Sunday, February 20, 2011

Singular TIME

I just wrote in my News item for this 2011 February:
The AI Singularity predicted for thirty-odd years from now may very much change things, I don't doubt that things will change; but will AIs produced by dishonest human institutions be honest as well as smart? What if the AIs learn hypocrisy from us as well as programming? The AIs may keep us around for reasons of their own, they may depend on us for some things no matter how smart they get, but will they be dumb enough to allow us political power? Power over them? I doubt it, I hope not.

I'll be back to explain, offer background, unpublicized facts.

Thursday, February 17, 2011

pk Online

I had five domains, several blogs, thousands of essays and other text files, thousands of images on line. The fed destroyed all that, all but destroyed me.

I can't afford to repost, so I've been recreating some classic pk modules at blogs.

Here's what I'm going to do now: get all my files into a blog, sorting by blog specialty.
Then, reorder, as logically as I can, so visitors can browse by Knatz.com type categories: Teaching / or Personal /

I'm going to stop explaining all this every time I mount a new post.
Then I'm going to my five destroyed domains back up, restoring the original logic, improving on the original logic.

Sunday, February 13, 2011

Cupid Conflict

After the dance Friday night my beloved Jan told me that Liz, her son's girlfriend, had commented on the behavior of Cybil, the woman who'd audaciously plucked me from Jan's side toward the end of the evening to invite me onto the dance floor with her. I'd never seen Cybil before in my life, but we did a foxtrot. Buddy Canova, our favorite one-man-band immediately went into a repetition of the Cupid Shuffle and I kept Cybil on the floor with me to do it too. Others, lots of others, got up also to enjoy this simple, highly syncopated line dance.

On the drive home Jan had showcased my attractiveness to women and this Cybil's chutzpah in snatching me right from under her. The next day Jan told me that Liz had commented further on Cybil's rudeness by reporting that during the Cupid Shuffle Cybil had repeatedly bumped into her.

Ah! I explained the situation, and some core of its significance, to Jan. I repeat it to you here – it has more than one moral.

Background details are necessary:

We were at the American Legion, Lake Placid FL.
Buddy Canova is a hell of a musician, playing and singing with digital support.
My dancing is celebrated at the Legion, and elsewhere, and has been since 1950 or so. I've been teaching line dancing around Highlands Country for three years now, having learned it myself only three years ago.
The Cupid Shuffle is a recording in which the singers call the dance steps. It's four basics to the right, four basics to the left, four kick and replace steps, and four funky twentyish degree turns adding up to 90 degrees: to face a new wall. The singing instructions don't begin till well into the number. I begin the dance as soon as I feel a clear "5, 6, 7, 8 ..." On the recording used at our Thursday night Legion session, I always come out in synch with Cupid, the song leader. When other bands play other recordings, most mixing their own singing and playing with the recording, karaoke style, I don't always come out in synch. Typically I'm the first one up, the dance leader. In that case, once the recorded "to the right" comes along, I loudly "correct" the group: and everyone joins me in synch.
When I thus "lead" a line dance, I take the center of the floor, face the audience, my back to the band, and begin.
Ball room dances are improvised. A bull could cross the dance floor during a number and skilled dancers can avoid both each other and the bull: like mosquites getting missed by your snatching hand. But not line dancing. In line dancing the whole line (or set of lines) have to synchronize: like the Rockettes. A bull crossing a line dance floor will cause havoc.

OK. Liz told Jan that Cybil had been bumping her. Here's what happened. Cybil asked me to dance. We did. Buddy went right into the Cupid Shuffle: for the second time: we'd already had twenty or thirty people up for that same line dance. Cybil and I were in the corner of the floor on the band stand side. Thus: I was already with a partner. There was no time for me to take the center of the floor. So Cybil and I merely began. Others arrived. But they didn't follow me (and Cybil): and they didn't coordinate with the wall rotation our dancing had already established.

Buddy's Cupid is one regularly out of synch with the dance if begun at his 5, 6, 7, 8. Buddy is a musician, not a dancer. He isn't coordinated with a choreographer, or a dance director. When Cupid began his "to the right," I loudly corrected everyone else's synch with my dancing, except that the others adjusted to my count but still stayed oriented to a wall not my wall.

