http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/worldchanging_fulltext/~3/y4v8zT_3X3U/010139.html

I've spent the past few days highlighting some of the works exhibited but i still had to write a proper review of Green Platform. The exhibition, dedicated to art, ecology and sustainability, closes on July 19 at Strozzina (aka CCCS) in Florence.

It is a good show. Definitely less spectacular but gutsier than Radical Nature which i had visited a few days before. It's also much darker. Although there are projects that lead the way to sustainable and achievable strategies, many others leave you with a guilty (but better informed) "What have we done to this planet?" feeling.

About two third of the pieces exhibited have been produced by the Strozzina. A few of them by the usual suspects but there's also a fair amount of talented Italian artists i had never heard of.

As curator Valentina Gensini explains in the essay she wrote for the catalogue:

Accordingly, the exhibition attempts to address ecological issues not only in environmental terms but also with respect to its philosophical, psychological, economic and social implications. As you can guess, Green Platform provides visitors with an intense experience. One which comes with much more questions to ponder on once you've left the gallery than answers.

Requiem, 2007

Requiem, 2007

The work i found most subtle and powerful was Julian Rosefeldt 's magnificent Requiem, a four screen video installation arranged in a square. Visitors find themselves surrounded by 4 films shot in the Brazilian rainforest, home of one third of the primary forests in the world. Precious and fragile as it is, the area is nevertheless relentlessly threatened by logging multinationals.

In the beginning of the video, visitors can revel in the contemplation of lush vegetation, bright colours, the hum of insects, birdsong and the sound of raindrops falling from the trees. After a few minutes, the peacefulness is interrupted by a disturbing sound which signals that a tree is falling nearby. The crashing of the tree is quickly echoes by another one. Then another one. Although, no human figure appears on the screen, it is impossible not to feel guilty and ashamed at man's lack of consideration and long-term intelligence regarding the health of this unique ecosystem. The fact that the sound of the chainsaw is absent, makes the crash of falling trees all the more resonant and distressing.

Medusa Swarm, 2009. Photo Credit: CCCS, Firenze; Valentina Muscedra

Tue Greenfort is the darling of exhibitions about ecology and sustainability. The work he created especially for Green Platform is a direct reference to the rise in temperature observed in the Mediterranean Sea. A combination of climate change, water pollution and lack of natural enemies like turtles and tuna decimated by overfishing have enabled the mauve stinger, a jellyfish with a very painful sting, to proliferate in the Mediterranean and threaten its biodiversity. Greenfort asked artisanal glassworkers on the island of Murano in Venice (an area which is more aware than most of the consequences that the rising level of the sea can have on urban life) to produce glass models of the pink jellyfish. The battle against the invasive jellyfish is absurd and tragic as the damage they are causing is the result of human foolishness. They are a part of nature but are deemed not 'natural' enough for European waters. The battle against the proliferation of the mauve stinger constitutes the umpteenth attempt by man to combat the consequences of his bad behaviour without attacking the root of the problem.

MARCH.16, 2008 (Pharomachurus mocinno), 2008. Photo Credit: CCCS, Firenze; Valentina Muscedra

Henrik Håkansson (who also has another work in the exhibition Radical Nature in London) had a long stay in the Mexican reserve of Montes Azules, in the Selva Lacadona (Chiapas.) The area is gradually shrinking as a result of human activities, leaving animals to constantly struggle for survival against the progressive reduction of their living space.

The audio works featured in Green Platform reproduces the song of the quetzal. Once venerated by the Maya and the Aztecs as Quetzacoatl, the feather-serpent, the "king" of birds is now an endangered species. Visitors can only hear the bird for a few seconds every 12 minutes, a rhythm that reflects the rareness of the bird. To hear the bird, you either have to be patient and stay there until it sings again or you must be lucky and stumble upon it. In Håkansson's work the song of the quetzal is reproduced by an amplifier, a Fender Reverb 65, which is itself considered a legend and defined, on the rock scene, as the "king" of its kind. The work thus takes the form of a sculpture/sanctuary, a tribute to the living legend of the quetzal, whose song might one day be heard and remembered only by artificial means.

Inlandsis 09, 2009. Photo Credit: CCCS, Firenze; Valentina Muscedra

Dacia Manto's Inlandsis 09 layers several sheets of delicate eco-plastic, derived from maize, to reproduce the area of the South Pole, which is gradually shrinking due to global warming. It has been estimated that over 13,000 square kilometres of marine ice have been lost over the past 50 years. Internally, the huge shelf loses between 90 and 150 square kilometres of ice each year. Manto invites us to consider the geography of the South Pole as a living and fragile organism whose protection is vital for the future of our planet. It can be disturbed the softest blow and even visitors passing near the sculpture seem to cast a menacing shadow upon it.

Invisible 5 (The Grapevine, Buttonwillow; San Fernando Valley Map), 2006. Images credit: Kim Stringfellow, Amy Balkin

Developed in conjunction with artists Kim Stringfellow and Tim Halbur, together with the Pond: Art, Activism, and Ideas and Greenaction for Health & Environmental Justice organisations, Amy Balkin 's Invisible-5 has a more journalistic approach. The project examines the social, economic and environmental context of the San Joaquin Valley along whose length runs Interstate 5 connecting San Francisco and Los Angeles. A strategic axis for the transport of goods and people, the corridor is also key in the development of livestock farming and intensive agriculture, waste disposal, oil and gas industries and the construction industry. Interstate 5 is one of the most toxic areas on Earth.

Invisible-5 is an audio tour starring the people and local communities who fight for environmental justice. The sound archive, shared over the Internet, gathers the testimonies of the inhabitants along with typical local sounds and music.

Green Platform, an exhibition curated by Lorenzo Giusti and Valentina Gensini, is on view until July 19 in Florence.

All my pictures. Image on the homepage: Julian Rosefeldt, Requiem 4, 2007, Lightjet print.

P.s. The catalogue of the exhibition is to die for. Strozzina has generously uploaded the essays online and the object itself is a superb large format Moleskine.

This piece originally appeared on Regine Debatty's blog, We Make Money Not Art.

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(Posted by Regine Debatty in Arts at 3:07 PM)

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/worldchanging_fulltext/~3/9g3MyPKOKpI/010138.html

by Roger Valdez

Last week I heaped praise on Portland’s plans to revise their city building codes to encourage family-friendly courtyard housing.

This week, I am feeling the same way about another set of changes being considered that would make it easier to generate clean energy and reduce runoff in urban neighborhoods. A package of changes called the “Green Bundle” is being reviewed this summer by the City of Portland. The Planning Commission will have a hearing on the proposed changes on August 25. 

Among many other nifty urban clean energy ideas like solar panels and green roofs, the Bundle would “allow small-scale wind energy systems to exceed Zoning Code height limits, either as stand-alone towers or when incorporated into building architecture.”

