Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: Mars on October 20, 2008, 02:44:26 pm
-
What could slowly render Earth uninhabitable (over to course of a couple hundred years, not millennia) to humans who have the technology to build a self sustaining colony on Mars? Anything? Or would such technology cover just about everything slow?
Man made, natural catastrophe suggestions are all good.
-
I'd count the modern man as such a catastrophe.
-
Dyson sphere or similar. Take it apart piece by piece.
-
Hmmm... what about a supervirus? The descolada virus from the Ender series might fit this (it was less a virus and more a genetic supersplicer that rewrote entire global ecosystems).
-
Total extinction of all kinds of bees, as Einstein said. It's far worse than you could ever imagine.
(please note that I'm serious)
-
Hmmm... what about a supervirus?
That sounds like something that she would come up with. :shaking:
-
What's with today's obsession with planetary disasters? :wtf:
-
They're more fantastical than local disasters, perhaps.
-
Because creating one seems to be in the human DNA somewhere. Plus it is interesting to think that we could be wiped out one day with nothing left to cause any more stupid problems. In fact the "Ultimate Solution" would probably be to simply wipe ourselves off the face of the earth.
-
The downside being, of course, that there wouldn't be anyone left to say 'I told you so.'
-
you mean only Nuke :drevil:
-
What's with today's obsession with planetary disasters? :wtf:
Just wait, I bet we start discussing universal disasters before this is done. Lol, Big Crunch.
-
Some sort of mutation occurring on the Martian colony or in space that transfers back to the Earth. You have your super virus, new bacteria, all the way up to a Human mutation resulting in sterility after a few generations. A lot can happen with all that cosmic radiation.
-
Just wait, I bet we start discussing universal disasters before this is done. Lol, Big Crunch.
Or maybe a Gnab Gib
-
if earth's magnetic field collapses, the atmosphere would get striped away over the desired time frame.
only problem would be it would be a lot easier to setup livable shelters on earth than mars, simply because we would have all the equipment and resources here already, and we'd have plenty of time to take advantage of the atmosphere before it got eroded.
I supose a better scenario would be if the output of the sun rose for some reason at a steady rate for a few hundre years, this would have the effect of making earth too hot, and mars less cold.
-
For those wondering I'm contemplating a story. I'd need a convinient disaster to be slowly sapping the life out of Earth, but not threatening Mars.
My problem, as Bobboau stated, is that if you can build biospheres etc on Mars, than Earth should be easy.
-
The Earth's core could start rapidly (still relatively slow) cooling, for whatever reason.
-
Turn on the LHC.
If that doesn't work, then just pile up all of the nukes of the world in one place and set them off at the same time.
-
Slow is kind of a big thing here
EDIT
Although, a nuclear winter could work
-
What's with today's obsession with planetary disasters? :wtf:
There seems to be an increasing trend as of late to believe in "the end is near" BS.
Turn on the LHC
I seriously hope you're joking, the LHC could never destroy the Earth.
-
No seriously, I just need a plausible explanation for the slow (and incomplete as the population capacity wouldn't allow it) evacuation from Earth to Mars / space stations.
I'm not obsessed with the apocolypse, really.
-
Something realistic/boring then? OK, how bout this:
Tectonic forces eventually stop, the core eventually slows down, magnetic forces drop because of this, the sun gets hotter slowly but surely, the atmosphere dissipates, etc. Basically, ecosystems collapse, the temperatures throughout the Earth reach unbelievable extremes, and the situation is guaranteed only to get worse as time goes on.
-
id have to say me
-
Someone at the LHC accidentally made a black hole and dropped it into the earth.
It is gradually gaining mass.
-
No seriously, I just need a plausible explanation for the slow (and incomplete as the population capacity wouldn't allow it) evacuation from Earth to Mars / space stations.
How about the oceans becoming anoxic (depeleted of oxygen) because of global warming and the currents shutting down? That'd cause a major ecological disaster and would take place over a very long period of time. :)
-
Global warming not good enough for ya?
-
Well there are the real ones. The sun starting to die off. The Moon finally escaping Earth's Gravity. Of course those won't happen for quite awhile.
