patrick.net

Just FYI - if you check my earliest posts on this site, you'll see I was a firm Atheist.

B.A.C.A.H. says

richwicks says

Well I went to public school and became dogmatically atheist for a period of time simply because I felt I had been deceived for a good portion of my life, and I had a lot of evidence I was, and I still conclude I was.

I didn't have a particularly bad experience with religion, but the hypocrisy of it was just so infuriating.

Sounds like the baggage of the atheists I know whose rejection of Catholic education dogma turned them against religion. Confused inside their minds between religion (a human societal institution) and being open minded to the possibility creative design. So much baggage they cannot separate the two concepts inside their minds.

You misunderstand.

I became an atheist because I thought it was a logical conclusion. If something can't be shown to exist through a test, why assume it exists? I can verify an atom exists. I can verify an electron exists. I can arrange these tests myself.

I became a strident atheist because I grew to hate the religion because I saw it as a cover for abject immorality. The pope is probably a pedophile - for example. But, if you want to be a good Catholic, make certain you donate some money so that they can do good works and other bullshit. The Catholic Church is DISGUSTINGLY rich. I hate the leaders of the religion, and maybe still do. Some of the adherents as well but 15 years ago, I'd have considered you a "sucker" and would have treated you with disdain.

I though the immorality and evil of the leaders reflected badly on the adherents. I've reconsidered that position.

richwicks says

Ever heard of an atheist talk about the "god shaped hole in their heart"? That's what they are talking about. I don't know if ALL atheists feel this

That's actually the first time I've ever heard this, and for me the answer is a decisive, "No, I don't have that." One of my earliest memories, with 22 months the upper bound by year, was my paternal grandmother's funeral which was literally the ONE time I set foot in a church till relatives started getting married 6+ years later. There had been explanations and questions earlier the gist of which was, we're going into God's house so you need to keep quiet. I was bored and fidgeting, with my gaze returning repeatedly to a small but bright stained glass window near the ceiling, the only colorful thing in a spartan room full of dour grownups all dressed in black. During a lull I piped up and pointed to the window and asked, "Is God up THERE, Mommy?"

In my 20s I certainly TRIED to explore the foundations of religion. I asked a girl out and she said sure let's go to a bible study together. She didn't even show up but I went to all 4 of what turned out to be new/curious church orientation/induction type meetings. It was interesting, but I was blunt about the parlor trick of "Hold the person's hand next to you and let God tell you what's on their mind." While the room erupted with cries of "OMG IT WORKS!" I just deadpanned to my neighbor that I didn't "hear" a thing. He acted kind of ashamed... that I didn't believe and avoided me thereafter. By the last day I was staring at the drum kit on the stage behind the podium, imagining a comedic rimshot at some of the more outlandish things the leader was saying. Of my own accord I read the bible, about many religions, dabbled in the works of Castenada (overblown IMO) and Shulgin, tried to unify shamanism, ethnobotany, messiahs and heretics; tried various psychedelics and experienced firsthand the subjective sense of a godlike omniscience in the universe, and confronted my own mortality and the meaning and permanence "firsthand" multiple times as I "died" during certain particularly bad trips.

The closest I've gotten is a subjective sense that there's SOMETHING "MORE" to the universe than what humans can routinely sense, experience, and comprehend or imagine. I don't find knowing "how do rainbows fucking work?" diminishes their beauty or my awe and wonder at seeing an especially nice one, but observe some people find this very distressing. It's like they WANT there to be a man behind that curtain pulling levers and controlling the universe, and they WANT to pay no attention to him and resent those who call for it. "Spoiling the magic" is frequently said to scientists and naturalists by supernaturalists. One of the few things I CAN say about the "something more" of the universe: If there EXIST beings so superior they are the literal progenitors of life on Earth, the religions of the planet have literally everything SO wrong that I'm embarrassed on behalf of the entire PLANET at the thought of these beings ever finding out what the religious thought up and how deeply they believe their constructs.



MisdemeanorRebellionNoCoupForYou says

By the way, somebody did the Monkey to William Shakespeare Writings experiment with 5 monkeys.
Note this experiment already assumes the existence of English language, specific English characters, and the existence of typewriters all arising naturally in order for the typing process to begin.

Those conditions make it kind of a poor metaphor. I think a better one is giving monkeys a bunch of lego sets, which like molecules can and easily do bond together in certain specific ways but not others, each according to their very nature. It wouldn't be reasonable to expect they'd assemble a perfect Taj Mahal, Millennium Falcon, or whatever is on the various boxes included down to the last color correct brick no matter HOW long they spent with the bricks, or that they'd even make them into abstract yet familiar to them things like representations of trees and other monkeys. I bet they WOULD relatively quickly develop things like boxes, bowls, spoons, back scratchers, and grooming pincers, and rapidly evolve them in a form follows function manner to species much like humans would set out to build given the same task and bricks. Long before they built anything complex out of them, they would start using them as trade tender for food and grooming or sexual access.

richwicks says

I used to believe in global warming, but I was frustrated that all the predictions it made were totally wrong.