This is a pretty big deal when you think about it. Many people might see the words “stand-alone towers” and start speed-dialing city officials to oppose the idea of a neighbor erecting a noisy, whirring monster in their backyard.

But a quick review of the existing technology shows that there are actually a variety of options in the wind industry that are designed in a way that would allay these fears and could gain support—they’re smaller than you’d think, and quieter. Here is an example from Oregon Wind of a combination street light and wind turbine.



Here is a video of another example from a designer in the UK appropriately called Quiet Revolution.

The QR5 is not likely to be the kind of wind generation installed on a house.  Here is a video of one the first urban windmills in the United States in operation.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/worldchanging_fulltext/~3/ge1qy5IPEJU/010141.html

This week's cartoon describes polyculture -- agriculture that mimics the diversity of natural ecosystems by allowing multiple crops and livestock to thrive in the same space. You'll find more discussions on sustainable agriculture in the Worldchanging archives: for starters, try Jamais Cascio's Agricultural Sustainability = Agricultural Productivity, David Zaks' and Chad Monfreda's Green Water and Sustainable Agriculture, Zac West's Permaculture: Lessons for Urban Living and Louis Fox's Attention Philanthropy Grant to Geoff Lawton and his Permaculture Master Plan.

Click image to enlarge

Editor's note: This post is part of a series featuring Worldchanging ally Andy Lubershane's original graphics. While many of the issues covered in the comics have been discussed on Worldchanging in the past, we hope that you'll be able to use this new medium in a different way … whether it's in your classroom, on your office wall, or to help explain ideas to friends and family.

Andy Lubershane researches, writes and cartoons about sustainability from his home in Boston. Check out more of his illustrations here

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(Posted by Andy Lubershane in Features at 3:00 PM)

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/14/a-trivial-but-telling-example/

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/?p=3287

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/14/a-1-trillion-bargain/

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/?p=3281

http://www.mindhacks.com/blog/2009/07/is_brain_death_deat.html

The New Atlantis magazine has an in-depth article discussing the difficulty in defining death and why arguments about the brain have become central to understanding the final curtain.

The article is a little bit wordy in places but does a great job of exploring the philosophy of death definitions and why these have direct practical applications in medicine.

Not least in 'pulling the plug' decisions and the removal of organs from people who have been declared brain dead even while their body is still functioning on life support.

Another way forward is to confess that all this time the real reason why the neurological standard seemed palatable was that the patient with total brain failure has lost consciousness and will never regain it.

All the talk about the body no longer being a whole was just a distraction. The pulsing heartbeat, the warm skin, all the integrated work of the body—these are indicators that the body is alive but not the person.

And it is the life of the person that demands protection, in this case from being made into a source for organs. This kind of dualism opens the door, of course, to the possibility that there are more “personless” bodies—that, for instance, some patients with severe dementia or PVS [persistent vegetative state] might meet the description.

Link to article 'What and When Is Death?'

http://www.mindhacks.com/blog/2009/07/encephalon_73_flicke.html

The 73rd edition of the Encephalon psychology and neuroscience writing carnival is here with a specially video enriched version, this time ably hosted on Channel N.

A couple of my favourites include Neurocritic tackling the myth of the depression gene and Providentia on the visionary psychosis surfer Emmanuel Swedenborg.

There's many more excellent articles and a video to match each one so head on over and enjoy.

Link to Encephalon 73.

http://www.mindhacks.com/blog/2009/07/unique_like_everyone.html

You've probably heard of the many cognitive bias studies where the vast majority of people rate themselves as among the best. Like the fact that 88% of college students rate themselves in the top 50% of drivers, 95% of college professors think they do above average work, and so on.

In light of this, I've just found a wonderfully ironic study that found that the majority of people rate themselves as less susceptible to cognitive biases than the average person.

It's work from psychologist Emily Pronin who studies insight into our own judgements and how it affects our social understanding and perception of others.

In this study, the participants (psychology students no less), were given a booklet explaining how cognitive biases work that described eight of the most common ones. They were then asked to rate how susceptible they were to each of the biases and then how susceptible the 'average American' was.

Each rated themselves as less affected by biases than other people, instantly causing an irony loop in the fabric of space and time.

The study also had a fantastic follow-up that demonstrated just how strongly these cognitive biases affect our thinking. Even when they're pointed out, we can't escape them:

Participants in one follow-up study who showed the better than-average bias insisted that their self-assessments were accurate and objective even after reading a description of how they could have been affected by the relevant bias.

Participants in a final study reported their peer's self-serving attributions regarding test performance to be biased but their own similarly self-serving attributions to be free of bias.

Pronin calls this the 'bias blind spot' and you can read the full study online as a pdf file. Pronin also wrote an excellent 2008 review, also available as a pdf, on how these biases mean we see ourselves differently from how we see others, because we have direct access to our own minds but only observations of other people.

pdf of 'bias blind spot' study.
Link to DOI entry for same.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/scienceblogs/pharyngula/~3/OmCk50kPGH4/unscientific_america_still_use.php

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/07/unscientific_america_still_use.php

Mooney is at it again, scrabbling madly to refute my criticisms. It's another ho-hum effort.

He claims he did spend some effort criticizing the overt anti-science forces in our country — only it was in his previous book, not this one. No, that doesn't rebut me at all: in a book that purports to be discussing problems and solutions to the science and society divide, there ought to be some effort made to prioritizing the issues, even if it means revisiting points made in other books. Unfortunately, the message here is that we have three problems: the bumbling scientists who don't know how to communicate, and the malicious atheists, who are hurting the cause of science education, and the sell-out media. You don't just get to pretend that your readers have all read your other books.

He then compounds the problem by answering my accusation that he did not deal with the root causes of the problem by simply saying "did too". Maybe he doesn't think religion is as serious a problem as I do…but judging this book by its content, he apparently doesn't think it has anything to do with the unusual American disregard for science.

Further handwaving ensues in his defense of the media. Apparently, his own words that label factual accuracy as "mere", is taken out of context — which he justifies by pointing out a comment by Dawkins that the natural world is fascinating, and doesn't need human drama. As I said before, accuracy is not the enemy of drama, so this is a silly and pointless argument. Sure, make fun, entertaining, exciting movies. They just don't need to be imbecilic to be good.

Ah, but the real kicker here, the one that clearly is annoying Mooney most, is my accusation of uselessness against his book, that it offers no solutions at all. He says there are, there are! He says it several times, in several ways!

There are solutions in each chapter of the main body of the book, broken down by sector-politics, media, entertainment, religion. And then there is the grand solution in Chapter 10-which emerged from our collaboration, and which we don't think either of us would have come up with on our own. So far as we know, it really is new in its particular way of analyzing the academic pipeline and finding, in it, a solution to our problems at the science-society interface.

