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Fierce Urgency...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on September 11, 2020 at 5:00am

Ouroboros

Ancient Symbols: Ouroboros

Topics: Civics, Civil Rights, Climate Change, COVID-19, Existentialism, Fascism

“We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there "is" such a thing as being too late. This is no time for apathy or complacency. This is a time for vigorous and positive action.”

― Martin Luther King Jr

From Middle English apocalips, from Latin apocalypsis, from Ancient Greek ἀποκάλυψις (apokálupsis, “revelation”), literally meaning "uncovering", from ἀπό (apó, “after”) and καλύπτω (kalúptō, “I cover”). Wiktionary

It is the 19th anniversary of September 11, 2001, now during a pandemic. What's been revealed:

The Russians that attacked the 2016 elections are doing so in 2020, with the apparent blessing of their installed puppet. Not only is he deferential to Vladimir Putin, but he's also nauseatingly gracious to him and any world dictator. He derisively nicknames everyone he meets to troll them. He hasn't once Vlad, the impaler of democracies.
The criminal enterprise masquerading as a political party (Max Boot names them the "gang of Putin") has conceded they have literally NOTHING they can sell the electorate on their policies: tax cuts for the rich don't cause economies to grow, or jobs to "trickle-down." All they can give the rubes is "white power," which doesn't mean anything if you can't buy a senator or congressman with your personal exchequer.
Confirming conservative judges hasn't ended Roe vs. Wade, and even if it did, it wouldn't eliminate abortion completely, just transfer the personal decision to individual states. The original intent by Margaret Sanger was to eliminate "lessers" and the "feeble-minded," which meant a lot of black and brown people, through involuntary abortions and sterilizations. Hell, America had a whole bureau for it. It backfired when it became a form of bodily agency for white women, wrongly attributed to lower birth rates. It didn't HELP, but babies and daycare are expensive. That probably did it.
It does ensure that, once the demographics changes are complete in 2045, they will be the guards of white supremacy - not democracy - at federal and state levels. Even though White Anglo Saxon Protestants be in the numerical minority, they will still be in a similar state as Apartheid South Africa: diminished, but in-charge.
The Russian-installed puppet knew Coronavirus was airborne, that it would affect children: in February. He lied. We ran for our lives middle of March last semester. We were open, exposed. What would have been the result of a masking order on February 8th? I have no doubt it still would have been horrific, but how many lives would still be with us? I don't if we'd be heading for 200,000 soon; 400,000+ by the end of the year.
The Coronavirus reveals that America by far is not "united." It is, in the title of author Isabel Wilkerson, arranged in a Caste system based on degrees of Melanin. Those with a preponderance of the pigmentation have to be demonized, violated, and killed. The reinforcement is by projection: monsters projecting their monstrosities on others. It is the origins of how we distribute wealth, resources, and health.
The near 100 fires on the west coast of America are visible from satellite. More will be said about how this is NOT climate change than about how this is the direct result of it. Other than the frenzied rush to qualify a vaccine, we have no warp drives, nor do we have a "planet B." People in the midwest and other locations will shrug and ask, "why should they care?" This is similar to the resistance to give New York help during Hurricane Sandy. A repeat of item six, "United States" is an oxymoron.

Donald John Trump lied, and people died: hundreds of THOUSANDS of people. If he followed science, he would have had a mandatory mask mandate. If he followed science, he'd literally be sailing to re-election. If he just, didn't LIE! He said he "didn't want to panic us," but he's trying to scare the shit out of Levittown 1950s "suburban housewives" against the evil brown people from urban cities led by the scary black Senator Cory Booker, and invading hordes from the Mexican border!

“I felt like this was pretty urgent,” said De Kai, who was born in St. Louis, and is the son of immigrants from China. “I saw the country where I grew up, where my family lives [now mostly in the Bay Area], about to face this pandemic without knowing much about something as simple as wearing a mask to protect themselves and others.” In part, this comes from a cultural difference between East Asia, where masks have been routinely worn for decades to fend off pollution and germs, and other parts of the world. This includes the U.S., where people are unaccustomed to wearing masks, and, in the past, have sometimes been insensitive, even stigmatizing East Asians, many of whom had chosen to wear them in public prior to the pandemic, and had continued the practice in the aftermath of the SARS and MERS outbreaks. (In part, this habit was meant to show other people that they were concerned about transmitting the disease—something we in the West would do well to emulate.)

De Kai’s solution, along with his team, was to build a computer forecasting model they call the masksim simulator. This allowed them to create scenarios of populations like those in Japan (that generally wear masks) and others (that generally don’t), and to compare what happens to infection rates over time. Masksim takes sophisticated programming used by epidemiologists to track outbreaks and pathogens like COVID-19, Ebola, and SARS, and blended this with other models that are used in artificial intelligence to take into account the role of chance, in this case the randomness and unpredictability, of human behavior—for instance, when a person who is infected decides to go to a beach. De Kai’s team have also added some original programming that takes into account mask-specific criteria, such as how effective certain masks are at blocking the invisible micro-droplets of moisture that spray out of our mouths when we exhale or speak, or our noses when we sneeze, which scientists believe are significant vectors for spreading the coronavirus.

If 80% of Americans Wore Masks, COVID-19 Infections Would Plummet, New Study Says, David Ewing Duncan, Vanity Fair

Here's the ArXiv preprint paper to review. It takes ninth-grade reading comprehension. What you don't understand in terms can be discerned with a search engine.

Tomorrow is today, and every day we're being trolled by the so-called chief executive. He's bankrupting the nation like one of his casinos. He's exhausting us with his criminality, obvious mental deficiencies, and endless gaslighting.

He's revealing his ineptness, incompetence, and likely, complicit relationship with a foreign adversary. Of the 20,000 plus lies already documented from 2017 to this now, he cannot obfuscate his FIRST official lie as president*:

Before he enters on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the following Oath or Affirmation:– I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. U.S. Constitution, Article II, Section 1, Clause 8

*Putin's puppet is an accidental oval office resident, and a clear and present danger to the republic, as Oroborus (America) eats its own tail.

Siberian and Heat Wave is Oxymoron...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on June 24, 2020 at 7:56pm

Smoke rises from wildfires near Berezovka River in Russia in this June 23, 2020 color infrared image supplied by Maxar Technologies. Image taken June 23, 2020. Satellite image ©2020 Maxar Technologies via REUTERS

Topics: Climate Change, Global Warming, Existentialism

LONDON/GENEVA (Reuters) - Pine trees are bursting into flames. Boggy peatlands are tinderbox dry. And towns in northern Russia are sweltering under conditions more typical of the tropics.

Reports of record-breaking Arctic heat – registered at more than 100 Fahrenheit (38 Celsius) in the Siberian town of Verkhoyansk on June 20 – are still being verified by the World Meteorological Organization. But even without that confirmation, experts at the global weather agency are worried by satellite images showing that much of the Russian Arctic is in the red.

