another nail in the coffin of nationalism

For all of those who hold exceptionalist positions and persist in the jingoism of nationalism: You're wrong!

The UK is far from a being a mdoel democracy, our health services are amongst the worst in Western Europe- and deteriorating- and our rail network is a joke. Still proud, are you?

falling birth rates are no comfort

An article in the Economist contains many misrepresentations, misdirections and not a few absurdities. The article makes a good start with a description of how population growth curves are ubiquitous across the spectrum of living organisms, from swallows to bacteria to humans to sponges. This good start is ruined by the next sentence:

"Overcrowding and a shortage of resources constrain bug populations."

For accuracy, and the analogy of a bacterial population dwelling in a petri dish is wonderfully appropriate here, the word "constrain" should be replaced with "kill". A bacterial population, after consuming all of the reources in its agar ecosystem, promptly dies out almost completely. The remaining organisms enter a state of suspended animation in a desperate attempt to survive until some future input of nutrients allows them to revive and reproduce again and life in the agar is, essentially, ended. Compare this description of life within one semi-closed system with another: The human population of The Earth.

There follows an observation that a Malthusian apocalypse is an unlikely future. I must disagree. Do the terms, "climate change", "peak oil" and "nuclear proliferation" mean anything to the author? Apparently not.

Following this comes an observation that the neo-classical economic model has led prices of commodities to fall during the last century, indicating that raw materials have become more abdundant. At last we see a glimpse of rationality as the author observes that the commodities consumed are not the problem, but the emissions associated with their production are, however the following sentence is so counter-intuitive that it defies logic:

"Certainly, the impact that people have on the climate is a problem; but the solution lies in consuming less fossil fuel, not in manipulating population levels."

The two numbers referred to- the consumption of fossil fuels per head and population levela, are the two key factors in determining the survival of our civilisation. Too many people consuming too much and we all drown or burn or fight to death. On the other hand, a lot of people consuming minute quantities of resources and producing a small amount of pollution and you have a very frsutrated and bored bunch of people. My preference, and I think many people will agree with me here, is of a world where consumption is not limited but population is so that the quality of life of the population is maximised but pollution is limited to a level that allows the biosphere to flourish- further enriching our existence. Why have a population of 6.5 billion where 2 billion have no access to electricity and 1.1 billion currently have no access to safe drinking water? Why not have a stable population of 500 million people all with the quality of life currently enjoyed by the Western World? Falling birth rates could lead to immigration from more developed countries and population control in those countries would then lead to a global trend toward falling population. Population centres would shrink but quality of life would progress. Its a combination of the humanitarianism, rationality and responsibility.

Anyway- I got distratced there. The rest of the article is a big whinge and contains many snipes at phenomena that I consider to be good things, eg:

"The Russian army has had to tighten up conscription because there are not enough young men around."

I'm sorry, what? How can falling numbers if armed men possibly be a bad thing? The more conscription there is the unhappier the population will be and the more feeling will turn against such a barbaric practice (the Russian Conscripted Army is, essentially, a borstal outfit).

The remainder of the article is fairly level headed and contains endorsements of sexual equality in the workplace and maternity legislation to allow mothers to avoid suffering for the gap in their careers that results from childbirth.

books to read

Half Gone by Jeremy Leggett.

ARM THE HOMELESS

This is scrawled on Tim's guitar in the video for People of The Sun. It fucking rocks!




Yeah!

the ecotopian idyll

Nice. It justs goes to show that you can live the dream. I'm not sure how comfortable the place would be in the middle of a storm though. It also sounds like a lot of work growing and maintaining. I'm a very lethargic character and whilst being surrounded by a flourishing and diverse flora and fauna appeals greatly I would rather occupy a lower maintenance environment. Just my personal opinion, you understand, but my talents lie apart from weeding and pruning. Maybe that's the whole point. If such a lifestyle became mainstream you would have the option of career choices - you could tend to your community's permaculture or you could contibrute with direct financial contributions whilst being part of the community but being excused from most of the communal duties. Kind of like 'buying' your way out of having to weed the fields. You would still be entitled to the produce and materials from your community.

This all sounds delightfully quaint until I realised that I am a lazy bugger and will do absolutely anything, including lying brazenly to my wife's face, to avoid having to do the washing up.

