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Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by jychang on Thursday September 21, 2023 @07:46PM (#37606008)
Every once in a while, I get reminded that people don’t necessarily have a scientific background.

1. Water molecules are not indivisible, of course. Many biological processes will rip apart hydrogen and oxygen, or combine them back together, and have been doing so for billions of years. Industrial processes do the same. So there’s plenty of “new water” from oxygen in the air, etc.

2. New water/oxygen/hydrogen land on earth fairly regularly due to comets, which are usually slushy balls of ice.

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by kcarter80 on Thursday September 21, 2023 @07:57PM (#37606093)
As a percentage of total water on earth, how many of the H2O molecules do you speculate came from comets or industrial processes?

Same question for the biological processes you mention.

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by ramraj07 on Thursday September 21, 2023 @09:43PM (#37606898)
Definitely more than a glass of water which was the original question anyway.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by foota on Thursday September 21, 2023 @10:38PM (#37607221)
I'm not a scientist; but water is used in photosynthesis, which is probably the main chemical reaction it undergoes. [1] says that the C3 cycle consumes 120 GT of CO2 per year, that's 2.7267×10^15 mols of CO2. C3 carbon fixation consumes one mol of H2O per mol of CO2, so that's 2.7267×10^15 mols of H2O. That's 5 * 10^13 liters. The USGS says there's ~1.4 billion cubic kilometers of water on earth (who chose that unit?), compared to 50 cubic kilometers for the C3 fixation. That's a lot of glasses, but not many oceans. Perhaps a bigger factor might be from back and forth reactions in the oceans and atmosphere, but I'm not sure how to estimate those (e.g., water converting between different acids or getting hit by light in the atmosphere).

[1]: https://bio.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Biochemistry/Fundamen...

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by labster on Thursday September 21, 2023 @10:18PM (#37607115)
Point 1 above greatly understates the case. Water just sitting in a glass is constantly creating and destroying hydronium and hydroxide ions, and bare protons. Not to mention the carbon dioxide that gets dissolved as carbonic acid which can dissociate to bicarbonate.

On the other hand, its tough to talk about new water because under thermodynamics, all atoms of the same isotope at the same energy state are completely fungible, so it’s hard to say anything meaningful about the history of a molecule.

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by adonovan on Thursday September 21, 2023 @10:30PM (#37607172)
True, but even Feynman talks about "new photons" when describing scattering.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by rcpt on Thursday September 21, 2023 @10:27PM (#37607153)
If a few water molecules are destroyed and replaced created over a long time then is it still the same glass of water?
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by mensetmanusman on Thursday September 21, 2023 @11:19PM (#37607427)
Nothing is ever the same at room temperature if you are counting atoms.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by alex_young on Thursday September 21, 2023 @11:53PM (#37607632)
The famous glass of Theseus’ water eh? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by labster on Friday September 22, 2023 @06:08AM (#37610113)
Is the Glass of Theseus half-full or half-empty?
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by developer93 on Saturday September 23, 2023 @03:14AM (#37621249)
Twice as big as it needs to be
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by jvm___ on Friday September 22, 2023 @12:55AM (#37608025)
Is the water I drink the same water I pee? Or does it get taken apart and put back together with different pieces?
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by c54 on Friday September 22, 2023 @01:09AM (#37608127)
Metabolism converts sugars and oxygen to carbon dioxide and water. Fire has the same inputs and outputs too! You can think of metabolism as releasing the same energy as fire but with more steps so our bodies can harness and use the energy via various other chemical reactions.

Most of the water from metabolism is released in your breath. Water you pee is mostly water you ingested via drinking and eating.

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by mjan22640 on Friday September 22, 2023 @04:37AM (#37609510)
How do the kidneys identify the H2O molecules origin?
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by diarrhea on Friday September 22, 2023 @05:09AM (#37609722)
It’s a tagged Union with associated data (the molecule), released in edition Homo Erectus. Pretty nifty feature a lot of other species lack. Abstract Human Types are much more powerful than what Homo Go can offer, for example.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by JshWright on Friday September 22, 2023 @07:12AM (#37610504)
The water you exhale is just the amount of water that happens to evaporate in your respiratory tract/lungs. The water you urinate is whatever "extra" water is left over (based on a bunch of factors like blood pressure, how much stuff is dissolved in you blood, etc).

