I'm wondering if a fossil impression of a CD could be detailed
enough to allow reading some of the data.
The data pits on a CD are covered by a smooth, transparent layer
of plastic.
I know. But that plastic won't last forever. I'm wondering how
likely it is to be replaced by fine silt or clay such that the
impressions are preserved.
Millions of years after every atom of a seashell or a bone is
washed away, the impressions can be preserved in silt or clay which
subsequently becomes rock, sometimes with microscopic detail. So why
not CDs (or even DVDs) long after all the plastic and aluminum is gone?
There's also the question of how data is distributed on a CD. If only
one square inch is preserved, rather than the whole CD, can anything
useful be gotten from that? Does it matter if it's music, text, or
pictures?
The details that are preserved are usually porous parts of the animal.
I would imagine that all parts of the CD would degrade at about the same rate - and by the time the plastic covering degrading, the surrounding material would already have formed into rock. The CD would have to get exposed and the re-buried, and the CD is unlikely to survive the forces during that process.
James Gassaway 29 January 2008 12:01:43 [ permanent link ]
Mark_Reichert@hotmail.com wrote:
On Jan 28, 8:50 pm, "James Gassaway" <dtra...@sonic.net> wrote:
Mark_Reich...@hotmail.com wrote:
On Jan 27, 1:21 pm, "Keith F. Lynch" <k...@KeithLynch.net> wrote:
David V. Loewe, Jr <davelo...@charter.net> wrote:
"Keith F. Lynch" <k...@KeithLynch.net> wrote:
I recall reading an article in some magazine about how long
various large man-made things would last if we all disappeared.
It had an illustration of that arch being destroyed by a tornado
thousands of years from now.
Because it's such a large target for a tornado?
Presumably because it's immune to anything less, and because each
point in the midwest is likely to be directly hit by at least one
strong tornado every few thousand years.
It will have to be a direct hit, unless the structure has been
seriously weakened first. It's currently only supposed to sway a few
feet in a 150 mph wind. I don't think a direct hit would do anything
but blow out the windows now because a tornado wouldn't act upon the
Arch long enough to do serious damage.
Stainless Steel isn't perfectly "stainless". It is substantially
better than "regular" steel but it will corrode over enough time.
I understand that. Somebody in the History Channel forums was talking
about 304 stainless.
I just think that a thousand years in the future when the program is
claiming everything else will have crumbled save the pyramids and
Hoover Dam, the Arch or its legs will still at least be quite visibly
be sticking well above whatever vegetation is growing along the
Mississippi.
Actually, given that the Arch is about 100 to 200 yards from the bank of the Mississippi and that it is literally built on top of an underground museum (so the ground under it is hollow), I would suspect it would succumb to a flood within a hundred years and collapse.
-- "Reading by the light of a lost Christmas day It begins...."
David V. Loewe 29 January 2008 21:22:31 [ permanent link ]
On Tue, 29 Jan 2008 00:01:43 -0800, "James Gassaway" <dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:
Mark_Reichert@hotmail.com wrote:
On Jan 28, 8:50 pm, "James Gassaway" <dtra...@sonic.net> wrote:
Mark_Reich...@hotmail.com wrote:
On Jan 27, 1:21 pm, "Keith F. Lynch" <k...@KeithLynch.net> wrote:
David V. Loewe, Jr <davelo...@charter.net> wrote:
"Keith F. Lynch" <k...@KeithLynch.net> wrote:
I recall reading an article in some magazine about how long
various large man-made things would last if we all disappeared.
It had an illustration of that arch being destroyed by a tornado
thousands of years from now.
Because it's such a large target for a tornado?
Presumably because it's immune to anything less, and because each
point in the midwest is likely to be directly hit by at least one
strong tornado every few thousand years.
It will have to be a direct hit, unless the structure has been
seriously weakened first. It's currently only supposed to sway a few
feet in a 150 mph wind. I don't think a direct hit would do anything
but blow out the windows now because a tornado wouldn't act upon the
Arch long enough to do serious damage.
Stainless Steel isn't perfectly "stainless". It is substantially
better than "regular" steel but it will corrode over enough time.
I understand that. Somebody in the History Channel forums was talking
about 304 stainless.
I just think that a thousand years in the future when the program is
claiming everything else will have crumbled save the pyramids and
Hoover Dam, the Arch or its legs will still at least be quite visibly
be sticking well above whatever vegetation is growing along the
Mississippi.
Actually, given that the Arch is about 100 to 200 yards from the bank of the
Mississippi and that it is literally built on top of an underground museum
(so the ground under it is hollow), I would suspect it would succumb to a
flood within a hundred years and collapse.
