What was the most hyped up diasaster that never happened?

[gsellis]

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus

Originally posted by: cubby1223
Just another one of lesser note, 15-20 years ago (don't remember exactly when) geologists were predicting a massive earthquake to hit Southern Illinois soon, going to hit like a 7 or 8 on the Richter scale. Never happened.

Just so you know that quake will hit, it's just a matter of time. Anytime anything in nature is predicted to happen in a given time frame, it most likely will not happen. Nature is unpredictable and chaotic, so anytime something predicted about when something in nature will happen its just a sheer guess. If you research it that quake did hit in the early 1800's and caused a tremendous amount of damage. That quake will hit, just give it time.

+1 And when it hits it will be bad. Memphis and St. Louis do not follow earthquake building codes IIRC like most of California. It will be a huge mess.

 

[KentState]

Brittany's upskirt photos. I remember hearing about that and going home and finding out, to my disgust that it was nothing special.

 

[manowar821]

Originally posted by: michaelsslave

Originally posted by: ja1484

"Climate Change"

its happened, ever hear of the ice age

Blasphemy, god made this planet and it will stay this way forever!

 

[HardcoreRobot]

2nd coming / day of reckoning / end of days

 

[Eeezee]

Mutual Assured Destruction wins without a doubt. The whole country was insane over the commies for decades...

Followed closely by Y2k, but only because we didn't worry about it as much

 

[yuppiejr]

Acid Rain / Ozone Layer get my vote... guessing we can add "man-made global warming" to the list in a decade or so as well.

 

[JTsyo]

To go along with the earthquake, there's the supervolcano in the southwest.

How about recently with all the youtube videos about the asteroid that was on a fly by?

 

[manowar821]

Originally posted by: Eeezee
Mutual Assured Destruction wins without a doubt. The whole country was insane over the commies for decades...

Followed closely by Y2k, but only because we didn't worry about it as much

They still are... Haven't you heard all the fear mongering over health-care proposals and all those "evil liberal commies"? The retard communist witch hunt is still alive and well.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Originally posted by: gsellis

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus

Originally posted by: cubby1223
Just another one of lesser note, 15-20 years ago (don't remember exactly when) geologists were predicting a massive earthquake to hit Southern Illinois soon, going to hit like a 7 or 8 on the Richter scale. Never happened.

Just so you know that quake will hit, it's just a matter of time. Anytime anything in nature is predicted to happen in a given time frame, it most likely will not happen. Nature is unpredictable and chaotic, so anytime something predicted about when something in nature will happen its just a sheer guess. If you research it that quake did hit in the early 1800's and caused a tremendous amount of damage. That quake will hit, just give it time.

+1 And when it hits it will be bad. Memphis and St. Louis do not follow earthquake building codes IIRC like most of California. It will be a huge mess.

To the effect of natural disasters that will kill us all, I was reading Bill Bryson's book A Short History of Nearly Everything (which is an entertaining read). In it, Bryson outlines a doomsday scenario that some scientists are legitimately concerned about. Yellowstone National Park is built above natural vents that release superheated water from several miles below the surface of the Earth (hence all the geysers and hotsprings). Well it turns out Yellowstone is also home to the largest volcano in North America; the Yellowstone Caldera. At around 45 miles in diameter at its widest, the caldera is absolutely massive.

Now the problem is that this volcano is still active. The bigger problem is that it seems to erupt every several hundred thousand years on average. The biggest problem is that we're overdue. And when a volcano 45 miles wide erupts, you know it's going to be an event; the last eruption released roughly 2,500 times the explosive force of the Mt. St. Helens eruption in 1980. The force of the explosion would be great enough that superheated ash would get shot off at hundreds of miles an hour in all directions, destroying cities and towns as far away as the Pacific Ocean. The ash would also be shot into the atmosphere, where it could conceivably block out the sun for months at a time, causing widespread destruction of crops and famine. The effect of the explosion would be felt on a worldwide scale, and while it almost certainly would not be an extinction level event, it would radically change life as we know it for years, or even decades, to follow.