Alas, if you read his rebuttal, he won't actually tell you what those solutions, or even that Grand Solution, are. It's very strange; it's as if he's afraid that if he even briefly summarizes what his proposals are, you won't need to buy his book, so they've got to be kept secret. His book is apparently like an M. Night Shyamalan movie — if you're told what the little twist is before you go to see it, all you've got left is a rather slow moving, boring story that is plodding tediously towards the big reveal. Come on, grow up. If it's a substantial idea, it's the explanation and the details that make your book worth reading, not the one-liner gloss on your solution. You can give it away, it really won't hurt your book sales. And if it does, that suggests right there that you aren't offering much.

Well, I'm going to do it. I'm going to spill the beans. I am going to give you the Grand Solution that Mooney and Kirshenbaum present in chapter 10, the one that is so new that neither of them could have come up with it on their own.

Here it is. Ready?

Here's a summary of chapter 10: seven pages laying out the many problems that face people who want to pursue a career in science, from uninspiring teachers in grade school to the fierce competition for university positions. All true, of course, nothing at all novel here. What is their solution, presented in the final three pages? Create more well-rounded scientists, more Renaissance scientists, more scientists with specific training in communications skills, so that when they don't manage to land that academic position, they're still prepared to go out into society and act as ambassadors for science.

Really, that's it. All of it. That's their solution.

How nice.

I'm all for it. I teach at a small liberal arts college, and there's absolutely nothing new at all in the sentiment expressed by Mooney and Kirshenbaum. It's actually something of a letdown and rather dismaying that they think it "really is new in its particular way of analyzing the academic pipeline". Excuse me for being thoroughly un-dazzled, but I think they could have talked to any of a few hundred thousand academics and they would have told them the same thing.

It's also a little insulting.

You know, the majority of my cohort that entered graduate school with me are not currently employed in academic positions. Mooney and Kirshenbaum know this, they outlined the general state of affairs in the first 7/10ths of this chapter. Yet, somehow, they aren't sitting around panhandling for Thunderbird money down at the bus station — they are gainfully employed, and they are already smart, well-educated people with considerable depth and breadth to their knowledge and marketable skills, and no, none of them (as far as I know) are now anti-science cranks out there fighting the system. They already are ambassadors for science in our culture. They vote for pro-science candidates, they support public schools, and some of them even have jobs in government, industry, and communications where they are working in their own way to better the country…and many of them are certainly more effective at what they do than I am.

It's very strange. Mooney and Kirshenbaum say their "solution" will "alleviate pressure by opening new pathways for pent-up scientific talent to filter out into society." I had no idea that post-docs and graduate students who left the academic track were "pent-up" somewhere! I do hope someone lets them out of their cage soon.

Now there really is a problem, that all of you readers who have gone through grad school know. There is a lot of social pressure that is piled up on you to reinforce the notion of a hierarchy of science careers. The very topmost rung is the research professor at a Research I university, getting big grants and running a big lab with a team of grad students and post-docs; anything less is regarded as something of a failure. It can make it very hard to move on to something like these Renaissance jobs Mooney and Kirshenbaum want to promote. You can also see that same attitude resounding throughout the comment threads on their own site, where being, for instance, a teaching professor at a small liberal arts college or, oh no, a mere popularizer of science are the marks of a lesser being.

I think it would be absolutely wonderful if science students could also value the noble profession of teaching, or think that communicating well was a most excellent and useful skill that they could acquire by writing and speaking throughout graduate school. Or if they felt empowered to use their knowledge for public outreach in film-making, or in working as an activist for environmental causes, or finding a job in the pharmaceutical industry that would help establish new medicines. I know I felt that way, as did enough of my peers who went on to such professions. However, nothing in their book explains how to make such an attitude occur more frequently, or even why we should expect a major change in the culture if something that is already happening, Ph.D. students finding work outside of academia narrowly defined, should continue to happen.

So, bottom line, still useless. The fact that Mooney seems so determined to hide his Grand Solution from public attention testifies to the fact that he's offering some mighty thin gruel in his book.

Oh, but I should mention where Mooney shines, just to be fair. He's written a rather shallow book with negligible substance, but he has managed to get articles in Salon that tells us we need to "figure out where the real blocks to accepting science are" (but fails to tell us what they are) and another in Newsweek that claims that atheists are "hurting their own cause". Perhaps self-promotion ought to be high on the list of their proposed Renaissance curriculum.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/14/multiplier-muddles-wonkish/

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/?p=3271

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/worldchanging_fulltext/~3/mezxvR7-87Y/010135.html

The U.S. government PR team celebrates the green retrofitting of the Empire State Building with this 2-minute video, which features the the building management, commercial tenants and others lauding the "simple tactics" used to achieve massive energy savings.

I think the best point made here comes from Anthony E. Malkin at the Empire State Building Company, when he says, "It's great to build green, but it's more important to begin to look at energy efficiency in the existing built environment."

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(Posted by Julia Levitt in Energy at 11:52 AM)

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/scienceblogs/pharyngula/~3/hNRddjIKPt0/i_find_it_appropriate_to_read.php

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/07/i_find_it_appropriate_to_read.php

The military has plans for a new kind of drone robot that will wander the wastelands of future battlefields, scooping up organic debris — such as dead bodies — and burning them to fuel their advance. The call it an EATR: Energetically Autonomous Tactical Robot.

It's kind of sweet, in a morbid way. It recycles! It uses renewable energy! Put a gun on it, and it could even harvest its own fuel as it mows its way through the enemy's cities!

To be perfectly fair, though, the company building it doesn't talk about using bodies for energy, but is more about generic biomass. Bodies are probably messy and inefficient compared to hunks of wood or corn stubble. It's Fox News that emphasized the corpse-eating idea, which somehow seems like just the kind of thing Fox would find copacetic.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/worldchanging_fulltext/~3/NItKDEq607w/010134.html

As i wrote yesterday, i've just spent a day in Florence to see Green Platform - Art, Ecology, Sustainability at the Strozzina center. It is a good show, more coherent than Greenwashing and much darker than Radical Nature. Proper review should land on your screen shortly but i felt compelled to dedicate a post to a project i found particularly striking.

Michele Dantini, The World Bank, 2009. Courtesy the artist

In the Winter of 2001/02, Michele Dantini traveled to Cameroon to photograph and document what is still the biggest private sector investment in sub-Sahara Africa: the construction of the controversial Chad-Cameroon oil pipeline.

The World Bank takes the name of the international financial institution that made the construction possible. It's indeed the World Bank that teamed up with ExxonMobil, ChevronTexaco and Petronas of Malaysia and allocated 4.2 billion dollars to the ambitious project. Concerned by the potential risks to human rights and the environment, international NGOs and local communities voiced their opposition right from the start. The consortium attempted to calm down the accusations by forcing the governments of Chad and Cameroon to sign a strict guarantee protocol destining oil revenue for health, education and agriculture.

