HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: carl@SOL1.GPS.CALTECH.EDU (Carl J Lydick)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Worse case scenario
Date: 11 Apr 92 20:28:00 GMT
Reply-To: carl@SOL1.GPS.CALTECH.EDU
Organization: HST Wide Field/Planetary Camera

In article <40911729@hpindda.cup.hp.com>, alanm@hpindda.cup.hp.com (Alan McGowen) writes:
>Also, our need for so much infrastructure is a result of rather more 
>than just "information poverty" -- it is a result of the fact that we
>eat, drink, wear clothing and like to keep warm in cold weather, and
>move goods and people around. Increasing information will help to make
>technology more efficent at doing these things, and perhaps reduce the
>movement of people significantly, but it will not fundamentally
>alter the raw energetics of food, heating, transport of goods, and 
>manufacture. I'm all in favor of increasing information, but let's not
>delude ourselves about what it can and cannot do: you can't eat bytes,
>drink from a bit bucket, or keep warm with the data flowing through a 
>fiber optics link.

I find myself somewhat, but not totally, in agreement here.  If, by "the raw
energetics of food, heating, transport of goods, and manufacture," you mean the
fundamental physical limits on these, I agree with you.  On the other hand,
we're not even close to those fundamental physical limits.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Carl J Lydick | INTERnet: CARL@SOL1.GPS.CALTECH.EDU | NSI/HEPnet: SOL1::CARL

Disclaimer:  Hey, I understand VAXes and VMS.  That's what I get paid for.  My
understanding of astronomy is purely at the amateur level (or below).  So
unless what I'm saying is directly related to VAX/VMS, don't hold me or my
organization responsible for it.  If it IS related to VAX/VMS, you can try to
hold me responsible for it, but my organization had nothing to do with it.
From: mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: EMI from radio towers, health risks?
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 92 20:30:37 PDT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

The alarmist book referred to by a previous poster is _Currents_of_Death_
by Paul Brodeur.  About 15 years earlier, he wrote another book _The_
_Zapping_of_America_ which exposed the incredible hazards associated
with microwave ovens.  :-)
From: tilley@kodak.com (Dave Tilley)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Wildeness Definitions Please.
Date: 16 Apr 92 12:49:03 GMT
Reply-To: tilley@kodak.com (Dave Tilley)
Organization: Image Processing Algorithms Laboratory, Eastman Kodak Co.

In article <1992Apr15.170313@zippy.gso.uri.edu>, shipman@zippy.gso.uri.edu (Scott Lindstrom) writes:
|> --
|> In article <1992Apr13.163404.12168@ke4zv.uucp>, gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
|> writes:
|> $>In article <1466601318@igc.org> alanm@igc.org (Alan McGowen) writes:
|> $>>
|> $>>But if there are going to be 10 billion of us, we had better develop
|> $>>a taste for algae... (or maybe humans?)
|> $>
|> $>The best food for Man is Man. Let's all breed like rabbits so we'll 
|> $>have enough to eat. :-)
|> $>
|> $>Gary
|> $>
|> 
|> Just make sure you don't eat someone with a parasitic problem.
|> 
|> "The democratic theory is that if you accumulate enough ignorance at the
|> polls you produce intelligence"  Philo Vance, _The Benson Murder Case_.
|> 
|> shipman@zippy.gso.uri.edu 4017926509 URI GSO NBC Narragansett RI 02882
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Subject: Re: Where's the "F" in CFCs?
Organization: Computer Science Department University of Rochester
Petpeave: fluorine
Date: Tue, 14 Apr 1992 17:57:31 GMT

In article <1992Apr14.123519.9463@news.larc.nasa.gov> siskind@eos4.larc.nasa.gov (David Siskind) writes:

> Flourine has NOT been ignored, you just have to read the literature. On the
> other hand, the computer models still don't adequately explain the observed
> amounts. The reason you get lots of reactive chlorine and not flourine is
> because much of the flourine from CFC's ends up as HF which is more stable
> than the equivalent chlorine reservoir, HCl.


I think the reason you don't get a lot of reactive flourine is that flour
particles are soon washed out of the atmosphere after drifting out of
the grain mill.

	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: EMI Book
Keywords: Currents of Death
Date: 9 Apr 92 19:10:01 GMT
Organization: Computer Science Department University of Rochester

In article <3753@cod.NOSC.MIL> jmichael@cod.NOSC.MIL (James A. Michael) writes:

>I believe the book was _Currents of Death_, and I think the author was John 
>McPhee.

