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Earthquake In China
Posted by
kdawson
on Tue May 13, 2008 12:14 AM
from the twist-and-shout dept.
from the twist-and-shout dept.
Several readers sent in links on the earthquake that hit 10 hours ago near the Sichuan city of Chengdu in China. The Telegraph focuses on the citizen journalism that got word on the quake out on the Net instantly (the first report was via Twitter). Science magazine speculates that deaths from this event could exceed the 240,000 killed in the Tangshan quake in 1976, though the estimated death toll is below 10,000 at this writing. Hundreds of videos are up on YouTube, including this footage from a security camera — keep your eye on the goldfish.
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This is the future (Score:5, Interesting)
Which is interesting because I could swear China had a Youtube block to prevent such uncontrolled proliferation of footage.
Re:This is the future (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:This is the future (Score:5, Funny)
Cheers,
IT
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Re:This is the future (Score:4, Interesting)
Don't get me wrong, China's censorship is lame and probably won't last much longer as it just becomes too difficult to accomplish, but it's not as all encompassing as people think. The pr0n must flow.
Cheers,
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
People dying somehow make human rights stop being an issue?
If that's what you think, you're absolutely wrong. Human rights don't stop mattering because people die. They don't stop mattering if an earthquake hits. Or for a terrorist attack. Or even in an active war zone.
In this case, the news is good - China's notoriously problematic censorship system hasn't noticeably hurt people's ability to communicate vital information during a natu
Re:This is the future (Score:5, Insightful)
It's true that these concepts have been heavily abused, to the point of governments artificially starting wars (say, Iraq or Kosovo) to preserve the state of emergency. But I don't think chinese science is advanced enough to produce a massive artificial earthquake.
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Re:This is the future (Score:4, Insightful)
The fact that people are are and have died because of this earthquake does not make the means of transmission of the information less relevant. Robert1 was not heartless in anything he said, nor did he say anything inflammatory. His language, IMO, was relatively neutral.
I will say something potentially inflammatory though. The fact that there is an earthquake does not change the fact that this country violates human rights every day. To not discuss topical/relevant violations would be stupid. Hurricane Katrina did not mean that we should stop discussing the war in Iraq, did it? I realize there is a difference of scale, but I think the point stands.
The fact is, it is impressive that this much information on this quake is available in such a short time. I believe that was the point that your parent was making.
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Re:This is the future (Score:5, Insightful)
I've seen comments (not on slashdot, elsewhere) ranging from: "serves you right, commies!" to "why would they care? those sick bastards would be murdering their own people anyway" to various smartass comments.
Yeah should have made some sick waterboarding joke when Katrina struck...
[/rant]
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A tragedy... (Score:4, Funny)
Slashdot-proof? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Slashdot-proof? (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Slashdot-proof? (Score:5, Interesting)
Then the next day I found out how bad the earthquake had been and was sorry for the people living there and the victims but also glad I lived in an area that experienced no earthquakes.
I recently went to Japan and experienced a couple of small earthquakes at night. I slept through the first one but the second one felt like somebody was trying to wake me by shaking me. I literally said out loud "I'm up already" before I realized nobody was shaking me and it was just an earthquake. It was so small that it didn't scare me though, although it was a bit unnerving (it was the first earthquake I ever experienced).
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Duration varies with distance (Score:4, Informative)
IIRC the Northridge quake in 1994 only lasted about 17 seconds at the epicenter. I was about 100 miles away when it hit and the shaking went on for a good 30-45 seconds. Based on the immediate reports I got from friends over email and their estimates of the duration of shaking, I was able to pinpoint the epicenter somewhere in western Los Angeles long before the news services.
At the epicenter itself, the duration of the shaking generally corresponds to the length of fault that gives way. If only a few km slips, it's a short quake. If several thousand km slips (like happened in Chile 1960 and Alaska 1964 [usgs.gov]) the shaking can go on for several minutes. The Alaska quake was 4 minutes at the epicenter, with several distant but affected communities reporting shaking for almost 10 minutes.
