It's Coming Right At Us!! (1 Viewer)

[Jason Seaver]

It's like when you're on a camping trip, a hike or something, things that seem so important when you're home are all of a sudden a memory at best, and don't matter anymore.

Actually, when I'm on a camping trip, I find that things that seem trivial (like indoor plumbing, or, say, antibiotics) suddenly seem a heck of a lot more important.

 

[MickeS]

Dinosaurs weren't as smart and as adaptable as humans. I'm pretty sure we stand a much better chance of survival than they did.

/Mike

 

[Mike__D]

I guess it just gives me a certain calmness to know that even a distaster like this, humanity will survive in one form or another.

Aren't you contradicting yourself here? First you say so what if civilization can be wiped out, then say you have a certain calmness humanity will survive.

I agree we are adaptable, but we'd NEVER survive a huge impact. Humans do have one advatage over the dinosoars, we have intelligence, and that is how we can adapt to our situation. We see a potential threat and realize we need to do something about it. Now whether we do something about it is another story.

And what have we survived through thousands of years? Sure, we have had large wars, natural disasters, etc... but never have we expierenced a large scale disaster as the dinosoars have.

I'm certainly not calm about huge rocks hurling through our path un-noticed. On the flip side, I don't stay up at nights worrying about it either.

 

[Julie K]

I'm pretty sure we stand a much better chance of survival than they did.

Willing to bet your life on it?

But even assuming the 'best' - a collapse of civilization - do you really want to go on a hellish camping trip with absolutely no way to go home? One can endure and enjoy campouts because there's a nice comfy home, good medical and dental care, plentiful food, clean water, and so forth waiting for you. There may be flaws in our current civilization but I'll take it any day over grubbing in the mud and shit for bugs that I can gum to paste after my teeth have all fallen out.

 

[Neil Joseph]

It's easy to distance yourself from a problem like this, that is until the real deal happens and ourselves and loved ones are under great threat.

In before the lock

There is no reason to lock the thread. Lets us just stick to the topic at hand and keep things on track. This is a serious topic that I wish people would take seriously because it just may be in the cards in the near future.

 

[Mike__D]

This is a serious topic that I wish people would take seriously because it just may be in the cards in the near future.

I think that's one of our problems. Most of the time, we don't like to deal with problems until after it happens. And this is a case were this shouldn't be.

 

[Dennis Reno]

...but I'll take it any day over grubbing in the mud and shit for bugs that I can gum to paste after my teeth have all fallen out.

LMAO!
An impact the size that killed the dinosaurs would most likely cause the extinction of Homo Sapien. Yes, our intelligence has given us a major advantage, but like the dinosaurs, we need quite a bit of food to keep us alive. Keep in mind that a major hit to the Earth does not only have an immediate impact (pun not intended) but major long term effects. The global changes would be severe and last for years. The unlucky few that survived the initial catastrophe would likely perish in a few months as food sources become scarce. Unable to grow any crops and with no sources of game humans can't simply hibernate until things return to "normal."
My money is on the cockroach...

 

[MickeS]

The NASA guy they interview in one of the video segments on the BBC page says something like "an object of this size will hit earth every few million years". I've only heard of the "dinosaur killer" one (which I think is the one in Mexico?). There should have been multiple large meteors to hit us after that, what damage did they do?

/Mike

 

[Frederick]

Question: Let's say that we're in for a very unpleasant surprise in a few years, and we do get hit. What are we looking at here, if it hits land vs. if it hits water? I've seen Deep Impact. Are we looking at every coastal city on the planet being wiped out?

And I don't know about you guys, but I have plans for my future. Getting wiped out by a rock `cause we're too busy spending on other things isn't in the program. This is serious. This isn't something that MIGHT happen, this WILL happen. Maybe because it's not on the radar screen for next week, they don't give enough importance to it. Or maybe somebody DOES have a plan, they're just not telling us ...


Freddy C.

 

[Jack Briggs]

Micke: The asteroid that pummelled Earth at the K-T boundary was much larger--anywhere from six to twelve kilometers wide. Yes, the impact crater is off the Yucca Penisula, beneath the water. This NEO is approximately two kilometers wide--still a devestator.

