Ah, I think Doug has gotten to the root of the problem. -T On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 5:08 PM, Douglas Roberts <[email protected]>wrote:
> Excuse me, but what, exactly, does this have to do with rutabagas? > > [?] > > On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 2:53 PM, Nicholas Thompson < > [email protected]> wrote: > >> Steve S., >> >> Now I KNOW you should write an op=ed for the Times. Or better still, the >> NEW YORKER. >> >> The Liberal's Contract with the world: "You let me do to you whatever I >> want, and in return I give you my guilt." >> >> Another Liberal fallacy: "As long as I have contempt for myself, I get to >> have contempt for you" >> >> These are habits of mind I both deplore and indulge in myself in the same >> sentences. In fact, in those very sentences. >> >> But when I am trying to be serious, I return to the existentialism that I >> was braised in as a kid.: Choosing is what humans do; we have to take our >> best shot! And if our best science tells us (1) that global warming may be >> a terrible problem and (2) that we wont know if it is a terrible problem >> until after it is too late to do something, then we ==>must<== take a crack >> at solving the problem. >> >> Note the use of modal language! ("==>must<==") Anytime somebody uses >> modal language, they have entered into the world of values ... have, in >> fact, taken leave of their sense, gone mad!. I cannot argue for "taking our >> best shot". I just believe that as humans we "should" do it, and hope that >> you will join me in this belief, because I would rather be mad together than >> mad alone. This is the best rationale I can muster for supporting >> Anti-global warming measures. >> >> To be serious, we have to escape irony; to escape irony, we have to go >> mad. The solution is that easy. >> >> Nick >> >> >> >> Nicholas S. Thompson >> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology, >> Clark University ([email protected]) >> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/<http://home.earthlink.net/%7Enickthompson/naturaldesigns/> >> >> >> >> >> >> ----- Original Message ----- >> *From:* Steve Smith <[email protected]> >> *To: *The Monday Morning MisApplied Complexity Coffee Group >> Grope<[email protected]> >> *Sent:* 3/30/2009 12:41:38 PM >> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Freeman Dyson and Homo Sapiens Exploitatus >> >> In the spirit of avoiding deadlines by reading things I don't have time >> for and writing things I probably should delete before sending, or better >> yet, not bother to write: >> >> I have a love/hate relationship with Freeman Dyson and his work and >> legacy. >> >> I have a love/hate relationship (quite parallel actually) with Global >> Climate Change. >> >> I'm a human-chauvanist (in the sense of Robert Heinlein) and I loathe >> myself for it. >> >> I'm a bleeding heart liberal humanist (in the sense of many of us on this >> list) and I loathe myself for it. >> >> Yes Nick, it is time for another huge helping of starchy, fatty, Ennui, >> liberally drizzled with rich, spicy Angst: >> >> I think it is horribly/wonderfully arrogant of us to think we can do >> anything of consequence to this planet. But then "what means >> consequence"? After all, even our most devastating nuclear holocaust would >> look like a drop in the bucket compared to one good impactor from space (or >> any other historical Extinction Event). And at the same time, there is >> some evidence that humans, at the end of the last ice age managed to wipe >> out most of the megafauna (where did those mastadons, giant tree sloths, >> dire wolves and sabertooth cats go anyway?) on the planet, sparing only >> those in Africa who (apparently?) adapted to our enhanced predatory >> (neolithic?) capabilities as fast as we developed new ones? >> >> Mother Nature is not really that nice to her children (and I think of us >> as some of her most precocious brats to date), starting as early as the >> Siderian period, the rise (and cum-uppance) of the Oxygen Extinction. >> Stupid Photosynthesizers... didn't they know when to quit? And look what >> they ushered in, Oxygen Metabolizers that could run circles around them, >> gobble them up like so much fodder and shit them out. The over-zealousness >> of the photosynthesizers lead to the creation of their own new masters, the >> oxygen-eating herbivores who in turn provided a substrate for the >> carnivores, which collectively provide a great playground for Homo Sapiens >> Exploitatus (read Genesis and talk to some fundamentalist Christians if you >> don't think this planet was designed to be our playground). >> >> Like members of the pantheon of Greek (and Roman and Norse) Gods, Ma >> Nature gives us the rope to hang ourselves, lets us stew in our own