That extreme heat is fanning the unusual extent of wildfires across the remote, boreal forest and tundra that blankets northern Russia. Those blazes have in turn ignited normally waterlogged peatlands.

Scientists fear the blazes are early signs of drier conditions to come, with more frequent wildfires releasing stores of carbon from peatland and forests that will increase the amount of planet-warming greenhouse gases in the air.

“This is what this heat wave is doing: It makes much more fuel available to burn, not just vegetation, but the soil as well,” said Thomas Smith, an environmental geographer at the London School of Economics. “It’s one of many vicious circles that we see in the Arctic that exacerbate climate change.”

Siberian heat wave is a 'warning cry' from the Arctic, climate scientists say, Matthew Green, Emma Farge, Reuters Science

New Pole, New Earth...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on January 14, 2020 at 5:00am

MOSAiC researchers take samples on the ice near the Polarstern. Credit: Esther Horvath Alfred-Wegener-Institut (CC-BY 4.0)

Topics: Climate Change, Existentialism, Global Warming, Research

The first leg of an ambitious, yearlong Arctic science expedition just ended, and scientists say they’ve already gained new insight into the rapidly changing Arctic—the fastest warming region on Earth.

An initial team of researchers from the MOSAiC Expedition—short for Multidisciplinary Drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic Climate—arrived in the port city of Tromsø, Norway, on New Year’s Day after more than three months at sea. Billed as the largest Arctic science mission in history, the expedition launched from the same spot on Sept. 20, led by a German icebreaker known as the Polarstern.

The Polarstern remains in the central Arctic Ocean, now staffed by a replacement research team. The mission’s goal is to spend a year closely observing the fine details of the Arctic climate system, including the interactions among the ocean, sea ice and atmosphere.

To accomplish that goal, the Polarstern has allowed itself to freeze into the sea ice in the central Arctic Ocean, where it will remain stuck in place as it drifts across the top of the world. The ship is expected to emerge next fall somewhere north of Greenland, with a year’s worth of continuous scientific data under its belt.

Researchers are optimistic the mission will provide an unprecedented perspective on the shifting Arctic, where the effects of climate change are unfolding at a dramatic pace.

I'm not sure John on the island of Patmos had the above in mind.

Then I saw "a new heaven and a new earth," for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. Revelation 21:1

Frozen in Dwindling Ice, a Historic Expedition Finds a “New Arctic”, Chelsea Harvey, Scientific American

Angry Summers...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on January 13, 2020 at 5:00am

Credit: David Gray Getty Images

Topics: Climate Change, Existentialism, Global Warming, Thermodynamics

In the U.S., it is post the winter solstice: tilted 23.5 degrees away from the sun, our days are shorter, nights are longer and we usually experience precipitation in the forms of rain and snow.

The southern hemisphere is tilted the same degrees TOWARDS the sun, thus it's their summer. A summer typically marked by tourism, lazy beaches, mixed drinks and one would assume selfies of once-in-a-lifetime experiences. This is what was the usual and typical.

No hellscape could be penned more bleak than what we're seeing now. A billion living creatures have died, and likely are headlong barreling to the endangered species list. The elderly, sick and disabled are cannon fodder. The prime minister, firmly in the pockets of big coal, is as much a climate change lunatic as our current lobotomized "leader."

Oh yes, endangered species are not important now, are they (even if its us)? The "Environmental Protection Agency" is oxymoron. Climate change is a Chinese hoax, and the Australians just need better "forest management" by sweeping as advised to California and (not-at-all) practiced by residents of Finland. If soon-to-be past is prologue, we can only expect a repeat performance in the northern hemisphere once we get past May, especially in states like Texas, where water rationing by zip code is more or less expected, and a spark on a curb scratched by the pipe of a pickup truck in high heat and drought can cause infernos.

Avarice and abject ignorance will kill us all.

Summer in Australia use to be something we yearned for: long, lazy days spent by the beach or pool, backyard barbecues, and games of cricket with family and friends. But recent summers have become a time of fear: Schools and workplaces are closed because of catastrophic fire danger, while we shelter in air-conditioned spaces to avoid dangerous heat waves and hazardous levels of smoke in the air. Campgrounds have been closed for the summer, and entire towns have been urged to evacuate ahead of “Code Red” fire weather. Welcome to our new climate.

Of course, unusually hot summers have happened in the past; so have bad bushfire seasons. But the link between the current extremes and anthropogenic climate change is scientifically indisputable.

The fires raging across the southern half of the Australian continent this year have so far burned through more than 5 million hectares. To put that in context, the catastrophic 2018 fire season in California saw nearly 740,000 hectares burned. The Australian fire season began this year in late August (before the end of our winter). Fires have so far claimed nine lives, including two firefighters, and destroyed around 1,000 homes. It is too early to tell what the toll on our wildlife has been, but early estimates suggest that around 500 million animals have died so far, including 30 percent of the koala population in their main habitat. And this is all before we have even reached January and February, when the fire season typically peaks in Australia.

Australia’s Angry Summer: This Is What Climate Change Looks Like
Nerilie Abram, Scientific American

Internet Carnot...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on December 19, 2019 at 12:33pm

Credit: ALFRED T. PALMER/VICTOR TANGERMANN

Topics: Climate Change, Existentialism, Internet, Thermodynamics

The Carnot cycle is the only thermodynamic cycle that is reversible, because compression and expansion of the gas are isentropic (no heat flow), while heating and cooling are isothermal (T does not change, only P and V), meaning that no energy is lost into increasing the system's entropy. Quora

The world is modeled using "ideal" circumstances: the Ideal Gas Law also comes to mind. You obviously start with this, initially.

Then, you have to model based on the reality, the biology, chemistry and physics of the actual case at hand.

Basing a civilization on a non-renewable resource of dead dinosaurs is a recipe to become museum artifacts ourselves.

As far as environmental damage is concerned, our increasingly-online lives incur a massive toll.

If everything continues on its current course, then the internet is expected to generate about 20 percent of the world’s carbon emissions by 2030, according to The New Republic. That would make its environmental impact worse than any individual country on Earth, except for the U.S., China, or India.

In other words, our internet use is linked to a vicious cycle of environmental devastation, making it increasingly clear that something has to give.

In the Face of Climate Change, the Internet is Unsustainable, Dan Robitzski, Futurism

Going Vertical...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on November 6, 2019 at 5:00am

Czech scientists have opened a lab to experiment growing food for environments with extreme conditions and lack of water, such as Mars.

Topics: Climate Change, Mars, NASA, Space Exploration

PRAGUE (Reuters) - Czech scientists have opened a lab to experiment growing food for environments with extreme conditions and lack of water, such as Mars.