Here's a good one. With all the technology people no longer need to leave their homes to interact. Over the centuries this becomes the norm and eventually shifts the population growth from positive to negative. Eventually everyone just dies of old age sitting in front of their computer (probably playing FS2_Open 57.3.5 with the HoloVPs) with no one born to replace them.
-
I saw that on an episode of sea quest once.
-
How about the oceans becoming anoxic (depeleted of oxygen) because of global warming and the currents shutting down? That'd cause a major ecological disaster and would take place over a very long period of time. :)
This seems the most plausible one TBH.
-
I saw that on an episode of sea quest once.
That was the one with the giant robots, right? :yes:
-
Grey goo!
-
Martians! In Tripods!
Moving very slowly...
-
Simple depletion of resources? If you use all (or enough that you can't sustain a population) the natural resources Earth starts to become uninhabitable, making Mars look nice. Combine it with global warming or something.
-
I saw that on an episode of sea quest once.
Yea it was on there but that's not the only show. Can't think of the other ones right now.
Well this would probably be faster then a couple hundred years. What about a Gamma ray burster at a distance that is far enough not to destroy the solar system but close enough to irradiate the Earth. The population that wasn't wiped out in the first few weeks would probably dwindle and die out over time due to cancer, sterility, lack of palatable food and water.
Scary how many things can wipe us out isn't it?
-
One World Dictator. 'Nuf said.
-
Gamma Ray burst would kill everything in the solar system
-
Slow.
I think Bob-san might have a point
-
Well there are the real ones. The sun starting to die off. The Moon finally escaping Earth's Gravity. Of course those won't happen for quite awhile.
Here's a good one. With all the technology people no longer need to leave their homes to interact. Over the centuries this becomes the norm and eventually shifts the population growth from positive to negative. Eventually everyone just dies of old age sitting in front of their computer (probably playing FS2_Open 57.3.5 with the HoloVPs) with no one born to replace them.
A large asteroid crashes into the moon and sends it slowly back to where it may have come from. The tides increase, the plates move more and "make | -more- | earthquakes". Then the Earth and moon become metaballs, meaning Surge the sea-snake will be able to say "Mithter Dexthter, where are the air breatherrrssss?" i.e. humans will be forced to evacuate or - die - .
-
Slow.
I think Bob-san might have a point
Perhaps it's not quite the catastrophe that you were initially thinking of, but having an exodus (forced or voluntary) from a Utopian society could be quite the plot device. You don't even have to make up details about this government that some people oppose: but you an do anything with it really. Basically if we're all living in a Utopia, why would anyone want to leave? Well, anyone that enjoys real rights and freedoms would want to. Anyone prosecuted. Possibly include a non-religious clause, in that anyone found practicing a religion are sentenced to death. Raise the stakes, include a rebellion with several factions or the core intelligence of this one world government as a faction, using the government's technology to evacuate hundreds of thousands of themselves. They leave the government slower and stupider, settle somewhere nice like Mars, and make due with whatever they can find.
-
Total extinction of all kinds of bees, as Einstein said. It's far worse than you could ever imagine.
(please note that I'm serious)
that one has lots of people worrying atm, because of the massive death of beehives over the last few years.
-
Heat death of the universe.
-
Snopes.com (http://www.snopes.com/quotes/einstein/bees.asp) isn't too sure it was Einstein that said that quote:
...All in all, this looks like a classic case of a useful quote's being invented and put into the mouth of a famous person for political purposes.
Though that doesn't necessarily mean the danger isn't true.
-
It wouldnt mean the danger is true if Einstein said it, on the other hand ^^
A simple fact, not all plants need bees or even other insects to reproduce, so the importance of bees is exaggerated
-
A super-mutating super-virus that turns people into mindless zombies /raving mutants /corpses.
-
Thanks to everyone, there have been a lot of good ideas posted. I would never have come up with the moon decaying in orbit for instance.
-
Ever saw the movie "Time Machine" ? At a part of the movie, it has humans make colonies on the Moon. And sometime in 2017-2027 they detonate a bomb under the Moon's surface, to make space for colonists. However, the detonation goes wrong, and not only screws up the Moon's orbit, but also craks it, so it starts to fall apart, while screwing up everything on Earth. In around 2030, Earth is like after an apocalypse, with people trying to evacuate.
