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Another idea occured to me. what about prepositioning fuel dumps? The in-situ fuel production plant is mostly for the return to orbit vehicle, the rovers just suck up the left overs. There is no need to have a seperate reactor for each fuel production plant. If you have 2 years to produce fuel at the supply depot, then maybe solar panels will suffice, the purpose being to supply enough fuel to the the rover over to the next fuel dump. These fuel stations would be lighter than the reactor powered ones for the return to Orbit vehicle. You could have one return to orbit vehicle at one end of the line of fuel dumps and another return to orbit vehicle at the other end. The fuel production depots could then be sent over on smaller rockets, and each one can be seperated 500 km from the next, it would be the first Martian Highway, and since the fuel dumps are reusable, they could remain for the next mission and the next as they would continue to produce more fuel. The longevity of the Mars rovers testifies to this possibility.
Yes, by all means. Protect us from the Orange Blight menace.
Won't someone think of the Citrus!
Next thing ya know, it won't be safe to eat in taco bell anymore!
You wouldn't make light of it if you were an orange grower, that would be your bread and butter then.
Tom, you're just playing silly buggers with history: I even recognize your sources. The truth is that "WWI" was never concluded, which led to "WWII" and the A-bomb finale. Sorry, kid, but your Georgie is strictly a "bush leaguer" when it comes to running a proper world war. In fact, his administration stands a good chance as being written off as the Nation's worst and crookedest ... with almost two years of it still to go. God help us.
George W. Bush and Franklin D. Roosevelt have more in common than you'd like to admit. Dicktice, you're just playing silly buggers with history: I even recognize your sources. The truth is that "Persian Gulf War I" was never concluded, wich led to "Persian Gulf War II" aka "The Iraq War", which is not yet concluded. Like FDR, George W. Bush choose not to play the isolationist, and like FDR, he felt that the dictator needed to be put in his place. It is too bad their aren't any Democrats like FDR anymore who at least was patriotic and wanted his country to win the War rather than lose, it is depressing listening to all the Democratic Presidential candidates talk about the War, they all shake their heads and say the war cannot be won, so I wonder why I should bother voting for any of them if they are so useless and can't win the war. If as they say, that George Bush is a poor leader, then clearly a better leader than George Bush can win the War where he can't, but I don't hear any Democrats telling us how he can win the war. All I hear is them talking about giving up and pulling out, FDR would never have talked that way! But I guess the rank and file of the Democratic Party today would rather have this hopeless useless talk from their candidates and would not vote for a Democratic Candidate who said he could win, tis a shame that they have such a loser mentality.
Nah, there is no good way to power a mobile rover-hab. A nuclear reactor puts off far too much radiation to have it bolted to your vehicle.
Who said it had to be bolted to the Rover hab? You can have two rovers, one is a rover/Hab, and the other is a rover/reactor. The Rover/reactor stays a long distance away from the rover hab and it manufacture's fuel while on the move and then deposits the fuel in a tank which the rover picks up and then drops an empty tank, which the reactor rover picks up. Actually the Rover had can run on a closed cycle internal combustion engine that collects all the exhaust in another tank with the reactor rover then picks up and recycled back into fuel and oxygen.
The rover hab would start out with a tank full of methane and another tank full of liquid oxygen, and when it has used up its fuel, it ends up with a tank full of water, which it exhanges with the reactor rover for another tank full of methane and liquid oxygen Both rovers can stay far away from each other by simply dropping and picking up tanks as they are needed. You might even have the Return to Orbit vehicle towed on a trailer, it would be a whole mobile base on wheels. No need to be stuck in any particular spot.
I only mention the WTC because RobertDyck says our concern about terrorism is all overblown and that we should just give his country what it wants while getting nothing in return and loosening our border security with no compensatory agreements. I think it makes no difference in one customs inspector is Canadian and one American or they are both American or Both Canadian, our criterion for who and what we want in our countries and don't want are similar enough to coincide most of the time, but during those rare exceptions we need a double veto system with regards to accepting certain individuals or shipments. For instance a Canadian port might receive a certain shipment of oranges that contain an orange blight which would do certain damage to crops in Florida and California, and since Canada does not grow oranges, it might let the shipment right through since it has no reason by itself not to. if there was an American inspector there, he would cast his veto to protect American Orange crops.
About 95% of Americans not having passports well for one, the USA is a large country and many of its people find no reason to leave or have a passport, and might not find the money for international travel in any case, and secondly many of the news reports make Americans feel distictly unwelcome, and they in turn decide to have little to do with the rest of the World as well. All those people protesting George Bush's visit to Columbia and Brazil, well, they might decide not to go to Columbia and Brazil as well. What was George Bush trying to do in Barzil anyway, bring jobs to Brazilian Sugar growers for one, yet all the Brazilians are concerned about is that the Iraqis aren't being properly oppressed by a strongman dictator like they should be, elections in Iraq is a terrible thing to them, and they'd like a return to the Status Quo, they want the Punch and Judy "Kill the Jews" terrorist puppet show to continue because they find it so entertaining.
Because the demand for energy is such, and if we meet that demand without adding CO2, we contribute less to global warming as CO2 is a greenhouse gas, whether the difference is significant is another matter.
Tom, why should Canada let the United States or anyone else dictate what our immigration policy should be?
because they want open borders with the US where they can travel back and forth unhindered, and with no checking of passports or IDs and no questions asked. If we open the borders completely with Canada, we must close the border with the rest of the world a little more to compensate, that is the price, because there is a reason we stop people at our border. There are some people we don't want getting into our country because they are dangerous to us. If we check them at your border, then that removes the requirement that we check them at the border seperating the US and Canada, don't you see? Canadians also get to do the same thing at our border with Mexico for instance. If there is a Mexican or some other foreigner that they don't want getting into their country, they have the power to stop him from getting into the United States and thus have access to Canada through the free and open border, that is the price. Do you simply think we should relax our security and get nothing in return just to make a few Canadian's happy? A border in part defines what separates Canada from the US. If both countries are to give up individual control over who enters from Canada or the US, then they must establish mutual contol over who enters from the rest of the world, doesn't that make sense to you?
