We have a new brochure we are looking into. Right now we are looking at four different options. You may want to stop by so I can review the prototypes with me.
(Meeting tomorrow regardless!)
Because, dear Dima, we are moral creatures and almost all of us act morally (within our cultural teachings) almost all of the time. God isn't necessary for that, and I, within what I know to be moral, won't act as you suggest either.(Dima had suggested, that, if I'm right and we're all doomed, why not just ignore our carbon footprint and do whatever we wish. I'm no hermit, but I also know that having no offspring is the best I can do for the rest of life, and it reduces the numbers who will suffer when the biosphere no longer supports our species. That's my moral stance, as Chuck A has so beautifully amplified. Frish)
ELKTON, Md. – The Cecil County Sheriff's Office said a deputy about to take a bathroom break at a gas station smelled crack cocaine and made a quick arrest. Police spokesman Lt. Bernard Chiominto said Deputy John Lines was waiting to use the bathroom Friday at a Wawa convenience store when he smelled crack cocaine from outside the bathroom.
Lines then saw a 27-year-old man come out of the bathroom. Chiominto said Lines went in the bathroom, saw drug paraphernalia and arrested the man, who police said had glassy eyes and dilated pupils.
Police said the man resisted arrest and was subdued using pepper spray. He was charged with assault, resisting arrest and possession of drug paraphernalia after police found drug paraphernalia in his pockets.
Yes, the cop's name is LINES.
Honestly, you VHEMT people scare the shit out of me. Self-hating self-fulfilling genocide prophecies aside, any ideology which banks on denying the fundamental substance of human nature is not to be trusted. We are creatures who use tools. We are creatures who rather than adapting to our environment, cause our environment to be adapted to us. This is neither a good thing or a bad thing, it's powerful, and like all powerful things can either cause great good or great harm. We have to find the wisdom to use our adaptation to our benefit, which probably will look a lot like benefitting the earth ecosystem as a whole.Regardless, I hope you assholes don't ever suggest this nonsense is synonymous with atheism, or you'll bring back the fun times of burning atheists at the stake.William
Frish,
That was a very interesting website.
I guess I was a VHEMT without ever having heard of them.
www.vhemt.org
I didn't read every word on the site, but I looked around, read about half of it, and am still left with no answer to a question I've had for a long time.
Perhaps you have come across some answer(s) to this.
The question is: What is the long-term carrying capacity for humans on this planet? Assume that long term is a million years or longer, and that we were immediately reduced to this number, and stayed within 1% of this number "forever".
My guess is perhaps a billion or less, but I really don't have any evidence to back up that guess.
What do you think (or know) about this?
yours,
Chuck A
At 10:49 PM 2/15/2009, frish wrote:
How droll. Is it fair that we pay taxes to kill people in Iraq, in an illegal war? there are plenty of things we ought not subsidize but we do, and birth control, contraception, abortion are in the public interest, and so should be subsidized.
Condoms ought to be free with every happy meal.
Abortion has been shown (Freakonomics) to reduce crime. Condoms are even cheaper.
Libertarians ought to realize (but won't) that VOLUNTARY Human Extinction is the only MORAL choice since it is the best way to reduce our population in the face of the coming "Armageddon" (sorry for the biblical reference, but it applies, in spades).
I am just sorry that any tax incentives still exist to support procreation.
Like tax credits for kids.
Like tax credits for big suvs that subsidize big families.
It is DEFINITELY in the government's interest (if we still have government by,of,for people) to subsidize birth control, abortion, sex ed and anything else that will reduce population.
But, my view is definitely far less "popular" than atheism. And, I'm a "libertarian" too!
There is no "biological clock" only social forces and ignorance that keeps people procreating.
Oh well. Live long and die off!
Dima, there are people starving right here in America.
But that's not the point. The future is filled with starvation and a biosphere that CANNOT support human life, regardless of the "technology" we throw at it. Our momentum and human nature will preclude solutions to the situation, and, we'll be extinct regardless of what we throw at the problem. Oh well.
I don't suspect/expect any of you agree. VHEMT is far less acceptable than atheism.
Frish, who is pleased every day that he's a volunteer!
Take a minute and read, it is a serious site...we're Vehement!
www.vhemt.org
Flick the peanuts at the squirrels.
By WES JACKSON and WENDELL BERRY
Published: January 4, 2009
THE extraordinary rainstorms last June caused catastrophic soil erosion in the grain lands of Iowa, where there were gullies 200 feet wide. But even worse damage is done over the long term under normal rainfall — by the little rills and sheets of erosion on incompletely covered or denuded cropland, and by various degradations resulting from industrial procedures and technologies alien to both agriculture and nature.
