“How paramount the future is to the present when one is surrounded by children.”
Now I know what a hot topic Darwin is. I know the conrtoversy that his ideas caused, I have have my own thoughts on his work. But this is a marvelous quote.
Nov
24
“Penguin rafts.”
Every since man discovered his brain there has been quest to find the most comfortable environment. He had to walk everywhere, so he tamed the horse and built planes, trains and automobiles. He wanted a warmer cave so he made tents, then castles, houses and eventually, cities. He didn’t like being dirty so he made the shower, he didn’t like the earth to sleep on so he made the bed . There’s no doubt about it, man is a problem solver. With his developed brain and his opposable thumbs he seems to want to conquer, and tame but even with his ingenuity he is still lacking one thing, common since. And the old adage really applies here: “Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.” (I agree with the comfort concept, especially showers and beds.)
It’s kind of a self defeating cycle, we make our selves weaker by concurring the smaller troublesome things. However, this is how progress works. So when I read an article in Yahoo- news about ice bergs, I couldn’t help but question a few things and ponder the irony.
The situation: Hundreds of Giant Ice bergs drifting north into the shipping lanes due to global warming.
(link here)↓
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20091123/ts_afp/australianzealandantarcticaclimateiceberg
Now I know there is only correlation between man and global warming, that the real issue is so convoluted and complicated we may never know why it’s happening. In fact, much like the holocaust, there are people who are adamant that it is not happening.
There are people who believe that the Earth is only cycling. Personally I think we have a great deal to do with this problem. We are the only species on the planet that destroys valuable parts of the ecosystem to make our self more comfortable.
Take deforestation for instance. I am not the type of person who will climb a tree and live in it to save it. However, I do see an issue with destroying forests.
(Explanation of the problem: In our natural cycle we need oxygen, we cannot breath Carbon Di-oxide. Plants have this fantastic ability to breath Carbon Di-Oxide and the bi-product is Oxygen. If we cut these trees down we will have nothing to breath. Not to mention that as the amount of Carbon dioxide rises, radiation from the sun becomes trapped here on the surface. This raises the temperature a few degrees and poof instant problems.)
We destroy these trees and plants because we need room for crops, we need the wood, we need the land for development. We have to do this because our decision making process is fundamentally flawed. We make choices that lead us right back to our own demise. From the water we drink (which we have poisoned in the sake of progress) to the population problems we have (because we don’t think beyond our genitals, responsibility, or the “moment”) We are reactive, not proactive. As a species we need to learn to read beyond the one page we are on. It’s a choose your own adventure where you can’t keep your finger on the page and flip back when you see you made the wrong choice. We can’t even look ahead and see that it is our children that will have to clean up our messes.
So why? Why is it that way?
It goes back to comfort, we have a desire to be comfortable all the time. We become complacent when we are comfortable and don’t tend to do anything at all, except try and maintain that level of comfort. So we pollute the air with exhaust from our cars because walking is uncomfortable, we don’t develop greener technology because we are happy with gasoline. (thankfully that is slowly changing.) and the list goes on and on… Soon when our temperature goes up a few degrees there will be mammoth chunks of ice bobbing around in the ocean. This will effectively cool the temperature of the ocean, change currents, and convection zones, causing storms, floods, droughts, and water levels to rise. But its just so much easier to do nothing until we have too…. (sarcasm)
One side of the coin.
A lot of people argue that the problems we have with these icebergs are minimal. And that the rise in temperature is a joke. That the Earth can take it and come back for more just like it always has. I have a question for those people: “What if you’re wrong?” I believe something should be done now because it is a problem, (And I do contribute to the solution). If I am wrong and we do something about it, nothing happens, we get some new age cars, some better recycling methods, safer paints, better processing, and cleaner energy… ect.
Flip the coin.
If there is a cause to worry and we do nothing. Then, when we finally see the scope of the problem we neglected to fix, it’s so massive we cannot control the situation. It’s suddenly far less than comfortable. So in our desire to stay comfortable we eventually drive our selves to being uncomfortable. So why not do something before the problem comes up?
It’s an epidemic of our backwards thought processes.
