Current Events > Why don't we just dump blocks of ice in the ocean?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Since the libs so are so worried about "global warming" (ummmmmmmm it's pretty cold out, LIBS!!!), we should just dump bags of ice into the ocean so it cools it down.

Your Nobel prize for saving the world is en route

This isn't Futurama. Global warming doesn't just work that way.

Why don't we drop ice on libs so they'll cool off.

Why don't we just nuke the sun? It's the enemy.

Nirvanas_Nox posted...

This isn't Futurama. Global warming doesn't just work that way.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/d/df268e4b.jpg

https://what-if.xkcd.com/162/

To ask a semi-serious question

The solution in this Futurama episode turns out to be to move the planet further away from the sun, just enough to counter global warming.

What is stopping us from doing this? ELI5

even better, make GIGANTIC refrigerators and air conditioners so we can control the temperature and cool it off and make building sized ice blocks

I think we might have to use refrigerants and pour epic amounts of gasoline into them, but that is a fair tradeoff to stop global warming

Why don't we just take the Earth and MOVE IT SOMEWHERE ELSE??!!

Reported for trolling

Why just build a bunch of windmills in the ocean to make electricity and hook them up to a bunch of freezers and leave the doors open?

Alles-Losen posted...

Why just build a bunch of windmills in the ocean to make electricity and hook them up to a bunch of freezers and leave the doors open?

WINDMILLS DO NOT WORK THIS WAY
GOOD NIGHT

Cruciferous posted...

To ask a semi-serious question

The solution in this Futurama episode turns out to be to move the planet further away from the sun, just enough to counter global warming.

What is stopping us from doing this? ELI5

Imagine you're spinning a plate on your finger. Now imagine you're spinning like dozens of plates that are spinning on sticks stacked on top of spinning plates that are stacked on top of a plate that you're spinning on your finger.

Now I walk over to you and push you a few inches. What happens to the plates?

Bestoffuture posted...

Reported for trolling

saving the earth is not trolling

What if they gave everyone free A/C units and we turned them all on hmmmmmmmm

Why don't we just blow all the hot air into space!?

Tyranthraxus posted...

Imagine you're spinning a plate on your finger. Now imagine you're spinning like dozens of plates that are spinning on sticks stacked on top of spinning plates that are stacked on top of a plate that you're spinning on your finger.

Now I walk over to you and push you a few inches. What happens to the plates?

I see what you're saying but there must be like a perfect angle and amount of force that would do it for us. Taking the spin of the earth and such into consideration. If we can use math to basically blind shoot a rocket into the surface of a moon millions of miles away why can't we figure that out?

still ELI5 I am being half serious tho

SkittyOnWailord posted...

Why don't we just blow all the hot air into space!?

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/f/f1e3c95a.jpg

Cruciferous posted...

I see what you're saying but there must be like a perfect angle and amount of force that would do it for us. Taking the spin of the earth and such into consideration. If we can use math to basically blind shoot a rocket into the surface of a moon millions of miles away why can't we figure that out?

still ELI5 I am being half serious tho

Shooting a rocket to the moon is kind of like throwing a rock into the air with you good hand and trying to hit it with a second thrown rock from your off hand while it's still in the air.

Really though any force which pushes the earth hard enough to disrupt its orbit will also disrupt its rotation & revolution. Now I bet you're wondering why all this is a problem and I've got a handy comic for you.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/d/df6ffb4c.jpg

Why not build a giant air conditioner that vents the heat into space?

Launching some solar shades would be easier than trying to push the Earths orbit out enough and would be fairly effective.

It is widely known that a watched pot never boils.

As such, we can infer that, like how light changes from a particle to a wave, observation can halt the heating of water.

We simply need to have people watch the ocean at all times.

Actually, its warmer den it was in da 80s. Hell, it isnt dat uncommon to have a few days in da 60s here in late December. Dat never happened when I was a kid.

I mean, that's part of the problem. Look at the glaciers. It desalination and throws the currents off.

If everyone flushed a tray of ice cubes 3 times a day, like theyre supposed to, we wouldnt have global warming now would we?

I still love this part

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IjmtVKOAHPM&pp=ygUtZnV0dXJhbWEgc29sdmluZyB0aGUgcHJvYmxlbSBvbmNlIGFuZCBmb3IgYWxs

Turbam posted...

we should just dump bags of ice into the ocean so it cools it down.

