Tag Archives: global climate change

This is where you Live.

09 Tuesday Jun 2015

Posted by in Climate Change., Education, Environment, Natural World Disasters, Politics., Sustaniability, The Future

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The other day I was wondering how one would describe Earth to an alien or a classroom of our modern-day interconnects kids.

Where would one start.

Is it round?  Not quite it is an oblate spheroid instead of a perfect sphere. It takes the Earth on solar day to rotate upon its axis.

An alien might come to earth and attempt to understand the planet by reading the literature of the planet, or just the dictionary. Looking up the word “earth” the alien may be surprised to see the this term has multiple meanings, referring to a planet and to a substance (soil/dirt).

May be the best place to start is to give an perspective of where we are in space.

As you look outward into space, you’re actually looking backwards in time. The light you see from your computer is nanoseconds old. The light reflected from the surface of the Moon takes only a second to reach Earth. The Sun is more than 8 light-minutes away. And so, if the light from the nearest star (Alpha Centauri) takes more than 4 years to reach us, we’re seeing that star 4 years in the past. There are galaxies millions of light-years away, which means the light we’re seeing left the surface of those stars millions of years ago. For example, the galaxy M109 is located about 83.5 million light-years away.

A radio signal to travel once around Earth in 1/7 of a second.  To get to the moon from Earth, so the round-trip time is twice this or 2.46.

From the sun to earth at the speed of light  seconds.https://youtu.be/Bw-I9JimhOM

If aliens lived in those galaxies, and had strong enough telescopes, they would see the Earth as it looked in the past. They might even see dinosaurs walking on the surface.

Only a few of us have ever seen Earth from afar.  It’s mankind’s rarest view of all.

To see it without borders, see it without any differences in race or religion, we would all have a completely different perspective. Because when you see it from space you cannot think of your home or your country. All you can see is one Earth….”Earth, our home planet.

It is a beautiful blue and white ball when seen from space.  the only planet in our solar system known to harbor life.

All of the things we need to survive are provided under a thin layer of atmosphere that separates us from the uninhabitable void of space.

HERE IS HOW I WOULD DESCRIBE IT;

It was formed about 4.5 billion years ago.

Earth is made up of complex, interactive systems that are often unpredictable. Air, water, land, and life—including humans—combine forces to create a constantly changing world that we are striving to understand.

It is the third planet from the sun and the fifth largest in the solar system.

About 71% of its surface is covered by water; the rest by land.

It is orbited by one satellite, the Moon.

Earth’s total surface area is 196,950,000 sq. mi. The area covered by the oceans is 139,480,000 sq. mi. Total land area is 57,470,000 sq. mi.

Earth’s diameter is just a few hundred kilometers larger than that of Venus.

The Earth’s crust is about 6.5 miles thick beneath the oceans, and about 25 miles thick under the continents.

Our planet’s rapid spin and molten nickel-iron core give rise to a magnetic field, which the solar wind distorts into a teardrop shape. The magnetic field does not fade off into space, but has definite boundaries.

Our planet completes its elliptical orbit around the sun in an average solar year, 365.24219 days. Its average distance from the sun is 80,777,537.8 n.mi.

The Earth’s axis is tilted 23.45 deg away from the perpendicular to its orbital plane.

It wobbles very slightly.

The Moon orbits the Earth about once a month (every 29 days, 12 hours, 44 minutes, 2.9 seconds) The average distance from the Earth to the Moon is 238,857 mi., about 30 times Earth’s diameter.

The Earth’s crust is about 6.5 miles thick beneath the oceans, and about 25 miles thick under the continents. The surface layer is made of rock. This outer layer formed a hard, rocky crust as lava at the surface cooled 4.5 billion years ago.The crust is broken into many large plates that move slowly relative to each other. Mountain ranges form when two plates collide. The plates move about one inch per year. About 250 million years ago, most of the land was connected together, and over time has separated into seven continents. So millions of years ago the continents and the oceans were in different positions.

Scientists had previously concluded that the Earth was slightly older than 4.5 billion years old, but had not found a piece of the Earth’s primitive mantle.