Canada is a sovereign country, we make our own policy.
and so is the United States of America, if you want a certain policy from us, you would have to give us something in return, we worry about terrorists entering our country, maybe you don't but we do. If you want us to open our borders to you, you have to address our concerns about terrorism, and a formal agreement where each country gets to guard the other's border seems a reasonable way to go about it. Lets face it, we both want the same sorts of immigrants, don't we, no one really wants a terrorist coming into his country, the only problem we have is if one country thinks someone is a terrorist and the other does not, this reduces our security both ways.
And we make a point of being polite and courteous, welcoming to immigrants from all over the world. That gains us a good reputation, making friends everywhere. Those friendships mean we don't have people so pissed-off at us that they feel they have to kill themselves in a terrorist act to stop us. Specifically, when a terrorist organization does commit the offence of terrorism, we blame just them, not everyone one in the world.
So you want us to give into terrorist demands and establish a syndocracy in our country for them to govern us with.
"Racial profiling" is a means of painting everyone of Arab descent as a terrorist, despite the fact the vast majority of Arabs are just as peace-loving as us.
You are making two assumptions here, that we measure people's foreheads to assess the probability of their being terrorists, and that the najority of Arabs are peace loving. If the majority of Arabs were peace loving, we wouldn't have problems with arab terrorists, just like we don't have problems with Hindus or Buddists.
Our immigration policy does include criminal background checks, and we do exclude members of known terrorist organizations. We aren't going to exclude someone from Morocco, for example, just because al Qaeda mounted a terrorist attack on our ally.
Thus you are asking us to relax our security requirements just so Canadians can travel more freely across our border, what do we get in return for this? We are a soverign country too, and we don't let foreigners dictate our foreign policies. If you want an open border with the US, some compromises will have to be made. If you are unprepared to make compromises and subbornly insist that you get your way all the way, you'll get nowhere. If all you want to do is complain about the US border, but get nothing done then that's fine, but if you want to see some progress, you must come to the table with something to bargain with, and I don't mean hostages.
You put it quite succinctly, "We aren't going to exclude someone from Morocco, for example, just because al Qaeda mounted a terrorist attack on our ally." Well maybe you should. If you want something from us, you have to take our concerns about terrorism seriously, even if Canadians aren't concerned. If you aren't concerned about what we're concerned about, then why should we be concerned about what your concerned about? It works both ways you know. If your concern is free and open commerce with the US, then that's one thing, but if you want to control US foreign policy or tell us how we should protect ourselves, that is another.
Your comments support an idea I've been hatching lately. Russia wants to buy our grain to feed their people, and they want to use the port of Churchill. We in Manitoba want an ocean port, but Churchill is on Hudson's Bay, which freezes over in winter. Right now grain is transported by train to Thunderbay, at the west end of Lake Superior, where it's transferred to a lake ship. The St. Lawrence Sea Way has locks that permit good size ships to travel from the Great Lakes to the Atlantic, where they can proceed across the ocean, but modern ocean cargo ships are larger than will fit through the locks. Churchill has a deep water port that can accommodate the largest grain ships. So Russia has offered to use their big nuclear powered icebreakers to open a shipping channel. Everyone in Manitoba wants to accept this offer, and I've been mentioning to politicians that we do so. One politician mentioned the "guys down south" (Americans) don't want that to happen. I propose Canada accept Russia's offer anyway.
You can be stubborn, but there is a price. You must understand that you must give if you want to get something from us, its not all about just what you want.
The other idea is more related to the Mars Society. I've argued before that space exploration provides the same impetus for technological development as war, but without the horrendous cost. Canada has been a world leader in peace, while being a modern industrialized economy and a modern democracy. I propose that Canada get over its national inferiority complex, and lead the way to peaceful use of technology. We should ask Russia to launch 2 Canadian satellites in exchange for Canada paying for restoration of infrastructure for the Energia rocket, and to gain access to it. Then Canada design and build the spacecraft for a human mission to Mars, launched on an Energia rocket. Robert Zubrin said Mars Direct would require 2 Saturn V size rockets, and designed the Ares launch vehicle to be that size using Shuttle parts, but Energia would require 3 launches per mission. Now America is arguing with itself whether to return to the Moon using a mission plan that can only be called Apollo on steroids. While America argues, Canada will go directly to Mars. We'll use all Canadian equipment; the only Russian part will be the big rocket. If Russia wants a seat for a cosmonaut on the first human mission to Mars, they can pay for it by providing the rocket at their expense. We could add an additional level of security to this plan by encouraging Russia to launch the Science Power Platform for ISS themselves, and do so with the Ptichka space shuttle. That's the only Buran class orbiter that still exists. Canada could provide at Canadian expense a CanadArm (NASA calls it the Remote Manipulator System or RMS) along with all auxiliary equipment and cosmonaut training to use it. Once the Russian space shuttle is operational again, then Russia will be motivated to maintain the Energia launch vehicle since it lifts their shuttle. Canada can't afford to bail them out a second time, once restored they'll have to maintain it themselves.
