10 things you can do to make a difference

1) Take-away food, not garbage. Bring your own cup, bowl, fork, spoon, and knife for all take-away food (yes, that includes Star Bucks).

2) Use cloth towels. Never purchase disposable plates, plastic wear, or paper towels.

3) Use a canvas bag for all groceries. Never again bring food home in a plastic or paper bag.

4) Use rechargeable batteries. Never again use disposable batteries.

5) Ride your bike, walk, and take public transportation, no matter the weather or season. Not only will you survive, but your body will thrive for the exercise, change of pace, and focused time to relax or just think.

6) Make your next vehicle electric. The ranges are increasing every year, now over 100 miles per charge for the Nissan Leaf and 200 for the 2017 Chevy Bolt. The amount you drive likely remains less than 40 miles a day.

7) Install passive solar water heating on your home’s roof. You can build your own for the cost of the pipe, or purchase high-efficiency, evacuated tubing systems which bring water nearly to boil in a matter of minutes.

8) Install photovoltaic (PV) solar panels to provide some or all of your electric needs. The cost of PV has dropped dramatically over the past decade, bringing PV generated electricity to grid parity in certain power districts.

9) Read, research, learn, and spread the word.

10) Stop making excuses.

By |2016-04-15T02:15:35-04:00February 19th, 2016|Critical Thinker, Humans & Technology|Comments Off on 10 things you can do to make a difference

Good News for Bad News Days

While living in Cape Town, South Africa for the past two years, I came to crave my 7km barefoot runs on the beach, surfing in the cool, early morning waves of False Bay, breakfast of fresh, locally grown organic veggies and hand-picked eggs, and a half hour reading the good news of the day.

In a world filled with news of local political corruption and national debt, gang fights and robberies, ISIS and the North Korean threat, and increasing violence in Palestine and Israel, I long for something to remind me that our species is not as sinister as we seemingly demonstrate.

For me, scientific research and discovery is much needed good news, a human craving for knowledge and expression of creativity that knows no bounds. Science, Scientific American, New Scientist, National Geographic, –they offer stories of teams that are working to solve some of our greatest challenges. Yes, many of the stories begin with a description of a dire situation–global warming, browning waters, fisheries on the brink of collapse, energy production that poisons our atmosphere, and the spread of deadly disease. But each issue is met with deeper insight to the problem and often a means to counter pending catastrophe. Even more stories are about pure discovery, made by those who desire to know how the world works in intimate detail.

We peer inside the human brain to address our behaviour. We follow the migration of wild game to learn how to help keep ecosystems in balance. We study ancient relics to learn what we once knew, but have long since forgotten. We look to the dark corners of our solar system in search of the origin of life and to the very beginning of time to determine if this is the only universe, or one of many which co-exist.

“The hole wide multiverse”
“A 10-minute rest can boost memory like sleep”
“Farting plants kick up a stick if irked”
“Narwhal nurseries spotted”
“Math whizzes of ancient Babylon figured out forerunner of calculus”
“Tegu lizards get body heat boost during mating season”
“Computer that mimics human brain beats professional at game of Go”

In New Scientist, issue Jan 9-15, 2016, a story of Alexander Graham Bell in 1880, when he built a photophone, a device that uses light to transmit sound, has him saying, “I have heard articular speech by sunlight! I have heard a ray of sun laugh and cough and sing! I have been able to hear a shadow and I have even perceived by ear the passage of a cloud across the sun’s disk!” The inventor of the telephone, whose namesake yet lives on, wrote in poetic form the exuberance of his discovery and invention.

When we allow ourselves to see the world through the eyes of a child, we once again take on that child-like form. We celebrate what we learn not because it elevates us as individuals, to gain fame, wealth, or power (for those are the burdens of the adult world) but because it opens our minds to what we do not know, and how much more of the mystery remains for us to unravel.

By |2017-08-05T19:12:23-04:00January 29th, 2016|Critical Thinker, Ramblings of a Researcher|Comments Off on Good News for Bad News Days

In the Void of Education – Part 5

This topic starts with In the Void of Education, Part 1 and follows Part 4.