Predictive value is a HUGE signal of the veracity of any data or claim. As for AGW, I consider the concept sound and evidence of effects visible. I agree the predictions of its proponents have been exasperatingly poor. I attribute this more to overselling than evidence of a sinister secret world government plot, and am personally inclined to attribute it to incompetence over malice particularly among overly enthusiastic lay proponents.


MisdemeanorRebellionNoCoupForYou says

If we see organized, specific data, based on abductive reasoning (see Karl Popper), we should assume intelligence, not natural processes, based on prior experience and observation, since there is no precedence for otherwise.

This is an interesting angle that I will remember and add to my ruminations and further inquiries into the topic. As for the underlying mathematics and statistics needed for a deep firsthand analysis, those are unabashedly out of my depth.

Automan Empire says

richwicks says

Ever heard of an atheist talk about the "god shaped hole in their heart"? That's what they are talking about. I don't know if ALL atheists feel this

That's actually the first time I've ever heard this, and for me the answer is a decisive, "No, I don't have that."

It may be a byproduct of my childhood indoctrination into religion.

Automan Empire says

I went to all 4 of what turned out to be new/curious church orientation/induction type meetings. It was interesting, but I was blunt about the parlor trick of "Hold the person's hand next to you and let God tell you what's on their mind." While the room erupted with cries of "OMG IT WORKS!" I just deadpanned to my neighbor that I didn't "hear" a thing. He acted kind of ashamed... that I didn't believe and avoided me thereafter.

OK, let me explain what this is as I personally experience it. It's a vague feeling of another presence.

When I'm alone, I can forcibly make myself feel to be alone, and isolated and I habitually did this for something like 20 years - but if I allow myself, I can feel that there's some presence there just generally around me. Since I was thinking about this today, it FEELS as if it's sitting in the left side of my brain, about center of that mass.

It doesn't talk to me, but I can bounce ideas off from it and (mentally) talk to it - I feel no need to compunction to voice anything out loud to it. It's probably just another section of my brain or a brain tumor, or a delusion. I have no idea. I know at least some people experience something similar. Not generally something I talk about as it's a bit personal, so I haven't done a large sampling on this.

I think there is a lot of shared delusions that people will falsely engage in for group conformity within religion. I do NOT engage in this behavior and never have. You probably have heard of the Asch conformity experiment in which the test subject is surrounded with people he thinks are OTHER test subjects, but are part of the experiment. Trivial questions are asked like "which of the 4 lines is the shortest, a, b, c, or d?" and at certain times, the participants in the experiment are ALL asked to give an incorrect (but the same) answer to see if the test subject will comply with their supposed observation. Very frequently they do.

I am not a person to agree with the group, even before I was aware of this experiment. Now that I'm aware of this test, I understand it's commonly used in propaganda, and now I never will conform to the group if I think I'm correct. Most people WILL. In the group you were in, it's quite possible the person that said "OMG IT WORKS!" may have been a shill, or there could have been several.

I'll go off a bit on a tangent here with regard to group conformance and how common it is.

People wonder why the "democrats can be so crazy" - exposure to television and other celebrated personalities is just implementing the Asch conformity experiment. "Conservatives are crazy" is also correct. Both "sides" implement it. My conclusion is that society is basically insane as a result.

From personal experience - decades ago I had a "friend" that constantly gaslit me - would tell me I did things I didn't do, or didn't do things I did, that I would misremember something they said - etc. That was a horrible relationship because you feel, because it's your friend, that you need to give them the benefit of the doubt - maybe you WERE wrong? It happened 2 months ago after all... Maybe I DID do that?

People who do this may have borderline personality disorder or narcissistic personality disorder - or whatever, the DSM is bullshit anyhow. Point being is they are crazy, and they drive you crazy. It creates self doubt, it's awful to be put in that state all the time. It literally drives you nuts and to end that cycle, I basically had to keep notes about what I did and then refer to them to verify my memory was correct. Maybe HIS memory was incorrect, but I doubt it - he was just lying to me. And it would be over trivial shit.

The point I'm making with this, is that our government has borderline personality disorder and/or narcissistic personality disorder. It's in our news (ESPECIALLY in our news), our films, television shows, and even in newspapers - the LAST place you'd think they'd lie because you have a record - but they do - why do you think some people would collect 10 years of newspapers? Cultural and political norms are commonly created entirely artificially by pushing conformity, and by isolating people from actual real people. Our "entertainment" is mostly propaganda. It wasn't always like this, but you have to go back quite a ways before you find "just entertainment".

Religion may POSSIBLY shield people from this influence to some degree I think. They are more intransigent about accepting the "new norm". The "get with it man! It's year X!" doesn't work with them. In a way, I kind of have to respect the people of the Westboro Baptist Church. Without religion, society can be changed very quickly. Look at the Amish - they just ignore propaganda straight up. None of their kids are going to be transgendered. Everybody in the modern world - I think they're a bit psychologically damaged, and quite purposely.

Automan Empire says

Predictive value is a HUGE signal of the veracity of any data or claim. As for AGW, I consider the concept sound and evidence of effects visible. I agree the predictions of its proponents have been exasperatingly poor. I attribute this more to overselling than evidence of a sinister secret world government plot, and am personally inclined to attribute it to incompetence over malice particularly among overly enthusiastic lay proponents.

