Fun With: Ruining a World

[rhoenix]

Setting: Earth-like world (same specifics where necessary).
Scenario: Fuck this world up to become inhospitable to human life for at least a few thousand years.

Caveats: You may only use what hard sci-fi would allow you (e.g. what's possible with today's technology).

So - how would you do it? I'm looking for variety here, so the more ideas, the better. In terms of this scenario, even inefficient mechanisms would be acceptable - so throw out your ideas.


As always, my thanks in advance.

[Zor]

Easy. You build a nuclear fusion propelled spacecraft about a kilometer long with a flat bow with various cables and other fastening devices at it's bow, as well as an explosive charge system. You go about finding sizable asteriods, fastening them to the bow of this craft, push them into new orbits in which they will crash into the surface of the planet. Once there on their way, jetison the rock, Rince and repeat.

Zor

[Batman]

Except a fusion propelled spacecraft ISN'T possible with today's technology.

And define inhospitable, please. Does it actively have to kill humans (toxic atmosphere, radiation, man-eating wildlife and the likes) or would a planet simply not up to supporting any sizeable population be enough? And is there a timeframe? Because I think we can do the latter easily by simply ignoring environmental issues long and hard enough.

[open_sketchbook]

Double Failure. Fusion reactors cannot be miniaturized small enough for practical use on a spacecraft. It simply cannot be done from an engineering perspective.

However, launching every nuclear missile and dropping every bomb on the planet on an even spread across the land masses should pretty much do it. The only survivors will be on boats and they'll have to return eventually for food and fuel.

[rhoenix]

And define inhospitable, please. Does it actively have to kill humans (toxic atmosphere, radiation, man-eating wildlife and the likes) or would a planet simply not up to supporting any sizeable population be enough? And is there a timeframe? Because I think we can do the latter easily by simply ignoring environmental issues long and hard enough.

Short answer: "yes, within a short timeframe."

Long answer: Since it would be boring to simply let us as a species just continue on our merry way and have that be an answer, I'm looking for ways to toxify the atmosphere, irradiate this world, greatly thicken cloudcover to dramatically increase global warming; that sort of thing.

For the others: remember, the goal here is to mess this world up in terms of supporting life easily, not to destroy it.

[Samuel]

Snow Ball Earth is the best bet. Remove all the CO2, methane and the rest of the greenhouse gases and watch as the oceans freeze over. I have no idea how you could do that without being stopped though.

Alternatively find a way to dump a large amount of particulaties into the atmosphere to drop the temperature.

[Batman]

(WRT open-sketchbook)
Roughly 2 billion casualties for a full-scale nuclear exchange if memory serves. Large swathes of land WOULD be inhospitable for a good while but the planet as a whole would still be habitable.

[rhoenix]

Snow Ball Earth is the best bet. Remove all the CO2, methane and the rest of the greenhouse gases and watch as the oceans freeze over. I have no idea how you could do that without being stopped though.

Interesting - is there a mechanism for doing so?

Alternatively find a way to dump a large amount of particulaties into the atmosphere to drop the temperature.

...Wouldn't that increase the temperature by preventing heat from escaping?

EDIT: Added reply to Batman.

Roughly 2 billion casualties for a full-scale nuclear exchange if memory serves. Large swathes of land WOULD be inhospitable for a good while but the planet as a whole would still be habitable.

That's certainly a good addendum then. It should also irradiate the atmosphere for a good while as well, correct?

If so, how would that affect the weather patterns?

[Zor]

I appoligize for my missreading of the thread's subject and conceed.

Zor

[Samuel]

Interesting - is there a mechanism for doing so?

They are currently working on devices that can remove the CO2 from the atmosphere. Part of geoengineering. I don't know how well they work though, but you can use that.

Or, for more competant individuals, solar shades. Just block out the sunlight and let the planet freeze

...Wouldn't that increase the temperature by preventing heat from escaping?

Most of the planet's heat comes from the Sun.

That's certainly a good addendum then. It should also irradiate the atmosphere for a good while as well, correct?

If so, how would that affect the weather patterns?

Weather is unaffected by nuclear particulates. You won't irradiate the air either- eventually the substances causing fallout will settle down. Given their density they should settle out very quickly. If you want something coherant and more exact, ask Stuart.

[Batman]

That's certainly a good addendum then. It should also irradiate the atmosphere for a good while as well, correct?