Soil that is used and abused in this way is as nonrenewable as (and far more valuable than) oil. Unlike oil, it has no technological substitute — and no powerful friends in the halls of government.
Agriculture has too often involved an insupportable abuse and waste of soil, ever since the first farmers took away the soil-saving cover and roots of perennial plants. Civilizations have destroyed themselves by destroying their farmland. This irremediable loss, never enough noticed, has been made worse by the huge monocultures and continuous soil-exposure of the agriculture we now practice.
To the problem of soil loss, the industrialization of agriculture has added pollution by toxic chemicals, now universally present in our farmlands and streams. Some of this toxicity is associated with the widely acclaimed method of minimum tillage. We should not poison our soils to save them.
Industrial agricultural has made our food supply entirely dependent on fossil fuels and, by substituting technological "solutions" for human work and care, has virtually destroyed the cultures of husbandry (imperfect as they may have been) once indigenous to family farms and farming neighborhoods.
Clearly, our present ways of agriculture are not sustainable, and so our food supply is not sustainable. We must restore ecological health to our agricultural landscapes, as well as economic and cultural stability to our rural communities.
For 50 or 60 years, we have let ourselves believe that as long as we have money we will have food. That is a mistake. If we continue our offenses against the land and the labor by which we are fed, the food supply will decline, and we will have a problem far more complex than the failure of our paper economy. The government will bring forth no food by providing hundreds of billons of dollars to the agribusiness corporations.
Any restorations will require, above all else, a substantial increase in the acreages of perennial plants. The most immediately practicable way of doing this is to go back to crop rotations that include hay, pasture and grazing animals.
But a more radical response is necessary if we are to keep eating and preserve our land at the same time. In fact, research in Canada, Australia, China and the United States over the last 30 years suggests that perennialization of the major grain crops like wheat, rice, sorghum and sunflowers can be developed in the foreseeable future. By increasing the use of mixtures of grain-bearing perennials, we can better protect the soil and substantially reduce greenhouse gases, fossil-fuel use and toxic pollution.
Carbon sequestration would increase, and the husbandry of water and soil nutrients would become much more efficient. And with an increase in the use of perennial plants and grazing animals would come more employment opportunities in agriculture — provided, of course, that farmers would be paid justly for their work and their goods.
Thoughtful farmers and consumers everywhere are already making many necessary changes in the production and marketing of food. But we also need a national agricultural policy that is based upon ecological principles. We need a 50-year farm bill that addresses forthrightly the problems of soil loss and degradation, toxic pollution, fossil-fuel dependency and the destruction of rural communities.
This is a political issue, certainly, but it far transcends the farm politics we are used to. It is an issue as close to every one of us as our own stomachs.
Wes Jackson is a plant geneticist and president of The Land Institute in Salina, Kan. Wendell Berry is a farmer and writer in Port Royal, Ky.
A version of this article appeared in print on January 5, 2009, on page A21 of the New York edition.
A mixed-race couple welcomes home their second set of incredibly rare twin daughters. » One black, one white
(Copied from Yahoo! news homepage today 1/02/2009 As of 11:29 a.m. PST)From Frish (thanks to friend Janet who Pointed This Out!): Obviously a little USA biased, but, nice thoughts regardless.
Union of Concerned Scientists' Top 10 New Year's Resolutions
1. Defend Americans from unsafe drugs, toys and other products by requiring that federal agency leaders protect employees who blow the whistle when science is misused.IRVINE, Calif. –
The box of crackers Debra Rogoff bought from the grocery store had some crackerjack in it — an envelope stuffed with $10,000.
Yet the Irvine woman was more curious than ecstatic about her daughter's find. After all, who would leave money in such a place?
"We just thought, 'This is someone's money,'" she said. "We would never feel good about spending it."
Rather than go on a shopping spree, the family called police and was initially told the money could be part of a drug drop.
Police later heard from store managers at Whole Foods in Tustin that an elderly woman had come in a few days earlier, hysterical because she had mistakenly returned a box of crackers with her life savings inside. In a mix-up the store restocked the box rather than composting it.
The Lake Forest woman, whose identity was not released, had lost faith in her bank and decided the box would be a safer place for the money.
Luckily for her, the box of Annie's Sour Cream and Onion Cheddar Bunny crackers were bought by the Rogoffs, who discovered the crisp $100 bills in an unmarked white envelope on Oct. 10.
The Rogoffs never heard from the woman and didn't receive a reward, but Rogoff did return to Whole Foods a couple weeks later.