The “Marsonaut” experiment by scientist Jan Lukacevic, 29, and his team at the Prague University of Life Sciences is based on aeroponics - growing plants in the air, without soil, and limiting water use to a minimum.

The plants grow horizontally from a vertical unit and are stacked one above the other to minimize space. Researchers experiment with light and temperature changes, Lukacevic said.

The team has already succeeded in growing mustard plants, salad leaves, radishes and herbs like basil and mint.

Scientists ate their first harvest last week.

“They taste wonderful, because they grow in a controlled environment and we supply them with bespoke nutrients,” said Lukacevic.

Czech lab grows mustard plants for Mars
Reporting by Jiri Skacel; Writing by Jan Lopatka; Editing by Alexandra Hudson and Dan Grebler, Reuters Science

Adaption and Extinction...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on October 3, 2019 at 5:00am

MV5BMWQ4MzI2ZDQtYjk3MS00ODdjLTkwN2QtOTBjYzIwM2RmNzgyXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMTQxNzMzNDI%2540._V1_.jpg

Source: Internet Movie Database

Topics: Biology, Climate Change, Existentialism, Philosophy, Politics

Though the movie poster is an attempt at dark humor, I do agree with the science. We're in a time of our history where science is being suborned to political and economic considerations, when we need it literally for survival.

From a biological perspective, there is no such thing as devolution. All changes in the gene frequencies of populations--and quite often in the traits those genes influence--are by definition evolutionary changes. The notion that humans might regress or "devolve" presumes that there is a preferred hierarchy of structure and function--say, that legs with feet are better than legs with hooves or that breathing with lungs is better than breathing with gills. But for the organisms possessing those structures, each is a useful adaptation.

Chief among these misconceptions is that species evolve or change because they need to change to adapt to shifting environmental demands; biologists refer to this fallacy as teleology. In fact, more than 99 percent of all species that ever lived are extinct, so clearly there is no requirement that species always adapt successfully. As the fossil record demonstrates, extinction is a perfectly natural--and indeed quite common--response to changing environmental conditions. When species do evolve, it is not out of need but rather because their populations contain organisms with variants of traits that offer a reproductive advantage in a changing environment.

Is the human race evolving or devolving? July 20, 1998, Scientific American

The Lightness of Stupidity...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on October 1, 2019 at 5:00am

Anti-evolution books on sale during the Scopes "Monkey Trial" in 1925. Credit: Getty Images

Topics: Biology, Civics, Climate Change, Education, Science, Research

History.com: Scopes Monkey Trial

Nearly a quarter of a million science teachers are hard at work in public schools in the United States, helping to ensure that today’s students are equipped with the theoretical knowledge and the practical know-how they will need to flourish in tomorrow’s world. Ideally, they are doing so with the support of the lawmakers in their state’s legislatures. But in 2019 a handful of legislators scattered across the country introduced more than a dozen bills that threaten the integrity of science education.

It was a mixed batch, to be sure. In Indiana, Montana and South Carolina, the bills sought to require the misrepresentation of supposedly controversial topics in the science classroom, while in North Dakota, Oklahoma and South Dakota, their counterparts were content simply to allow it. Meanwhile, bills in Connecticut, Florida and Iowa aimed beyond the classroom, targeting supposedly controversial topics in the state science standards and (in the case of Florida) instructional materials.

Despite their variance, the bills shared a common goal: undermining the teaching of evolution or climate change. Sometimes it is clear: the one in Indiana would have allowed local school districts to require the teaching of a supposed alternative to evolution, while the Montana bill would have required the state’s public schools to present climate change denial. Sometimes it is cloaked in vague high-sounding language about objectivity and balance, requiring a careful analysis of the motives of the sponsors and supporters.

Either way, though, such bills would frustrate the purpose of public science education. Students deserve to learn about scientific topics in accordance with the understanding of the scientific community. With the level of acceptance of evolution among biomedical scientists at 99 percent, and the level of acceptance of climate change among climate scientists not far behind at 97 percent, it is a disservice to students to misrepresent these theoretically and practically important topics as scientifically controversial.

Science Education Is Under Legislative Attack, Glen Branch, Scientific American

No Planet B...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on September 22, 2019 at 9:35pm

BENEDETTO CRISTOFANI/SALZMANART

Topics: Chemistry, Climate Change, Economy, Global Warming, Green Tech, Jobs

This week will be historic. In over 150 countries, people are stepping up to support young climate strikers and demand an end to the age of fossil fuels. The climate crisis won’t wait, so neither will we. Source: Global Climate Strike dot net

As with the Parkland demonstrations on mass shootings, young people are leading us - actually, PULLING us over the line to DO something about both important matters.

This is not about being "woke": it's about being aware. The extreme avarice causing this societal division and economic stratification could be just the petard humanity hoists itself with* to extinction. I'm glad you all know that, because old, fossilized wealthy (men mostly) can't see beyond the next quarter; that their wealth also falls to dust if the planet fails beneath them. As far as the youth, this is THEIR planet as those above septuagenarians and octogenarians are exiting it. The very least adults can do is use our ashes to fertilize trees for more oxygen (my personal plans). We should leave something for them to live out their lives and dreams. To do less is the height of arrogance, self-destruction and egomania.

Shakespeare's phrase, *"hoist with his own petard", is an idiom that means "to be harmed by one's own plan to harm someone else" or "to fall into one's own trap", implying that one could be lifted (blown) upward by one's own bomb, or in other words, be foiled by one's own plan. Source: Wikipedia

*****

Black, gooey, greasy oil is the starting material for more than just transportation fuel. It's also the source of dozens of petrochemicals that companies transform into versatile and valued materials for modern life: gleaming paints, tough and moldable plastics, pesticides, and detergents. Industrial processes produce something like beauty out of the ooze. By breaking the hydrocarbons in oil and natural gas into simpler compounds and then assembling those building blocks, scientists long ago learned to construct molecules of exquisite complexity.

Fossil fuels aren't just the feedstock for those reactions; they also provide the heat and pressure that drive them. As a result, industrial chemistry's use of petroleum accounts for 14% of all greenhouse gas emissions. Now, growing numbers of scientists and, more important, companies think the same final compounds could be made by harnessing renewable energy instead of digging up and rearranging hydrocarbons and spewing waste carbon dioxide (CO₂) into the air. First, renewable electricity would split abundant molecules such as CO₂, water, oxygen (O₂), and nitrogen into reactive fragments. Then, more renewable electricity would help stitch those chemical pieces together to create the products that modern society relies on and is unlikely to give up.

