1. I Believe in Miracles
How Technology will Save our Planet
Media Presentation
Mark John Fiddes Shipston
Social Impact of Technology – GNED1022 - 33
Inst. Emily Brett
Thursday, August 9th, 2012

2. I Believe in Miracles
How Technology will Save our Planet
• Abominable Asteroids • Perilous Pandemic
• Villainous Volcanoes • Ultimate Unknown
"The Blue Marble”
photograph of Earth, taken from
Apollo 17

3. Abominable Asteroids
• What is the Risk?
 The question is not if but when!
 NASA estimates that they have found 20-
30% of the ~4,700 PHAs (Potentially
Hazardous Asteroids) in near Earth
orbits
 Effects range from Incidental Damage to
Global Extinctions
 Most famous example was the Dinosaur
extinction at the end of the Cretaceous
period
 Tunguska event in Russia was ~1,000
times the destructive power of Hiroshima

4. Abominable Asteroids
• What is being done?
 The skies are being watched by
• The Near Earth Asteroid Tracking Team
• SpaceWatch
• The Asteroid and Comet Impact Hazard
Group
 Numerous fly-bys including
the NEAR Shoemaker
landing on asteroid Eros
 Preliminary designs for
Solar Sail pushing asteroids
off collision course
 Preliminary designs for
“Tractor Beam” technology to
tow asteroids off collision course
• Downside
 Low likelihood of event within near future
so the return on investment is unclear

5. Villainous Volcanoes
Volcano Year Deaths Major cause of deaths
Tambora, Indonesia 1815 92,000 Starvation
Krakatau, Indonesia 1883 36,417 Tsunami
Mount Pelee, Martinique 1902 29,025 Ash flows
Ruiz, Colombia 1985 25,000 Mudflows
Unzen, Japan 1792 14,300 Volcano collapse, tsunami
Laki, Iceland 1783 9,350 Starvation
Kelut, Indonesia 1919 5,110 Mudflows
Galunggung, Indonesia 1882 4,011 Mudflows
• What are the Risks? Vesuvius, Italy 1631 3,500 Mudflows, lava flows
Vesuvius, Italy 79 3,360 Ash flows, falls
Papandayan, Indonesia 1772 2,957 Ash flows
 Again, the question is not if but when! Lamington, Papua New Guinea 1951 2,942 Ash flows
El Chichon, Mexico 1982 2,000 Ash flows
 One in twelve people live within striking distance of an Soufriere, St. Vincent
Oshima, Japan
1902
1741
1,680
1,475
Ash flows
Tsunami
active volcano Asama, Japan 1783 1,377 Ash flows, mudflows
Taal, Philippines 1911 1,335 Ash flows
Mayon, Philippines 1814 1,200 Mudflows
 Property Damage, Death, Global Climate Change Agung, Indonesia 1963 1,184 Ash flows
Cotopaxi, Ecuador 1877 1,000 Mudflows
Pinatubo, Philippines 1991 800 Disease
Komagatake, Japan 1640 700 Tsunami
Ruiz, Colombia 1845 700 Mudflows

6. Villainous Volcanoes
• What is being done?
 Remote Data gathering from satellites and
robots are increasing the accuracy of the
information and safety of the scientists
 Increases in Computational speed are
making predictive models more accurate
and more timely
 Technologies include
• Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar
• Seismic and geodetic measurements
• High-resolution Digital Elevation Models
• Imaging Spectroscopy
• Downside
 Despite historical evidence and scientific
research, societies will not relocate and the
usefulness of predictions is restricted

7. Perilous Pandemic
• What are the Risks?
 You know what is coming, not if
but when!
 Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918
killed between 15 and 100
million people
 Viruses are constantly mutating
due to solar radiation and
random re-sequencing which
nullifies our immune systems
efforts to protect us
 Increasing urbanization and
high-speed global transportation
provide multiple vectors of
infection

8. • What is being done?
Perilous Pandemic
 Genetic research is revealing ways
to tailor make vaccines to suit an outbreak
 New DNA vaccines
• Abandon the weakened
pathogen model
• Delivering the genes
(or proteins) that are used
by the body to recognize the
invading virus.
• Encourages the body to
manufacture antigens rapidly
and with little risk of reaction
 Advanced diagnostic techniques
can isolate cases before a
widespread outbreak
• Downside
 Genetic research is cited by many
conservatives as high risk research - escaping
pathogens and moral issues

9. Ultimate Unknown
• What are the Risks?
 The point is we don’t know…
anything could happen
 If there are extraterrestrial
beings and we meet them how
can we prepare
 Space borne disease could take
any form and have any imagined
consequence
 What happens when our sun
dies

10. Ultimate Unknown
• What is being done?
 New generations of computers are allowing us to
investigate and perhaps begin to understand the
large and small scale structure of the universe
 The internet, social media, and spreading access
to data germinates ideas at an ever-increasing
rate
• Downside
 Our knowledge is starting to penetrate mysteries
of the universe that have always been the
purview of religious authorities.
 Most of the research and technological
development to prepare for an unknown future
is in areas where there are no immediate results
to validate the expense

11. Conclusion
Whether our race, the planet, or our whole solar system will someday face
annihilation, there is no other defence than the development and use of new
technologies. Technology and the knowledge and curiosity that drives its
development are the keys to our future
References
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12. References - continued
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