As an independent country, that's you perogative to establish joint missions with the Russians. If you refuse to understand our concerns about Russia being run by a dictator, and Russian foreign policy trying to undermine us and hlep the Iranians develop nuclear weapons, then you can't expect much understanding from us, if you ask us to open our border with your country. To put it succinctly, if you don't respect our desires, we won't respect yours. Russia is no friend to democracy, and it has proven to be no friend of ours. If you enter into partnerships with our adversaries and still expect to be our friends afterwards, you may be in for a rude awakening. I hope Russia gets its democracy back, but making friends with Russia's dictator is not the same as making friends with the Russian people, it worked the same with Ferdinand Marcos of the Phillipeans by the way.
It may be ironic considering Canada is part of NATO and NORAD, and the Soviet Union was our enemy during the Cold War. However, the Soviet Union doesn't exist any more. Russia is a trading partner now. Establishing friendly relations would be consistent with Canada's "boy scout" foreign policy. It would also lead others in the world to work with Russia as a partner rather than trying to return to a Cold War mentality. But as a strategic position, if the government of the United States is going to continue to challenge our sovereignty over the arctic and militarize our border, then it's in our best interest to establish a friendly working relationship with Russia.
I just came from the Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the Liberal Party of Canada (Manitoba). That's the provincial chunk of the federal party, not the provincial party. It was an eye-opening experience, and frustrating in some ways. There are many individuals within the party, with varying views. I was distressed to see so many who want to go "tax and spend". However, our party leader has 3 "pillars" to his election platform: social justice, environmental sustainability, and economic prosperity. I feel voters want it all, they don't want to make a choice of right vs. left, so I'm glad he did this. I was a delegate for him at the leadership convention. My focus is economic prosperity; you could call me a "blue Liberal". In Canada the Conservative party adopted blue as their party colour because it's seen as the colour of business; the Liberal party colour is red. This has become the opposite of American party colours, so when I say "blue Liberal" I mean toward the right of many others in my party. I want reduced spending and reduced taxes. But one policy resolution I submitted was to accept Russia's offer for an icebreaker.
So Tom, do you still think it's a good idea to push Canada around, demand we follow George W.'s paranoid reaction to 9/11 with the threat of arming the border if we don't?
You consider it paranoia, I saw the buildings burn and it wasn't my imagination. You don't drive by the hole in the ground just about every day, I do. You can pretend it didn't happen, but I can't. Being a smaller country, you don't have the same concerns we do, you don't have your army deployed the same places we do. If you want an open border with us, you have to understand our geopolitical concerns, if you just ignore them, you won't get anywhere. It is not very hard to try and put yourselves in our shoes and try to understand us, but you don't. We are not so very different on an individual basis. I would be happy to have a mutual understanding between out two countries so we can have freerer traffic across our mutual border. What we ask is not a whole lot compared to the benefits of this increased cross border traffic, if Russia is a more important partner to you than the US, then that's your countries decision, but as the French say, "You can't have your cake and eat it too."
I just have to ask this question. I'm not saying that humans aren't causing global warming, but ...
What if they aren't and humans take measures to reverse global warming, and what if those measures work too well?
What if Earth's natural climate was in the midst of a cooling trend that human activities interupted?
What are the costs of stopping global warming in a hurry?
What are the costs of letting the Earth Warm up?
If we regulate the economy, and drive up costs of transportation, what if this causes an economic depression and throws people out of work, and what if the sacrifice being made was unnecessary?
We don't have a good alternative to fossil fuels. A good alternative would be just as cheap as fossil fuels and painless to switich to, but what if government doesn't want to wait and forces consumers to switch to more expensive alternatives by forcing up the price of gasoline and collecting a whole bunch or revenue. People who own gasoline powered cars have at first no choice but to pay the higer prices of gas that government imposes on top of OPEC. Maybe an alternative such as an ethenol powered car would now look more attractive by contrast, and people would start manufacturing and buying those cars. Farmers would have to expand their fields to grow corn for fuel in addition to what they grow for food, that means less land for forests, and wild life habitats would disappear, just as they would for certain species with global warming.
Now if Polar Bears become endangered due to the shrinking ice caps, what about the creatures of the forest whose homes disappear when the lumberjacks chop down the trees to make way for the expanded fuel farms. Aren't the clear cutting of forests equally detrimental to the environment if not more so that global warming?
We could make cars more efficient so they burn less gasoline, but as people's standard of living through out the world increases, they'll buy more cars. I think their are 1 to 2 billion car owners now, there are mover 6 billion people in the World and plenty of room for people to increase their standard of living and by more cars. Imagine a world full of middle class people who drive 6 billion cars, and lets assume the cars only consume 30% of the gasoline todays cars consume, where does this bring us? Are you going to start suggesting we have child quotas, or start forcing people to live in cities where there is mass transit? How are we going to regulate their lives so that they behave the way we want to in order to meet the requirements to reduce global warming?
My approach is to do the research and present alernatives so that people choose them of their own free will because in makes ecomonic sense to them individually. If we try to make gasoline engines artificially unattractive by taxing gasoline through the roof, this is still taxation, and a crule sort of taxation as well as it affects those with meager incomes more than the rich, who can always buy and afford carbon offsets as Al Gore does. So you have a world where the rich still fly around in their private jets while individual cars are made more unaffordable to the masses, these people will be forced to move from the countryside into the cities where there is mass transit, and the cities will become bloated and overcrowded. Those advocating those measures probably envision themselfs as one of the elite luck few who can afford the carbon offsets, rather than one of the unfortunate huddled masses who get their cars taken away from them and have to push and shove to get on the packed subways, buses and trains, and pay through the roof for living space in a crowded city.
