conditioners, wristwatches radios, Tvs, tivos (oh no!!!!!! the last episode of Lost was lost?! AHHHH!!!), outboard engines, satelites, if the space shuttle Discovery is up there....

Quite literally, the only real difference between Earth after a solar flare, and the Cromagnons in the Stone Age, is that instead of throwing stones, we're gonna be shooting each other. But hey, look at the bright side: seeing as how they're never gonna stop blathering about Michael Jackson, at least the solar flare will end it.

Again, this is all HYPOTHETICAL, but very true. So, when thinking about the apocalyse, don't just think of a big asteroid hitting Earth, think- "my Iphone won't work!!!"

I'm fairly sure the main concern about ejecta from the sun passing by/at Earth is not necessarily the effects on electronics, but on our atmosphere.  Something of that high energy/velocity has the potential to strip away the atmosphere, which is obviously a bad thing.  But in such an event we wouldn't have to worry about our electronics, as they would be destroyed along with everything else.

Aside from that, the Earth is only ~4.5 billion.  One billion too many in there.  And yes, over the many hundreds of millions of years the Earth has been bombarded numerous times.  Popular theory contends that much of the water we see on Earth is the result of hydrogen bearing objects from space.  Then again, some time spent surfing satellite maps and the moon will tell you just how many objects have hit their target.  The moon itself may be the result between a collision between a roughly Mars-sized object and the Earth early on.

On the other hand, the Earth is not dieing.  It's just not.  To think we could someone kill the planet is an outrageous thought, as the planet as come back from much worse before.  We might make it unlivable to humans or other life forms for a damn long time, yet the planet is certainly not dieing.  It's still very much active and dynamic, and should keep on chugging for longer than you or I can see or care about.

[Blacksheepboy]

Get with it, the world is going to end 2085.

But no, my post was sarcastic. Running out of oil/coal/trees? Please...

The moon itself may be the result between a collision between a roughly Mars-sized object and the Earth early on.

Don't make me sick...

[excruciator]

Get with it, the world is going to end 2085.

But no, my post was sarcastic. Running out of oil/coal/trees? Please...

You don't believe that resources are limited?

[Blacksheepboy]

Limited? Of course they are. But please, do you think they make 80% of our wood products with rain-forest growth? They have tree farms silly, and they rotate crops.

And oil: calling it a fossil foil is rather a false interpretation of its main origin, which would be the constant rotation of stuff under the Earth's crust. Essentially, we're set for many hundreds of years.

Coal: there is so much under American soil... I don't have the words to express the stupidity of not using it.

By the way, nuclear energy is clean, efficient, and affordable. Nice alternative for coal energy, eh? Unless you believe we'll all turn green

[excruciator]

We might not want to release more stored carbon into the atmosphere. Because of global warming.

But let me guess, you don't believe in global warming.

EDIT:

Tree takes years to grow. Rotating crops doesn't really work. Unless you want to rotate every 20-30 years...

[Blacksheepboy]

...you don't believe in global warming.

Haha, you act like it's a religion. Of course I believe in global warming. But even in 1992, there was enough controversy to make it unbelievable. So no, I don't believe it is happening at this time in history. Rather, temperatures are calculated to be slightly declining. But please, don't say it's because global warming is melting the ice caps.

Tree takes years to grow.

And you think people haven't thought about that...?

[Veritas]

And oil: calling it a fossil foil is rather a false interpretation of its main origin, which would be the constant rotation of stuff under the Earth's crust. Essentially, we're set for many hundreds of years.

Feel free to source that, because last I checked every estimate ever has it running out within one hundred.

Coal: there is so much under American soil... I don't have the words to express the stupidity of not using it.

How about the fact that coal is ridiculously dirty?

But even in 1992, there was enough controversy to make it unbelievable.

The fact that uneducated people create controversy makes it unbelievable? Really?

So no, I don't believe it is happening at this time in history.

That's because you're an idiot.

[Kazuki]

Earth isn't dying; it's changing. Most people think that's absurd because they haven't witnessed it in their lifetimes, but this planet has changed rather drastically plenty of times before. You know what I wanna be around to experience? The shift of the magnetic poles. There would be some cool stuff happening all over the planet.

I agree with MadDog for the most part. Solar flares have the potential to render all of our technology useless overnight. The possibility of such a large solar flare hitting us, however, is rather slim. Smaller solar storms have hit the Earth before, knocking out power grids for days, sometimes weeks. If you're interested, look up the Quebec solar storm of 1989.

Earth is relatively a very weak planet. Our "defenses," so to speak, are mediocre at best. (Edit: As Geo stated, a single highly-powered solar storm is capable of ripping apart our magnetosphere.) As such, it is entirely possible for the Earth to be destroyed or altered beyond recognition by several factors within our galaxy. Earth is not, however, "deteriorating," or anything of the sort.

[Blacksheepboy]

Rawrs, let us fling insults because that's what debating is all about!
Good job buddy.

Coal. It can be made into oil through processing.

The fact that uneducated people create controversy makes it unbelievable?

Um, hm. Uneducated. Opinion much?

[excruciator]

Haha, you act like it's a religion. Of course I believe in global warming. But even in 1992, there was enough controversy to make it unbelievable. So no, I don't believe it is happening at this time in history. Rather, temperatures are calculated to be slightly declining. But please, don't say it's because global warming is melting the ice caps.