The solid shell that is between the Earth’s crust and the outer core makes up about 84 percent of the Earth’s volume. Until recently, researchers generally thought that the Earth and the other planets of the solar system were chondritic. This means that the mantle’s chemistry was thought to be similar to that of chondrites, some of the oldest, most primitive objects in the solar system. Chondrites contain certain isotope ratios of the chemical elements of helium, lead and neodymium.

Sixty-five million years ago it looked quite different than it does to-day.

There are about 300,000 plant species and about 1,400,000 animal species on Earth.

In the next 6.4 billions of years it will be eating by it nearest star the Sun which is 149,597,891 kilometers away.  It will take a little more than 8 minutes before we realized it is time to put on a sweater. It takes Sunlight an average of 8 minutes and 20 seconds to travel from the Sun to the Earth.

It weighs 5.9736×1024kg.  That is about 13,170,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 pounds (or 5,974,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 kilograms).

80% of its fresh water is in its polar ice caps. Fresh water exists in the liquid phase only within a narrow temperature span (32 to 212 degrees Fahrenheit/ 0 to 100 degrees Celsius). The surface is unique from the other planets because it is the only one which has liquid water in such large quantities.

Its greatest present day threats come from humanity which is at a crossroads now, where we have to make an active choice.

Evolution, the Big Bang, and climate change are all things that were first proposed as hypotheses long ago.

Climate change is not. What are we doing about it. The same as always. Turn it into a product for profit.

One choice is to acknowledge these issues and potential consequences and try to guide the future (in a way we want to). The other choice is just to throw up our hands and say, ‘Let’s just go on as usual and see what happens.’ My guess is, if we take that latter choice, yes, humanity is going to survive, but we are going to see some effects that will seriously degrade the quality of life for our children and grandchildren.

The ongoing wars, the distortions of truth we have witnessed, the widening gaps between rich and poor disturb us more than we can say; but we have had so many reminders of powerlessness that we have retreated before the challenge of bringing such issues into our classrooms of our brains.

The best effort so far is the creation of an Earth Day this year.  One day!

Population growth, widespread destruction of natural ecosystems, and climate change may be driving Earth toward an irreversible change in the biosphere, a planet-wide tipping point that would have destructive consequences absent adequate preparation and mitigation. No one knows how close Earth is to a global tipping point, or if it is inevitable.

Life on Earth is constantly changing and only the fittest organisms survive.

Every few of us appreciate how thin our little atmosphere is that supports all life here on Earth. So if we foul it up, there’s no coming back from something like that. The dictionary offers a firm set of definitions for this term, but no single definition, which leads to a sense of complexity. The complexities of perception are, in part, what post-modernism is all about.  I describe it as pure insanity.

The Earth system now includes human society, Our social and economic systems are now embedded within the Earth system. In many cases, the human systems are now the main drivers of change in the Earth system. Earth system changes, natural or driven by humans, can have significant consequences without involving changes in climate. Global change should  not be confused with climate change; it is significantly more. indeed, climate change is part of this much larger challenge.

Throughout history human societies have had to confront and adjust to climatic and environmental hazards. A long-term perspective that draws on such experiences must inform today’s climate policies. I argue that climate policies aimed at mitigating and adapting to hazards should be informed by our knowledge of past human experience.

In today’s globalised world our food tends to take a long route from farm to table, relying on international trade routes that pass through several bottlenecks. Sudden disruption of such delivery systems – via climate change or political volatility – can severely affect the food security of particular regions.

Large-scale governance is unavoidable in today’s world where hazards are regional and often transcend political boundaries, unfortunately at the moment we are relying on out of date World Organisations that are incapable of putting the  Earth First!