Very doubtful. The worst flood in the recorded history of St. Louis did not really come close to inundating the museum. Moreover, the entrances to the museum are well above the level of numerous levees on other parts of the river - levees that would be overtopped (and lower water level at the Arch) long before flood waters got close to the museum.
Now, the river changing *course* might do it, but I don't think a flood has any real chance of doing it. -- "Unquestionably, there is progress. The average American now pays out twice as much in taxes as he formerly got in wages." - H. L. Mencken
David V. Loewe 30 January 2008 01:22:40 [ permanent link ]
On Tue, 29 Jan 2008 12:33:18 -0800, "James Gassaway" <dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:
Mark_Reichert@hotmail.com wrote:
On Jan 29, 2:01 am, "James Gassaway" <dtra...@sonic.net> wrote:
Mark_Reich...@hotmail.com wrote:
On Jan 28, 8:50 pm, "James Gassaway" <dtra...@sonic.net> wrote:
Mark_Reich...@hotmail.com wrote:
On Jan 27, 1:21 pm, "Keith F. Lynch" <k...@KeithLynch.net> wrote:
David V. Loewe, Jr <davelo...@charter.net> wrote:
"Keith F. Lynch" <k...@KeithLynch.net> wrote:
I recall reading an article in some magazine about how long
various large man-made things would last if we all disappeared.
It had an illustration of that arch being destroyed by a
tornado thousands of years from now.
Because it's such a large target for a tornado?
Presumably because it's immune to anything less, and because each
point in the midwest is likely to be directly hit by at least one
strong tornado every few thousand years.
It will have to be a direct hit, unless the structure has been
seriously weakened first. It's currently only supposed to sway a
few feet in a 150 mph wind. I don't think a direct hit would do
anything but blow out the windows now because a tornado wouldn't
act upon the Arch long enough to do serious damage.
Stainless Steel isn't perfectly "stainless". It is substantially
better than "regular" steel but it will corrode over enough time.
I understand that. Somebody in the History Channel forums was
talking about 304 stainless.
I just think that a thousand years in the future when the program is
claiming everything else will have crumbled save the pyramids and
Hoover Dam, the Arch or its legs will still at least be quite
visibly be sticking well above whatever vegetation is growing along
the Mississippi.
Actually, given that the Arch is about 100 to 200 yards from the
bank of the Mississippi and that it is literally built on top of an
underground museum (so the ground under it is hollow), I would
suspect it would succumb to a flood within a hundred years and
collapse.
You are showing a marked ignorance of St. Louis and its topography.
On the other hand, with the paucity of hard data on the Internet, I
couldn't find the elevation of the base of Arch above the river, just
that the original village that was on that land was on a bluff forty
feet high. I think that means forty feet above the river bank, well,
well above the highest flood and all the flood plain on the east side
of the river.
I visited the Arch just two years ago.
If so, why would you postulate that the Arch will "succumb to a flood within a hundred years and collapse" in the absence of man? It doesn't make sense to either Reichert or myself and we both *live* here.
The highest flood in recorded history didn't get that high. There are literally hundreds of levees that would be topped (and each levee so topped would open up thousands of acres to inundation by the flood waters LOWERING the level at the Arch) before the level could rise high enough to pour in the museum. It's just not happening *that* way. -- "The trust and self-assurance that can lead to happiness They're the very things we kill, I guess Pride and competition cannot fill these empty arms And the work I put between us, doesn't keep me warm" Don Henley, Mike Campbell & JD Souther
Their odds would upgrade considerably when they figure out fire, language,
and the screwdriver.
It doesn't have to be today's crow that does that. It isn't like some lemur learned how to use fire and take apart old stereos. Evolution is a long-term game. * -- * PV something like badgers--something like lizards--and something like corkscrews.
only if we could get rid of competitors. I think once one
species has grabbed the intelligent tool user nitch, it's
going to be impossible for anything else to give it a try.
What a pile of crap. it's a big planet, with plenty of room for isolation. * -- * PV something like badgers--something like lizards--and something like corkscrews.
only if we could get rid of competitors. I think once one
species has grabbed the intelligent tool user nitch, it's going
to be impossible for anything else to give it a try.
What a pile of crap. it's a big planet, with plenty of room for
isolation. *
Wrong. Look at what an intelligent species does, in terms of
rapidly spreading all over the place.
Where "rapid" is measured in tens or hundreds of millennia.
It might help if the two intelligent tool-using species came from, and preferred, significantly different types of ecological niches.
Yes, _eventually_ one would spread into the other's "universe" and problems might arise, but at least it'd be delayed for a lot longer than were the meeting(s) between Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon.