If I were to believe in such a thing as sin, that invisible tag of deficiency, that scarlet letter which signifies an inevitable justification for actions which work against the divine standards, I would define sin as allowing even one person on this planet, no matter the colour of her skin, caste, or condition at birth, to be given anything less than opportunity for an education which enables reaching for his ideals.

Anything less is failing that individual and our total, collective potential.

By |2017-04-10T11:17:31-04:00December 9th, 2015|Critical Thinker, Humans & Technology|Comments Off on In the Void of Education – Part 5

Earth to Mars, A Journey for Us All

Science Cafe Cape Town
29 October 2015

Science Cafe Cape Town with Kai Staats Science Cafe Cape Town with Kai Staats

A week ago Thursday, October 29, I was honoured by the opportunity to speak to the Science Cafe Cape Town. Held at Truth Coffee, the Science Cafe offers “monthly meetups for anyone with a curiosity in science, a chance to chat with local experts about cutting-edge research in a relaxed setting.”

Indeed, the unique venue was ideal for an interactive conversation with an audience of more than one hundred. Following a brief introduction, I showed a short film produced while I was working as an embedded filmmaker and technician at the Mars Desert Research Station, Utah, in January 2014 with MarsCrew134. I then moved through two dozen slides in order to bring the audience into an awareness of the many organisations that are now working toward taking humans to Mars, the asteroids, and beyond. I introduced a few of the many technical and financial challenges, and offered topics for consideration, including “Why should we go to Mars?”

Science Cafe Cape Town with Kai Staats For me, as a speaker, it was a most enjoyable event. My thirty minutes presentation was followed by an hour of questions, which is most unusual and incredibly fun. Thanks to all who attended, for such being the most engaging audience I have ever enjoyed.

I opened the evening with full admission that I am a “jack-of-all-trades, master-of-none” and promised to let the audience know if I could not answer a question asked. This kind of presentation is new to me. Informal and wonderfully engaging, it was as much a conversation with new friends as it was a lecture. Yet in that informality, I was not as accurate with some of my answers as I would have liked to have been.

This past week I have conducted a series of fact-checks, to correct some of my answers and to build upon the subjects addressed. What’s more, Kerry Gordon, co-founder of the Science Cafe Cape Town granted me the opportunity to edit and clean the audio recording of my presentation. In so doing, I was able to remove the inaudible questions (too far from the microphone) and tighten a few of my answers in order to be more concise. The total recording is now just under one hour, including the short film.

 

In this follow-up research process, I have learned a great deal. I hope you will as well.

CAUTION! The proverbial rabbit hole runs deep. Myriad pathways unfold when investigating such a tremendous topic as space exploration. Dive in, but don’t expect to stop … until you walk on the face of Mars or build a future such that your children’s children may climb aboard a massive vessel bound for a neighbouring star.

RESOURCES

 

CORRECTIONS

  • I stated the distance from the Sun to the Earth was similar to the distance from the Earth to Jupiter, and again the same distance to Saturn. This was not correct. The distance from the Earth to Jupiter is nearly 5x that of the Sun to the Earth. But yes, the distance from the Sun to Jupiter is approximately the distance from Jupiter to Saturn. To continue, Uranus is 2x the distance from the Jupiter to Saturn at 20 AU; Neptune another 10 AU. —source
     
  • The average temperature on Venus is 460C (not 300C). —source
     
  • Voyager was launched in 1977 (not 1978) and became the first human-made object to enter interstellar space in 2012 (not “last year”). —source
     
  • Astronauts who live on the ISS for periods up to 6 months are required to exercise for approximately 2 hours per day (not 4.5). Even with rigorous exercise, astronauts have typically lost up to 0.4-1% of their bone density per month in space.—source
     
  • The longest continuous stay in space is on-board the Russian MIR for 437 days, not the International Space Station for which the longest run is 223 days.—source
     
  • It would take 73,000 years to travel to Proxima Centauri at the speed of Voyager I (17.3 km/s). This is approximately 2500 generations. At 100x this speed, we would need 25 (not 100) generations to arrive. —source
     

ADDITIONS & VALIDATIONS

  • Concerning the discussion of how we determine if a moon of another planet has a liquid water ocean, there are in fact 5 methods for such an observation and conclusion:
    1. dampening of the moon’s magnetic field through monitoring the auroras
    2. observation of geysers
    3. spectroscopy
    4. orbital wobble
    5. gravimetry

