Suggested Answers to the Short Quiz

[johnkarls]

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NB: SUGGESTED ANSWERS 6 AND 16 RELY ON INFORMATION DEVELOPED IN PRIOR MEETINGS --

RE #6, ADDITIONAL VOLUMINOUS INFORMATION CAN BE ACCESSED BY ENTERING IN THE PRIMITIVE SEARCH BOX IN THE UPPER-RIGHT-HAND CORNER OF EVERY FRAME OF THIS BULLETIN BOARD – “JCPOA” w/o the quotation marks – and 27 items dating back to 2019 are listed for ready access.

RE #16, ADDITIONAL VOLUMINOUS INFORMATION CAN BE ACCESSED BY ENTERING IN THE PRIMITIVE SEARCH BOX IN THE UPPER-RIGHT-HAND CORNER OF EVERY FRAME OF THIS BULLETIN BOARD – “Stenger” w/o the quotation marks – and 16 items dating back to 2012 are listed for ready access.



Question 1

Does the “Doom” Table of Contents comprise brief summaries of each chapter which together occupy 5 pages?

Answer 1

Yes.

Question 2

Does “Doom” NOT get around to discussing COVID-19 until the last third of the book?

Answer 2

Yes.

Question 3

Does “Doom” cover in any detail the focus of a currently-proposed book in Sec. 3 of www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.com – “NYC Harvard Club Book Promotion -- ‘Warp Speed: Inside The Operation That Beat COVID, The Critics and The Odds’” by Paul Mango?

Answer 3

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

NB: President-Elect Biden received his first COVID shot on live television Mon 12/20/2020 (and he was NOT the first recipient).

The NYC Harvard Club notice begins --

“Whether you are a Republican or Democrat, it will go down in history as the U.S. Government’s greatest achievement since the Manhattan Project: the 14-month*** campaign to develop an anti-Covid vaccine. Nobody thought it could be done, “’it would take years,’ everybody said. Almost all other nations tried — and nobody came close. When the United States came to the finish line standing alone, it arrived with not one but two vaccines, with a third on the way! That’s like inventing three different kinds of atomic bombs! Furthermore, the vaccines were supposed to be 50% effective. They turned out to be 95% effective. According to the progressive Commonwealth Fund, they prevented 2.2 million deaths and 17 million hospitalizations — avoiding an estimated 66+ million additional infections and nearly $900 billion in associated health costs.

“How did the United States manage to achieve this miracle? It took inspired leadership, close cooperation between government and the private sector, and a strong spirit of collegiality and cooperation among all members of the task force. One of the principals leading the team was Paul Mango — West Point, Harvard Business School (Baker Scholar), head of the Worldwide Healthcare Practice at McKinsey, and former Deputy Chief of Staff at Health and Human Services.”

*** Sic -- as stated above before the NYC Harvard Club quotation, President-Elect Biden received his COVID shot on 12/20/2020 -- however, the public had been receiving COVID shots since 12/14/2020 when the first was received by Sandra Lindsey, an African-American nurse at Long Island Jewish Medical Center and, accordingly, since President Trump's "Coronavirus Task Force” had not been established until 1/29/2020, the alleged 14 months was actually 10.5 months.

Question 4

Does “Doom” address all types of catastrophes throughout history – geological, geopolitical, biological, technological, etc.?

Answer 4

Yes.

Question 5

Does “Doom” posit that the biggest disasters in human history have been pandemics and wars?

Answer 5

Yes.

Question 6

Is this perhaps misleading since humanity has faced its possible extinction from a nuclear holocaust for nearly 8 decades?

Answer 6

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

After all, if Hitler had perfected atomic bombs before the U.S., do you think for a moment all of the world would not be speaking German today -- if, indeed, any human beings were still alive???

And do you think for a moment that the 2015 Iran Nuclear Deal, which guaranteed Iran nuclear weapons by 2030, will NOT produce a nuclear holocaust (hint - Iran Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei loves to call Israeli a "one-bomb state" and loves to chant "death to America" which he calls "The Big Satan" while he develops INTER-CONTINENTAL ballistic missiles not needed for Israel and not addressed by the Nuclear Deal).

Question 7

Does Doom’s author, who also wrote 15 other insightful books on, inter alia, Pax Britannica and Pax Americana, overlook how successful has been the imposition of the European Union on the geographic location of so many of the world’s wars??? An organization whose legislative body (the European Parliament) does NOT even have the power to initiate legislation??? And the militaries of most of whose members are embedded in an American-dominated NATO???