I'm the first dancer on the floor. They should be oriented to my wall. The Christians should coordinate with the already established Jews, not the Jews adapt to the newcomer Christians. If MacArthur is marching the troops, and Rommel arrives with his troops on the same field, Rommel should coordinate with MacArthur, not just let the troops bump into each other: unless you want the practice to be the war.The last time I was in Vermont the modesty rule for the swimming hole was very simple: whoever got there first set the rule: nude, or bathing suits. If the girl and her data are at the swiming hole first thing in the morning, and some more guys arrive, they have to don suits. If the guys were there first and then the couple arrive, it's skinny hour. When I'm dancing the Shuffle facing the north wall, others arriving should adopt the same orientation, turning west with me.

The Big Bangers say that the universe began with a Singularity. There was nothing, infinite, eternal nothing. Then here was a Singularity. It happened. It could happen again. Not likely. But then the Singularity itself wasn't likely. Just possible. And given enough possibility, it will happen. So: I've enjoyed the thought for decades, What if: a new Singularity occurs, spontaneously, instantly, in the enormous expanse of empty space between the proton and the electron of a hydrogen atom in your elbow? Talk about a tumor! If that Singularity was like ours it would expand at its speed of light, very fast. That universe could rip this universe up pretty well. Or: that universe could, in time, obliterate this universe. Or: that universe could be absorbed by this universe.

Save for a separate meditation the dynamics of this universe being matter and the new universe being something like anti-matter ... and so forth. It could be a real mess. The old god could eat the new god, the new god could eat the old god ... or, after the new god had eaten the old god, the old devil could reach out and gobble the new god ... Physics could change. But, if there are still people, though their religion would change, it might not in any way reflect what actually happened!

On the dance floor, as elsewhere, I'm a natural leader. But kleptocrats hate natural leaders. Socrates got pressed to commit suicide, Jesus got arrested, got Rome's version of a fair trial, got scourged, crucified. And the people who stood with their thumb in their ass then join the priesthood and say they represent Jesus. Boy, I can't wait till a real Judgment where we hear what God and Jesus really say: if we let them get a word in.

Buddy's a musician. Music is counting in large part, so's dance. Buddy should know the dance steps and time his version so that "5, 6, 7, 8" will mesh with "to the right, to the right." Buddy should see me on the floor, and give me time to get to the center, where I'll be most visible: or, take me aside and say, "Paul, let someone else lead this one: you led the last one. You're always leading them. Take five."

I resist the temptation to corner the Legion's boss and suggest that he let me consult with his bands on coordinating music and dancing. In West Side Story, in any stage production, music and dance, have to coordinate. Leonard Bernstein has to be able to talk to and listen to Jerome Robbins. A director has to make them both behave (as a producer makes a director behave, and bankers make the producer behave). Lou is a musician, but I doubt that his training is very deep. He doesn't strike me as knowing the dances, or caring. The other musicians he hires screw up all the time, get their rhythms wrong, show that They Can't Count! without any correction from him, at least not any that's visible to me. I resist because I am not a member, don't want to become a member, can't afford the dues, but don't want to loose my main dancing venue. If Lou sees that I'm not a member I may get 86'd right there: lose my mine of alternate dance partners.

Picture this pacifist dancer dancing before an American Legion mural of war: ships burning, tanks burning, oil slicks aflame! Where else am I supposed to go? If my fellow Americans had simple murdered me the first time I complained about having to go to school, then the bomb droppers could do whatever they want to the Cupid Shuffle. They don't deserve to have me to coordinate them.

There isn't enough wealth in the history of the world to compensate me for what's already been done to me. And why would I get a penny's compensation before Jesus got compensated? or Socrates? or Crazy Horse? or John Sutter?

I post this: then rewrite it, from scratch: better, in better order.

Saturday, February 05, 2011

Authority: Gen / Degen

Generate / Degenerate

The language group says that "two and two is four." Any speaker of the language, teaching the language to a newbie or to a foreigner, has authority. In such a case the infant never knows better than the adult.
The case naturally and legitimately generates authority.

