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There are two reasonable argument I have heard. The first is what some calls spaceship Earth argument: Imagine that you are traveling on a generational spacesh
by krisoft 5y ago
There are two reasonable argument I have heard.
The first is what some calls spaceship Earth argument:
Imagine that you are traveling on a generational spaceship. You have a really good life support system which keeps everyone able to breath, temperature comfortable or bearable and the agriculture pods ticking. It was built eons ago and nobody knows how it really works, but it works mostly. And then one day a bright eyed, young engineering cadet recommends that we tweak a subsystem. Now remember, you have one spaceship and no hangar, no safe harbour where you can dock if things go fubar. Do you let the engineer monkey with the system risking permanent damage?
Earth is like that spaceship. It is vast, and complex, and things affect other things in surprising ways, and we only have one of it.
The second is about international relations and conflicts:
Interventions into weather modifications have the potential to be beneficial in one area and disastrous at other areas. You create a deluge here and a desert there kind of things. If Somewhereistan steals the water Otherland's farmers would depend on that's a direct threat to the existence of the Otherland state. Predicting and measuring these changes is challenging. Rectifying harm caused might be impossible even if everyone agrees on what happened, but getting such agreement in a noisy world is hard. This makes weather modification ripe for international conflict. The kind where angry man shoots missiles at each other. Which is better to be avoided.
Australia is "far" from other places, so maybe they are safer in this sense, but memetically they are connected to everyone. Once they proved they can manipulate their clouds who is to tell to Somewhereistan that they can't?
- junon 5y agoSo two opinions/speculations, basically.
- ehnto 5y agoAustralia is pretty close to New Zealand (5m pop), Indonesia (267m pop), Papua New Guinea (7.2m pop), and dozens of island nations. The Australian wildfires of 2019/2020 taught me that the atmosphere is not that disconnected, as we were breathing smoke from fires thousands of km away.
- dr_dshiv 5y ago1. Spaceship earth is heating up and some parts are dying as a result. Someone wants to develop a new technology to cool those parts down. If there was no risk of permanent damage (the technology involves lofting sprays of ocean water), would there still be opposition? 2. Developing technologies for weather control should be avoided because they could lead to conflicts of interest. Can't the same argument be made around any technology?
- clifdweller 5y agoas they are introducing moisture into a loud in theory they could impact where the cloud releases its precipitation. This could be used for great economic gain to increase growing seasons by expanding wet season of an area. But this would be at the cost of surrounding areas that would get that rain instead. For many areas of Australia that get wildfires it might not be initially apparent if altering where it rains but then could have a delayed impact of years before true consequences known so while they should proceed with the research they should be mindful of the side effects.
- Day1 5y agoFirst argument seems defeatist to me. Second argument seems like the realistic outcome but I also think it underestimates the powers that be/will be. The conflicts of interest will be addressed too slowly and the powers that be will say too bad to their opponents.