by rogerhb » Mon 04 Sep 2006, 04:10:13
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('kam30en', 'I') doubt this planet will host another intelligent species.
One could argue whether it is currently doing so.
"Complex problems have simple, easy to understand, wrong answers." - Henry Louis Mencken
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by entropyfails » Mon 04 Sep 2006, 13:35:41
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Atlantean_Relic', 'A')ssuming the worst happens and we humans go the way of the Dodo will there be any evidence of all this for the Roach/Rat/Squid men to find. Or will we just be bones in a museum label as those funny bipedal monkey things?
In 65,000,000 years the oil supplies will have barely been replaced. We can assume that we used all the coal supplies in our descent into hell, along with most of the metals.
Said Sir Fred Hoyle,
"It has often been said that, if the human species fails to make a go of it here on Earth, some other species will take over the running. In the sense of developing high intelligence this is not correct. We have, or soon will have, exhausted the necessary physical prerequisites so far as this planet is concerned. With coal gone, oil gone, high-grade metallic ores gone, no species however competent can make the long climb from primitive conditions to high-level technology. THIS IS A ONE SHOT AFFAIR. IF WE FAIL, THIS PLANETARY SYSTEM FAILS SO FAR AS INTELLIGENCE IS CONCERNED. The same will be true of other planetary systems. On each of them there will be one chance, and one chance only."
Hence, the "cockroach civilization" will not have the necessary energy to restart their civilization. No civilization, no paleontology. No paleontology, no "discovery of the past".
The only chance we would have for "discovery" comes from an alien species landing and doing forensic analysis. I'll include a snippet from their report.
"Like all other carbon based life forms we have encountered, their need to reproduce outstripped their ability to achieve mental and hence physical sustainability. They had developed all the prerequisite technology for silicon children including deconstructing matter into energy and serial logical string manipulators. But like all other carbon civilizations, they used this knowledge to extract ever increasing resources from their home world for the purposes of mindless reproduction. Strangely, they had developed full ecological models that showed exactly how this process would finish their world but they could not apply this knowledge against their biological imperative. The humans succumbed to the consumptive wave and all that remains is a deep 10,000 year scar in geological record."
EntropyFails
"Little prigs and three-quarter madmen may have the conceit that the laws of nature are constantly broken for their sakes." -- Friedrich Nietzsche
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by Tanada » Mon 04 Sep 2006, 13:46:15
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('entropyfails', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Atlantean_Relic', 'A')ssuming the worst happens and we humans go the way of the Dodo will there be any evidence of all this for the Roach/Rat/Squid men to find. Or will we just be bones in a museum label as those funny bipedal monkey things?
In 65,000,000 years the oil supplies will have barely been replaced. We can assume that we used all the coal supplies in our descent into hell, along with most of the metals.
Said Sir Fred Hoyle,
"It has often been said that, if the human species fails to make a go of it here on Earth, some other species will take over the running. In the sense of developing high intelligence this is not correct. We have, or soon will have, exhausted the necessary physical prerequisites so far as this planet is concerned. With coal gone, oil gone, high-grade metallic ores gone, no species however competent can make the long climb from primitive conditions to high-level technology. THIS IS A ONE SHOT AFFAIR. IF WE FAIL, THIS PLANETARY SYSTEM FAILS SO FAR AS INTELLIGENCE IS CONCERNED. The same will be true of other planetary systems. On each of them there will be one chance, and one chance only."
Hence, the "cockroach civilization" will not have the necessary energy to restart their civilization. No civilization, no paleontology. No paleontology, no "discovery of the past".
That is just silly and hoplessly pessemistic. It totally ignores the fact that if every human dropped dead later today, all of those vast structures we built out of steel would slowly but surely rust down into the soil and form new ores. Not to mention that in some locations like Sudsbury ON, CA we have barely dug up the ore availible. It wouldn't be as easy for the next sentitents to acheive high technology as it was for us, but it would still be possible.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Alfred Tennyson', 'W')e are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
by entropyfails » Mon 04 Sep 2006, 14:39:04
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', 'T')hat is just silly and hoplessly pessemistic. It totally ignores the fact that if every human dropped dead later today, all of those vast structures we built out of steel would slowly but surely rust down into the soil and form new ores. Not to mention that in some locations like Sudsbury ON, CA we have barely dug up the ore availible. It wouldn't be as easy for the next sentitents to acheive high technology as it was for us, but it would still be possible.
Honestly, it sounds like you didn’t truly understand a single word you posted above.
Answer me this. What is the energetic difference between building a civilization from high quality ore deposits vs building one from dispersed iron oxide and silicon dust?
I’ll answer it for you. It would take orders of magnitude more energy to build it from the diffuse material source. Now what sources of energy will they have available?
Oil? No.
Coal? No.
Uranium that you can mine with 1930’s technology? No.
Wood? Yes.
Now looking at materials available..
Copper you can mine with 6000 BC technology? No.
Iron that you can mine with 2000 BC technology? No.
Wood? Yes.
So basically you are saying that it would be possible to build a civilization out of wood up to the point where it understand relativistic physics and gains the nuclear power necessary to mine the diffuse elements scattered by the humans that came before. And you think this is possible given that the civilization would take many orders of magnitude more energy to get to the Human level given the dispersion of elements? And this doesn’t count as a pessimistic scenario to you?!?
If we fail to make our sustainable transition, we will take the world with us and destroy any chance for advanced intelligence on this planet. I don’t see how you can logically argue differently.
EntropyFails
"Little prigs and three-quarter madmen may have the conceit that the laws of nature are constantly broken for their sakes." -- Friedrich Nietzsche
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by rogerhb » Mon 04 Sep 2006, 17:10:46
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', 'W')ith wood and natural fibers from plants and animals they make music.