Also note that earthquake magnitude is a measure of energy released, while certain types of damage correspond more to the power (energy over time) of the quake. The Northridge quake was moderate in terms of magnitude, but its direction and focus generated enormous power in certain areas. One seismograph recorded accelerations over 1g, whereas the previous largest recorded acceleration during an earthquake was less than 0.25g (typically you only see about 0.5 - 0.1g).
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Don't worry: the fish survived (Score:5, Informative)
The purpose of slashdot (Score:5, Insightful)
the faster the world knows about it, the faster help can be sent for the victims.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Sometimes the ruling junta isn't interested in help [smh.com.au]
The real tragedy of the earthquake... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The real tragedy of the earthquake... (Score:5, Funny)
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:The real tragedy of the earthquake... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Awful, awful, awful (Score:5, Insightful)
I always have a tough time getting my mind around the numbers bandied about in these human tragedies, but just imagine if 5,000 people died in the United States from something like this.
The 1989 quake that hit Northern California caused a lot of economic damage and freaked the hell out of people. It took years for the areas hit to fully recover from it. That incident killed 67 people.
I really do hope that the numbers turn out to be lower than expected. Major suckage.
Many aftershocks (Score:5, Informative)
The reason for the current massive damage due to this earthquake is because it did happen at only 10 km depth. If it had happened at 40 or 80 km depth, there would have been less damage as less energy from the earthquake would have reached the surface.
There are going to be many, many aftershocks in this area for the next two months or more. Most of them from mb4.5 up to Mw6.5. Creating more damage to already badly damaged houses in the nearby area.
Good list of aftershocks can be seen here, along with information on the main quake.
http://www.emsc-csem.org/index.php?page=current&sub=list [emsc-csem.org]
When you should be embarrased (Score:5, Insightful)
You ought to be embarrassed to think that way.
I don't think Chinese rescuers are thinking about chairman mao any more than US rescuers think about George Washington. I think they are more likely concerned with digging out as many wives, husbands and children so that husbands, wives and parents can have their loved ones back.
I don't see these images of destruction and desperate hoping a story of politics. Instead, I see incredible suffering, and I feel for them. I imagine how I would feel if it were my wife, or my son, smashed up inside my crushed house, if that earthquake happened to me. Thank god it didn't.
Take a little trip with me. (Score:5, Insightful)
Imagine having your legs pinned under 18 tons of concrete. You are laying in the dark under the rubble of a multi-story apartment complex. Next to you is the body of one of your children, below you is your other child, who is suffering yet refuses to die. As the rest of the world is in a warm bed or on a comfortable couch or sitting here being crass, drinking coffee and taking this in as some sort of sick Romanesque spectator sport.
Yet here you are under the rubble watching your last child suffer away and you are wishing and hoping that if you die maybe a higher power will be placated and spare your child. The pain isn't so bad anymore, except for the cries coming from under you in the rubble. The cries of people who had dreams that will likely never be realized. The cries of pain and anguish. You hope for some relief before the dark comes, but only rain water dripping down on you. The darkness comes the cries continue. The pain continues. You watch your child draw his last breath.
Those of you without sympathy for the suffering are the ones that need to be lined up and shot on sight.
Just 2 cents from a red blooded American!
Remember that scenario is happening now....
From the USA: Today we are all Chinese (Score:4, Insightful)
China is a pretty powerful country, but if there's anything China needs, I hope they ask just ask. Americans would be honored to help.
Re:News for Nerds? (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously.
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Re:News for Nerds? (Score:4, Insightful)
I think it must be the internet angle, otherwise there should be a
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it is a stuff that matters (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:News for Nerds? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:News for Nerds? (Score:5, Funny)
You know, it made me smile more, when I saw "Compare prices on Quake" in the related links.
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Re:News for Nerds? (Score:4, Funny)
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
>that should have been faster than a human posting on twitter.
