Similarly, I would argue - a scientific understanding of reality is objective with respect to all ideological interests. So, it has happened before. It is something of which human beings are capable. — karl stone

Again, like I said, this is a utopian vision with no prospect of occurring in the real world any time soon. And while we're waiting for your utopia to arrive, we're busy, busy, busy giving ourselves ever greater powers at an ever faster rate.

I'm sure you're aware of the Peter Principle, which suggests that people will rise in their careers until they finally arrive at a job that they can't handle. That's basically what I'm suggesting, that we will continue to develop greater and greater powers until we inevitably create one that we can't manage. It's reasonable to argue that this has already happened with nuclear weapons.

My argument is that this Peter Principle process will reach it's climax long before your utopia arrives.

Again, like I said, this is a utopian vision with no prospect of occurring in the real world any time soon. — Jake

Then I'm sorry to have wasted your time. Rest assured, I'll waste no more of it.

Then I'm sorry to have wasted your time. — karl stone

Well, no problem, because I'm wasting your time too. There appears to be no chance we will avoid what I'm pointing through via a process of reason, so there really isn't any point to me typing on the subject. Like you, I'm lost in my own little imaginary utopia.

Solving the energy issue is the first necessary step to securing a sustainable future. Energy is fundamental to everything we do. And clean energy is necessary to prevent run-away climate change. There are two main obstacles to providing the world with bountiful clean energy:

1) an abundance of fossil fuels - still in the ground, and
2) the cost of applying the technology.

The idea that renewable sources of energy are necessarily unreliable or insufficient to the task - is not a genuine obstacle, if applied on a sufficiently large scale. But we'll come to that in due course. First, we must address the question of how to keep fossil fuels in the ground. This may seem like an insurmountable issue - but the solution I devised is very simple, and entirely consistent with the principles of our economic system. Basically, fossil fuels are commodities, and commodities are assets. Assets can be mortgaged - and in this way, fossil fuels can be monetized without being extracted. The money raised by mortgaging fossil fuels would first go to applying sustainable energy technology.

Having overcome these two obstacles, the next question is "what technology?"

Here I would suggest taking on board the next big problem, and solving that at the same time. The next most fundamental need we have is abundant fresh water. 7/10ths of the earth's surface is covered with water, but fresh water is scarce. Only 2.5% of the world's water is fresh water, and it's unevenly distributed around the world. That's the cause of great human suffering and environmental damage. Solving these two problems together, would be a tremendous boon to humankind, and is ultimately necessary to sustainability. So how do we do it?

Bearing in mind such issues as transmission loss over long distances, I would suggest that solar panels floating on the surface of the ocean, could produce electricity - used to power desalination and electrolysis, producing fresh water and hydrogen fuel at sea, collected by ship, or pumped through pipelines to shore. The geographical area available at sea is incredibly vast, and effectively shading the ocean, with thousands of square kilometers of solar panels would also help combat global warming.

Desalination can be achieved via evaporation - heating sea water and collecting the steam. Steam can drive a turbine, to produce electricity - at voltages, adequate to power electrolysis. Electrolysis is the process of breaking the atomic bonds between two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom in water, by passing an electric current through it. Thus, these two process work hand in hand - producing fresh water and hydrogen fuel. Hydrogen - when compressed into a liquid gas, contains 2.5 times the energy of petroleum by weight, but when burnt (oxidized) the hydrogen atoms recombine with an oxygen atom, giving back the energy spent wrenching them apart - and producing no pollutant more volatile than water vapour.

Burning hydrogen in traditional power stations would provide the base load for the energy grid - rather than, depending directly on renewable power sources, and the fresh water could be used to reclaim wasteland for agriculture and habitation - thus protecting environmental resources from over-exploitation. Eventually, this whole technological complex would power itself (as long as the sun shines) without adding a molecule of carbon to the atmosphere. Ships powered by hydrogen, would collect and bring water and fuel ashore.

