[Viral Video Chart] Asteroid Impact Simulation

The internet is large enough for the billions of people that occupy this planet. Through sheer numbers alone, you know we're in for a significant amount of diversity and therefore creativity as well.

Thus you'd think that it's probably accurate to say that somewhere in the world at any given time, someone is thinking of something to showcase to the world. And of all those creative, thinking people, at least one of them will put it on YouTube.

Here's a pretty interesting simulation of the effects of a very large, albeit perfectly spheroid, asteroid hitting the Earth. Yeah, you know this can't possibly end well.


#16 - big asteroid impact

[Environmentalism] Thinking Greener

I've always considered myself to be a pocket environmentalist - I say pocket since I've yet to get on a boat to protest whale fishing in the middle of the ocean and other fun stuff like that. Still, what geek doesn't maintain some level of awareness of the needs of the planet, right? How can we even hope to reach the futuristic world of our science fiction fantasies unless we manage to keep things together long enough for human civilization to get there, right?

With recent news focusing on constantly rising oil prices, greater concerns over the cost of basic necessities like food and utilities like electricity, thinking "greener" is definitely more and more important these days. It seems only right that as your resident Geeky Guide, I ought to be doing more in line with this.

That's always the challenge, isn't it? I'm sure a lot of us are keen on wanting to do something (or at least we say we are) and then when the task seems too daunting to address right away, we sort of take time, park it then forget about it until the next big issue or crises comes along to spur us into action. Don't you just hate that?

At the very least, I've started with the basics.

Image by Getty Images via DaylifeFirst off I made sure that my partner and I put a conscious effort towards using only florescent bulbs throughout our apartment. It was a bit tricky since there is some comfort associated with the warmer tones of incandescent lights, but with recent advances in bulb technology to include a wider variety of both shapes and colors, we eventually resolved that concern.

Next came energy conservation. It's the basics of closing all lights when not in use, keeping appliance use to a minimum and checking the energy efficiency ratings of appliances before purchase. It certainly helped keep our electrical costs down, but it's not exactly saving the world just yet. I also tried to address the so-called "vampire electricity" usage due to higher technology appliances using power even when turned off. I now have all appliances on simpler kill-circuit power strips so when they're not in use, I can kill the circuit and thus the flow of electricity. That really made on our electric bill and I was very happy to see that.

But there's a lot more to be done, naturally.

I'm thinking of trying to devote more Geeky Guide time and resources towards speaking more about environmentalism, actively working to battle climate change and generally trying to reduce our carbon footprint in order to impact the world less negatively. It seems a great thing to do since everything starts with information, and I can only hope it pays off somehow.

Let's all try to be greener my fellow geeks! More on this subject in the weeks to come.

[Earth News] Ecological Debt Day

Today, October 9, 2006, has been announced to be this year's World Ecological Debt Day. What this is supposed to mean is that this is the day of the year that our demands as a global population exceed the planet's ability to produce resources and absorb waste. Pretty strong statement, huh?

The declaration is based on a study done yearly by the Global Footprint Network, a US-based think tank that has been conducting this research based on footprint information since 1961. They use a unit of measure roughly equivalent to the productive output of the planet as a whole, thus "number of planets" when you get right down to it.



In the graph above, this shows that as a planet we've moved from using about half of the equivalent resources of the world in 1961 all the way to using 1.2 time the biocapacity of the planet in 2002, a pretty scary number since we're not going to be able to "borrow" resources from anywhere else anytime soon. Thus, we're stuck with our debt unless we figure out what to do.

The World Ecological Debt Day has been steadily moving earlier and earlier over the years starting with it being on the 19th of December in 1987 to the 1st of November in the year 2000 and this year with it at the 9th of October. The group's site also includes national footprints for limited countries, namely China, France, India, North and South Korea, Mexico, the Netherlands and the Philippines, surprisingly enough.

You may have already encountered the organiztion if you've ever taken the Ecological Footprint Quiz created back in 2002, which is still active today. It turns out that I use up the equivalent of over 2 Earths primarily because of my food and shelter related resource consumption. Geez.

It certainly gives you something to think about.