Chemists in academia, at startups, and even at industrial giants are testing processes—even prototype plants—that use solar and wind energy, plus air and water, as feedstocks. "We're turning electrons into chemicals," says Nicholas Flanders, CEO of one contender, a startup called Opus 12. The company, located in a low-slung office park in Berkeley, has designed a washing machine–size device that uses electricity to convert water and CO₂ from the air into fuels and other molecules, with no need for oil. At the other end of the commercial scale is Siemens, the manufacturing conglomerate based in Munich, Germany. That company is selling large-scale electrolyzers that use electricity to split water into O₂ and hydrogen (H₂), which can serve as a fuel or chemical feedstock. Even petroleum companies such as Shell and Chevron are looking for ways to turn renewable power into fuels.

Changing the lifeblood of industrial chemistry from fossil fuels to renewable electricity "will not happen in 1 to 2 years," says Maximilian Fleischer, chief expert in energy technology at Siemens. Renewable energy is still too scarce and intermittent for now. However, he adds, "It's a general trend that is accepted by everybody" in the chemical industry.

I repeat:

Tee Public: I'm going to buy this shirt

Can the world make the chemicals it needs without oil?
Robert F. Service, Science Magazine

Of Memes and Men...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on July 26, 2019 at 5:00am

Image source: Facebook

Topics: Civics, Civil Rights, Climate Change, Existentialism, Human Rights, Politics

We were inundated with Facebook memes, videos and caricatures of Robert Mueller.

We saw him pose heroically as a Marine when he served in Vietnam.

We saw him superimposed as Sheriff Matt Dillon (played by actor James Arness) from the two-decade television series, “Gunsmoke.”

As much as I enjoy the movie theater and seeing my once comic books on the big screen, like Bill Mahr has opined, I think we're inundated with superhero movies to the point like our fixation with reality shows, we're losing our ability to use critical thinking and reasoning. It has disastrously resulted in a reality show president with demonstrable Internet Addiction (Twitter) and Narcissistic Personality Disorder (across the pond, Boris Johnson is now British Prime Minister). Of course, we give such a limited being, a caricature bereft of any respect for scientific inquiry, now having control over entities that will impact our addressing (or, ignoring) climate change and the nuclear codes.

Do you remember the good old days when we had "12 years to save the planet"? Matt McGrath, BBC Science & Environment

Spoiler alert: we don't.

This country has been surprised by the way the world looks now
They don't know if they want to be Matt Dillon or Bob Dylan
They don't know if they want to be diplomats ...
Or continue the same policy of nuclear nightmare diplomacy
John Foster Dulles ain't nothing but the name of an airport now

The idea concerns the fact that this country wants nostalgia
They want to go back as far as they can ...
Even if it's only as far as last week
Not to face now or tomorrow, but to face backwards

And yesterday was the day of our cinema heroes
Riding to the rescue at the last possible moment
The day of the man in the white hat or the man on the white horse ...
Or, the man who always came to save America at the last moment
Someone always came to save America at the last moment
Especially in "B" movies

Gil Scott-Heron, B Movie, Genius Lyrics

In the end, Robert Mueller is a 74 year old man that clearly didn’t want to be there. He wrote his 448 page report for a different time and American: when we got our news from morning and evening local papers, not mobile apps. He wrote it for an American that developed powers of concentration during the dominance of radio, listening intently to every word spoken. He wrote it for an America that had fewer options for distraction in the form of a plethora of cable channels and Internet websites. It is an America and American that does not exist now.

He's not Matt Dillon - tough as the laptop doctored memes made of him, or the videos of him handcuffing Orange Satan and leading him off to the pokey. He doesn't have the deep voice he had on earlier videos of his speech patterns. He's an older man now. Entropy diminishes our faculties over time. It's biology, chemistry, physics: senescence. Despite a billion-dollar industry selling us all manner of snake oil, there is nothing we can do to stop it from occurring to any and all of us. At best, we can ease its transition.

Yes. He could have used the deferment the draft board gave him during the Vietnam War: he had actual bad knees (not fake bone spurs). He conditioned himself to pass the grueling Marine physical and served his country. He went through Army Ranger School and Airborne School to jump out of perfectly good airplanes. He is in the Army Ranger Hall of Fame (I didn't know there was such a thing). After September 11, 2001, he steadily lead the FBI during some dark times as we entered the 21st Century, unsure if we'd survive at all.

Yet, there were his fellow republicans Wednesday with exception of a respectful few attacking him. The ageism jokes were repugnant of elected officials, yet it's on video. The Orange Caligula crowed it as a "win": he's consumed an entire political party, making it as crude, traitorous, licentious and feckless as himself. Pundit's like Chris Wallace said it looked "disastrous for the democrats." Chuck Todd said the "optics were terrible."

When did facts need optics? When did an attack on our nation (9/11; the 2016 election) need a band? "Infotainment" should have never entered our lexicon in the 1980s. It's made us less than non-serious: it's made us silly.

Don’t think of visuals or theatrics. Have you READ The Mueller Report? Download it for G-d's sake! You binge watch streaming videos, so you can digest this in a weekend! Did you HEAR Mueller use the words "unpatriotic" and "problematic" with regards to this president*? Did you hear that the Russians are interfering, not next year, but NOW? My senator, Richard Burr (R-NC) and Vice Chairman Mark Warner (D-Va) just released the intelligence report on Russian interference in the 2016 election. It's chilling, but not enough for Mitch McConnell et al. to hesitate blocking election protections that would - in their warped minds - not favor republicans. No worries.

Fun fact: no president has ever been removed from office by impeachment. Jackson after the Civil War like Bill Clinton after Monica Lewinsky was impeached in the House but both measures failed in the Senate. Their records still reflect their impeachment.

Nixon after the Watergate impeachment inquiry was looking at it actually happening in the House and upheld in trial in the Senate with members of his own party. The inquiry was after he won a landslide reelection victory: 49 states to his opponent George McGovern's 1. He won 60.7% of the popular vote and was the first republican to sweep the south. His popularity fell after the inquiry revealed his malfeasance, and he resigned rather than be removed by members of his own party when they actually had principles and followed their Oath of Office.

Mitch McConnell above all others has reduced the senate from a political body that prided itself on deliberating hard issues and coming to consensus into a tribal, unconstitutional free-for-all. Oleg Deripaska, indicted by Mueller Russian oligarch and close adviser to Putin is building an aluminum plant in his state - no worries. Donald Trump would likely survive as McConnell would "pull a Merrick Garland," and just refuse to hold a trial. Since the votes would go on partisan lines, that would put senate republicans on record supporting a lawless president before a major election. His impeachment however would stand, on his record for all time. Impeachment is also not just about this president*, but the next actual one, and what we as a nation will tolerate.

Nancy Pelosi hasn’t brought forward an impeachment inquiry because previous to this, only 85 democrats supported impeachment. That number has climbed, and will likely go higher.

However, if the thesis of the argument is this president* is not following The Constitution and thus constitutes a crisis, neither is the current Speaker of the House. Slow-walking an impeachment inquiry is either also a constitutional crisis, or it's not. If NO ONE is following The Constitution, there effectively isn't one and the rule of law is a myth: it is the rule of whims and notions of current moments and times as arbitrated by a pathologically lying narcissist with impulse control.