How about less than a minute? Compare the event and solution times on this page.
http://neic.usgs.gov/neis/eq_depot/2008/eq_080512_ryan/neic_ryan_cmt.html [usgs.gov]
Re:Twitter? (Score:5, Interesting)
Early warning from toad migration on May 10.
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Re:Twitter? (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.google.com.tw/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.chinareviewnews.com%2Fdoc%2F1006%2F4%2F3%2F1%2F100643181.html%3Fcoluid%3D45%26kindid%3D0%26docid%3D100643181%26mdate%3D0513002548&hl=zh-TW&ie=UTF8&sl=zh-CN&tl=en [google.com.tw]
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Re:Twitter? (Score:5, Funny)
Hundreds of thousands of toads the size of factories crushing vehicles? That makes the earthquake seem like a minor inconvenience...
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Re:Twitter? (Score:4, Informative)
And here I thought you'd be pointing out that English is not considered a Latin-based language (though there are many latin words, the structure and grammar was from an independent language).
Chinese is a very complex language, with subtle "grammar" rules which makes it hard to parse with an automaton.
Actually, I'd say it is nearly grammar-less. When translating, you must hear an entire sentence, understand the meaning, then translate the meaning. When I was learning some Chinese, I would ask questions about grammar and the response was "they'll understand what you mean." There are no tenses at all. "I drive ago" for "I have driven" or "I drive later" for "I will drive" would be the words used. There is only what we would consider the present tense, and time modifying words. If ever you hear someone who speaks Chinese have trouble with tenses, it's because even the idea of them doesn't exist in their native language. They aren't just learning a new language, they are learning a whole different way of thinking.
The simplification applies to Chinese characters only, basically establishing some kind of shorthand for writing complicated characters.
The simplification was to improve literacy. However, it has not achieved its goal. Taiwan almost exclusively uses Traditional (I think as a sign of independence from the mainland pushing Simplified). And those that are literate on the mainland that completed university will probably know both and use Simplified. But you still need to know Traditional because of its use in Taiwan and limited continued use on the mainland. Add to that the effect that handwritten Simplified is more confusing than handwritten Traditional, and the limited alphabet replacement is pretty useless and probably not achieving its stated goal of imcreasing literacy.
Cantonese and Mandarin are (among the many) spoken dialects, and have little to do with the written language.
Both spoken languages can be represented with the same printed characters, so they could be classified as a single language (with an "accent" that renders it indecipherable to those that aren't trained in that "accent"). The grammar rules are quite similar, helping one written language represent both, and with one written language representing two spoken languages, the combination could also be reasonably regarded as three separate languages, one unpronouncable and two unwritten. It's a unique linguistic situation that defies all traditional (European-based) descriptions. It would be about the same as if you decreed that French and Italian must be written the same, but that you still spoke it as you always have. We would think that impossible, and the Chinese did it and have made it work for quite a while.
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Re:Twitter? (Score:5, Informative)
According to sources, omens appeared before the earthquake in Mianzhu, Sichuan: large scale migrations of toads. When some citizens commented that these were bad omens, the local forestry department explained that this was a normal phenomenon.
According to reports by wccdaily, there are always indications before earthquakes, some animals react more strongly than humans. Large scale migrations of toads appeared in Sichuan Mianzhu city: hundreds of thousands of toads marched on a highway near a pharmacutical factory, and were rolled over by many passing vehicles, or crushed by pedestrians. The appearances of large numbers of toads led villagers to speculate that something bad will happen.
==Toads crossing roads in flocks, frightened pedestrians take alternate routes===
"Too many, too frightening, flocks and flocks, as if they were taking their families to a carnival" villager Zhou said, "At early dawn, I went to the market to buy something, and I didn't get far before I saw toads strolling on the streets, and I was too frightened to put my feet on the ground. So I decided to take another route. When I went back home at noon, I saw a few toads remaining, and because some cars passed by, a number of toads were already killed under their wheels.
The toads appeared near a pharmacutical facility. Mr. Liu who lived next to the facility said that he saw a black mass of toads crawling on the ground, "a lot of them had already been killed by cars and pedestrians at that time, lying bloodily on the floor. We never had such phenomenon here before."