Answer 7

Yes, Doom’s author, who also wrote 15 other insightful books on, inter alia, Pax Britannica and Pax Americana, does (at least this time) overlook how successful has been the imposition of the European Union on the geographic location of so many of the world’s wars.

Yes, the European Union’s legislative body (the European Parliament) does NOT even have the power to initiate legislation. It must be proposed by the European Council.

And yes, the militaries of most of the EU’s members are embedded in an American-dominated NATO.

So do you think the U.S. “stitched up” Europe well as part of Pax Americana???

Let’s discuss!!!

Question 8

How many disasters are avoidable such as by not locating settlements near volcanoes or fault lines, in flood plains, etc.?

Answer 8

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

Question 9

Does Doom Chapter 6 examine a theory that political and military disasters result from incompetent leaders and democracy will prevent such incompetence? Despite American democracy, have we seen quite a bit of incompetence during the COVID era?

Answer 9

Yes, Doom does examine a theory that political and military disasters result from incompetent leaders and democracy will prevent such incompetence.

Re whether despite American democracy, we have seen quite a bit of incompetence during the COVID era – AT LEAST WITH THE EXCEPTION OF VACCINE DEVELOPMENT (please see Q&A-3 above) – What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

Question 10

Does Doom Chapter 7 posit that the Asian flu of 1957 was about as dangerous as COVID-19 but yet it was controlled with no lockdowns or school closures?

Answer 10

Yes.

Question 11

Are such comparisons to the Asian flu of 1957 invalid because “Doom” was written in the middle of 2020 less than one year into the COVID pandemic, even though “Doom” was not published until 5/4/2021?

Answer 11

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

Question 12

How many of us are old enough (Yours Truly will be 81 in February) to remember the threat of polio??? That our mothers made us take daily one-hour naps after lunch??? And that public swimming pools typically closed by the middle of the summer as polio epidemics broke out and swimming pools were viewed as polio-germ breeding grounds??? [And please, you “wise acres,” don’t ask how a pool can be a grounds!!!]

Answer 12

Yours Truly’s answers – yes, yes and yes.

And yours???

Question 13

How many of our mothers were raised on farms and, accordingly, preached that there are zillions of germs around you all the time and the only way to defeat them is to get plenty of fresh air, sunshine, exercise, sleep and to eat right??? And if you do, you will never get sick???

Answer 13

Yours Truly’s answers – yes and yes.

And yours???

Question 14

But weren’t we nevertheless first in line to get the anti-polio Salk vaccine after it was announced in 1955??? And weren’t we first in line to receive COVID-19 shots???

Answer 14

Yours Truly’s answers – yes and yes.

And yours???

Question 15

Does Doom Chapter 8 posit that many disasters are the result of operator/managerial error???

Answer 15

Yes.

Question 16

In championing thorium fission as the only practical solution for economic reasons to global warming (aka climate change), have we explained that the world’s only significant nuclear accidents (which involved uranium fission – thorium is incapable of exploding) were the result of human error???

Answer 16

Yes, every time we have discussed global warming (aka climate change), we have always reviewed the facts that –

(1) wind and solar are much more expensive than fossil fuels which is why they require such massive subsidies.

(2) hydropower is less expensive than fossil fuels but the world has an extreme shortage of dammable rivers.

(3) nuclear is the only abundant “clean” energy source that is cheaper than fossil fuels.

Accordingly, every time we have discussed this topic, we have always asked for a show of hands by anyone who would favor invading militarily China (THE WORLD’S LARGEST CARBON POLLUTER BY FAR – WHICH IS NOT REQUIRED TO DO ANYTHING UNTIL THE DISTANT FUTURE BY THE PARIS CLIMATE ACCORD OR ITS PREDECESSOR, THE KYOTO PROTOCOL) to prevent it from bringing on line every week a new monster-size coal-fired electric generation plant.

In all the meetings we have had, nobody has ever raised a hand!!!

*****
Nuclear power can be generated from uranium, plutonium or thorium.

Thorium is incapable of exploding – the world’s LARGEST THORIUM REACTOR IS THE EARTH ITSELF which is why molten lava billows from any rupture in the earth’s thin surface AND WHY THE CENTER OF THE EARTH IS 7,000 DEGREES FAHRENHEIT WHICH IS HOTTER THAN THE SURFACE OF THE SUN!!!

Indeed, thorium’s inability to explode is the reason why – after the U.S. National Nuclear-Research Laboratory at Oak Ridge TN conducted a successful 18-month continuous demonstration project comprising a thorium-fueled nuclear reactor in the 1960’s – President Nixon caused the nation to turn away from thorium (and toward uranium and plutonium) because thorium is incapable of exploding or being utilized to produce nuclear weapons.

