3 ms·
> The sun provides over 1GW/sq km when it's shining. The biology seems to get by fine with that. The issue is the amount of heat relative to the environment in
by hackuser 10y ago
> The sun provides over 1GW/sq km when it's shining. The biology seems to get by fine with that.
The issue is the amount of heat relative to the environment in which flora and fauna have evolved to survive, not relative to absolute zero.
It's like saying that a 313 Kelvin body temperature shouldn't bother me because I do fine with 310K (~37C). It's only a 3K difference, after all.
- petters 10y agoOTOH, that 1GW drops to almost zero at night.
- hackuser 10y ago> 1GW drops to almost zero at night I'm not sure what that means (or if it's really true). The temperature at night doesn't drop to almost (absolute) zero; the oceans don't freeze; so plenty of the Sun's energy must still be present.
- maxerickson 10y agoThe initial statement was power/area, the instantaneous energy input from the sun, given as 1GW/sq km. The energy input from the sun at night really is pretty much zero.
- hackuser 10y agoThe initial statement argued that because organisms are "fine" with 1GW/sq km, they therefore should be fine with the additional heat of a datacenter. I disagreed with the conclusion, not the number. The second statement was that "OTOH, that 1GW drops to almost zero at night." It may be a literally true statement on its own, but it's misleading in response to a statement that absolute zero isn't a realistic basis for this discussion.
- maxerickson 10y agoThat's fine if you think it was misleading, my point was that the intended meaning was clear enough in context.