No, McPhee has nothing to do with it.  The author was Paul Brodeur.
I would take the book with more than a few grains of salt.

	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
From: yodaiken@chelm.cs.umass.edu (victor yodaiken)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: AIDS in Africa (was: environment and animals)
Date: 9 Apr 92 11:12:30 GMT
Organization: University of Massachusetts, Amherst

In article <1992Apr8.115131.1189@falcon.aamrl.wpafb.af.mil> bkottmann@falcon.aamrl.wpafb.af.mil (Brett Kottmann) writes:
>In article <40911767@hpindda.cup.hp.com>, alanm@hpindda.cup.hp.com (Alan McGowen) writes:
>	I don't think it is stupid at all.  Today's society *depends* upon
>transportation to feed, shelther, etc. itself.  You can counterargue that
>today's society would not have developed without the auto, but I would
>disagree.  Today's society would still be here, but constantly on the brink of
>starvation.  Look at the xUSSR.  Technologically advanced enough to be a first
>world nation, but without the transportation network necessary to feed itself.

This makes no sense at all. Surely a pro-technologist like yourself should
be able to come up with transportation alternatives to IC automobiles.

>	Perhaps we should just sit around in grass skirts and contemplate the
>universe.

Could do worse.

>	"Imbalences" are best cured by raising the rest of the world up to the
>same technological level, and not be decreasing it.

That's an interesting idea. If the rest of the world used the same amount
of petroleum per-capita that we do, where would all the petroleum come from?
How about, if the rest of the world produced the same amount of garbage
per-capita as we do. Where would they put it? 


>	The solutions to today's problems will largely be technological,
>despite green fiction horror stories to the contrary.

Really? And some guy told me just recently that the messiah was
going to solve all of today's problems. He had the same quality of proof
that you do.


-- 


yodaiken@chelm.cs.umass.edu

Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: aaron@juliet.caltech.edu (Packman, Aaron I.)
Subject: Re: Refrigeration: Eliminating that evil chlorine
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
Date: Sat, 11 Apr 1992 23:26:00 GMT

>In article <1992Apr10.125103@IASTATE.EDU>, danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock) writes:
>>    The current issue of Science has an article on CFC substitutes including
>> 
>>         F F                          F
>>         | |                          |
>>       F-C-C-H     in place of     Cl-C-Cl
>>         | |                          |
>>         F H                          F
>> 
>> for refrigeration but not freezing.  The article said flourinated hydrocarbons
>> could replace CFC's in about half of all applications including automotive air
>> conditioning (one of the leakier uses of CFCs?).
>> 
>>    They contend that replacement of chlorine with flourine is good and report
>> that short term toxicity studies gives the FHC's a clean bill of health with
>> some marginal results indicating _possible_ long term trouble.
>> 
>> Any more info in netland?
> 

The fluorinated hydrocarbons are not inherently worse refrigerants than the
chlorinated/fluorinated hydrocarbons.  They simply have somewhat different 
thermodynamic properties that we must learn to use effectively.  It's just
a matter of engineers gaining experience with the new refrigerants.  Toxicity
was not expected to be a problem since fluorine is less toxic than chlorine.
One problem, however, is what to do about old systems that were designed to
use CFC's.  Some industrial chillers, etc. have lifetimes of 30 or 40 years.
Equipment can generally be retrofitted for a new refrigerant, but only at the
expense of performance.

Aaron Packman
From: parson_r@cubldr.colorado.edu (Robert Parson)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Refrigeration: Eliminating that evil chlorine
Date: 11 Apr 92 20:21:12 GMT
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder

In article <1992Apr10.125103@IASTATE.EDU>, danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock) writes:
>    The current issue of Science has an article on CFC substitutes including
> 
>         F F                          F
>         | |                          |
>       F-C-C-H     in place of     Cl-C-Cl
>         | |                          |
>         F H                          F
> 
> for refrigeration but not freezing.  The article said flourinated hydrocarbons
> could replace CFC's in about half of all applications including automotive air
> conditioning (one of the leakier uses of CFCs?).
> 
>    They contend that replacement of chlorine with flourine is good and report
> that short term toxicity studies gives the FHC's a clean bill of health with
> some marginal results indicating _possible_ long term trouble.
> 
> Any more info in netland?