I don't see why, really. Nukes are meant to blow stuff up, just like regular bombs. Modern day nukes DO irradiate the surroundings of the impact site, but one hell of a lot less than Hiroshima-era stuff. Every gram of reactant that goes to irradiating the surrounding area is a gram that DIDN'T react and contribute to the explosion. I'm not sure how 'irradiating the atmosphere' would work but generally it's solids and liquids that get contaminated, and that mostly by having radioactive material embedded in them rather than mere exposure to radiation.

If so, how would that affect the weather patterns?

I don't know but I'd predict 'nothing much'. Nuclear winter scenarios usually involve a preposterous number of dirty nukes being used or a ridiculous overestimation of the EFFECTS those nukes would have.

[rhoenix]

Or, for more competant individuals, solar shades. Just block out the sunlight and let the planet freeze

That does sound like a fun possibility.

Most of the planet's heat comes from the Sun.

Granted; but would this particulate matter outright block heat, or trap it?

Either way would be pretty messed up, now that I think about it.

I don't see why, really. Nukes are meant to blow stuff up, just like regular bombs. Modern day nukes DO irradiate the surroundings of the impact site, but one hell of a lot less than Hiroshima-era stuff. Every gram of reactant that goes to irradiating the surrounding area is a gram that DIDN'T react and contribute to the explosion. I'm not sure how 'irradiating the atmosphere' would work but generally it's solids and liquids that get contaminated, and that mostly by having radioactive material embedded in them rather than mere exposure to radiation.

Now this is an interesting thought - some sort of radioactive (or other) substance that bonds with water, thus contaminating this planet's entire water table.

I don't know but I'd predict 'nothing much'. Nuclear winter scenarios usually involve a preposterous number of dirty nukes being used or a ridiculous overestimation of the EFFECTS those nukes would have.

Ah - that takes that option off the list, then.

[Junghalli]

With today's technology it's pretty close to impossible. With hard SF technology though it's actually fairly easy, as long as you have a lot of resources at your command (except for #2, which is the poor man's method).

1) Build a huge fleet of spacecraft and slam rocks into the planet. Lots and lots of big rocks.

2) Create a genetically engineered bacteria that quickly kills humans and can thoroughly saturate the biosphere. The bacteria can live in a wide variety of plants and animals and can live independently if no host is available but is only fatal to humans. The planet will technically be habitable but being dropped on it without an NBC suit will be a death sentence.

3) Build gigantic sunshades and/or solar mirrors and use them to change the planet's climate until its environment is no longer survivable to humans (i.e. raise the temperature above 100 C or lower it below 0 C). For extra sadism points change the temperature slowly so the natives can only watch helplessly as the temperature increases by 1 degree per day until they all boil to death.

[Batman]

Now this is an interesting thought - some sort of radioactive (or other) substance that bonds with water, thus contaminating this planet's entire water table.

Um-no. You get a limited amount of radioactive matter that in turn contaminates a limited amount of water. I very much doubt all or even a lot of Earth's surface water would be affected, and even if that were true, there's still the deep seas, so the vast majority of Earth's water supply would be unaffected. Heck Earth's seas ALREADY contain a lot more radioactives than we can ever hope to mine on land. They're just too widely distributed to make that a problem or an option for harvesting them.

[tim31]

Granted; but would this particulate matter outright block heat, or trap it?

Either way would be pretty messed up, now that I think about it.

You're confusing particulate matter with greenhouse gases. The latter allows solar radiation in but does not allow the usual reflection into space. Thus, like a greenhouse, heat is trapped. Particulate matter in the atmosphere does not allow enough radiation through to sustain the global climate as it stands today, and thus we are plunged into a nuclear winter.

[rhoenix]

You're confusing particulate matter with greenhouse gases. The latter allows solar radiation in but does not allow the usual reflection into space. Thus, like a greenhouse, heat is trapped. Particulate matter in the atmosphere does not allow enough radiation through to sustain the global climate as it stands today, and thus we are plunged into a nuclear winter.

I wrote that in a very unclear fashion; my apologies. I was referring to the same basic mechanism (dumping stuff into the atmosphere) could accomplish either goal (that of reflecting heat away from the planet and therefore dramatically dropping the global temperature, or trapping heat received from the sun here and creating a high-speed runaway greenhouse effect).

Which does beg the question, now that I'm elucidated this train of thought - would creating a runaway greenhouse effect to bake this world be more malignant overall, or would plunging the world into a nuclear winter be worse overall?

