NationStates Jolt Archive

The General Assembly,

AWARE that existing international, national, and non-governmental research in the space sciences are continuously identifying Near Earth Objects (NEOs) including many asteroids and comets which have the potential to one day collide with the Earth,

OBSERVING that some of these space sciences programs are not specifically charged with identification and characterization of the hazards posed by NEOs,

RECOGNIZING that the risk of a NEO impact is shared by all nations on Earth, and thus is of international concern,

TAKING NOTE of the "Report of the Task Force on potentially hazardous Near Earth Objects",

NOTHING WITH APPROVAL the Planetary Defense Conference, held February 23-26, 2004,

CONCERNED that the funding of current space sciences projects and conferences is fairly limited,

BEARING IN MIND that adequate warning time is a requirement for any space or terrestrial based response, ranging from mass evacuation to impact avoidance,

NOTING WITH CONCERN that few formal management plans for dealing with potential impacts exist,

APPROVING of the use of hazard assessment scales, such as the Torino Impact Scale, as a means of weighing the risk of impact with the consequences of an impact,

1. ENCOURAGES all nations, United Nations members and non-members, to share any information on the trajectories of any Near Earth Objects (NEOs);

2. EXPRESSES ITS HOPE that nations will continue to identify and characterize the hazard associated with potential NEO impacts;

3. SOLEMNLY AFFIRMS the continuation of pre-existing international, national, and non-governmental research in the space sciences (which are considered to be included in military budgets for the purposes of NationStates); and

4. RECOMMENDS that international, national, and non-governmental space science research groups continue to research and develop possible contingency plans should an impact be likely.

The above is the same old proposal I brought to the attention of this body back in April. Since I was away for my nation's "Blackest Sunday" week-long celebration in May, I didn't pursue this proposal then.

First, I'd appreciate comments.

Second, let me state that although we could add more to the document, I was thinking baby steps would be appropriate. If we pass this resolution, further resolutions might address issues related to finding ideal locations for telescopes / tracking stations.

Third, the international standing for this issue is clear. When a NEO hits the Earth (or any other planet), it doesn't care about political borders. Furthermore, bi-lateral plans to deal with an impending impact could lead to increased military tensions -- as nations will be forced to compete for limited resources and deal with panic-driven populations.

The need for international attention in this matter is long overdue. And unlike the garbage that typically fills this assembly, this is not something that can be effectively handled at the domestic level. By working together we can all benefit.

Please join this effort by providing your comments, as I'd like to soon submit a proposal to the queue.

Thanks,
10kMichael

The General Assembly,

AWARE that existing international, national, and non-governmental research in the space sciences are continuously identifying Near Earth Objects (NEOs) including many asteroids and comets which have the potential to one day collide with the Earth,

OBSERVING that some of these space sciences programs are not specifically charged with identification and characterization of the hazards posed by NEOs,

RECOGNIZING that the risk of a NEO impact is shared by all nations on Earth, and thus is of international concern,

TAKING NOTE of the "Report of the Task Force on potentially hazardous Near Earth Objects",

NOTHING WITH APPROVAL the Planetary Defense Conference, held February 23-26, 2004,

CONCERNED that the funding of current space sciences projects and conferences is fairly limited,

BEARING IN MIND that adequate warning time is a requirement for any space or terrestrial based response, ranging from mass evacuation to impact avoidance,

NOTING WITH CONCERN that few formal management plans for dealing with potential impacts exist,

APPROVING of the use of hazard assessment scales, such as the Torino Impact Scale, as a means of weighing the risk of impact with the consequences of an impact,

1. ENCOURAGES all nations, United Nations members and non-members, to share any information on the trajectories of any Near Earth Objects (NEOs);

2. EXPRESSES ITS HOPE that nations will continue to identify and characterize the hazard associated with potential NEO impacts;

3. SOLEMNLY AFFIRMS the continuation of pre-existing international, national, and non-governmental research in the space sciences (which are considered to be included in military budgets for the purposes of NationStates); and

4. RECOMMENDS that international, national, and non-governmental space science research groups continue to research and develop possible contingency plans should an impact be likely.

