Major collision threat about a million years from now?

[Pro-Humanist FREELOVER]

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Per the following, if humans last that long (which is by no means
certain) in anywhere near our current form (which is also highly
unlikely being that technological advances will, if nature or acts
of humans don't contravene, likely result in current humans even-
tually becoming advanced symbiotic intellectually sophisticated
long-lived healthy beings far superior to the current version), our
descendants (and/or creations) will have the following to deal with ...

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March 15, 2010

Star set to collide with solar system
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=star-set-to-collide-with-solar-syst-2010-03
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Excerpts:

Have a good look at this star. For astronomers have discovered that
it is on course to collide with the outskirts of our solar system with
potentially catastrophic consequences. New calculations show that
the orange dwarf, called Gliese 710, will crash through the Oort Cloud
that surrounds the Sun. The disruption to this shell of many billions of
icy fragments would launch a shower of comets into the inner solar
system, threatening the planets with devastating impacts.

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http://tinyurl.com/Gliese710photo
Have a good look at this star. For astronomers have discovered that
it is on course to collide with the outskirts of our solar system with
potentially catastrophic consequences.
- - -

New calculations show that the orange dwarf, called Gliese 710, will
crash through the Oort Cloud that surrounds the Sun. The disruption
to this shell of many billions of icy fragments would launch a shower
of comets into the inner solar system, threatening the planets with
devastating impacts.

Some believe it could lead to a repeat of the Late Heavy Bombard-
ment that left the Moon covered with craters around 4 billion years
ago. The good news is that the star is not expected to arrive for a
million or more years.

The threat from Gliese 710, a star with about half the mass of the
sun 63 light-years away in the constellation of the Serpent, is rated
as 86 per cent likely. That is nearly as good as a certainty.

... Gliese 710, which can be seen in small telescopes, has our solar
system clearly in its sights. ... it is racing towards us at 30,000 mph
and on course to crash through the Oort Cloud, which lies around
a light-year away, within the next million and a half years.

It could even come within a zone of asteroid-like bodies around
Pluto called the Kuiper Belt, though the chances of this are put at
only one in a thousand. But some astronomers are suggesting that
Gliese 710 might be circled by its own Oort Cloud, which could
produce a double shower of hazardous comets.

... The new alert comes days after a NASA astrobiology site
reported that an invisible brown dwarf star nicknamed Nemesis
may be circling the sun and causing mass extinctions of life on
Earth every 26 million years. ...

