When is the End really?

[sunshine185]

They could build a rocket launchpad here in Oldham, if anything went wrong and the rocket blew up and scattered **** everywhere, nobody would notice.

[JamesF]

They could build a rocket launchpad here in Oldham, if anything went wrong and the rocket blew up and scattered **** everywhere, nobody would notice.

I thought that had already happened?

James

[obscura]

You're right Olly.

Will energy prove to be the start of that decline? Forgetting oil and gas, reliance may be just on wind, wave, solar, hydro, nuclear, coal?, trees .... are there more? Here nuclear is about the best option to meet demand I think. Or will the decline be due to food and water supply? Probably both energy and food/water.

Is that so far away????

[Black Knight]

Sounds like the first programme of the first "Connections" series. Brilliant television. I'd love to see a modern version. My son still watches the old ones.

James

That was it! I couldn't remember the name of the show. British TV needs more James Burke.

[petermarknimmo]

When you die.

[petermarknimmo]

Well, at least from your point of view, anyway

[Ganymede12]

Cheery thought petermarknimmo, cheery thought...

I think that a world wide disaster would have to be sudden to wipe us out completely wipe us out. We're quite adaptive as a species so I don't think global warming would wipe us out. A meteorite large enough could make our numbers thin but not gone.

[661-pete]

Yellowstone.

The supervolcano that lies underneath the park, that is: which could go 'pop!' at any time - utterly unpredictable.

According to reports the caldera floor has started rising more rapidly than usual, over the past few years.

Think about it.

Wasn't there a movie about it?

[petermarknimmo]

Cheery thought petermarknimmo, cheery thought...

true though

[Ganymede12]

Yellowstone.

The supervolcano that lies underneath the park, that is: which could go 'pop!' at any time - utterly unpredictable.

According to reports the caldera floor has started rising more rapidly than usual, over the past few years.

Think about it.

Wasn't there a movie about it?

I think I saw a documentary about that one. The volcano looks huge and it covers nearly the entire park. I think I'll stay here until that thing go's off!

[obscura]

Aren't there half a dozen super volcanoes? The dome is rising in Yellowstone and an odd lake has emptied due to tilt. i was beginning to understand that it was more likely to blow from a number of vents rather than one biggy. Surface damage would not be so bad for the world (sorry USA) what the ash cloud does is another matter. But it would not bring the end of life incl. man. Maybe?

[Earl]

When everything in the universe is at Absolute Zero that will be the end, and quiet possibly the start at the same time.

So there could be no end just a transition from one state to another state.

[petermarknimmo]

I I think I'll stay here until that thing go's off!

The gases released would probably kill us all over here

[ObscuredbyClouds]

Lol, like i said ages ago, whats stopping the Sun and the Earth from going BOOM?

Nobody can predict it sorry

The Sun could do anything at anytime, its nuclear aint it?

The Earth could go anytime, Yellowstone!

Theres a song here i believe - No one knows . . Queens of the Stone Age

[JamesF]

Lol, like i said ages ago, whats stopping the Sun and the Earth from going BOOM?

Nobody can predict it sorry

The Sun could do anything at anytime, its nuclear aint it?

Nobody can say with 100% certainty, no. But equally we (ie humans) believe we have at least a passable understanding of how it works and that there's no specific reason for it to "go boom" at any time in the near future.

Given options including the sun "going boom" or man being wiped out by a war over access to scarce fossil fuel resources or just by our own avarice and unwillingness to get on, the first would be well down the list.

The Earth could go anytime, Yellowstone!

Yellowstone won't even come close to destroying the Earth. Give it ten or fifteen years after an eruption at Yellowstone and I'd bet you'd barely notice it had happened. Mankind may well not be around long enough to witness just how resilient the Earth is, of course.

James

[JamesF]

That was it! I couldn't remember the name of the show. British TV needs more James Burke.

I don't understand why they don't get repeated. Some bits are rather dated (James Burke's wardrobe and the almost total absence of computers), but much of it is still as relevant today as when they were first shown in the late 70s/early 80s (I think).

