Ken Fabian

I hadn't noticed the time limit - mostly I do edits fairly soon or else post another comment. Or possibly I had known and forgotten; I find that happening more and more, sigh. A correlation with grey hair growth but not necessarily causation. I had noticed a bunch of blank lines ahead of some random symbols in the follow up post in 'Australian Politics' and wanted to edit that out, but too late. I understand that the up/down vote option is absent on my own posts, but I thought the tally of votes posts receive normally remains visible to the poster. It is absent for the post linked above but present for the follow up comment (sitting on zero when I just looked ). Looking further back at random posts, I find that tally is absent. Does that disappear with a time limit too? It seems odd that I can't know the tally of votes for things I post, to get a sense of how they were received - and I keep thinking that I previously had been able to.

Just wondering why I can't edit my posts - the edit thingy just isn't there. I hadn't noticed a time limit and most recent post appeared immediately without the edit option. Also I got notified of 'react to post' but that display is absent on this comment. (could have been on the later one, which does have the display ... an up and a down to give zero, possibly?) Reloading pages doesn't bring these up. It's not that serious - but I had wanted to do minor edits.

I don't have any great issue with how the political party selects the Prime Minister in Australia - or that they can change PM without calling an election; if their own team can't work with the leader it seems reasonable that they be able to replace him/her - and Australians know, or should know, that is how things work. It comes with high electoral risks and normally political parties don't do this to popular Prime Ministers, rather, reserving it for unpopular ones - although not always - but there are deep divisions within the LNP that don't appear to be resolvable by changing the leader. ik],

Divided opinions over climate and energy were at the heart of this blow up; the conservative right leaning Liberal and National party coalition (LNP) appears to be deeply divided between the pro-coal and gas climate science deniers who don't know any better and the pro-coal and gas climate science deniers who do know better. The ones who do know better lost. Flippancy aside, it's a serious division within the LNP, that has not been resolved by this change of leader. I don't think there is any will within the LNP to tackle the climate problem head on with eyes open but a significant proportion could still be counted as climate "lukewarmers" - in my view, this is just a variant of denial; the link between climate and emissions being considered real but, unlike actual mainstream climate scientific advice, they believe it is not that serious or significant. ie they believe the mainstream science is wrong. Practically speaking it means the lukewarmers are framing support for fossil fuels and opposition to a renewable energy led transition to low emission in ways that don't involve denying climate science - and done in ways the climate science denying faction can live with. Had Dutton won the leadership, we may have seen subsidies for new coal power stations and withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement - bringing that essential debate about acceptance or rejection of climate science, that the ones who know better know will go badly, back to the fore. The ones who know better are almost certainly correct - the votes that climate denial will win from the extreme right will cost them the support from the centre. Now I'm not sure how PM Morrison will play it; he was the one who brandished a lump of coal in parliament, as an unmistakeable declaration of support for fossil fuels, but he looks like a pragmatist who surely knows that - electorally - climate denial and anti-renewables rhetoric doesn't have great public appeal. My prediction is his approach will be much the same as Turnbull's - he will not withdraw from Paris agreement and will not be caught saying outright that he rejects climate science. He will play the energy issue like a three shell game, where every bet on emissions reductions or renewable energy comes up empty. Oh, too bad. Play again?

Interesting, but there is so much more to DNA than DNA - the ribosomes and spliceosomes and other molecular 'machinery' that assembles, splits, copies, transcribes; a much larger cross-sectioned molecular chain may present problems for the development of the complementary chemistry to do these or equivalent functions. Just because I found the imaging of some of these processes so stunning I'll provide a link to a video showing a selection -

We have roadside drug testing in Australia - it's a saliva test. It doesn't cover every kind of drug. Methamphetamines, cannabis, and MDMA but not opiates - (latter could be problems with tests distinguishing between opiate based analgesics and heroin - or consumption of poppy seeds). Anecdotally the results appear to vary widely, with people who had smoked weed sometimes, to their surprise, passing the test and others claiming it picked up usage from days prior. Supposedly it should show usage within the past 12 hours but I'm not convinced the test used is consistently accurate and I'm not sure what the minimum concentrations detected are or if that minimum relates to any trialled and tested 'safe' versus 'unsafe' levels for driving ability. In my view it's primarily been a political move, to appease the many drinkers who are subject to testing and who want to share that experience with weed smokers and 'iceheads', and it works as yet more 'tough on drugs' style politicking. Back to the question - I support legalisation across the board, ie legally available for sale to adults. Policing dealing with problem behaviour will go on, much the way they deal with drunks but burglary and theft by addicts supporting their habits would be much reduced and 'drug enforcement' will focus on a much reduced illegal supply chain. 'War on drugs' resourcing can be turned to education and rehabilitation. I'd also support ongoing research into addiction and searching for biochemical means of short-circuiting addiction's feedback loops; an effective medical means of dealing with addiction would be very welcome.