This proposal belongs in "International Security". Aside from that, the proposal (as quoted above) meets all requirements for being legal under NationStates rules.

--The Modified Democratic States of Cogitation
NationStates Game Moderator

Upon reading the proposal Caras Galadon wishes it to be noted that it beleives this proposal to be worthwhile and well thought out. The damage potential for an object striking the eart is on a level beyond any weapon ever conceived by men or elves. Sharing of information in this regard is clearly a step that must be taken as we belive a multi-national effort would be required to mount any sort of effective response to an NEO that would collide with the earth or pass close enough to harm earth. We encourage all delegates to endorse this fine proposal.

~Torin nan Huor
Cheif Weapons Expert
Caras Galadon

Sounds like Science Fiction, doesn't it?

Guess what, there are some very good sources I recommend you read. Please pay attention to what the sources are, as my nation finds them very respected.

http://www.nearearthobjects.co.uk/report/resources_task_intro.cfm

http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/
http://impact.arc.nasa.gov/

http://www.planetary.org/html/neo/
http://www.planetary.org/html/neo/NEONews/1999news/neo-07011999.html

http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/39/40/2503992.pdf

http://www.aero.org/conferences/planetdef/
http://nai.arc.nasa.gov/impact/news_detail.cfm?ID=136
http://128.102.38.40/impact/news_detail.cfm?ID=139

That is more than enough reading for now. :)

10kMichael

This proposal belongs in "International Security". Aside from that, the proposal (as quoted above) meets all requirements for being legal under NationStates rules.

--The Modified Democratic States of Cogitation
NationStates Game Moderator

Thank you! :)

I wasn't sure exactly where to place it, since the previous Space Defense Initiative dealt with military budgets.

I'll leave the proposal here in DRAFT form for about 1 week before considering tossing it in the queue. Afterall, I've waited over a month to get this far, there should be no reason to ram something by without getting solid opinions from this Assembly.

Danke,
10kMichael

Ekpyrotic Universe certainly endorses this proposal.
Every nation state in the UN but ideally the world that has the capability should help one another to identify any NEO.

We propose that a data-base for all information that has been collected on such objects be created should this proposal ever come to be. This can be used to help any nation access information about any object that threatens the earth's surface or any man-made object in the earths orbit.

These are a few suggestions for relevant information for each nation about these foreign bodies for both safety and scientific reasons:

Object Designation
Temporary designation or permanent number for this object. All designations must correlate between each nation at all times.


Year Range
Time span over which impacts have been detected. Typically, searches should be conducted 100 years into the future.


Potential Impacts
The number of dynamically distinct potential impacts that have been detected by Sentry. There can be several qualitatively unique pathways to impact in a given year, e.g., some with an extra revolutions around the sun, others deflected to impact by an earlier planetary encounter.


Impact Prob.
The sum of the impact probabilities from all detected potential impacts.


V/infinity
The velocity of the asteroid relative to the Earth, assuming a massless Earth.


H/magnitude
Absolute Magnitude is an intrinsic measure of brightness. It is the apparent magnitude of the object when it is 1 AU from both the sun and the observer, and at full phase for the observer.


Est. Diam.
The estimated diameter of the asteroid, assuming a visual albedo pV = 0.154. The actual diameter could differ by as much as a factor of two.


Palermo Scale
The cumulative and maximum hazard ratings according to the Palermo Technical Impact Hazard Scale.


Torino Scale
The maximum detected hazard rating using the Torino Impact Hazard Scale. According to this ten-point scale, a rating of zero indicates the event has "no likely consequences." A Torino Scale rating of 1 indicates an event that "merits careful monitoring." Even higher ratings indicate that progressively more concern is warranted. (these can be formulated and specified at a later date)

These are a few suggestions for relevant information for each nation about these foreign bodies for both safety and scientific reasons:


I can see that your nation has already given serious consideration to the threat of NEOs as well. That is an excellent list. Do you feel that it should be worked (somehow) into the current proposal or that we can further define the standard database information *if* this proposal passes in a future resolution.