==Was it a foreword for disaster? Forestry experts dismiss doubts==
Many villagers expressed worries, "Isn't this a bad omen for some natural disaster?", as the news spread people got unsettled and worried.
When the local forestry deparment received report and arrived at the scene, the head of the department said that large numbers of young toads grouping on shore to migrate is a normal phenomenon, unrelated to the natural disasters claimed by citizens, and the toads will not affect the living of people, their arrival would also reduce the number of mosquitoes and pests, so villagers need not worry.
De-yang Forestry workers said that these massive migrations are good signs, they show that Mianzhu's wildlife environment is getting better and better.
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
"Mother Nature" has nothing to do with plate tectonics. She is involved in things like Ebola and homosexuality in Orca pods.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Heart ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Stop judging a nation's people by it's government's actions and the world will make a lot more sense.
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Re:Heart ? (Score:4, Insightful)
The public agrees with its government's actions because they generally do. Is it so hard to accept the fact that sometimes these governments actually work for the people? Is it so hard to accept the possibility that Chinese leaders actually have a sense of responsibility and morality, and actually care about the people, instead of the vote-buying enterprise that dominates "democratic" politics?
It's ironic that in "democratic" countries governments with less than like 40% approval rating can still rule the country... and then instead of electing a better government these people bitch about "brainwashing" of other countries when an "evil" authoritarian government does a better job.
I'm not saying democracy is worse than authoritarian government... but people like you are essentially saying "you're evil!!! you can't be better than us!! it must be a trick!!". Pathetic.
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Re:Heart ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Is America the country where I'd rather be a citizen? Yes. Does America have flaws galore? Absolutely. But understand that the Chinese people are smart. They understand the flaws of their government. But they also understand that they have had unbelievable growth over the past 30 years, and that this ascendancy is going to cause some problems.
The problems that China faces are the same as those in America: people care more about whether they can buy the next cool thing. So long as they can, and the government keeps the economy growing so they can, they don't care what the government does. The same way we don't care what abuses our government commits so long as we get our cheap oil, food, clothes, etc. The only difference is that we have a different government system, so the abuses are done with (slightly) more caution.
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Re:Heart ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Bread and circuses. The stuff works, and it has been refined over the course of many years. Maybe one day you tell people that they have to follow your rules so they can have life after death and the next day you dangle their credit score in front of them, but the process is the same.
Shut up, do your work, and you get to buy stuff.
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Re:Heart ? (Score:5, Insightful)
We just discovered that humans tend toward violence and oppression.
Wow.
Maybe someone should write about this.
Then we can study it.... maybe we could call it....
history.
And then we might learn from it.
But that would be too much work.
sigh.
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Re:Heart ? (Score:4, Insightful)
furthermore, if i didnt have a heart, there is absolutely nothing barring or deterring anyone from announcing it, so just dont let me see you making such dud remarks about hearts again.
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Re:Compare (Score:5, Insightful)
1) The 9/11 attacks were entirely malicious, whereas an earthquake is an accident of nature. An earthquake sucks, but it happens every now and then. Some douchebags hijacking planes and crashing them into tall populated buildings doesn't fit into most peoples' view of "usual happenings".
2) You're sampling the US's reaction based on a couple of comments made by trolls within the first 10 minutes that this post has been up. Give moderation a chance.
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Meh (Score:4, Insightful)
I was surprised that the US is willing to do more for the Burmese than they were their own citizens; although it came as no surprise that no one in the Bush administration seems to have realized the irony.
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Ouch (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:Compare (Score:5, Informative)
Here's the link to the first 9/11 story on Slashdot:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?threshold=-1&mode=nested&commentsort=0&op=Change&sid=21541 [slashdot.org]
Be sure to browse at -1.
It's chock full of idiotic jokes, complaints about this not being 'tech', ignorant nonsense about politics.
I guess not that much has changed.
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