  There are two big advantages: first, the atmospheric lifetime of CH2FCF3 is 
8 years, as opposed to 105 years for CF2Cl2, so much less will make it into the 
stratosphere. Second, everything we know about stratopheric chemistry suggests
that those compounds which do make it will be almost entirely innocuous.
Fluorine-containing radicals can catalyze ozone loss, but the chain is quickly 
terminated by the formation of HF. Whereas HCl is converted back to active Cl
compounds by reactions on the surfaces of stratospheric cloud particles, HF is
essentially inert in the stratosphere, and eventually rains out.

Of course, atmospheric chemists were caught off guard by the ozone hole - until
then, they hadn't considered heterogeneous reactions to be important in the
stratosphere - and there might be another unpleasant surprise ahead. I doubt
it, though, since we know far more about the subject than we did ten years ago.

Robert
From: alanm@hpindda.cup.hp.com (Alan McGowen)
Date: Fri, 3 Apr 1992 21:56:25 GMT
Subject: Re: AIDS in Africa (was: environment and animals)
Organization: HP Information Networks, Cupertino, CA
From: chidsey@smoke.brl.mil (Irving Chidsey)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Pontificating, was Re: Short Population Facts
Date: 8 Apr 92 18:11:52 GMT
Organization: U.S. Army Ballistic Research Laboratory, APG, MD.

In article <1466601312@igc.org> ecosystems@igc.org (Eco Systems Inc.) writes:
<
<What we need less of is closed minds. I don't see how listing of 
<facts can be construed as pontification.
<
<I say less machines and less meat. More with less!
<
<Ron Swenson, ecosystems@igc.org

	When controversial ideas are being discussed, there is frequent
disagreement on the accuracy, applicability, relevance, or even truth of 
chunks of information presented as facts.  If we could agree on the facts, 
there would often be no further discussion; it would be obvious what the 
conclusion should be.

	Unfortunately, what one person considers to be a fact someone with
different outlook may well consider to be a biassed opinion, or even to be
falsified for propaganda effects.

	The listing of facts, such as those I presented above, often appears
to those to whom the 'facts' are presented to be pontificating. 

									Irv

	P. S., in this case, I am probably guilty. 8^)
-- 
I do not have signature authority.  I am not authorized to sign anything.
I am not authorized to commit the BRL, the DA, the DOD, or the US Government
to anything, not even by implication.  They do not tell me what their policy 
is.  They may not have one.		Irving L. Chidsey  <chidsey@brl.mil>
From: Ligon@macgw1.ge.com (Woody Ligon)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Where's the "F" in CFCs?
Date: 15 Apr 92 18:18:19 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: GE-CRD

I believe that the following _verbatim_ quote is relevant to this thread:

"The ratio HF/HCl in the upper stratosphere is important is understanding the 
effects of injection of halogenated chemicals as it resolves the complication
that arises because chlorine has natural as well as anthropogenic sources,
coupled with the fact that HCl is removed more easily than HF from the 
atmosphere. This ratio at mid-latitudes is presently 1/4 (ref 9), a value 
which has increased from 1/10 over the ten years since its distribution was 
first measured (ref 14)"

Taken from:  C.B. Farmer, et al.,Stratospheric Trace Gases in the 1986
 Antarctic Atmosphere, Nature, vol 329, p. 126 (1987).

Reference 9 is given as "WMO/NASA Atmospheric Ozone 1985: A Statement of our
 Understanding of the Processes Controlling  its Present Distribution and 
Change, World Meterological Organization Global Ozone Research and Monitoring
 Project, Report No. 16 1986"

Reference 14 is given as "Farmer, C.B. et. al. Geophys. Res. Lett., 4, 527, 
(1977). 


Contrary to other comments on this thread, the HF/HCl ratio is a very 
important number to know. I think we should all be quite interested to 
realize that in spite of the fact that  HF is known to be removed more 
slowly, nevertheless there is much less of it than there is Cl--even 
though Freons deliver F and Cl in near equal quantities. Clearly there must be
a very large natural contribution of chlorine to explain this situation. 
Simply put, there is an awful lot here which isn't understood!

At a seminar last year, one of the guru's of this business (sorry I can't 
remember the name) was asked to compare his degree of certainty with that of 
a typical economist's prediction. As I remember it, this fellow allowed as 
how he was "pretty damn sure he had the sign right". and he didn't think 
economists usually did. 