I wanted to comment on this.

The Earth is far more resilient than we realize, and animals can easily deal with 10x the CO2 in the atmosphere, barely without being able to recognize it.

The question is if CO2 is detrimental to lifeforms. It's advantageous to plants, largely harmless to animals - so the only question is if it causes harm in some other way. The prediction was the melting of icecaps, and raising ocean levels also the prediction was that it would create deserts. There is no evidence of this at all. The Earth appears to be getting MORE vegetation, not less. CO2 increases appear to be benefiting the planet and all life forms.

It may be that CO2 increase is actually a BENEFIT to this planet.

Governments just take advantage of anything. It's always "give us money and we'll fix it!" - well, you can give them $1.00 and you get 1 penny to actually fix the problem. I don't see any serious attempt to deal with "global warming" - the real concern is "what can we do when we run out of fossil fuel"? That's a real problem, but the solution is distribution of energy resources, and that works against energy providers.

richwicks says

the real concern is "what can we do when we run out of fossil fuel"? That's a real problem, but the solution is distribution of energy resources, and that works against energy providers.

You have addressed the mainstream false narrative regarding CO2 and global warming very well, and I'm very much in agreement with you on that. Regarding running out fossil fuel, that is impossible for two reasons:

1. "fossil fuel" is actually not from dead animals at all, but abiogenicly generated by subducted water and limestones at the bottom of the oceans, after they come under the heat and high pressure caused by uranium and thorium decay inside the earth and the tidal force from the moon. It's just a matter of how deep do we want to dig, economically limited by the alternative mentioned in the following point:

2. We are on the verge of being able to produce synthetic fuel from ocean water, thanks to US navy effort trying to fuel combat aircraft wings on aircraft carriers. Ocean water has 50+ times higher CO2 content than the air. The carriers would be using nuclear reactor for energy source, whereas civilian facilities can use solar energy (solar concentrators and solar panels). That technology can turn every tropical country with a sea coast into Saudi Arabia, and even vast areas like the Sargasso Sea and "Pacific trash patch" (i.e. ocean surfaces where currents and wind are slow moving in circular patterns). Extremely high voltage electric transmission lines lose about 10% energy every 1000 miles, so running a high voltage line from equatorial Africa to Europe would lose more than half of the electricity generated, whereas tankers shipping synthetic fuel would lose much less. Furthermore, fixed transmission lines would attract and cause the rise of ever more greedy despots, flexible shipping lines that can originate from just about anywhere near the equator would be much harder to monopolize. A solar panel can generate 3-5 times as much energy in equatorial Africa compared to the same panel in Germany. Synthetic fuel will be the battery, with far higher volumetric efficiency and weight efficiency than lithium batteries, and safer. The giant oil tankers will be the transmission line, far more efficient and far less susceptible to being monopolized by despots in between than thousands of miles of copper wires.

Reality says

1. "fossil fuel" is actually not from dead animals at all, but abiogenicly generated by subducted water and limestones at the bottom of the oceans, after they come under the heat and high pressure caused by uranium and thorium decay inside the earth and the tidal force from the moon.

It's irrelevant if fossil fuels are abiogenic or biogenic - it eventually runs out.

Reality says

We are on the verge of being able to produce synthetic fuel from ocean water

What synthetic fuel would this be? Hydrogen? It has very high energy density in terms of kg/watt but compression of it to transport it makes it very inefficient.

richwicks says

It's irrelevant if fossil fuels are abiogenic or biogenic - it eventually runs out.

It is regenerated by the heat and high pressure of the earth's mantel (working on water and limestone subducted at plate tectonic boundaries; limestones CaCO3 get their carbon from shellfish and coral fixing CO2 in water into CaCO3; CO2 in water comes from the air, as it is highly soluble in water). The heat and high pressure of the earth's mantel is caused by the nuclear decay of uranium and thorium inside the earth, and by the tidal gravitational force between the earth and the moon. The earth will be swallowed by the expanding sun (at the latter's Red Giant stage) before exhausting uranium and thorium inside the earth.

richwicks says

What synthetic fuel would this be? Hydrogen? It has very high energy density in terms of kg/watt but compression of it to transport it makes it very inefficient.

Synthetic fuel as in produced by the Fischer-Tropsch process . . . i.e. both jet fuel (what the USN is after) and every kind of fuel and lubricant that Germany produced during WWII and their modern day equivalents.

Reality says

Ocean water has 50+ times higher CO2 content than the air.

That is not saying much. CO2 is a trace element in the air, and even multiplying that by 50 leaves the CO2 concentration very low. Let's do some math:
A gallon of JP5 (basically kerosene with additives) weighs about 6.5 pounds. At least two thirds of that hydrocarbon is carbon. Just how much sea water do you think you would have to strain to get the 4 pounds or so of carbon you would need to make that gallon of JP5? Keep in mind that CO2 is only about 1/3 carbon. And if were one to strain all that CO2 out of the surface of the sea, you would essentially starve all the algae/plankton in the area that consume CO2. That would also affect the ocean oxygen concentration since that removed CO2 would no longer be converted to oxygen by the plankton/algae photosynthesis.

richwicks says

"fossil fuel" is actually not from dead animals at all, but abiogenicly generated by subducted water and limestones at the bottom of the oceans,

Limestone itself is a product of "dead animals."

