3 ms·
There are a large number of events taht have happened many times in Earth's history and, given the cosmic timelines, will happen again, repeatedly. Some may be
by jmyeet 4y ago
There are a large number of events taht have happened many times in Earth's history and, given the cosmic timelines, will happen again, repeatedly. Some may be preventable with technology (eg asteroid impacts), others less so.
A partial list is: tsunamis, earthquakes, volcanoes, supervolcanoes, flood basalts, asteroid impacts, magnetic field reversals, climate change (eg ice once covered the equator, North America used to be covered in an ice sheet a mile thick not that long ago), particles in the atmosphere blocking the Sun, supernovas, gamma ray bursts, solar flares and coronal mass ejections.
It's kind of amazing we're here at all.
- auctoritas 4y agoMore amazing to realize without any of those things we wouldn't be here!
- indigodaddy 4y agoWow thinking about it from that perspective is also kind mind-blowing. Interesting point!
- jvm___ 4y agoThe Carrington event where a solar flare turned telegraph wires into those electromagnetd you build in elementary school. The current from the storm electrified all the telegraph cables. This would be bad for anything we've built that has a long cable run... https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vQURWMzE2MjgwNzI4MA/episode/NzdlMzg0ODAtOGE5OS0xMWVkLWI1NmMtOTc2YWM0ZDUyOGEz?ep=14 https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGh... Or how 536 was the worst year on record (and no one really knows why) https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vQURWMzE2MjgwNzI4MA/episode/NTNiMjhhMzQtYTA5Yy0xMWVkLTk4YTctODc0MTBhMjVlNDRk?ep=14 https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGh...
- alister 4y ago> Or how 536 was the worst year on record Although I didn't listen to the 11 minute podcast, I was curious to know basically what it was about. This is what Wikipedia says about year 536: "In 2018, medieval scholar Michael McCormick nominated 536 as 'the worst year to be alive' because of the extreme weather events probably caused by a volcanic eruption early in the year, causing average temperatures in Europe and China to decline and resulting in crop failures and famine for well over a year. Other researchers have noted additional adverse events during the year, including a mysterious fog, possibly due to the volcanic eruption."[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/536 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/536
- charlieyu1 4y agoA single source of quote, and I really doubt we can find anything related in recorded history. The history books of China definitely didn't mention anything significant about year 536.
- jvm___ 4y agoThey should, a global darkening of the skies due to an unknown volcano or volcanoes (or something else that spewed massive amounts of dust into the atmosphere).
- Jorge1o1 4y agoThere’s a solid amount evidence showing that there was some kind of abnormal volcanic winter in 536. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanic_winter_of_536 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanic_winter_of_536 Whether it was “the worst year in history” is probably tough to quantify and prove, though.