My only concern is to keep the length of the proposals viewable by the upper quartiles of UN members (I'm assuming that these nations will be most likely to support this proposal).

I certainly feel that the first clause implies that information be shared, but having a list of standardized information is a great idea. A short way to incorporate this idea would be to add a clause that would say:


X. RECOMMENDS that, where possible, the information related to NEO trajectories and risks be standardized;


Or something along those lines. Perhaps an even more interesting and useful way would be to affirm that the standardization of NEO information will be dealt with at a future date (I can't remember the "international legalise" for saying that -- but there is a fancy way to do that).

10kMichael

We concur that your initial proposal is the first step and that any other addition to that should be made later.

For this system to work at all it must be implemented at a basic level first and many nations will not be versed in these matters. Through no fault of their own I might add as there are many other important matters they may of chosen to concentrate on. ALthough the economy is fragile we have chosen to use funds on several space programs as we do not spend money on defense and military to the extent of other nations. Which you could say leaves us susceptible to such a disaster but if we concentrate on defense then we will never know when a disaster like this is immanent. So it's a case of "Catch 22", unless we work together.
But still if this is to go ahead then your proposal is more than enough for these nations to incorporate intially.

I think that our suggestion of a data-base isn't even the next step after that and maybe the guidelines for communication and transference of information between nations should be specified before the actual transference begins.
Which now seems obvious but seen as though we are already partaking in tracking NEOs we have the guidelines set out for relevant information. But as we do not share such information within such a network (but only between that of our scientists and other nations scientists) we have not formulated any logistics stating how best to carry this out.
Though a freely accessable database (freely accessable with the right access codes) would allow Nations to submit information as they collected it. Of course it would have to be confirmed before being added to the database.

But like you have suggested; lets atleast wait till this proposal passes before getting ahead of ourselves.

* Likes proposal, nice, brief-ish, reasonably covers issue while paying attention to certain qualifying factors. Over-all, its very good.

{ YES } <- Generic badge of good-ness. :wink:

:wink:

- T.R. Kom
Le Représentant de Komokom.
Ministre Régional de Substance.
http://www.nationstates.net/images/flags/uploads/komokom.jpg (http://www.nationstates.net/cgi-bin/index.cgi/target=display_nation/nation=komokom)
<- Not A Moderator, Just A Know It All.
" Clowns To The Left of Me ... Jokers To The Right, Here I am ... "

* Likes proposal, nice, brief-ish, reasonably covers issue while paying attention to certain qualifying factors. Over-all, its very good.


Thanks.

Maybe since there haven't been any major objections, it would be helpful to me if there is interest from others ... I'd like to know before just submitting the DRAFT proposal into the queue, but I'll admit that I'm eager to drop this in the queue if nations like what they are currently seeing.

10kMichael

Full looking over done. All good. No possible past law conflict I can see. No GM stuff. All pretty. Only suggestion I could make was in relation to :

BEARING IN MIND that adequate warning time is a requirement for any space or terrestrial based response, ranging from mass evacuation to impact avoidance,

" To finding some way to blow the hell out of it "

Or eliminate the threat with the application of scientifically accurate force.

Something like that. Be careful Mikitivity, you could start a trend, :wink:

- T.R. Kom
Le Représentant de Komokom.
Ministre Régional de Substance.
http://www.nationstates.net/images/flags/uploads/komokom.jpg (http://www.pipian.com/stuffforchat/gdpcalc.php?nation=komokom)
<- Not A Moderator, Just A Know It All.
" Clowns To The Left of Me ... Jokers To The Right, Here I am ... "

The DSH endorses the concept of this proposal.

The DSH enjoys a substantial orbital network, which is equally capable to spy on nations on the surface, and study astronomical phenomena.

Rest assured that the DSH would advise the UN on the discovery of any danger from deep space, and would imagine other nations would do the same. However, we appreciate the idea that nations would feel reassured if their fellow member states would be "obligated" to advise them on such an unfortunate discovery.

Would we advise non-members of such a discovery?

The Council of Enn strongly supports such a move, but regrets that it may be out of touch when this is submitted.