-
Gas giants' moon systems are stable, yes? Well, for story purposes, you could have a moon slingshoted close to the Earth, disrupting the Earth/Moon system and messing with techtonics. Perhaps it ends up on a highly eliptical orbit, not doing much on one pass but the effects building up over time.
Oooh! make it Europa or one of the other water worlds, this could give you the new life aspect as the ice will melt when it gets closer to the sun, or atleast giving an interesting place to colonize.
-
OR you could use an object the size of Pluto on a 90% chance collision course with Earth (with impact in 20, 50 or whatever years). The object would be too big to nuke or push within the time limit, and have a too large hit probability to ignore.
Obviosly half the time from learning about the threat to the evac of Earth, people would argue about who gets saved, and who doesn't (and possibly start a war or two about it, limiting the grand total of seats to a few thousand due to damage taken by the global industry and science facilities).
And finally, the miniplanet could miss.
All the 'doomed' people who were left behind, to celebrate the day the Earth survived against the odds, shoot down all the escaping ships (which were still in range Earth based weapons, despite almost reaching the Moon) and enjoy the fireworks.
-
But I thought he was trying to actually force people to go to Mars. (As amusing as that scenario is.)
-
What would be funnier is if the planetoid missed and proceeded to plough through the Armada of escapees ;)
-
What would be funnier is if the planetoid missed and proceeded to plough through the Armada of escapees ;)
lol
-
All the 'doomed' people who were left behind, to celebrate the day the Earth survived against the odds, shoot down all the escaping ships (which were still in range Earth based weapons, despite almost reaching the Moon) and enjoy the fireworks.
Which would be wicked and sick.
Usually in scenarios shuch as this, one would pick young, healthy and intelligent people to further propagate the race.
What would be beneficial if all the retards and stupid people got fried...and whatever ship(s) carried the government gets fried too.
-
Well to add a twist to the already twisted ending-
The mini-planet flew by the Earth, just barely touching the atmosphere. Moments later, the left behinders watch as the lasers start illuminating the sky, and the nukes fly off.
They begin reaching their targets, producing mighty fireballs, visible to the naked eye. The population starts to celebrate the 180-degree turn in the fate of humanity, most are in shock that they're not dead, others are in euphoria that they were the first potential evac candidates not to make it to the spaceships and some still don't really understand what's happening.
In the mean time, the person who pressed the red button, a general who had to stay because he didn't have the political connections in the Selecting Comittee needed to get a seat in the life boats, yells out:
"Chosen people my @$$! Eat this, (0(k-suckers!"
Edit: When I'm done with TotT, I might just create a campaign based on this.
-
Add another twist...the asteroid misses and the people left on earth fire ze missiles at the fleeing ships. then
a) the missiles malfunction and explode, turning Earth into a nuclear wasteland
b) another planetoid comes and f*** Earth up
c) something else
-
Add another twist...the asteroid misses and the people left on earth fire ze missiles at the fleeing ships. then
a) the missiles malfunction and explode, turning Earth into a nuclear wasteland
b) another planetoid comes and f*** Earth up
c) something else
d) underpants
e) ....
f) profit!
-
g) the escapers disarm the nukes before takeoff, and the fireworks are a decoy
h) the escapers plant their own nukes on Earth, in case the asteroid misses
i) Nuke can finish for me.
j) this doesn't make sense anymore
-
v) I don't know the alphabet
Seriously- stop it.
-
And now for something completely different.
A scotsman on a zero-G based, five legged, armor-carapaced hors--wait, wrong script.
What about the explosion of a supervolcano like, say, yellowstone park? It'd take out mankind no problem within a year or so if the initial blast won't off us all.
Or what about a nearby star going kablooie and giving us about 7 years before the shockwave hits?
...hm. doubt that Mars would survive that either.
There IS one thing you could use instead of disaster, though. what if the Mars rovers etc. found alien tech on Mars? Like hell that the world would not want to be there post haste.
-
Oh boy, dangerous alien tech. That's sounds like exactly the thing I want in my backyard. :p
-
Or what about a nearby star going kablooie and giving us about 7 years before the shockwave hits?