We are in a cooling stage. Eventhough the temperature is decreasing, I'd say that our impact is undeniable.

And you think people haven't thought about that...?

We don't plant trees and wait 30 years for it to grow and only then we start harvesting. Our demand for tree is way higher than its growth rate.

[Blacksheepboy]

There are so many problems regarding the "facts" behind global warming, and I 'spose getting into a debate over it all would be off-topic and rather unwanted. Same goes for the resource debate.

[Veritas]

Rawrs, let us fling insults because that's what debating is all about!
Good job buddy.

Coal. It can be made into oil through processing.

The question then becomes: Can it do it cleanly, and can it be done in large enough quantities? Because that's still not a source for saying oil will last us hundreds of years.

The fact that uneducated people create controversy makes it unbelievable?

Um, hm. Uneducated. Opinion much?

Considering there is an overwhelming scientific consensus (those educated on the matter) that global warming is happening, yes. The controversy is created by uneducated people.

[The Geologist]

And oil: calling it a fossil foil is rather a false interpretation of its main origin, which would be the constant rotation of stuff under the Earth's crust. Essentially, we're set for many hundreds of years.

Coal: there is so much under American soil... I don't have the words to express the stupidity of not using it.

There's a lot wrong with both of these statements.

First, I don't have any idea what you're talking about with the "constant rotation" of the stuff. **edit: Maybe you meant the tectonic cycle?  Burial and uplift?  If so, that would be correct in part.  First time I read what you typed, it seemed you meant the oil was constantly rotating, which is wrong.** Oil is held in semi-permeable reservoirs (which are fed by source rocks) in deeply buried rocks sedimentary rocks.  These reservoirs are highly pressurized, which inhibits any sort of "rotation" as you see with the water cycle.  What's more, depending on the surrounding lithologies (which may be completely impermeable), or because of various tectonic activity and structural deformation, many reservoirs are either trapped where they form, or can be broken up into compartments that have no interaction with surrounding lithologies until they're drilled.

I won't ask you for sources here, but I'm tempted to.  Anyhow, oil forms over a very specific window of temperature and pressure.  Can't remember the numbers off the top of my head, but the higher your temperature, the more you "crack" the compounds that make up oil (meaning the difference between heavy crude versus lighter oils, and eventually natural gas).  There's a good reason we have to dig down to find oil - those T and P conditions aren't met until the organic material is buried deep enough to get hot/pressurized.  What's more, you have to get lucky in that no metamorphic/igneous events come along and provide too much regional or local heating which could destroy your potential oil reserve. 

Fossil fuel is pretty apt when considering the age of the materials which ultimately become the oil, or more precisely the age of the lithologies they're found in.

About the whole coal thing, the same case applies.  And for both oil and coal, it wouldn't matter if more coal/oil than anyone had ever seen in the history of the oil industry was all buried beneath the US - if it's not profitable to drill or mine, it won't be used.  Although, as with your statement on how oil itself forms, I'm not too inclined to bite down on such rampant coal all across the US.  There might be numerous coal-bearing formations all across the US, but no one is going to mine a unit out if it only has a thin band of coal.

[{LAW} Gamer_2k4]

The world isn't "dying", it's dead.
Because it's inevitable, cause everything that has a start has an ending.

There are many ways you could justify that first statement, but yours is just foolish.  Semantically, the purpose of tenses (dying vs dead) is there because future events are NOT present processes.  By your logic, I'm sleeping while I'm awake, simply because eventually I WILL go to sleep.  I'm stopped even while running, because eventually I'll stop.  But no.  The whole point of the word "dying" is to describe something that ISN'T dead, regardless of whether or not it'll eventually be in that state.

We don't plant trees and wait 30 years for it to grow and only then we start harvesting. Our demand for tree is way higher than its growth rate.

It wouldn't surprise me one bit if there were regulations that said 50 trees had to be planted for every one cut down.

Anyway, here's a pretty nifty site that goes into a ton of ways the world could end.  It's worth a look:
http://www.exitmundi.nl/exitmundi.htm

[excruciator]

It wouldn't surprise me one bit if there were regulations that said 50 trees had to be planted for every one cut down.

If that was the case then we wouldn't be having less trees than before.

[Blacksheepboy]

If that was the case then we wouldn't be having less trees than before.

You're right, we wouldn't. And frankly, we don't.

[~Niko~]

at this rate this thread will become likely to official religion debate thread.

I smell a sticky soon.

[demoniac93]

...you don't believe in global warming.

Haha, you act like it's a religion. Of course I believe in global warming. But even in 1992, there was enough controversy to make it unbelievable. So no, I don't believe it is happening at this time in history. Rather, temperatures are calculated to be slightly declining. But please, don't say it's because global warming is melting the ice caps.

Tree takes years to grow.

And you think people haven't thought about that...?

Actually, those temperatures are changing DRASTICALLY, did you know that last year's winter was the first time in history that it snowed in Saudi Arabia? I do mean first time ever. Seems like the effect of global warming to me...

[UnknownSniper]

It felt like it was around 85 degrees this year, on Christmas Eve and Christmas day, but it also snowed only weeks before. (In South-East Texas, usually never snows and very cold all through the middle of December-January)

More odd weather is the fact that there is a drought in Texas, we're already 22 months into it. We can't really count on a hurricane to come by and give us rain and flooding, because that el nino crap. 

I can honestly say something is fucking with the weather, and it sure ain't natural.