HeadSet says

That is not saying much. CO2 is a trace element in the air, and even multiplying that by 50 leaves the CO2 concentration very low. Let's do some math:
A gallon of JP5 (basically kerosene with additives) weighs about 6.5 pounds. At least two thirds of that hydrocarbon is carbon. Just how much sea water do you think you would have to strain to get the 4 pounds or so of carbon you would need to make that gallon of JP5? Keep in mind that CO2 is only about 1/3 carbon. And if were one to strain all that CO2 out of the surface of the sea, you would essentially starve all the algae/plankton in the area that consume CO2. That would also affect the ocean oxygen concentration since that removed CO2 would no longer be converted to oxygen by the plankton/algae photosynthesis.

The CO2 content in ocean water is plenty high enough for the process that the US Navy is trying to make jet fuel. For civilian purpose, solar energy (concentrators/mirrors and solar panels) would be much cheaper than military grade ship-board nuclear reactors as the ultimate energy source (the produced fuel is only the "battery" for carrying the energy, actually half-battery as oxygen in the air will be the other half; and the post-reaction waste will be carried back to the ocean water by nature instead of being dead weight in a car). As for algae and planktons, the limiting factor for their growth is not CO2 in water but iron in water (otherwise the concentration of CO2 in water would not remain more than 50x the CO2 content in the air).

HeadSet says

Limestone itself is a product of "dead animals."

In the biogenic theory of petroleum origin, the "dead animals" refers to the organic chemical compounds in dead animal bodies, not the inorganic CaCO3. More importantly, biogenic theory postulates organic chemical compounds in dead animals accumulated millions of years ago, therefore irreplaceable. CaCO3 from shellfish and coral is produced in massive quantities everyday in nature; even white beach sand is made of the stuff.

Reality says

As for algae and planktons, the limiting factor for their growth is not CO2 in water but iron in water.

I never knew this. Usually it's phosphorus which limits plant growth on land.

Patrick says

I never knew this. Usually it's phosphorus which limits plant growth on land.

For algae growth, the limiting factor can be either phosphorus or iron, or both, but never CO2 concentration in water. I remember reading for-profit projects "fertilizing" ocean surface with iron dust for CO2 trading credits (here is a link on "iron fertilization": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_fertilization )

Comes to think of it, the synthetic fuel production process of extracting CO2 from sea water (and then Fischer-Tropsch it into liquid fuel using either solar or nuclear energy) can also get CO2 trading credits. Elon Musk needs to get on this. LOL!

Reality says

The CO2 content in ocean water is plenty high enough for the process that the US Navy is trying to make jet fuel.

That is quite the wave off there. How many gallons of sea water would it take to extract enough CO2 to get the 4 lbs of carbon needed for a gallon of fuel? Of course the amount of dissolved CO2 in sea water would depend on temperature and the bicarbonate effects, but generally tops about 337 ppm. So, a million pounds of water would have 337 pounds of CO2, and thus about 112 lbs of carbon. So at best 1 million gallons of water has only enough carbon to make 28 lbs of fuel. That is not even 1 minute of fuel for a fighter jet.

Reality says

CaCO3 from shellfish and coral is produced in massive quantities everyday in nature; even white beach sand is made of the stuff.

Yes, those beautiful white sand beaches are basically pulverized seashells. But the limestone that comes from quarries, makes up the Sphinx, and buried deep underground is the accumulation of millions of years of a slow process.

Patrick says

the limiting factor for their growth is not CO2 in water but iron in water.

I never knew this. Usually it's phosphorus which limits plant growth on land.

Assuming more CO2 = more plant growth is simplistic and naive. Most ecosystems are straining against some local limiting factor, whether not enough of a macro or micronutrient present, or conditions making them not bioavailable to the plant.

30 years ago, the pine trees in even the remote pristine areas of Germany's Black Forest were suffering from chlorosis; yellow retarded growth tips due to lack of iron and magnesium. They eventually figured out the soils didn't suddenly become depleted of nutrients, acid rain from uncontrolled nitrous oxide and sulfide emissions lowered the pH of their local environment to the point where the still-plentiful elements couldn't get absorbed by the plant. Fortunately, the general danger had already been recognized and mitigation efforts started upon in the form of industrial and vehicle emission controls, so the multi-faceted problem of "acid rain" was already well on the road to being solved WITHOUT depriving humanity of the fruits of industry or mechanized transportation as critics of "the left" often claim.

These clean burn technologies have matured about as far as they can go. Everything from power plants, down to the scale of personal devices like cars and water heaters, has gotten emissions down to practically nothing but CO2 and water. Aerosol and particulate emissions are relatively "easy" to remove technologically speaking. The "Scientists thought Earth was going into a new ice age in the 70s" trope leaves out the fact that this was a very real concern through the late 60s as aerosol and particulate pollution were so severe that they blocked insolation and heat gain faster than rising CO2 blocked more heat energy from escaping.

richwicks says

Hydrogen? It has very high energy density in terms of kg/watt but compression of it to transport it makes it very inefficient.