There's a certain element of cold war paranoia in that first programme I think, but it makes a point about how little we understand about the day-to-day functioning of world we live in that is perhaps even more valid today than it was thirty years ago. That society is only three square meals away from anarchy is probably more true today than it ever was...

James

[Naemeth]

It could be anything really. Disease, Famine, Asteroid Impact, Global Warming, Drowning (from Ice Caps melting), Mass Self-Extinction, Death Penalty implemented Worldwide, Thermo-Nuclear War, Sun Expansion (we'll be dead in 600-800 million years due to this by the way ), the list is endless, best not to think about it.

[661-pete]

As so often, Wiki comes up trumps. Yes I know wiki is only as good as the data fed into it, but this stuff looks fairly authoritative. One or two entries caught my eye:

600 million years from now:

As weathering of Earth's surfaces increases with the Sun's luminosity, carbon dioxide levels in its atmosphere decrease. By this time, they will fall to the point at which C3 photosynthesis is no longer possible. All plants which utilize C3 photosynthesis (~99 percent of species) will die.[22]

Hmmm.... what will we or our livestock eat? Of course, this is always assuming that plants won't have evolved to cope with the changing CO2 levels.

1.3 billion years from now:

Eukaryotic life dies out. Only prokaryotes remain.[24]

I'm not quite sure what a prokaryote is, but I wanna be one when the time comes....

And finally, the last entry:

10^10^10^10^10^1.1 years from now:

Scale of an estimated Poincaré recurrence time for the quantum state of a hypothetical box containing a black hole with the estimated mass of the entire Universe, observable or not, assuming Linde's chaotic inflationary model with an inflaton whose mass is 10−6 Planck masses.[64]

Perhaps some physics brain on here can explain what that means? Or perhaps not. Anyway, a long wait.

[Naemeth]

Prokaryote is single-celled organisms I believe .

[ObscuredbyClouds]

As so often, Wiki comes up trumps. Yes I know wiki is only as good as the data fed into it, but this stuff looks fairly authoritative. One or two entries caught my eye:

600 million years from now:

Hmmm.... what will we or our livestock eat? Of course, this is always assuming that plants won't have evolved to cope with the changing CO2 levels.

1.3 billion years from now:

I'm not quite sure what a prokaryote is, but I wanna be one when the time comes....

And finally, the last entry:

10^10^10^10^10^1.1 years from now:

Perhaps some physics brain on here can explain what that means? Or perhaps not. Anyway, a long wait.

LOL wiki comes up trumps too right

check this out

This is about an Alice Cooper show

The show was seen to so be violent that the German government forced Cooper to remove some of the more graphic parts of the show. A Member of Parliament in the UK, David Blunkett, appealed to have the show banned altogether from the country, but his attempt was unsuccessful.

Hmmmm i wonder why it was unsuccessful

Thats how much wiki know lol

[JamesF]

Prokaryote is single-celled organisms I believe .

Eukaryotes have cell structures (particularly a nucleus) enclosed within the cell membrane. Prokaryotes don't. Humans are eukaryotic, bacteria are prokaryotes and there's at least one other group of prokaryotes as well.

I only know this because I have an interest in anaerobic digestion and people often talk about the methanogenic organisms being bacteria, which they aren't, because they're eukaryotic.

James

[Cath]

If you see this ..

[ObscuredbyClouds]

If you see this ..

Thats good for cooking eggs for breakfast on the car bonnet

:D

[perkil8r]

According to my other half, the world will end if I buy another scope

[sologuitarist61]

Aren't there half a dozen super volcanoes? The dome is rising in Yellowstone and an odd lake has emptied due to tilt. i was beginning to understand that it was more likely to blow from a number of vents rather than one biggy. Surface damage would not be so bad for the world (sorry USA) what the ash cloud does is another matter. But it would not bring the end of life incl. man. Maybe?

Yes you are right. Super volcanoes like Yellowstone are more of a 'tear apart' kind I believe that allows lava to flow over a vast area. However there will, I suppose, still be eruptions, but along the length of the rip.

There a suppervolcano in India that produced so much lava over a long period, that it is miles thick called the Deccan Traps

http://www.geosociety.org/news/pr/05-27.htm

Makes interesting reading if nothing else.