I would think that lakes that accumulate borax must exist within regions where boron compounds will be washed out of rocks and soils - and less sodium. Likewise for lithium salts and other evaporites - they are specific to particular regions. I use borax for woodworking as a preventative for lyctus (powderpost) borer, which otherwise eat out the sapwood of the natural poles and sticks I like to use - https://www.scienceforums.net/topic/112706-woodworking-amateurs-craftsmen-in-between/?do=findComment&comment=1033346

If bits of Mars have reached Earth as meteorite fragments, it seems likely (even if less commonly) that fragments of Earth also reached Mars. If life is found in underground water on (in?) Mars and it has enough biochemistry in common to conclude a common origin we will still be left with the question of which planet it originated on (in) - or if they both came from elsewhere. I'd still put my bets on Earth over Mars and both over interstellar - but that could be my Earthocentrism. Or just the abundance of life on Earth in comparison to Mars. A mile/1.6km down will need a serious (custom engineered) drill rig plus what it takes to get it there. Could be a very long time before any samples can be examined. I doubt I'll be around to see, but luck to any future efforts to find out if there is life in that water.

Maybe electrolytic processes could work for refining and making metals under water. It might be an important early step, preceding 'dry' processes.

Yes, they can and do move about outside of water but not generally for extended periods. Minutes usually, but stories of hours (if keeping wet somehow) are around. Stories of their escapes from aquariums or of moving between tanks abound - prey species mysteriously disappearing from their nearby tanks, with an octopus watching the fuss it caused from it's own tank, to which it returned. Clever and can squeeze through very small openings.

Sounds like a space elevator connected to a space based solar power installation? Mostly SBSP (or SPS - space power satellite) proposals use beamed power transmission systems from satellites to receivers on Earth, but, whilst technically possible, face big hurdles. The reality is it is much easier and cheaper to do solar on Earth - even with the complementary technologies to overcome the intermittency - and space elevators are purely hypothetical and not currently even technically possible. Rather than SBSP being the necessary leap forward to fix our dirty energy dependence, I think fixing our energy problems down here are the essential prerequisites to sustaining our Earth economy long enough to develop the means to build viable SBSP. Which makes it unnecessary, I suppose. I have always wondered if those transmission technologies for beaming down to Earth could be used to beam power up in one region on Earth to beam down in another, ie as a global power transmission system. From my reading it looks like the losses from transmitting one way (down) could be manageable but doing it twice (up then down) or thrice (up, across to another transmission satellite and then down, ie full global coverage) would multiply the transmission losses beyond usefulness. I don't expect any one-size-fits-all grand energy/emissions/climate fixes are likely to save us from having to do it piecemeal, using a combination of existing and developing technologies. I will have issues with optimist/advocates of space dreams who use our serious Earth based concerns about clean energy or other global sustainability issues to drive subsidising the space technologies and activities they want for other reasons - without reliable business plans and realistic expectations for achieving their primary aims.

Absence of poverty does look like a key element of any quest for utopia but I have long thought independent courts and Common Law type systems have been important to the success of modern "western" nation states. As messy and subject to corruption these often are in practice they do there does seem to be a self-correcting, corruption resisting element in them and they don't get as messy and corrupt as nations that do not have them. If their partial success makes such a difference, maybe better legal systems are going to be a key ingredient for a healthier society. Just as access to basic living needs would need to be universal, I suggest affordable access to not-corrupt courts, justice and legal redress would also need to be universal.

@ John Cuthber - that was the potential difference of significance that occurred to me too. I suspect a lot of the time there was not a choice, but where there was a choice it may have included a preference for cool water over warm, but to what extent our hunter gatherer ancestors suspected a connection between warm water and illness is hard to say. But if it's cloudy or discoloured, that is easy to see and could lead to clear water being preferred despite temperature. I expect aroma and taste might still take precedence over other considerations - but it may be that cool water will have less aroma and is likely to taste better.

I try to avoid the insults, to the extent of politely explaining what I think and why I think they are wrong. For some people just telling them they are wrong will be taken as an insult - if there is no great interest in the subject at hand I will usually give it one more try, politely, to be sure then leave others to it and move on. If I do have a particular interest I might persist further, sometimes consciously making it an exercise in better educating myself and in communicating clearly. And if they lower their bar I make an effort to not lower mine - just not 100% successfully. Worst of all in my experience (elsewhere) when unprincipled moderators are the principle offenders.

Unitive mystic, either way these are not serious problems that I think would lead to migrations - more akin to the health risks populations would face regardless of location. I think rereading my posts will tell you why I think that - and the reasons others give support that conclusion also. Unless you have something new to add I'll leave it at that.