As I recollect, people worried about radiation, but we didn't think we were doomed, and no one was getting sick from radiation. We didn't drink less milk (strontium-90 or not). Minnesota has the best overall health outcomes of all the other states, except Hawaii and Massachusetts, with whom we trade off first place position. Good health outcomes are not owing to more radiation, of course, but to social policies and community norms which have brought about less smoking, less drinking, less fried food, better dentistry and better health care. — Bitter Crank

Usually higher than average radiation people get is when flying and in medical imaging. And most of the radiation we get is from the natural background radiation, either from cosmic or ground radiation. Here the capital Helsinki is built upon ground that has a lot of radon gas. Hence when building basements one has to provide enough ventilation. The average household here in this country gets 2 millisieverts of radiation from this background radiation annually. Now to put this into context with the Chernobyl accident in 1986, we here in Finland will suffer radiation until 2036 (50 years) of 2 millisieverts of radiation. Hence the Chernobyl accident gives in 50 years the average annual radiation that we get from natural radiation annually. And to put this into context, when I was scanned this year by a modern medical scanner, I got instantly 8 years worth of background radiation. From a dose of 1 sievert (not millisievert) of radiation there's a 5% change you get cancer. But how many people know about background radiation and how many of them can put into perspective the radiation from nuclear accidents?

As annoying as the facts are, animals do seem to be able to tolerate more radiation than I thought. There are some adverse effects on animals living in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, but nothing approaching catastrophic consequences. Wolves--the top predator--seem to be doing well there, despite feeding at the top of the food chain. Some birds have, if I remember correctly, developed a mal-aligned beak, not a beneficial mutation. The wolves may not be attaining the same upper age as they would elsewhere. — Bitter Crank

The reason for animals to prosper in Chernobyl exclusion zone is very natural: life in the wild is short and radiation effects in the long term. Hence the animals can reproduce before radiation effects kick in. This is btw the similar reason NASA basically opts for older astronauts for long term space missions: younger one's could fall ill to radiation during their lifetime, older astronauts die naturally.

And lets remember that the Chernobyl accident's radiation was equivalent to the radiation of 500 nuclear weapons being detonated. The exclusion zone itself basically shows how wildlife springs back once humans are taken out of the environment.

This may seem like an insurmountable issue - but the solution I devised is very simple, and entirely consistent with the principles of our economic system. Basically, fossil fuels are commodities, and commodities are assets. Assets can be mortgaged - and in this way, fossil fuels can be monetized without being extracted. — karl stone

Ok then, let's all repeat our posts yet again. Here's mine.

1) Assets which can't be used have no market value.

2) Assets without a market value can not be mortgaged.

3) You have no funding source for all your grand plans.

4) Your utopian dream is dead.

To debunk the claims above, prove to us that you would invest YOUR money in to a buried asset which can not be used until maybe some vague time way off in the distant future, long after you'll be dead.

Or...

Be honest enough to admit that you've built your entire scheme on a foundation made of sand that you were too lazy to think through for yourself, thus requiring others to do the homework for you, a process which you seem to deeply resent.

I'm not wasting my time writing something you won't read, or perhaps, simply don't understand. You are certainly not commenting from engagement with, and comprehension of these ideas. And this comment just seems designed to hurt me:

4) Your utopian dream is dead. — Jake

If I respected your intelligence in the least - that might matter, but I haven't got time for the closed minded, less yet the unpleasant. We're done. I will not speak to you again.

Interesting plan. But if it works, people might still dig up the coal 5000 years from now and burn it.

Whatever CO2 we put up will be scrubbed out of the atmosphere by the oceans. If we burn all the coal, the atmosphere will be back to normal in around 100,000 years.

