sethoflagos

The effectiveness of carbon sequestion via weathering of basalt etc. is ultimately limited by actual reaction rates. One only has to consider the rather slow disappearance of such basalt structures as eg the Giant's Causeway (and essentially the entire surface lithosphere of Northern Ireland), Fingal's Cave, Iceland to understand that these carbonation reactions are not lightning fast. Even in finely divided form, a visit to a basaltic black sand beach is scarcely seething with chemical activity. But that does not make it a factor to be ignored. It cannot be a solution to all our problems but it can help. EDIT: I see @studiot has just made the very same point (simulpost) I found quite a useful summary of its global relevance at https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.2138/am-2019-6884/html?lang=en. I've wondered for a while whether weathering of the calcium silicate content of concrete had a similar effect, and found an interesting Caltech article at https://www.caltech.edu/about/news/weathering-cement-important-overlooked-sink-carbon-dioxide-53134 ... which I found quite interesting.

Does that observation increase our understanding of what free will actually is? Personally, I would reject @Eise's Quantum Decision Maker as an agent of free will not on the grounds that it (potentially) confounds determinism, but that it is indistinguishable from taking actions based on false premises. The popular understanding of the concept would be along the lines of choosing to get out of bed when you felt like it, not when someone else told you to. Do we have any more sophisticated definition to work with? If not, then such a decision is arguably just a balance of pleasure/pain responses and no more an example of free will than a peckish amoeba wandering off in search of its next meal. Easy prey for the determinist camp. I'm tempted toward an atheist position on both free will and determinism, though remain open to harder definitions of free will and less evangelical revelations of determinism. If free will does not exist, then the validity of the OP is moot. Kind of like asking what unicorns prefer for breakfast.

This is a form the Young-Laplace equation as I understand it. Your earlier version with 1/(h/2) instead of 1/r was incorrect for the diagramme given. But note that the usual form is dP= -T(1/r + 1/R). It only becomes the form quoted above AFTER you have performed algebraic manipulation of the signs. I suggest you apply more focus to distinguishing between the standard forms of equations and expressions lifted from part-completed calculations.

Merely a futile attempt to establish some mutual understanding of what you mean by 'free will'. I invested some time in it, but lesson learnt.

Hint: can you express r in terms of h & theta?

What are the benefits of understanding our free will? I suspect the quick answer is that a true understanding of the nature of free will would take us close to a true understanding of the nature of consciousness which would be no small achievement. One of the major challenges seems to be determining the sphere of influence of free will to which end it may be helpful to identify where free will has no observable scope of application. So if you will bear with me... Practically the entire Tree of Life outside of clade Holozoa (and many members of Holozoa) arguably thrive without any recourse to free will. Their activities can perhaps be simplified to a set of spontaneous reactions to stimuli (both external and internal) ultimately mediated by their genetic preprogramming. A great diversity of viable ecosystems could be constructed of such purely impulsive communities that we would see as being dominated by plants and fungi. Within such communities the following hierarchy of advantageous evolutionary development can be considered: a) development of a nervous system to communicate stimuli and response by faster means than chemical diffusion/convection. b) development of a centralised brain to better coordinate communication between sensory and endocrine systems. c) expansion of the brain to facilitate development of learned responses (ie those not easily built into genetic coding). These seem to be sufficient for the evolution of phenotypes capable of language and the ability to observe a written code of conduct (among many other behavioural characteristics). To this extent, free will is not necessary. A societal training programme based along the lines of 'spare the rod and spoil the child', has historically been more or less sufficient to persuade individuals to resolve conflicts between subconscious impulse and social code in favour of the latter levering on natural fight or flight and pleasure/pain responses. If we want to isolate free will, I think we need another level in the developmental hierarchy: d) further develop the brain to generate reasonable, novel responses to novel stimuli. This is clearly distinct from level c) as the response cannot be explicitly specified in advance of the experience - on post hoc ergo propter hoc grounds. Specific types of training (eg the scientific method) may provide an approach to dealing with novelty when encountered, but this doesn't strike me as enough to guarantee a good outcome. Deduction has to be augmented with imagination I think. It is the imagination, free of dogmatic constraints, that generates the variety of possible responses in the mind of the individual. And I would tentatively propose that it is in the evaluation of those imagined possible responses that free will can be found. If free will is so intimately connected with imagination, then is it not an expression if not the primary expression of consciousness? I could develop this further, but enough for now.

