Oddbean new post about | logout
 100% the earth is alive it has a plasma neurological nervous system is the best way I can explain it 
 all of the celestial bodies have an electromagnetic thing

the big absurdity of modern climate doomers is that only heat and albedo matters (how much we absorb and how much we reflect of heat) but negatively charged dust is key to cloud formation, water does not form droplets without negatively charged dust to stick to... and cloud formation itself stops albedo anyway, as most of it is reflected back upwards due to total internal reflection of the water droplet's high refractive index

it's the same kind of phenomenon as crystallization, the crystals always form on some tiny bit of garbage with the right electrostatic field around it

i for one am keeping my ears open for clues about how you draw electrons up out of the earth deliberately, because drilling holes and sticking long metal rods down to conduct this electrostatic charge (yeah, i am thinking what these nerds are calling "electric fields" are really the same thing as electrostatic) and how to catch that in a giant array of capacitors and then discharge it slowly into batteries or drive pumps to move water so the energy can be stored later 
 Ok I have some ideas too, you need a very specific type of jungle at a high elevation 
 Before we harness it can we just figure out the mechanics first? 
 that is necessary first step, really, it's just the question of what you can do to create a massive positive electrostatic charge on a material so when a conductor is connected to a negative charged object the current jumps through the conductor and you get your discharge 
 yeah, damp ground is important, as is carbon levels, as both increase conductivity

but i think the hard part is how to make something that has the required positive potential at the upper end of your conductor

it obviously can't just be another capacitor, because that's what is at the other end, you see what i mean?

needs to be some kind of device that induces a massive positive charge somehow, or some material that you can induce this state repeatedly or cheaply

i mean, think like, why does wool carpet and many kinds of polyurethane rubber when rubbed, pull electrons out of the rubber and then discharge when you touch earth?

whatever this rubbing process entails, how can i get that passively, how can i make an electrostatic adsorbing surface dump all its electrons so it can suck them up from somewhere

the key would be how you can bootstrap that process, because i'm pretty sure you could make it run overunity so long as you aren't pulling more up than is down there