     
    The above expands upon my answer of spectroscopy and acceleration by the gravitational field (gravimetry). Further conversation with Stephen Potter, Head Astronomer at the South African Astronomical Observatory offers, “Visual size is a first rough guess. Orbital period and distance cannot give you the mass. You can put any mass at a specific period+distance. E.g. replace Earth with Jupiter and it will have the same period and distance. Moon masses can be refined by studying the deviations in their orbits as a result of their interactions with other moons. So this now becomes a more complicated N-body problem, which you refine with more longer term observations. e.g. JPL has one of the best solar system N-body simulations right now. Only once you get close with a flyby can you refine it further. I.e. your spacecraft becomes the test mass.”

  • Concerning construction materials on Mars, yes, silica and iron are prevalent, as stated, but it is also believed that magnesium, aluminum (aluminium for those who prefer the British spelling :), calcium, and potassium are abundant, as discovered through the sampling of soil on Mars, and inspection of meteorites which originate from Mars. —source
     
  • My reference to “not likely having calcium-based stone” for use as a construction material (cement) was in reference to limestone (calcium carbonate) which is formed primarily from the remains of marine life forms. Carbonates have been discovered on Mars using spectrometers on-board Spirit and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which provides evidence for a warmer, wetter past. (source) But for there to be limestone as we have on Earth, there would have had to have been many hundred of millions of years of calcium-bearing marine lifeforms, which has not, to date, been determined.
     
  • To confirm the question of the young man to my left, yes, all planets are the same age as they were all formed from the same accretion disc orbiting our newly formed sun, between 4.4-4.6 billion years ago. —source
     
  • While I correctly differentiated electromagnetic radiation from particle radiation, I could have further discussed “ionizing” radiation as the type which causes harm to human tissue. (source). However, per the question by the woman sitting directly to my front, given my current understanding, it would require radioactive isotopes, not highly energetic particles (“cosmic rays”) to cause food used as a radiation barrier, to become poisonous to the astronauts who would consume it. This requires further investigation …

    “Cosmic rays are immensely high-energy radiation, mainly originating outside the Solar System. They may produce showers of secondary particles that penetrate and impact the Earth’s atmosphere and sometimes even reach the surface. Composed primarily of high-energy protons and atomic nuclei, they are of mysterious origin.”
     
    “The term ray is a historical accident, as cosmic rays were at first, and wrongly, thought to be mostly electromagnetic radiation. In common scientific usage high-energy particles with intrinsic mass are known as “cosmic” rays, and photons, which are quanta of electromagnetic radiation (and so have no intrinsic mass) are known by their common names, such as “gamma rays” or “X-rays”, depending on their origin.”
     
    “Galactic cosmic rays are one of the most important barriers standing in the way of plans for interplanetary travel by crewed spacecraft. Cosmic rays also pose a threat to electronics placed aboard outgoing probes. In 2010, a malfunction aboard the Voyager 2 space probe was credited to a single flipped bit, probably caused by a cosmic ray. Strategies such as physical or magnetic shielding for spacecraft have been considered in order to minimize the damage to electronics and human beings caused by cosmic rays.”—verbatim from source

  • I was correct in stating that Mars habitats will not have windows, at least not until we employ something like Star Trek’s transparent aluminum (which I learned is real!) as a shield to radiation. However, after the Q&A, a gentleman suggested that sunlight could be bounced into an otherwise radiation protected greenhouse (meaning, covered in soil). By selecting the coating on the mirror, you could determine what wavelength of light is reflected. However, if this is the case, then it would stand to reason that the human habitats would also have windows, even if tucked back, beneath an shielded roof. However, without a magnetic field and atmosphere 1/1000 the thickness of our own at sea level, the cosmic rays may yet penetrate the domicile through the window, even if travelling through the thickest part of the Martian atmosphere. This requires further investigation …
     
