The Brothers Karamazov

"Actually, people sometimes talk about man's 'bestial' cruelty, but that is being terribly unjust and offensive to the beasts..."
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
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Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Predators Among Us?

Wild animals who have knowledge of mankind have an instinctive recognition of man as predator and behave accordingly. Recently discovered species are often trusting or disinterested until they learn the truth about us. The information becomes operative over generations and we are accurately marked as dangerous.

Perhaps this same predator/prey sense clouds the relationship between men and women. Women as they mature seem to have an inborn sense over and above early childhood training that men can cause them harm. If other animals have this sound instinct should we not expect to find it amongst the ladies? Are they not as perceptive as say chipmunks or squirrels? Do we men think they don't know us for what we are?

Our society insists on clothing of some sort in public situations. Allegedly this is done to prevent distraction but is it not to protect females from predation as well? Throughout the western world in organizations and retreats people have for decades successfully met and socialized in clothing optional settings. Consider the behavior of our women and girls when in a safe environment which usually does not preclude the presence of men and boys. In such settings women and girls have been found to be relaxed and uninhibited in the presence of males even if everyone is unclad.

The presence of full nudity is accepted by the women as well as the men, girls of all ages seem to have no problem with it, nor do the young boys. Historically, what has been notably missing from these communities is the presence of teenage boys and younger men in significant numbers. The teen girls apparently have no problem with such arrangements and relax and enjoy the surroundings. Young males are a different story.

We can understand a tendency for shyness caused by raging hormones for this group but somehow even a benign setting is much more threatening to them than to females of any age. This inability to be comfortable in the presence of unadorned but comfortable peers presents a social and personal handicap of some considerable degree. If this failure is the result of a tendency toward predation that exists among young males then how can society ignore the consequences?

Without putting too fine a point to the incidence of violence, criminal activity and social delinquency of this group, should it not be considered? If young males are indeed afraid of unclad females and reports of similar reactions in Adult Clubs featuring female nudity are known. And since this group also seems prone to misadventure and tends to be warlike, what needs to be done? Such persons have a dual dilemma. On one hand they are fearful of their own mortality (females) and conversely, they have delusions of immortality (warfare)! Keeping in mind that every army in history was composed chiefly of young males.

One theory in anthropology predicates the collapse of Neanderthal society on evidence that the males did not cohabit with the females and offspring. Many reasons could have contributed to this if it is a correct hypothesis, but among them is the possibility of violent predation that rendered the male persona non gratis in the cave. Possibly male aggression led to the downfall of an entire species.

In summation consider that mature men and women along with young boys and girls of any age can find social accommodation with others even when unclothed and vulnerable, but a great many young males cannot. This would suggest the need for an immediate and far reaching effort among nations to determine how to tame our young males and also, how much protection from them is needed.

Saturday, March 7, 2009

Keep On Smokin'



At the anti-coal demonstrations in Washington protesting the coal fired electric generating plant supplying the nation's capitol little of substance was presented about our reliance on the stuff. Coal has become a latter-day villain with few defenders. We were told that big coal is a monster: that Appalachia is a wasteland, and that coal is not very clean, to put it mildly. To get a glimpse of the larger picture consider the following by Robert Bryce, author of "Coal Hard Facts".

"Let's look at the U.S., second only to China in terms of total coal consumption. In 2007, the U.S. used about 1.1 billion tons of coal. That’s the energy equivalent of about 4.2 billion barrels of oil per year or about 11.5 million barrels of oil per day. Here’s the key comparison: America’s daily coal ration contains more energy than Saudi Arabia’s daily oil production.

Indeed, the scale of U.S. coal consumption boggles the mind. In 2007, the amount of energy America used in the form of coal exceeded the total energy consumption – from all sources, coal, oil, natural gas, and nuclear – of all of the countries of Central and South America combined. Just as important as the scale of America’s coal consumption is this fact: U.S. coal use has increased faster in recent decades than has oil or natural gas consumption. Between 1973 and 2007, U.S. coal consumption jumped by 75.5 percent. During that same time period, U.S. oil consumption increased by 15.2 percent and natural gas consumption increased by just 5 percent.

Here’s another comparison: On a daily basis, global coal consumption is equivalent to about 63.8 million barrels of oil. Thus, replacing the world’s coal habit with something else will require finding an energy source (or sources) that can supplant the equivalent of six new Saudi Arabias. Or consider China. On an average day, its coal use provides the energy equivalent of 26.3 million barrels of oil, or about two and a half Saudi Arabias.

By any measure, those are daunting numbers. U.S. and global policymakers may not like coal, but given the enormous scale of the coal business, it’s obvious that the U.S. and the rest of the world will be relying on the black fuel for many years to come."

So what will we have left if coal use is curtailed? Unfortunately, only nuclear energy can begin to duplicate those mammoth energy numbers. Not solar, not wind or wave, geo-thermal and certainly not our dwindling supply of petroleum and natural gas. And then if everybody switches to nukes, in only a few decades the usable uranium will be gone, and that will leave only deadly plutonium. What a dangerous future for our grandchildren that promises to be!

In the current frenzy to shut down coal burning, the details of exactly how we will keep the lights on is basically ignored. And where in the anti-coal movement is found a valid comparison of smokestack to tailpipe? Few serious students of the energy crisis believe that we will still have 150 million cars on the road in ten or twenty years. Most experts say: Can't happen, not enough usable, portable fuel remains.

And with the cars gone will it make much difference to the environment if we have a few thousand smokestacks in this vast country compared to millions of tailpipes? Before the switch to natural gas after WWll Dr.Allen W. Hatheway estimates 52,000 manufactured gas plants existed in the United States. Every small town and city made gas for their own use or to sell. That is in addition to countless factories, locomotives and home furnaces in use at the time. Now that's a lot of chimneys.

So don't be too quick to shut down the old smoke belcher or prevent new ones coming on board or we may end up shivering in the cold, but clean, air of a new dark age fifty years from now.

Quoth the Raving

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Veni,Vedi,Vici

Julius Caesar



Veni,Vedi,Vici...Sidi ( I stuck around )

Uncle Sam


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....Zero Gravitas


Quoth the Raving


All I know, all any of us know, is what we're told.

...Zero Gravitas

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Quoth the Raving

If it walks like a depression, talks like a depression, and looks like a depression; it's a recovery.

...Zero Gravitas

Nice paint job

Nice paint job
Watch your step!

Quoth the Raving


WHY IS THAT?
Full scale War in Korea; we called it a Police Action
Police Action in Iraq; we call it a War.

...Zero Gravitas

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Gene Pool?

Gene Pool?
by failblog.org

Quoth the Raving


Ecology is an impending Black Swan quagmire therefore incorporation is anathema to Economists.

...Zero Gravitas

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Quoth the Raving


An incoming US President who does not immediately resign his office after having received eyes-only briefings of what's really going on is hopelessly co-opted or delusional.
....Zero Gravitas

Quoth the Raving

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We are now a nation of middlemen. What becomes of us if the center cannot hold?

....Zero Gravitas
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Quoth the Raving

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Why not use some of the red ink to make things Green?

....Zero Gravitas
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"Ashes to Ashes"

"Ashes to Ashes"
Whoa!