peski Wrote:
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>
> Let's put it in perspective:
> The study posits a 62 million year cycle +/- 3
> million years.
> +/- 3 million out of 62 million is almost a 10%
> margin of error.
> 1 century = 0.00016% of the total time frame
> 1 century = 0.00167% of the margin of error!
>
> In the last 100 years mankind has gone directly
> from horses and other beasts of burden, sailing
> ships, and a few steam driven vehicles to manned
> space flight, probes to the outer solar system,
> and thousands of daily passenger flights all
> around the globe.
>
> Assuming the regularly scheduled Extinction Event
> is headed right for us, it seems to me that we
> ought to get off the tracks. Take advantage of
> whatever few centuries we have to expand outwards
> & get all our eggs out of the same basket.
>

Yes, thanks for saying it better than I could, Peski. I tend to sound like Chicken Little when I get going on this stuff.

As you point out a century is a very small percentage of the margin of error. Problem is though, inasmuch as the last die-off occurred ~65 million years ago, we have just about used up all those little centuries on both sides of the +/- 3 million year margin of error. I realize you see this when you say we should "take advantage of whatever few centuries we have to expand outwards & get all our eggs out of the same basket", but others might take your figures to mean we have all the time in the world to get an ark into space.

t.