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I dunno, I'd say its effect on earth's tide is a pretty "natural system". Seems odd you can assert such certainty of not having unintended consequences and miss

I dunno, I'd say its effect on earth's tide is a pretty "natural system". Seems odd you can assert such certainty of not having unintended consequences and miss that

rbanffy 4y ago
Do you have any idea how much material you'd need to remove from the Moon to change its mass enough to get a measurable effect on tides?
- staticassertion 4y ago
  I don't. How much? I'd also be curious to compare that number to: 1. How much we have mined on earth 2. Expectations on how much we expect to mine over time
  - seti0Cha 4y ago
    According to Google, the moon's mass is 8.1 x 10^19 tons. According to some random info I found, we mined about 3 x 10^9 tons of metal ore in 2019. If we did that on the moon for a thousand years and brought it all back to earth, that's still 7 orders of magnitude less than the moon's mass, so what is that, 1 ten millionth? Is that significant? Well, the earth apparently gains 4 x 10^4 tons every year from just sucking up space dust, and presumably has been for the entire 4.5 x 10^9 years the moon has been around without obvious issues, so it seems like our moving a bit more mass between them wouldn't do much.
    - staticassertion 4y ago
      Thanks. That sounds reasonable.
- VoodooJuJu 4y ago
  But tides aside, which we kind of understand, and you may be correct about in regards to mass and mining, what other effects does this system have that we don't understand? The unknown unknowns are the important things to consider here. Did people who started burning coal all those years ago ever think they'd have to worry about climate shift driving their descendants from their homes centuries later because of their actions? Did anyone ever consider that the mass use of disposable plastics would cause these chemicals to persist in our bodies, our water, our food supply? Did any of these people proceed slowly and with caution out of consideration of unknown unknowns? Unfortunately, no.
  - seti0Cha 4y ago
    There's a certain line you need to draw when considering unknown unknowns. You're suggesting that changing surface features on a remote body in space could somehow affect Earth. Consider that the moon has been hit by very large asteroids in the past which caused disruption on a scale beyond what we could ever do and we don't have any indication that it has affected the Earth other than kicking up some meteor showers. Worrying that we could somehow provoke something more is akin to worrying that driving to the grocery store will trigger an ecological collapse. We have no reason to think it will, we can't even posit something that sounds plausible, but there could be unknown unknowns that make it so.
- jelliclesfarm 4y ago
  The mass of the Moon is around 7.35 x 1022 kg. It would take in the order of 10^6 years to reduce the mass of the Moon by 0.01% if we mined at the rate at which we mine(example: iron) on Earth. Having said that, it is not about altering the mass of the moon. It is not even about deorbiting. Both of which are enormously difficult to fuck up by our puny efforts. It would also have very little effect on rotational speed or gravitational field. But that’s not the point. At all. What is the cost of mining the moon/space mining? What is this metal that we are going to mine at astronomical costs that is alleged to magically make all our lives better and ‘save the oceans’. I couldn’t find that information the article. I think someone simply wants grant money to build a bigger house or fund their children’s college fund. This duck isn’t flying..not walking..not even limping it’s way to the moon to mine anything.
- rekrsiv 4y ago
  How about the supply chain that would move equipment and labor to and from the moon? How about the debris this would leave behind around both bodies? How long can this be done before the Earth's environment is affected? Will our descendants stop drilling when problems begin? Will they still continue long after the damage has become visible? Do you have any idea how many problems were created by good intentions?
Chris2048 4y ago
Which is a gravitational effect, and per original post: "the volume you remove is unlikely to be enough to influence moon gravity"
2000UltraDeluxe 4y ago
The amount of mass you'd need to move for that to happen is... well... astronomical. Besides, that's easily offset by sending things back to the moon for recycling/dumping.

I dunno, I'd say its effect on earth's tide is a pretty "natural system". Seems odd you can assert such certainty of not having unintended consequences and miss that

rbanffy 4y ago

Do you have any idea how much material you'd need to remove from the Moon to change its mass enough to get a measurable effect on tides?

staticassertion 4y ago
I don't. How much? I'd also be curious to compare that number to: 1. How much we have mined on earth 2. Expectations on how much we expect to mine over time
- seti0Cha 4y ago
  According to Google, the moon's mass is 8.1 x 10^19 tons. According to some random info I found, we mined about 3 x 10^9 tons of metal ore in 2019. If we did that on the moon for a thousand years and brought it all back to earth, that's still 7 orders of magnitude less than the moon's mass, so what is that, 1 ten millionth? Is that significant? Well, the earth apparently gains 4 x 10^4 tons every year from just sucking up space dust, and presumably has been for the entire 4.5 x 10^9 years the moon has been around without obvious issues, so it seems like our moving a bit more mass between them wouldn't do much.
  - staticassertion 4y ago
    Thanks. That sounds reasonable.
VoodooJuJu 4y ago
But tides aside, which we kind of understand, and you may be correct about in regards to mass and mining, what other effects does this system have that we don't understand? The unknown unknowns are the important things to consider here. Did people who started burning coal all those years ago ever think they'd have to worry about climate shift driving their descendants from their homes centuries later because of their actions? Did anyone ever consider that the mass use of disposable plastics would cause these chemicals to persist in our bodies, our water, our food supply? Did any of these people proceed slowly and with caution out of consideration of unknown unknowns? Unfortunately, no.
- seti0Cha 4y ago
  There's a certain line you need to draw when considering unknown unknowns. You're suggesting that changing surface features on a remote body in space could somehow affect Earth. Consider that the moon has been hit by very large asteroids in the past which caused disruption on a scale beyond what we could ever do and we don't have any indication that it has affected the Earth other than kicking up some meteor showers. Worrying that we could somehow provoke something more is akin to worrying that driving to the grocery store will trigger an ecological collapse. We have no reason to think it will, we can't even posit something that sounds plausible, but there could be unknown unknowns that make it so.
jelliclesfarm 4y ago
The mass of the Moon is around 7.35 x 1022 kg. It would take in the order of 10^6 years to reduce the mass of the Moon by 0.01% if we mined at the rate at which we mine(example: iron) on Earth. Having said that, it is not about altering the mass of the moon. It is not even about deorbiting. Both of which are enormously difficult to fuck up by our puny efforts. It would also have very little effect on rotational speed or gravitational field. But that’s not the point. At all. What is the cost of mining the moon/space mining? What is this metal that we are going to mine at astronomical costs that is alleged to magically make all our lives better and ‘save the oceans’. I couldn’t find that information the article. I think someone simply wants grant money to build a bigger house or fund their children’s college fund. This duck isn’t flying..not walking..not even limping it’s way to the moon to mine anything.
rekrsiv 4y ago
How about the supply chain that would move equipment and labor to and from the moon? How about the debris this would leave behind around both bodies? How long can this be done before the Earth's environment is affected? Will our descendants stop drilling when problems begin? Will they still continue long after the damage has become visible? Do you have any idea how many problems were created by good intentions?

Chris2048 4y ago

Which is a gravitational effect, and per original post: "the volume you remove is unlikely to be enough to influence moon gravity"

2000UltraDeluxe 4y ago

The amount of mass you'd need to move for that to happen is... well... astronomical. Besides, that's easily offset by sending things back to the moon for recycling/dumping.