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How quickly we forget the ties between mapping and exploitation. The British Empire didn't map the world to preserve it, nor will these maps be used to protect
by sandworm101 3y ago
How quickly we forget the ties between mapping and exploitation. The British Empire didn't map the world to preserve it, nor will these maps be used to protect the seafloor. This is about demarcation ahead of future development and resource extraction. Sure, some interesting areas will be saved, but thanks to these more accurate maps such areas can now be defined as narrowly as possible.
- deadbabe 3y agoAre those resources more valuable just sitting at the bottom of a deep sea?
- crote 3y agoThe Statue of Liberty is just sitting there too - it would be far more valuable recycling all that copper and putting it to use. Could there perhaps be another reason we haven't melted it down yet?
- Retric 3y ago> The Statue of Liberty is just sitting there too - it would be far more valuable recycling all that copper and putting it to use. The US makes a several orders of magnitude more money from the Statue of Liberty where it is than they would get from its scrap value. https://www.nps.gov/stli/planyourvisit/fees.htm https://www.nps.gov/stli/planyourvisit/fees.htm
- BobaFloutist 3y agoThe same math could probably be done for sustainable stewardship of our oceans, just with more steps.
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago> same math could probably be done for sustainable stewardship of our oceans, just with more steps Could it? We can measure the cash flow the Statue of Liberty produces relative to its commodity value. A pristine deep sea certainly has value. But it's difficult to argue that every square inch of it is more valuable than the commodities on and below it. Particularly when you start trading off extraction there against terrestrial mining.
- dopidopHN 3y agoHow fish were fished from place X 40 years ago. How much now. Make the difference.
- s0rce 3y agoSeems highly unlikely, tourism economic value must exceed the scrap value of the copper...
- tacocataco 3y ago"Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame, With conquering limbs astride from land to land; Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame. "Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" It's remarkable how people forget how we all got here.
- pimlottc 3y agoDon't forget about the people who were already here, too
- sandworm101 3y ago>> another reason we haven't melted it down yet? Because it was gift. It was supported in the US locally by donations, but it was conceived and built in France as a gift to a younger nation.
- sockaddr 3y agoMy first reaction is: No But if you rephrase it as "Are those resources more valuable just sitting at the bottom of a deep sea instead of mixing them into our bodies and environment?" my reaction is now: Yes
- hex4def6 3y agoBut then, also: "And what if the (human) environment is damaged / contaminated less by deep undersea extraction vs land-based mines"? and also: "What if an abundance of these materials enables vastly cheaper energy storage batteries, making solar / wind energy overnight storage practical, reducing our reliance on cheap fossil fuel energy generation"? To be clear, I'm not sure if either of those hypotheticals are true, but I have a feeling, as with many things in life is "It's complicated". Being good stewards of our resources with careful management / regulation is the answer, rather than unfettered exploitation or outright bans.
- pygy_ 3y agoExtracting these resources means destroying the ecosystems that live on top of them. So, yes, they are better left to their own devices.
- dopidopHN 3y agoThose bottom are brittle ecosystem that thrive in silence and total darkness. It would be nice to document and observe first, rather than barging in to get the riches as fast as possible once again. ( riche in that point being « nodules » it’s a fun resource ! )
- non-chalad 3y ago[flagged]
- tomrod 3y agoNah. We aren't creating rutters to navigate tough waters for enforcing colonialism. Sometimes the past doesn't predict the future with much confidence.
- Teever 3y agoWe're going to be using these maps to expand deep sea mining that will certainly result in the poisoning of innocent people in remote regions of the world whn their food sources become contaminated from whatever we dredge up. It's colonialism and exploitation of a different kind. I'm not expecting you to single handedly put a stop to it or anything but it's not unreasonable to expect that you can recognize and acknowledge it instead of pretending it doesn't exist and saying that those sort of things only happened a long time ago.
- non-chalad 3y agoSo compete with eco-friendly dredging, and show them a better way?
- Teever 3y agoBut you know that 'eco-friendly dredging' in this context is an oxymoron on par with 'consensual rape.'