The situation is different where a human group does not know something for sure, but must make decisions. It's guessing. If I am crossing the Sinai I may guess that I'll reach my destination by night fall. If I and my brother are crossing the Sinai, he may guess that we will not reach our destination by nightfall. (My wife may think that we won't reach it by tomorrow night fall either, his wife may think that we'll arrive in an hour, but both women know to keep silent while we're speculating. Here we have no authority, or contested authority, or a default of male authority. Maybe my brother is older, maybe he has provisional authority.)

If brother is wrong, natural authority will transfer to me. If I am wrong, natural authority will transfer to our wives: or to one of our daughters, or one of our sons.

Human experience suggests a hierarchy. Human behavior may try to alter the natural hierarchy: men see women coming, and knock them back.

In such circumstances authority degenerates, but may yet hold its place by accumulated (or stolen) power.

The peasant saw that the priest could spew magical gibberish better than he, the peasant. So the Church acquired authority. The Church said that man owns the earth, by God's authority, that man is the center of creation, that the earth is the center of the universe. The Church went further: it said that the earth is the only physical center in the physical universe.

But Galileo saw moons around Jupiter. Authority split. Galileo's observation was based on experience: he saw it. The Church's position was based on authority, degenerated authority: they said it. So, as always happens in groups so large that they're disconnected form individual's experiences, authority and evidence came into conflict: conflict direct and open.

It's continued since: by simple experience one might think that bombing gooks was killing them. But no: state authority says that raining terror is helping them: is good: Christian, if you will. Of course the free press, which wants Fortune 500 advertising, backs authority. And we have an utterly dishonest public: with no rational hope of survival.

Never mind God's punishment: neither I nor my brother nor my wife nor my brother's wife, nor our daughters, nor our sons, know how to cross a desert in a group larger than one: not once a false state has knocked down a false church.

I'd be for starting over: if we could have a habitable biosphere left. But no: it's too late. In founding FLEX (see InfoAll) I (following suit with God, Christ) offered a last chance. The state-coerced public ignored it, stole and perverted it.

Gifts stolen by knocking Santa Claus down won't satisfy enduringly.

Thursday, February 03, 2011

Politics

pk is the deschooler. With Illich dead, pk inherits. pk earned what he inherits.

Deschooling is the social stance which opposes compulsory ritual. The public got out from under the Church's compulsions; now it's past time that Americans, and the rest of the world, get out from under the alpha morons who run things: tell the state and the school board, and the draft board, to take a hike: indeed, just to ignore the state and the school board. If absolutely no one (who didn't actually want to) paid taxes, if people boycotted the products and services of corporations who paid taxes, and who lean on the alpha morons to guide them what to do with the taxes, who to bomb, the state would be bankrupted by the effort of putting everyone in jail: the jail walls would decay: and the schools would be inhabited by squatters, by people not compelled to be there: students and their state-paid guards, the teachers, the administrators.

So. You see: I've taken a step beyond deschooling. Or rather, deschooling represents (the most outspoken) part of my general anarchism: the belief that the state has no legitimate function: it doesn't matter which state. There's an irony there: pk is the guy who says that

There are no political solutions to our problems
.

So it sounds like my politics is no politics. But it ain't true. No politics is the condition the species was born into. Everything being supervised by politicians, who wield not understanding, but power, is recent, factitious, artificial: not natural!

Anyway, Knatz.com (and all my domains, with their thousands of essays and articles and stories) had a section on Politics (in Knatz.com / Teaching / Society / NoHier /). I need to recreate that material on line, in a blog, where it should be archived regardless of whether I can pay to again host Knatz.com. I'll begin putting the materials into a vacant chronological spot. I was put in jail October 2006. 2006 October 13 onward for fifteen months is open. November will do temporarily: perhaps I should should all Knatz.com / Teaching / Society / materials not already archived to blogs into that temporal space: / Society / Social Epistemology, / Society / Survival /, and the rest of / Society / NoHier /.


A movie is never any better than the stupidest man connected with it.
Ben Hecht
Ben was a smart cookie, a great writer, a genuine wit. Could his statement be literally true? I don't see how; but it's delicious.

I'll say the same thing about lots of things:

A society is never any better than the stupidest man connected with it.
An institution is never any better than the stupidest man connected with it.
A church, a school, a university is never any better than the stupidest man connected with it.


Oh, Ben, for shame! For shame, pk, for repeating his solicism: where's the gender disclaimer?

