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Tremors baffle scientists? Yellowstone is a volcanic cauldron. . . a "supervolcano".
You beat me to it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BigJon3475
I'm still waiting on the killer asteroids and hamsters.....
Asteroids pass through Earth's orbit on a regular basis. It is only a matter of time when a large one strikes. It would require a very large asteroid to completely wipe out earth, though.
Quote:
Originally Posted by cap1717
A couple of folks here seem to think that they will be "safe" if Yellowstone blows. . . interesting.
While many people will experience a very bad day and life on the planet would be rather grey for about a decade, life as we know it will change, but not completely end if the entireity of Yellowstone blows. But Yellowstone will not blow as one large eruption. There more than likely will be a few good sized eruptions or many smaller ones. Nothing that will cause the end of the planet.
Quote:
Originally Posted by GCSTroop
Should Yellowstone go up, most of the people on the Western half of the U.S. wouldn't know it anyway. You'd all be dead. Those of us East of the Mississippi would feel the effects before too long and we'd be goners too.
Of course, you could get hit by a bus tomorrow, a plane could crash into your house, lightning could strike you or you might get a fishhook stuck in your cerebral cortex. Why do people worry about Yellowstone any more than these things?
There are numerous ways in which the Universe could end life on our planet. Most of which we could not defend against and if we were not aware that we have just been wiped out we would have a few hours to a couple of weeks to make peace.
I wouldn't worry about Yellowstone, though. We are going to kill each other off long before Mother Nature will. Happy New Year.
All I'm saying is that people are going crazy over it but it's nothing we can control. Sure, we should learn about it, perhaps we may be able to predict when it will blow its top in doing so. I don't have a problem with that - especially if it may be able to save lives. But, let's face it, it's one of those things that is either going to happen or not - regardless of what we do about it. I'm not going to lose sleep over it. If it blows up, don't get me wrong, that sucks - BADLY. But, let's face it, why am I going to stay up at night wondering if it's going to blow up in my backyard? Fear sells and there's a reason for it.
Point taken. My thoughts are that in a salacious world where we get every minute detail of "stories" like the missing Aruba girl and the like, I see a glaring lack of real Scientific discussion and information about the various potentials. I may be the most paranoid guy around, but I explained all of this to my wife last night and she said if it makes me feel any better to go to CostCo and stock up on a few weeks of canned food, to go ahead. I'm going to do just that. Why? Because any scenario where something meaningful occurs is going to initiate panic and I don't want to be one of the many speeding to the stores then.
I just want to know what could happen, along with some odds. If it's 1%, I think that merits the trip to the stores now. I'm not seeing any statistical analysis. The only such thought I've seen, and I agree with it, is that fact that the last three monster eruptions happened at about 600,000 year intervals does not have substantial meaning in predicting the exact time of the next event. It could be today or it could be a million years from now. But I'm reminded of a great story in a poker book written by Barry Greenstein. He recounts a story where in his amateur days he bet a huge amount into a pot and a professor took a lot of time thinking about whether he'd call. The bet was thousands of dollars and would materially affect the guy's life. The professor waxed on about how the only way Greenstein could take the pot would be if he had two exact cards in his hand. The guy convinced himself to call because the odds against that were a thousand to one. So the professor called and Greenstein showed him the two cards he dreaded seeing and scooped the pot. Greenstein's point was that the professor, who was brilliant, had one fatal flaw in his thinking. The odds were not a thousand to one that he held those cards. The odds were closer to a thousand to one that he didn't have those cards, because he never would have made that big of a bet with anything less than the best hand possible. The professor should have known Greenstein's behavior and folded.
So even if in geological time the odds of an eruption occuring in any hundred or even thousand year span are very low, the odds go out the window when you start seeing the level of harmonic Seismic activity that appears to be related to magma movement, at a period when the Caldera itself has been experiencing years of unusual upward movement.
Yes, I agree that if this does happen, it happens. But at the very least I will have enough provisions on hand to survive the first month or so with my family so we can decide how to respond from there. To that degree, I have something I can do about it. Beyond that, I agree there isn't much that can or should be reasonably undertaken.
Hope I come off looking like a nut in a week or two, my garage lined with cans.
A somewhat reassuring update. James Pethokoukis of US News's email conversation with Dr. Jacob Lowenstern of the U.S. Geological Survey, top scientist at the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory, at 3 PM EST January 1:
I watch an earthquake website and have noticed a lot of quakes recently. Southern California, Utah, and may places in the West have earthquakes on a regular basis, but I am seeing more quakes in the Eastern United States recently. I sometimes think weather patterns affect the quake activity. Maybe all the snow and the freezing of the ground cause things to move a little. What do you think?
I don't think so, though if there is a volcano, it could affect the weather. I see the underground stuff as one kind of weather, while topside is another kind.
Point taken. My thoughts are that in a salacious world where we get every minute detail of "stories" like the missing Aruba girl and the like, I see a glaring lack of real Scientific discussion and information about the various potentials. I may be the most paranoid guy around, but I explained all of this to my wife last night and she said if it makes me feel any better to go to CostCo and stock up on a few weeks of canned food, to go ahead. I'm going to do just that. Why? Because any scenario where something meaningful occurs is going to initiate panic and I don't want to be one of the many speeding to the stores then.