- non-chalad 3y agoThen use caissons and hyperbaric chambers; Mine the old fashioned way. You could make a floating island to service the system; They can be quite cheap https://ventivefloathouse.com/ https://ventivefloathouse.com/
- Teever 3y agoWithout getting into whether or not this technology that you're bringing up out of no where is the panacea to all the problems with seabed mining that we're talking about, what sort of mechanisms do you propose we use to ensure that the people who mine will use these safer technologies?
- jjk166 3y agoBy that argument, anyone who drinks a gin and tonic today must be trying to protect themselves from malaria.
- Waterluvian 3y agoMy house has a threshold to hold the thresh in the room I do all my threshing.
- giantg2 3y agoI do my threshing where I do my winnowing.
- eschneider 3y agoIt's worked for me so far.
- dr_dshiv 3y agoTotally agree. We need to know where we can establish kelp farms.
- BurningFrog 3y ago"Exploiting" the natural resources of the oceans, if allowed, will be a huge benefit to humanity. Just like we've benefitted enormously from "exploiting" land resources.
- sleepingreset 3y agowhat makes you so certain we can coordinate our resources and act in unprofitable ways to ensure long-term survival? genuine question
- BurningFrog 3y agoCertainty is hard, but we've done pretty well with it on land, so I think leaving the 3x larger mineral resources untapped would be madness. Not saying things will be perfect, of course. They never are.
- godelski 3y agoFWIW, that land allocation came through a lot of blood allocation. Of course, wars are fought very differently these days but I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss the "transitionary period"
- ToValueFunfetti 3y agoFortunately the merpeople are already extinct; no genocide necessary this time. More seriously, I'd expect greater resource availability to result in fewer wars over it. That's pretty consistent with human history.
- godelski 3y agoWe fought many wars over lands that no one occupied. In fact, we've fought many wars over maritime territories before too. Wars are far from exclusively fought via inhabiting force and invading force. How do you think those boundaries were developed in the first place? People don't grow out of the ground and we all originated from Africa. In fact, not even the whole of Africa!
- perihelions 3y agoThe US government actually has an ongoing push right now to claim parts of the Arctic Ocean, for mining purposes, on the basis of bathymetric data. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-12-22/us-claims-huge-chunk-of-seabed-amid-strategic-push-for-resources https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-12-22/us-claims... ("US Claims Huge Chunk of Seabed Amid Strategic Push for Resources", https://archive.is/9Uyg4 https://archive.is/9Uyg4 ) https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/products/us-extended-continental-shelf-data https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/products/us-extended-continental-s... ("U.S. Extended Continental Shelf Data") - "The mission of the U.S. Extended Continental Shelf (ECS) Project is to establish the full extent of the U.S. continental shelf, consistent with international law. " - "Data collected for the project include bathymetric, subbottom, gravity, magnetic, seismic , and geologic sample data from the U.S. coastal waters to the deep ocean. U.S. ECS project data are in the public domain."
- dragonwriter 3y ago> The US government actually has an ongoing push right now to claim parts of the Arctic Ocean as territorial waters. No, it doesn't. (Beyond that part of the Arctic Ocean already generally recognized as US territorial waters.) “Continental shelf” is not “territorial waters”, it is a whole different legal category. The project to identify the extent of what qualifies under international law as continental shelf beyond the 200nm presumed limit is not about extending territorial waters.
- perihelions 3y agoAlright, I've edited out "territorial waters" from my comment.
- dragonwriter 3y agoThe correct term for the legal category which they are trying to determine the extent of is “continental shelf”, hence the name of the project (under international law this is legal category is determined by the greater of 200nm or the natural extent of the physical continental shelf.)
- acchow 3y agoIf I'm understanding the history correctly, the British Empire eventually actively fought to end the slave trade because they realized there was something even more profitable than colonialism and extraction: trade.
- ricardoplouis 3y agoChasing profits didn't cause slavery to end, it was the abolitionists who were standing up for human rights. Historically massive social change doesn't come from the top down like you are describing. It would be akin to saying LBJ was a civil rights hero for his legislation. Sure, he signed it, but the civil rights movement of 60s is why it was possible in the first place. Hardly can one deserve credit for playing a forced hand.
- non-chalad 3y ago[flagged]