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~~~
Pro-Humanist FREELOVER
http://prohuman.net
(Freethinking Realist Exploring
Expressive Liberty, Openness,
Verity, Enlightenment, & Rationality)
~~~

[Brian E. Clark]

Post by Pro-Humanist FREELOVER
Have a good look at this star. For astronomers have discovered that
it is on course to collide with the outskirts of our solar system with
potentially catastrophic consequences.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0044207

[Larry]

Post by Pro-Humanist FREELOVER
... The new alert comes days after a NASA astrobiology site
reported that an invisible brown dwarf star nicknamed Nemesis
may be circling the sun and causing mass extinctions of life on
Earth every 26 million years. ...

Just as with every god ever invented by every clergy that ever existed,
every publicly-funded academic in every publicly-funded field in every
publicly-funded institution finds himself or herself trying to figure
out the easiest way to get access to the public treasury for as much of
its contents as they can carry off, as often as they can get away with
it.

The finest way ever invented, both by the thousands of religions and all
of academia, is to create periodic panics, real or imagined. If there
is a real threat, it's like handing these people the keys to the master
vault. If a real threat cannot be obtained, or if the threat is so
remote like this star "within the next million and a half years", the
treasury is not likely to open its checkbook wide enough or often enough
to create the desired new religion to support the academia desired by
its inhabitants, for a thousand years after those seeking grandeur and a
place in history have died.

In recent history, going backwards in time from today, we've seen this
phenomenon many times called many different "brand names" to "sell the
product", that keeps the money rolling in:

"Climate Change"
"Global Warming"
"Afghanistan - Taliban/terrorism/Bin Laden"
"Iraq - Weapons of Mass Destruction"
"Terrorism"
"9/11"
"HIV/AIDS"
"Global Cooling"
"Pollution"
"Ozone Hole over Antarctica"
"Nuclear Threats"
and a host of pending astronomic catastrophies from collisions and near
Earth encounters with other celestial bodies dating back a thousand
years.

Massive funding follows if the "message" can be told enough times to
convince enough people, especially ignorant politicians.

No human will ever be harmed by Gliese 710 crashing directly into the
sun. No amount of money being DIVERTED away from real threats to
humans, like starvation, can change the outcome of the event that
matters not to humanity....so no funding should ever be granted to study
or find a solution to the non-existant problem created by the academia
who will live off it, in perpetuity.

The nonsense simply HAS to stop and those geniuses involved need to be
redirected to finding solutions to the more pressing problems of our
SURVIVAL!......especially NASA.

[Pro-Humanist FREELOVER]

"Pro-Humanist FREELOVER" wrote ...

Post by Pro-Humanist FREELOVER
- - -
March 15, 2010
Star set to collide with solar system
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=star-set-to-collide-with-solar-syst-2010-03
- - -
Have a good look at this star. For astronomers have discovered that
it is on course to collide with the outskirts of our solar system with
potentially catastrophic consequences. New calculations show that
the orange dwarf, called Gliese 710, will crash through the Oort Cloud
that surrounds the Sun. The disruption to this shell of many billions of
icy fragments would launch a shower of comets into the inner solar
system, threatening the planets with devastating impacts.
- - -
http://tinyurl.com/Gliese710photo
Have a good look at this star. For astronomers have discovered that
it is on course to collide with the outskirts of our solar system with
potentially catastrophic consequences.
- - -
[...]

[...]
No human will ever be harmed by Gliese 710 crashing directly into the
sun. No amount of money being DIVERTED away from real threats to
humans, like starvation, can change the outcome of the event that
matters not to humanity....so no funding should ever be granted to study
or find a solution to the non-existant problem created by the academia
who will live off it, in perpetuity.
The nonsense simply HAS to stop and those geniuses involved need to be
redirected to finding solutions to the more pressing problems of our
SURVIVAL!......especially NASA.

Gliese 710 is actually projected to have an 86% proba-
bility of striking an area about a light year away from us,
in a million years or so, and if it does, the ensuing ava-
lanche of comets is likely to have a devastating impact
on whatever life is around at the time, on Earth and
elsewhere.

The discovery was in line with the normal course of sci-
entific research, and does offer information of import
reflecting on the so-called "perfect design" that many
religionists assert accounts for their/our existence.

Doesn't appear to be "perfect" to me. A close examin-
ation of the historical record should be enough to con-
vince anyone that the natural world is a high-risk envir-
onment and that if a supposed 'loving' God is responsible
for all this, he/it/she/they have a lot of explaining to do.

Not that he/it/she/they would bother, mind you, for per
the ancient so-called 'holy' documents, if there's anything
wrong, it's not God's fault or even if God is involved, the
blame resides with humans for whatever imperfection or
unpleasantness besets anyone or anything anywhere at
any time.

Speaking of imperfections and unpleasantness, I discov-
ered some information regarding some imperfections and
unpleasantness I was previously unaware of this morning,
in the following article:

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March 15, 2010

Triumph for Drug to Straighten Clenched Fingers
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/16/business/16hand.html
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Excerpt:

... The Food and Drug Administration approved the drug,
known as Xiaflex, last month as a nonsurgical treatment for
Dupuytren's contracture, a condition in which one or more
fingers cannot be straightened.

Hundreds of thousands of Americans have Dupuytren's,
which can make it difficult to type, shake hands, wear
gloves, reach into a pocket or perform numerous other
tasks. The afflicted have included Ronald Reagan, Margaret
Thatcher, the playwright Samuel Beckett and the classical
pianist Misha Dichter.

Xiaflex, an injectable drug that goes on sale later this month,
will not be cheap, at an estimated average cost per course
of treatment of $5,400. But analysts expect sales to reach
hundreds of millions of dollars a year.

And that total could go higher, if Xiaflex eventually wins
approval for a related condition known as Peyronie's disease,
in which a bent penis makes intercourse painful or even im-
possible.

About one in 20 men is estimated to have Peyronie's, but
figures are not precise because people with the condition
tend not to discuss it publicly. ...

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Comments:

Saddened to hear about those conditions, but pleased that
a resolution for many may be at hand.

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~~~
Pro-Humanist FREELOVER
http://prohuman.net
(Freethinking Realist Exploring
Expressive Liberty, Openness,
Verity, Enlightenment, & Rationality)
~~~