  • The risk of radiation exposure is not as bad as we had thought, for a long-term manned mission to Mars. Results from Curiosity rover suggest that a mission consisting of a 180-day journey to Mars, a 500-day stay, and a 180-day return flight to Earth would expose astronauts to a cumulative radiation dose of about 1.01 sieverts. For comparison, the European Space Agency limits its astronauts to a total career radiation dose of 1 sievert, which is associated with a 5% increase in lifetime fatal cancer risk.—source
     
  • Per the photograph of the “blueberries” on Mars, a concretion is a hard, compact mass formed through precipitation of mineral cement between particles. It is found in sedimentary rock and soil. This process can make the concretions harder and more resistant to weathering than the surrounding rock or soil.—source
     
  • Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) lost contact with Spirit after last hearing from the rover on March 22, 2010. Attempts were continued until May 25, 2011, bringing the total mission time to 6 years 2 months 19 days—25 times the original planned mission duration. —source
     
  • For the gentleman who after the Q&A asked about the formation of our Moon, I found this page by NASA’s Jen Heldmann. Yes, the current theory remains that of a large impact. The difference from prior theories is that the Moon formed not from a lump of molten rock thrown into orbit by the impact, but by the accumulation of vaporised material from both the proto-Earth and the massive (Mars sized) object with which it collided.
     
  • On the topic of nuking Mars, “Elon Musk details his plan to bomb Mars saying constant ‘nuclear pulse explosions’ would create double suns to heat the planet”. Read more …
     
  • On the topic of teleportation, this is incredibly complex and wonderfully engaging, far beyond Captain Kirk arriving to the transporter room in duplicate (while wonderfully entertaining). I provide just a few links to stimulate further reading:
By |2017-04-10T11:17:31-04:00October 29th, 2015|2015, Humans & Technology, Looking up!, Out of Africa|Comments Off on Earth to Mars, A Journey for Us All

Lost days

Sometimes I spend an entire day searching for a place to work.

I venture to two or three cafes.

The first is too noisy, with traffic, construction, and trains screaming by.

I order a drink and dessert at the next only to learn the wi-fi is intermittent, at best, twenty minutes lost trying to connect. I do what I can off-line.

The final stop and I find a cozy, relatively quiet corner only to realise there is no power and my laptop has but 12% battery remaining.

I know. It sounds silly to complain about such things, for life is far more dynamic than this. But when what I do requires that I am on-line, days like today are days lost to a modern quagmire.

By |2015-10-06T23:20:45-04:00September 23rd, 2015|Critical Thinker, Humans & Technology|Comments Off on Lost days

Best feature of Apple hardware

Apple firmware (bios) enables a total, bootable system copy and restoration with but a few clicks of the mouse. This is perhaps the most underutilised, little known feature of Apple computers. Interested? Follow these instructions:

1) Attach the USB drive and make certain it shows up.

2) Reboot the computer. The moment you hear the chime, press and hold ALT (newer) or CMD-R (older), depending upon age of your Mac.

3) A simple graphical interface will appear with what should be 3 or more icons. 2 of which will be for your internal drive, 1 or more for the USB.

4) Using the cursor controls, choose the “RECOVERY” partition of your internal drive and hit ENTER or the button at the bottom.

5) Select your language.

6) Select “DISK UTILITY” (see screenshot.png)

7) Select the icon on the left which is your internal drive.

8) Select “RESTORE” from the upper-right of the 3-4 options. This drive should now be in the SOURCE entry.

9) Drag the icon for the USB drive to the DESTINATION entry.

In this step, you can backup to a partition on the backup USB drive and ONLY replace the partition. This is what I do. But that would be ONLY if the backup drive is substantially larger than the internal drive and you don’t want to waste the space.

Else, if the 2 drives are closely matched, then select the primary (not indented) and see what happens. It may reject it. In which case you simply use the indented instead. It will rename that partition anyway, to match the drive it is copied from.

10) Double-check that the SOURCE is your internal drive and that the DESTINATION is the external, USB drive. Else, you will wipe-out your entire computer. Not good.

11) Press RESTORE and accept the warning for total doom.

12) Between 35 minutes and an hour and a half later, your computer will have made a complete, bootable copy.

What’s more, the external USB drive will now have 2 partitions, one which is a bootable copy of your internal drive, and the other a RECOVERY partition. When next you conduct this backup, you will again boot from the internal RECOVERY partition, not that of the external USB drive, just to play it safe (and it is faster).