Michele Dantini, The World Bank, 2009. Courtesy the artist

It soon became clear that the petroleum exploitation did not manage to balance juicy profits with ecological and social principles. The pipeline required the cutting through the primary forest of south-eastern Cameroon for some 1000 kilometres in order to reach the export-loading terminal on the Atlantic coast and the drilling of 300 oil wells in Doba, south of Chad. The region affected by the project is a richly biodiverse area and home to the forest-dependent Bakola and Bagyeli people. 150 families were singled out for resettlement, many village lands were expropriated, crops and plants destroyed and water sources polluted. The upgrading of existing seasonal roads has facilitated logging and illegal poaching in otherwise inaccessible areas. Besides, the arrival of largely male job seekers in the area has led to serious social disruption of the communities, with prostitution, alcohol abuse, and STD all on the rise. The compensation plan crafted by the World Bank was very limited in scope and inadequate to restore or improve on broken livelihoods.

Michele Dantini, The World Bank, 2009. Courtesy the artist

The pipeline commenced operation in autumn 2003. Less than five years later a statement from the World Bank announced that it was ceasing to support the project because Chad's government had repeatedly violated the terms of the agreement by using oil revenue to purchase arms and recruit French troops.

The World Bank, 2009. Photo Credit: CCCS, Firenze; Valentina Muscedra

The artist created a magazine (bilingual: italian and english) distributed in the gallery and entirely dedicated to the pipeline and its developments. If you can't go to the Strozzina befor ehte show closes, you can download the PDF of the mag online.

Green Platform runs until July 19, 2009 at Strozzina in Florence.

This piece originally appeared on Regine Debatty's blog, We Make Money Not Art

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(Posted by Regine Debatty in Arts at 10:34 AM)

http://coilhouse.net/2009/07/14/come-sail-away/

http://coilhouse.net/?p=8747

Journey by Egil Paulsen

Like any other job, there are downsides to being employed at the Catacombs. The company health insurance does not cover dental, for example. Also, parking is sparse. There are also more idiosyncratic deficiencies and policies, like the recent memo I received from Zoe which informed the staff that olives would no longer be allowed on the premises. Still, for every omission or strange and drug-addled edict, there is a perk. Our co-pay is almost criminally low and the break room is always fully stocked. The company also works with other local businesses to get discounts for employees, like 10% off electrolysis (Thanks, Dave!).

Certainly the best perks though, are the company vehicles. Not only are they immaculate and well-kept, they are also available for employee use. It’s comforting to know that should the grind of panning through the silt of the web for that tell-tale sparkle become too much, one can call down to M.E.R. to have their office unlocked and sign out the company balloon for an hour. After being escorted to the roof there it will be, the cranium full and bobbing gently over the basket. Then, it’s just a matter of dropping some of the eyes and you’re on your way. Just you, your armed guard, and the endless gray vista.

Post tags: Art, Coilhouse, Surreal

Dear Mr. Steve Jobs,

Hello from Albert Hofmann. I understand from media accounts that you feel LSD helped you creatively in your development of Apple computers and your personal spiritual quest. I'm interested in learning more about how LSD was useful to you.

I'm writing now, shortly after my 101st birthday, to request that you support Swiss psychiatrist Dr. Peter Gasser's proposed study of LSD-assisted psychotherapy in subjects with anxiety associated with life-threatening illness. This will become the first LSD-assisted psychotherapy study in over 35 years.

I hope you will help in the transformation of my problem child into a wonder child.

Sincerely,
A. Hofmann

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/worldchanging_fulltext/~3/wNDZznq6eAM/010133.html

Five climate change pieces with something new to say:

Two degrees of global warming -- the target the G8 nations last week approved as a maximum temperature rise allowable due to climate change (and which many argue is being made inevitable by slow political action in G8 nations) -- has been played in the media as a "moderate" target. It's not. Real Climate writes about a two-degree goal:

"[E]ven a “moderate” warming of 2°C stands a strong chance of provoking drought and storm responses that could challenge civilized society, leading potentially to the conflict and suffering that go with failed states and mass migrations. Global warming of 2°C would leave the Earth warmer than it has been in millions of years, a disruption of climate conditions that have been stable for longer than the history of human agriculture. Given the drought that already afflicts Australia, the crumbling of the sea ice in the Arctic, and the increasing storm damage after only 0.8°C of warming so far, calling 2°C a danger limit seems to us pretty cavalier."

Compared to a three-degree rise, aiming for a two-degree temperature rise is playing Russian roulette with one bullet instead of four. That doesn't make it safe.

===

Developing nations at the G8 summit demand rich nations reduce CO2 40% by 2020. This demand got largely ignored or played as pure politics in most of the English-language media, but there's actually a very real point to see here: if we want to both dramatically curtail emissions by the middle of the century and provide for greatly more widespread prosperity, it's not enough for rich countries to meet their obligations in three or four decades. Rich countries need to meet their obligations first, both because they have the economic means to do so, and because it is their blazing of a path to climate-neutral prosperity that will clear the way for billions in the developing world to follow as they climb out of poverty. A set of goals which are ambitious decades from now but vague over the next two decades, well those are next to useless.

===

Ally Alan Durning (a brilliant researcher whose work frequently appears here at Worldchanging) details what's to love and hate about the Waxman-Markey climate bill that passed the U.S. House of Representatives. A couple key bits:

"I hate that Waxman-Markey allows 2 billion tons of offsets each year. That’s too many by an order of magnitude. Offsets are too slippery; you can never be sure if you’ve reduced emissions overall or just moved them around. W-M’s offsets provision could blow a hole in the cap – and the cap is the only guarantee we’ll meet crucial goals. This offsets number is, in my view, the bill’s biggest flaw.

"I hate that Waxman-Markey’s goal for 2020 is a paltry 17 percent reduction below 2005 levels. President Obama’s clean-energy stimulus and budget investments, the 2007 federal energy bill, new fuel-economy standards announced in May, and new programs in Waxman-Markey for efficient buildings, vehicles, and appliances—these initiatives alone might take the United States to a 17 percent drop in emissions. Even without cap and trade."

"I love W-M’s “strategic reserve”—a stockpile of permits that authorities will accumulate to help buffer prices. To establish the reserve, authorities will withhold a share of each year’s permits, typically 1- 3 percent. The reserve will have the effect of tightening the cap in normal years, but if permit prices spike upwards (rising by 60 percent above their three-year average), it will temper the market by releasing permits. Smart policy! This reserve is a clever, cap-protecting alternative to an off-ramp, which would generate cap-busting extra permits if prices spiked."

"I love many of its technical features: W-M provides for unlimited “banking” but tightly limits “borrowing”; has few barriers to bidding at its permit auctions (low barriers to entry are among the best safeguards against market manipulation); uses quarterly, uniform-price, sealed-bid, single-round auctions (don’t ask); incorporates a battery of protections against market manipulation; allows linkage with European and other cap-and-trade systems, at the discretion of federal authorities; and allows any recipient of free permits to offer them on consignment at the main federal auction."