Another issue, plain hydrogen is the smallest molecule that exists, which is part of why hydrogen cars are so costly to engineer for. To wit: That shit leaks almost no matter WHAT the engineers do!

Reality says

I remember reading for-profit projects "fertilizing" ocean surface with iron dust for CO2 trading credits

I remember that, and without looking at the wiki link rn my recollection was that the effect is extremely temporary, as in you have to KEEP sprinkling the iron for the effect to sustain. It's tough to reach even a zero sum state, much less a process that ultimately removes more CO2 than it generates. A more recent "sexy" among environmentalists but IMO technologically dumb idea is mining and crushing olivine and transporting it to the sea.

Automan Empire says

Assuming more CO2 = more plant growth is simplistic and naive.

No. That is something that can be experimentally tested and proved. Even the NOAA admits that https://www.noaa.gov/news/study-global-plant-growth-surging-alongside-carbon-dioxide. Even some science classes have proven plants grow faster in a sealed terrarium when extra CO2 is pumped in.

In fact, it is rather simplistic naïve to think that adding CO2 would not aid plant growth. After all, CO2 is essential for plant growth but is only a trace element. Adding more CO2 is like adding fertilizer to deficient soil.

HeadSet says

No. That is something that can be experimentally tested and proved.

This may feel like a gotcha, but it completely ignores the very next sentence. Literally nobody is denying this like you suggest. In areas where there is no shortage of macro and micro nutrients, of COURSE more CO2 means accelerated plant growth. "The left" knew this 30 years ago, and had evolved CO2 enrichment alongside hydroponics technologies quite far for their indoor pot gardens. This assertion reminds me of my Mom's neighbor from the LA suburbs who owned property in Oregon, going on and on about how the spotted owl controversy (yeah that long ago) was bullshit because forests grew back FAST! Based on their experience cutting a bunch of trees down on their property and finding surprisingly huge new trees in their place a couple of years later. What they downplayed to an aside late in the discussion was that their property where they experienced this was in a river bottom, the very place where nutrients and topsoil leached away from the mountainsides get concentrated and endlessly replenished!

HeadSet says

Of course the amount of dissolved CO2 in sea water would depend on temperature and the bicarbonate effects, but generally tops about 337 ppm. So, a million pounds of water would have 337 pounds of CO2, and thus about 112 lbs of carbon. So at best 1 million gallons of water has only enough carbon to make 28 lbs of fuel. That is not even 1 minute of fuel for a fighter jet.

I'm afraid the two estimates you are giving are self-contradictory: a million gallons of sea water is roughly 8 times as much as a million pounds of sea water, so if a million pounds of sea water contain 112lbs of carbon, a million gallons of sea water should have enough carbon to make more than 1000lbs of liquid hydrocarbon fuel. A million gallons of fresh water is worth quite a lot, but a million gallons of sea/ocean water is worth next to nothing.

Edit: you might have applied divide by 8 where the calculation should have been multiply by 8. So your estimation was off by a factor of 64. 28x64= 1792.

HeadSet says

Yes, those beautiful white sand beaches are basically pulverized seashells. But the limestone that comes from quarries, makes up the Sphinx, and buried deep underground is the accumulation of millions of years of a slow process.

At the tectonic subduction boundaries, the earth's mantel taking the sea floor in is not exactly rejecting the white sand at the sea bottom or the new shellfish or coral growth from yesterday! The limestone coming from the quarry was after the sea floor had been pushed up to above sea surface level (simply because people don't dive into the sea to quarry limestones from the sea bottom for its freshness, but would rather pick a place where a long wait has taken place for tectonic activities push up sea bottoms opposite the subduction side shaping it into mountains before hacking the mountain side with a hammer); the earth's mantel is not asking to take in the Sphinx instead of the sea floor itself. It's a massive recycling center for carbon, not an art collector ;-)

Automan Empire says

This may feel like a gotcha

I do not do "gotchas" here. I like the intellectual discussions with a knowledgeable crowd that includes various subjects and interests.

Reality says

dit: you might have applied divide by 8 where the calculation should have been multiply by 8.

Could be, I will check.

Reality says

Edit: you might have applied divide by 8 where the calculation should have been multiply by 8.

No, the error is that I wrote "gallons" on the second line when I meant to write "pounds." It is a million pounds of water to make 28 pounds of fuel. That still means 125,000 gallons of water to get enough carbon for less than one minute of flight. A one hour flight would take over 7.5 million gallons of seawater to be processed. 7.5 million gallons that has to go through a chemical/screen/electrolysis method to extract that CO2 even before doing the Fischer-Tropsch synthesis.

HeadSet says

No, the error is that I wrote "gallons" on the second line when I meant to write "pounds." It is a million pounds of water to make 28 pounds of fuel. That still means 125,000 gallons of water to get enough carbon for less than one minute of flight. A one hour flight would take over 7.5 million gallons of seawater to be processed. 7.5 million gallons that has to go through a chemical/screen/electrolysis method to extract that CO2 even before doing the Fischer-Tropsch synthesis.