[William Smith]

Post by Pro-Humanist FREELOVER
The discovery was in line with the normal course of sci-
entific research, and does offer information of import
reflecting on the so-called "perfect design" that many
religionists assert accounts for their/our existence.
Doesn't appear to be "perfect" to me. A close examin-
ation of the historical record should be enough to con-
vince anyone that the natural world is a high-risk envir-
onment and that if a supposed 'loving' God is responsible
for all this, he/it/she/they have a lot of explaining to do.

Why, a catastrophe every now and then may be perfect and
conducive for complex life forms.

Put a massive Jupiter in the system, have it suck in most
asteroids, so there won't be major disasters for eons.
But once in a while clean up the space and kill everybody
in sight except the fittest of the fittest. Dinosaurs out,
mammals (and cockroaches) to the front stage.
Religionists can argue that it was God's plan and a way
to create humans. Or maybe not...

[Pro-Humanist FREELOVER]

Post by William Smith

Post by Pro-Humanist FREELOVER
The discovery was in line with the normal course of sci-
entific research, and does offer information of import
reflecting on the so-called "perfect design" that many
religionists assert accounts for their/our existence.
Doesn't appear to be "perfect" to me. A close examin-
ation of the historical record should be enough to con-
vince anyone that the natural world is a high-risk envir-
onment and that if a supposed 'loving' God is responsible
for all this, he/it/she/they have a lot of explaining to do.

Why, a catastrophe every now and then may be perfect and
conducive for complex life forms.
Put a massive Jupiter in the system, have it suck in most
asteroids, so there won't be major disasters for eons.
But once in a while clean up the space and kill everybody
in sight except the fittest of the fittest. Dinosaurs out,
mammals (and cockroaches) to the front stage.
Religionists can argue that it was God's plan and a way
to create humans. Or maybe not...

Religionists can (and do) argue that God is
whatever they wish him/it/her/them to be.
As they contradict one another, and con-
tradict their own selves, their Gods evap-
orate in clouds full of their deceptions, dis-
tortions, disingenuousness, and delusions.

Their Gods, in most cases used as the ulti-
mate seduction and the ultimate threat,
pushed into most childrens' minds from
birth.

Created by evolved apes to try to control/
manipulate/enslave/divide/conquer/kill, isn't
it long past time that humans outgrow that
infantile servile stage of evolution and aspire
to reasonably and responsibly address the
risks and challenges regarding our naturalistic
fates?

When people are pushing their Gods at you,
just reply "I've evolved past that." If there's
any interest exhibited by the God-pusher(s),
you might consider adding "You're welcome
to join me." Of course, at this point, deeper
discussions may ensue, so feel free to refer-
ence my website for further details on the
whys and wherefores of living a life apart
from religion:

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~~~
Pro-Humanist FREELOVER
http://prohuman.net
(Freethinking Realist Exploring
Expressive Liberty, Openness,
Verity, Enlightenment, & Rationality)
~~~

[Uncle Vic]

On Mar 16, 7:44 am, "Pro-Humanist FREELOVER"

Post by Pro-Humanist FREELOVER
March 15, 2010
Star set to collide with solar system

I thought Elvis had left the building...

--
Uncle Vic
AA#2011