[Bernard L. Madoff]

You need to watch 2012 Sol.

http://en.wikipedia....wiki/2012_(film)

[Ruffian]

AndersB, on 24 February 2011 - 01:19 PM, said:

Sorry to continue derailing with the riots thing...

What about the USA? How much longer will it take, with high unemployment and little social welfare, before there will be riots in the streets over there? And this is a country with an insane gun culture!

That is exactly why every county in the US has it's National Guard outpost. It isn't just a turn of phrase - 'load up, load up, with rubber bullets...' Or non-rubber bullets if the situation requires.

The US expects civic unrest and plans for it, the way we plan for Australia Day BBQs and nationalisation ceremonies. We are very different societies.

[Solomon]

Bernard L. Madoff, on 25 February 2011 - 05:25 AM, said:

You need to watch 2012 Sol.

http://en.wikipedia....wiki/2012_(film)

Yeah I have Bernie.
I actually thought it was one of the better apocalyptic type movies that I have seen.
Of course, these types of movies actually raise more questions than they answer.
Most times, there is always this remnant that survives. (Otherwise they wouldn't have the human relationship component)
But most of the worst case scenarios I can imagine, no one survives. We are obliterated.
Sorry.

[staringclown]

Solomon, on 24 February 2011 - 10:25 PM, said:

I wanted to make a different post in this thread.

I think it is fascinating that our entire earth's crust floats on a sea of magma, and that it is actually only a thin layer of earth and rock that supports our life.
That these plates move and create earthquakes has always fascinated me.
Somehow this heat from the core of the earth remains constant (Why doesn't it cool down?) and the only time we become aware of it, is when earthquakes or volcanoes erupt, and remind us.
It also is the reason why certain mining deposits are where they are.
As this schematic shows.

It is a fascinating topic.

It doesn't cool because heat is being generated by the radioactive decay of the various isotopes that make up the core. This keeps replenishing the system. This is where geothermal energy comes from. Even the byproducts of the decay then further decay so there's no danger of the fuel running out any time soon.
E.g. Uranium238->Thorium234->Proactinium234... etc (Not saying the earths core is uranium - just an example of radioactive decay that people might be more familiar with)


Radioactive decay series.

[Solomon]

staringclown, on 25 February 2011 - 09:26 AM, said:

It is a fascinating topic.

It doesn't cool because heat is being generated by the radioactive decay of the various isotopes that make up the core. This keeps replenishing the system. This is where geothermal energy comes from. Even the byproducts of the decay then further decay so there's no danger of the fuel running out any time soon.
E.g. Uranium238->Thorium234->Proactinium234... etc (Not saying the earths core is uranium - just an example of radioactive decay that people might be more familiar with)


Radioactive decay series.

There is just so much I don't know, even about this planet.
Thanks SC.
I know I could have googled it myself, but you've supplied me with something that has intrigued me most of my life.
How good is that.
I know all you other guys out there knew this, but I didn't. I don't know why. I guess I just never bothered to investigate it far enough.
The value of a soft core I imagine is stability.
A bit like the principle of a gyroscope.
I then wondered do all planets have this?
I picked this up from Yahoo answers. Well it may not be scientific, but its a good answer.

Quote

Two things make Earth's core molten and keep it from cooling too fast: (1) radiation from elements like uranium in the Earth itself, and (2) pressure from the outer layers of Earth crushing in on the inner parts. Someday Earth's core will cool, but we're probably talking billions of years.

Venus is about the same size as Earth and is very volcanically active, suggesting that it has molten material under the surface too. Mars and Mercury, even though their surfaces are pretty quiet, have evidence for molten cores as well.

The earth's core is actually mostly molten iron, which occasionally escapes and becomes the iron ore deposits we find today. So no problem running out of iron. Coal might be a different matter.
They actually measure the size of the core by magnetic force.

Interesting things you find out on a Friday night, with nothing better to do.

[urchin]

being american i'm super ignorant about everything that isn't america (and ignorant about america too) but i didn't realise that NZ was so seismically active. How do the building codes reflect this? having lived in Japan for 10 years or so, where you usually have one "feelable" earthquake a month, the codes are obviously really strict. I understand it was a shallow quake under a densely populated (for NZ) area, coming on the heels of another major earthquake, but it seems like the destruction and loss of life is out of all proportion with the scale of the quake itself.

[tor]

urchin, on 25 February 2011 - 12:02 PM, said:

being american i'm super ignorant about everything that isn't america (and ignorant about america too) but i didn't realise that NZ was so seismically active. How do the building codes reflect this? having lived in Japan for 10 years or so, where you usually have one "feelable" earthquake a month, the codes are obviously really strict. I understand it was a shallow quake under a densely populated (for NZ) area, coming on the heels of another major earthquake, but it seems like the destruction and loss of life is out of all proportion with the scale of the quake itself.