That makes no sense: you had already stated that "So, a million pounds of water would have 337 pounds of CO2, and thus about 112 lbs of carbon." Why would 112 lbs of carbon result in only 28 pounds of fuel when all the carbon is turned into hydrocarbon fuel? The hydrogen atoms attaching to the carbon chain are not antigravity devices. 112lbs of carbon should result in more than 130lbs of hydrocarbon fuel (hydrocarbon chains usually have 2 hydrogen atoms for each carbon atom in the chain, plus two more hydrogens at the head and tail; assigning atomic weight 12 and 1, so (112/12) * (12+1+1) = 130.67; that's before adding the weight of the hydrogen atoms at the head and tail of the chains). A million gallons of sea water should result in over 1000lbs of hydrocarbon fuel if all the CO2 is taken out and the carbon in the CO2 molecules turned into hydrocarbon fuel, assuming roughly 337ppm CO2 concentration in sea water.

Edit: also the CO2 concentration number provided by Headset is wrong. Atmospheric CO2 concentration is usually cited as 412ppm in 2020. Sea water in 2021 is assessed at around 2050 micromol CO2 per kg of sea water (Molar mass of CO2 is 44). The latter translates to close to 900ppm by weight. So we should be looking at enough carbon in a million gallon of sea water to make about 3000lbs of liquid hydrocarbon fuel.

Reality says

Why would 112 lbs of carbon result in only 28 pounds of fuel when all the carbon is turned into hydrocarbon fuel?

Because JP5 weighs 6.4 pounds per gallon and it is about 2/3 carbon. Therefore, I divided 112 by 4 to get 28 pounds of fuel. But you are correct - the 28 lbs is just the carbon component, I should have added in the hydrogen part.

Reality says

Edit: also the CO2 concentration number provided by Headset is wrong

I had sources that averaged about 337 ppm, and here is one that I did not consider:



I thought .00205 moles/kg sounded high, so I compared it to the CO2 in Coke. Since Coke turned out to be about .14 moles/kg, your estimate is well within reason.

Gotta admit, I made a couple of unforced errors here, and Patnet has too many knowledgeable folks like you to get away with such goofs.

So, according to your inputs and calculations, 1 million gallons of water makes 3,000 lbs of fuel. My estimate of 28 pounds of fuel lasting about one minute would be true for a something like a Learjet flight, an Navy fighter in an operational mission would use that 3,000 lbs in about 30 minutes. So, the question is the feasibility an extraction process that needs 2 million gallons of sea water per hour of flight time, in addition to the process that creates the fuel from that extracted CO2. Interesting to see if the Navy actually does this.

Reality says

richwicks says

What synthetic fuel would this be? Hydrogen? It has very high energy density in terms of kg/watt but compression of it to transport it makes it very inefficient.

Synthetic fuel as in produced by the Fischer-Tropsch process . . . i.e. both jet fuel (what the USN is after) and every kind of fuel and lubricant that Germany produced during WWII and their modern day equivalents.

I did not know that. I knew the Germans were making gasoline from coal but I didn't realize the were starting from carbon monoxide. I would bet even low grade high sulfur coal could be used to make synthetic fuel this way.

Automan Empire says

They eventually figured out the soils didn't suddenly become depleted of nutrients, acid rain from uncontrolled nitrous oxide and sulfide emissions lowered the pH of their local environment to the point where the still-plentiful elements couldn't get absorbed by the plant. Fortunately, the general danger had already been recognized and mitigation efforts started upon in the form of industrial and vehicle emission controls, so the multi-faceted problem of "acid rain" was already well on the road to being solved WITHOUT depriving humanity of the fruits of industry or mechanized transportation as critics of "the left" often claim.

The disappearance of the Acid Rain Scam, explained:

The situation turned out to be much more complex than had been predicted. The acidity of a lake is determined as much by the acidity of the local soil and vegetation as it is by acid rain. Many lakes in north-eastern America, dead in the 1980s, had plenty of fish in 1900. It was surmised by environmentalists that 20th-century sulphur dioxide emissions had choked these lakes to death with acid rain. But the NAPAP showed many of these lakes were acidic and fishless even before European settlement in America. Fish survived better in these lakes around 1900 because of extensive slash and burn logging in the area. The soil became more alkaline as the acid vegetation was removed, reducing the acid flowing into the lakes and making the water hospitable to fish. Logging stopped in 1915, acid soils and vegetation returned and the lakes became acidic again. The study also found that in many cases forests were suffering debilitation due to insects or drought and not acid rain.

The NAPAP reported in 1990. The findings were explosive: first, acid rain had not injured forests or crops in US or Canada; second, acid rain had no observable effect on human health; third, only a small number of lakes had been acidified by acid rain and these could be rehabilitated by adding lime to the water. In summary, acid rain was a nuisance, not a catastrophe.