===

Building bright green prosperity is now the U.K.'s official economic strategy, says Prime Minister Gordon Brown:

Factories producing energy-saving products, construction companies erecting renewable energy systems, scientists working to develop new nuclear power, mechanics maintaining hybrid engines and people installing insulation in homes: this is the workforce of the future. So as we meet our international obligations, we must seize the opportunity for a comprehensive transition to a greener, cleaner future for Britain - one which is fairer, stronger and more prosperous for all.

Two weeks ago, the government launched Building Britain's Future, setting out our radical plan for recovery and beyond into a digital, low-carbon, high-technology age. We will pursue a new, more active industrial policy - investing towards a nationwide high-speed broadband network by 2016, building a world-class modern infrastructure and supporting future industries such as biotechnology, life sciences, advanced manufacturing and financial services. And over the coming fortnight we will push further ahead with a series of announcements on electric cars and railways and on energy-efficient homes and communities.

===

We often hear that the kind of climate change we're facing has no parallel in recorded human history, but that's actually substantially understating the case. New measurements show greenhouse gas levels are already the highest they've been in 2.1 million years. That's grim new information, but not nearly as provocative as the fact that we need to go back 55 million years to find a rapid temperature spike like the one we are on our way to causing. Our great-great-umpeteengreat-grandparents were little tree-shrew-like primates back then. That's how unprecedented our climatic experiment is.

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(Posted by Alex Steffen in Climate Change at 10:33 AM)

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/worldchanging_fulltext/~3/YZRJRb7nAXI/010132.html

From the photo archive of the Centre for Land Use Interpretation, 1977. Photograph: CLUI archive

Radical Nature - Art and Architecture for a Changing Planet 1969-2009, an exhibition that opened a few days ago at the Barbican in London, brings together Land Art, environmental activism, experimental architecture and utopianism.

Artists and architects have always been moved and inspired by the beauty and mysteries of nature. Since the 1960s and even more unreservedly over the last five years, the increasingly evident degradation of the natural world and the effects of climate change have brought a new urgency to their responses.

Mark Dion Mobile Wilderness Unit, Wolf, 2006. Courtesy Georg Kargl Fine Arts, Vienna. Photo: Lisa Rastl

There is sincere commitment in artists' efforts to raises consciences about the eco-drama our planet is going through... even if sometimes, while visiting artshows on a similar topic, i've found myself in front of art works or events that smelled a bit too pungently of opportunism. But if those artworks help us change the world that's a good thing, right? My answer is "yes of course but how can i avoid being cynical?" As long as these artworks do not step out of museums and galleries most people hardly ever visit (i'm not talking about you and me but about my old friends, most of whom have no time nor inclination to follow the visual art scene), i fear that the impact of their work might be somewhat limited. Besides, setting up a contemporary art exhibition, whether its theme is eco-awareness or Bronze Age jewellery, is everything but a 'sustainable' activity. Laudable exceptions, however, are slowly emerging.

Lothar Baumgarten. Albatross,1968. Courtesy Marian Goodman Gallery, New York and Paris

Right! That didn't prevent me from enjoying Radical Nature. Unlike the many shows i've seen over the past 2 years on the exact same topic, this one is more than the sum of its parts. The pieces found on the first floor are mostly flashy, easy to love artworks. The most thought-provoking pieces occupy the gallery upstairs. Many of them are remnants of performances, photos and videos of actions, models of projects and other paraphernalia.

Simon Starling. Island for Weeds, 2003. Courtesy the artist and the Modern Institute/Toby Webster Ltd, Glasgow. Photo: Jeremy Hardman-Jones, c/o Scottish Arts Council

Back in 1999, Simon Starling was working on an artwork in Scotland when he learnt that rhododendrons were to be uprooted and destroyed in the country. Considered weeds in the UK, the plants were due to be removed by government agencies from an environmentally "pure" zone of native vegetation and destroyed. Starling took seven rhododendrons and drove all the way from Northern Scotland to southern Spain, reversing the introduction of these plants to England in 1763 by a Swedish botanist. The work, called Rescued Rhododendrons highlights all the subtleties, complexities and paradoxes of nature, or rather what we regard as 'nature.' It is also a political piece, one that echoes the sometimes openly xenophobic ideas of ethnic purity found in many parts of Europe.

The work included in the Barbican exhibition builds upon Rescued Rhododendron. Starling's Island for Weeds is a floating island that hosts the plant that Scotland is adamant it should be eradicated. Starling had first hoped to install the floating structure on the famous Loch Lomond but his idea was rejected. Island for Weeds astutely questions the ability (of nature, of a nation or any system) to absorb new organisms and ideas.

Henrik Håkansson, Fallen Forest, 2006. Courtesy the artist, Galleria Franco Noero, Turin and The Modern Institute/ Toby Webster Ltd, Glasgow. Photo: Yann Revol

Henrik Hakansson displaced nature too but in a much more shocking way. His Fallen Forest is a 16-metre-square segment of rainforest re-planted in black plastic pots and flipped on its side as a comment on the unbalanced relationship between man and nature. Powerful lights pointed towards this portion of nature enable the plants to grow horizontally, though some of them didn't seem to be in excellent shape when i visited the show.

Agnes Denes. Wheatfield, A Confrontation, 1982. Photograph: © Agnes Denes
Courtesy the artist

In 1982, Agnes Denes planted a two-acre field of wheat in a vacant lot in downtown Manhattan. Wheatfield -- A Confrontation yielded 1,000 lbs. of wheat on a ground worth fortunes to comment on "human values and misplaced priorities".

em>Agnes Denes. Wheatfield, A Confrontation, 1982. Photograph: © Agnes Denes
Courtesy the artist </em>

It took her about a year to prepare the site, removing junk and debris from the construction of the nearby World Trade Center. She even installed an irrigation system. After that, trucks after trucks brought in organic matter to make the topsoil. The harvested grain then traveled to 28 cities worldwide and was symbolically planted around the globe.

As part of Radical Nature the work is restaged at an abandoned railway line in Dalston, East London (opens on July 15.)

Joseph Beuys's Honigpumpe am Arbeitsplatz (Honey Pump at the Workplace), 1977
Photograph: Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Denmark

One cannot dream of a more suitable guest at the exhibition than the co-founder of Germany's Green Party. Barbican is indeed showing the remains of Honeypump in the Workplace, a performance that saw Joseph Beuys pumping two tons of honey through 17 meters of plastic tubing, using motors lubricated with over 200 pounds of margarine. The action lasted for the 100 days of Documenta 6 and was accompanied by talks and debates that all together highlighted his expanded notion of art.

Joseph Beuys, Honigpumpe am Arbeitsplatz. First presented at documenta 6, 1977

Honey takes an important place in Beuys' work, it is the product of bees who, for him, represented as ideal society of warmth and collaboration.