You mean like a polar ice cap? Like the one that's melting and causing the oceans to rise?

WingsOfGood posted...

even better, make GIGANTIC refrigerators and air conditioners so we can control the temperature and cool it off and make building sized ice blocks

Refrigerators don't actually bring the net temperature down. All they do is move heat from inside to outside (ie the back of your fridge is warmer than room temperature).

Plus, obviously, the electricity they use results in more of a greenhouse effect...

An actual and more practical solution is paving roads, parking lots and driveway white, or a much lighter color than black asphalt that reflects instead of absorbs

@Cruciferous posted...

I see what you're saying but there must be like a perfect angle and amount of force that would do it for us. Taking the spin of the earth and such into consideration. If we can use math to basically blind shoot a rocket into the surface of a moon millions of miles away why can't we figure that out?

still ELI5 I am being half serious tho

Here let me try. Please excuse typo/grammar, I'm tired rn.

You are aware of the concept of gravitational potential energy? U=mgh? U=-GMm/r? Pick up a galon of water off the floor. Feel heavy? That's you workingagainst the earth's gravity.

That would illustrate the basic energy requirement for this job because now we will be moving the earth away against the sun's gravity, a fiery ball so large and heavy it's gravitational pull extends way waaaayyyyyyyy beyond Pluto.

U=-GMm/r. Those M and m are the sun's and the earth's mass respectively. r is the distance and G is physical constant. Look I can give you the exact number but just trust me that it's a big number... like, really biigggg. But let's ignore that and assume we somehow managed to move the earth away.

Now how are we gonna stop the earth once it reaches its new orbit? In case of sending a rocket to the moon like in your example, we basically just slammed the rocket against the moon to make it stop. What are we gonna slam the now moving earth against? Yup, we would need to built yet another earth moving rocket just to stop the earth and stabilize its new orbit. Voila! More energy needed for this insane project

Okay we just reached a new orbit. Feel satisfied? Well, don't, because more problems follow. Are you familiar with tidal wave? It's largely regulated by both the sun's and the moon's gravity and most importantly, it affects the earth's rotation.

Think of it this way. The portion of the earth that's solid just wants to rotate merrily on its axis without a care in the world. However the oceanic water on its surface got pulled away by the sun+moon and wants to stay that way and in doing so, slows the rotation of the solid earth beneath it through friction. Spin a boiled egg (all solid). Now spin a raw egg (solid + liquid) and observe. The liquid part of the raw egg will slow the spin through friction against its outer shell. Similar principle.

This new orbit will throw the delicate tidal wave equation out of balance because the sun will now exert less gravitational pull on the earth's water. The result? We just fucked up the earth's rotation. Yay!

Btw, the movement and orbit of other celestial bodies around us will get affected too. You know, gravity and all that jazz. Some celestial bodies might experience orbit decay, some might get slingshot out of the solar system and so on. We just fucked up our solar system too, except the sun lol.

That's not all because we just doomed the humanity too. Essential plants like corn, rice, and tomatoes need a lot of sunlight to grow properly. Like a lot of sunlight. Some like potatoes need less but still, how are they going to get their sunlight now that we're farther away from the sun? I hope you like eating nothing but oregano for meal since it need less sunlight

Let's recap:
<1> We would need a lot of energy to both move and stop the earth
<2> We would fuck up the earth's rotation
<3> ... and the plants
<4> ... and the animals and the hoomans too
<5> ... and our friendly neighborhood celestial bodies because gravity's a bitch.

Other equally insane solution exists like increasing the earth overall albedo, in particularly the ocean's. Btw albedo is a fraction of light reflected by a surface. Higher albedo = lighter, whiter surface = higher reflection (example: polar region). Lower albedo = darker surface = lower reflection (example: ocean surface).

The polar region is colder than the equator because its has way higher albedo. Lots of white and bright icy surface there, reflecting back the sunlight instead of absorbing it and get heated in the process.

Unfortunately increasing the ocean's albedo using say, a massive amount of alumunium foil, will also fuck up our weather system...

TL;DR Climate change is real.

Will_VIIII posted...