An anything is never any better than the stupidest woman connected with it.

Wednesday, February 02, 2011

Religious Mania

The woman's behind was plush. Her buttocks flexed like a champion horse as she strode the Catskills street. A slightly more natural pace might have signaled the tear in her shorts less. As it was, every step forced shining panty silk, and a good crest of gluteus maximus, into the breach. Her bottom winked at the world. I had tried to get my mouth near her ear to whisper, "Miss, you're pants are ripped," but even my runner's stride made discretion impossible. After a couple such attempts I stood my ground and watched her ass send its signals over diminishing distance. "She knows," I told myself: that's why she wouldn't pause to hear what I was telling her. It wasn't that she was being rude, it wasn't that she didn't hear me; she knows. She's fleeing: and thereby broadcasting her embarrassment the more. Female flesh.

I've remembered her distress since then not because her rump was classic so much as because her humiliation at the world seeing her underwear – and the health of what it covered, was so pronounced. She reminds me of me. Her manic modesty reminds me of my vain imitation of Christ: indeed it reminds me of Jesus' own passion: and of the publicity-conscious contortions of many a religious nut.

Mania: obsessive activity to no visible result. It's religious when the disconnection between action and result becomes manifest: the shaman praying over the cholera victim, the congregation praying for Hitler to be kind: Jesus going to the cross as a magical ritual of redemption for mankind: pk's paroxysms to warn his fellow man against state power. The state isn't saving us; it's making life impossible.

The woman with her heaving ass fled my attempts to tell her of her display. Mel Gibson showed a Hollywood Jesus getting scourged, persecuted, crucified – and even his own disciples denied they had anything to do with it. I protested the school silencing my alarms, and my family, the whole society, told me, "Shut up, Go back to school (the same school that doesn't listen, won't learn), Never mind that it's counter-intelligent, subversive of survival: Submission is the path to making money.
"Survival is not our object; money is."
Survival is not our object;
money is.

If the woman had slowed down, she might have gotten back to her car without the entire population noticing her ass. For two thousand years the whole world has had Jesus-on-the-cross shoved in their eye. A lot of good it has done. Where's the salvation? Where's God's kingdom? Can God really still love us? when we haven't learned a thing?

The "holy man" in India standing on one leg, living on a pole, sticking needles through his balls ... What's transformed? Did spring come? Sure: but then winter followed. Did it rain? Yes: but then it got dry. People are the same: only there's billions more of us: all the more addicted to submission before the state.
Before 1870 we all had to bow down before the war lord, but we didn't all have to go to school: where teachers mindlessly repeat rituals of the state – I pledge the legions of the flag – never mind the farm chores.

Everything I've said to the public since junior high has just gotten me in trouble. The Temple would have left Jesus alone if he'd just practiced the same hollow hypocrisy the priests were already master of. No: it was Jesus actually cutting close to the bone that riled them, stirred them till the rabbis actually got the secular power, the Roman governor – according to the stories, to defy Roman laws to persecute the Jewish savior for them.

Today the United States dispenses with promises of spiritual salvation. It's claims are secular (Rome's were both sacred and secular). The US claims freedom: while abrogating it. It promises, it pretends to guarantee, freedom of speech.
How can I have freedom of speech and simultaneously be compelled to be in school x hours a day y hours a week? Wouldn't freedom of speech mean that the state couldn't interfere not only with my ability to speak but with what I said and where and when I said it?
The condemned can scream all he wants – down in the dungeon, where no one can hear.

But even if such impossibilities were possible: what good is freedom of speech when no one understands what's said or written? by key people? I tried to explicate Jesus. Rots of ruck. I tried to show that our reading of Shakespeare missed much of the potential. Uh uh, the professors were impervious. And the state backs the egregious experts.
So I tried to tell the public. I offered digital librarianship, an internet, that the public could have protected from the state. Major institutions blinked: IBM, Ma Bell, TIMELife. Might as well try to train chickens to juggle.

But, me – like the guy standing on one leg, like the girl jiggling full stride, me, still trying, four decades later, the US put me in jail! for what I'd written! They were embarrassed that I hadn't done anything. But that didn't stop them. And the media? Simply reported my satire by rote: as extortion: and forgot about it.