If something unforeseen pops up and makes us extinct, there will still be life. The world doesn't need to be saved. :smile:

I'd be willing to bet more people are killed by solar than nuclear energy, installers falling off roofs. I'm not defending fossil fuels, but rather pointing out that total number of deaths is no indication of the inherent dangers associated with any technology. — karl stone

When we factor in time, we can make estimates of the inherent dangers. We have had now for over 70 nuclear energy and in those 70 years we have seen accidents. And yes, when nuclear energy is as dangerous as solar power with it's unlucky installers, that does indicate the inherent danger especially when compared to the massive casualties of coal energy. Chernobyl was a reactor that could blow up, the people there were doing tests with the safety systems off, hence we do have an example of the worst kind of accident.

Nuclear power doesn't produce carbon emissions, but it takes half the energy a nuclear power station will ever produce - to build a nuclear power station. — karl stone

Really? And how much energy one has to need for the steel plant in Sweden using hydrogen you referred to? Energy infrastructure needs energy to be built, yet 90 percent of the carbon emissions from electricity generation in the United States come from coal-fired power plants.

On the whole however, I think we're pretty much on the same page here. I agree fossil fuels are a massive problem. I just don't believe nuclear power is the answer, and designed my solar/hydrogen approach with these ideas in mind; not some overblown fear of radiation, but environmental costs of construction, running costs, and nuclear waste storage costs - against the type, amount and utility of the energy it produces. Solar/hydrogen is the best all round solution. — karl stone

My basic point is that our energy policies have to be tuned to reality and not wishfull thinking or the ignorance of the masses. The basic line is that when Coal power far kills hundred fold more people (basically counted in the millions) than nuclear and nuclear power emits no greenhouse gases, why are we then giving up first on nuclear? And taking off a energy source that doesn't emit greenhouse gasses has meant that then fossil fuels are used because the renewable energy infrastructure is not there yet. Sure, there are risks, but these risks have to put in some kind of rational scale to the danger of others. The problem is that environmental friendly administrations in many countries (perhaps with the exception of the US) can make too ambitious goals like Sweden did, and then fall totally flat on those goals as those goals simply were not realistic in the first place. Then as the energy policy has basically failed, we use the old energy resources, namely fossil fuels.

I don't have anything against a hydrogen economy, yet that still begs the question of where the electricity to produce hydrogen fuels comes from. Nowdays global hydrogen production is 90% done by fossil fuels.

Interesting plan. But if it works, people might still dig up the coal 5000 years from now and burn it. — frank

We might need to Frank. Climate change can also go the other way. We might need to stave off an ice age someday - if only we survive our technological adolescence.

Whatever CO2 we put up will be scrubbed out of the atmosphere by the oceans. If we burn all the coal, the atmosphere will be back to normal in around 100,000 years. — frank

Are you unaware of the dire warnings issued by thousands of scientists? Or do you have solid grounds to disagree with specialists in this particular field?

If something unforeseen pops up and makes us extinct, there will still be life. The world doesn't need to be saved. — frank

The world? No! Humankind - the only intellectually intelligent animal we're aware of, the knowledge we've gained, the art and literature, the music and cuisine, the comedy - the tragedy, is in my view worth saving.

The world? No! Humankind - the only intellectually intelligent animal we're aware of, the knowledge we've gained, the art and literature, the music and cuisine, the comedy - the tragedy, is in my view worth saving. — karl stone

I understand. You love us.

Solar/hydrogen is the best all round solution. — karl stone

That, or fewer people? :chin: If there were no humans none of the issues we're discussing would have become problematic, would they? So focus clearly on the elephant in this topic: humans are the problem. The topic asks "how to save the world?", and there is an obvious answer.... :gasp:

That, or fewer people? :chin: If there were no humans none of the issues we're discussing would have become problematic, would they? So focus clearly on the elephant in this topic: humans are the problem. The topic asks "how to save the world?", and there is an obvious answer.... :gasp: — Pattern-chaser

Antinatalism? :roll:

