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Man Can Survive a Major Disaster

If there is a major world disaster will Mankind survive? In the past our forebears got through environmental difficulties, so there is no reason to believe that this will not continue to happen. As technology becomes increasingly specialized, things we take for granted will be lost. Humanity will take a few steps back or fall right back into a survival-type culture. The skill to print could end. Story telling could return as a way to pass on culture. Man has always been inquisitive about what lies over the horizon. Experimentation will still be the key to survival. In a major disaster only those species that can adapt will live through it. Neanderthals were not smart enough to survive. This is despite their brains being larger than humans. The brains of Man obviously operated differently. This could have been the power of imagination. Neanderthals learned more by direct copying of behavior. Humans can deduce answers from information. Another important factor is present

Damage From Hurricanes and Tornadoes Still Not Foreseen

Natural disasters on this planet cause human pain and suffering. This includes financial loss from destroyed properties. The science in forecasting such events is still developing. Tornadoes are very unpredictable. Hurricanes move slower; yet the amount of damage is still an unknown quantity. The whole history of the US has included repeated "attacks" by hurricanes and tornadoes. Tracking of these events began in 1873 with the first hurricane warning by the U.S. Army Signal Corps. Advances were made in understanding flooding from storm surges. This did not prevent the most destructive hurricane of 1900 hitting without warning killing 12,000 citizens. In 1943 a pilot was sent into the eye of a hurricane. This marked the beginning of an intensive period of study into natural weather events. Ultimately, hurricane forecast models were developed. The 1960s saw the first use of satellites. In 1975 the Saffir-Simpson scale rating hurricane strength of one to five was fo

The Danger of Nuclear Power Stations

Countries are going ahead with investment in nuclear power despite very real dangers. Similar crises to Chernobyl and Three Mile Island will definitely occur in the future with catastrophic results for resident of neighboring nations of the country experiencing the problem. Where are they going to put the contaminated material after use? Putting it deep under landfill and into natural cavities in the earth have failed in the past. The only answer is to launch it into space on a trajectory to the sun. But what if the rocket explodes in the earth's atmosphere or crashes to earth? Nuclear power is also very expensive. It is too high a price to pay to reduce green house gas pollution. Electricity charges are already going through the roof in Australia and the green tax hasn't even been instituted yet. There is no way the use of uranium purchased from countries such as Australia can be policed. Once another country owns the uranium it can use it for military purposes, though all nuc