Re: two-page synopsis of Message Received


"David Friedman" <ddfr@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:ddfr-BDB0AB.10334010022006@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
In article <11upd49rdpo130f@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
"Patricia C. Wrede" <pwrede6492@xxxxxxx> wrote:

"Zeborah" <zeborah@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1hakffm.pk7psi1c9pjv4N%zeborah@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Rich Weyand <weyand@xxxxxxx> wrote:

The system deflected the asteroid a bit before it broke it up, just
enough to
delay the impacts until the Pacific Ocean was centered on the leading
side of
the planet in its orbit. Given that the Earth actually hits the
asteroids,
and not the other way around, that puts almost all of the debris in
the
Pacific. Lots of empty space.

Lots of tsunamis?

What would worry me about that would be the effect of the steam. I saw
an
article a while back that ran some numbers on asteroid impacts, and
concluded that a big one coming down into water would be as destructive
or
even more destructive than one hitting land, because of the triple effect
of
the immediate steam generated (= increased cloud cover), the local rise
in
ocean temperature killing off a big chunk of sea life (how big depending
on
where it hit and how large the asteroid), and the long-term effect of
even a
fraction-of-a-degree rise in overall ocean temperature given the other
two
things. I wish I could remember where I saw it...

That might worry you if it were actually happening. But it seems to me
that climate models are sufficiently uncertain at this point to permit
an author to plausibly assume either very little effect or very large
effect, according to what serves his purposes.

Yes -- all those butterflies have to make *some* kind of difference...

Patricia C. Wrede


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