Well seven or eight thousand million of us does seem like too many, don't you think? As the rest of the world - and the remains of its living population - sees us, we are a plague species; a catastrophe for the world and all the creatures in it. If we can't learn to share the world with the other creatures that live here, there seems little point in discussing a hydrogen-powered future. :chin:

VHEMT

When we factor in time, we can make estimates of the inherent dangers. We have had now for over 70 nuclear energy and in those 70 years we have seen accidents. And yes, when nuclear energy is as dangerous as solar power with it's unlucky installers, that does indicate the inherent danger especially when compared to the massive casualties of coal energy. Chernobyl was a reactor that could blow up, the people there were doing tests with the safety systems off, hence we do have an example of the worst kind of accident. — ssu

I think we're incredibly conscious of the dangers of nuclear power and go to extraordinary lengths to contain it. That's not so with fossil fuels. So, it's not really a fair comparison - or rather, such a comparison only carries one so far.

Really? And how much energy one has to need for the steel plant in Sweden using hydrogen you referred to? — ssu

It's powered by hydrogen made from renewable electricity - exactly what I'm proposing we do on a global scale.

Energy infrastructure needs energy to be built, yet 90 percent of the carbon emissions from electricity generation in the United States come from coal-fired power plants. — ssu

We would need to use existing fossil fuel infrastructure to overcome the need for fossil fuels, that's true - but surely that's a better use of fossil fuels than building new nuclear power stations, that wouldn't provide a comprehensive solution for domestic, industrial and transport energy needs. Further, they cost vast amounts of money and energy to build, they're potentially dangerous, there's no solution to the hundreds of thousands of tonnes of nuclear waste already stored in decaying bunkers all over the US, and no doubt - other countries. Compare that to 350 square miles of solar panels - used to produce hydrogen - broken down any way you like:

350 x 1 mile square
175 x 2 miles square etc..
700 x 1/2 mile square.

any part of which breaks, causes no environmental damage, and can be replaced very easily. Nuclear is no contest.

My basic point is that our energy policies have to be tuned to reality and not wishfull thinking or the ignorance of the masses. — ssu

Are you accusing me of either wishful thinking or playing upon the ignorance of the masses? I just want to be clear before I tell you where to go to do something unpleasant with a particular object.

The basic line is that when Coal power far kills hundred fold more people (basically counted in the millions) than nuclear and nuclear power emits no greenhouse gases, why are we then giving up first on nuclear? — ssu

I don't know that we are. I know Germany and Japan are - but the French company EDF want to build a nuclear power station in the UK, and agreed an electricity price with the government about 3 times the market price. Make of that what you will!

And taking off a energy source that doesn't emit greenhouse gasses has meant that then fossil fuels are used because the renewable energy infrastructure is not there yet. — ssu

I mentioned before something before called 'base load.' It's a tricky concept, but basically refers the "umph" necessary to power the electricity grid. With a piecemeal application of renewable energy technology like German wind and solar farms, you can get still and cloudy days that don't provide the "umph" necessary to power the grid. I rather suspect that if Germany is building new coal power plants, they are as a backup. Because there can be little doubt as to the efforts they've gone to promote renewables. It's conceivable that divesting from nuclear created a shortfall - they are supplementing with coal, but their direction of travel is clear.

Sure, there are risks, but these risks have to put in some kind of rational scale to the danger of others. The problem is that environmental friendly administrations in many countries (perhaps with the exception of the US) can make too ambitious goals like Sweden did, and then fall totally flat on those goals as those goals simply were not realistic in the first place. Then as the energy policy has basically failed, we use the old energy resources, namely fossil fuels. — ssu

Really? What happened in Sweden?

Sweden on target to run entirely on renewable energy by 2040 | The ...
https://www.independent.co.uk › News › World › Europe
26 Oct 2016 - Sweden is on target to run entirely on renewable energy within the next 25 years, a regulatory official has said. Last year, 57 per cent of ...

