Bill Gates Versus God (Round 1)

[Modbert]

Hurricane-calming technology? Bill Gates has a plan - USATODAY.com

Looks like Bill Gates is going to try, and minimize if not stop hurricanes from impacting us.
Here's hoping he wins.

 

[Xenophon]

Sounds kind of kooky to me, but if he wants to try it, maybe it will do some good.

 

[Modbert]

Sounds kind of kooky to me, but if he wants to try it, maybe it will do some good.

It's realistic, he's funding it, and it has a chance to stop hurricanes. At this point, no negative reason to not try it.

 

[elvis]

and to think Clinton spent more money trying to prosecute him than he did catching the most wanted terrorist on the planet.

 

[Ravi]

Methinks Mr. Gates is getting senile.

 

[Shogun]

 

[Diuretic]

Has God hit Gates up for a loan yet?

 

[DiveCon]

Hurricane-calming technology? Bill Gates has a plan - USATODAY.com

Looks like Bill Gates is going to try, and minimize if not stop hurricanes from impacting us.
Here's hoping he wins.

sounds like it has a valid premise, but i hope they actually run simulations with real world variables
dont want some of those unintended consequences to bite ya in the ass

 

[KittenKoder]

Hurricane-calming technology? Bill Gates has a plan - USATODAY.com

Looks like Bill Gates is going to try, and minimize if not stop hurricanes from impacting us.
Here's hoping he wins.

sounds like it has a valid premise, but i hope they actually run simulations with real world variables
dont want some of those unintended consequences to bite ya in the ass

The only way to know for certain is if they actually try it, no mathematical model can predict all the implications, that's what environuts forget to. But meh, I hope if they do it that there isn't a butterfly effect.

 

[DiveCon]

Hurricane-calming technology? Bill Gates has a plan - USATODAY.com

Looks like Bill Gates is going to try, and minimize if not stop hurricanes from impacting us.
Here's hoping he wins.

sounds like it has a valid premise, but i hope they actually run simulations with real world variables
dont want some of those unintended consequences to bite ya in the ass

The only way to know for certain is if they actually try it, no mathematical model can predict all the implications, that's what environuts forget to. But meh, I hope if they do it that there isn't a butterfly effect.

we just better hope they dont run it on a windows box, eh

 

[KittenKoder]

sounds like it has a valid premise, but i hope they actually run simulations with real world variables
dont want some of those unintended consequences to bite ya in the ass

The only way to know for certain is if they actually try it, no mathematical model can predict all the implications, that's what environuts forget to. But meh, I hope if they do it that there isn't a butterfly effect.

we just better hope they dont run it on a windows box, eh

News flash, Bill recently installed Ubuntu on his home computers ... his reply when asked about it, "I didn't say I liked using Windoze."

 

[editec]

Hurricane-calming technology? Bill Gates has a plan - USATODAY.com

Looks like Bill Gates is going to try, and minimize if not stop hurricanes from impacting us.
Here's hoping he wins.

I can see how this might be effective at dampening hurricanic wind, but one wonders what the blowback will be if we pumped huge amounts of cold water off the bottom of the ocean?

Surely that's going to seriously mess with the ecology of those areas of the ocean from whence those waters are pumped, no?

 

[DiveCon]

Hurricane-calming technology? Bill Gates has a plan - USATODAY.com

Looks like Bill Gates is going to try, and minimize if not stop hurricanes from impacting us.
Here's hoping he wins.

I can see how this might be effective at dampening hurricanic wind, but one wonders what the blowback will be if we pumped huge amounts of cold water off the bottom of the ocean?

Surely that's going to seriously mess with the ecology of those areas of the ocean from whence those waters are pumped, no?

exactly
when you pump water up from the ocean floor it has to be replaced by other water


this is why they need to do TONS of simulations before they try real world

 

[Old Rocks]

Normally, water at depth warms and cools much slower than the water at the surface. So pumping water at depth to the surface would result in warmer water extending deeper as the cool water mixed with the much warmer surface water. The deeper layer of mixed water, cooler than the former surface water, but warmer than the water that the was at the depth the layer now extends to. This water will lose its heat slower as the inevitable cooling takes place as the ocean currents move it North. So we have more heat being transported North in the Gulf Stream. Just one possible scenario. Definately a stop and think idea.

 

[Barb]

Sounds kind of kooky to me, but if he wants to try it, maybe it will do some good.

It's realistic, he's funding it, and it has a chance to stop hurricanes. At this point, no negative reason to not try it.

Honestly, I hope somebody has the sense to stop him. Pumping the depths up will force warmer waters down, and there just isn't enough known about what that will do. The ocean is able to sequester carbon dioxide from the atmosphere in its depths for 100-1000 years, an important natural service. Changes in the biogeochemical makeup and warmth of the water at the surface and upper layers of the ocean can induce sudden changes in species diversity, abundance, and body size. These changes also affect the ability of the depths to dissolve calcium carbonate and quarantine carbon dioxide There are significant unknowns about the various forms of life at the ocean floor because of lack of historical study and insufficient sampling of current studies, but what is known suggests caution is the best approach to introducing changes that would affect abyssal regions. Craig Smith and his associates explain, in highly technical and exhaustive detail, what we do know, and what those findings can predict in relation to what affects of global climate change, ocean mining, and iron fertilization might have on biodiversity and ecosystem services provided at the deepest parts of our oceans. “Abyssal food limitation, ecosystem structure and climate change” is not light reading, but it is highly informative, and the warning is clear. Maybe someone should send it to Gates.

http://www.soest.hawaii.edu/oceanography/courses/OCN621/Spring2009/Smith et al_TREE 2008.pdf