If you force people to change their lifestyle, that is a price, if you clearcut forests for farms that is also a price, if we do nothing and global warming takes its toll that is a price also, but couldn't you imagine that better and more painless alternatives might make themselves available in the future. Fusion development partially depends on funding like you say, that funding in turn depends on the availablity of funds, and funds are going to be less available if we make ourselves poorer with regulations to combat global warming now. We don't have the information about which alternative will be less costly to us. It might make sense to wait for fusion or for more efficient solar cells that make economic sense. I think we should do the research, but not pick winners. We should provide a range of options that people may choose from freely rather than force a certain option, that might not be the best one, on them.
samy,
Yeah just the thought of the large sloppy orbit object needed to move Venus over 10,000 years gives me shivers.
One bad impact day or very sloppy orbit day at Venus probably would be a bad day for earth later on.Even if you could move Venus somewhat easily, i would think that the delicate balance of moon earth would be impacted if Venus was much closer than it is.
Just a tiny extra tug more on the moon than on earth with each orbit would cause some serious problems on earth.The sunshade for Venus is such a good idea in theory, but in practice it seems near impossible.
Probably better to think of Venus as a carbon and o2 bank, then change Venus with co2 withdrawals over many thousands of years when we need recourses.
There is another way to move Venus without comet flybys.
You could build a giant fusion space ship or a fleet of fusion space ship, and have them lead Venus ahead in its orbit, they would have fusion torch engines which produce just enough thrust to keep the gravity of Venus from pulling them closer, the engine exhausts would be aimed so as to miss Venus entirely, the engine nozzils would be vectored to produce a net thrust directly away from Venus in the direction of its orbit while the exhaust streams would diverge so they just miss the planet and continue on past at escape velocity. A steady supply line of tanker space ships would make the circuit between Saturn and the spaceships keeping them fueled at all times. The rockets simply over there against Venus's gravity.
Venus's gravity exerts a pull on the rockets, and thus obeying Newton's law of motion the rockets exert an equal pull on the planet, and since the exhaust stream misses the planet, there is a net pull on Venus in the direction of its orbit. Over time Venus' orbit will get wider and wider as the planet moves further from the sun. In the meantime a few comets impact with Venus, both adding spin and volitiles. Dust kicks up in the atmosphere reducing the sunlight that reaches the surface and thus cooling it. This process does a number of things, cool the planet, spin it up and also move it further away from the Sun. Since the comets impact with Venus, they are not still around to bother the Earth. The impacts will be timed so they don't heat up the planet so much due to their frequency, the dust should stay up in the atmosphere, creating nuclear winter like conditions, and when the dust settles another comet hits.
How many American Soldiers died fighting in FDR's War? Was it greater than the number of Soldiers who died in Bush's two Wars? I think it was. There were battles in the Pacific where more Americans died than in the entire Iraq War thus far. When a battleship gets sunk, that's 3,000 men right there. Like World War II, the War on Terrorism is fought all over the globe, it is fought in the Phillipeans, it is fought in Ethiopia, it is fought in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, in London, Paris, Frankfort, and even on our own shores, by the definitions used for World War I and II, what were fighting is a World War on Terror. If FDR were running for President today under the Democratic Banner, he would not be nominated due to his lack of sufficient "anti-war" credentials.
There was an Anti-War movement in the 1930s too by the way, Adolf Hitler got maximum milage out of it all the way up to the Bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941. Hitler was able to build his formidable War machine, thanks in part to all the various Anti-War movements in Europe and America that managed to stay allied hands until that moment on September 1, 1939, when Hitler believe he was ready. The Anti-War movement let him have Austria and Czechoslovakia after all. By the time public opinion permitted the United States to go to war against Germany, Hitler had already conquered most of Europe, it was just luck that Great Britian wasn't taken too, and then we had to begin a massive build up of US troops, we had to draft people and quickly build second rate US tanks to overwhelm the Tiger Tanks quality with sheer numbers.
Many Americans died taking back Europe from the Germans, and we were forced to cooperate with Russia which took more than half of Europe as it price for participation in the War against Hitler, it would have been better if we would have done a little preventative regime change in the Mid-1930s, but our Anti-War/isolationist crowd wouldn't permit it, we had to wait until our backs were to the wall and we had no choice but to fight, and only luck saved us then. Luck gave us the two years to build up are armed forces and prepare them for the Global conflict. FDR's lack of preparation was appauling, and much of the build up we did engage in was at the last hour.
We quickly built up massive armies consisting of tens of millions of inexperienced draftees, who in many cases practiced with wooden guns, that inexperience showed in the battlefields of North Africa, and our soldiers learned on the battlefield at great cost, this is one of the reasons, Winston Churchill suggested the US invade Africa and not France, a failure in Africa would have been less damaging and less consequential than one in France, the Green Troops of the US need practice against the Italians before taking on the Germans..
Hi Dicktice,
There are problems with Geothermal power as well. A geothemal reactor on the border of France - Switzerland injected high pressure water into the rocks which caused earth quakes damaging a small town across the border in Switzerland. The company owning the reactor is being sued for damages and endangerment because it turns out that scientists adviced the plant owners that the geothermal reactor might cause earthquakes. (They ignored this warning hoping that any earthquakes would be too small, so they are likely liable.)Anyway the whole project is likely going to be canned perminantly. Yes it is clean power, but sadly, it knocks down buildings & might kill people.
I saved the newspaper clipping, but I can't find it right now. I'll edit this post & give more details when it turns up.
The excitement over fusion is simply it is orders of magnitude more concentrated energy than anything except fission, it produces few radiaoactive wastes and it burns deuterium found in water.
In "New Destinies Volume IX" pg 273 S. M. Stirling writes an essay called "Fusion" which draws the conclusion (based on historical anologies) that the wealth and freedoms a population enjoys is based on how concentrated their power sources are.