This has been a rant. And I could be completely off beat with this rant, maybe the penguins are just getting sick of living in arctic. Maybe all these massive Icebergs are just Penguin rafts….
If your read this I hope you could follow it, as most of my stuff is written on the fly.
Nov
23
For all of you Sci-fi Geeks out there, here is the link of the day, brought to you by “NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC”. I have been interested in Europa for along time and always questioned whether there could exist some sort of freakish brain eater in the oceans under the ice. Or some giant intergalactic octopus. Maybe a killer virus frozen in the depths, who knows?
Any way its here for you enjoyment ↓ (See link below.)
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/11/091116-jupiter-moon-life-europa-fish.html
Nov
23
Now I am not easily deceived with optical illusions. They don’t hold me transfixed like most most people. But I got to admit I really like this one. Not too horribly ”hip” on the content, but it still rocks.
Remember that Grilled Cheese...
Nov
23
“Look, I don’t want to wax philosophic, but I will say that if you’re alive you’ve got to flap your arms and legs, you’ve got to jump around a lot, for life is the very opposite of death, and therefore you must at very least think noisy and colorfully, or you’re not alive.”
One of my favorite personalities out there. Mel brooks is the man. I was raised on his since of humor and his movies are still nostalgic: Especially “Young Frankenstein” and “Blazing Saddles.”
Nov
23
OK, I apologise for the lack of posts, I turned into Nosferatu over the week end. I spent the time in dark places averting my eyes. It was unpleasant to say the least but in the end I triumphed (hopefully). But I am back on track and back to the blog… So enjoy this post about my mail.
“My wife was “porked” and I was too…”
So, the wife formally know as woman got the Pork Flu a little while ago, it couldn’t be avoided because she has school and everyone insists on going to school when they are sick. So She came home feeling a little sick… That night she stopped in the middle of a sentence and promptly went to sleep for three days. When she woke up, she had pneumonia. So I made sure the “infected one” made it to the doctor. They shot her in her ass and gave her a pill line-up to take every day for a few weeks. She is better now.
I have no problem paying for services rendered so there was no surprise when I found a bill in the mailbox, that’s why I have insurance. As it turns out, that first bill was just the front-runner. There were seven more to follow. The hospital was sending us a separate bill for every separate thing that she had done. So the imaging was a different bill from the ER visit (a seven hour wait I might add), the check up was a separate bill from the doctor bill ect….
Why the hell was it set up this way? I have eight bills. Why can’t the hospital consolidate? Although I think the bills are steep I will pay them. This is an epidemic problem in the states. I don’t know that much about how the hospital works, but I know it doesn’t work very well. I would complain to the hospital staff, but I can not find the accountable parties. They seem to hiding in the bureaucracy.
This is another thing that is contributing to the decline of this country. Poor management in everything. This is just like Henry Ford did with the assembly line (good move, sort of), except billing isn’t a service or a product and should never be dichotomized for easier processing (Bad move! It’s freeken health!). If they want my money for services rendered why is it that they can do a poor job through out the system but when it comes to getting my money they are experts? It seems that every one who talked to the wifenator wants a piece of the insurance pie. I got charged less when I was really poor. I am actually paying more because I have health insurance than I did when I didn’t have it. Really? Then again, when I was broke(r) I didn’t get eight bills for a diagnosis and a presciption.
It’s not like I am buying a car, or a TV, this is healthcare we are talking about. This is an institution that helps people live. I believe in doctors (half of them at least… Ok a few of them). I believe that the majority of them got into the business to save lives. How the hell did they even find eight services to bill me on, she just had the swine flu and pneumonia.
Any way she is better now…
Sorry for the rant.
Nov
20
Well today sucks.
Got a badass sinus infection and the office lights are making my head feel like a tennis ball full of match sticks. Light hitting the retnas makes it feel like I pulled my iris somehow, or my retnas detached. I plan of making my bed my best friend tonight, but I will put in a nice long post tommarrow.
