Friday, November 04, 2005
Still more ruminations.
My son told me of an experiment that was assisted by an aquaintance involved in primate research. The study was to determine a primate's ability to comprehend physical symbols. The experiment was to give tokens to rhesus monkeys to reward them for positive behavior. Whenever the monkeys performed as requested, they would receive a token which they could then redeem for a treat.
The monkeys quickly got the hang of this abstraction from tokens, which they can't eat, into treats, which they can. - in other words, Money.
In the next phase of the experiment, they introduced tokens into the monkey's cages without first requiring a positive behavior. The monkey's response was perhaps predictable, the stronger monkeys would batter the weaker ones and take the tokens from them. Some of the female monkeys would have sex with these stronger monkeys and would receive a token good for a treat in return.
The scientists managed to introduce robbery and prostitution into the primates' social structure in a very short period of time.
...........................................
Historically, these same behaviors became evident as exercised by the tribes of Isreal while Moses was talking to a burning bush on Mt. Sinai.
The monkeys quickly got the hang of this abstraction from tokens, which they can't eat, into treats, which they can. - in other words, Money.
In the next phase of the experiment, they introduced tokens into the monkey's cages without first requiring a positive behavior. The monkey's response was perhaps predictable, the stronger monkeys would batter the weaker ones and take the tokens from them. Some of the female monkeys would have sex with these stronger monkeys and would receive a token good for a treat in return.
The scientists managed to introduce robbery and prostitution into the primates' social structure in a very short period of time.
...........................................
Historically, these same behaviors became evident as exercised by the tribes of Isreal while Moses was talking to a burning bush on Mt. Sinai.
More ruminations.
It is amazing to me how pragmatic the invisible hand can be. Is there ever an end in which the money-grubbing becomes too much? A place where even the most obtuse capitalist starts seeing the self-destructiveness of this avaricious behavior?
The northwest passage to the orient has ever been a Ciabola to the merchant class. To cut so many miles off of established trade routes, ahh, the profits! Enough to make an Emperor blush.
This planet (earth) is made up of many checks and balances. These checks and balances are like vast machinery awaiting sufficient force applied to the appropriate lever to begin functioning.
The most obvious example is the hydrologic cycle, liquid to gas to solid, or water to evaporation to ice. Ice formed is white, water is dark, evaporation is grades of clarity. Water falls from the sky, rain. If the temperature is warm enough it quickly returns to the gaseous evaporative state. If cold enough, the water freezes into ice.
Longwave solar radiation excites the water molecules enticing them to evaporate. The longwave radiation rebounds off of the frozen ice in what is known as the albedo effect. Polar ice is very white with a strong albedo effect. Dark water has almost no albedo.
The radiation striking the water is absorbed, the radiation striking the ice is reflected. Therefore, the water absorbs heat at the same time as the ice rejects it. The ice is floating on the surface of the water, where currents gradually melt it away. Reduction in ozone resistance to longwave solar radiation makes water molecules more active, creating more heat, melting more ice. The mechanism is now in operation.
Whatever agent has caused it, the water is now warmer. The warmer water causes the ice to melt faster, the ocean gets warmer with more unfiltered solar radiation, the ice diminishes, further reducing albedo effect, causing more absorption of solar radiation, and so it goes.
Global warming is not that hard to understand. Did human beings cause it?
Does it matter who caused it?
...............................
Religion and science can each provide all the plausible denial one would need to deny anything. Holocaust revisionists can scientifically prove that the holocaust was made up by Zionist jews, scientists with strong religious beliefs can prove that the world has only been in existence 8,000 years. Both scenarios superficially plausible, but very unlikely.
When dealing with a precision device such as the planet earth, is it so hard to see that if there is a dumbshit at the controls, despite all inherent checks and balances, the course of the planet can go astray?
We humans are that dumbshit.
Is it arrogant for a human to claim that tiny little people can cause a fundamental change in the world climate? Hm, Is it arrogant for tiny little people to claim, based on an old testament, that God created the earth for the dominion of man? Sounds to me like man is dominating the planet, just as the Abrahamic God wanted it.
.................................
So the fabled Northwest Passage is due to become a year-round trade route within the next 25 years (science currently feels it will take fifty years, but let's just see.) Investors with an eye towards long-term growth potential are snapping up previously barren, icebound coastline all along Canada's northernmost shorelines, and likely along the northernmost shores of Siberia as well. In a warmer global climate, this will be the latitude in which the merchants will be able to bypass the Panama Canal and the Red Sea, saving both time and money.
Though rising sea levels will reduce land mass substantially, the human race will still have access to cheap imports. A sound investment.
The northwest passage to the orient has ever been a Ciabola to the merchant class. To cut so many miles off of established trade routes, ahh, the profits! Enough to make an Emperor blush.
This planet (earth) is made up of many checks and balances. These checks and balances are like vast machinery awaiting sufficient force applied to the appropriate lever to begin functioning.
The most obvious example is the hydrologic cycle, liquid to gas to solid, or water to evaporation to ice. Ice formed is white, water is dark, evaporation is grades of clarity. Water falls from the sky, rain. If the temperature is warm enough it quickly returns to the gaseous evaporative state. If cold enough, the water freezes into ice.