Ant Farm, Oceania, Dolphin Embassy Sea Craft, 1976. Photo: Doug Michels

The Dolphin Embassy was an unrealized sea station that American architects Ant Farm had imagined to build in Australia. The project aimed at researching the possibility of establishing non-verbal communication between dolphins and humans using the new video technologies. Interspecies communication was for them a means to reach a shared vision for a harmonious co-evolution.

As usual, Ant Farm's practice made an innovative use of technology, this time by making video equipment the intermediary that would enable humans to connect with dolphins. (more info at this video of a press conference where Doug Michels and Doug Hurr are presenting the Dolfin Embassy to the media.)

Ant Farm, Doug Michels with video and dolphins in Australia, 1977. Courtesy Ant Farm. Photo: Alex Morphett

In the '70s, Wolf Hilbertz developed the mineral accretion process which consists in the electrolytic deposition of sea-shell-like minerals from seawater that creates a construction material. Sunlight would then turn the minerals in seawater into limestone for underwater and dryland constructions.

Hilbertz's Autopia Ampere project was an island that would grow in the Mediterranean Sea. It would house, feed, and employ 50,000 inhabitants.

No one does Philippe Rahm like Philippe Rahm. His Pulmonary Space is a form made to inflate when 5 musicians blow into their wind instrument. In his statement about Pulmonary Space, Rahm refers to Hegel who considered music the most beautiful art form and architecture the lowest art form. According to the philosopher, the more an art form goes beyond its materiality, the less it is constrained by the natural world and the closest it is to pure spirit, the more elevated and transcendent it became.

Today we know that sound or voice are not abstract nor dematerialized. They possess a physical, biological and chemical dimension. Pulmonary Space gives a visible, physical presence to music.

Video of a Pulmonary Space performance:
Pulmonary space

More images: Barbican, flickr and The Guardian.

Radical Nature - Art and Architecture for a Changing Planet 1969-2009 runs until 18 October 2009 at the Barbican Art Gallery.

Events focusing on a similar topic: Day 1 at the VivoArts School for Transgenic Aesthetics: Seed broadcasting workshop, Open Sailing, drifting lifestyle to cope with looming disasters, How to Save the World in 10 Days at Vooruit in Ghent, Transmediale 09 - Survival and Utopia, Interview with Ulla Taipale from Capsula, Greenwashing. Environment, Perils, Promises and Perplexities , Ecological Strategies in Today's Art (part 1) and (part 2).

See also: Ant Farm retrospective in Sevilla.

This piece originally appeared on Regine Debatty's blog, We Make Money Not Art

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(Posted by Regine Debatty in Arts at 10:23 AM)

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/worldchanging_fulltext/~3/WnMg_xPzeqI/010131.html

The solutions picked by the Guardian and Manchester International Festival's expert panel as the most promising for tackling global warming

The Guardian and Manchester International Festival assembled an expert panel to sift through ideas for tackling climate change from all over the world. Below are the top 20 and you can vote on the what you think is the best of the top ten here. The results will be presented to policy-makers as The Manchester Report.

The panel was chaired by Lord Bingham, Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales, the most senior judge, until 2008. It was made up of Dan Reicher, director of climate change and energy at Google.org; Bryony Worthinton, director of Sandbag.org; Chris Goodall, editor of carboncommentary.com; and Prof Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, founding director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research.

The panel's top ten

Concentrated solar power
Gerry Wolff explains how concentrating solar power in deserts could supply enough electricity to power the whole of Europe.

Thorium nuclear power
Switching from uranium to thorium as our primarily nuclear fuel could lead to cheaper, safer and more sustainable nuclear power.

Carbon capture plants part-fired with wood
If affordable carbon capture and storage technologies can be developed, the prospect is there for "carbon negative" power plants that burn a mix of coal and wood.

Ceramic fuel cells
Domestic fuels cells are super-efficient mini power stations that can efficiently and cheaply provide electricity and hot water.

Sequestering carbon and boosting crops with biochar
Turning crop wastes and other biomass into charcoal and spreading it on tropical soils can sequester carbon and boost crop productivity.

Marine energy
Marine turbines are like underwater windmills than can extract energy from fast-flowing tides or deep ocean currents.

Regenerating grasslands
Grazing cattle in a way that imitates the movements of wild herds could lock huge quantities of CO2 into the world's dry soils.

Efficient cooking stoves
Simple and inexpensive biomass cooking stoves can slash emissions, save forests and avoid lung disease.

Universal family planning access
Global investment in family planning and female education could slow down global population growth, reducing future emissions and tackling climate change vulnerability.

Enhanced geothermal power
Enhanced geothermal systems, or 'hot rocks', can be exploited in a larger number of locations and operate 24 hours a day.

The 10 runners up

Energy bonds
Backed by the government, 'energy bonds' would allow individuals and institutional investors to finance a renewable energy revolution.

Carbon conversations
Knowledge and awareness of climate change isn't enough to influence low-carbon lifestyle changes; people need to be engaged on a emotional level.

Giant algae 'stomachs'
Giant plastic 'stomachs' in the sea could be used to digest seaweed farmed at the ocean surface, converting it into CO2 for burial and methane for cooking and heating.

Methanol and artificial photosynthesis
Carbon dioxide generated by power stations can be converted into methanol and used to generate electricity or fuel cars.

Adding lime to the oceans
Putting lime into the oceans has the potential to decrease ocean acidity and reduce atmospheric CO2 levels.

Leasing low-emission cars
Schemes for leasing super-lightweight low-carbon cars could help slash the emissions of the transport sector.

Solar PV and feed-in tariffs
Solar photovoltaic energy reduces emissions both directly and indirectly – and it can make an ideal long-term investment vehicle, according to its advocates.

New indicators for human development
Rethinking economics to reduce consumption and emissions and boost life satisfaction.

Cloud-making ships
Ships that spray minute water droplets into the sky could increase cloud cover and reflect sunlight away from the earth.

</div>

This piece originally appeared in The Guardian

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(Posted by WorldChanging Team in Climate Change at 10:06 AM)

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/scienceblogs/pharyngula/~3/MXNpk-qX1ac/burned_out_on_the_bickering_am.php

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/07/burned_out_on_the_bickering_am.php

Then you need to turn to the non-scientists for some refreshing expressions of unity. Or not.

A New Age magazine in Minnesota is under new management, and the editor wants to exercise some "quality control": astrology, fairies, life-force energy, and spiritual quests are OK. Channeling and paganism are out. This has annoyed the so-open-minded-their-brains-have-fallen-out crowd.

Other New Age leaders are appalled.

"He is excluding channeling? Yikes. Or pagans? He should not be doing that," said Kathy McGee, editor of the Washington-state-based magazine New Age Retailer.

"New Age is an umbrella term encompassing anything on a spiritual path — Bigfoot, Jesus, Buddha. Even worshipping a frog is sort of OK," McGee said.