Now that, my friends, is a good disaster. If it was even remotely hyped, it would totally make my list.

 

[bladder23]

I'd have to agree with 9/11

 

[imported_Baloo]

Gotta be Iran nukes, or Iraqi WMD's.

 

[Pepsei]

Originally posted by: cubby1223
The invasion of killer bees coming north from Mexico was another big media hype that never happened.

i did hear that a lot of regular honey bees are dying left and right....
and that's causing a problem with honey production in the US that we might not get certain flavors of Haagen-Dazs

oh yeah, here

 

[rockyct]

Originally posted by: gsellis

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus

Originally posted by: cubby1223
Just another one of lesser note, 15-20 years ago (don't remember exactly when) geologists were predicting a massive earthquake to hit Southern Illinois soon, going to hit like a 7 or 8 on the Richter scale. Never happened.

Just so you know that quake will hit, it's just a matter of time. Anytime anything in nature is predicted to happen in a given time frame, it most likely will not happen. Nature is unpredictable and chaotic, so anytime something predicted about when something in nature will happen its just a sheer guess. If you research it that quake did hit in the early 1800's and caused a tremendous amount of damage. That quake will hit, just give it time.

+1 And when it hits it will be bad. Memphis and St. Louis do not follow earthquake building codes IIRC like most of California. It will be a huge mess.

I'm from San Diego and I visited St. Louis one time. I was amazed at how their overpasses looked like they were standing on twigs. Plus, there are so many brick buildings. Everything is going to fall down in that city even if they get a medium earthquake.

 

[IGBT]

Originally posted by: DVad3r
I think the most hyped up diasaster was the Y2K bug that was supposed to cripple the worlds computers. I don't think I have heard or read about 1 computer that has died or the world being severly affected as a result of this. I remember places charging 50 bucks to Y2K proof your computer, god what a money making scheme that was.

..the same "bugs" that hyped the Y2K crap are now behind the carbon-con.

 

[TastesLikeChicken]

Masturbation.

There's not a single hair on my palm.

 

[nanette1985]

Originally posted by: Pepsei

Originally posted by: cubby1223
The invasion of killer bees coming north from Mexico was another big media hype that never happened.

i did hear that a lot of regular honey bees are dying left and right....
and that's causing a problem with honey production in the US that we might not get certain flavors of Haagen-Dazs

oh yeah, here

But there's no connection between the Killer Bees From Mexico and the newer bee colony dying mysteriously thing, is there?

 

[Q]

Originally posted by: waggy

Originally posted by: DVad3r
I think the most hyped up diasaster was the Y2K bug that was supposed to cripple the worlds computers. I don't think I have heard or read about 1 computer that has died or the world being severly affected as a result of this. I remember places charging 50 bucks to Y2K proof your computer, god what a money making scheme that was.

i think Y2k was great. it made me a lot of money.

Hows that?

 

[SaoFeng]

Originally posted by: TastesLikeChicken
Masturbation.

There's not a single hair on my palm.

ahaah thats because u rub them off.

 

[PingSpike]

Originally posted by: princess ida

Originally posted by: Pepsei

Originally posted by: cubby1223
The invasion of killer bees coming north from Mexico was another big media hype that never happened.

i did hear that a lot of regular honey bees are dying left and right....
and that's causing a problem with honey production in the US that we might not get certain flavors of Haagen-Dazs

oh yeah, here

But there's no connection between the Killer Bees From Mexico and the newer bee colony dying mysteriously thing, is there?

Last I heard we were ignoring some research that suggested it was due to some disease and saying it was caused by our current boogie man, global warming.

The best part of most disasters that are hyped is that there is usually little or nothing that we could actually do about them even if we willing to completely change our lives bankrupt whole countries. I think people are just hardwired to seek things to fear. I mean, we have real things to fear like car crashes, robberies, health problems, etc...but yet we still seek out improbable things to fear like asteriods destroying the planet and worldwide disease. While those latter things are possible, WTF are we going to do about them? Its hard to cure diseases that don't exist yet, but *might* evolve. And who is going to pay to build a bunch of comet blasting lasers that probably wouldn't even work? (What are we going to do? Test it on the moon?)