Longwave solar radiation excites the water molecules enticing them to evaporate. The longwave radiation rebounds off of the frozen ice in what is known as the albedo effect. Polar ice is very white with a strong albedo effect. Dark water has almost no albedo.
The radiation striking the water is absorbed, the radiation striking the ice is reflected. Therefore, the water absorbs heat at the same time as the ice rejects it. The ice is floating on the surface of the water, where currents gradually melt it away. Reduction in ozone resistance to longwave solar radiation makes water molecules more active, creating more heat, melting more ice. The mechanism is now in operation.
Whatever agent has caused it, the water is now warmer. The warmer water causes the ice to melt faster, the ocean gets warmer with more unfiltered solar radiation, the ice diminishes, further reducing albedo effect, causing more absorption of solar radiation, and so it goes.
Global warming is not that hard to understand. Did human beings cause it?
Does it matter who caused it?
...............................
Religion and science can each provide all the plausible denial one would need to deny anything. Holocaust revisionists can scientifically prove that the holocaust was made up by Zionist jews, scientists with strong religious beliefs can prove that the world has only been in existence 8,000 years. Both scenarios superficially plausible, but very unlikely.
When dealing with a precision device such as the planet earth, is it so hard to see that if there is a dumbshit at the controls, despite all inherent checks and balances, the course of the planet can go astray?
We humans are that dumbshit.
Is it arrogant for a human to claim that tiny little people can cause a fundamental change in the world climate? Hm, Is it arrogant for tiny little people to claim, based on an old testament, that God created the earth for the dominion of man? Sounds to me like man is dominating the planet, just as the Abrahamic God wanted it.
.................................
So the fabled Northwest Passage is due to become a year-round trade route within the next 25 years (science currently feels it will take fifty years, but let's just see.) Investors with an eye towards long-term growth potential are snapping up previously barren, icebound coastline all along Canada's northernmost shorelines, and likely along the northernmost shores of Siberia as well. In a warmer global climate, this will be the latitude in which the merchants will be able to bypass the Panama Canal and the Red Sea, saving both time and money.
Though rising sea levels will reduce land mass substantially, the human race will still have access to cheap imports. A sound investment.
Ruminations:
Now that George W. Bush has been relegated to lame duck status, are his policies, i.e. social security reform, still viable? The Republican controlled congress must sense that the straight party line is becoming increasingly unpopular, so will they ease up on the more controversial issues that have a real possibility of inflicting long-term damage, like the overturn of Roe vs. Wade and the continuation of the Iraq war?
Or perhaps, sensing that the Bullshit has gotten way out of hand and the possibility of a shift back to Democrat (not democracy) is eminent, Should it make them more cautious as they wend their precarious way towards the end of My pet goat's (MPG) term, one of the more destructive presidencies this country has ever been forced to endure?
I am frequently hearing the Iraq war referred to in conversation as "George Bush's war". This is scarcely odd because an unjust war based on lies, even if Plato said that the philosopher kings sometimes must lie to the common man, is still an unjust war. Considering the fact that Plato and Jesus Christ, two men who held righteousness in high regard, are the main figures on which MPG seems to base his administration's philosophy, this state of paradox begins to form a bit of a conundrum for the "Bushies".
The Supreme Court is about to become staffed with the most creative majority since the Dred Scott decision thanks to the fortuitous timing of the Bush presidency, and Allan Greenspan is also due to retire on MPG'S watch. The republicans have been given the key to dominion over the American government, and realizing this, maybe the power has gone a little to their little, bullet-shaped heads.
(more beer)
The world circumstance brought about by America's odd foreign policies are getting harder and harder to justify. How can you help but blame dependence on oil? We have made the American way of life available to the world, as long as the world can provide the oil that that way of life requires. The manufacture of goods, the delivery of goods, the promotion of goods, the electricity to operate goods, there is literally nothing that does not in some way depend on oil. How the hell did this happen?
Or perhaps, sensing that the Bullshit has gotten way out of hand and the possibility of a shift back to Democrat (not democracy) is eminent, Should it make them more cautious as they wend their precarious way towards the end of My pet goat's (MPG) term, one of the more destructive presidencies this country has ever been forced to endure?
I am frequently hearing the Iraq war referred to in conversation as "George Bush's war". This is scarcely odd because an unjust war based on lies, even if Plato said that the philosopher kings sometimes must lie to the common man, is still an unjust war. Considering the fact that Plato and Jesus Christ, two men who held righteousness in high regard, are the main figures on which MPG seems to base his administration's philosophy, this state of paradox begins to form a bit of a conundrum for the "Bushies".
The Supreme Court is about to become staffed with the most creative majority since the Dred Scott decision thanks to the fortuitous timing of the Bush presidency, and Allan Greenspan is also due to retire on MPG'S watch. The republicans have been given the key to dominion over the American government, and realizing this, maybe the power has gone a little to their little, bullet-shaped heads.
(more beer)
The world circumstance brought about by America's odd foreign policies are getting harder and harder to justify. How can you help but blame dependence on oil? We have made the American way of life available to the world, as long as the world can provide the oil that that way of life requires. The manufacture of goods, the delivery of goods, the promotion of goods, the electricity to operate goods, there is literally nothing that does not in some way depend on oil. How the hell did this happen?