The water that leaves via your lungs and the water that leaves via your kidneys all had to get there via your blood. There's no distinction made based on the "source" of that water.

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by c54 on Friday September 22, 2023 @05:28PM (#37618028)
Yes agreed fair enough
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by lloeki on Friday September 22, 2023 @07:14AM (#37610515)
> Most of the water from metabolism is released in your breath

And the reason for that is that air is bad for heat exchange and transport, water is much better, and evaporates! While the body passively cools in air (either directly when air is colder or via sweat evaporation when air is too hot) most of the heat exchange happens actively via breathing, which is nice because it's easy and quick to adjust, just by breathing faster or slower, so as to maintain 37ish C-100ish F while the body is continuously burning molecules. Without breathing we'd not only lack comburant (oxygen), we'd overheat pretty quickly!

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by JshWright on Friday September 22, 2023 @08:49PM (#37619640)
The primary driver for your respiratory rate is the pH of your blood. For instance, metabolic disorders that result in a drop in blood pH will result in an increase in respiratory rate/depth (e.g. Kussmaul breathing). As far as I know (with a fairly deep anatomy and physiology background) there is no mechanism by which body temperature can directly influence respiratory rate. If your respiratory rate increased just to get rid of heat, you’d also be blowing off more carbon dioxide and would end up in a state of respiratory alkalosis.

As you mentioned, sweat is also evaporating water, and that is a much more effective way of dumping heat.

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by nojvek on Friday September 22, 2023 @01:04AM (#37608086)
Same H2O molecules, different levels of other molecules mixed in with it.

It is possible to recycle urine into drinkable water. That’s what they do in international space station where water is very precious.

https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/wat...

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by kolinko on Friday September 22, 2023 @02:32AM (#37608613)
They also do it in Singapore iirc.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by thombat on Friday September 22, 2023 @05:14AM (#37609754)
I'm curious why this would be worthwhile: since Singapore is an island conventional desalination would seem easier than either coping with the witches' brew of sewage (random amounts of random chemicals) or the expense of plumbing urine separately.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by Cthulhu_ on Friday September 22, 2023 @05:37AM (#37609902)
Seem being the key word here; if it's plain sewage, there's affordable, scalable and relatively low energy ways to turn it back into clean drinking water, vs desalinization which requires a lot of energy still.

But it's not just sewage though, it's chemicals as well, e.g. from medication, plus whatever else gets flushed.

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by thombat on Friday September 22, 2023 @06:58AM (#37610427)
Exactly: all the sewage systems I know of process it enough to dump into a sea or river, where even if a downstream town draws drinking water from it the dilution with other water plus additional environmental chemistry reduces the purification problem.

In Singapore's case the sea is the obvious sink for treated sewage, which kicks it back to desalination. Except that I believe that Singapore's water comes across the causeway to the mainland in a pipe.

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by bbor on Friday September 22, 2023 @05:17AM (#37609766)
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by Cthulhu_ on Friday September 22, 2023 @05:35AM (#37609889)
The Urine of Theseus, lol
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by bmitc on Friday September 22, 2023 @02:29AM (#37608594)
> Every once in a while, I get reminded that people don’t necessarily have a scientific background.

This isn't necessary for your point and detracts from it.

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by jimkleiber on Friday September 22, 2023 @02:35AM (#37608629)
I find it helpful to remember. When covid was starting to spread I worried a lot about potential exponential growth and was confused why a lot of others didn't seem so worried. While there may be many reasons, one that came to mind is that they may not have learned as much about exponential growth as I had in electrical and computer engineering and in working with startups. So it helped me to remember not everyone has the same education and experience that I do, that we're all relatively ignorant, depending on the field.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by bmitc on Friday September 22, 2023 @02:51AM (#37608732)
There will always be people that don't know what you know and vice versa. It's a given fact of life. It's like forgetting that the sky is blue. Haha. I.e., I agree with you, but your statement is more humble than the last.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by hutzlibu on Friday September 22, 2023 @04:47AM (#37609572)
"but your statement is more humble than the last."

It also was a different person ..