Lastly, if he gets away with it, interference in our elections by foreign countries becomes in the words of Mueller “the new normal,” and our democracy* as well as our sovereignty* as currently our Putin-installed president* will forever have asterisks next to their titles. We won't have to worry about immigrants of any stripe.

Our sovereignty will depend on our getting out to vote en masse to counter any foreign election meddling, domestic voter suppression and the return of an "oldie-but-goody" in Florida: poll taxes!

We will cease to be a country.

White supremacy was this nation's origin; racism unto oblivion and the ash heap will be our epitaph.

“We will take America without firing a shot. We do not have to invade the U.S. We will destroy you from within....”

Attributed to Nikita Khrushchev in comments from Barbara Fowler post Helsinki, Orlando Sentinel

The Caveat of Clean...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on July 25, 2019 at 5:00am

Data: Wood Mackenzie; Chart: Axios Visuals

Topics: Alternative Energy, Climate Change, Global Warming, Green Energy

I am proudly the owner of all battery-powered lawn equipment: lawn mower, hedger; weed edger and blower (a twofer). All require a few hours of charging to power and get me through a typical pruning in roughly two hours. I did it in a nod to the environment, but also so I wouldn't have to get gas for a mower or lug electrical extension cords around. The purchases admittedly were more pragmatic than progressive.

The unfortunate reality is batteries like anything else we use come from raw materials. The world is limited in volume, even though we're on it and these raw materials to construct the things we utilize and enjoy are not in unlimited supply.

Problems are never simple to solve, else they wouldn't be problems.

*****

There could be a "supply crunch" for cobalt, lithium, and nickel used in batteries for electric vehicles and other applications as soon as the mid-2020s, the consultancy Wood Mackenzie said Wednesday.

The big picture: The chart above shows their projections of demand for materials used in EVs but also batteries needed for consumer electronics and energy storage.

What's next: Wood Mackenzie forecasts that pure electrics and plug-in hybrids combined will account for 7% of all passenger car sales by 2025, 14% by 2030 and 38% by 2040.

Of note: That's less bullish than BloombergNEF, which sees EVs accounting for 57% of passenger car sales in 2040.

The bottom line: "The electrification of transport is redefining a number of metals markets," Wood Mackenzie said in a release summarizing their analysis.

Troubles may loom for the battery supply chain for electric vehicles
Ben Geman, Axios

Elysium Oceania...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on June 5, 2019 at 5:00am

Plan for Tokyo Bay by Kenzo Tange, 1960. Wikimedia

Topics: Architectural Engineering, Civil Engineering, Climate Change, Global Warming

The main problem I see: the seeking of public funding for a Utopian project could easily benefit the well-healed instead of the needy many. It would be cynical to use government funds, first gaining public support, then diverting funds but not unlikely. The wrong-type of people being preserved after the earth is ravaged by our environmental hubris is the main plot of the movie Elysium.

Humans have a long history of living on water. Our water homes span the fishing villages in Southeast Asia, Peru and Bolivia to modern floating homes in Vancouver and Amsterdam. As our cities grapple with overcrowding and undesirable living situations, the ocean remains a potential frontier for sophisticated water-based communities.

The United Nations has expressed support for further research into floating cities in response to rising sea levels and to house climate refugees. A speculative proposal, Oceanix City, was unveiled in April at the first Round Table on Sustainable Floating Cities at UN headquarters in New York.

The former tourism minister of French Polynesia, Marc Collins Chen, and architecture studio BIG advanced the proposal. Chen is involved with the Seasteading Institute, which is seeking to develop autonomous city-states floating in the shallow waters of “host nations”.

While this latest proposal has gained UN attention, it is an old idea we have repeatedly returned to over the past 70 years with little success. In fact, the Oceanix City proposal has not reached the same level of technical sophistication as previous models.

Floating cities: the future or a washed-up idea? Cosmos magazine
Brydon T. Wang, Research Assistant and PhD Candidate, Queensland University of Technology

The Strength of Ignorance...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on May 29, 2019 at 5:00am

The Meaning of War Is Peace, Freedom Is Slavery, and Ignorance Is Strength in Orwell's "1984", Natalie Franks, PhD, Owlcation

Topics: Climate Change, Global Warming, Existentialism, Politics

Note: Please forgive the midweek rant but...this...is...insane.

Mr. Trump is less an ideologue than an armchair naysayer about climate change, according to people who know him. He came into office viewing agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency as bastions of what he calls the “deep state,” and his contempt for their past work on the issue is an animating factor in trying to force them to abandon key aspects of the methodology they use to try to understand the causes and consequences of a dangerously warming planet.

As a result, parts of the federal government will no longer fulfill what scientists say is one of the most urgent jobs of climate science studies: reporting on the future effects of a rapidly warming planet and presenting a picture of what the earth could look like by the end of the century if the global economy continues to emit heat-trapping carbon dioxide pollution from burning fossil fuels.

The attack on science is underway throughout the government. In the most recent example, the White House-appointed director of the United States Geological Survey, James Reilly, a former astronaut and petroleum geologist, has ordered that scientific assessments produced by that office use only computer-generated climate models that project the impact of climate change through 2040, rather than through the end of the century, as had been done previously.

Trump Administration Hardens Its Attack on Climate Science
Coral Davenport and Mark Landler, New York Times

It's insane, but cynical: the current Russian-installed occupant of the Oval Office is 72, meaning by 2040 if the afterlife doesn't want to screw with him, he'd be 93, still Virtual Reality tweeting his inane thoughts further rattled by Entropy, Alzheimer's and Dementia while firmly encompassed in adult pampers on his sixth trophy wife from whatever is left of the Czech Republic! We're personally causing the extinction of millions of species, and one of them might be the linchpin break in our own food chain.

NONE of the morons making these decisions will live to see the impact of them. They will cash in and peace out to the planet richer than Solomon, fiddling like Nero as the world burns. The end of white Christian Evangelical America occurred rather quietly around 2017, only noted by demographers, authors that notice such things...and white Christian Americans! This is why they could vote for the vagina gripper without a hint of pious hypocrisy, literally 81% of them selling what's left of their souls. This is why they're in a wholesale panic in Texas...TEXAS could turn blue by 2045! This is a naked power grab masquerading in choir robes that are demonstrably, decidedly Klan white. The other impact other than the lack of coitus would likely be the proliferation of readily available guns for violence, the opioid crisis and farmers affected by the trade tariffs committing harikari. But we won't talk about that because...logic (or, lack thereof).