An actual and more practical solution is paving roads, parking lots and driveway white, or a much lighter color than black asphalt that reflects instead of absorbs

Correct, I explained this above. However this is a massive safety risk. Human's eyes & brain work basically on average, overall brightness. Increasing the road's brightness might decrease our sensitivity to other more important light source such as traffic light, parking brake, road sign or even another car/human. Might need a self driving AI for this.

There are places with the light color roads where this isn't an issue and the surface temperature is lower

the displacement would cause tsunamis

thisworld posted...

@

Here let me try. Please excuse typo/grammar, I'm tired rn.

You are aware of the concept of gravitational potential energy? U=mgh? U=-GMm/r? Pick up a galon of water off the floor. Feel heavy? That's you workingagainst the earth's gravity.

That would illustrate the basic energy requirement for this job because now we will be moving the earth away against the sun's gravity, a fiery ball so large and heavy it's gravitational pull extends way waaaayyyyyyyy beyond Pluto.

U=-GMm/r. Those M and m are the sun's and the earth's mass respectively. r is the distance and G is physical constant. Look I can give you the exact number but just trust me that it's a big number... like, really biigggg. But let's ignore that and assume we somehow managed to move the earth away.

Now how are we gonna stop the earth once it reaches its new orbit? In case of sending a rocket to the moon like in your example, we basically just slammed the rocket against the moon to make it stop. What are we gonna slam the now moving earth against? Yup, we would need to built yet another earth moving rocket just to stop the earth and stabilize its new orbit. Voila! More energy needed for this insane project

Okay we just reached a new orbit. Feel satisfied? Well, don't, because more problems follow. Are you familiar with tidal wave? It's largely regulated by both the sun's and the moon's gravity and most importantly, it affects the earth's rotation.

Think of it this way. The portion of the earth that's solid just wants to rotate merrily on its axis without a care in the world. However the oceanic water on its surface got pulled away by the sun+moon and wants to stay that way and in doing so, slows the rotation of the solid earth beneath it through friction. Spin a boiled egg (all solid). Now spin a raw egg (solid + liquid) and observe. The liquid part of the raw egg will slow the spin through friction against its outer shell. Similar principle.

This new orbit will throw the delicate tidal wave equation out of balance because the sun will now exert less gravitational pull on the earth's water. The result? We just fucked up the earth's rotation. Yay!

Btw, the movement and orbit of other celestial bodies around us will get affected too. You know, gravity and all that jazz. Some celestial bodies might experience orbit decay, some might get slingshot out of the solar system and so on. We just fucked up our solar system too, except the sun lol.

That's not all because we just doomed the humanity too. Essential plants like corn, rice, and tomatoes need a lot of sunlight to grow properly. Like a lot of sunlight. Some like potatoes need less but still, how are they going to get their sunlight now that we're farther away from the sun? I hope you like eating nothing but oregano for meal since it need less sunlight

Let's recap:
<1> We would need a lot of energy to both move and stop the earth
<2> We would fuck up the earth's rotation
<3> ... and the plants
<4> ... and the animals and the hoomans too
<5> ... and our friendly neighborhood celestial bodies because gravity's a bitch.

Other equally insane solution exists like increasing the earth overall albedo, in particularly the ocean's. Btw albedo is a fraction of light reflected by a surface. Higher albedo = lighter, whiter surface = higher reflection (example: polar region). Lower albedo = darker surface = lower reflection (example: ocean surface).

The polar region is colder than the equator because its has way higher albedo. Lots of white and bright icy surface there, reflecting back the sunlight instead of absorbing it and get heated in the process.

Unfortunately increasing the ocean's albedo using say, a massive amount of alumunium foil, will also fuck up our weather system...

TL;DR Climate change is real.

Correct, I explained this above. However this is a massive safety risk. Human's eyes & brain work basically on average, overall brightness. Increasing the road's brightness might decrease our sensitivity to other more important light source such as traffic light, parking brake, road sign or even another car/human. Might need a self driving AI for this.

hey thanks, that all makes perfect sense and honestly pretty much describes why I assumed it wouldn't work.

Now I can sleep peacefully KNOWING it's a dumb idea lmao

thisworld posted...

@

Here let me try. Please excuse typo/grammar, I'm tired rn.

You are aware of the concept of gravitational potential energy? U=mgh? U=-GMm/r? Pick up a galon of water off the floor. Feel heavy? That's you workingagainst the earth's gravity.