If I were one of them I wouldn't migrate for that reason, even knowing my risk of skin cancers to be greater than people with a similar skin type to mine living in other places - I'd be too concerned with staying alive where I am. Sunburn risks might rate as a reason to get kids to wear hats but not for the arduous task of migrating great distances on foot or in bark canoes.

Plenty of reasons given to think this kind of preferential migration will not happen. I haven't seen any arguments that change my view that it would not.

Unitive Mystic - I don't see any obvious mechanism or motivation that would induce the kind of preferential migration patterns you suggest - ie would send pale skinned people to high latitudes and dark skinned people to the equatorial regions - they wouldn't know that would be a long term solution or even any kind of solution, even if they have the means. Getting sunburned can prompt changes to behaviour - make hats or other kinds of clothing (especially parents doing so for vulnerable youngsters), have shade in and around camps, change time of day for some activities - but I doubt migration would occur to people as a rational response; within walking distance there would be no apparent differences in sun exposure except by changes to vegetation or perhaps deep valleys vs highlands rather than latitude. It's clearly possible for populations to do well enough for other reasons that sun exposure or vitamin D deficiencies is not going to stop them. Migrations tend to either be motivated by belief that the destination offers opportunities, or motivated by desperate need and will lack clear direction. Raised levels of dangerous cancers later in life may or may not be understood as being related to sun exposure, but I don't see that we can assume they would know that or know that North/South migration would help - and, all things considered probably won't. Rather than migration changing what mix of skin types in different geographic/climatic regions the real mechanism that looks most relevant would be evolutionary - but we then need to assume that civilisation and long distance travel doesn't arise again over evolutionary time frames and I doubt that would be the case. Assuming it doesn't it is certainly possible that some populations would divide across skin colour lines and intermarriage would be uncommon but the notion that pale skins belong on one side of an imaginary line and all the rest (the "one drop" rule) on the other has always been false. To me it looks like the easiest way to a permanent solution to vulnerability to sun exposure in pale skinned people in hot and sunny climates/dark skinned in sun poor climates would be intermarriage (gene flow), not migration, and this is very likely to happen, even with racist, isolationist societies given enough time; ie those that 'successfully' prevented intermarriage would be less fit than populations that allow or encourage it. Given that the genetics for more melanin rich skins has already evolved, gene flow can introduce it rapidly (in evolutionary terms) to populations that don't have it, and vice versa. No need to migrate.

With civilisation gone the means to relocate (easily) will be also. Lack of civilisation does not mean no tools or technology - especially since knowledge and remnants will mean people know a lot is possible. A whole lot of basic technologies will still be within reach, even if it's back to knapping knives out of stone. Whether those living in less than ideal climate will be displaced over multi-generations by those who (from here) look better suited could depend on how long before civilisations develop again. Most places now tend to have mixed populations - the genes for dark skins and light skins will co-exist and mix in populations in all kinds of climates. I think most humans will continue to have the capability of surviving in most locations, that the idea that there is an ideal climate or geography may not strictly apply, that ingenuity if not plain human stubborness that worked in our past will keep work in the future, regardless of location. I doubt we would see any significant evolution any time soon - and the mixing of genetic heritages may make it less obvious. Or make it necessary for new traits to emerge. I suppose the most significant kind of evolution might be ongoing genetic flow - genetics from one population type to another - as mixed populations mix even further, perhaps (if isolated long enough) into a more homogenous population.

We've come a long way in all aspects of renewable energy and we make a lot of good use of intermittent solar and wind. You can add a lot of solar to existing electricity networks without problems. More importantly adding wind and solar now sets things up for the next stages, which will include adding some on-demand backup or equivalent. It is a progression in stages, not an all at once change. At small scale - my PV fitted home for example - a relatively small amount of battery storage is enough to go from drawing power from the grid every night to (my estimate to date) about one night out of 50. And overall, we send four times the total power we use ourselves back into the grid. This will happen at larger scale - apparent already in the usefulness of the (still relatively small) Big Battery in South Australia (aka Hornsdale Power Reserve); it has exceeded expectations for it's role in system fast voltage regulation and fast, short term backup - and helping keep wholesale power prices constrained when gas or other "reliable" supply fails, and they do, surprisingly often if you look. We don't know how the last stages of transition to low emission will play out - fast start gas, batteries, pumped hydro, demand shifting - likely a combination of these will be used. Nuclear will struggle to find opportunity for profit outside the periods when solar owns the daytimes and wind, the windy times. Investment in serious storage will be resisted until the proportions of wind and solar grow to where they become needed (eg South Australia approaching this threshold), then viable proposals start coming. At this point in this transition adding as much wind and solar as the market demands (and it is now demand driven) makes good sense.