That is what excites people about fusion. With enough power we can crack water for a hydrogen economy, blast chemical toxic wastes into elemental forms and vastly improve our standard of living in a myriad of ways. Fusion (if it works) is a quantum step forward in humanities net wealth.
As for me, I think that we could have fusion. With the steadily declining funding for it, we are not likely to find out soon, tho.
Warm regards, Rick.
I think compared to the amount of time it takes for the Global climate to change, practical controlled fusion should occur "soon". If we achieve controlled fusion in the next 100 years, that should be soon enough to halt and reverse global warming, if humanity's output of carbon dioxide is what's causing it.
I think though that many Canadians might come to regret it if ever we succeeded in reversing global warming. The Little Ice Age that started in the Middle ages, might have been the beginnings of a real ice age, that out CO2 emmisions put a stop too. Canada might not be a pleasant place to live if the glaciers started advancing again. If not for the little ice age, we might all be speaking Norse at this time. The Viking colony in Greenland failed because of this little Ice Age.
Oh by the way, I voted that it is a problem for the great grand kids. I'd rather be spending the money finding a substitute for middle east oil. My solution might include a tariff on imported oil with a possible exception made for Canada, rather than a gasoline taxe at the pump. I see no reason why we should be punishing domestic producers of oil when they help make us less dependent on Middle East Oil. I think Canada has behaved rather well compared to other countries such as Mexico, it has not nationalized all its oil assets or created a National Oil company which it favors, it has allowed competion and free markets to govern the extraction of oil from its territory, Mexico has not. Another source of gasoline is coal. Carbon sequestration, can take care of the CO2 emmisions problem, gasoline, Diesel, and even motor oil can by synthesized from a base stock of coal. People are overly concerned with the CO2 problem, I have to ask, would they rather we'd clear cut the forests so we can grow corn for the production of ethenol, I wonder which is more harmful to the environment? If we mine for coal, most of the forests can remain as they are, and if there is a green house effect from this, it is a slow sort of thing. Coal is a temporary stop gap until we develop practical cleaner forms of energy such as Fusion or Solar Power, as these energy sources are not yet ready for prime time, Coal will do for now. The News Media has put too much alarm in the Global Warming phenominon, I think they hyped it up because they want immediate government response and they want us to act without thinking. Raising taxes has serious economic consequences, and governments will tend to waste the extra revenue the get from this mostly, they don't have the economic instinct to maximize their returns on spending. An Asteroid is a different matter, if it is on a collision course with Earth, we know then what has to be done, but the Earth's climate is a complex phenominon, their are many variables and predicting where is going to be is not as easy as prediction the location of an asteroid sometime in the future.
What makes you so sure that sustained, controlled fusion is even possible--not to mention feasible as a source of domestic electricity--here on Earth? Think how much easier the drilling of deep-well geothermal sources might be with today's know-how redesigned to reach depths of 10 miles (where temperatures adequate to produce super-heated steam are said to be available) anywhere you want on the planet ... to provide the same end result as your hypothetical fusion plant: electricity from steam driven turbo-generators.
The fact that the Sun's core doesn't implode and cause the Sun to explode leads me to believe that Fusion is possible.
That is an interesting statement given that what planetologists have been discovering from interplanetary probes is that climate is not gradualistic. Basically our climate is a chaotic system and it is very hard to predict what a small change will do and when we will reach a tipping point.
All the more reason we should not make our plans based on the assumption that the World Climate will reach a tipping point in 10 years unless we make some dramatic and extreme measures to reduce our carbot output now.
We don't know for certain that the climate will reach a tipping point in 10 years, and there are no new technologies we can use now, the only thing we can do now is make economic sacrifices and plunge the World into a Depression, that will reduce our carbon output, but will never know if such measures were needed if implemented. If the dire predictions don't happen after we've implemented these harsh economic measure, the authors of those measures could say, "See they work." But what if drastic climate change was not in the cards in 10 years no matter what we do, then those sacrifices become meaningless and pointless.
Now for me, my preferences are for technological development, not carbon emmision regulations that are to be implemented now or by any date certain. If we find an alternative to coal and oil, then that alternative should make sense for individuals to switch to rather than having those alternative forced on the public when better ones may show up later.
If I mention Fusion power to those liberals, I get the old mantra, "Fusion power was 50 years away 50 years ago and 50 years away today." All that really means to me is that we are not very good at predicting when fusion power will arrive, not that it isn't a worthy goal to pursue. Fusion like fission power doesn't produce carbon emmisions, however fusion power doesn't leave nuclear bomb grade material behind as one of its waste products. Liberals have become supportive of fission reseach lately ever since Iran started developing it. Before some dangerous despot might get his hand on a nuke and start giving it to terrorists, the liberals have always been for "no nukes".
Back to subject: Fusion power might be 20 years away or it might be 50, alot of that depends on how much effort we put into it and which technologies we investigate first. Eventually though, in the fullness of time if we don't give up, we will have fusion power. I believe in addition the scales of time for fusion development are much shorter than the scales of time required for global climate change. I think it would be worth while and less costly to develop those technologies that can replace oil and not make regulations that cause unnecessary hardship, that to implement some crash program that forces technologies on people at great cost, things like new gasoline taxes for instance. I believe we can wait for the supply of oil to drive up prices on their own accord rather than the government artificially jacking up the price of gasoline with new taxes and then pocketing the money they collected to be spent wastefully on their own pork barrel projects. The Arabs waste enough of our petrodollars as it is, we don't need the US Government getting in on that act as well. It is also funny that the same politicians that talk about getting us out of the Iraq war also talk about raising our taxes, whatever happened to the peace dividend?