This is one interesting proposals... be sure to recheck them again before submitting the proposal :D :D

The government of Telidia strongly supports this resolution and congratulates the representative from Mikitivity in authoring an excellent proposal. We agree that this is an excellent starting point and find the comments made by the representative of Ekpyrotic Universe very worthy indeed and must be viewed for inclusion in any later proposal on this subject.

If I may, I would like to make once suggestion regarding article 1, which currently reads:

“ENCOURAGES all nations, United Nations members and non-members, to share any information on the trajectories of any Near Earth Objects (NEOs);”

Since global co-operation is fundamental, I feel this sentence is a little vague because non-member states has no legal obligation to UN members and some will probably not even be aware that the UN is dealing with this topic.

Perhaps it may be better to encourage UN members to seek agreements with non-members for tracking and identifying NEO’s or even, specifically charge members to actively create agreements of this type.

My point being that on an issue where global co-operation is so essential to the success or failure of a project, simple light encouragement may not prove to be sufficient or indeed helpful. This I feel will ensure that co-operation will continue, it is my fear that faced with domestic fiscal pressures, nations will easily opt to discontinue involvement in this type of project.

Respectfully
Lydia Cornwall, UN Ambassador
HM Government of Telidia

If I may, I would like to make once suggestion regarding article 1, which currently reads:

?ENCOURAGES all nations, United Nations members and non-members, to share any information on the trajectories of any Near Earth Objects (NEOs);?

Since global co-operation is fundamental, I feel this sentence is a little vague because non-member states has no legal obligation to UN members and some will probably not even be aware that the UN is dealing with this topic.

Perhaps it may be better to encourage UN members to seek agreements with non-members for tracking and identifying NEO?s or even, specifically charge members to actively create agreements of this type.


Your point is valid and well taken, but I think that passage of the resolution and then future advocacy on the behalf of nations like mine own will be enough to bring attention to this issue to non-UN members.

Since the risk is shared, and this resolution clearly respects terretorial sovereign rights, I would be surprised if many non-UN members do not find this type of resolution preferable to many of the interference based domestic issue related resolutions this body is litered with.

That said, how about if I added a clause right after clause 1 that "1b. FURTHER ENCOURAGES United Nations members to seek agreements with non-member states to share any information related to NEOs;"
It is still vague, but I don't feel we can really tell nations how to carry out their bilateral negotations.

10kMichael

The future peoples of the jovian worlds will support a UN fund to track near earth objects. With our last experimental attempts to tap the roiling quantum space, tapping the near-mystical zero point energy, we won't be emigrating from Earth anytime soon. We've blown our ram-shackle amalgam of flotsam, cardboard rafts, and sand bars sky high a few times. Thus, the costs to sending our nation into space to avoid extinction events like meteors, has been set back significantly a few times...

That said, how about if I added a clause right after clause 1 that "1b. FURTHER ENCOURAGES United Nations members to seek agreements with non-member states to share any information related to NEOs;"
It is still vague, but I don't feel we can really tell nations how to carry out their bilateral negotations.

I agree with your sentiments and changing the sentence as per your suggestion would be acceptable. You have the full support of the Telidian government regarding this proposal.

Respectfully
Lydia Cornwall, UN Ambassador
HM Government of Telidia

Excellent work, Mikitivity. We fully support this proposal.

Sax Russell
Speaker for Science

Here is the final DRAFT before I submit this proposal into the queue later tonight.

Category: International Security

The General Assembly,

AWARE that existing international, national, and non-governmental research in the space sciences are continuously identifying Near Earth Objects (NEOs) including many asteroids and comets which have the potential to one day collide with the Earth,

OBSERVING that some of these space sciences programs are not specifically charged with identification and characterization of the hazards posed by NEOs,

RECOGNIZING that the risk of a NEO impact is shared by all nations on Earth, and thus is of international concern,

TAKING NOTE of the "Report of the Task Force on potentially hazardous Near Earth Objects",

NOTHING WITH APPROVAL the Planetary Defense Conference, held February 23-26, 2004,

CONCERNED that the funding of current space sciences projects and conferences is fairly limited,