Phi for All - Australia previously had government owned electricity - selling it off to private enterprise has not resulted in better reliability, lower costs or improved investment practices. It's been something of a disaster for consumers and long term energy policy implementation - and because those selloffs and the consequent raised electricity costs overlapped in time with rising concerns about climate and support for renewable energy, it was popular and effective amongst climate science deniers to conflate the two and blame the largest part of rising costs on renewable energy subsidies (when the largest component was overbuilding within rules that made that possible and financially rewarding). In part things went worse with private ownership in this is because there isn't a market large enough to support genuine, efficiency inducing competition and in part because the conditions under which they were sold included government backed guarantees ie was not and never was actually a free market - although the rhetoric of "free enterprise will do it better and cheaper" was the selling point. Whilst nationalising them now would be problematic I disagree that government ownership of what is unlikely ever to be a free and open competitive market is intrinsically problematic, at least in Australia's case. Bazzy - Underpinning distrust and rejection of RE is usually distrust and rejection of climate science - as is continuing support for coal fired power. Politically in Australia arguing that coal is better than renewable energy tends to be a proxy for climate science denial - the main culprits preferring not to argue about the science directly, thus avoiding arguments that they can't win and that tend to make them look foolish. I don't know that it's possible to win arguments about the merits of low emissions energy with people who reject climate change science - who reject that there is any responsibility for climate change; their opinions are not based on good information and rational arguments. Depending on who they get their news and commentary and energy politics from - the current LNP govenment and large elements of News media for example - the idea that RE will be costly and unreliable will be something they hear all the time. They may be won over by cost savings alone - and solar for homes and businesses is winning them over at the local level - but this takes at least some pro-active research. In this, we are at a turning point, and we are seeing things shifting, with major energy companies choosing RE investments over coal (on the basis of ended RE subsidies and with an enduring amnesty for fossil fuels for their externalised costs) and facing criticisms by the pro-markets government for disagreeing with their "coal is good" mantra. I think the continuing growth of solar and wind, and increasingly, storage, will accelerate and attempts to shape opinion against them will fail. Even more than the (still mostly limited) emissions reductions, the near term impacts of the solar and wind success story is changing minds by showing as false the fears of economic disaster that opponents of strong climate action have pushed hard and made into their most powerful tool of persuasion. The political implications of that will be more fundamentally important for building support for a transition to low emissions than the emissions reductions themselves - emissions that won't come down significantly until the levels of RE mean everything we make or use will have a big RE component.

You could do that - and you will have to pedal harder. A lot harder. Whoever told you about energy losses was right - you'd be better saving that effort for making the e-bike go when it needs pedalling. The energy losses in pedalling to make motion are small, but energy losses converting crank power to electricity via an altenator, to charge a battery, back to an electric motor to turn the crank to make motion are much higher. Running the alternator on down hill runs in place of braking will result in a gain, but if you have to pedal where otherwise you didn't, you'll be working harder for very little (no) gain. More exercise and better health outcomes maybe, but you'd get that by using an ordinary bicycle, not an e-bike.

In a world without chairs, everyone will squat. Not the best of observations to assign that to any specific nation or race; white anglo old timers mustering cattle would squat around their campfires here in Australia, and probably a lot still do. And Darwin probably distractedly swiped at flies without noticing that he was feeling them through small body hairs - the hairs he was convinced served no useful function in man. Even highly skilled observers can get things wrong. I don't know about Einstein, however I expect racist sentiments, mixed with interpretations and misinterpretations of Darwin's work, were so widespread and unchallenged as to be seen as normal - even whilst, as a jew in Germany - he would have been subjected to ones he knew to be unwarranted. Sound like he may have spent time thinking about issues arising. Meanwhile his contributions to physics remain immense and beyond dispute.

As my post says I just wanted to give a sense of perspective to what the odds of "unlikely" chemistry look like at the scale of a planetary ocean and hundreds of millions of years - take that view and it looks not all so unlikely after all. Not anywhere near so unlikely as to be impossible - which is what is suggested by the "but it's so unlikely it must need godly intervention" arguments. I don't claim any expertise, so I don't know what specific chemical precursors. From my reading, a lot of what I would call complex organic chemicals are formed in vast quantities from non-biological processes - in space (precursor material to the Earth) and the waters of this planet - and these can and will react and interact in various ways under conditions that, whilst not universal, are still widespread and of long duration. Those conditions won't all apply to every ml of water (and when they do reactions may be occurring at much higher frequencies) but take a dozen zeros off my numbers and they are still enormous numbers. Wikipedia is always a good start, for a general overview, with attention to the sources listed recommended if you are serious about it.