Or just put a squeeling cat straight in some checkered cloth and call it a bagpipe.
"Complex problems have simple, easy to understand, wrong answers." - Henry Louis Mencken
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by Tanada » Mon 04 Sep 2006, 17:16:57
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('entropyfails', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', 'T')hat is just silly and hoplessly pessemistic. It totally ignores the fact that if every human dropped dead later today, all of those vast structures we built out of steel would slowly but surely rust down into the soil and form new ores. Not to mention that in some locations like Sudsbury ON, CA we have barely dug up the ore availible. It wouldn't be as easy for the next sentitents to acheive high technology as it was for us, but it would still be possible.
Honestly, it sounds like you didn’t truly understand a single word you posted above.
Answer me this. What is the energetic difference between building a civilization from high quality ore deposits vs building one from dispersed iron oxide and silicon dust?
I’ll answer it for you. It would take orders of magnitude more energy to build it from the diffuse material source. Now what sources of energy will they have available?
I'd rather speak for myself thank you very much.
Those 'high quality' iron ore deposits you are referring to were mostly bog ore, they are still forming today and there is no reason to expect them to stop doing so any time in the forseeable future. If you leap forward 65 million years what would a deserted city look like? It would crumble down into a pile of debris as year after year passes until it was a big stain of metal bits and sheetrock with some organic sources mixed into it. Over the eons it will be buried or crushed by a glacier or similerly effected by geological processes.
When the new sentient species arises and goes about its bussiness exploring science or alchemy what will it find in those buried layers? Concentrated iron oxide mixed mudstone aka Iron Ore, with seams of copper from household and building wiring and piping, plus occasional nuggets of aluminim from things like vehical engine blocks. In addition they will have 'bog ore' deposits that have accumulated from now until then, plus the copper derived from eroded volcanic cones.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')
Oil? No.
Coal? No.
Uranium that you can mine with 1930’s technology? No.
Wood? Yes.
Now looking at materials available..
Copper you can mine with 6000 BC technology? No.
Iron that you can mine with 2000 BC technology? No.
Wood? Yes.
They will also have some oil, Cantarell one of the largest fields on earth after all is about 65 million years in age and there is no reason to assume the geologic formation of oil will stop. They won't have the portions we have used up, obviously, but new sources are always being very very slowly formed. 65 million years is also a very very long time for those sources to accumulate new resevoirs.
Coal, the same as above plus another factor you probably ignored. About half of all coal in underground mining is left behind because it isn't safe or economic to extract it. Given 65 million years most of those mines will be geologically worked over recompacting the seems and forming new seems from peat and surface depositions of trees and mosses. Again it won't be as rich a set of deposits as what we had but their will be coal, lignite and peat for them to make use of.
Uranium, here they would be way better off than we were because everywhere we have spent fuel stored they would have a ready made Uranium deposit with greater than natural levels of enrichment to work with. Typical spent fuel has .84% U-235 plus .55% Pu-239. In 240,000 effectively all of the Pu-239 will have turned into U-235 giving an enrichment of 1.39% U-235 compared to the natural ratio of .071%. In 65 million years the natural level will have fallen to about .065% and the enriched spent fuel reamnents will have decayed to about 1.26% due to the decay rate of U-235 and the long time interval involved.
Now back to your base metals Copper? Millions of tons of mires and pipes that have been crushed over geologic time back into native copper nuggets and seems everywhere Humans had a high tech city with electricity and running water. All attainible with primitive technology.
Iron? Not only are all the bog ore sources we used still availible, there are also massively concentrated areas that used to be the cores of cities filled with steel reinforced concrete and steel beam framed buildings. All of that metal is crushed into new ore by geologic processes and simply needs to be refined back into iron.
So yes, if you look at the earth on a geological timescale all the ills inflicted by man would be removed and the resources would still be there for the Sentient Species 2.0 to make use of.
by PenultimateManStanding » Mon 04 Sep 2006, 17:19:42
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('rogerhb', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', 'W')ith wood and natural fibers from plants and animals they make music.
Or just put a squeeling cat straight in some checkered cloth and call it a bagpipe.
OK rog, this is one of those occasions when you make me laugh.
by smallpoxgirl » Mon 04 Sep 2006, 17:34:42
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('rogerhb', 'O')r just put a squeeling cat straight in some checkered cloth and call it a bagpipe.
Hey now!
"We were standing on the edges
Of a thousand burning bridges
Sifting through the ashes every day
What we thought would never end
Now is nothing more than a memory
The way things were before
I lost my way" - OCMS
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by TheDude » Mon 04 Sep 2006, 18:22:21
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('rogerhb', 'O')r just put a squeeling cat straight in some checkered cloth and call it a bagpipe.
Hey now!
Speaking as a player of bagpipes I don't find that the slightest bit funny.
Who was it that said "Praise be to him who came up with the notion of playing the insides of a cat with the tail of a horse"?
Wow, fosillized cars. "And here we come to the division between the Studebaker epoch and the Stratus era." "At this point they evolved the whitewall, obviously to attract mates."
How about dumping cars en masse into likely looking swamps? Like in, oh, Psycho? Could be a form of religious statement. Or a statement anyway, like the Burning Man.
Is it possible to fossilize books? In the future people will just have to assume what's in surviving books is infallable. If it's pseudoscience you could have some really out there cargo cults going. Like all those medieval thinkers pondering how many epicycles in the heavens.
Now, I'm going to tune in Savage Nation to see if he mentions the Ratpeople.