Jesus was convicted of blasphemy – translated as insurrection! I was convicted of extortion. Mocking my rapists is extortion!

Pad the Alarm

People who've padded the alarm so it can't be heard, who've drugged the watchman, replaced humans with robots ... can't be saved. People who stand by while their saviors get poleaxed sure don't deserve to be.
Understand: the Romans weren't atheists: they believed in Jupiter, and Mars: and Caesar. But the pope who put a contract out on Martin Luther, he had to be an atheist. He had to have disbelieved that God would judge! He had to have believed that the Church would do the judging, that he'd be exempt from judgment, that God would back the Church: a rotten church.
My contemporaries don't believe in God. Or, like the Pope, they believe that God won't hold the US to any standards the US doesn't volunteer to be held accountable to.
Atheism. Lawlessness.
(And never mind God: use Truth as a synonym!)

Back in her car, I hope that woman drove home safely, got changed into other pants without accident. That tush was still hers, ripped pants or whole: not quite all is evil in the world.

St Peter denied Jesus once he was arrested, getting mistreated by official power. Maybe he should have been crucified upside down for that. But the story tells it that he was crucified upside down for trying to tell people they could be saved. By the time he was crucified upside down, might he have learned that the state kind of didn't cooperate?

Every day I encounter people who don't have a clue who I am: despite my articulateness, despite my dozens of short stories, three novel attempts, thousands of essays, my public trail of offering community data bases, social networking, cybernetic alternatives to school, to government, to the Fortune 500 ... despite my having been jailed and censored!

That woman shouldn't have ignored my message. She'd have been less embarrassed had she slowed down, walked normally. Now I'm glad that my ministry was received no better than Jesus'. My lifelong behavior is manic: trying to save people even while being tormented for it. It's religious: totally removed from reason. I don't learn from my experience, so you don't have to learn from yours. That's mania, religious mania.

It's in vain. And I'm glad. Hooray for futility.

Jesus' suffering was over in a day. Mine too is evanescent. I'm seventy-two, I'll be gone soon. But human suffering is just getting a-going.

2011 06 23 Note the comment. Thanks, Buddy, glad to help, wish I could help more: also wish I'd gotten some help, a lot of help. Meantime though, please know that my PKnatz is gathering my dozen blogs into one coordinated place, and recreated my fed-destroyed domains.

related post at pKnatz blog

Tuesday, February 01, 2011

In Memoriam

News: Country music singer Doc Williams, who left coal mining as a teen to play in beer gardens and became a star radio act with his wife on Jamboree USA, has died. He was 96.

In Memoriam

When ever an asset to the culture dies, those who remember shim "should" tell what they remember. I loved Doc Watson and here I'll tell of a close encounter with him. In 1957 or '58 my buddy and I agreed to run the Si Como No Mexcian artifact gallery on MacDougal Street for the owner while he went to Mexico to gather more inventory. Al sold original pre-Columbian pottery picked up from the ground around the pyramids. He also carried Mexican-crafted sandals, tops, pants ... His stock was damn low, we wouldn't have much to sell, but hell, it would keep me from drinking beer in the White Horse every night. Supposedly I was working: studying, taking an extra lit class in summer school: neat: Columbia co-ed for a change.

Next door was an idle basement which would soon be converted into the Gas Light. Bob Dylan would half-live there for the next several years. Upstairs next door was the Caricature coffee house. Next over, going toward Bleeker, was a string music shop: guitars, mandolins, zithers, banjo ... Sales and repairs. My buddy Alan reported being in there when some blind guy was shown a twelve string guitar. "Gee, I've never played a twelve string," the blind guy said. They handed him the axe. Right off, he blew the roof off the place. First try, sounded more like Leadbelly than not.

Doc Watson. That's right.

I didn't see it, but I almost saw it. I was only a few dozen feet away, in the Si Como No.

PS. Distinguish between Al the store owner and Al my buddy. Esquire had a great full page color pick of Al the store owner that year: Al sitting with a guitar at the fountain in Washington Square. 1958 hippy beatnik: right on Woody Guthrie's turf.