That would illustrate the basic energy requirement for this job because now we will be moving the earth away against the sun's gravity, a fiery ball so large and heavy it's gravitational pull extends way waaaayyyyyyyy beyond Pluto.

U=-GMm/r. Those M and m are the sun's and the earth's mass respectively. r is the distance and G is physical constant. Look I can give you the exact number but just trust me that it's a big number... like, really biigggg. But let's ignore that and assume we somehow managed to move the earth away.

Now how are we gonna stop the earth once it reaches its new orbit? In case of sending a rocket to the moon like in your example, we basically just slammed the rocket against the moon to make it stop. What are we gonna slam the now moving earth against? Yup, we would need to built yet another earth moving rocket just to stop the earth and stabilize its new orbit. Voila! More energy needed for this insane project

Okay we just reached a new orbit. Feel satisfied? Well, don't, because more problems follow. Are you familiar with tidal wave? It's largely regulated by both the sun's and the moon's gravity and most importantly, it affects the earth's rotation.

Think of it this way. The portion of the earth that's solid just wants to rotate merrily on its axis without a care in the world. However the oceanic water on its surface got pulled away by the sun+moon and wants to stay that way and in doing so, slows the rotation of the solid earth beneath it through friction. Spin a boiled egg (all solid). Now spin a raw egg (solid + liquid) and observe. The liquid part of the raw egg will slow the spin through friction against its outer shell. Similar principle.

This new orbit will throw the delicate tidal wave equation out of balance because the sun will now exert less gravitational pull on the earth's water. The result? We just fucked up the earth's rotation. Yay!

Btw, the movement and orbit of other celestial bodies around us will get affected too. You know, gravity and all that jazz. Some celestial bodies might experience orbit decay, some might get slingshot out of the solar system and so on. We just fucked up our solar system too, except the sun lol.

That's not all because we just doomed the humanity too. Essential plants like corn, rice, and tomatoes need a lot of sunlight to grow properly. Like a lot of sunlight. Some like potatoes need less but still, how are they going to get their sunlight now that we're farther away from the sun? I hope you like eating nothing but oregano for meal since it need less sunlight

Let's recap:
<1> We would need a lot of energy to both move and stop the earth
<2> We would fuck up the earth's rotation
<3> ... and the plants
<4> ... and the animals and the hoomans too
<5> ... and our friendly neighborhood celestial bodies because gravity's a bitch.

Other equally insane solution exists like increasing the earth overall albedo, in particularly the ocean's. Btw albedo is a fraction of light reflected by a surface. Higher albedo = lighter, whiter surface = higher reflection (example: polar region). Lower albedo = darker surface = lower reflection (example: ocean surface).

The polar region is colder than the equator because its has way higher albedo. Lots of white and bright icy surface there, reflecting back the sunlight instead of absorbing it and get heated in the process.

Unfortunately increasing the ocean's albedo using say, a massive amount of alumunium foil, will also fuck up our weather system...

TL;DR Climate change is real.

Correct, I explained this above. However this is a massive safety risk. Human's eyes & brain work basically on average, overall brightness. Increasing the road's brightness might decrease our sensitivity to other more important light source such as traffic light, parking brake, road sign or even another car/human. Might need a self driving AI for this.

Nah, it'd work

Imagine typing up dat wall of text in what is obviously a joke topic.

Cruciferous posted...

I see what you're saying but there must be like a perfect angle and amount of force that would do it for us. Taking the spin of the earth and such into consideration. If we can use math to basically blind shoot a rocket into the surface of a moon millions of miles away why can't we figure that out?

still ELI5 I am being half serious tho

Even putting aside the dizzying amount of physics to consider here, how would you even go about creating a force that can shift something that weighs 13 septillion pounds, rotating at 1,000 miles an hour and travelling at 67 thousand miles an hour through space? Is there a God-sized finger around ready to poke it like a basketball on a god-sized globetrotter's finger?

thisworld posted...

You're overthinking it and are fundamentally wrong as a result.

Why don't we take Global Warming and PUSH it somewhere else?

Trumble posted...

https://what-if.xkcd.com/162/

Best part of that: Outer space is a lot higher up than Niagara Falls,[citation needed]

Why dont we simply pump water into space to cool it down and then pump it back to earth