It could be just nationalistic pride but I think New Zealand is actually one of the best at making earthquake proof buildings.

I think the problem is that we have a lot of old buildings because our quakes don't tend to hit populated places (we are a spread out country, just over 4 million in a country the size of Japan) so most buildings don't have the new knowledge incorporated into their design.

When I was about 18 we had a 6.something quake. Fortunately the house I grew up in lived through the 1932 quake (NZ's second biggest disaster) and so took it with no real problems. That did pretty much nothing to my town.

I did see a building put up in 1933 get demolished at one point (non quake related). The walls were a couple of feet thick concrete and all reinforced steel. So they obviously went nutbag on buildings after the big one.

[urchin]

tor, on 25 February 2011 - 08:15 PM, said:

It could be just nationalistic pride but I think New Zealand is actually one of the best at making earthquake proof buildings.

I think the problem is that we have a lot of old buildings because our quakes don't tend to hit populated places (we are a spread out country, just over 4 million in a country the size of Japan) so most buildings don't have the new knowledge incorporated into their design.

When I was about 18 we had a 6.something quake. Fortunately the house I grew up in lived through the 1932 quake (NZ's second biggest disaster) and so took it with no real problems. That did pretty much nothing to my town.

I did see a building put up in 1933 get demolished at one point (non quake related). The walls were a couple of feet thick concrete and all reinforced steel. So they obviously went nutbag on buildings after the big one.

i can understand smaller and/or older buildings collapsing, but the way that TV station went down brings to mind images of the China quake a few years back when the shoddy and non-code construction resulted in schools collapsing upon the kids... it could just be that the combination of two major quakes before repairs could be made after the first one did it, but one wonders.

some of the anti-earthquake measures incorporated in japan are pretty cool--must be an interesting field to be working in (not to mention genuinely meaningful, which is always nice).

[tor]

urchin, on 25 February 2011 - 11:44 PM, said:

i can understand smaller and/or older buildings collapsing, but the way that TV station went down brings to mind images of the China quake a few years back when the shoddy and non-code construction resulted in schools collapsing upon the kids... it could just be that the combination of two major quakes before repairs could be made after the first one did it, but one wonders.

some of the anti-earthquake measures incorporated in japan are pretty cool--must be an interesting field to be working in (not to mention genuinely meaningful, which is always nice).

Oh apparently earthquake codes only came in in the 90's in NZ. That could explain it.

The beehive has got some big rubber things under it.

[staringclown]

Solomon, on 25 February 2011 - 11:57 AM, said:

There is just so much I don't know, even about this planet.
Thanks SC.
I know I could have googled it myself, but you've supplied me with something that has intrigued me most of my life.
How good is that.
I know all you other guys out there knew this, but I didn't. I don't know why. I guess I just never bothered to investigate it far enough.
The value of a soft core I imagine is stability.
A bit like the principle of a gyroscope.
I then wondered do all planets have this?
I picked this up from Yahoo answers. Well it may not be scientific, but its a good answer.

The earth's core is actually mostly molten iron, which occasionally escapes and becomes the iron ore deposits we find today. So no problem running out of iron. Coal might be a different matter.
They actually measure the size of the core by magnetic force.

Interesting things you find out on a Friday night, with nothing better to do.

Don't feel too bad. I don't think that many people know this sort of stuff. Geology is a pet subject for me.

Now if I can just find a volcano that spews molten gold...

[Bernard L. Madoff]

For those of you that haven't got around to it

http://www.redcross....hurchearthquake

[tux]

Bernard L. Madoff, on 22 February 2011 - 07:06 AM, said:

‎30+ earthquakes in Christchurch since Monday. No 5 was the big one.

Now get this, 25 after shocks since the 12:51 bigger one. Archives reveal Canterbury has been shaking for months. For gods sake lets pray that these aren't precursursors for a bigger one.

For those that skipped Maths, the seismological richter scale is logarithmic. That means a 6 is ten times bigger than a 5 and a 7 ten times bigger than a 6.

Monitor this:
http://www.geonet.or...ent_quakes.html
MONITOR THAT CONSTANTLY. There is a shake every hour.

Or monitor this:
ChristchurchQuakeMap

[Bernard L. Madoff]

tux, on 01 March 2011 - 10:25 AM, said:

Or monitor this:
ChristchurchQuakeMap

That 7 day sequence of 213 looks like the Bomber Command pics of the runs over Germany. No thanks.