Water works mostly on b), with a side dish of a) when water vapor displaces air. Foam and CO2 work both on a) and b). Powder works on a) and c). CFC gas works on all three.
In an enclosed space powder fire extinguishers are only a little less liable to suffocate you as CO2 or CFC, with the added complication that a low exposure to CO2 won't affect you much while inhaled fire extinguisher powder while sit in your lungs and maybe send you to hospital for treatment.
]]>Consumation of sexual acts within the said summoning grid with the aforementioned girlfriend disregarding their potential to constitute a summoning sacrifice, considering the employee was aware her partner was a virgin.
Demonic possession of the house cat by a cat-eating entity as a direct consequence of the involuntary summoning, resulting in the spawning of at least three new lolcat memes.
]]>I see from where Jay comments come from because my work from time to time requires calculating costs and benefits of different (industrial) investments.
Say you have a product line with outdated equipment. It requires 11 workers to run, each costing USD 40K a year.
It can be updated with newer equipment which will require 6 workers to run, all other costs being the same. The investment costs USD 1200K, depreciated across 10 years, so you have a net saving (5 less workers - depreciation) of USD 80K a year.
Now, to evaluate the project you have to discount the future earnings through some kind of expected investment return rate. Lets say that's 5% above the prevailing interest rate.
If your prevailing interest rate is 5%, then applying a 10% discount rate to the project (5% + 5%) will make it inviable. You're better off keeping your existing product line. However, if you cut the interest rate back to 0% your project, now with a DR of 5% will be viable, as you'll save more money (discounted) than you invested.
This is a single data point, but if technology moves you to the point where this effect predominates in enough investment decisions, you may end up in a situation where cutting the interest rate won't create enough jobs by additional demand to offset the ones lost to additional automation.
]]>According to Google Maps (which refuses to chart a route across the China - Khazajstan border but otherwise does just fine) it's 11100 Km Shanghai to Hamburg, driving 135 hs straight at an average just above 80 Km/h and crossing 4 borders: China - Khazajstan - Russia - Belarus - European Union (in Poland). If Russia manages some sort of free transit agreement out of the former Soviet Republics then you're down to just two borders. Automate a lot of the paperwork and scanning and you can have a cargo leaving a warehouse in China and arriving 7 - 10 days later to a warehouse in Europe. It will not be cost-competitive with bulk deliveries of cheap materials, but for time-sensitive stuff or high cost products such as electronics it will beat ships hands down.
]]>Unless we include a general purpose robot and lots of AI in the picture, you will be able to automate the logistics of a fighting army and maybe the front lines themselves, but the rearguard will still be humain domain.
Consider this:
You have a drone swarm (both aerial and terrestrial) fighting in the front lines. You have to keep them supplied with fuel and ammo, so you have automated ammo and fuel runners as well. However, if one of your drones is damaged for whatever reason you ight like to have a base nearby where repairs can be made by human tech personnel. The base itself can act as ammo and fuel depot, supplied by yet more auto trucks from further back in the supply chain.
This may lead to the strange situation where the front-line soldiers (sitting on a bunker back home, remote - controlling the robots) are much safer than the rear-guard troops (which need to be reasonably close to where the robots are). It also allows for a single human operator to manage whole groups of drones, in the manner of real-time strategy games (Age of Empires, indeed).
Ocuppation of hostile territory becomes simpler with no humans to risk. Decree a curfew and the unblinking eye of the panopticon will be able to enforce it 24/7 at minimal human cost, particularly if you don't care about how many weddings you mistake for armed uprisings to be stomped by a sawrm of drones, guns ablaze.
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