I think our best policy is technology development, not energy price regulation or taxation. $3 per gallon for gasoline is high enough, its not my problem that European willing decide to pay $7 per gallon due to their own self-taxation and willingly give that revenue to their own wasteful governments.
I think if global warming hits us, it can always be followed by global cooling after we develope fusion power.
Tom, your thin skin is visible for all to see--so why not drop it? Lots of good stuff to discuss as soon as you get a grip, eh?
Cindy, I've got a rotten old shirt just like that!
Ok, back to the subject we we're discussing before Mars-B4-Moon so rudely interupted us and for those of you who don't recall, my last statement before the character assassination attempt of his was this:
I think if we can just coordinate our immigration and importation policies then we need not check the US/Canadian border, it would mean giving up soverignty on both sides though. National governments are always reluctant to cede national power. We would have to set up an agency that is answerable to both national governments with a shared power structure. I see no reason why this wouldn't work, but I want to make sure that no terrorists can get into Canada that would threaten US citizens, and I'm sure the Canadians would want to make sure of the same things for their citizens too before we open up the border for unlimited unregulated travel. I think my concerns on this matter are reasonable, and not "garbage". You want me to just wave my hands and ignore them, sorry but I can't. You want open borders between the US and Canada, then security concerns of both countries must be addressed first, that is the price, and I believe most Canadians would find that to be a reasonable request.
I think a veto system would work. You would have Canadian and US Immigration officials at every entry point into the US and Canada, each would have access to a data base from his government and each would have a veto on whether to let a prospective visitor or immigrant in. An external foreigner would need to get visa approval from both countries before he would be allowed into either. This would be a more restricive by default immigration policy. You would need Canadian officials at Kennedy Airport for example, and if the Canadian dosen't like somebidy coming through, he can send him back to his point of origin. Like wise a US agent would be stationed in Toronto, and if somebody coming into Canada looks to dangerous, he would get to refuse him entry into Canada. The FBI and the Canadian Police would also have to share databases so they can track down and apprehend wanted fugitives, and if someone commits a crime in the US that carries the Death Penalty, then Canada would have to hand him over if apprehended up there. Likewise if someone was evading Canadian taxes and is hiding out in the US, the US would hand him over to Canada, it wouldn't matter if he wasn't violating laws in the United States.
Canadians might not agree with some US laws, but if someone violates then in the US and then hides in Canada, then the Canadians would have to hand him over to face US justice, and it works the otherway too.
The problem is that the US economy is suffering due to the weakness of the dollar and the high fiscal debt. That is why the economies growth has gone from 4.3% to 3.1% and now its a 2.2%. All that is happening with such a fiscal debt is that the US economy is slowing and at a high rate.
Weak and Strong are very loaded words but they have to have evidence and at the moment unfortunatly for me as a space advocate the US economy is weak. The US economy has to support other things than space flight and priorities have to be met. Iraq and Afghanistan are rightly priorities and so the money has to come from elsewhere. Vietnam did the same for the apollo programme so the Orion programme will get burned.
Seems obvious doesn't it?
The money will come from Iraq and Afghanistan. In fact if we win the war in Iraq, Iraq will be better able to pay since it has the 2nd largest oil reserves in the Middle East, but Iraq will only be able to pay if we win the war there and don't cut and run.
If we cut and run, we'll be left holding the bill, since the insurgents we left there will be messing thing up for Iraq and preventing the flow of oil. If we want to be paid back for the Iraq War effort, we have to put Iraq back up on its feet so it can pay us. Isn't that obvious, or is there some flaw with that logic?
Obviously we need some change in tactic, and George Bush is trying, but the only tactic the Democrats will consider is cut and run, and that will leave us holding the bill and Iraq incapable of paying it.
As I recall the height of the Apollo program coincided with the height of the Veitnam War in 1968. We didn't cancel Apollo to pay for the costs of the Veitnam War, we we're pulling out of Vietnam anyway, so there was no war to pay for. What really cost America were thos high tax neoliberal policies that the Democrats imposed on this country after Nixon and through to the end of the Carter Administration. Ford was a lame duck since he became President, so he doesn't count, we had the Imperial Congress that was running the Vietnam War defeat, as Congresses are incapable of leading an Army to victory. Everytime Congress tries to make itself Commander-in-chief, we lose, and it is trying to again. If you like to live in a crumbling Empire, then accept Congresses leadership in place of our President's.
The Words weak and Strong are loaded words. During the Great Depression the US had a strong dollar for instance. All a person had to do to increase his wealth was to stuff his matress full of currency notes, for he didn't trust banks, if he just kept his dollars in his mattress and nobody stole them, the value of his money would increase over time. The dollar was very very strong in those days, but that was small consolation to those people who couldn't find a job. The important thing is the growth in the economy, the dollar could be weak compared to other countries, but if those other countries have 12% unemployment and the US has 4.5% unemployment, no one here would want that stronger currency. The size of the debt relative to the overall economy is what matters. It is perfectly fine to let the demt grow if the economy is growing faster. The objective should be to keep the growth of the economy ahead of the growth in debt most of the time. During slow times the debt can be allowed to grow faster for a time, just so long as during the prosperous times the economy later catches up. The strategy should be to promote growth and do everything possible to maximize growth. If you slow growth by raising taxes to reduce the deficit, that is self-defeating. the economy grew slowly from 1976 to 1980 for example, when the US had high marginal tax rates.
When the government gets its hands on most of your profits, you don't get to reinvest those profits into expanding your business, the government spends it instead on burocracies and pork-barrel projects, most of that spending does not generate a return that expands the economy.
I blush to admit, I didn't know that. What else, I wonder?
Well we used to have a HUGE surplus (which could have kept 3 generations of Americans comfortably retired/Social Security healthy)...now we're zillions of dollars in debt.