The last major impact was the 1908 Tgunska event in Siberia. It may have been a cometary nucleus, and appears to have detonated in the atmosphere--flattening all the foliage beneath it for something like a twenty-mile radius, but leaving no impact crater. JB

 

[MickeS]

Jack, but what about the others? Any info on those? There must have been a few more, I would assume.

 

[Brian Perry]

This isn't something that MIGHT happen, this WILL happen.

Let put this in perspective. A rock this size will hit earth every million years. We are in no position now to do ANYTHING about it, and won't be for many decades (if then). But I'm confident that in a few hundred years, mankind will have alternatives.

Let's say in the 1600s someone thought that a deadly virus would kill most of humanity. At that time there was virtually no knowledge of medicine. Would it have been smart for the world to embark on some plan to protect itself, when it was clearly not equipped? Today we have no idea of how to protect ourselves from this asteroid scenario. I think the best course is to let technology develop and solutions will eventually become apparent.

 

[Steeve Bergeron]

Time to call Bruce Willis and his gang!

 

[Julie K]

But I'm confident that in a few hundred years, mankind will have alternatives.

We may not have that long. That "every million years" is a statistical number and an actual time interval between large impacts can be much higher or much lower.

There are also much smaller objects out there in much greater quantities that could still do significant damage. Is anyone really that blase about several million people being killed? (Consider that you, or someone you love, may be amoung those killed. That might change your view slightly...)

We don't know how long we have until an impact. It's that simple. It may come from something huge 1 day away that we haven't seen. It may indeed be hundreds of years. But I don't like to gamble with these high of odds.

Our space program is regressing. We cannot currently send a human to the moon. It seems most unlikely that we would be able to do something about a potential impactor in 50 years if we don't do something now, primitive as it may be.

 

[KDHM]

Our space program is regressing. We cannot currently send a human to the moon.

I was 14 years old when the first man walked on the Moon, In some ways the world is far better then I thought it would be in the 21st century but as for as todays Space Program is concerned I feel really cheated that all the hope and dreams of space back in 1969 still have not happened.
kd

 

[Joe_C]

Julie and Kim:

I agree. I'm 18 years old, and it doesn't look like my generation will be able to experience anything even as remotely profound as that experienced by my dad's generation in '69. It's really depressing actually. My grandpa was one of the chief engineers who designed the Saturn V engine(s), and he is deeply concerned and upset about the degenerative state of our space program. I obviously can't blame him...

 

[Brian Perry]

We don't know how long we have until an impact. It's that simple. It may come from something huge 1 day away that we haven't seen. It may indeed be hundreds of years. But I don't like to gamble with these high of odds.

The question is how much of a cut in your current standard of living would you be willing to make in order to possibly ensure a cataclysmic impact doesn't wipe us out? Let's say we all had to put 80% of our salaries into a fund that would be used exclusively for preventing this. Would you go for that? I don't think many people have any idea what it would cost to embark on such a project.

Now, if all you're really after is to get the space program back to 1969 levels, then I say great. But even during that "heyday," we had no capability of dealing with an asteroid impact.

 

[Joe_C]

Now, if all you're really after is to get the space program back to 1969 levels, then I say great. But even during that "heyday," we had no capability of dealing with an asteroid impact.

But at the very least it's a start.

 

[Jack Briggs]

Let's say we all had to put 80% of our salaries into a fund that would be used exclusively for preventing this. Would you go for that? I don't think many people have any idea what it would cost to embark on such a project.

If it came down to a choice of life over death, then yes of course.

As for the American space effort's "1969 levels" of funding: It was already on the downhill slide by then. NASA's peak funding levels were reached in fiscal 1966--and then the cuts started. Once John F. Kennedy's goal for Project Apollo was achieved, Congress turned lukewarm. And at the time of Apollo 11, the then sitting president was not in any mood to push higher the legacy of the slain Kennedy.

NASA has never really recovered.

If the refined calculations of this object's trajectory do confirm that it is on a collision course with Earth, then a massive crash program must be mounted.

 

[MickeS]

I got the impression that they HAVE concluded that it's on a collision course, they're just not sure when it'll happen.

But in 18 months, they'll know for sure, apparently.