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In Sydney, Dick Smith, environmentalist, businessman and aviator, recently hosted a very interesting TV doco on renewable energy. In it, he noted that Australia has one of the largest carbon footprints(per capita)in the world, mainly in consequence of the massive amounts of coal we mine and export.
But that made me think: which party incurs the responsibility for the carbon release: the exporter, or the importer, which in our case is China. If it is the exporter – us – then China is virtually blameless for any carbon debt, as all the nations that sell them coal, iron and the rest are the ones who are fitted up as the guilty parties. But I have read that they too have a very big carbon footprint. Is there some rather shonky bookkeeping going on here, where carbon emissions are being counted twice? Myles325a ( talk) 06:22, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
The point here is "does it matter?" - this is a global problem. If Australia didn't mine the coal, China couldn't burn it. If China didn't burn coal, Australia wouldn't mine it. Who cares which of the two countries is responsible? Either one of them could choose to end it - so in any useful sense, they are both equally at fault. The naive statistic of "National Carbon Footprint" glosses over so many details in a dynamic, interconnected world as to be almost useless. Any simplistic view of the situation has to be viewed as a very general indication of a problem - and the specifics have to be examined before deciding on some course of action. If the world decided that this trade between Australia and China was unacceptable, political pressure would likely be exerted at both ends of the supply chain.
If China was pressured into not buying the coal - probably the Australian mining industry would sell it somewhere else. The sudden glut of coal would result in a dramatically falling price of the stuff on the open market - which would likely result in more Australian power generators burning it instead - and other countries would probably step in to buy Australian coal at this lower price point.
If Australia was pressured into not mining the stuff - the Chinese would buy it from some other country - a shortage of coal on the open market would push up the prices and encourage other countries to step up their production rate accordingly.
No single "fix" for this problem will work. It requires a global perspective. You need ALL coal mines around the world to reduce production and ALL coal fired power plants in every country to reduce their consumption. That kind of global cooperation has proven elusive...which is a very depressing situation.
SteveBaker ( talk) 14:10, 22 August 2013 (UTC)
OP myles325a back live. It matters to me Steve coz while I am an environmentalist I despise the Green’s natural position that they can lie thru their teeth whenever they feel the end is worth it, while becoming holier than thou whenever they spot a fib that doesn’t suit their purposes. Activist literature is full of colossal exaggerations and outright falsehoods, and in the end it does their causes much harm, as the public founds out eventually and becomes cynical.
I don’t like propaganda, and I don’t like crappy statistics. I like to know the truth, and if some fanatic is counting carbon footprints twice, then I wanna know about it, and I want the lie exposed. Call me an old fuddy duddy but I’ve had an absolute gut full of the mealy mouthed post modernist view that “there is no such thing as truth”, and it’s all just a matter of what suits you, sir. Myles325a ( talk) 05:27, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
Okay, so in a transparent medium with a refractive index greater than 1, light is propogated with a velocity that is less than c. I understand the wave explanation of this in terms of electromagnetic radiation, distinction between group velcoity and phase velocity etc. But what actually happens at the level of individual photons ? Does each individual photon travel at a speed less than c ? Or do individual photons travel at c but the slowing down is a bulk effect because photons are absorbed and re-emitted by electrons ? Or is the slowing down the result of some complicated interaction involving virtual photons ? I've read the articles on refractive index, speed of light, slow light and transparency and translucency, but they don't seem to answer this question. Gandalf61 ( talk) 08:54, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
I imagine that a lot of people have wondered at this, having been told that we can only observe light travel at the same speed c, we are then told that it can “slow down” when travelling thru a medium. How is that possible? I think the simple answer is that when light is travelling, it cannot be seen to move at any other speed than c, regardless of whether it is moving through empty space or honey. When a photon moves thru material, it can be briefly trapped by an electron in an atom’s shells. That excites the atom as it absorbs the photon, and then the atom sheds the photon (or another exactly the same) and returns to its previous state of energy. This procedure takes some little time. The photon ALWAYS travels at the same speed, but if we count these times when it is being absorbed and re-emitted, then it appears to travel at a lower speed than c. Myles325a ( talk) 07:49, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
Is there any organ that made of only ONE tissue? (I have not found information about on Wiki) 46.210.138.154 ( talk) 17:48, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
what do you think about the nail or hair, are they not organs or do they contain blood vessels? 46.210.138.154 ( talk) 18:46, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
Can non-soluble medicine pills be absorbed into the body through the mouth? This applies to the whole world. Pubserv ( talk) 17:59, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
why all cells of the body are called "cyties" (in example: osteocyties is of bone tissue, miocyties is of muscle tissue) while the nerves cells called neurons without 'cyties'? and second, how are called the cells of connective tissue? (see about the names of the cells of the other tissues in the first qustion). thank you. 46.210.138.154 ( talk) 18:40, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
Sorry, fibrocyte is just not the general name of the cells which incloud all the connective tissues. A fibrocyte is only ONE of kinds of the the cells which build the connective tissue. There are some kinds of cells of connective tissues like adipocyte, chondrocyte, endothelium, and so on. So, you can not say that the name of all cells of connective tissue called "fibrocytes" like you can say that the miocyte is general name of all kinds of muccels tissues cells. It's intresting for me to know if there is a general term for connective tissue cells. 176.13.166.201 ( talk) 20:51, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
Science desk | ||
---|---|---|
< August 20 | << Jul | August | Sep >> | August 22 > |
Welcome to the Wikipedia Science Reference Desk Archives |
---|
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages. |
In Sydney, Dick Smith, environmentalist, businessman and aviator, recently hosted a very interesting TV doco on renewable energy. In it, he noted that Australia has one of the largest carbon footprints(per capita)in the world, mainly in consequence of the massive amounts of coal we mine and export.