"I asked them if I could have another box of crackers," she said with a laugh. The store obliged.
___
Information from: The Orange County Register, http://www.ocregister.com
Frish,
This email, you have sent to me, is very upsetting!!!!!
Your company made a huge mistake which has affected my business, my staff and my family.
I pulled 2 people off vacation and have taken the one day away from my daughter, who flew in to be with me over the weekend.
Everyone worked overtime to get you the job so that we could have these in our customers hands by January 1st.
You know how business is awful, and that we specifically timed this introduction to capture sale for the first week of January when all the retailers will be replacing inventory.
I don't know what stress you have in your job, but I have the financial well being of 12 of my employees on my back . And when you write me a note, casually telling me what you are not going to do for me... I am thinking of my company and the people in it and the safety of whether they are going to have jobs when they come back in the new year.
I would think that you would be sending me a note telling me how you are going to get your employees back to work,
fix the problem and get our catalogs to kesmail on Tuesday.
Does your company stand by your promises or not!!!
Are you accepting that this is your fault and that you have greatly inconvenienced me and my company or not!!!!
Are you going get this back on press Monday morning or not!!!!!
This email that you have sent me has only made my day worse.
I want to hear what you are going to do for me and my staff.
This is all very upsetting~!!!!!!!!!!
On 12/26/08 10:32 AM, "Frish" wrote:
Marta:
I wish I could wave a wand...
I cannot and did not make any commitments on when we can replace the catalogs.
We will do what we can do.
In the meanwhile, use what you can.
Frish
(Frish has 2000 hours of paid Archaeological experience and a BA in the subject)
The subject, above, is misleading.
There is no lesson - only confirmation that vhemt is the moral answer to the future.
(Hi Louis, on this note I copied my blog and two yahoo groups related to www.vhemt.org.
Thanks for smiling, but we are not just serious, we're Vehement!)
VHEMT IMPLICATIONS OF THE ARTICLE BELOW, WHICH IS DENSE BUT IMPORTANT.
Abstract:
The effect to the climate as reflected in radio-carbon dating of forests post-epidemic human virus in pre-Columbian times.
Forests grew nicely at the same time decimated human populations recovered from a pandemic. The article is far too heavy on the "science" of the mechanics of the dating technique and far too light on the virus or condition of human activity during the same time period...the implication is that HUMAN CAUSED CLIMATE CHAOS has been going on for a long time already.
1. WE'RE RIGHT. THE REFORESTATION WILL BE TREMENDOUS WITH LESS/NO HUMAN ACTIVITY.
2. BEFORE IT ALL CEASES TO SUPPORT US, I EXPECT HUMANITY WILL UNDERSTAND ENOUGH ABOUT AI THAT WE CAN AT LEAST ATTEMPT TO HAVE INTELLECT/CONSCIOUSNESS PROCEED.
3. BUT, PERHAPS NOT.
4. AI IS A REALLY BIG PROBLEM AND THERE ISN'T MUCH TIME.
5. BESIDES, IS IT A GOOD IDEA?
6. THAT'S THE ONLY REAL QUESTION ACTUALLY, WHAT SHOULD OUR LEGACY TO THE UNIVERSE ACTUALLY BE?
This belongs to "The Future of City Living" keyword...
Public release date: 18-Dec-2008
Contact: Louis Bergeron
louisb3 @stanford .edu
Stanford University
New World post-pandemic reforestation helped start Little Ice Age, say Stanford scientists
The power of viruses is well documented in human history. Swarms of little viral Davids have repeatedly laid low the great Goliaths of human civilization, most famously in the devastating pandemics that swept the New World during European conquest and settlement.
In recent years, there has been growing evidence for the hypothesis that the effect of the pandemics in the Americas wasn't confined to killing indigenous peoples. Global climate appears to have been altered as well.
Stanford University researchers have conducted a comprehensive analysis of data detailing the amount of charcoal contained in soils and lake sediments at the sites of both pre-Columbian population centers in the Americas and in sparsely populated surrounding regions. They concluded that reforestation of agricultural lands-abandoned as the population collapsed-pulled so much carbon out of the atmosphere that it helped trigger a period of global cooling, at its most intense from approximately 1500 to 1750, known as the Little Ice Age.
"We estimate that the amount of carbon sequestered in the growing forests was about 10 to 50 percent of the total carbon that would have needed to come out of the atmosphere and oceans at that time to account for the observed changes in carbon dioxide concentrations," said Richard Nevle, visiting scholar in the Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences at Stanford. Nevle and Dennis Bird, professor in geological and environmental sciences, presented their study at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union on Dec. 17, 2008.