I just want to know what could happen, along with some odds. If it's 1%, I think that merits the trip to the stores now. I'm not seeing any statistical analysis. The only such thought I've seen, and I agree with it, is that fact that the last three monster eruptions happened at about 600,000 year intervals does not have substantial meaning in predicting the exact time of the next event. It could be today or it could be a million years from now. But I'm reminded of a great story in a poker book written by Barry Greenstein. He recounts a story where in his amateur days he bet a huge amount into a pot and a professor took a lot of time thinking about whether he'd call. The bet was thousands of dollars and would materially affect the guy's life. The professor waxed on about how the only way Greenstein could take the pot would be if he had two exact cards in his hand. The guy convinced himself to call because the odds against that were a thousand to one. So the professor called and Greenstein showed him the two cards he dreaded seeing and scooped the pot. Greenstein's point was that the professor, who was brilliant, had one fatal flaw in his thinking. The odds were not a thousand to one that he held those cards. The odds were closer to a thousand to one that he didn't have those cards, because he never would have made that big of a bet with anything less than the best hand possible. The professor should have known Greenstein's behavior and folded.
So even if in geological time the odds of an eruption occuring in any hundred or even thousand year span are very low, the odds go out the window when you start seeing the level of harmonic Seismic activity that appears to be related to magma movement, at a period when the Caldera itself has been experiencing years of unusual upward movement.
Yes, I agree that if this does happen, it happens. But at the very least I will have enough provisions on hand to survive the first month or so with my family so we can decide how to respond from there. To that degree, I have something I can do about it. Beyond that, I agree there isn't much that can or should be reasonably undertaken.
Hope I come off looking like a nut in a week or two, my garage lined with cans.
I agree with you in how the news presents a story but you also have to remember that the way the media portrays science is no different a story than anything else. I really do wish we had more science heroes in our day (Brian Greene, Michio Kaku, etc...) rather than these ridiculous icons of modern day society that glamorize stupidity and airheadedness as if it were something to strive for. Yet, we should also be skeptical in how the news presents certain items to us as well. This goes for programs that are found on Discovery Channel, History Channel, TLC and others as well. The reason I say this is because sensationalism sells and fear sells. Boring volcanic rocks do not sell. They do not attract viewers. They do not sell newspapers and they usually do not spawn internet conversations.
But what does sell is by telling people that there are any number of chances for their life to end tomorrow. We are watching this right now in the news by hearing them playback minute after minute after minute after minute of clips and reports about just how horrible the world is in terms of financial security (notably in the U.S.). They did it after 9-11 with their constant indundation and use of the word "terror" every single time you turned on a television or radio. This is not me trying to sound as though I am undercutting the magnitude of certain events but are we really better off scaring ourselves to death with every single thing we hear about in the news? This goes for terrorists, financial crisises, and yes, super volcanoes. Hell, the religious have been doing it for years with their promenades and ridiculous "predictions" about how certain prophets will be returning "any day now" whenever things turn for the worse and we will all be repenting for our sins as we burn away in fire.
In so much as what you mention about probabilities and the like, it is indeed true that unforeseen events occur both for the good and for the bad. But, using this logic and the logic you are providing yourself with for buying some tuna fish and bottled water at the grocery store, why have you not done this sooner out of fear of asteroids hitting the earth, alien attacks (there is perhaps a chance that could happen ) or, to put it in a more realistic perspective, terrorists attacking? After all, I would venture to guess that the odds of this volcano going up are probably very close to the odds of terrorists striking your home given the number of years between volcanic events as compared to the number of cities in America.
Yet, there seems to be something more compelling about things that happen on a massive scale because they have a greater potential of affecting us even if ground zero of the event is miles away. Thus, we seem to have greater fatal attractions to these things but why?
Would you be stocking up on tuna fish and bottled water if you had never heard about the supervolcano? No. There could be an asteroid floating around headed straight for us that will wipe us all out before we watch the ball drop in Times Square to ring in 2010. Although, I think it would be pretty neat to synchronize the ball drop with an asteroid strike! But, why have you not prepared for it?
Seriously though, if you want to go out and buy supplies in case of something unforeseen, I think that is a much more logical approach than being scared witless over a volcano. All in all, I don't think it'd matter much anyway.
I'm the kind of person who is going to spend what I normally spend because if I lose my job, there's no amount of squirreling away cash that is going to keep me from foreclosing and losing everything. I'm not going to build a nuclear bunker in case Russia gets a little overzealous again or if terrorists decide to detonate a bomb somewhere over Northern Mississippi and I'm not going to stock up on canned goods and bottled water in case Mt. Saint Yellowstone decides to send us back to the Stone Age. I'm not going to live my life worrying about every little thing that could possibly knock me off or hurt me. I'm just going to live my life.
"We have nothing to fear but fear itself" - What profound words of wisdom.
Yet, there seems to be something more compelling about things that happen on a massive scale because they have a greater potential of affecting us even if ground zero of the event is miles away. Thus, we seem to have greater fatal attractions to these things but why?
Because events like this actually have in impact on lives, regardless of how far removed we are from the epicenter. They challenge our ideas of what mortality means on this planet. The realization that there are things out there that we cannot control that can seriously change the way we live is sobering. It takes us out of our comfort zones.
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) or, to put it in a more realistic perspective, terrorists attacking? After all, I would venture to guess that the odds of this volcano going up are probably very close to the odds of terrorists striking your home given the number of years between volcanic events as compared to the number of cities in America.