I don't have anything against a hydrogen economy, yet that still begs the question of where the electricity to produce hydrogen fuels comes from. Nowadays global hydrogen production is 90% done by fossil fuels. — ssu

Oh, I see - you mean, you having dismissed my plan for floating solar farms producing hydrogen fuel as wishful thinking - and/or preying upon the ignorance of the masses. That is a head scratcher. Good luck with that!

Solar/hydrogen is the best all round solution.
— karl stone

That, or fewer people? :chin: If there were no humans none of the issues we're discussing would have become problematic, would they? So focus clearly on the elephant in this topic: humans are the problem. The topic asks "how to save the world?", and there is an obvious answer.... :gasp: — Pattern-chaser

If that's what you truly believe - kill yourself! You are the only person on earth you have a right to say shouldn't exist. No? Hypocrite!

Are you unaware of the dire warnings issued by thousands of scientists? Or do you have solid grounds to disagree with specialists in this particular field? — karl stone

I pm'd you. :smile:

I understand. You love us. — frank

Erm... Of course I love us. I love me. I want my genetic, intellectual and economic legacy to be carried forward. I want human inquiry and creativity to reach its full potential - whatever that may be. If there's a way to travel to the stars - we'll find it. It might be alternate dimensions, or uploading our minds into machines. It might even be God. But whatever it is, I'd belong to that legacy - and thus my life now would have meaning. I don't think there's any meaning to life if we chart off the edge of the map in the near future. It's just masturbation. An empty gesture.

p.s. I read your PM and I'll keep an eye out! Thanks!

But whatever it is, I'd belong to that legacy - and thus my life now would have meaning. I don't think there's any meaning to life if we chart off the edge of the map in the near future. It's just masturbation. An empty gesture. — karl stone

So it gives your life meaning now to work for the well-being of your descendents. So you know your ancestors felt the same way about you. They blessed your life without knowing you.

I would say remember to honor them by looking on this world with a loving eye. So many people who engage this issue come to it with abiding hatred for humanity. It's a breath of fresh air to meet someone who comes to it with love.

:blush:

I think we're incredibly conscious of the dangers of nuclear power and go to extraordinary lengths to contain it. That's not so with fossil fuels. So, it's not really a fair comparison - or rather, such a comparison only carries one so far. — karl stone

You've nailed it. This is the main problem. Public opinion is prone to scares and ignorance and politicians actually won't go against it. Hence energy policy can be out of touch of reality.

We would need to use existing fossil fuel infrastructure to overcome the need for fossil fuels, that's true — karl stone

That's the whole problem! Nobody is against renewable energy, but just how we get out of using fossil fuels is the question. And why wouldn't we use nuclear energy as a stop gap energy resource rather than coal, which is many times deadlier and is one of the main sources to the greenhouse effect?

Are you accusing me of either wishful thinking or playing upon the ignorance of the masses? — karl stone

No. But energy policies in general can be based on whishful thinking and hence be basically decietful.

What happened in Sweden? — karl stone

Explained it earlier, but I'll tell it again. In 1980s Sweden made a public referendum on it's energy policy and after the anti-nuclear result the goverment vowed to close down all of it's nuclear power plants by 2010 and be using renewable energy. In 2010 Sweden was producing more energy from it's nuclear power plants than in 1980 and the government had silently given up it's agenda of a non-nuclear Sweden.

This is an example of energy policy falling totally flat on it's goals. Especially with coal power this can happen too as the public isn't at all so afraid of coal power as they are of nuclear power. Add to the form that it's typically an domestic resource employing many people on coal mines and you get the picture why people wouldn't be so enthusiastic to drop coal. The real "devil in the details" is what you said: we use existing fossil fuels for the change to renewables. Is there really going to be the change? How long will this change really take? Are here the objectives and goals made realistically or not?

So it gives your life meaning now to work for the well-being of your descendents. So you know your ancestors felt the same way about you. They blessed your life without knowing you.