Nevle and Bird synthesized published data from charcoal records from 15 sediment cores extracted from lakes, soil samples from 17 population centers and 18 sites from the surrounding areas in Central and South America. They examined samples dating back 5,000 years.
What they found was a record of slowly increasing charcoal deposits, indicating increasing burning of forestland to convert it to cropland, as agricultural practices spread among the human population-until around 500 years ago: At that point, there was a precipitous drop in the amount of charcoal in the samples, coinciding with the precipitous drop in the human population in the Americas.
To verify their results, they checked their fire histories based on the charcoal data against records of carbon dioxide concentrations and carbon isotope ratios that were available.
"We looked at ice cores and tropical sponge records, which give us reliable proxies for the carbon isotope composition of atmospheric carbon dioxide. And it jumped out at us right away," Nevle said. "We saw a conspicuous increase in the isotope ratio of heavy carbon to light carbon. That gave us a sense that maybe we were looking at the right thing, because that is exactly what you would expect from reforestation."
During photosynthesis, plants prefer carbon dioxide containing the lighter isotope of carbon. Thus a massive reforestation event would not only decrease the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, but would also leave carbon dioxide in the atmosphere that was enriched in the heavy carbon isotope.
Other theories have been proposed to account for the cooling at the time of the Little Ice Age, as well as the anomalies in the concentration and carbon isotope ratios of atmospheric carbon dioxide associated with that period.
Variations in the amount of sunlight striking the Earth, caused by a drop in sunspot activity, could also be a factor in cooling down the globe, as could a flurry of volcanic activity in the late 16th century.
But the timing of these events doesn't fit with the observed onset of the carbon dioxide drop. These events don't begin until at least a century after carbon dioxide in the atmosphere began to decline and the ratio of heavy to light carbon isotopes in atmospheric carbon dioxide begins to increase.
Nevle and Bird don't attribute all of the cooling during the Little Ice Age to reforestation in the Americas.
"There are other causes at play," Nevle said. "But reforestation is certainly a first-order contributor."
Wanted to send out some sort of holiday greeting to you, but it is so difficult in today's world to know exactly what to say without offending someone. I met with my solicitor yesterday and, on his advice, I wish to say the following: Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, my best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, non-addictive, gender neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of religious persuasion or secular practices of your choice with respect for the religious/secular persuasions and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all.I also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling, and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2009, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make Britain great (not to imply that Britain is necessarily greater than any other country or is the only "Britain" in the western hemisphere) and without regard to the race, creed, colour, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee.By accepting this greeting, you are accepting these terms: This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for her/himself or others and is void where prohibited by law, and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.Disclaimer: no trees were harmed in the sending of this message however, a significant number of electrons were slightly inconvenienced. In other words, a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
xxBarbara
EMOONING!!
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Conventional wisdom: Nuclear power would be great if only we could figure out how to get rid of the horrific waste. Plutonium lasts 24,000 years. There is absolutely no way we can keep that waste safe for such a ridiculously long time.
All of our greatest space science has come from robots.
Conventional wisdom: Because the United States is responsible for about one fourth of the excess carbon dioxide that drives the greenhouse effect, the key to solving the problem is for America to go green.
Some say the United States needs to set an example. But it already has: Once a country is wealthy, it can afford to cut back on carbon dioxide. Unfortunately, by the time China is as wealthy as the United States, the world will very likely be 5 to 7 degrees Fahrenheit warmer.
Message for Obama: If we want to stop global warming, then our focus must be on the developing world. Wealthy countries could start by financing clean coal in China. For $50 billion per year, we could at least make sure that new coal plants in China are capable of sequestering carbon dioxide. Sending that kind of money to China would have been a tough sell during the election, but now that the campaign is over, it is time to come clean—about getting clean—to the American people.
Richard Muller, a MacArthur Prize winner, is the author of Physics for Future Presidents (New York: W.W. Norton, 2008) and a physics professor at the University of California, Berkeley.
"You need more oozing out of them, running down your cheeks, etc…"
Movies are Boring
Best Friends For LIFE (and, just fwos!)
You sure catch my drift
Satisfied my itch!
"Absence makes hearts grow fonder"
Can't wait for bowling!
In relaxation, Frish
With his tongue firmly in cheek
just not anywhen
**These 'ku make me proud.
I am only the author...
So, you be the judge!
The part I like best
Is reading the first - last lines
1st 2 ku above!
You stand on your mark
Let gravity take control
ball goes for the pins
Paul? Or Paula?