Incidentally, in direct contrast to public opinion and common sense (big fucking surprise), the government appears to be hell-bent on making it impossible to even attempt to live in such an idyllic setting. £2000 per acre of land! I could happily make do with half an acre, given the opportunity to construct and reside within my own bender. As I observed above, it would be a trial to make it through your 1st winter but I'm certain that I could make it comfy enough to survive. Compare the cost of that to the £85000 price tag of a grotty 1 bedroom flat that is the alternative!

floods of tears

Here is the brutal truth: however good our flood defences, transport planning, emergency relief and so forth, it is all inadequate if we don't face up to the primary question: not "Why hasn't the government been better prepared?" but "Isn't our failure to respond to climate change by changing our economy and lifestyles simply idiotic?".

Hear, hear!

I only wish the rest of the piece were as strongly worded. In fact, after bewailing the British resposne to "the (climate-change-caused) bad summer by getting into (climate-change-causing) jets and flying to the Mediterranean - where, by the way, global warming is causing innumerable heatwave deaths?" she then goes on to brand us all hypocrites before stating unabashedly that "I hold my hand up too. Our long-planned week's holiday to a Greek resort will go ahead if the airports are open."

I'm sorry? Did I misunderstand you there, Jackie? You think that climate change is bad and a real problem but you aren't doing anything about it? In fact, you are wilfully making it worse! The conceit and arrogance of this little gobshite truly becomes clear in the penultimate sentence: "I need to be cajoled, led, provoked and taxed into changing my ways, as do we all."

Only if you're a lackadaisical fuckwit with the moral compass of Pol-Pot, you do. Fucking whinging, liberal toerags waiting for someone to come along and legislate them out of trouble. I fucking hate people like this.

RRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!! ! ! ! ! ! !



On a less ranty and more holier-than-thou note I would like to announce that I am going to the South of France in August by train. Yes, not by plane or ferry but by good old choo-choo. Admittedly I am going wakeboarding on my friend's fat boat for a week but I still reckon that's half the CO2 of the flight.

Smugness is me.

The Threat to Reason by Dan Hind

I want this book. The author was on Radio 4's Start The Week program and was a very interesting chap.

an example of how not to set housing policy

Brown is a cock-weasel.

He seems to think the housing associations can build houses out of thin air and dreams.

Hint to Gordon: Stop spending £1 billion a year on an illegal war and put the money into something beneficial to society.

beauty in a physical form

Some may disagree but I think this is one of the most profoundly beautiful artifacts I have laid eyes on.


Linkage to more pics

Link
Link

eating meat fucks the environment royally

So says New Scientist. There are some fascinating (read- "fucking alarming") stats in there.

If only I had the willpower to give up meat.

Tried it.

Failed.

plutocracy . . . yada yada yada . . . cock-weasel . . . . . British public transport is shit . . . etc . . .etc

These two themes seem to be prevalent throughout the press these days with the Joseph Rowntree Foundation's latest report and the ongoing debacle of Metronet. The third string to this bow is, of course, the government's climate policy which is as full of holes spewing carbon and pollution as , well, as a cheap, Chinese-made plastic collander.

So why, dear listener (I'm listening to the radio and it appeals to me to address you so), why is it that we tolerate being treated as serfs? I must take a bus to work today at a cost of £1.45 per trip. An interesting observation is that that £2.90 would allow me to travel an impressive 25 miles (ok, so that's shit fuel economy but I drive a 1.6 Nissan Bluebird- you try and get a decent car for under £500). I can assure you that the trip to town is barely 2.5 miles, so why the extreme expense?

Today's Independent cover story suggests an answer, this story inside has more.

20 facts about Iran

Its a pdf.

Bush is a cock-weasel

Vietnam mark II - anyone remember My Lai?

Well, this is 50 times worse.

I want one!

This is totally gnarly:



Does anyone want to give me £3K so's I can buy one?

Or, if you're feeling particularly generous, how about £10K for one of these beautiful things:


That's a production car, kids! Fucking beautiful!

There's a couple more fascinating developments in automotive technology in this article.



