Voyager 1, So Close To Interstellar Space That We Can Taste It!

Man's pollution on a cosmic scale is essentially zero, the universe is already pre-polluted

The average density of the universe is about one proton per cubic meter. The vast majority of the visible universe is pristine vacuum. Plus, nearly every galaxy holds at its core a matter-disposal rip-heap of eternal safe-keeping.

Bear in mind that we now know there's a very small leak into the surrounding environment at around 60 nano-kelvin (*). Before we route too much of our crap to the galactic disposal unit, perhaps we should learn from our mistakes on the slimy blue marble and perform a rigorous environmental impact study on anthropogenic black-hole warming, just in case bumping it up to 61 nano-kelvins triggers a dark matter landslide. (By the "it's all about us, every time, and in every way" anthropic principle, every bulk coefficient of our local environment is fluttering around a precarious and exquisitely tuned value optimal to survival as we presently know it.)

(*) For simplicity I use the Hawking temperature for a solar mass black hole. From the equation at Wikipedia, this appears to scale inversely with mass. Possibly the right temperature involves division by another factor of 4 million to account for the correct mass of the galactic darth Timbit (local idiom for doughnut hole). I'm getting 15 femto-kelvins without a napkin. Let's not be brash and mess with this number anthropogenically without really thinking things through, to solve some minor problem with space-based pollution in some gossamer filigree of the pristine vacuum.

One would think it might be easier just to toss our junk in the direction of the Local Void [wikipedia.org]. This, however, amounts to carting your garbage uphill.

Wikipedia: The Milky Way's velocity away from the Local Void is 270 kilometres per second (600,000 mph). Voids are hugely repulsive.

Source: http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotScience/~3/RXHokmumyGk/story01.htm

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