Cheers…
Nov
19
Nov
19
Bailout Blues vs. Voter apathy…
Round 1
It is no secret that this country has fallen from economic grace, but it is also no secret that we cannot blame our leaders. Weather it is from a lack of faith in the system or confusion over the issues. Maybe it was bad policy or maybe it was simply public lackluster. Something happened with the way we view politics and the economy. It is clear that we as a public have the power to do something about it and should seize the responsibility that comes with the democratic system.
In the past three years we have seen economic calamity befall this country. Many businesses have closed many branches and the unemployment has skyrocketed. We have seen the downfall of companies like: Circuit city, Washington Mutual, Lehman, Worldcom, AIG, Tropicana, IndyMac, and the list goes on and on. We allowed them to hedge them selves into a collapsing system. We allowed credit default swaps and a whole host of other bad practices from outsourcing to loans from people who barrowed to loan. When these companies collapsed they threatened to take the rest of the system down. Thus the bail-outs which went to fulfilling bonus agreements with the CEOs who worked for these companies.
I didn’t agree to this, of course I didn’t get the chance to vote on it either. The first major bailout was roughly $800,000,000,000 dollars. The magnitude of the bailout is as follows:
If every one in the US made and could live off of $36,000.00 a year (I can live off a lot less) 22,222,222 people would be able to be unemployed for one year or get a check for $36,000.00(that’s That’s enough money to give almost every man woman and child nearly $3000.00.)
That’s just the first bailout with loose estimates:
It would have been better to give that money to us. I could accomplish a lot with a year of free time and my bills paid. For every bailout we allow the public is robbed. For every company we let get away with bad money management and risky investment, we encourage this behavior and tell other companies it is okay because the public will pay for it. Then as companies sink because no one is paying off debt, people loose jobs and the next bail out becomes more difficult for the rest of us.
When a horse goes lame you don’t race him you retire him.
This has generated what is called a “recession”. A time in which the economy slows, production, employment and investment shrink, and unemployment and bankruptcies grow.
With a greater level of interest in our own futures, we as the people of the US, could change this. Over the past few generations people have lost faith in the systems that are supposed to serve them, those same systems are slowly enslaving them. We let this happen and there are many theories to this disinterest in political activism (I don’t mean holding a picket sign necessarily). I mean owning a piece of the responsibility.
Some believe that when both parents started working kids slipped through the cracks, some believe that the distractions of TV, video games, and movies keep the new generation occupied. Yet others believe its a lack of education and focus. It’s hard to tell because the situation is so complex. Any action would some action at this point. Some think the problem is too big a challenge to change.
It is clear that the system runs on money, and where there is money there is always greed and power. It takes a special type of person to ignore those the carrots. The level of greed is rooted pretty deep in the system.
Who doesn’t want easy money on the backs of someone else? But it’s our backs, and being politically active is the only way to get out of the mess. People need to vote, show interest in the country they live in, and take pride in fixing it, and take action in controlling the system not letting it run rampant.
Instead of that, let it serve the common wealth of the country.
-Whew… -
Thanks for the ears, er eyes…
So what is your opinion?
Notes-
Don’t know what a credit default swap is?
A credit default swap, or CDS, is often compared to the concept of buying insurance. And until recently, credit default swaps were primarily used to reduce the risk associated with holding bonds, promissory notes, loans, and / or commercial paper. With a CDS, there are two parties involved, and the swap entails the transfer of a third-party credit risk from one party to the second. (Money-zine, see links…)
http://www.money-zine.com/Investing/Investing/Credit-Default-Swaps/
Don’t know what a hedge-fund is?
Technically, a hedge fund is defined as a private investment fund. They are usually organized as limited partnerships and often employ non-traditional investment strategies. Meaning they often shy away from investment strategies that involve long-term buying and holding of securities in the portfolio. (Money-zine See links…)
http://www.money-zine.com/Investing/Mutual-Funds/Fund-of-Hedge-funds-and-Hedge-Funds/
Some other info from: http://www.pinoymoneytalk.com/list-bankrupt-companies/
Oh, one last thing, please forgive the errors, i typed this on a tiny keyboard on the fly.
Nov
18
“All the president is, is a glorified public relations man who spends his time flattering, kissing, and kicking people to get them to do what they are supposed to do anyway.”