They don’t even WANT you to vote a week from Tuesday. They hate voters and they hate voting. They have worked with a religious fervor to game voting tallies in Missouri, and Tennessee, and North Dakota, and Ohio (we can thank the Supreme Court for that), and Florida, and North Carolina, and most notably in Georgia, where elderly black people were literally pulled over for trying to vote, and where Republican gubernatorial candidate and current secretary of state Brian Kemp purged over 300,000 people from the voter rolls. They don’t want you voting, and they don’t particularly care if it’s fair or not. And if you happen to resist, the president already tacitly endorsed violence against you.

This is because Republicans hate a true representative democracy. And if they hate that, then they hate America. And if they hate America, then they hate you. I know Republicans say they LOVE America. They love it so much they wanna marry it. But that’s not true. They only love using America, mostly as a means of engineering hate.

They also hate your kids. If they liked your kids, they would support paid maternity leave, free health care, free child care, better public schools, and they would do everything in their power to enact stricter gun control laws so that schoolchildren don’t get routinely slaughtered en masse. They hate all of those ideas. They even hate teachers. You ever meet a teacher? They’re fucking saints, man. It doesn’t matter. Republicans hate them and would rather die than pay teachers a living wage.

In fact, they don’t just hate your kids, they hate your grandchildren as well. If Republicans gave the thinnest of shits about your grandkids, they would act with incredible haste on every Defcon 1 climate report that says we’re doomed if we don’t stop humping carbon to death. But they don’t. They hate the Earth, they hate the future, and they HATE any report that might dare ask them to take a break from pillaging the lands. Those reports go right into the shredder.

And they hate reporters too. Of course they hate reporters. A reporter just got kidnapped, tortured, and dismembered by Saudi Arabia (the country that was home to the majority of 9/11 hijackers, mind you). Did Republicans give a shit? Of course not. This is because they hate reporters. They get so much mileage out of hating reporters, it’s almost impressive. Why, it’s as if breeding hate and resentment is the only thing they do competently! They hate facts. They hate whistleblowers. They hate the truth. They don’t even like QUESTIONS. How dare you ask a Republican a question? That’s really rude. The president thinks you should be body slammed. If Republican leaders liked answering for shit, they would hold more town halls. Instead, they fuck off back to their home states and huddle up with their donors.

Republicans Hate You, Drew Magary, GQ

"War is peace.
Freedom is slavery.
Ignorance is strength." George Orwell, 1984, Spark Notes

These words are the official slogans of the Party, and are inscribed in massive letters on the white pyramid of the Ministry of Truth, as Winston observes in Book One, Chapter I. Because it is introduced so early in the novel, this creed serves as the reader’s first introduction to the idea of doublethink. By weakening the independence and strength of individuals’ minds and forcing them to live in a constant state of propaganda-induced fear, the Party is able to force its subjects to accept anything it decrees, even if it is entirely illogical—for instance, the Ministry of Peace is in charge of waging war, the Ministry of Love is in charge of political torture, and the Ministry of Truth is in charge of doctoring history books to reflect the Party’s ideology.

That the national slogan of Oceania is equally contradictory is an important testament to the power of the Party’s mass campaign of psychological control. In theory, the Party is able to maintain that “War Is Peace” because having a common enemy keeps the people of Oceania united. “Freedom Is Slavery” because, according to the Party, the man who is independent is doomed to fail. By the same token, “Slavery Is Freedom,” because the man subjected to the collective will is free from danger and want. “Ignorance Is Strength” because the inability of the people to recognize these contradictions cements the power of the authoritarian regime.

This is insane...and terrifying.

...and we are all living through a tweet-created, GOP-enabled dystopian nightmare.

This is terrifying as we might be staring down the barrel of our own extinction.

At least there will be no billionaires,..

...or assholes (not that for most, there isn't much of a difference).

The Great Filter...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on May 24, 2019 at 5:00am

Image Source: Gizmodo and originally, Wait, But Why

Topics: Astrobiology, Carl Sagan, Climate Change, Drake Equation, Existentialism, Fermi Paradox, Nuclear Power

“The universe is a pretty big place. If it's just us, seems like an awful waste of space.” Carl Sagan

My First Contact scenario doesn't involve Vulcans, warp drive or impossible scenarios: it involves radio transmissions, as communication is a big part of the Drake Equation. Specifically audio, video and digital data (Internet?) of extraterrestrial origin as we would confirm before announcing to the world. Assuming the aliens developed their technology in an oxygen-nitrogen environment, the language we could hear might amount to a lot of "clicking" noises, that mathematicians - specifically specialists in cryptography, and linguists - would dive into deciphering. Eventually after coming up with a Rosetta Stone of syntax, we could translate what would amount to news, drama and sitcoms. Of specific interest might be their political climate and sectarian strife (if any). More particularly, did they successfully translate through their "Great Filter"...

...or, if they did not.

*****

I'm a big fan of Jordon Peele's incarnation of The Twilight Zone, particularly the sixth episode: "Six Degrees of Freedom." It is unfortunate that popular show title describes our current political climate.

I won't give away the intriguing ending, but Peele has mastered the macabre plot twist of Rod Serling's writing style, and (my opinion) his surreal monologue delivery. It's streaming, so you may have to pay less than you would for a single movie ticket per month to view it. I've enjoyed it andother shows so far, and I get no monetary gain for the endorsement.

"The Great Filter, in the context of the Fermi paradox, is whatever prevents dead matter from undergoing abiogenesis, in time, to expanding lasting life as measured by the Kardashev scale.[1][2] The concept originates in Robin Hanson's argument that the failure to find any extraterrestrial civilizations in the observable universe implies the possibility something is wrong with one or more of the arguments from various scientific disciplines that the appearance of advanced intelligent life is probable; this observation is conceptualized in terms of a "Great Filter" which acts to reduce the great number of sites where intelligent life might arise to the tiny number of intelligent species with advanced civilizations actually observed (currently just one: human).[3] This probability threshold, which could lie behind us (in our past) or in front of us (in our future), might work as a barrier to the evolution of intelligent life, or as a high probability of self-destruction.[1][4] The main counter-intuitive conclusion of this observation is that the easier it was for life to evolve to our stage, the bleaker our future chances probably are.

The idea was first proposed in an online essay titled "The Great Filter - Are We Almost Past It?", written by economist Robin Hanson. The first version was written in August 1996 and the article was last updated on September 15, 1998. Since that time, Hanson's formulation has received recognition in several published sources discussing the Fermi paradox and its implications.

Using extinct civilizations such as Easter Island as models, a study conducted in 2018 posited that climate change induced by "energy intensive" civilizations may prevent sustainability within such civilizations, thus explaining the lack of evidence for intelligent extraterrestrial life.[5]" Source: Wikipedia/The Great Filter

The Great Filter is alluded to in science fiction with or without warp drive: Star Trek described global wars on Earth and the fictional Vulcan that involved their respective nuclear holocausts. For the Vulcans, recovery involved a relentless embrace of logic, or as I recall reading in a Trek novel, "reality-truth." For Earth, it essentially involved accepting help from the Vulcans after the human species was discovered warp capable through a singular genius with a funny name post self-induced Apocalypse, a Deus ex Machina plot device used since publicly performed Greek and Roman plays. We don't have warp drive, but we do have thermonuclear devices poised for Armageddon. We don't have Vulcans, but we once did have the Easter Islanders, just as once we had the Dodo.

