S is for Statistics, yes those mind numbing numbers that some can rattle off as if they are there own birthday stats, while most of us cringe instead.

         Lets, get these over with, and yes many of these numbers are best guesses by people who have spent lifetimes collecting information, that others twist and turn to make their point of view work. (Hopefully, I am not one who does that but simply let the numbers speak for themselves, okay maybe a little interpretation!)         This beautiful planet is around 4,500,000,000 years old and no almost nothing alive today could have lived on it until perhaps a couple of hundred million years ago, and it would have been tough even then with all the tools for life we have today at our disposal. I believe that living on the planet Mars now would be easier to do than the Earth, 200 million years ago! But I start to ramble again, life on Earth took a very long time to become established sometime at around 1,000,000,000 years after our planet has taken shape life had become established but the makeup of that primeval atmosphere, have almost nothing in common with the atmosphere of the planet as we see it today. It was many times thicker, perhaps like the planet Venues is today, 90 times as dense, and almost completely made up of carbon-containing gases, mainly carbon dioxide and methane.                                                                                                                                                           So life started with what was in plentiful abundance, "CARBON DIOXIDE" "WATER" and the "SUN'S ENERGY" and almost no oxygen at all! (Okay maybe as much oxygen as there is carbon dioxide now in the atmosphere, very little) yet over time life started to use up that most plentiful carbon dioxide in two main ways, the first was by separating the carbon molecules from the oxygen molecules by plant respiration, in doing so it used the carbon to bind with sunlight for growth and that left the unneeded oxygen to be put off as a gas that started changing the mix of the gases in the atmosphere. Since oxygen was not used in plant growth of those eras, as its levels increase in the atmosphere, it started to act as a poison as its concentration slowly increased in the atmosphere. This change took almost 2 billion years to do which gave life plenty of time to adapt to the new life that could easily live in an atmosphere with oxygen in it. there still are lifeforms on the planet that can only survive in an oxygen-free system.                                                            As the atmospheric levels of oxygen rose, the levels of carbon gases in the atmosphere were dropping, both by the conversion of CO2 into C and O2 and by the sequestration of carbon by the death and burial of carbon-based life which once gravity and time converted much of it into limestone and other carbon-containing rocks. These numbers have been calculated at 100,000,000 gigatonnes of limestone all over the planet that was at one time free carbon dioxide in a very dense atmosphere. now there is estimated that there are only 800 gigatonnes in a much thinner atmosphere, which scientists tell us is still too much if we wish to maintain "normal" temperature ranges. (by the way, 1 gigaton is 1 billion tons with a B) As I have explained before it was the planet's creation or arid and semi-arid areas of the planet that caused the loss of the majority of cloud cover and the resulting loss of rainfall that would have accompanied that cloud cover, keeping the planet cooler but also much more humid.                                                                                                             One hundred million billion tons of limestone on the planet, it is estimated that there is only around 4000 gigatonnes of fossil fuels left on the planet and only around 39,000 gigatonnes of carbon left in all of the great oceans of the planet, all told researcher have estimated that there are less than 50,000 gigatonnes of "available" carbon left on the planet, meaning that the planet has sequestrated 99.9995% of all the carbon that was once available for life to use. Leaving only .0005% for all carbon-based life to use. And they say that the reason that ice-ages returned to the planet starting around 2.5 million years ago is because of Milankovitch oscillations where the planet is receiving slightly less sunlight energy, Milankovitch was a brilliant man, but even he, did not think that the ice-ages were only caused by these cycles, and back in the 1970s researcher confirmed that they only (I love this term) "paced" the cycles, but did not cause the cycles!        How are we to understand the reasoning behind a statement, "that the planet is the most perfect recycler of carbon that there can be" for this statement is indeed a "true" statement, for mankind can not even approach the planet ability in recycling carbon to be able to make carbon last for over 3,000,000,000 years, means that it was losing only just a tiny, tiny, tiny % of the whole every year, Mankind is lucky if it can recycle nearly 50% of its aluminum cans each year, and we call that a win?                                                            With carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere at around 415 parts per million and around 25% of the planet, is either arid or semi-arid we can only just now start the replanting process in these areas, but to do so we need to use every cubic mile of freshwater that we can divert from entering the salty seas and oceans of the planet to even start! And again only in the last century do we have both the available knowledge, and manpower to undertake such a massive project and in a timely manner as to see noticeable progress within a single generation. Other ways of increasing freshwater production by increasing rainfall will need to also both be studied and acted upon. the whole west coast of North, Central, and South America, are perfect places to both study and create increase rainfall amounts by increasing the evaporation rate of the Pacific Ocean, which will also have the added effect of cooling the surface temperature of that part of the Pacific Ocean waters which in turn will decrease the chances of severe storms and yet increase milder but more consistent rainfall amounts. This will of course need to become a new science in itself, with all of the hiccups that would be expected, in the learning curve! These were only some of the statistics, so be on the lookout for more next time, many of the stats have already been talked about in previous posts, but do not ask me which ones as there are over 350 posts online already. @ <https://lifecycleofaplanet.blogspot.com> good hunting. Thank you, and the need to tell others of the only correct way to repair the planet and save ourselves from creating more million and billionaires without really doing what needs to be done and raising 100,000,000, people up in the world and making a better world for all. I can be reached at 402-890-7946 or you can G-mail me at <daniel.kadavy212@gmail.com> or  <https://lifecycleofaplanet.blogspot.com.> Thank you, Dan