By |2017-04-10T11:17:35-04:00November 15th, 2014|Critical Thinker, Humans & Technology|Comments Off on Best feature of Apple hardware

The Dire State of GNOME

Tonight, I concluded the installation and configuration of Ubuntu 14.04, my first major upgrade since 10.04 in February 2011. I remain reluctant for major upgrades due to exactly what unfolded, a quagmire of manipulation of what was once a series of simple routines conducted entirely by user-friendly graphical interfaces or through automated services.

The default Unity desktop, while functional, is not in my experience designed for a workstation. If I wanted the look and feel of a tablet, I would not be using a laptop. In the following I share the procedures required, with the fair warning that even now, much of the basic functionality of 10.04 is yet missing or non-functional.

  1. Replace the Unity theme with a classic theme.

    Using the Ubuntu Software Center, install “GNOME Flashback” Window Manager.

    Or from the command line:
    $ sudo apt-get install gnome-flashback

  2. Restart your session to enable Flashback
  3. Configure the Desktop panels to your liking (ALT-right-click for options).
  4. Modify the Applications menu (using the built-in Main Menu editor).

    If you move menu item from one sub-menu to another, unfortunately you cannot simply drag-n-drop. You must create a new button in the desired location. To do this, you must copy and paste the name and command line argument which launches that application. If you desire for the icon to match, navigate to /user/share/icons/Humanity/apps/48/ and locate the icon associated with that app (the one which matches the original).

  5. Fix the Places menu to open a file browser instead of Baobab Disk Analyzer.

    Seems to be the fault of the Flashback theme as it opens properly prior to installing this theme. Follow the directions provided at askubuntu.com:

    [as sudo or root] xdg-mime default nautilus.desktop inode/directory [ENTER]

  6. Customize the Places menu.

    Follow the directions provided at choorucode.com

    As your user, edit /home/[user]/.config/user-dirs.dirs but keeping the file format exactly as is presented. You may add or remove links to your preferred directories. However, I have had limited success in that I am unable to get a direct path to function. Therefore, I created a sym link (ln -s /[path]/ [link_name]) in my /home/[user]/ directory and then use this as the mount point for this configuration file. It seems very hit / miss. Certainly not robust nor straight-forward as it used to be in previous versions of Gnome.

  7. Add widgets and applications to the panel.

    Again, this is not nearly as simple as it once was in previous, far more user-friendly versions of Gnome. No longer can you simply right-click, but must add the ALT key. Widgets are simple to add, and applications which already reside in the Applications menu will add with relative ease. This is the only part of this entire experience that remains functional without invocation of the command line.

  8. Invoke auto-start for all applications which you desire to have running when you first log-in.

    Follow the directions provided at askubuntu.com The problem is that this does NOT take into consideration those applications which were running when you logged out. Again, this used to work perfectly in prior versions of Gnome, but for some reason this ideal functionality was removed. This article explains how to reinstate this functionality, but it assumes you have a full GNOME installation in order to have both gnome-session and the gconf-editor installed.

  9. Every time I restart, my desktop shrinks to a quarter of its full 1920 x 1080 dimension, moving all desktop items outside of that reduced space. I must re-select the background image to resize the desktop and then manually replace the desktop items. I have not found a solution to this.
  10. Every time I restart, I must manually place each application on its preferred desktop. I am hoping the installation of the full GNOME suite will resolve this (as mentioned above).

As the former CEO and developer of Yellow Dog Linux, I am disappointed. Ten years ago we delivered an operating system which was far more user friendly, more intelligently designed, with a far greater offering of time saving functionality and options for personal customisation. When I first switched to Ubuntu in early 2011, my last YDL PowerPC on its final legs, I was pleased by the dynamic design of the user interface, from install to log-out. Ubuntu 10.04 was a well crafted system with only a few, minor flaws.

My concern with Unity is less with the aesthetics of the interface, rather with the over-simplification of what appears to be an attempt to match the experience of a hybrid of Apple’s OSX and iOS. This is a total disregard for the ways in which a laptop or workstation is not a tablet. I choose Linux because it (use to) offer the ability to customize the means by which I use my computer.