BEARING IN MIND that adequate warning time is a requirement for any space or terrestrial based response, ranging from mass evacuation to impact avoidance,

NOTING WITH CONCERN that few formal management plans for dealing with potential impacts exist,

APPROVING of the use of hazard assessment scales, such as the Torino Impact Scale, as a means of weighing the risk of impact with the consequences of an impact,

1. ENCOURAGES all nations, United Nations members and non-members, to share any information on the trajectories of any Near Earth Objects (NEOs);

2. FURTHER ENCOURAGES United Nations members to seek agreements with non-member states to share any information related to NEOs;

3. EXPRESSES ITS HOPE that nations will continue to identify and characterize the hazard associated with potential NEO impacts;

4. SOLEMNLY AFFIRMS the continuation of pre-existing international, national, and non-governmental research in the space sciences (which are considered to be included in military budgets for the purposes of NationStates); and

5. RECOMMENDS that international, national, and non-governmental space science research groups continue to research and develop possible contingency plans should an impact be likely.

The proposal has been submitted. It is currently on page 14. Please endorse this proposal.

Thanks,
10kMichael

The People's Republic of Groot Gouda fully endorses this proposal, though would like the proposer to consider more direct measures, such as a NEO agency to improve and facilitate international research and cooperation on this subject.

Regards,
PRoGG UN Ambassador

The People's Republic of Groot Gouda fully endorses this proposal, though would like the proposer to consider more direct measures, such as a NEO agency to improve and facilitate international research and cooperation on this subject.

Regards,
PRoGG UN Ambassador

Thank you for your timely endorsement.

Certainly should this proposal pass as a resolution, my nation is committeed to the idea of furthering international cooperation and information sharing. My government hopes to begin work on establishing recommendations on what useful information is (of course using scientific standards that are known to exist) and continuing NEO research by seeking to work out international agreements on the placement of terrestial and celestial observation locations. Naturally existing bodies such as the UNSC (I think that is its name) will be utilized at that point.

It goes without say that while much of the infrastructure necessary to accomplish this goal exists, there is still a need to establish means of communication and one resolution alone can never do that. On the flip side, my own attention span for resolutions is about 1-page, so we've decided to *slowly* address this complex issue.

Besides, we've waited years to get this far, so months will not significantly increase the risk.

10kMichael

Here is a better link to your proposal

http://www.nationstates.net/cgi-bin/index.cgi/page=UN_proposal1/match=Tracking

Observed and endorsed.

Endorsement requested from ACA delegate. Good luck.

I’ve requested my delegate in The West Pacific to support the proposal. Best of luck!!

Regards
Lydia Cornwall, UN Ambassador
HM Government of Telidia

The Federation of Teleria fully approves of the proposal and intends to endorse it. We have one concern, however. What safeguards are in place to ensure that funds appropriated to the militaries of U.N. nations under the pretence of complying with the "Tracking NEOs" proposal will not instead be used to increase military power or weapon caches?

Alex Friedman, UN Delegate (Cosmic Rift)
Federation of Teleria

The Federation of Teleria fully approves of the proposal and intends to endorse it. We have one concern, however. What safeguards are in place to ensure that funds appropriated to the militaries of U.N. nations under the pretence of complying with the "Tracking NEOs" proposal will not instead be used to increase military power or weapon caches?

Alex Friedman, UN Delegate (Cosmic Rift)
Federation of Teleria

OOC:
The game stats are for increasing military budgets because there are *no* game stats for R&D or anything remotely related to the space sciences. (BTW, I'll deny having said the out of character material. But sadly NationStates does have some limits.)

IC:I think the intent of this is covered by the following phrase of Article 4:

space sciences (which are considered to be included in military budgets for the purposes of NationStates)

I'd argue that this clause is very important and implies that any funding will go to these fields.

That said, the resolution is what I'd consider "mild", and hopefully makes use of existing information. The basic idea is that if our scientists begin to work together on a regular basis that alternative means of communication will be built between our nations.