I would say remember to honor them by looking on this world with a loving eye. So many people who engage this issue come to it with abiding hatred for humanity. It's a breath of fresh air to meet someone who comes to it with love. — frank

And no small measure of self regard! But thank you Frank. That's a kind thing to say and a lovely thing to hear. I do think there's a natural moral duty to the struggles of past generations, to make good on what evolution, hard work and sacrifice have provided - to use our abilities and our knowledge to further the cause of future generations. To not give it our all is the most egregious betrayal, not just of future generations who will suffer for our failure, but of past generations who built all this. Giants upon whose shoulders we stand.

Well seven or eight thousand million of us does seem like too many, don't you think? — Pattern-chaser

No. We fit nicely into our cities. The best way to decrease population growth is to make people to be more affluent. Rich people have less kids than poor people universally. It might happen that in our lifetime we see the peak of humanity, and then a global population decrease.

As the rest of the world - and the remains of its living population - sees us, we are a plague species; a catastrophe for the world and all the creatures in it. — Pattern-chaser

Who sees us like this?

I think that we are just a very successfull very adaptive and resourceful animal species and hence part of life in this planet. Typically the "human haters" see us as not a part of life making a huge divide between "us" and "nature". We can have an influence on events, but we don't pose a threat to life on this planet just as an asteroid hitting the planet won't pose a threat to the existence of life on this planet. The sun in it's end of it's life cycle will cause the death of life in this planet. And that's not something that is going to happen very soon.

Your utopian dream is dead. — Jake

We're done. I will not speak to you again. — karl stone

Philosophers, mind your manners! Gentlemen never walk off in a huff.

You both recognize that we face grave problems. You disagree about methods of avoiding catastrophe. Situation: Normal.

If the way forward were so obvious, and were we so dispassionate as to see with perfect clarity, we would have avoided all our problems. As it happens the way forward has usually not been at all obvious at the moment. That's why we spend so much time hacking our way through dense thorns and nettles, not knowing if we are even hacking in the right direction.

A part of our primate heritage has endured through the stone age of hunting and gathering, through the first grain harvest, through the age of bronze and iron, through the dawn of civilization, on into the present moment: the ape's inability to think about long term consequences. Only with great difficulty can we plan 25 or 30 years into the future. 50 years seems to be about the limit. Hundreds of years is out of the question. And 50 years planning assumes that we even see the necessity to plan that far in advance. Usually we don't.

Assets can be mortgaged - and in this way, fossil fuels can be monetized without being extracted — karl stone

The oil mortgage plank in your platform needs clarification.

A mortgage is given by a bank because the value of the property can be cashed out if the loan is not paid. Oil in the ground can indeed be mortgaged as long as there is no barrier to its extraction and sale. IF society decides to leave the rest of the oil in the ground, then it ceases to be a mortgageable property.

Once we pump up the last barrel of obtainable oil, there will still be lots of oil in the ground. It just won't be practically obtainable by fracking or any other method. The unobtainable oil has no more value than the immense and lovely diamonds produced on a planet orbiting a distant star.

I'm not wasting my time writing something you won't read, or perhaps, simply don't understand. You are certainly not commenting from engagement with, and comprehension of these ideas. — karl stone

We can observe that you again declined to respond to a specific concise challenge to the funding scheme for your utopian vision.

Each of the following simple, concise, direct to the point statements are true.

1) Assets which can't be used have no market value.

2) Assets without a market value can not be mortgaged.

3) You have no funding source for all your grand plans.

4) Your utopian dream is dead.

If anyone feels one or more of these statements are not true, they are of course free to explain why they feel that is so, and hopefully will do so with equal concise directness. No wandering walls of text I hope.

What might make your utopian dreams take on some reality would be to drop poorly conceived ideas your ego has become attached to, and try again. So you didn't get it right on the first try. So what? Nobody is stopping you from getting over it, rolling up your sleeves, and taking another shot at the problem.