Simple functionality that placed Ubuntu above OSX is simply missing. For instance, there is no reason that any user of any age, experience, or computer background would NOT desire to have an application relaunch on the same desktop, the same location as when it was last used. Removing the ability to modify menus is beyond frustrating, sending us back nearly a decade in desktop functionality. I have not spent this much time at the command line since the very early days of Yellow Dog Linux when the graphical installer was a revolution in Linux OS deployment and playing movies was worthy of a press release.

It saddens me to see that Ubuntu is following Apple’s lead in assuming the general userbase is growing less capable instead of moreso. When you spend 10, 12, 14 hrs a day engrossed in your computer, to have it custom tailored to your needs enables it to become an extension of you. Comfortable, quick to respond are the signatures of a positive OS experience. Replacing the desktop image does not constitute customizability, especially when that image must be reset with each and ever log-in.

QA anyone?!

By |2017-12-25T04:53:29-04:00July 12th, 2014|Critical Thinker, Humans & Technology|0 Comments

“A Telescope Opens the Mind to a Larger World”

“A Telescope Opens the Mind to a Larger World”
A TEDx talk for TEDx Frontrange, Loveland, Colorado
22 May 2014

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 In April of last year I was in rural Tanzania, working on a documentary film about Astronomy, how it opens the mind to a larger world.

 

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 I was fortunate to meet Chuck from the US and Mponda from Tanzania at a secondary school outside of Arusha. Through the organization Telescopes to Tanzania, they introduce hands-on science education to the classroom.

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 Following a series of interviews with both teachers and students, I was packing my gear when a young learner Catherine said, “Sir, may I ask you a few questions?”

I had just risen from my chair to break down my camera and tripod, and seated myself again, “Yes, of course.”

Catherine asked “Is it true, … that we live outside the Earth and not in it?”

I smiled, I almost laughed. I pointed out the window at the sun and clouds of the pending storm as assurance we were not underground. But Catherine was quite serious. Mponda, who was seated to my left, nodded, saying, “This is a serious question. You need to answer it.”

I said, “I apologize. Can you please repeat your question.”

She made the shape of a ball with her hands and asked, “Do we live on top of the ball or inside it?”

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 Now I didn’t know if I should laugh or cry, but I realized that she was talking about celestial spheres—an ancient concept in which the Sun, Moon, planets, and stars are all reside on multiple sphere of some unknown substance, that the entire universe is contained in a very small ball.

I confirmed that we do in fact live “on the ball” and that the Earth is in orbit around the sun, and that our sun orbits the center of our galaxy. And she was relieved. and then went on to ask questions about how we predict the weather and if she could grow up to an airplane pilot.

Catherine had looked through a telescope just one month earlier, and it had got her thinking, asking questions. Now, she was craving more. I assumed she had missed a few lectures, or was not paying attention in class.

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 I later interviewed a geography teacher who having looked through a telescope for the first time a year earlier, saw the moons of Jupiter in the eyepiece. He recognized that they were in orbit, like the Earth around the Sun. It was then that he realized we live outside of the Earth, not inside it.

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 He sat back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest, “I see now that the other planets move around our Sun too, and our Sun orbits around the center of our galaxy. The galaxies,” he laughed the laugh of one who is about to say something profound, “there are so many galaxies we can’t even count them all,” he continued, “It makes me realize how very small we are.”

The phrase, “I see how small we really are,” was repeated over and over again by those I interviewed during the making of this film.

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 Elvirdo, a secondary learner in South Africa shared, “At first I thought that the Moon was inventing its own light. Then I learned the Moon is an object which reflects light and I wondered, where does this light come from?”

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 Willie, a retired psychologist and astronomer in upstate New York expressed, “The kids were blown away by what they could see through the telescope. If that can kindle some interest in science, then we have really done something.”

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 Laure, a French PhD Astronomer at UCT shared, “Unlike a microscope which helps us look to the parts of which we are made, a telescope helps us see something much bigger, the greater universe of which we are a part.”

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 Why does any of this matter?

We wake up in the morning, pour a cup of coffee, drive to school or the office. Eight hours later we head to the gym or return home again, eat dinner, catch-up on Facebook and watch a few videos on YouTube. Day after day, week after week, year after year, we do this over and over again.