...hm. doubt that Mars would survive that either.
There IS one thing you could use instead of disaster, though. what if the Mars rovers etc. found alien tech on Mars? Like hell that the world would not want to be there post haste.
And how would you know it had exploded seven years in advance? It's gonna take light seven years to reach us, and the neutrinos will be right behind that.
-
Well. If you want a slow planetary catstrophie, it would entail that it starts quietly, so that no one at first notice whats going on.
Say plants are growing slower and slower each year, because of the depletion of natural minerals they require. No one would notice if the rafflesia took a year or a year and three months to bloom. It would only be noticed when crops start to take much longer to produce. As a result, oxygen production is decreased, and slowly the atmosphere of Earth would grow thinner and thinner. Because of the thinning atmosphere, less ozone is being replenished, and eventually, the ozone layer will die out, exposing the earth and humans to deadly UV radiation.
Or maybe the melting of the polar ice caps cause a slow shift in the climate, a la Day After Tomorrow ( i think ), only at a much slower rate. The overall lowering of the Earth's temperature causes the Earth to slowly and irreversibly sink towards an Ice Age. The people have to leave Earth because of the Ice Age which will kill anything on the planet.
Or the outer core of the Earth is starting to freeze at an alarmingly fast rate, causing the Earth's magnetic field to grow all screwy, causing a geomagnetic reversal to take place. At this point, you can come up with reasons for kicking humans off the Earth, because the exact effects of a geomagnetic reversal are unknown.
If you want more, I can always think up more.
-
Well if you want something that's hard to explain here's one. An approaching rogue blackhole. How fast it's over all depends on where your looking at the destruction from. So basically Earth and the rest of the universe would see the destruction at different times. It could take days, decades, thousands of years depending on how you see it and how long you are near the event horizon.
-
... Wouldn't Mars' orbit put in in danger from the same black hole too?
-
Unless you had a really small black hole just the right size to destroy Earth...but then where would it go? Into the sun? :drevil: and gets vapourised...
-
I still think ecological disasters will be your best bet though, Mars.
-
Unless you had a really small black hole just the right size to destroy Earth...but then where would it go? Into the sun? :drevil: and gets vapourised...
No, it would eat the sun. Black holes don't vaporize.
And, actually, you might be able to justify a hole that small. I'm not sure how fast it'd evaporate.
-
Unless you had a really small black hole just the right size to destroy Earth...but then where would it go? Into the sun? :drevil: and gets vapourised...
No, it would eat the sun. Black holes don't vaporize.
And, actually, you might be able to justify a hole that small. I'm not sure how fast it'd evaporate.
It wouldn't take very long, I don't think.
http://xaonon.dyndns.org/hawking/
A black hole with a single Earth mass would have a radius of approximately 0.8865 centimeters. The temperature of the black hole would be approximately .02 degrees kelvin, and luminosity would be 0.000000000000000009998181 watts. And lifetime? 5.668638e+50 years... I stand corrected: quite a freaking long time!! For the size, however, we'd be safe. I think. Surface gravity would be 516,931,900,000,000,000 earth gravities. Wow. Just... wow.
Now then: a single solar mass black hole would have a radius of 2955 meters. Surface gravity would be 1,550,796,000,000 earth gravities (.000300000058% that of the prior 1 Earth Mass black hole). Temperature would be 0.000000062 kelvin too--so much, much colder. Finally, lifetime would be 2.099496e+67 years. That's an enormous amount of time--much more than that of the "micro"black hole.
-
Thing is you don't need an earth sized hole, you just need one large enough that it can swallow mass at the same speed it loses it as radiation. Now you just say that a LHC type experiment created such a thing and then went wrong. The mass is slowly eating the Earth. Mars would be completely unaffected by such a black hole since its final mass would be about the same as the Earth or less.
A supervolcano is a possible option too but if the technology exists to warm Mars to the point where it can be terraformed then it could no doubt more easily be used on Earth.
-
Or what about a nearby star going kablooie and giving us about 7 years before the shockwave hits?
...hm. doubt that Mars would survive that either.