But what do Bush and his cronies care? They're gazillionaires with utmost financial security. Guess the rest of us can eat cake or whatever.
FDR ran up higher Debts during his administration, it was this massive deficit spending during World War II which brought us out of the Great Depression.
Do you know what Herbert Hoover did during the Stock Market Crash and the beginnings of the Great Depression? He tried to balance the budget, that's what.
By squandering our budget surplus, scarce resources, and irredeemable lost time on the war in Iraq, I wonder if Bush hasn't inadvertantly caused a foreign manned space coalition to spring up in our own backyard? This just out:
"The first Soyuz launch from the Guiana Space Center is slated for November 2008. Arianespace has already signed several launch contracts for Soyuz, which will round out the company’s family of launchers, alongside Ariane 5 and Vega."
Tell me Dicktice, what was the Mars Society doing during the Clinton Administration?
It was trying to get people interested in Mars Exploration. In fact one of Clintons Early acts was to cancel George Bush's Space Exploration Initiative (SEI) in favor of the Space Station. Bill Clinto also wasted money on the VentureStar, didn't do a heck of alot in advancing the goal of a return to the moon or Manned exploration of Mars. If you ask me, I'd say George W. Bush did alot more in advancing the Mars Society's agenda than any other President did, it is unfortunate that so many people here want to attack their benefactor in pursuing their interests in Mars. I'm sorry that no mainstream liberal president has been as big a Mars fan as George W. Bush, but that's just the way things are. Take it or leave it.
Remember the Aries Launcher that was first discussed in Bob Zubrin's The Case for Mars? Well, thanks to George Bush, its becoming a reality. I don't think any other President since Nixon has changed the direction of the Space Program as significantly, other presidents simply relied on inertia, continued flying the Space Shuttle and did little else.
As for other accomplishments, the Bush Administration killed more terrorists than the terrorists killed Americans, they infact killed more terrorists than any other administration. In fact the Bush Administration is the first Presidency to actually bring the fight to the terrorists, which is more than can be said for the tokein bombing runs in response to airplane hikjackings during the Reagan, 1st Bush and Clinton Administrations.
George W. Bush actually started deploying parts of the missile shield, which is more than any other administration can say. There are of course the elections in Iraq, the fall of Saddam Hussein, things that are not insignificant, and would not have been accomplished under any other president.
Words have a tendency to come back and haunt you, Tom. That's why you should think before you write your political barbs, which frankly are becoming a bore. Stick to technical arguments regardless nationality, creed, or political affiliation, and you can't go wrong, eh?
I NEVER SAID WE SHOULD BOMB CANADA!
I was merely saying how we could open up the border with Canada and how it might come about, and this scum bag see fit to assassinate my character and implies that I advocate wholesale bombing of Canada, and I never said any such thing!
Yes, indeed words can come back and haunt you, especially when somebody takes them out of context from way back and uses it to imply that you take a position that you do not.
I did not do anything to justify this character assassination, I was explaining how to open up the border so that it would be acceptable to both countries and under what conditions that would occur. We are not going to suddenly disregard all our national security requirements just to satisfy a few Canadian whiners. If you want to get something you must give something in return, no ones going to give you something just because you ask for it, that is a simple law of economics. Apparently Mars_B4_Moon gets offended by this conversation so he just derails it, not wanting to get into the points were discusing. I'll tell you what were not discussing, we are not discussing the US and Canada going to War!
Notice that his quote he took was not from what I previously said up above. I could do the same with his sarcasm and use it at some point later to protray him as some kind of war monger. It doesn't matter what he says, I could put anything between two quotes and attribute it to him, or I could take something he said and use it out of context as a position he advocated. What is clear to me though is that Mars_B4_Moon doesn't want to talk about what we're talking about now, he instead wants to sabotage the whole thread. I say to him, "If you not interested get out! Don't sabotage other people's threads or try to derail them with irrelevant gibberish or character assassinations!"
Unless of course there has to be a whole raft of new taxes to pay this debt off and this will hurt them.
Taxes for everything, is that your motto? The Europeans have overtaxed themselves, this slows growth and makes less revenue available for the future. You raise revenue by growing the economy, not by taking more money away from the people! You manage the economy to increase growth. If you tax the rich people at 90%, they won't invest their profits productively, they'll send it to tax shelters instead, or they'll invest overseas where the taxes are lower, but all liberals can think of is raising taxes or cutting defense or space exploration.
When youre in debt you have to pay that debt off. The fact that the USA owes over a trillion $ hurts the US economy. The US goverment has to pay out just to service that debt and that reduces its ability to spend elsewhere. Normally it is not a problem when your economy grows but there is a global slowdown in trade and so the goverment gets less money in. This deficit also increases inflation and of course there is the problem that it increases the economies that you owe the debt too. In this case the single biggest holder of US goverment bonds is China.
An economy is a balance of taxes, spending and growth. The US economy is skewed and weak at the moment.
How many people take out mortgages to buy homes? They are in Debt, they must pay it off right away!
The US Government is probably paying less interest on its debt than you are paying on your home. United States savings bonds are probably the safest investments around. US Debt is one of the levers the Fed uses to control the money supply, without US Debt, there'd be no Treasury bills for the Federal Reserve to buy, it would have to resort to picking companies and buying their debt
Our unemployment rate is 4.5%, how is it in Scotland? Raising taxes sure isn't going to accelerate growth, all that does is leave less money in private hands to invest. The economy is growing, if the government controls spending then that growth will eventually balance the budget all by itself. Part of the government's spending is servicing the debt, that means that with a balanced budget the debt will eventually be paid off.