We might need to stave off an ice age someday — karl stone

We might, that's true. But nobody is going to invest today's money in such a remote distant possibility, especially given that we are currently racing hard in the opposite direction.

Assets can be mortgaged - and in this way, fossil fuels can be monetized without being extracted. The money raised by mortgaging fossil fuels would first go to applying sustainable energy technology. — karl stone

If solar generated hydrogen is a practical energy source (and let's say it is) then the logical place from which to obtain capital finance is the market. Since the technology is scalable, you don't have to finance the final stage before the first stage is built. IF you built the final stage of the project today, had 300 square miles of solar panels and a plant cranking out hydrogen, and freighters lined up to take it away you wouldn't be able to sell much of it because the industrial base isn't ready to receive and use H. What you would do is finance a 10 square mile solar panel set up, located near the right shore, and start producing electricity, drinking water, and some H. The electricity and water could be sold to the nearby shore (i.e., India). The H would have to find its market. The profit could be plowed back into the operation, or used to pay dividends. When you were ready to expand, additional shares could be sold to finance enlarging the plant. And so on down the line.

The usual way to pay for capital projects is either a national subsidy or the capital market.

You both recognize that we face grave problems. You disagree about methods of avoiding catastrophe. Situation: Normal. — Bitter Crank

I would summarize the difference in our perspectives this way.

We're building a global technological machine. As the engine of a machine is made more powerful the guidance system for that machine has to be updated as well.

KARL: Karl seems to feel that the human guidance system for the global technological machine can be successfully updated by some vague method that he can't seem to articulate beyond repeating "science as truth". Such vagueness seems acceptable to Karl, so he is up for full speed ahead on further construction of the global technological machine.

JAKE: Given that neither Karl or anybody else has presented a credible plan for how human maturity will be upgraded to successfully manage an ever accelerating array of ever greater powers, I've suggested we slow the growth of the machine while we figure this out.

We can surely have reasonable disagreements about how much power human beings can successfully manage, and at what rate we can successfully receive new powers.

The "more is better" relationship with knowledge and power doesn't seem reasonable, because such a paradigm seems to assume that human beings can successfully manage ANY amount of power delivered at ANY rate.

Crank, your financing plan is built upon an asset with market value, solar generated hydrogen. Karl's financing plan is built upon an asset that can't be used, and thus has no market value.

I blame primates. Had they opted to stay in the trees and not evolve, we wouldn't have all these problems. Alas, they did. And alas, they didn't evolve far enough fast enough. While we are able to split the atom, spot planets around distant stars, and create many things of beauty and utility, we retain a good deal of our primate nature. (Remember, chimp DNA is almost the same as ours.)

When Lise Meitner was walking through the winter park thinking about whether the atom could be fissioned, it did occur to her that a great deal of power would be released. She, being a very smart primate, was pleased to see that the equations she had sketched out worked. It didn't occur to her to burn her notes and say nothing about it. She reasoned her way to identifying fission as a possibility; others could and would do the same thing, sooner or later. People like Meitner or Rutherford, who discovered the proton earlier in the 20th Century, weren't thinking about bombs. They were just doing their physicist thing. Which is of course what your are pointing out: smart people just doing their thing risks our undoing. That, and completely ill-willed assholes doing their thing...

We primates are capable of worrying about our present situation, and maybe the immediate future of our children -- but we are not capable of practically thinking 100 years or a thousand years into the future. Most of us are "detail" people. Even people who see the Big Picture fail to see a big enough view of what's happening.

Our deficiencies are not personal: they are a feature of the species. If we had 20/20 vision into the future, we'd be paralyzed with fear. We wouldn't be able to do anything. We know that we are primates, but being primates prevents us from fully utilizing that knowledge. Just because we know we belong to the primate family, doesn't mean that we can do anything much about ourselves.