Re: The Planet

Chris L Peterson <clp@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Wed, 26 Nov 2008 13:31:31 -0500, Dave Typinski <nospam@xxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

Lessee... 6 cubic feet per person, 6 bn people, cube root of
36,000,000,000 gives a flesh colored cube about 5/8 of a mile on each
edge. Huh, pretty small! A sphere would be ballpark the same size,
i.e., less than a mile in diameter.

That part's pretty interesting. But now consider that a human at rest
radiates about 100W (and 5-10 times this if they get worked up). You can
take it a few directions from there- the power dissipated by the surface
of the cube, perhaps treating people as water. The internal temperature.
It's worth comparing these numbers to the temperature of the Sun, and
the temperature required to start fusion.

Well, you get a bit over half a terawatt for a bit over an eighth of a
cubic mile... 4 TW/mi^3, 700 GW/mi^2, 25 kW/ft^2. That's gonna be
hot.

But how *do* you analyize the themodynamic equilibrium and calculate
the blackbody radiation of such an assembly? I vaguely remember doing
a 2D problem like this back in school. Hm... any suggestions?
--
Dave
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: The Planet
    ... 36,000,000,000 gives a flesh colored cube about 5/8 of a mile on each ... A sphere would be ballpark the same size, ... less than a mile in diameter. ... The internal temperature. ...
    (sci.astro.amateur)
  • Re: Comet - specs in imperial ?
    ... So many people might prefer LSD but it ... A mile is more sensible than a km, which is too small for long distances. ... Using F as opposed to C for temperature has numbers that are more meaningful ... I'll buy milk in litre or 2 litre containers. ...
    (uk.legal)
  • Re: Units question for Americans
    ... I know that a foot is about 30cm, and therefore a yard is around 90% of a metre, and a mile is sort of 5/3 km, but I have no feel for it any more. ... As someone upthread pointed out - the only real reason for not switching to the metric system is familiarity, the units in any system are essentially arbitrary, avoiding negative values in temperature measurement is not bad reason, but since most people on Earth live in areas where it doesn't get below 0C/32f, it's a tad precious, and "100f is near the temperature of the human body" is frankly pathetic, if it *was* the average temperature of the human body it would make sense. ...
    (rec.arts.sf.written)
  • Re: Todays Tempo Run
    ... mile, run three miles at my 10K race pace, and cool down for a mile. ... the temperature on my back patio was in the mid ... The next two miles were 11:53 and 12:13; I had wanted to do the tempo ...
    (rec.running)