Technology, Science and the Environment.

[leicsmac]

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-53951754

 

....is this supposed to be surprising?

[WigstonWanderer]

2 hours ago, leicsmac said:

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-53951754

 

....is this supposed to be surprising?

The failure of economic systems of all types to price in the cost of damage to the environment is devastating. The tragedy of the commons.

[leicsmac]

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-53993937

 

The Universe keeps surprising us!

[leicsmac]

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-54034134

 

Well, that's cheery.

[leicsmac]

Wildfires continue to rage pretty much across all the West Coast of the US. Scale is pretty much unprecedented.

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-us-canada-54095895

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm not sure how much clearer it has to be that changes have to be made, unless this - or worse - is meant to be the new normal.

Edited 11 September 2020 by leicsmac

[The Bear]

No doubt Donny and his ilk will assure every one it has nothing to do with climate change. 

[leicsmac]

1 hour ago, The Bear said:

No doubt Donny and his ilk will assure every one it has nothing to do with climate change. 

No doubt.

 

There's already a plethora of talking heads putting blame on arsonists, poor forest clearance policy and the like...all talking about the possible immediate cause of *these* fires while saying and doing nothing about the overall climate that allows them to start and burn to the degree that they do.

[leicsmac]

More on the above:

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-54113416

 

This is bloody awful.

[leicsmac]

It's like something out of Dune.

[Kopfkino]

https://www.chip.de/news/Penny-wagt-Experiment-Discounter-zeigt-erstmals-wahre-Verkaufspreise_182944887.html

 

This is something I'd like to see in the UK, sensitise people to the real cost of their food. A German supermarket is showing the 'true' cost of food when you include the environmental cost of food. For example, minced beef (albeit it should really be the cost of the whole cow cause based on this fillet would have far greater environmental cost built in, if not more than) should be 3x as expensive in Germany and given the UK has the cheapest food in Western Europe, nearly a fifth cheaper than Germany, it'd be a wake up call for a lot of people. Organic food becomes relatively cheaper than commercial food. 

Edited 13 September 2020 by Kopfkino

[WigstonWanderer]

5 hours ago, Kopfkino said:

https://www.chip.de/news/Penny-wagt-Experiment-Discounter-zeigt-erstmals-wahre-Verkaufspreise_182944887.html

 

This is something I'd like to see in the UK, sensitise people to the real cost of their food. A German supermarket is showing the 'true' cost of food when you include the environmental cost of food. For example, minced beef (albeit it should really be the cost of the whole cow cause based on this fillet would have far greater environmental cost built in, if not more than) should be 3x as expensive in Germany and given the UK has the cheapest food in Western Europe, nearly a fifth cheaper than Germany, it'd be a wake up call for a lot of people. Organic food becomes relatively cheaper than commercial food. 

I’d like to go further and see an environmental impact tax levied. Perhaps it could replace VAT/GST.

[leicsmac]

https://www.digitalspy.com/tv/a34004227/bbc-one-sir-david-attenborough-new-documentary-extinction-the-facts/

 

Did anyone watch this last night in the UK?

 

In the past Sir David Attenborough has dropped hints about how humans are affecting the biosphere. It seems that with time now so tight, he's become much more stark and forthright about it.

[Vacamion]

 

Shocking Blue / Bananarama about to pick up some significant amounts of airplay, if the internet buzz about Venus is to be believed:

 

 

 

 

[leicsmac]

7 minutes ago, Vacamion said:

 

Shocking Blue / Bananarama about to pick up some significant amounts of airplay, if the internet buzz about Venus is to be believed:

 

 

 

 

Is this about the phosphine, I wonder?

 

Well, organic life does produce it as it decays, but then so does the atmosphere of Jupiter with no life there.

[The Bear]

Could just be this:

 

 

[Kopfkino]

15 hours ago, WigstonWanderer said:

I’d like to go further and see an environmental impact tax levied. Perhaps it could replace VAT/GST.

 

Good luck finding any sane politician that's willing to try to wean us off cheap food, even eco folk barely touch the subject because it's essentially an attack on the poor. On food production, I feel any demand-side change is going to have to be voluntary and the change is going to have to be supply-side with subsidies and innovation. Lab-grown meat, vertical farming, glasshouses etc

[Vacamion]

 

The worst thing about reading stuff about Venus on Twitter is the amount of astrology stuff you have to scroll past. 

 

 

 

[Jon the Hat]

15 hours ago, WigstonWanderer said:

I’d like to go further and see an environmental impact tax levied. Perhaps it could replace VAT/GST.

Ah yes a completely impossible to implement idea.  That will fix it!

[leicsmac]

40 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

Is this about the phosphine, I wonder?

 

Well, organic life does produce it as it decays, but then so does the atmosphere of Jupiter with no life there.

Through a process that, apparently, the folks at the RAS have ruled out.

 

It seems that there is a statistically significant probability that there is microbial life of some kind on Venus.

 

Holy shit.

 

 

[Vacamion]

36 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

Through a process that, apparently, the folks at the RAS have ruled out.

 

It seems that there is a statistically significant probability that there is microbial life of some kind on Venus.

 

Holy shit.

 

 

 

Putting this out there without very good reason would leave these scientists open to all kinds of academic and professional ridicule, so it looks like the real deal.

 

We are not alone.

 

 

[leicsmac]

10 minutes ago, Vacamion said:

 

Putting this out there without very good reason would leave these scientists open to all kinds of academic and professional ridicule, so it looks like the real deal.

 

We are not alone.

 

 

If life is found to exist in such an extreme environment as that, I'd lay very good money that it is not the only place in our own Solar System where such life might be found.

[Vacamion]

 

My absolute favourite thing about the articles relating to this is that several people have made a bit of a leap and posited multicellular life.

 

In describing conditions in the venusian atmosphere, they almost always mention tardigrades, as the example of life that can withstand extreme conditions.

 

Any excuse to post a pic of tardigrades. 

 

[Free Falling Foxes]

56 minutes ago, Vacamion said:

 

My absolute favourite thing about the articles relating to this is that several people have made a bit of a leap and posited multicellular life.

 

In describing conditions in the venusian atmosphere, they almost always mention tardigrades, as the example of life that can withstand extreme conditions.

 

Any excuse to post a pic of tardigrades. 

 

They're like the pig on Pink Floyd's Animals album cover

 

Edited 14 September 2020 by Free Falling Foxes

[nnfox]

18 hours ago, WigstonWanderer said:

I’d like to go further and see an environmental impact tax levied. Perhaps it could replace VAT/GST.

I absolutely believe that there will be a beef tax introduced before the end of the decade.

[The Bear]

Venus is the last place in the solar system, other than the Sun, that you'd expect to find any sort of life! Mental.