A good analogy is the CEO of a company, if the companies profitability isn't so good, a democrat with a similar philosophy would take out his calculator and say, "heres our problem, we sell 'x' amount of goods and multiply it by 'y's price and the total amount of sales minus cost is our revenue and its not high enough to generate enough revenue, so the solution is simple, we just raise our prices through the roof and we'll have plenty of profits. Say for example the product was 20 oz bottles of Coca Cola and they were being sold at 20 million bottles times $1.25 per bottle, all we have to do then is raise our price to $12.50 per bottle and multiply that by 20 million bottles sold and we'd tremendously increase the companie's revenue!" And of course the entire board being of like minded persuation all stand up and give the CEO a cheer for saving the company.
Then some smart Alec guy with glasses raises his hand, "Ah sir, how do we know the public is still going to buy 20 million bottles at that new price that you propose?"
The board, being of liberal pursuasion, simply tries to shout down the guy with glasses for spoiling their day, they'd rather live in their fantasy world where they can set their company's product price to whatever they want.
Likewise the Democrats can just assume that the US economy will star the same no matter to what level they raise their marginal taxes. If before it was 35% and they raise it to 70%, they just assume that they'll double their revenue because 70% is twice 35% it is simple math as far as they are concerned. Of course corporate investments go way down if their profits are taxed at 70% instead of 35%. New plants aren't build, and new technology isn't invested in, while countries like Japan and China soar way ahead of us. If we are going to use European Economic policy as our inspiration, then our economy will end up slow and moribound just like theirs. Meanwhile Japan's economy and China's has low tax rates and they aren't raising them. I took a degree in economics so I know what I'm talking about. The US government isn't a monopoly, and corporations do have a choice as to whether to pay its US taxes, in the long run they would simply move their operations overseas. Few people are going to want to invest in the US and pay its taxes if it just arbitrarily raises them to balance the budget as you propose.
All you are looking for is an argument against Bush and your goal is simply to replace him in 2008, it doesn't matter whether your economic solutions actually works in the real world economy. A corporation can either raise its prices or cut its expenses, cutting expenses usually workes better in boosting profitability than raising prices due to competition. The United States has compeditors too you know, and the tax rate is the price of goverment, so don't be so naive in assuming that all the rich people have no choice in paying whatever tax rate the Congress decides, because they do, they can vote with their feet and move to another country that doesn't tax them as much.
Unless of course there has to be a whole raft of new taxes to pay this debt off and this will hurt them.
Taxes for everything, is that your motto? The Europeans have overtaxed themselves, this slows growth and makes less revenue available for the future. You raise revenue by growing the economy, not by taking more money away from the people! You manage the economy to increase growth. If you tax the rich people at 90%, they won't invest their profits productively, they'll send it to tax shelters instead, or they'll invest overseas where the taxes are lower, but all liberals can think of is raising taxes or cutting defense or space exploration.
Here's a hint folks. the Bushes revitalized the manned moon and space programs. What has Clinton done to put us on a path back towards the Moon and Mars. Being that your from the Mars Society, I'm suprised you've overlooked that!
Ya a little good with the bad it would seem but as for the good earlier that I meantioned with Brizilian Ethanol here is the bad. Demand for ethanol driving up meat prices
Strong demand for corn to use in ethanol plants is driving up the cost of livestock and will raise prices for beef, pork and chicken, the Agriculture Department said Friday.
Meat and poultry production will fall as producers face higher feed costs, the department said in its monthly crop report.Just what we all want to see rising food costs,,Not...
whine whine whine whine!
All you do is complain, what would you do that is different? Buy more oil from the Arabs? If you convert coal into gasoline, then your all going to whine about the increasing greenhouse gas emmisions. As a matter of fact every solution is going to elicit a complaint from you, because the world is full of trade-offs. Higher prices of food will raise farming families out of poverty, and with that money they'll be able to feed their families, pay the morgage, and not have to leave their farms, it will revitalize the country side, and not as many people will have to migrate to the cities and look for work, but you don't want that do you, as rural folk tend to vote more conservative.
Is there ANYTHING federally supported that has produced positive results, since the Bush Administration came into power? I can't think of ONE. And now, we learn of the scandalous conditions at Walter Reed hospital (and others?) that wounded and tramatized veterans of the "war on terror" and their families are encountering. Incompetence personified at the top: two more years to endure, without hope of any lessons learned....
That's a Lawyer's question: Never ask a question whose answer you don't already know in your own mind. As they say, "Shit happens!" What Draconian "Darth Vader" management practicise do you suggest to ensure that this doesn't happen again? Line them up and shoot them and then promote some new soldiers into their positions perhaps? In any large organization, you will find people that do not do their job properly, this arises out of laziness. the question is what management practises you you institute to eliminate this 100%? Do you want the entire hospital staff to fear for their lives that one rat might be found by one inspector? Do you want them to spend inordinate amounts of time trying to hunt down every single rat in the hospital or disinfecting every square inch of the place, rather than saving patients lives! One simple management practise is to always fire who is responsible, if done too frequently this results in putting inexperienced people in responsible positions and having the job done even more poorly. You talk as if someone else can do this better. Prove it!
Yes we should bomb Canada as part of this war on terror, or at least make them become a 51st state
Can't wait can you. What a warmonger you are! How will destroying Canada help us?
Er, why don't you reply to something I just said rather than referring to previous posts a long time ago and quoting them out of context.
Liberals have a way of just tuning out whenever they meet something they don't agree with. I never advocated bombing Canada, never, never never! Misquoting me to suggest I do is just plain malicious! I could quote you as saying anything, that is just fiddling with text and proves nothing. Are you going to talk about what were talking about now, or are we going to misquote each other and play your silly word games?
Liberals avoid the argument by misdirecting or changing the subject.