More News: Willie Mays Aikens, who went from World Series star to federal prison inmate, has been hired by the Kansas City Royals as a minor league coach.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110201/ap_on_sp_ba_ne/bba_royals_aikens;_ylt=AkA4lfd3bb7YNjKfHmQtv.QLMxIF;_ylu=X3oDMTJtamthYWUyBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTEwMjAxL2JiYV9yb3lhbHNfYWlrZW5zBHBvcwM3BHNlYwN5bl9hcnRpY2xlX3N1bW1hcnlfbGlzdARzbGsDcm95YWxzaGlyZXdp

I read this line because I knew Willie Aikens at Jesup fed jail, played chess against him. I was one of the best players, Willie was a bit better (at least I never beat him, though I'd regularly get a pawn up, then fade). He regularly got trounced by a guy called "Wall Street." I never played Wall Street, arrogant bastard. I went a step out of my way to befriend Willie because I though he trounced Wall Street regularly. Apparently it was the other way around.

I'm glad I was there no longer than I was: but I also would have liked to have strengthened my game to the point where I'd humiliate Wall Street. Then again, if I got better, so too could have he: he was younger. They were all younger, by quite a bit.

News

Last month I initiated a News post. Now it's February, so I commence a fresh one:

Leonardo
A male apprentice, longtime companion and possible lover of Leonardo da Vinci was the main influence and a model for the "Mona Lisa" painting, an Italian researcher said Wednesday.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110202/ap_en_ot/eu_italy_mona_lisa;_ylt=AmtfpHTjxxdXOp8qqxwTiWBxFb8C;_ylu=X3oDMTJqYXZoMjQzBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTEwMjAyL2V1X2l0YWx5X21vbmFfbGlzYQRjcG9zAzIEcG9zAzYEc2VjA3luX3RvcF9zdG9yeQRzbGsDbWFsZW1vZGVsYmVo

VOC
You've probably heard the term VOC, which stands for volatile organic compounds. VOCs are chemicals that give off gas from certain materials and liquids. These chemicals hang around our homes, sometimes for years, polluting the indoor air and causing adverse health effects. VOCs are one of the main reasons that indoor air is often 200 times more polluted than the outdoor air.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/usnews/20110202/ts_usnews/5waystofreeyourhomeofdangerouschemicals;_ylt=Atkp37VRDL5YoqWfDDdFlBIPLBIF;_ylu=X3oDMTNncGFnOW01BGFzc2V0A3VzbmV3cy8yMDExMDIwMi81d2F5c3RvZnJlZXlvdXJob21lb2ZkYW5nZXJvdXNjaGVtaWNhbHMEcG9zAzcEc2VjA3luX2FydGljbGVfc3VtbWFyeV9saXN0BHNsawNmdWxsbmJzcHN0b3I-

Oysters
By averaging the loss among all regions, the researchers came up with an estimate that 85 percent of oyster reef ecosystems have been lost, but said that figure was likely low because some areas lacked historical records for comparison.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110203/sc_afp/environmentusfoodoceans;_ylt=Ap0T6iE_fq31o6upNnpscFIPLBIF;_ylu=X3oDMTJsc2NnbnZpBGFzc2V0A2FmcC8yMDExMDIwMy9lbnZpcm9ubWVudHVzZm9vZG9jZWFucwRwb3MDNQRzZWMDeW5fbW9zdF9wb3B1bGFyBHNsawNveXN0ZXJzZGlzYXA-

CO2
The Mongol invasion of Asia in the 1200s took enough carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere to offset a year's worth of the world's gasoline demand today, according to a new study. But even Genghis Khan couldn't create more than a blip in atmospheric carbon compared to the overwhelming effect of agriculture.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20110208/sc_livescience/mongolinvasionin1200salteredcarbondioxidelevels

Rape, Egypt, Lara Logan
Sexual harassment of women is an all-too-common occurrence on the streets of Cairo. But many women noted a complete absence of it in the early days of protests in Tahrir Square, where demonstrators made a point of trying to create a microcosm of the society without many of Egypt's social ills.
However, in the final days, and especially after the battles with pro-Mubarak gangs who attacked the protesters in Tahrir, women noticed sexual assault had returned to the square. On the day Mubarak fell, women reported being groped by the rowdy crowds. One witness saw a woman slap a man after he touched her. The man was then passed down a line of people who all slapped him and reprimanded him.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110215/ap_en_ot/us_tv_lara_logan_attack;_ylt=AjCl7R6F6KixeeWxccUMLAlxFb8C;_ylu=X3oDMTJvam8xc2VnBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTEwMjE1L3VzX3R2X2xhcmFfbG9nYW5fYXR0YWNrBGNwb3MDMwRwb3MDNwRzZWMDeW5fdG9wX3N0b3J5BHNsawNjYnNuZXdzbG9nYW4-