She said New Age thinking is all-or-nothing — you either have an open mind to all beliefs, or you don't. It is wrong for anyone to pick which beliefs are acceptable.

"You don't want to say, 'This is OK, and this is not,' " McGee said. "There is nothing we would exclude. We are about goodwill to men."

Her definition, then, puts Bigfoot believers shoulder-to-shoulder beside organic farmers. Along with channeling, she includes the Fair Trade movement, which promotes products that benefit Third World farmers.

Wait a minute…worshipping a frog is sort of OK? Only "sort of"? I am offended. Why is she belittling the faith of frog-worshippers all around the world?

The rest of the story has some interesting information about the cracks in the New Age universe. Organic farmers would rather not be associated with fairies. Chiropractors really hate it — one says, "That New Age connection should not be made. I cannot see how anyone can put chiropractic care and Bigfoot together." To which I can only reply, well, what if Bigfoot has an aching back, huh? He's bipedal, he's probably got the same difficulties we do.

By the way, one psychic also joyfully reports that the poor economy is helping her business.

Sitting on a bench in a secluded part of Riverfront park on my way
back from the library. I was returning some overdue books and would
have paid the fine but the library doesn't open until 10:00. Can you
guess what time it is?

http://heathershair.com/index.php?entry=/1247587519.txt

http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/2009/07/ingraham-puts-crosshairs-on-planned.html

http://robertreich.blogspot.com/2009/07/goldmans-back-and-why-we-should-be.html

Should we breath a sigh of relief that Goldman Sachs has posted record earnings as revenue from trading and stock underwriting reached all-time highs (second quarter net income was $3.44 billion) -- less than a year after the firm took $10 billion directly from taxpayers and $13 billion indirectly through AIG?

But in another respect, Goldman's resurgence should send shivers down the backs of every hardworking American who has lost a large chunk of retirement savings in this economic debacle, as well as the millions who have lost their jobs. Why? Because Goldman's high-risk business model hasn't changed one bit from what it was before the implosion of Wall Street. Goldman is still wagering its capital and fueling giant bets with lots of borrowed money. While its rivals have pared back risks, Goldman has increased them. And its renewed success at this old game will only encourage other big banks to go back into it.

http://heathershair.com/index.php?entry=/1247586280.txt

http://clarkparsia.com/weblog/2009/07/14/cp-awarded-grant-from-nist/

http://clarkparsia.com/weblog/?p=836

Clark & Parsia Awarded Grant From National Institute of Standards and Technology

Research will increase quality of complex enterprise information and software

WASHINGTON, DC, July 14, 2009 — Clark & Parsia announced today that it has been awarded an SBIR Phase II grant from NIST. Based on ARRA stimulus funding, the grant will support developing new data validation capabilities that build on OWL, the Semantic Web ontology language, and on Clark & Parsia technology.

“We think that the Clark & Parsia technology represents an opportunity to conquer the enterprise data validation challenge that exists in every large organization with complex data,” said Evren Sirin, Clark & Parsia’s CTO and SBIR Principal Investigator. “We are happy that NIST recognizes the potential of this technology and has decided to support our company.”

NIST invests in fundamental technology innovation that has the potential for high impact in meeting national and societal needs, particularly in the manufacturing sector. Grants are awarded based on a competitive review process performed by a panel of experts selected by NIST.

The Clark & Parsia SBIR Phase II grant will support work to be conducted from July 2009 through December 2011.

For more information about NIST, visit www.nist.gov.

About Clark & Parsia

Based in Washington, DC, Clark & Parsia is an enterprise software company that uses early-stage research to make information more integrated, accessible, and valuable. Organizations use Clark & Parsia products to analyze, integrate, visualize, and automatically reason about complex information systems, thus increasing agility, reducing programmer effort, and increasing ROI.

Contact

Via email: inquiries@clarkparsia.com; or phone: +1 202 408 8770.

Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of NIST.

Which do you prefer?

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/07/blue-dog-districts-need-health-care.html

The bottom line is that the health care bill, among other things, is designed to help out the poor and the uninsured, and somehow or another will tax the rich in order to do so. I can understand if, say, Jason Altmire from PA-4 wants to vote against the health care bill. His district is suburban and pretty well off, and almost everyone there has health insurance. But Mike Ross of the Arkansas 4th, where almost 22 percent of the population is uninsured? This is a bill designed to help districts like his. And the same goes for most of the other Blue Dogs. A lot of the time, these guys are stuck in a tough spot between their party and their constituents. Here, those interests are mostly aligned. If a lot of the people on the top half of this list are voting against health care, first check the lobbying numbers, and then check to see if they're still in office four years hence.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/scienceblogs/pharyngula/~3/A5L3dX6RzFk/coyne_on_unscientific_america.php

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/07/coyne_on_unscientific_america.php

An important tip to book authors who want to decry the ability of others to engage a consensus: don't alienate the literate, thinking part of your readership yourself. Mooney and Kirshenbaum make much of the fact that those wicked "New Atheists" are going to drive away support for science, a fact not in evidence, but they seem oblivious to the fact that their recommendation to hush up a significant element of the public voice of science is going to alienate us, and it's working to bite them in the ass right now. In other words, Jerry Coyne's review of their book is online.

I'll start with my overall opinion of the book, which is that it is confused, tendentious, evanescent, and preachy.  It is a blog post blown up to book length.  Yes, there are some useful parts, in particular the emphasis on science communication and the need to reward those who are good at it. But these solutions are hardly new; indeed, I could find little in Unscientific America that has not been said, at length, elsewhere. And what is new—the accusation that scientists, in particular atheist-scientists, are largely responsible for scientific illiteracy—is asserted without proof.

I am still endlessly amazed at how proponents of congenial communication, like Mooney and Nisbet, manage to so consistently piss off the targets of their discussions while trying to appease the people who care least about good science.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/scienceblogs/pharyngula/~3/igcvRjazX7A/why_do_they_hate_the_manimal.php

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/07/why_do_they_hate_the_manimal.php

It's happening again. The Republicans are tilting at one of their favorite windmills, the mad scientists' dream of creating an unholy union between beast and human to produce a slave race of soulless monsters. They have introduced legislation to ban human-animal hybrids. And it's even bipartisan! They've got 19 Rethuglicans, like Sam Brownback, the ignoramus from Kansas:

What was once only science fiction is now becoming a reality, and we need to ensure that experimentation and subsequent ramifications do not outpace ethical discussion and societal decisions. History does not look kindly on those who violate the dignity of the human person.

And they've also got 1 Dimocrat, Mary Landrieu of Louisiana:

Here in the United States, we simply cannot open the door to the unethical blending of humans and animals, which the British government seems intent on doing. It creates an unnatural species and is a clear line we cannot cross.