juices, >> offers us the best of all parental benefits: "benign neglect". Those >> cigarette burns on our cheeks? That just comes from not being careful >> enough around adults smoking cigarettes at a cocktail party (gesticulating >> wildly in their drunken exuberence). Only the slow and dull-witted let >> that happen more than once. Thanks Ma, you are right... I'll be more >> careful next time... and thanks again for the chemistry set you gave me for >> Xmas and the big box of matches! Have a nice party. >> >> Whether Al Gore (and the many very serious scientists he quotes, or the >> many Chicken Littles who flock to him) are correct or not, I am not sure. >> My human-centric arrogance loves the idea that in 100+ years of industrial >> activity we have been able to kick the planet's ecological and >> climatological balance so far out of whack that we might not recover. My >> (somewhat more humble) humanist side abhors that we can so blithely set the >> planet on fire (metaphorically) with little thought to the consequence to >> all the cute little baby seals and our cute little grandchildren and their >> even cuter grandchildren (if we, the species last that long). >> >> Dyson is not only a deep thinker, but also a grand thinker. What could >> something as mundane as "Global Climate Change" mean to someone who has >> proposed collecting up all of the planetary and asteroidal material in the >> solar system to create a perfect shell at the optimal distance from the sun >> to create a perfect "inside out" planet, intercepting every bit of radiation >> energy leaving the sun. If it were set at 1 AU, to simulate the solar flux >> of earth (how terra-centric can we get?) we get a surface something like 55 >> million (~2^16 ) times that of earth. The total energy output of the sun >> is about 2^43 times our current use. All the engineering problems aside >> (hah!) we have a theoretical maximum in this solar system (unless we decided >> we needed to boost the rate of fusion in the sun, if we could) of at least >> 55 million times as many people consuming trillions as many times as much >> energy per capita (put your money back in GM/Hummer stock)! Given that we >> would be living on a shell whose "other side" (a few meters or kilometers >> away?) we might even be able to make much more efficient use of the solar >> flux than we do now, restricted by having to create/find gradients in our >> closed little atmospheric and oceanic shell. Imagine the entire surface of >> the sphere a huge set of valved heat-pipes just waiting to provide thermal >> gradients for optimal energy utilization to do useful work! Imagine all >> that "useful work"! Oh the things we could do! >> >> Of course Dyson scoffs at our fears of global warming, and suggests we >> bio-engineer forests to sequester carbon. He might even be right (that we >> have the wherewithal to do such). And if we start doubling our population >> every 30 years right away, we can have the population necessary to maximally >> use the Dyson Sphere in a mere 11 generations (330 years!) (check my math >> guys). We'd better quit worrying about minor problems like rising sea >> levels and desertification of the interior of north America and get cracking >> on the really hard problems like how to gather up and reshape all the >> non-solar matter in the solar system. Better kick a few Obama Bucks into >> Space Technology, hell kick them all in! >> >> So, is anthropogenic global climate change real? I fear it is. I hope it >> isn't. What I'm equally disturbed about is that *we can't tell!*. I don't >> mean that the climate change scientists don't have really good data and even >> good models (ice cores from antartica, greenland, etc.). What I mean is >> that as a species, as a culture, we are so tangled up in our value system >> that something vaguely like half of us (well, half of those living in the >> US, or half of those in the 1st World) insist that *they know for a fact* >> that the *other half* are totally insane and being disagreeable for entirely >> specious and political reasons. Half of us think the other half are trying >> to destroy the biosphere while the other half think that the *other* other >> half are trying to destroy the economy. >> >> Either way, everyone thinks everyone else is trying to destroy humanity >> (and life, the universe, and everything)! If the stakes are this high, why >> are we screaming and running in every direction at once? Wait... isn't that >> what we humans (primates, mammals, vertebrates) do? What possible survival >> value is there in that? The canoe is rocking and tipping madly and we are >> all rushing to see how far out the side we can hang our bodies to try to >> balance the "idiots" hanging out the other side. Anyone who's fallen out >> of a canoe knows that