Addition:

Ok, so actually its not a production car but I still want one when they go on sale.

a little climate change philosophy

This caught my eye and I was reminded of Paul Robert's observation in his book, The End of Oil, that its all very well rich nations accepting responsibility for most of the greenhouse gases produced but the biggest threat comes from developing countries and a pound spent on efficiency measures and limiting emissions in a developing country buys you a fuck load more than a pound spent in the UK on the same. This is because here we have already gone down the road of efficiency improvements to get where we are today. But that coal fired plant in China or the diesel locomotives carrying people through Indonesia could be improved and upgraded for relatively little, whereas a redevelopment of the UK network to super-efficient TGV-style trains will cost hundreds of billions. I think Mr Ban should have pointed this out.

this is just fucking amazing

Watch this video. I love the fluorescent colour scheme- you can tell its filmed int he early 90s. There's lots more information about WIGs here.

the European rail revolution - unless you live in the UK, that is

This is one of my favourite subjects to rant about. Check the map and, apart from Portugal- a country of 10 million with less than half the population density of the UK- see if you can spot any country in Western Europe without a red, high-speed line in it (The poxy piece between Waterloo and the channel tunnel doesn't count, IMO).

Yeah, I know. You can't.

Thanks, Maggie, John "Y-fronts" Major and Lord Blair of Kut al-Amara!

The Great British Public is greatly ignorant. And Stupid.

Yeah, another reason why I'm really not proud to be a UK citizen. Thanks to Murdoch and the other media magnates there remains a pall of inconclusivity over the science of climate change.

Fuckers.

Oxford Research Group piss all over the nuclear fire

Their' latest report deals descriebs how new nuclear generation capacity will not aid the fight against climate change and will create new terrorist threats by propagating the spread of fissile material throughout the world. Not only that but it increases the chance of a nuclear war.

Pretty conclusive, methinks.

Welcome home Alan Johnston!

He's free!

COngratulations to the Hamas Executive Force for not using overly heavy-handed tactics that might have endangered his life and a big "Fuck You!" to the Dogmush Clan, who captured and held him for so long in pursuit of their fundamentalist Islamist goals.

Wankers.

European's nuclear revamp on the rocks already

The Finnish experience must be somewhat disheartening to all you nuke-lovers.

another piece of the Neo-Malthusian jigsaw emerges

Soil erosion. I'd heard of it before and knew it was a problem but this article puts it into perspective. Building on one of my favourite themes of Environmental Economics, there are more interesting numbers to be found in the opening paragraph of this article; where the net worth, in ecotoxicological terms, of a hectare of Thai mangrove is contrasted with its value- or rather, its cost- as a shrimp farm.

I just came up with the "Neo-Malthusian" tag. Its, like, a cockweasels favourite ad-hominem attack on us eco-warriors but turned back on them. "Yes", we cry, "we're embracing Malthus predictions of imminent catastrophe but backing them with oodles of profoundly irrefutable scientific evidence".

The difference is, Malthus' scenario failed to take into account the technological developments that kept mankind growing until now. But now exponential population growth is taking over the linear progression of technology and we're back where he thought we were 300 years ago and there are good human beings out there working to explain why.

There's a fascinating critique of Malthus, by an anthropologist called Eric Ross, reviewed here. It sounds totally wicked and I fancy laying my filthy paws on a copy for enlightenment purposes. I must state here, however, that I am shocked by their connection of neo-Malthusianism, racism and eugenics. I don't advocate militant birth control and family planning because I want to improve the human gene stock or because I want to eliminate a particular strand of humanity. I am convinced that every single healthy human child has the potential to cure cancer or to kill a million innocents- its very much a matter of upbringing which decides which of these extremes they move toward. I just think there are too many fucking humans on the planet and we're not looking after the ones that are alive now. I think people should stop having kids until there are no more hungry or neglected children (hmmm- Annual births (eg. for Asia = 97560105) divided by total number of orphan children under 16 (again, for Asia = 253656272) equals 2.6 years (all figures torn from Wikipedia).

Two point six fucking years! That's a goddamn long time to stop a continent giving birth. But all then orphans in the continent would have families.

Frankly I wasn't even aware of the use of the term "Neo-Malthusian" in the review until I finished reading it; I'd started writing this post before I'd finished more than a couple of paragraphs and I'm now regretting embracing the term in my title. But I haven't removed my reference to it as I believe this post shows a progression of thought and understanding of the subject. The Znet article contains many indisputably alarming facts. Rather than being scared of being branded something I'm not I'd rather stand behind my convictions and clarify why they might sound inhuman but actually profess more concern for the future of humanity than they initially be obvious.