One teensy little problem: these clowns do not understand the science. We actually aren't planning to creating a slave-race of beast-men; the technology isn't there, for one thing, and for another, that's really not at all an interesting goal. No one is planning on operating on any human persons, or even violating them; the focus is all on cells and molecules. This is routine stuff. In one hand, you've got a dish full of human cells — it doesn't talk, it can't sign a consent form even if it had the capacity to understand one — and you want to know what makes them tick. In the other hand, you've got a collection of hard-won tools you've gathered from work in mice or worms or flies; interesting vectors, genes that act as indicators or switches, ways to basically reach into a cell and toggle states. Scientists have had these for years, and we've regularly used these tools to manipulate cells and puzzle out what happens.

Another example: we want to know what genes on different human chromosomes do, but it is highly unethical to do random mutagenesis on human gametes, bring them together, and then raise up the fetus in a volunteer's womb to find out what interesting ways it might go kablooiee. One technique that has been used is to make mouse-human hybrid cells: use a little ethylene glycol to weaken the cell membranes, push a mouse cell next to a human cell, and presto, they fuse. They then recover and go through cell divisions, and the hybrid cell begins to lose pieces of the unnatural excess of chromosomes it's got. You can then screen the resultant cells and correlate the presence or absence of gene products with the presence or absence of specific human chromosomes.

I know. It sounds so nefarious.

One more example: scientists have made transgenic pigs carrying five human genes. The idea is to create animals that can be a source for xenografts — transplanted organs — in humans with a reduced level of rejection. These pigs would become illegal under the Brownback bill, because they mingle a blessedly human H-transferase gene with pig cells. This is not to argue that there are no ethical considerations in these kinds of experiments, since there certainly are: we can argue about the ethics of creating species of pigs with the specialized purpose of providing organs for human use (it's about as great a moral dilemma as raising pigs for meat), and there's also the concern that hybrid pigs will also be dangerous incubators for training viruses to respond to human epitopes. But the ethical debates aren't the domain of crude science-fiction versions of the science that these clueless lawmakers think them to be.

I'd like Brownback to answer a simple question. Does putting the human insulin or growth factor gene into E. coli violate the dignity of the human person? If it does, he's suggesting shutting down a good chunk of the pharmaceutical industry. And Ms Landrieu: what is an "unnatural species"? If they're unnatural and we can't cross that line, then we certainly don't need legislation to enforce it.

I don't know why she bothered to complain about the British government, unless she's using just plain old conservative xenophobia to stir up votes. American scientists have been using hybrid cells and have been introducing cross-species genes into cells for a long, long time now.

   "Such sauce!" is a favourite phrase of mine. In my opinion most stories worth telling could begin with "it was such sauce!" I often forget that this is not a normal phrase to most people, and the fact that my friends tend to pick it up makes this even easier to forget.

   In the phrase "such sauce" emphasis is usually strongly placed on the "sauce," as in "it was such SAUCE!" but sometimes placed on the SUCH, and in some cases even both, to form an emphatic "SUCH SAUCE" ... but basically it's hardly ever just "such sauce" casually uttered without an emphasis.

   At it's most basic, it means "this is [was] so saucy!" Meaning the story I'm about to tell that's prefaced with "It was such sauce..." is about some saucy situation. The dictionary defines saucy as "impertinent, insolent, or boldly smart," but I don't think that does the word justice. I think of it as more of someone doing something devilish with a grin. Something cheerfully (and knowingly) arrogant. Most jokes that are actually funny could probably be said to be saucy.


   I think the phrase's etymology, however, at least in how I came to be using it, took a different route to get to it's current meaning.
   In the California Bay Area "weak sauce" (or weaksauce) is a fairly common phrase for something that is disappointing. I picked up this phrase from my exgirlfriend Kristy, who was a Bay Area native. We also started using the corollary "strong sauce" which isn't in normal use.
   Eventually I started using the phrase "such sauce" simply to mean the situation was either unspecified strong or weak sauce. Usually the flavour of the sauce was obvious from context and the comment was just an observation on the sauce without actually using the normal prefix.

   So basically, "such sauce" can mean either "so saucy" or be a remark about something being strong or weak sauce.


And now for an unrelated photograph


         A sauce delivery device?


Other photos uploaded yesterday include many more of that tube, a firefighting aircraft hanging out in a lake, and me eating a gigantic hotdog at the fair.



If you or your friends have any unique phrases of your own I'd be interested in hearing about them!

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/07/will-kay-bailey-hutchison-play-texas.html

Here's that same data in graph form:



This should be a fun race to follow -- especially if Sarah Palin, who seems to have a mutual grudge with Hutchison and has already endorsed Perry -- gets further involved.

Perhaps the more interesting question for our purposes however is when and if Hutchison will resign her seat in the Senate to concentrate on her pursuit of the governorship. This would trigger a special election in which Democrats could be quite competitive. We have been alert to this possibility for some time now, which is why you see Texas included on our list of potentially competitive Senate races.

Ironically, we had just downgraded the race on speculation that the turnaround in the polling might deter Hutchison from pursuing the governorship after all. Obviously, we were wrong about that. But the fact remains that there's nothing compelling Hutchison to resign her Senate seat until and unless she becomes governor. It's her decision when and whether she wants to resign.

The smart bet, though, is that the resignation is coming (to the great annoyance of Hutchison's colleague in the Senate, John Cornyn). For one thing, this is a pretty big prize that Hutchison is competing for: becoming governor of the nation's second-biggest state. If Texas were to secede, it would have a larger GDP than all but eleven countries (the U.S., Japan, China, Germany, France, the U.K., Italy, Russia, Spain, Brazil and Canada). Hutchison would also become one of the most powerful female governors in history. Of the country's five largest states, only Texas itself has ever had a woman governor (Ann Richards), and it's population was about 25 percent smaller then. And of course, being governor of Texas is an obvious jumping off point for anyone with presidential ambitions.

Also, if Hutchison is losing momentum to Perry, that could cut both ways in terms of her desire to remain in the Senate. On the one hand, she might have more to lose by failing to hedge her bets. On the other hand, it might be precisely that bet-hedging that is getting her into trouble. Perry has been able to grandstand by doing things like

http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/london.asp

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap090713.html

A volcano on

http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/07/conditional-love.html

http://www.overcomingbias.com/?p=19008

In the traditional stereotype, a mother’s love is unconditional, while a father’s love is conditional.  Mom loves you no matter what, but dad loves you because you live up to his standards.  Moms who resist disciplining their kids, but instead say “wait until your father gets home,” seem to want it this way.

Women apparently initiate most divorces, and in my experience also most breakups.  I feel tender toward every woman I’ve ever been involved with, and would be happy to talk to any of them, but many of them do not reciprocate such feelings.  On average women’s love for men seems more conditional that men’s love for women.  Which helps explain why men seem to signal more to women than women do to men.

So when a mother and a wife compete for a man’s affection, the mom has the advantage of offering the less conditional love.  A husband competing with with his wife’s father has a similar advantage.  What else follows from this gender role flip?

P.S.  We’ve passed the 3 million visits mark!