There IS one thing you could use instead of disaster, though. what if the Mars rovers etc. found alien tech on Mars? Like hell that the world would not want to be there post haste.
And how would you know it had exploded seven years in advance? It's gonna take light seven years to reach us, and the neutrinos will be right behind that.
:innocent: Oh, idunno...I mean it isn't as if there's maniacal geniuses about that could do such a thing, right? Right?
*crickets chirp, tumbleweed flits past*
...and it would be too much to hope for a random Sathanas fleet do explode a star?
Drat.
Oh well; it was worth a try, right?
-
And how would you know it had exploded seven years in advance? It's gonna take light seven years to reach us, and the neutrinos will be right behind that.
Which would pass straight through the Earth barely causing any noticeable effect at all.
-
Unless you had a really small black hole just the right size to destroy Earth...but then where would it go? Into the sun? :drevil: and gets vapourised...
That's almost as stupid as my dad's "When you go in the bath you drown the bacteria" comment.
-
And how would you know it had exploded seven years in advance? It's gonna take light seven years to reach us, and the neutrinos will be right behind that.
Which would pass straight through the Earth barely causing any noticeable effect at all.
Actually, there's some debate about that -- I've heard from some sources (college profs) that the neutrino flux is actually dense enough to cause serious radiation damage in this case.
Normally, yes, neutrinos are very weakly interacting, but supernovae make a ton of them. I'm not sure if it's enough to actually do any damage.
Thing is you don't need an earth sized hole, you just need one large enough that it can swallow mass at the same speed it loses it as radiation. Now you just say that a LHC type experiment created such a thing and then went wrong. The mass is slowly eating the Earth. Mars would be completely unaffected by such a black hole since its final mass would be about the same as the Earth or less.
A supervolcano is a possible option too but if the technology exists to warm Mars to the point where it can be terraformed then it could no doubt more easily be used on Earth.
Yep, that's the general kind of hole I was thinking of.
-
Or the outer core of the Earth is starting to freeze at an alarmingly fast rate, causing the Earth's magnetic field to grow all screwy, causing a geomagnetic reversal to take place. At this point, you can come up with reasons for kicking humans off the Earth, because the exact effects of a geomagnetic reversal are unknown.
If you want more, I can always think up more.
Actually, a geomagnetic reversal is long overdue, and it's probably already started. the Earths magnetic field is changing already.
-
It happens every so often IIRC and people don't notice.
-
actually no.
The last one was ...40.000 years ago IIRC.
And it usually happenes every 20 000 - 30 000.
Recent surveys have shown that the southers hemisphere has begun to show more and more anomalies - in that there places where magentic lines are supposed to be coming out, are now becoming places where they go in. In a similar fashion, the norther hempisphere shows sport where the reverse is happening.
Eventually when the shift does happen, you can expect multiple Auerora Borealis to appear on the sky at random, all over the wrold and for compases to go beserk, at least until the poles re-align themselves. It should be a short process.
-
If the film "the core" taught of anything, it's that pacemakers are the first sign to look for. Also that terranaut pilots are hot.
-
If the film "the core" taught of anything, it's that we shouldn't watch films like The Core.
Fixed it for you. :p
-
If the film "the core" taught me anything, it's that we shouldn't watch films like The Core and that I'm a n00b for watching it.
Fixed it for you. :p
Fixed it for you. :p
-
Well, birds navigate using magnetism, and they've been around for a good few million years, so whatever impact it has, it can't be as severe as some publications are making out.
Could explain what's going on with the Bees, however, since they have more sensor equipment than the FBI Headquarters.
-
All birds nagivate using magnetism? Are you sure of it?
(I know many species of them use magnetism to navigate, but all...?)
-
Most breeds of birds that migrate, I didn't, strictly speaking, make a distinction, I simply said 'birds', there aren't many that don't, even penguins navigate using magnetism, and they swim (obviously) when they migrate.
There has been a decline in the number of migrating birds in the last 30 years, but it looks far more likely to be linked to climate or pesticide use, as the numbers of birds lost seems to vary depending on which country they are migrating to.
-
I'm not sure, but birds like eagles, sparrows, hawks and gyrfalcons don't use magnetism to migrate. They don't migrate at all, I think.
