A lobby group of scientists have urged the United Nations to invest in a system for detecting near-Earth asteroids that could collide with the planet. We’ve got a lot of existential risks on our plate right now, of which being clobbered into a prehistoric state by a lump of space rock is just one – and a fairly remote possibility, thankfully. But it’s also one that we’d need every spare moment of advance warning to deal with… Bruce Willis will need time to put on a clean vest, if nothing else. Forewarned is forearmed, and all that. [image by goldenrectangle]
That said, space rocks striking planets might have their upsides… at least on currently uninhabited planets. A paper from a Japanese university suggests that meteorites colliding with Earth may have been the source of the amino acid groups that began the chain of life. Not quite as science fictional as panspermia, but still quite a mind-bending thought.
In this universe there is a hierarchy of things which are likely. From very likely, DOWN to less likely and into impossible.
– >25% inflation between now and 2011 inflation almost everywhere.
– Wall street bankers receiving another bail out next year
– A popular mammal going extinct in the next 5 years except for in zoo’s
– Obama being assassinated by a
sinister unknown black ops teampatsy.– The US ratifying any climate treaty that affects US
companiesvoters financially– An asteroid strike causing deaths in a major city before 2050
– George W. Bush being charged with being accessory to a serious crime
– Cold fusion goes online
– Earth taking any level of coordinated action to protect us from humans from asteroid impacts before 2050
– Switzerland creating a lunar colony before 2050
– my butt >> http://www.bartcop.com/burns-flying-monkeys.JPG