But that made me think: which party incurs the responsibility for the carbon release: the exporter, or the importer, which in our case is China. If it is the exporter – us – then China is virtually blameless for any carbon debt, as all the nations that sell them coal, iron and the rest are the ones who are fitted up as the guilty parties. But I have read that they too have a very big carbon footprint. Is there some rather shonky bookkeeping going on here, where carbon emissions are being counted twice? Myles325a ( talk) 06:22, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
The point here is "does it matter?" - this is a global problem. If Australia didn't mine the coal, China couldn't burn it. If China didn't burn coal, Australia wouldn't mine it. Who cares which of the two countries is responsible? Either one of them could choose to end it - so in any useful sense, they are both equally at fault. The naive statistic of "National Carbon Footprint" glosses over so many details in a dynamic, interconnected world as to be almost useless. Any simplistic view of the situation has to be viewed as a very general indication of a problem - and the specifics have to be examined before deciding on some course of action. If the world decided that this trade between Australia and China was unacceptable, political pressure would likely be exerted at both ends of the supply chain.
If China was pressured into not buying the coal - probably the Australian mining industry would sell it somewhere else. The sudden glut of coal would result in a dramatically falling price of the stuff on the open market - which would likely result in more Australian power generators burning it instead - and other countries would probably step in to buy Australian coal at this lower price point.
If Australia was pressured into not mining the stuff - the Chinese would buy it from some other country - a shortage of coal on the open market would push up the prices and encourage other countries to step up their production rate accordingly.
No single "fix" for this problem will work. It requires a global perspective. You need ALL coal mines around the world to reduce production and ALL coal fired power plants in every country to reduce their consumption. That kind of global cooperation has proven elusive...which is a very depressing situation.
SteveBaker ( talk) 14:10, 22 August 2013 (UTC)
OP myles325a back live. It matters to me Steve coz while I am an environmentalist I despise the Green’s natural position that they can lie thru their teeth whenever they feel the end is worth it, while becoming holier than thou whenever they spot a fib that doesn’t suit their purposes. Activist literature is full of colossal exaggerations and outright falsehoods, and in the end it does their causes much harm, as the public founds out eventually and becomes cynical.
I don’t like propaganda, and I don’t like crappy statistics. I like to know the truth, and if some fanatic is counting carbon footprints twice, then I wanna know about it, and I want the lie exposed. Call me an old fuddy duddy but I’ve had an absolute gut full of the mealy mouthed post modernist view that “there is no such thing as truth”, and it’s all just a matter of what suits you, sir. Myles325a ( talk) 05:27, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
Okay, so in a transparent medium with a refractive index greater than 1, light is propogated with a velocity that is less than c. I understand the wave explanation of this in terms of electromagnetic radiation, distinction between group velcoity and phase velocity etc. But what actually happens at the level of individual photons ? Does each individual photon travel at a speed less than c ? Or do individual photons travel at c but the slowing down is a bulk effect because photons are absorbed and re-emitted by electrons ? Or is the slowing down the result of some complicated interaction involving virtual photons ? I've read the articles on refractive index, speed of light, slow light and transparency and translucency, but they don't seem to answer this question. Gandalf61 ( talk) 08:54, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
I imagine that a lot of people have wondered at this, having been told that we can only observe light travel at the same speed c, we are then told that it can “slow down” when travelling thru a medium. How is that possible? I think the simple answer is that when light is travelling, it cannot be seen to move at any other speed than c, regardless of whether it is moving through empty space or honey. When a photon moves thru material, it can be briefly trapped by an electron in an atom’s shells. That excites the atom as it absorbs the photon, and then the atom sheds the photon (or another exactly the same) and returns to its previous state of energy. This procedure takes some little time. The photon ALWAYS travels at the same speed, but if we count these times when it is being absorbed and re-emitted, then it appears to travel at a lower speed than c. Myles325a ( talk) 07:49, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
Is there any organ that made of only ONE tissue? (I have not found information about on Wiki) 46.210.138.154 ( talk) 17:48, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
what do you think about the nail or hair, are they not organs or do they contain blood vessels? 46.210.138.154 ( talk) 18:46, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
Can non-soluble medicine pills be absorbed into the body through the mouth? This applies to the whole world. Pubserv ( talk) 17:59, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
why all cells of the body are called "cyties" (in example: osteocyties is of bone tissue, miocyties is of muscle tissue) while the nerves cells called neurons without 'cyties'? and second, how are called the cells of connective tissue? (see about the names of the cells of the other tissues in the first qustion). thank you. 46.210.138.154 ( talk) 18:40, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
Sorry, fibrocyte is just not the general name of the cells which incloud all the connective tissues. A fibrocyte is only ONE of kinds of the the cells which build the connective tissue. There are some kinds of cells of connective tissues like adipocyte, chondrocyte, endothelium, and so on. So, you can not say that the name of all cells of connective tissue called "fibrocytes" like you can say that the miocyte is general name of all kinds of muccels tissues cells. It's intresting for me to know if there is a general term for connective tissue cells. 176.13.166.201 ( talk) 20:51, 21 August 2013 (UTC)