Personal opinion only
Standard Disclaimer Applies

Woody Ligon
From: russ@pmafire.inel.gov (Russ Brown)
Date: Sun, 12 Apr 92 03:43:18 GMT
Organization: WINCO
Subject: Re: EMI Book
Summary: 
Followup-To: 
Organization: WINCO
Keywords: Currents of Death

In article <1992Apr9.191001.8249@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz) writes:
>In article <3753@cod.NOSC.MIL> jmichael@cod.NOSC.MIL (James A. Michael) writes:
>
>>I believe the book was _Currents of Death_, and I think the author was John 
>>McPhee.
>
>No, McPhee has nothing to do with it.  The author was Paul Brodeur.
>I would take the book with more than a few grains of salt.
>
>	Paul F. Dietz
>	dietz@cs.rochester.edu

Having read Brodeur's articles on the subject in the New Yorker, Paul
seems to be overstating the value of the book by several grains.

:-)
From: chidsey@smoke.brl.mil (Irving Chidsey)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: AIDS in Africa (was: environment and animals)
Date: 15 Apr 92 12:07:11 GMT
Organization: U.S. Army Ballistic Research Laboratory, APG, MD.

Identifications removed to protect the guilty.
<>How about, if the rest of the world produced the same amount of garbage
<>per-capita as we do. Where would they put it? 
<
<If the entire world population produced garbage at the rate we do, 2.5 tons
<per person per year, 15 billon tons total, it would all fit in a pile 
<10 kilometers on a side, 150 meters high. That would cover the state of 
<Nevada in 3,000 years. By then it would have settled enough for us to do 
<it again. Finding enough room to put the world's garbage is not a problem.
<
	Name removed to protect the guilty. :-)

	Just out of curiosity, what is the purpose of the so-called 
"Subject" line?

								Irv


-- 
I do not have signature authority.  I am not authorized to sign anything.
I am not authorized to commit the BRL, the DA, the DOD, or the US Government
to anything, not even by implication.  They do not tell me what their policy 
is.  They may not have one.		Irving L. Chidsey  <chidsey@brl.mil>
From: brian@mbf.UUCP (Brian Davis)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: The Evil Man Is (Was: Re: Pigs in space)
Date: 15 Apr 92 17:39:23 GMT
Organization: MAI Systems Corp.

In article <40911811@hpindda.cup.hp.com> Alan McGowen writes:
>>   >	Mankind is not inherently evil.
>>   Evidence please.  
>>What a neat conundrum. Provide evidence that mankind is
>>not inherently evil. Now how should we do that...
>
>Very well, if no evidence is relevant to the truth or falsity of the 
>assertion, the assertion itself must be meaningless, no? Brett either 
>has to produce evidence, or 'fess up to talking nonsense.
>

Alan then goes on to say ( correct me if I'm wrong Alan )
	Mankind damages the biosphere
	Mankind knows it damages the biosphere
	Therefor, mankind IS evil.


Alan, can you offer evidence that mankind damages the biosphere?  Now before
you turn purple and go balistic on me, let me tell you that I know about the
mass extinctions we are causing, and that I don't like them either.  It's
your "man is evil" conclusion that I have a problem with.  What evidence do you
have that the changes man has made to the environment are "damage" and not
just "changes"?

When photosynthisis began to spew forth that nasty poisonous oxygen stuff, was
that "damage"?  If the first plants had had consciousness, would they have
been evil because of the poison they spewed into the atmosphere?

Do you have an opinion on what the optimal state of the biosphere would be?
From some of your posts I get the impression that you believe that the
optimal state would be whatever state it was in just before the first humans
evolved.  Why should this state be "better" than any other state.

I agree that from an environmental standpoint, things are going to pot.  But
I don't agree that any change to the environment by a conscious being is evil.
The change CAN be misguided.  And in far too many cases, the changes we make
are misguided becuase they decrease the long term survivability of our own
species.

If you want to talk good vs. evil maybe you should start an 
environment.religion newsgroup.

-- 
Brian Davis					It ain't no sin!
MAI Systems Corp., Tustin, CA			Take off your skin,
brian%mbf.uucp@ics.uci.edu			And dance around in your bones.
Xref: sparky sci.environment:6040 misc.jobs.offered:5348
From: adesai@skat.usc.edu (Axay Desai*)
Newsgroups: sci.environment,misc.jobs.offered
Subject: Envi. Info
Date: 12 Apr 1992 09:22:52 -0700
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
Distribution: ca
NNTP-Posting-Host: skat.usc.edu

Newsgroups: alt.save.the.earth,talk.environment,sci.environment,misc.jobs.offered
Subject: Info regarding Environmental Companies
Summary: 
Expires: 
Followup-To: 
Distribution:California 
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
Keywords: 

 Hello! Everyone...
 