[Samuel]

I believe it takes less energy removed rom a system to make water solid than it does added to a system to make it a gas.

Latent heat of melting - 334 kJ/kg
Latent heat of evaporation - 2,270 kJ/kg
http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/water ... d_162.html

So it would be easier to freeze the planet than scorch it. Of course, the heating would be more permanent so if you want something that is going away you could have a solar sail block the planet and fall apart after a couple hundred years.

[rhoenix]

To me, this also raises an interesting question - is it possible to somehow contaminate the world's water cycles, so that storms would heat up the areas where they gather, rather than pour down rain?

[Gerix]

Hi, I'm new to this board.

As for dumping particulates in the atmosphere. That's basically what nuclear winter is all about. Dumping huge amounts of particulates into the atmosphere which were generated by burning cities due to a nuclear war. We're talking lots of burning cities. The particulates reflect sunlight causing the temperature to go down. If you can dump enough into the atmosphere it would reduce the sunlight hitting the ground enough to affect crops. I'm not sure if that's realistic for a nuclear war. There were a bunch of studies done in the '80s and I'm not sure what the final result was, but it was definately taken seroiusly for awhile.

An all out nuclear exchange would certainly increase the average level of radiation, kill a lot of people, and make living a lot less fun for those remaining but probably wouldn't make large areas of the Earth toxic or anything. Although details would depend on the type of nuclear exchange. If it involved ground bursts of LOTS of weapons the fallout would be hundreds of times worse then air bursts for example.

I'm going from old memories here, but I seem to recall there are absolutely huge amounts of methane trapped in the ocean floor. If that could be released (perhaps by some well placed nuclear devices) it could cause all sorts of problems. Sorry but this is an old memory and I can't give more details.

[Samuel]

To me, this also raises an interesting question - is it possible to somehow contaminate the world's water cycles, so that storms would heat up the areas where they gather, rather than pour down rain?

Short answer- no.
Long answer- How do you contaminate the water cycle? Also, storms already move heat with them in the form of water going from gas to liquid.

I'm going from old memories here, but I seem to recall there are absolutely huge amounts of methane trapped in the ocean floor. If that could be released (perhaps by some well placed nuclear devices) it could cause all sorts of problems. Sorry but this is an old memory and I can't give more details.

I can... well actually the navy can.
http://www.nrl.navy.mil/content.php?P=02REVIEW112

Nukes wouldn't work due to the short range and the sheer number you'd need. The ocean floor is big.

[rhoenix]

Short answer- no.
Long answer- How do you contaminate the water cycle? Also, storms already move heat with them in the form of water going from gas to liquid.

Quite honestly, I'm not sure. I just want to see if something like this can be done somehow.

[rhoenix]

Hi, I'm new to this board.

Hi, and welcome to SDN.

So far, the two biggest potential things that can be done are to heat up the planet on a global scale, mimicking Venus in mechanism basically; or blocking sunlight from hitting it to have the planet freeze.

Other effects, like mass irradiation with cobalt warheads, or other sorts of fiendish fun are an excellent bonus, which is why I'm looking for those avenues too. You know, for added flavor.

[K. A. Pital]

Fullscale nuclear exchange between all and every nation on the Earth, with groundbursts for maximum pollution, and strikes against population centers, rivers and crop regions, not military objects. Maybe cobalt casings for ICBM warheads. Targeting of all nuclear powerplants for maximum contamination of larger cities. Ouch...

[Molyneux]

Drop some Ice-9 into the Atlantic. What can I say? I'm just a fan of the classics.

More realistically, I'm not sure what could work. If there is any known way to induce a volcano to erupt, I'd probably try to rig every active volcano on Earth to erupt near-simultaneously; the increase in particulate matter in the atmosphere would drop the temperature quite a bit, though I doubt there would be enough to take the world below life-sustaining levels.

I suppose I could build gigantic rockets on the Moon, and attempt to slowly nudge it out of orbit...that's more a tens-of-thousands-of-years move, but dropping the Moon on the Earth would have to do some damage.

[KroLazuxy_87]

Option A:
Slowly manipulate all the world's religions into predicting the apocalypse and watch societies tear themselves apart. (Sadly, I think with enough know-how, man power, and some luck, this wouldn't be too hard)

Option B:
Step 1. Birth A.I.
Step 2. Realize I've forgotten to program it to obey humans.
Step 3. Die

Option C:
Discover all those "smart-people" at the LHC were wrong, and a continuously growing black hole is created.