Not entirely clear on what you mean by 'pumping rod'. Bottle jacks have two pistons: a pumping piston to generate hydraulic pressure and a ram piston to actuate the hydraulic ram. This is reasonable for a x-section ratio of pumping piston : ram piston and indicates that 1kgf applied to the pumping piston will generate 21.4 kgf lifting force at the ram in theory (there's always going to be a little leakage of hydraulic fluid). But the load applied to the pumping piston is also subject to the leverage (mechanical advantage) of the handle which is the ratio of overall length to the distance from the pivot to the shaft of the pumping piston. Using the handle extension supplied, you may get a mechanical advantage of perhaps 20 : 1 which would give you an overall mechanical advantage of 20 x 21.4 = 428 : 1. So a force of 1 kgf at the handle should generate a theoretical lifting force of 428 kgf. The jack maximum load rating is set by an internal pressure relief valve that limits the pressure difference between the pumping pressure and low pressure reservoir. In principle you can measure this by extending the ram and then gradually increasing the load on it until the safety valve lifts and the ram lowers.

By being explicitly non-local, Cramer's Transactional Interpretation is immune to Bell's inequality test while being entirely consistent with counterfactual definiteness. Which is somewhat interesting given its rooting in (explicitly) the relativistic form of the Schrodinger equation and its consistency with (though not a dependency on) an Einsteinian block universe (so I have been led to believe). This seems to make it a particularly interesting viewpoint from which to consider determinism and the relationships between past, present and future in general. I'd be interested in your thoughts on this perspective.

Given a free neutron in whatever initial boundary conditions you care to set, in what sense could its instant of decay into a proton and W- be understood to be '(pre)determined' prior to the actual event? If there is none then it would seem to me that dterminism in any real sense is dead on its feet. Otherwise we would appear to have the mother of all hidden variables theories and I'd be interested to hear how this squares with the 2nd Law (where's all the information stored?) Perhaps I'm missing something (yet again).

I bow to your greater experience in this area, but I think we're saying the same thing aren't we? In passing, I don't see the cases for the falsity of b) and d) being quite so clear cut. Does b) fall on the isothermal constraint and d) on catalyst dependency, or am I barking up the wrong tree(s).

a) is correct by definition. dG = RT ln(Keq) so dG=0 implies Keq=1 Remembering that Keq is also by definition the ratio of reaction rate constants for forward and reverse reactions, we have to remember that the rate constants are functions not only of the concentrations of chemical species (either reactants or products respectively) but also the reaction mechanisms. In general the mechanisms for the forwards and reverse reactions will be different, and therefore simultaneous equality of both reactant and product concentrations and forwards and reverse reaction rates could only occur under very special conditions (if ever in real life). Therefore, in general, statement c) is incorrect. I hope this is what you were looking for. Your question isn't perfectly phrased in English.

Nigeria mostly.

Another possibility might be from opening a buoyancy tank that had been sealed for long enough for SRBs to poison its air contents. During my apprenticeship in the paper industry we had several fatal incidents due to personnel entry into poorly ventilated secondary water tanks without appropriate breathing apparatus. Concentrations as low as 0.1% v/v are often immediately lethal. It doesn't take much in a confined space.

About as much as you would expect of an organisation under the direction of someone like Therese Coffey I guess. I can see what the written responsibilities of these organisations are, but a non-resident is perhaps not best placed to judge whether or not they meet those obligations,

My understanding is per: The full article is archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20070626204942/http://www.defra.gov.uk/environ/fcd/defrafm.pdf

UK Coastal Defences are managed by the Environment Agency, currently sponsored by DEFRA. You can browse activities by area at https://www.gov.uk/check-coastal-erosion-management-in-your-area

As @Endy0816 says, it depends. Typically, mustard or cumin seeds are fried (or dry roated over a medium heat) until they pop, at temperatures that would burn the likes of fresh coriander or parsley. And much depends on whether the spice is fat- or water-soluble.

Just spent a while staring in puzzlement at the 'Unread Messages' notification half a dozen posts in on the first page of the thread. ... but I did eventually get around to checking the date a little more carefully.

I'm not inclined to. 4th Dynasty Egypt lifted some pretty impressive pieces of masonry at Giza. Elevators typically account for 3% to 5% of the energy consumption of a modern high-rise office block (ref: Elevators and Escalators Energy Performance Analysis: Patrao et al.). Even this relatively low energy usage could be significantly reduced by appropriate technological improvements (same reference). Plus people capable of using staircases should do so for the health benefits as much as power saving. Hence: I see that @TheVat has kindly just fielded the rest of your post so no point in me restating his explanations.

