Bill Gates vs. the Weather: Your Thoughts

[rodsky]

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Before everything else, read this article:

Can Bill Gates stop hurricanes? Scientists doubt it - CNN.com

Now discuss.

-RODION

[fritzd]

If one can perhaps minimize or control hurricanes, something has got to give. Something which will maybe even cause more trouble. hehe

[jamesmusslewhite]

For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. The term "It is not nice to fool around with mother nature." Just might come into play here.

[Tarmac]

Do we want to tamper with these forces of nature?

Thunderstorms are nature's heat pumps. They take heat close to the surface and pump them into the upper atmosphere where it is ultimately radiated off into space.

On a larger scale, Tropical Cyclones (which begin life as a series or cluster of thunderstorms) are nature's way of redistributing heat and moisture over a large area, often covering hundreds of thousands of square kilometers. A typhoon, for instance, starts forming somewhere near the Micronesian islands about 5 degrees above the equator, and end up in Japan over a week later. That's a wide swath of ocean. Will Bill Gates be building enough tugs and barges to cover such a large area?

Cyclones then are not all about destruction and mayhem. They play a vital role in regulating global temperatures. Scientist estimate that without thunderstorms or hurricanes, global temperatures would actually rise several degrees. Bill Gates in effect wants to tamper with nature's thermostat.

And we haven't even begun to consider what effects pumping cold ocean water from the deep to the surface may have on oceanic currents.

[jamesmusslewhite]

Tarmac,

Excellent post. Once you start an event you must think how it will effect all events. One wrong action could start a chain reaction of catastrophic falling Dominoes. How do you stand them back up, and correct a mistake. There is no download patch on this one.

Bill Gates can not even produce an OS with out being full of bugs and flaws, and he plans to solve the world's ills. He needs to first prove he can fix his Windows Vista, before we allow him to start tampering with the weather over our world's vistas.

[brownprose]

^^ he sees them (storms) like software bugs ... soon, we expect our oceans to get some updates every now and then.

[emailroy2002]

he will direct all hurricanes to his competitors office when he can control the hurricane by his trustworthy mouse.

[moz_k2]

maghuwat sa ta ug service pack 1 kay naa jud na palpak at first
nahan jud ni si bill gates ma stormtrooper da.

[emailroy2002]

he wants the hurricanes to be a virus free.

[rodsky]

I'll play the devil's advocate for a bit.

When nuclear fission was being thought about, people said "Nooo, don't do it! The chain reaction would unravel all space-time as we know it!" or "It will destroy the world!" But then, the bottom line was, if we didn't try it out, then we wouldn't have known the effects of a nuclear explosion.

So, they did the tests...and we're still here. We didn't blow ourselves up.

Granted, several nuclear explosions scattered over decades, does have an effect on the environment and weather. However, my point being is, if we don't try it, at least just ONCE, we wouldn't really know if this "controlling a storm" has any lasting adverse effect on the environment/planet in general.

To sum up my point, I don't think that one test will destroy humanity or the world. And if that test saves a lot of human lives, I'm all for it.

-RODION