I've often encapsulated The Great Filter in my own dictum: "intelligence is its own Entropy." I think when Carl Sagan was alive, the regressive forces we see now denying science, climate change; verifiable facts and reality were well engaged in his day of the original COSMOS. Slowly, shows like COSMOS lost their appeal to Game Shows cum Reality Shows, and as a country we reveled in our distractions, added as channels on cable and Internet multiplied like E. coli. and measles resurgence as well as our grasp of what is real and verifiable. In fact, we seek distractions in gadgets and online machinations in the constant need to fill "horror vacui."

In the east, nothing meant something, particularly in clarity of thought: Mu Shin No Shin - "the mind without mind" or more colloquially, "no mind." As translated from the martial battlefield to artists both martial and objective; and Zen philosophers, it offers a certain clarity that can be attained when not focused on minutiae detail, but accepted reality "as-is" after diligent practice. A practice like karate forms that takes years of repetition, dedication and study. That is the key to mastering anything, from martial arts to science to civics.

The stars are silent. Intelligence may be rare. Vulcans if existing may not be benevolent, and in the myopic attention span of the erect species of which I am member - "wise men"...fleeting in longevity.

We hope we're past The Great Filter. I'm not sure we are.

Either...Or...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on April 26, 2019 at 5:00am

The Mueller Report (CNN.com - read it while you can)

Topics: Civics, Civil Rights, Climate Change, Existentialism, Human Rights, LGBT Rights, Women's Rights

I'll be taking a break for finals, writing my thesis and the birth of our granddaughter. Her entrance to this plane is pending.

For her, it's all hands on deck.

The future belongs to the young, soon born and yet-to-be born. The future is diverse and more tolerant than the Neanderthal mythologized past we're being dragged to. The present is hopefully planning for a future that will be 8.6 billion in 2030 and 9.8 billion in 2050, and the strains on resources that will bring. The present is hopefully planning for a future with a warmer climate, and our strategy towards ameliorating it. The future is being written, with every tweet and malfeasance of a man epitomizing more demon than Christian; more boorish mobster than sophisticated president. He's covered by a complicit evangelical base and a Republican Party that's less diverse, whiter, aging and dying off. Instead of diversifying, they're doubling down on "The Southern Strategy" for one last push for white supremacy, a push that will take the entire country and the world over an existential, unrecoverable cliff.

Either we're a Constitutional, Federal Republic...or, we're not.

This started...on a porch in Philadelphia, Mississippi, a miniscule distances from the site three Civil Rights workers - Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner - were murdered in 1964 for the "crime" (according to the KKK) of registering black voters:

"I still believe the answer to any problem lies with the people. I believe in states' rights. I believe in people doing as much as they can for themselves at the community level and at the private level, and I believe we've distorted the balance of our government today by giving powers that were never intended in the Constitution to that federal establishment." Ronald Reagan

1964...the year the Civil Rights Act passed. Followed by 1965...the year the Voting Rights Act passed. Three years later, we lost Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy as the Fair Housing Act passed. It was also the year, finally, Richard M. Nixon after Lyndon B. Johnson refused to run for reelection - was elected "law and order" president, running and winning on The Southern Strategy born of racist fear.

The seventies was a loss of innocence with the shame of "losing" the un-winnable Vietnam War, the near impeachment of Nixon, his pardon and his successor getting beaten by a peanut farmer in Plains, Georgia, himself only serving one term due to the Iranian Hostage Crisis. The eighties was muscular, toxic masculinity disguised as action heroes: Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis were young then and box office sensations. They were also admittedly as republican as "the gipper." Arnold would become governor of California and his fiscal failures turned what was a large land mass red state to almost reliably blue. After his affair on Maria Shriver, he's redeeming himself as a climate advocate and adversary to the current occupant at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Tom Steyer nor "Auntie Maxine" needs tell us.

Article 1, Section 1:

All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.

Article 2, Section 4:

The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.

Some caveats and perspective: Secretary Clinton in a Washington Post op ed cautioned a rush to impeachment. The historical memory in this country is deliberately brief, as history nor civics is seldom taught in secondary education. There were Watergate hearings on ABC, CBS and NBC. There was daily education on a president that had just won a landslide reelection - 49 out of 50 states - that didn't need burglary or "plumbers" committing. The case was made to the American people over 28 months, and even after the tapes became public, he STILL had a 24% approval rating among his ardent supporters when it was evident he was going to get impeached in the House and convicted in the Senate by members of his own party. This was the foundation for Roger Ailes to form what would become Fox Propaganda.

Impeachment isn't about conviction: it’s about The Constitution.

We’re either “a nation of laws, and not of men,” or we’re a nation of ONE man.

Either “no one is above the law,” or every elected official can “shoot someone on 5th Avenue” and get away with it.

Impeachment isn't about this president: it’s about the NEXT president.

If THIS one gets away with his clear crimes, every nation can pass information to the candidate they would desire for president as a matter of "diplomacy." No president will ever have to divest from their business if they have one. Jimmy Carter gave up his peanut farm, so he would not violate the Emoluments Clause. No presidential candidate will EVER again show their taxes, and thus open to bribes and manipulation by distant actors. Government "of the people, by the people and for the people" will go from Russian handler to Russian roulette.

We either do this, or we’re not a country: we're a kleptocracy.

Either we're a Constitutional, Federal Republic...or, whatever emerges after this Caligula will not resemble our best self-mythology. It will be too stark, too dark: too dystopian.

For our granddaughter, I must fight until my last breath for her future...because it is hers.

Near the Levee...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on April 24, 2019 at 5:00am

Credit: Mario Tama Getty Images

Topics: Climate Change, Existentialism, Global Warming

Related spoken word piece: Near the Levee

We cannot exist as a nation without a basic acceptance of common facts. I can't say "2+2=4" and another "2+2=5" and we BOTH be correct!

Abortion: Let's accept hormonal teenagers are likely to do something a little more than "make out" and pet heavily. They have myriad means of gathering information on the sexual act. We can educate them on birth control and responsible sexual behavior as the Netherlands does. Or, we can try "abstinence only" and get abysmal teen pregnancy rates as many red states do.

Climate Change: A sane republican administration accepting the science might use cap and trade policies to make polluting uncomfortable for manufactures financially. Compliance would be a matter of the bottom-line.