IN ADDITION TO PRODUCING NO GREENHOUSE GASES, proven thorium/fission has the following advantages over conventional uranium/fission –

[These advantages are virtually identical to those listed by Dr. Victor Stenger in The Huffington Post – https://www.huffpost.com/entry/lftr-a-l ... _b_1192584.]


[THE FIRST TWO ADVANTAGES WERE NOT PERMITTED TO BE LISTED HERE BY OUR SOFTWARE EVEN THOUGH THEY HAVE BEEN PERMITTED WHEN THIS LIST HAS BEEN POSTED ELSEWHERE ON THIS BULLETIN BOARD.]

[THE FIRST TWO ADVANTAGES CAN BE FOUND IN THE IMMEDIATELY-FOLLOWING "REPLY."]


(3) Thorium is so stable that, as mentioned above, it is impossible to make a nuclear weapon from thorium which is why the U.S. turned to uranium and plutonium instead of thorium.

(4) Thorium has such an incredibly-high “burn-up” that there is virtually no long-lived radioactive waste.

(5) LFTR’s can safely consume uranium from decommissioned nuclear warheads and from spent uranium-reactor fuel rods. Indeed, the Oak Ridge MSRE in the 1960’s was able to use U-235, Pu-239 and U-233 at the same time as thorium. [NB: Since former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of NV prevented the opening of Yucca Mountain NV as the repository for our spent uranium-nuclear fuel rods, the spent uranium-nuclear fuel rods have been left on site at each uranium-nuclear plant to remain cool in the equivalent of home swimming-pools even though many of those uranium-nuclear plants are situated in high-volume air corridors!!!]

(6) Because LFTR’s are economically practical in small sizes, they can be mass-produced in factories and assembled near electrical demand so that the huge energy losses during electricity transmission are virtually eliminated -- though to replace huge uranium reactors, it would only be necessary to assemble several of the small modular thorium reactors into a larger plant.

(7) In addition, thorium is so plentiful that proven thorium supplies are capable of supplying 100% of the world’s energy (not just electricity) for more than 1,000 years. Indeed, virtually all of India’s “sand” beaches comprise thorium.

[Our calculation was 80 years of “proven” reserves of uranium for current (electricity only) usage multiplied by 3 (the minimum abundance factor of “proven” thorium reserves vs. “proven” uranium reserves) multiplied by 99 (usable thorium energy content vs. usable uranium energy content) multiplied by 5.8% (the percentage of total worldwide energy including transportation fuels, that comes from nuclear plants) = 1,378 years.]

[ThEC15 was a worldwide conference on thorium research that was held in Mumbai, India, in 2015 by the Government of India and two of its agencies, BARC and NPCIL, along with HBNI and IThEO. The ThEC15 website (http://www.thoriumenergyworld.com/thec15-mumbai.html) contains 127 papers and speeches by 46 speakers from 30 different nations.]”

Question 17

Do Doom Chapters 9-11 deal in depth with COVID-19?

Answer 17

Yes.

Question 18

BTW, would it be important to know after all its horrendous consequences whether COVID was caused by a “lab leak,” how such work was funded despite U.S. bans on “gain of function” research, why proper precautions were obviously not employed, etc., etc.???

Answer 18

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

Question 19

What does Doom’s final Chapter (“Conclusion - Future Shocks”) recommend?

Answer 19

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

Question 20

Do Doom’s 11 chapters + intro & conclusion make you think that Hollywood has invented a device capable of recording your dreams in living color and these are 13 nightmares that the world’s foremost historian had IN MONTANA after suffering from COVID during the early months of the pandemic while on his perpetual worldwide lecture tour causing him to abandon his lecture tour and ride out the pandemic in isolation in Montana with his wife (Ayaan Hirsi Ali) and two youngest children???

Answer 20

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

[johnkarls]

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These are the first two advantages of thorium fission which are virtually identical to those listed by Dr. Victor Stenger in The Huffington Post AND WHICH OUR SOFTWARE WOULD NOT PERMIT TO BE PLACED IN ANSWER 16 ABOVE – EVEN THOUGH THEY HAVE BEEN PERMITTED WHEN THIS LIST WAS POSTED ELSEWHERE ON THIS BULLETIN BOARD.

(1) LFTR’s (Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors) require minimal containment chambers because meltdowns are physically impossible since LFTR’s operate near atmospheric pressure (this is both a safety and cost factor).

(2) LFTR’s do not require elaborate cooling systems because they operate well below the boiling point of molten salt and can be passively cooled (this is also both a safety and cost factor).