I was excused Eng. Lit,. PE. & RE. for most of my school career in favour of trumpet practice. However, I do recall two literature texts from those times. I was young for my year, and arguably young for my age too, but I found Shane to be banal and The Tempest to be both hilarious and spiritually upliftiting (ie 'magical'). Independently, I'd read my mother's cherished Lord of the Rings at around 13, and that had a big impact. Then later, through college years I was introduced to the classic political works: Animal Farm, 1984, Brave New World etc. Interesting but not life changing. Four works I read in my mid-twenties stand out as being character forming. Sartre's Roads to Freedom trilogy; Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita; Sholokhov's And Quiet flows the Don; and (particularly) Canetti's Auto da Fe. All four of which tore deeply into my soul but left me stronger for it. I wouldn't recommend any of these works for school curriculum. Children don't need horror, but adults need to be ready for it.

The technical/economic challenges and energy costs of heavy lifts to oto 1000 tonnes are trivial. This was demonstrated in the bronze age. You lift when you have the relatively small amount of required power available (think counter balances). Non sequitur argument. Blizzards in southern California? And at the other extreme we have various reflective coating options to avoid absorptive overheating. Design so escape is unnecessary. Who mentioned steel and concrete? That's a strawman of your making. We have thousands of these in Africa. The structure is ready built. Just mine out the living spaces using long established room and pillar mining methods. Extract the excavated stone as ashlar and use that to construct other 'termite mounds'. The pillars can be any dimension they need to be - 5 metres/10 metres diameter: whatever is necessary to withstand the imposed forces (earthquakes, hurricanes, bombs and even snow load(!)). It's just engineering. Fail to see your point. Is it one of those 'not invented here' arguments. If so then I don't claim precedence over the termites. Or the Pueblo Indians for that matter. And yet you feel inclined to post. At length. How ironic.

I was unaware of this body of work, so thanks for that. Googling, it seems that the sci-fi novels were inspired at least in part by practical concepts developed by architect Paolo Soleri, so no flux capacitors or time portals required. Just finance and willpower.

Pretty much as I saw it. Hobbit holes! Nice idea in a middle England bucolic nostalgia sort of way but a little too low density for dealing with the bulk of the population. Taking the original OP scenario of high ambient temperature, low humidity. It would be nice if we could make use of the general principles, but construct them above ground in multi-story medium to high density accommodation units each suitable for populations oto 10,000 individuals. Basically a version of a scaled up termite mound. Let's run with it a while. Since hot, dry areas tend to have cool nights, natural convection can exhaust the internal heat of the structure (and critically, a large central water supply also) out through a central 'chimney' by (in principle) natural draught alone if you get the engineering right. During the day air inflow reverses (due to the reversal of thermal gradient) and is tempered by the high thermal inertia of the structure itself augmented by, say, underfloor cooling by the cooled water store, and further augmented by evaporative cooling which can also up the humidity into an appropriate comfort zone. In principle, temperatures within the structure will float between somewhat above the night time low and somewhat above the daytime wet bulb temperature without recourse to heat pumps at all. At least this is should be sufficient for people to exhaust their body heat without sweating like the proverbial christmas goat. Where does the cooling water come from? Recycled effluent plus a structure of this scale has potential for economic condensate recovery via eg. gas/gas heat exchange etc. In 'the best of all possible worlds', the community would not have individual cooking stoves, refrigerators, freezers etc, but centralised communal facilities that exhaust their waste heat directly outside of the structure (ie not overheating the living/working spaces). It looks to have possibilities. If you don't mind the termite social model. But then they have had well over 100 million years of practice and seem to be doing okay..

Btw... Why has this hijack thread been shifted to the Politics forum rather than say Climate Science? Are these concerns now solely the province of the political left? I sincerely hope not.

As regards having a major rethink on architecture and lifestyles, I couldn't agree more. There's nothing like committing some serious public money into upgrading the housing stock for giving a much needed boost to GDP. Maynard Keynes for the environment yay! (not totally a joke) Our ancestors built stone vaulted rooves that could last a millenium and more. It's just a matter of raising the building codes to what is easily achievable by appropriate engineering. Razor wire topped security wall with a tented fabric roof. Standard Lagos approach.