Poisoned Oaks
Auburn: Oak trees poisoned at historic site
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110217/ap_on_sp_ot/auburn_trees_poisoned;_ylt=AoFgKaBgummvYTPq4XoT_LcLMxIF;_ylu=X3oDMTJpOGwzdTA2BGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTEwMjE3L2F1YnVybl90cmVlc19wb2lzb25lZARwb3MDNwRzZWMDeW5fbW9zdF9wb3B1bGFyBHNsawNhdWJ1cm5vYWt0cmU-
I include this news item to declare that Knatz.com had a fair amount of material on differing attitudes toward trees in different times, places, cultures. The oak was especially revered: along with mistletoe, a common parasite of oaks.
pk wishes to emphasize: the ancient Teutons punished harm to trees severely. One convicted of cutting the bark of an oak had his belly button removed and tacked to the injured oak. The criminal was then driven around the tree in circles as his intestines were pulled from his guts by his passage. The trees wound was therefore bound by the attacker's flesh.
I love a number of aspects of Teutonic justice.

Little Replaces Big
"Humans have always fished. Even our ancestors have fished. We are just much much better at it now," said UBC scientist Reg Watson.
Examining the 2006 numbers, 76 million tons of commercial seafood were reported, meaning about "seven trillion individuals were killed and consumed by us or our livestock," said Watson.
Watson said fishing efforts have been growing over the past several decades, reaching a collective point of 1.7 billion watts, or 22.6 million horsepower, worldwide that year.
In terms of energy use, that would amount to 90 miles (150 kilometers) of "Corvettes bumper to bumper with their engines revving," he said.
"It looks like we are fishing harder for the same or less result and this has to tell us something about the oceans' health. We may in fact have hit peak fish at the same time we are hitting peak oil."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110218/sc_afp/environmentoceansfish;_ylt=Ap2GMjghMUgICjnSnQahPlMPLBIF;_ylu=X3oDMTJqZWQzY2ozBGFzc2V0A2FmcC8yMDExMDIxOC9lbnZpcm9ubWVudG9jZWFuc2Zpc2gEcG9zAzcEc2VjA3luX21vc3RfcG9wdWxhcgRzbGsDZmV3ZXJiaWdmaXNo

pk adds: civilization formed a similar pattern on the land masses. Gatherer/hunters archeo-anthropologists tell us were bigger, stronger, healthier, had better teeth than the incipient farmers but were fewer. In conflict the toothless runt farmers beat the tiny team of better athletes. Numbers rule. So soon there was an earth full of spastic midgets with bad teeth: us: or at least us till very recently. Currently we're getting bigger again, healthier again, have dentistry even as we lose our teeth. But it's artificial, temporary, can't last.
The AI Singularity predicted for thirty-odd years from now may very much change things, I don't doubt that things will change; but will AIs produced by dishonest human institutions be honest as well as smart? What if the AIs learn hypocrisy from us as well as programming? The AIs may keep us around for reasons of their own, they may depend on us for some things no matter how smart they get, but will they be dumb enough to allow us political power? Power over them? I doubt it, I hope not.

Space Weather & Gadgets
A potent solar storm could disrupt these technologies, scorch satellites, crash stock markets and cause power outages that last weeks or months, experts said Saturday at the American Association for the Advancement of Science's annual meeting.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110220/ts_alt_afp/usastronomyspacetelecomweather;_ylt=AiuoqGuQduuZEp0kGGwLgo0PLBIF;_ylu=X3oDMTJzMGtzdTdhBGFzc2V0A2FmcC8yMDExMDIyMC91c2FzdHJvbm9teXNwYWNldGVsZWNvbXdlYXRoZXIEcG9zAzgEc2VjA3luX21vc3RfcG9wdWxhcgRzbGsDc3BhY2V3ZWF0aGVy