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by bmitc on Friday September 22, 2023 @12:59PM (#37614500)
And? I know it was a different person.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by kjkjadksj on Saturday September 23, 2023 @12:53PM (#37624995)
You are giving an example of the very issue you complain about. You worry about this not from a background of epidemiology, but another field entirely. Some of the people who were not worried were deferring to expert opinions they have read about the matter.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by xorbax on Saturday September 23, 2023 @11:46PM (#37629971)
The vast majority of people dont really "get" functions or plots or line fitting

They took 7th grade math, but assert that y=mx is meaningless in real life and doesn't help them understand anything they have to deal with

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by noduerme on Sunday September 24, 2023 @09:18PM (#37638667)
Yeah. Originally when those people refused to wear masks I quietly wished them death. But after awhile I got more tired of hearing educated people pretend that their intellect was keeping them alive more than their economic leverage was. Rooting for the ignorant to die of covid was a bad look. Granted, we also had a president who said he loved the uneducated, so it all took place at a moment when that line could be drawn in a certain way. In any event, the snobbish castigation of people who don't understand science or math didn't help and actually hurt the cause of getting them to protect themselves and everyone else.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by uoaei on Friday September 22, 2023 @02:57AM (#37608777)
> detracts from it

I think you're assigning a moral quality to certain kinds of knowledge that isn't warranted.

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by bmitc on Friday September 22, 2023 @03:03AM (#37608813)
I don't know what that means. The statement just wasn't useful and comes across as sassy and arrogant.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by peoplefromibiza on Friday September 22, 2023 @04:49AM (#37609595)
the most important thing though, is that that statement is true and verifiably so.

I am one of those persons that learned something by reading that comment.

assuming arrogance and sassyness in an otherwise neutral exposition of a true fact, to me means that, as usually happens, arrogance and sassyness are in the eye of the beholder.

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by bbor on Friday September 22, 2023 @05:15AM (#37609755)
Is the most important thing in communication that each statement is true, or that true information is successfully conveyed? If I prefaced this comment with true facts about how bad your life in particular is, I doubt you'd be ready to read the rest of it :)

  arrogance and sassyness are in the eye of the beholder
very true - but true of all aspects of communication, I think
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by peoplefromibiza on Friday September 22, 2023 @05:23AM (#37609803)
> Is the most important thing in communication that each statement is true, or that true information is successfully conveyed?

the former.

I, for example, am not native English speaker, so, for example, in this case should you learn Italian to the point where you are able to successfully convey the information to me, which could be "never"?

> f I prefaced this comment with true facts about how bad your life in particular is, I doubt you'd be ready to read the rest of it :)

you can try, but be ready to fail miserably. Also: I am very well aware how bad my life is, I would say that only an arrogant can think to know it better than me to the point that I will be surprised or shocked.

Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by uoaei on Friday September 22, 2023 @11:31AM (#37613359)
Do you think it's belittling to point out that someone may not have scientific knowledge? Ie, is the statement something beyond mere fact? What makes having scientific knowledge good, that you may infer that someone may think not having it is bad?
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by joe__f on Friday September 22, 2023 @03:14PM (#37616399)
My first reading of the sentence in question was that it was patronising
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by d1sxeyes on Saturday September 23, 2023 @04:14AM (#37621527)
In and of itself no. But in the context of responding to someone saying “your comment reminded me that some people don’t have a scientific background” can be read in a similar way to saying “your comment reminded me that not everyone on Hacker News is a genius”, even if that wasn’t the author’s intention.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by replwoacause on Friday September 22, 2023 @09:41PM (#37619900)
I agree with you. I took it exactly the same way and thought it was unnecessary.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by TheHappyOddish on Sunday September 24, 2023 @10:49PM (#37639186)
As a non scientific person, I took no offense. Whilst it's fine to point these things out, it's important to remember that people come from different cultures, and often the intent is unlikely to be there to offend.
Re:NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s m... by rpwverheij on Saturday September 23, 2023 @03:13AM (#37621248)
> 2. New water/oxygen/hydrogen land on earth fairly regularly due to comets, which are usually slushy balls of ice.

This + the fact that we've seen microbes come back to life after being frozen in polar ice for millions of years always seems like the most obvious explanation for the origins of cellular life on earth to me.

In other words, what's the chance that the immense complexity of cells did evolve from a molecular soup here on earth VS the chance that it formed somewhere in the universe and found its way here (and many other places)