Certain Habits

Catching up on reading over Thanksgiving, I came across the following:

The century is still young. What’s next? On September 2, 1859 an unusually large coronal mass ejection by the Sun cause intense magnetic fields on Earth which if they happened today would cause a large fraction of the big electric power transformers to fail in large electric grids. Large areas of industrialized countries would be without electric power for months. Picture cities evacuated due to lack of power to operate water pumps. Picture massive computer server farms sitting dark. Banks would fail.

The 20^th century was a relatively mild, wet, and calm century as compared to the 19^th century. We would make a mistake to expect the 21^st century will be as calm as the 20^th. … Do not be shocked if a severe turn of events happens.

Read the whole article.