A democratic administration did something: The Paris Agreement was landmark policy, involving "an agreement within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), dealing with greenhouse-gas-emissions mitigation, adaptation, and finance, signed in 2016. The agreement's language was negotiated by representatives of 196 state parties at the 21st Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC in Le Bourget, near Paris, France, and adopted by consensus on 12 December 2015.[4][5] As of March 2019, 195 UNFCCC members have signed the agreement, and 185 have become party to it.[1] The Paris Agreement's long-term goal is to keep the increase in global average temperature to well below 2 °C above pre-industrial levels; and to limit the increase to 1.5 °C, since this would substantially reduce the risks and effects of climate change." They might actually spearhead green technologies, spurring economic and job growth.

We're not at a sane point in our republic now.

#P4TC related link: Hidden History 1 February 2017...

The $14 billion network of levees and floodwalls that was built to protect greater New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina was a seemingly invincible bulwark against flooding.

But now, 11 months after the Army Corps of Engineers completed one of the largest public works projects in world history, the agency says the system will stop providing adequate protection in as little as four years because of rising sea levels and shrinking levees.

The growing vulnerability of the New Orleans area is forcing the Army Corps to begin assessing repair work, including raising hundreds of miles of levees and floodwalls that form a meandering earth and concrete fortress around the city and its adjacent suburbs.

After a $14-Billion Upgrade, New Orleans' Levees Are Sinking, Thomas Frank, Scientific American

Antithesis of Wisdom...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on April 5, 2019 at 5:00am

Topics: Biology, Civics, Climate Change, Existentialism, Entropy, Mars, Politics

Chimpanzees look up to those they consider to be more prestigious, echoing the way that young people admire celebrities such as David Beckham and Cheryl Cole, according to a new study. Researchers found that apes copy the actions of those they consider to have high status within their group.

Professor Whiten commented, “Teenagers look to pop stars as social models, copying their clothing, mannerisms and speech. Adults are inspired by prominent members of their society, such as successful professionals. Our study shows that chimpanzees are similarly selective in their choice of trend setters.” [1]

*****

Abstract

Humans follow the example of prestigious, high-status individuals much more readily than that of others, such as when we copy the behavior of village elders, community leaders, or celebrities. This tendency has been declared uniquely human, yet remains untested in other species. Experimental studies of animal learning have typically focused on the learning mechanism rather than on social issues, such as who learns from whom. The latter, however, is essential to understanding how habits spread. Here we report that when given opportunities to watch alternative solutions to a foraging problem performed by two different models of their own species, chimpanzees preferentially copy the method shown by the older, higher-ranking individual with a prior track-record of success. Since both solutions were equally difficult, shown an equal number of times by each model and resulted in equal rewards, we interpret this outcome as evidence that the preferred model in each of the two groups tested enjoyed a significant degree of prestige in terms of whose example other chimpanzees chose to follow. Such prestige-based cultural transmission is a phenomenon shared with our own species. If similar biases operate in wild animal populations, the adoption of culturally transmitted innovations may be significantly shaped by the characteristics of performers. [2]

*****

Thwaites glacier in West Antarctica is often referred to as the "Doomsday glacier" because of its sheer size and position as "'backstop' for four other glaciers which holds an additional 10-13 feet of sea level rise." [3] Add the two feet of sea level Thwaites holds and Florida may have a little more to fear than the denials of their republican senators on the impact of climate change.

I've used the term fascism before, not because it's powerful but because it's stupid. The basis of its appeal is fear: fear of the "other," fear of the future, fear particularly of a supposed loss of birth numbers, therefore future voters and numerical power. So-called "white" supremacy has always been a math game of bad algebra and pure ignorance.

But it does not benefit the crowd proudly without Melanin, intellect and possessing MAGA hats: the celebrity chimps with all the bananas above them they worship use the faux demarcation points of politically constructed cultural differences to rob blind the very people that become their shock troops. Rigging elections is not beneath the 1% simians, as they've motivated their rubes that their "white" team won, despite the lack of sharing of spoils after said rigging, Russian interference or not. Socialism is thrown up as demon while demons rob rubes. They ask for "trick-down" bananas" and get feces. Smoking causing cancer must be denied. Humans causing climate impact MUST be denied until the last drop of oil; the last fracking of methane. Then, the royal chimpanzees will wall themselves up as sea levels rise, soundproof beyond "weeping and gnashing of teeth." They'll have extra bananas to live on as the rest of the planet starves. Eventually, their impressive supplies will run out. Perhaps they'll resort to the cannibalism as the Jamestown colonists did in desperation, eating their own children first. Eventually they will see their last sunrise in splendid, decaying mansions atop a canopy of the forest they razed. Currently, their high potentate Orange Orangutan cannot discriminate "orange" and "origin"; that his own father was born in the Bronx and not the Germany and thinks windmills causes cancer.

Homo sapiens, (Latin: “wise man”) the species to which all modern human beings belong. Homo sapiens is one of several species grouped into the genus Homo, but it is the only one that is not extinct. [YET] See also human evolution. Source: Britannica

Entropy - the measure of a system's thermal energy per unit temperature that is unavailable for doing useful work. Because work is obtained from ordered molecular motion, the amount of entropy is also a measure of the molecular disorder, or randomness, of a system. Encyclopedia Britannica

Having stupid citizens also serves a more ‘noble’ purpose. Although most of us want to be treated as intelligent beings, it is also in the interest of ruling parties – be they political or religious – to have an overall stupid population, dumb enough to make them controllable. Education and knowledge are being pushed aside in favour of technical training. Governments are more interested in a highly-skilled labour force than in critical and intelligent citizens. The media feed the population with ready-made entertainment and information, thus forming people’s minds according to what is preferable for the overall functioning of society. Zoereei, Homo stultus

Mars may have been a living world once. We still study it. We wish to terraform it. Mars as a world still takes 687 days to complete its year. It will take 365.25 days for Earth to complete its year...whether we're here, or not.

Homo Stultus - foolish man, stupid man: the chimps are exonerated.

1. Chimpanzee trend-setters: New study shows that chimps 'ape' the prestigious, University of St. Andrews, 2010, Phys.org
2. Prestige Affects Cultural Learning in Chimpanzees, Victoria Horner, Darby Proctor, Kristin E. Bonnie, Andrew Whiten, Frans B. M. de Waal, PLOS Journal
3. A glacier the size of Florida is on track to change the course of human civilization. Pakalolo, Daily Kos

climate_change (17)

Fierce Urgency...

Siberian and Heat Wave is Oxymoron...

New Pole, New Earth...

Angry Summers...

Internet Carnot...

Going Vertical...

Adaption and Extinction...

The Lightness of Stupidity...

No Planet B...

Of Memes and Men...

The Caveat of Clean...

Elysium Oceania...

The Strength of Ignorance...

The Great Filter...

Either...Or...

Near the Levee...

Antithesis of Wisdom...

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