When I last checked the proposal had 30 endorsements, so it is still far short of the required 141. Though on a positive note, I've received a few positive telegrams and only one rude telegram -- the rude one was deleted and the nation added to my ignore list (none of us has time for morons who have nothing better to do than telegram insults to nations).

10kMichael

I wanted to let anybody who may be interested in TGing me that I'll be away for the weekend.

At this point, I'm guessing that the proposal will fall short (it presently has 40 endorsements) of the 140 required.

If it makes it in the queue, wonderful. If not, I'll be looking to the advise of those of you here what we might do to improve its chances.

-10kMichael

Unfortunately this proposal failed to get the 141 required endorsements.

Since I was unable to get online on Saturday, my nation is not sure how many endorsements the proposal fell short.

With that in mind, I'd like to ask a few of you if you feel it is worth my resubmitting and being more agressive in my cold calling of UN Delegates?

Also, with that in mind, if anybody has a list of UN Delegates they feel I should contact, all I'd need is the list. My nation is prepared to do the leg work.

Danke,
10kMichael

I'd simply send to everyone.

If you need a hand posting to delegates, I have the time :)

Imafloatinga fully supports this proposal.

Ambassador Thich Fonh Du
Respresentative of the Most Serene Republic of Imafloatinga

I'd simply send to everyone.

If you need a hand posting to delegates, I have the time :)

I have a list of the first 40 nations that endorsed the proposal last time, so I'll start with them. I was thinking of resubmitting the proposal tomorrow night, but is there really an ideal time?

For instance, would tonight be better?

10kMichael

<shrugs>

Any time is as good as any other time...I don't know of any best time
________________________
Ambassador Hirosami Kildarno
http://img34.imageshack.us/img34/2702/hirotabanner.jpg (http://www.nationstates.net/cgi-bin/index.cgi/30626/page=display_nation/nation=hirota)http://img38.imageshack.us/img38/6355/england2.jpg (http://www.nationstates.net/cgi-bin/index.cgi/04605/page=display_region/region=england)

I will endorse this as it is a very serious issue... You have my full support

I will endorse this as it is a very serious issue... You have my full support

As of 9:30 am PDT, my nation has resubmitted the proposal:

Tracking Near Earth Objects

Currently it is on the last page of the proposals. I'd appreciate any endorsements. The proposal is identical to the latest version shown in this thread.

Naturally if any nation has any questions, feel free to post them here or telegram my nation, the Confederated City States of Mikitivity.

I'll be contacting each of the UN Delegates that endorsed the proposal last time.

Danke,
10kMichael

Here is a much better link to the proposal :

http://www.nationstates.net/cgi-bin/index.cgi/page=UN_proposal1/match=Tracking%20Near%20Earth%20Objects
________________________
Ambassador Hirosami Kildarno
http://img34.imageshack.us/img34/2702/hirotabanner.jpg (http://www.nationstates.net/cgi-bin/index.cgi/30626/page=display_nation/nation=hirota)http://img38.imageshack.us/img38/6355/england2.jpg (http://www.nationstates.net/cgi-bin/index.cgi/04605/page=display_region/region=england)

Thanks, that is a better link.

As of this hour, the proposal needs {55} more endorsements. It seems to be doing well, but I'm a bit worried that it may still fall short of the required {140} endorsements.

This go around only one nation was offended enough to claim their tourists will travel to the Confederated City States solely to eat our beloved burrowing owls!

*eeep*

:wink:

In any event, I think many nations will find that this proposal offers a very different sort of debate (a debate none-the-less) and I'd appreciate it if those of you that like the proposal would telegram your regional Delegates and ask them to endorse the proposal.

I'm confidence that should the proposal reach the floor that the resolution will pass.

Many Thanks,
10kMichael

p.s. note edit to figure of votes needed.

The proposal only needs another 34 endorsements, but time is nearly out.

If you are interested in this proposal, please telegram your UN Delegate on my behalf (chances are fair I already have) asking that they endorse this proposal.

It certainly will offer a debate where we can use facts instead of opinions (not that opinions are wrong, but sometimes a change is good).

In any event, I'll call it a night. A long one at that ... telegramming and a short break to run off to a KMFDM concert. ;)

10kMichael