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"What has allowed so many Psychopathic Personalities to rise so high in corporations and government, is that they are so decisive. Unlike normal people, they are never filled with doubts, for the simple reason that they cannot care what happens next."
- Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
 |
| Atmosphere Control | ||
| Recently terraformed planets require constant maintenance. |
I just thought that this was a clever idea, taking advantage of a planet's natural vulcanism to distribute material throughout the atmosphere.
| Potter was doing most of the talking and all the pointing. "Those twin volcanoes; d'ye see them, Mr. Renner? D'ye see yon boxlike structures near the peak of each one? They're atmosphere control. When yon volcanoes belch gas, the maintenance posts fire jets of tailored algae into the air stream. Without them our atmosphere would soon be foul again." |
| Technovelgy from The Mote in God's Eye,
by Larry Niven (w/J. Pournelle). Published by Simon & Schuster in 1974 Additional resources -
|
Did I mention that this planet is called New Scotland. I hope that explains the accent.
Scientists believe that volcanoes have played (and continue to play) a vital role in the development of our own Earth's atmosphere. Most of the gas that surrounds the planet came from eruptions from below the surface. Volcanoes can inject remarkable volumes of SO2 and chlorine gas into the atmosphere, as well as dust that alters the albedo of the Earth. Volcanism has played an important role in recent history; the eruption (or explosion) of the Krakatoa volcano caused debris to fall upon locations as far away as Madagascar. Sunsets around the world were notably altered for years, as was the amount of sunlight reaching the surface.
See the entry for Pina2bo from Termination Shock (2021) by Neal Stephenson for another method of seeding the atmosphere, this time for geoengineering to prevent climate change.
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Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from The Mote in God's Eye
More Ideas
and Technology by Larry Niven (w/J. Pournelle)
Tech news articles related to The Mote in God's Eye
Tech news articles related to works by Larry Niven (w/J. Pournelle)
Atmosphere Control-related
news articles:
- Algae To Clean Atmosphere
- Reduce Hurricanes By Altering The Atmosphere
- Volcanoes Terraformed Mars?
- Dim The Sun With Stratospheric Controlled Perturbation Experiment
| China's Drone Mothership Can Carry 100 Drones |
| Drones Recharge In Mid-Air Like Jets Refuel! |
| Heat Waver - The First Ever Combo Solar Collector And Wind Turbine |
| Tesla 'Fleet Response Agents' Bolster FSD Autonomy |
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'I guess there's nobody round this table who doesn't have a Crosswell [tapeworm] working for him in the small intestine.'
'Their only check on the growth and development of Vulcan 3 lay in two clues: the amount of rock thrown up to the surface... and the amount of the raw materials and tools and parts which the computer requested.'
'Figments of his mind in one sense, of course, for he had shaped them...'
'So the parent drone carries a spotter that it launches...'
'...nurse drones that would cruise around dumping large amounts of power into randomly selected pods.'
'It's done with a flip of the third joint of the tentacle on the down beat.'
'...for months Grantline bores had dug into the cliff.'
'I hope all those other cars are on automatic,' he said anxiously.
'It’s smart enough to go wrong in very complicated ways, but not smart enough to help us find out what’s wrong.'
