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> But after a burst of publications on the topic, Robock, Toon and their colleagues struggled to find funding to continue their research. Finally, in 2017, they
by RcouF1uZ4gsC 5y ago
> But after a burst of publications on the topic, Robock, Toon and their colleagues struggled to find funding to continue their research. Finally, in 2017, they landed a grant worth nearly US$3-million from the Open Philanthropy Project, a privately funded group in San Francisco that supports research into global catastrophic risks.
> The Los Alamos group used its own models to simulate the climate impact of India and Pakistan setting off 100 Hiroshima-sized bombs. The scientists found that much less smoke would get into the upper atmosphere than Toon and Robock reported. With less soot to darken the skies, the Los Alamos team calculated a much milder change to the climate — and no nuclear winter.
So basically scientists that are funded by a group that has an interest in catastrophe comes up with a model that predicts catastrophe. On the other hand, Los Alamos which has far more expertise, data, and computational power, doesn’t show nearly the catastrophe and especially no nuclear winter.
I am going with the Los Alamos model.
- Tepix 5y agoGot a link?
- rhn_mk1 5y ago> an interest in catastrophe That interest is subtler than you make it out to be. The group wants to find out which catastrophes matter. It doesn't really mean that they are looking for one.
- troyvit 5y agoI agree, and if anybody has incentive to try to distort the effect of nuclear weapons it's the lab that's getting paid to create them. I don't think they would, but you never know.
- phillipseamore 5y agoExactly. On a similar note: "The Chernobyl explosion put 400 times more radioactive material into the Earth's atmosphere than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima; atomic weapons tests conducted in the 1950s and 1960s all together are estimated to have put some 100 to 1,000 times more radioactive material into the atmosphere than the Chernobyl accident." From: IEAE - Ten years after Chernobyl (https://inis.iaea.org/collection/NCLCollectionStore/_Public/28/058/28058918.pdf https://inis.iaea.org/collection/NCLCollectionStore/_Public/...)
- sophacles 5y ago> So basically scientists that are funded by a group that has an interest in catastrophe comes up with a model that predicts catastrophe. And Los Alamos is funded by a group that has a vested interest in keeping thier nukes, therefore downplaying the non-military, long lasting consequences.