Exactly. Also, why should a layperson's back of the envelope calculations be more accurate than, say, a recent peer reviewed study that actually models the effe

Exactly. Also, why should a layperson's back of the envelope calculations be more accurate than, say, a recent peer reviewed study that actually models the effects of a nuclear war? http://www.envsci.rutgers.edu/%7Egera/nwinter/nw6accepted.pdf http://www.envsci.rutgers.edu/%7Egera/nwinter/nw6accepted.pd... In short, the conclusion was that a nuclear war using 1/3 of the world's arsenal would devastate agricultural production for years due to average global temperature drops on the order of the last ice age occurring in /less than one year/, with temperature drops over land five times as severe (~-20 C), reduction in precipitation by over 45%, and a reduction in freeze-free growing seasons across the northern hemisphere by 50-100 days. Large scale nuclear wars: still a bad idea.