Knowing how the Universe was formed 13.5 billions years ago does not change the fact that our phone bills are due and taxes must be paid by April 15.

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 Let’s consider that right here, at the edge of this stage the earth just stopped. If I take one more step, I will drop off and never come back. What if beyond the western slope of the Rocky Mountains or off the coast of California there was a drop from which you would never return.

That world is filled with fear.

What if our entire world was in fact contained within a crystalline ball beyond which we could never travel? How would the stories we tell our children differ? What would be our hope for the future?

Fortunately, the work of Galileo, Haley and Newton proved the Earth is not contained within a celestial sphere, and that indeed, we are very small.

Astronomy is unique in that it engages all of the other sciences.

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 When we look through a telescope we engage engineering and physics for what we see and how we see it. Telescopes make use of some of the most advanced technology on the planet.

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014

When we look to our closest neighbor Mars we see polar caps and massive dust storms; what we believe to be ancient river beds and deep, carved canyons. Geology helps us understand what may have happened there based upon what we know happened here, on Earth.

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 We look to the light of distant stars shining through nebulae and recognize the chemical signature of the elements we have here on Earth.

Did you know that ten years ago we sent a spacecraft through the tail of a comet and discovered an amino acid. To date, we have discovered more than 1800 planets in orbit around distant stars. We are able to analyze their atmospheres for chemical composition and average temperature.

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 Now, we are talking about biology and the potential that life is not unique to our home planet. In fact, it may not even have originated here at all!

There are an estimated 11 billion Earth-like planets in our galaxy alone, and more than 100 billion galaxies in this universe. It is impossible to have this discussion without discussing philosophy.

I want to share with you a short film segment that inspired this story.

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 To be clear, a lack of understanding for our place in the cosmos is not unique to sub-Saharan Africa or those in under privileged school systems, but around the world with the highly educated too.

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 In your lifetime, we will become an interplanetary species, living, working, even reproducing on the planet Mars. This journey started 400 years ago with a very simple instrument.

Kai Staats: TEDx Frontrange, Colorado, 2014 I encourage you to make time to look through a telescope, and then embrace those conversations that unfold.

Thank you.

Leather and Meat

Kai: What do you think of this? Leather and Meat without Killing Animals

Ron: It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature. I’m consistently puzzled by the human conceit that we know better than God, than nature, than a system that’s been functioning for hundred of millions of years. Eat and be eaten. Put another way: live, reproduce and recycle. It’s vibrant, biodegradable, organic, endlessly renewable. Yeah, it evolves, but self-perpetuates. Yesterday’s t-rex gives way to today’s skunk. But life goes on. Why this desire to compartmentalize, to set ourselves apart from the system? Life in a petri dish. No thanks.

Kai:
This particular person is simply trying to find a solution to the too-large population of humans, providing clothing and meat without robbing the planet of all its remaining resources. Pop-reduction is #1, of course, but in the mean time …

Ron:
Yeah, I get that. Unfortunately, it postpones the inevitable and merely leads to more of the same. We’ve been trying to increase the food source to “solve” the overpopulation problem since the advent of agriculture. It doesn’t work, hasn’t worked, never will work because there are no constraints on pop. growth once you take away the natural constraints, which aren’t pretty. When food becomes more abundant, more children survive to breeding age. When food becomes too scarce, people starve and pop. is reduced, painfully. When people weaken from insufficient food, predation/disease increases.

Again, an ugly way, but nature’s way. Humans could circumvent this through intelligent, conscious choice to limit pop. growth. Alas, the only ones who do this are the enlightened, educated few who are then overwhelmed by the unenlightened, ignorant masses, further exacerbating the problem.

Most ancient civilizations crashed due to over-use of essential resources. I see nothing to suggest that will change in near future. And this may be as natural a cycle as overpopulating deer, locusts, rabbits or any other species subject to chronic pop. increases and crashes. Ugly, painful suffering, but part of the natural condition? Bigger than our ability to overcome?

By |2017-11-24T23:06:30-04:00September 28th, 2013|Critical Thinker, Humans & Technology|Comments Off on Leather and Meat
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