a good strategy when things get tippy is to move to >> the center and drop down low, not shriek loudly as we manically try to >> obtain a dynamic balance with the other shrieking occupants. >> >> When the wildfire roars through the forest or prarie, the animals, great >> and small run blindly in all directions. Those that run away from the >> fire, flush more, and give them a direction to run in. The only thing a >> smoke-blinded panicked creature needs to know in a wildfire is to run like >> hell in the same direction everyone else around you is running (even if they >> are running in circles). By the time the fire is about to consume you, this >> is a good strategy. Back when it was just starting and you were (un)lucky >> enough to be near the front, this is as likely to get you killed immediately >> as it is to help you run in a direction where you get to have a chance of >> being killed slowly or maybe, just maybe, not at all. We are the ones who >> started the fire (if there is one), isn't it amazing that some of us are >> eager to run right back into it and toss some more accellerant on it? >> Maybe it is just an illusion, a collective hallucination, and isn't it brave >> of those who run directly into it spraying volatile combustibles around like >> holy water? >> >> In the spirit of hunkering down in the center of the canoe... I think I >> should dig out those 5 year old vegetable seeds and start patiently doing >> germination tests. Then I should start preparing an area inside my south >> facing windows to sprout some starts. In about a week, the soil will be >> ready for some light tilling and I could plant those peas and an early crop >> of greens outside and start getting ready to put in the starts mid-May. >> Nah... I think I'll go to the Hummer store and see if the prices are finally >> down enough that I can finally trade my 30 yr old 40MPG Civic in on... I >> deserve to ride in style. I am, after all, one of Mother Nature's most >> special children! Gas is hovering at $2... no big deal. And the produce >> section is *full* of great green goodness shipped halfway across the planet, >> all shiny and wrapped up in cellophane, much prettier than anything I could >> grow myself. What was I thinking? Articles on big thinkers like Dyson get >> me all nostalgic sometimes. >> >> Besides, I need to work on the mathematics to see if my version of the >> Dyson Sphere will remain solar-stationary based on the "solar wind" alone, >> and what angular velocity I need to provide 1G, and whether the resulting >> coriolis forces will mess with my head. I guess I should go back and read >> Niven's RingWorld again for some pointers. What are we going to use to >> replace the magnetic field to deflect the "bad rays" and where will they >> go? Oh shit! I think we just created a giant Cavitron! No wonder there >> are so many pulsars in the known universe... they are just all of the >> civilizations who survived their own nonsense long enough to turn their >> solar system into a giant Cavitron spewing beams of intense energy around >> the Universe as cautionary beacons for the rest of us. >> >> Ahhhhhhhhyeeeeeeee! >> >> - Steven Angsty Smith >> Homo Sapiens Exploitatus ExtraOrdinaire >> >> That's a funny coincidence ... I am reading it just now. >> I'm always glad to come across another skeptic on anthropogenic global >> warming, particularly from someone with such strong credentials. The >> sustained level of pervasive hand-wrangling on this issue is quite >> worrisome. The actions that some are proposing to curb carbon emissions is >> far out of line relative to the level of uncertainty that still exists, and >> I think it likely that a stiff carbon tax of some sort will do much more >> harm than good. >> >> And I do get tired of the badly written articles one finds on this subject >> in the press. The level of blind acceptance among the press corp is rather >> reminiscent of those covering the Bush white house. >> >> Anyway, that's just my opinion. I have seen a slight uptick in skeptical >> writings over the last year or so on AGW, so maybe we have started to turn >> the corner on this issue. One can hope. >> >> Cheers, >> >> Ted >> >> *I didn't just drop a bomb, did I? >> >> On Sun, Mar 29, 2009 at 10:47 PM, Nicholas Thompson < >> [email protected]> wrote: >> >>> While we are at it, did anybody read about Freeman Dyson in the Times >>> Mag today? What did you think? >>> >> >> >> ============================================================ >> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College >> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org >> > > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org >
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============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