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/science/what-made-the-acid-rain-myth-finally-evaporate-1.900603

SO2 cap and trade was immensely profitable; Enron wanted to expand it to CO2 and both protect their Nat Gas Pipeline investment and profit like it did from SO2 cap-and-trade bullshit:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/larrybell/2014/02/11/remember-the-acid-rain-scare-global-warming-hysteria-is-pouring-down/?sh=54a2ddca53fc

Boreal Pines emit NO2 and contribute to smog and acidification of high altitude/latitudinal water bodies.
https://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2003/03/13/804613.htm

Sensing profit through the ability to create panic and get the government to regulate competitors, the NAPAP release just made Corporations seek out new BS to amplify. After Acid Rain, the media pivoted straight to the Ozone Layer, another issue which was "disappeared".

Even though we now know that CHY-na is violating the CFC Treaty, and I very much doubt Chinese factories are limiting their SO2 emissions either, but not a peep.
https://theconversation.com/how-we-traced-mystery-emissions-of-cfcs-back-to-eastern-china-117545



Additional lines of investigation confirm NE China is source for burst of CFC Production; well in excess of Montreal Agreement amounts.
http://hydrocarbons21.com/articles/9010/study_confirms_source_of_cfc_11_is_northeastern_china

Because CHY-na is above criticism, it's too much of a supplier for Amazon and Walmart and for Wokeness in US Academia and NGOs... and cushy consulting jobs and good words with Chinese Universities and US NGOs for Revolving Door Bureaucrats to stand up against.

Totally politicized for profit and Narrative Construction purposes.

MisdemeanorRebellionNoCoupForYou says

The situation turned out to be much more complex than had been predicted. The acidity of a lake is determined as much by the acidity of the local soil and vegetation

I'm talking about acidity of rainwater, which affects the microclimate of individual plants collectively but won't significantly change the long term pH of bodies of water due to dilution and buffering. Acid rain researchers and activists never claimed that acid rain was affecting the pH of bodies of water, that is a red herring dismissal of the entire topic. Sounds like you're just mashing up different claims, situations, and concerns as if they're one and the same.

HeadSet says

Automan Empire says

This may feel like a gotcha

I do not do "gotchas" here. I like the intellectual discussions with a knowledgeable crowd that includes various subjects and interests.

If your discourse was consistently as you claimed, you would have responded to the content of my original claim and rebuttal to you, not the form of it. Nobody is claiming higher atmospheric CO2 levels will NOT increase plant growth in the absence of other localized nutrient constraints, and to my knowledge this has claim NEVER been made in any discussion or prediction of the effects of rising atmospheric CO2 concentration.

Automan Empire says

Nobody is claiming higher atmospheric CO2 levels will NOT increase plant growth in the absence of other localized nutrient constraints, and to my knowledge this has claim NEVER been made in any discussion or prediction of the effects of rising atmospheric CO2 concentration.

Oh, I've heard this. The forests were burning down last year on the West Coast because of global warming and large areas of the Earth was going to return to desert. Famines were going to happen as a result of global warming, I've been hearing that since I was a kid.

I spent a few minutes the other day trying to get images of what South America looked like over the years, but I gave up. If http://maps.google.com is accurate (?) the amount of jungle in South America is in 2007 is identical to what it is today.

I've heard so much BS about global warming, so many lies, how can I believe anything they say at all? The arctic was actually reported as being ice free one year. They actually printed that in national papers. It was completely false.

Automan Empire says

I'm talking about acidity of rainwater, which affects the microclimate of individual plants collectively but won't significantly change the long term pH of bodies of water due to dilution and buffering. Acid rain researchers and activists never claimed that acid rain was affecting the pH of bodies of water, that is a red herring dismissal of the entire topic. Sounds like you're just mashing up different claims, situations, and concerns as if they're one and the same.

The purpose of the Acid Rain panic was to privilege Nat Gas over Coal. There was never any Precipitation driven acidification of mountain water, which was the metric by which they measured acid rain to begin with and how it got to be a concern in the first place; that acid rain in isolated mountain water bodies were killing fish.

Instead, it was the soil chemistry caused by protecting mountain lake areas "Area of Natural Beauty" from harvesting.

Geological evidence confirmed that Pre-European (much less pre-industrial) mountain lakes in North America were more acidic with smaller fish populations than today.

richwicks says

Automan Empire says

Nobody is claiming higher atmospheric CO2 levels will NOT increase plant growth in the absence of other localized nutrient constraints, and to my knowledge this has claim NEVER been made in any discussion or prediction of the effects of rising atmospheric CO2 concentration.

Oh, I've heard this. The forests were burning down last year on the West Coast because of global warming and large areas of the Earth was going to return to desert. Famines were going to happen as a result of global warming, I've been hearing that since I was a kid.

Yeah, well I've been hearing skeptics take a gunny sack of completely independent claims about climate change, mash them together in nonsense ways, and conclude that "climate change is fake and proponents crazy/stupid" for decades. I expected much better than that from you in this thread.

Man, if there's on phrase that is total bullshit

"The Science says..."

or the alternative version:

"not according to the Science."

There is no such thing as "The Science". Science is a process, that depends on Free Debate, Falsification, Criticism, and repeated observations and testing.