 I need the information of all the Environmental Firms particulary those
firms which associated with solid & hazardous waste management and located
in California. The information regarding the companies profile, size of the
firm and most important the services they are providing (if it's a consultancy)
will be highly appreciated.

you can send the mail straight personally to me, 
Thanks in advance...

AXAY DESAI
axaydesa@skat.usc.edu
adesai@alcor.usc.edu

Newsgroups: sci.environment,misc.jobs.offered
Subject: Environmental Info Needed
Summary: 
Followup-To: 
Distribution: ca
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
Keywords: 

Organization: Doctoral student, Engineering and Public Policy, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 1992 12:53:22 -0400 
From: Milind Kandlikar <mk49+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: NOT Vegitariansim was: Short Population Facts


 
>> I frequently meet people who for deep personal reasons have selected
>>vegitarianism as a way of life, many of them are concerned about the
>>impact of humanity on the planet earth.  What they seldom consider is that
>>vegitarianism can be taken as both a symptom of and an acceptance of
>>human over population.  The sympathy, the statistics like Mr. Grey 
>>presents are significantly oriented toward human retention, human life
>>as being of most crucial importance.  You may trace the high level of
>>vegitarian belief in India and China as either a cause or as effect of
>>human over population.  The success of intensive rice cultivation,
>>the overwhelming success of agriculture led to the limitations on meat
>>eating... a direct measure of environmental destruction.  In the
>>longer, multigenerational view, its a warning and a driver environmental
>>failure to have agricultural based vegitarianism! 
>>So a billion more could eat if the us had no meat,
>>and they all would cut trees for fuel 
>>and in the next generation when they have doubled again they still starve.
> 

Boy , you must totally out of touch with facts, and/or reality. India
has been predominantly Vegetarian for thousands of years not because of
"overpopulation" but because of religious and philosphical beliefs.
Buddhist teachings of Ahimsa (Non-violence) go back to the 4th century
B.C.
The argument is quite absurd, and presupposes that meat-eating is the
"natural" state, and vegetarianism is an "adaptation". You may have been
born a "savage", but please count me out!
 
Newsgroups: sci.environment,talk.environment,alt.activism.d
From: mlbohn@mtu.edu (Michael L. Bohn)
Subject: Re: UNCED draft declaration
Organization: Michigan Technological University
Distribution: sci
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1992 14:58:07 GMT

> I hope President Bush will stay away from Rio de Janeiro.
			     ^^^^^^^^^
> --
> John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
> *
> He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.



Yeah, lets just ignore our problems and maybe they'll all magically disappear...

Michael
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock)
Subject: A Technomaniac Position (was: Worse case scenario)
Keywords: combinatorics
Reply-To: danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock)
Organization: Iowa State University
Date: Thu, 9 Apr 1992 13:58:54 GMT

   I see the debate over synthetic biodiversity has sprung up again.  It
strikes me that the people who claim the level of lost biodiversity in the
tropics is approaching a critical level might be right, certianly there is
cause for immediate concern and action.

   The combinatorial argument that we cannot find extinct spiecies by synthesis
was correct in spirit; Assume a spiecies has 10^6 (an underestinmate in many
cases) base pairs in a four letter alphabet.  This gives us 4^(1,000,000)
possible combinations.  Even with efficent pruning of nonsense this is too
much.

   If one wanted to take a technomaniacal position one should ask about the
practicallity of rebalancing a damaged ecology with available genetic
information.  The idea is this; with genetic engineering you can mix and match
traits accross spiecies boudries.  This means that ten spiecies with five
useful traits could yield 2^50 (powerset of 50 traits) different potiential
spiecies for repair building blocks.  Since there is an unbelievable
investiment in sequencing and the _decoding_ the sequences of a spiecies the
number of spiecies available for use in this this tinkertoy approach will be
small.  Likewise, most of the combinations will be impossible leaving only, say
2^20 spiecies ~1,000,000 from the ten spiecies I mention.

   The above, while still science-fictional, is still much more reasonable 
than attempting to rebuild extinct spiecies with search heuristics :-).

Dan
Danwell@IASTATE.EDU