Nah, for personal experience I can ensure you that the decline is caused by environment changes. When a vast, green land is destroyed to build factories the number of birds is likely to be greatly reduced.
The lack of places to go has, oftentimes, terrible effects on reproduction. That's why the number of birds falls even more.
-
True, many of the smaller Birds of Prey don't migrate, but many of the larger breeds do, such as Bald and Golden Eagles. Same with Sparrows, English Sparrows, for example, don't migrate, but White Throated Sparrows do.
I agree completely on the loss of habitat being more to blame for the reduction in numbers than anything else :)
-
And also migrating birds aren't morons. When the poles shift they feel it and simple go the opposite way.
The poles have shifted thousands of times troughout the Earths history. I wouldn't worry about the effect on the animal kingdom. More about the effects on us.
-
Actually, it's more instinctual than a choice to fly in a different direction or anything, and as for us, we evolved in exactly the same environment as they did, and if you consider that Humanity has survived about 10 of these Pole flips in the last 500,000 years and is still here, from a Biological point of view, we probably also have nothing to worry about, it's from a technical point of view that we need to be looking at possible problems.
-
You're all proper poop for slating the core. I like unobtainium as a concept. I like me even more for being able to spell it :p god help everyone tomorrow when i remember this crap.
-
... Wouldn't Mars' orbit put in in danger from the same black hole too?
The original question didn't say anything about Mars surviving.
-
Actually, it's more instinctual than a choice to fly in a different direction or anything, and as for us, we evolved in exactly the same environment as they did, and if you consider that Humanity has survived about 10 of these Pole flips in the last 500,000 years and is still here, from a Biological point of view, we probably also have nothing to worry about, it's from a technical point of view that we need to be looking at possible problems.
On us it wouldn't have no noticalbe effect...but on our equipment? It wouldn't be anything earth-shattering, but I forsee a LOT of accidents and things going wrong during a pole shift.
-
Isn't the main worry about pole flipping the effect it might have on our magnetosphere, and therefore radiation? The human population is supposed to have been mostly wiped out in the past, because of our close relations genetically (humans don't have a very diverse GENOME) what's to say this wasn't caused in part by high levels of radiation?
-
The event is supposed to be short-lived. There are changes in the magentosphere, but it's not like it's turned off.
More likely the "thicknes" of it would shift as many proto-poles are formed and dissolved, resulting in some areas getting hit by more radiation for a while. However, I doubt the exposure would be enough to cause anything like that.
-
The greater risk, from what I understand, is the increased EM radiation, particuarly with things like Communication and Navigation satellites in orbits. Things like GPS etc will, iirc, be rendered pretty useless, since many of the satellites will be fried.
-
Isn't the main worry about pole flipping the effect it might have on our magnetosphere, and therefore radiation? The human population is supposed to have been mostly wiped out in the past, because of our close relations genetically (humans don't have a very diverse GENOME) what's to say this wasn't caused in part by high levels of radiation?
Because the timeline of magnetic pole reversals doesn't match with the extinction record in the slightest degree. One would expect it to do so if it dramatically increased the amount of radiation arriving at Earth's surface.
-
I wouldn't fly in a plane during a pole shift...especially during landing. There are dangers, but nothing that would hurt living beings directly, on a noticalbe level.
In essence the magnetosphere (on the proto-poles)would become as thin as it is on the North and South poles. more cosmic radiation for sure, but not enough to cause death. Heck, probably not enough to cause skin cancer either, unless you plan on sunbathing while a proto-pole forms above you.
-
Isn't the main worry about pole flipping the effect it might have on our magnetosphere, and therefore radiation? The human population is supposed to have been mostly wiped out in the past, because of our close relations genetically (humans don't have a very diverse GENOME) what's to say this wasn't caused in part by high levels of radiation?
Because the timeline of magnetic pole reversals doesn't match with the extinction record in the slightest degree. One would expect it to do so if it dramatically increased the amount of radiation arriving at Earth's surface.
Not to mention the fact that the Toba eruption occurred at about the same time as the bottleneck and is a much better suspect.
-
Slow Shivans?