100 years ago, if today's standards applied, you'd be told it was "The Science" that Continental Drift/Plate Tectonics were just Human Beings seeing Patterns in Nature as usual, just like People can see Mickey Mouse in a Cloud. Although the fossil record and geological strata fit beautifully with the theory.

(This is a general rant, not aimed at any post on this thread or really, board)

MisdemeanorRebellionNoCoupForYou says

(This is a general rant, not aimed at any post on this thread or really, board)

That's pretty much the state of this discussion thread, which is a breakout from a different topic thread and seems to be unmoored and drifting from the topic down some unproductive side tracks after 100 posts.

Automan Empire says

That's pretty much the state of this discussion thread, which is a breakout from a different topic thread and seems to be unmoored and drifting from the topic down some unproductive side tracks after 100 posts.

That's kind of all forums. Is that a problem? Unless you want a heavily moderated forum, this is what you get. Topics ebb and flow. Not all conversation is unproductive, that's an opinion on your part.

Automan Empire says

Oh, I've heard this. The forests were burning down last year on the West Coast because of global warming and large areas of the Earth was going to return to desert. Famines were going to happen as a result of global warming, I've been hearing that since I was a kid.

Yeah, well I've been hearing skeptics take a gunny sack of completely independent claims about climate change, mash them together in nonsense ways, and conclude that "climate change is fake and proponents crazy/stupid" for decades. I expected much better than that from you in this thread.

15 years ago I'd be in complete agreement with you. Seriously.

I remember thinking "they can't be possibly lying about this, because if they are, they have entirely destroyed their credibility and will have a full track record of themselves being wrong repeatedly. They can't be that stupid!"

* They did this with weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. I actually expected the US to plant MOBILE weapons labs, after all that's why they were claiming they were MOBILE, that's easy to fake..
* They did this with "Qaddafi was about to cause a humanitarian crisis" in Libya.
* They did this with Climate Change.

After all, a huge well founded organizations couldn't be so reckless could they? But they have been.

I remember LAUGHING and denigrating people that questioned the climate change story. They didn't understand science, they would bring up stories like Egyptians thought their arrows being shot through the air effected the weather, and other nonsense - comparing those primitive civilizations to ours and probably wasn't even true. Religious charlatans like televangelists railed against it. Well, if those MORONS were on that side, and a bunch of scientists were on the other, who should I trust? I can't evaluate the data. I have to have some faith, and here's all these REALLY SPECIFIC predictions that if they get wrong will completely ruin their credibility if not CAREERS.

All the predictions were wrong. ALL of them.

You might complain that "the science about covid has been politicized" - well climate change sure as hell has been, at least 30 years ago.

I know it's hard to believe, but the dummies, the religious nuts, the fundies, the people that just think scientists have no clue what they are talking about - were right. Do you think I came to this conclusion easily? I used to argue with my parents about this, I couldn't believe how STUPID they were. A few years ago I was talking to them and admitted I was wrong - and their response was "you really believed that crap??" They had no clue I was being serious from previous conversations. They thought I considered it a possibility, not an absolute - and being the fucking nice assholes they are, they didn't pushback. I hate it when people do that shit. If you think I'm wrong, do me a favor and point it out, but if you're wrong, I'll reciprocate. For 20 years I believed the nonsense.

For almost half a century, we've been routinely promised global warming that will "result in Manhattan being THREE FEET under water by the end of the (90s, 00s, 10s, now 20s) if we don't take action now.

In the 70s, Brown Geologists wrote to the President demanding action on the coming Ice Age, expected to come within the next 40-50 years.

Some suggested Nixon not wait a moment, but load up 100s of C-130s with soot and ash byproducts of coal burning and industry, and spread them over the poles ASAP to lower the albedo of the Earth. As usual, it was Action Now! There is no Time to Lose Before the Crisis Hits! No more research, just DO IT NOW!

Thank goodness they were ignored, but contrary to AGW alarmist websites, talk of avoiding an ice age were routine items in Media in the 1960s and especially 1970s. It's consistently gaslighted away, even though it made covers of widely read weekly magazines and even the subject of entire network TV documentaries.

Except now we hear wide ranging plans, but along the opposite lines. Yet the very wealthy continue to buy oceanside property and banks are still writing mortgages on them and insurers still insuring those properties.

One reason I'm convinced it's all actors looking to manipulate markets - like SO2 and the proposed CO2 cap-and-trade desired by Enron - is that Nuclear Power is entirely off the table, and "The Science(tm)" keeps the general population ignorant about Nuclear Power not being limited to high pressure Steam-Powered Fast Reactors.

Much of the AGW is a game to facilitate third world outsourcing while kicking the ladder down in first world countries by imposing enviro laws; and a battle between Fossil Fuels.

MisdemeanorRebellionNoCoupForYou says

Much of the AGW is a game to facilitate third world outsourcing while kicking the ladder down in first world countries by imposing enviro laws

Bingo

MisdemeanorRebellionNoCoupForYou says

talk of avoiding an ice age were routine items in Media in the 1960s and especially 1970s.

All right, I give up. This was discussed in the thread already. You're not coming to the discussion well informed, and once here you're not following along with it.