Abstract
We’ve put a lot of effort into learning how science works and what it says about a number of issues of concern to many people. In this chapter we will attempt to predict the future characteristics of some of these issues (and a few new ones). It is crucial that we remember that predictions concerning people are only as good as current knowledge and guesses of future behavior.
“Men argue. Nature acts.”
—Voltaire
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Notes
- 1.
“Prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future.” — Niels Bohr
- 2.
I computed this for a Star Alliance trip with itinerary New York, San Francisco, Hong Kong, Dubai, London, New York. The distances of these legs are 4125, 11,100, 5950, 5465, and 5565 km respectively, for a total of 32,205 km.
- 3.
Other types of oil abound, as we shall see.
- 4.
Within limits. It is possible for molecules such as water to leave Earth. This happened on Venus and Mars.
- 5.
Source: UN World Water Development Report 3, Water in a Changing World, 2009.
- 6.
T. Gleeson, et al. Water balance of global aquifers revealed by groundwater footprint, Nature, 488, 197 (2012).
- 7.
Except helium, which floats to the top of the atmosphere and is permanently driven away by “solar winds”.
- 8.
As we have seen, this is possible if discovery rates are tracked, but I can find no such data.
- 9.
A.H. Mokdad et al., Actual Causes of Death in the United States, 2000, JAMA, 291, 1238 (2004).
- 10.
In my opinion biofuels and hydrogen cars are silly. We will not discuss them.
- 11.
And the salmon. We can’t forget the salmon.
- 12.
Birds killed by wind turbines are a fraction of those killed by cars, which is a fraction of those killed by domestic cats.
- 13.
C.L. Archer and M.Z. Jacobson, Evaluation of Global Wind Power, J. Geo. Res., 110, D12110 (2005).
- 14.
This is not quite the correct procedure. See if you can figure out why.
- 15.
Come to think of it, solar power is not sustainable either! See Sect. 8.9.3
- 16.
The energy is the charge times the rated voltage of the device.
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Swanson, E.S. (2016). A Finite Planet. In: Science and Society. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-21987-5_9
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