"Kim Stanley Robinson - Forty Signs of Rain" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robinson Kim Stanley)

Kim Stanley Robinson

BANTAM BOOKS



TABLE OF CONTENTS

TITLE PAGE

ONE The Buddha Arrives

TWO In the Hyperpower

THREE Intellectual Merit

FOUR Science in the Capital

FIVE Athena on the Pacific

SIX The Capital in Science

SEVEN Tit for Tat

EIGHT A Paradigm Shift

NINE Trigger Event

TEN Broader Impacts

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

BOOKS BY KIM STANLEY ROBINSON

COPYRIGHT PAGE
 T
he Earth is bathed in a flood of sunlight. A fierce inundation of photons—on average, 342 joules per
second per square meter. 4185 joules (one calorie) will raise the temperature of one kilogram of water
by one degree Celsius. If all this energy were captured by the Earth’s atmosphere, its temperature would
rise by ten degrees Celsius in one day.

Luckily much of it radiates back to space. How much depends on albedo and the chemical composition
of the atmosphere, both of which vary over time.

A good portion of Earth’s albedo, or reflectivity, is created by its polar ice caps. If polar ice and snow
were to shrink significantly, more solar energy would stay on Earth. Sunlight would penetrate oceans
previously covered by ice, and warm the water. This would add heat and melt more ice, in a positive
feedback loop.

The Arctic Ocean ice pack reflects back out to space a few percent of the total annual solar energy