 

[m1ldslide1]

Originally posted by: Vic

Originally posted by: Fritzo

Originally posted by: SarcasticDwarf
I am going to go with the Three Mile Island incident for the US. If you survey the average person about nuclear disasters they will often put Three Mile Island right after Chernobyl..yet it was not a significant disaster. I consider it major since it has very heavily influences the US nuclear policy for decades now.

You better read up on what ALMOST happened there. That was more luck than over-hype.

Yes, but the fact still remains that nothing actually happened. No one was even injured. The hype comes from that the fact the while it is used as a symbol of the dangers of nuclear power, and literally decimated nuclear power in the US, the incident is actually evidence of how safe US reactor designs are.

Careful now... you could vanish into the night for that kind of heresy. Non-nuclear energy companies spent way too much money through several decades of smear campaigns to have you messing it all up now.

 

[m1ldslide1]

Originally posted by: 91TTZ

Originally posted by: jagec

If we were talking about C++, sure, words have set and unchangeable meanings.

We're talking about English. Meanings change according to common usage. Lots of meaningless words have been given meaning, some words have changed in meaning, and some meaningful words are now lost to us, as culture has shifted. You can never pin a word down 100%--this is not a "pure" language. Why do you think the phrase "reading between the lines" exists? What about allegories, metaphors, imagery? Strict literalists, ironically enough, miss out on most of literature. If you want exact meanings, stick to technical journals and instruction manuals.

Perhaps the OP was vague and misled you, but most of us understood what was actually being said. Communication took place. Just because the tool was imperfect and inexpertly wielded doesn't mean that the intentions of the user has changed. If you can't extract what was intended in a message from the fairly straightforward OP, then I really pity you when you get a job and recieve all manner of cryptic emails from your superiors. You really need to read between the lines in those cases.

Did you use to write long diatribes like this to defend your wrong answers in English class? He used the past tense. In what alternate universe can past tense mean future tense?

You seem like you're more of an emotional thinker than a logical thinker. Facts don't have much meaning in that touchy-feely world of yours. Probably a liberal.

I was skipping over the boring little semantic argument going on between y'all, but once I saw you being critical of his being an 'emotional' thinker as opposed to logical, and then in the same paragraph accuse him of having a political ideology opposite yours. I don't even need to read the stupid argument to know who's full of shit.

 

[Rubycon]

Big Tsunami on East Coast

Text

:laugh:

 

[zinfamous]

According to the economist Stephen Leavitt, it could very well be the unstoppable rise in crime and street violence that was predicted for the 1990s.

Posited the theory (with rather solid evidence) that Roe v Wade was the major factor in preventing this disaster from occurring. (far less children born into poverty and desperate situations means far less young criminals at their peak criminal age). Correlated this with Ceoucesku's [major sic] decades-long anti-abortion policy in Croatia and the extremely large population of young, poverty-stricken citizens that brought down his regime.

Anyone who hasn't read Freakanomics should give it a read. good stuff

 

[zinfamous]

Originally posted by: Sqube
Hasn't happened yet != Never happened, so you can't claim armaggedon/saviors/etc.

Y2K > * up to this point in history.

what, b/c you're 12 years old and have no other perspective?

 

[TallBill]

Originally posted by: zinfamous
According to the economist Stephen Leavitt, it could very well be the unstoppable rise in crime and street violence that was predicted for the 1990s.

Posited the theory (with rather solid evidence) that Roe v Wade was the major factor in preventing this disaster from occurring. (far less children born into poverty and desperate situations means far less young criminals at their peak criminal age). Correlated this with Ceoucesku's [major sic] decades-long anti-abortion policy in Croatia and the extremely large population of young, poverty-stricken citizens that brought down his regime.

Anyone who hasn't read Freakanomics should give it a read. good stuff

Awesome chapter from that book. Probably my favorite one.