<p><a href=”https://vimeo.com/32001208″>EARTH</a&gt; from <a href=”https://vimeo.com/michaelkoenig”>Michael K&ouml;nig</a> on <a href=”https://vimeo.com”>Vimeo</a&gt;.</p>

<p><a href=”https://vimeo.com/79771046″>Climate Change &mdash; The state of the science</a> from <a href=”https://vimeo.com/anthropocene”>WelcomeAnthropocene</a&gt; on <a href=”https://vimeo.com”>Vimeo</a&gt;.</p>

 

Take a trip into the unknown.

https://youtu.be/YzMrNFd4oOk

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The Beady Eye, Looks at Our Common Future Under Climate Change.

01 Monday Jun 2015

Posted by in Climate Change., Environment, The Future

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The hope of the twentieth century rests on its recognition that war and depression are man-made and needless as is so with Climate Change.

Over the past 50 years, humans have changed ecosystems more rapidly and extensively than in any comparable period of time in human history, largely to meet rapidly growing demands for food, fresh water, timber, fiber and fuel.

All can be avoided in the future by turning from … nineteenth-century characteristics … and going back to other characteristics that our Western society has always regarded as virtues: generosity, compassion, cooperation, rationality, and foresight, and finding an increased role in human life for love, spirituality, charity, and self-discipline.

We now know fairly well how to control the increase in population, how to produce wealth and reduce poverty or disease. We may, in the near future, know how to postpone senility and death but to what avail if we continue to deny Climate Change.

It certainly should be clear to those who have their eyes open that violence, extermination, and despotism do not solve problems for anyone and that victory and conquest are delusions, as long as they are merely physical and materialistic.

Our problem is that capitalism provides very powerful motivations for economic activity because it associates economic motivations so closely with self-interest.

Money and goods are not the same thing but are, on the contrary, exactly opposite things. Most confusion in economic thinking arises from failure to recognize this fact.

Goods are wealth which you have, while money is a claim on wealth which you do not have. Thus goods are an asset; money is a debt.

You would think that policymakers with the dark future of Climate Change ahead would be addressing a new set of existential questions.

Such as: Should Economics that grew wealth bear more of the burden to stop climate change.  Another words developed countries should take the lead allowing less developed countries to maintain emissions.

As we all know to date no international mitigation and abatement efforts have taken place on a large enough scale to freeze emissions. We don’t see any intense geopolitical cooperation. Countries will not do anything on behalf of other that requires them to sacrifice their own interests.

Off course when you introduce future generations into the question democracy as it stands is not equipped to represent the interests of future generations never mind the here and now. Humans that don’t exist have no say as to what will it mean to live a meaningful life in a world that has eliminated all wildness, and forms of life from the planet.

So here we are poised to become agent of the greatest catastrophic events ever to hit our planet which could have to support over 10 billion people by 2050.

We are currently on a trajectory to warm the planet 4°C. In such a 4ºC world most of us will not be able to adapt never mind our natural systems.

As we move beyond the stable state we are already well beyond the zone of uncertainty.  The risk for all species – including ours- grow and grow.

planetary boundaries

We need to start thinking in terms that we are just not used to thinking of as a human species.

Will it be left to the market to decide.  With businesses as hubs for democratic engagement this could unfairly shift costs onto either consumers or taxpayers.

I’m not convinced.. that we’ve ended up with a society that’s really able to harness the innovation potential of business.

Climate change challenges democracy. But climate change also needs democracy.

We live in a carbon dependent world. And for the most part, we are loath to forego this somewhat cosy arrangement. Carbon dependency is promoted in part by technology which gives us many good things on the cheap: electricity, personal mobility, affordable consumer goods, cooling and warmth. It is also encouraged by governments which promise easy options to low-carbon outcomes, without delivering these options. And for the most part, we do not seem to care, as the goodies continue to arrive.

We all know in our hearts that this is a cop out: we are duped but we connive in the deceit. Democracy is not a system that forces us to face up to these contradictions. We want to live in a sustainable society but the political system does not reward or support the innovators and entrepreneurs who would guide us to it.

Political institutions manipulate us, as do the power brokers who shape political opinion and guide policy.  Democracy shuns the long-term.

The goal of equipping democracy to mitigate and adapt to climate change is not a one-time endeavor but a continuous process.

Today, the formerly contented European middle classes, sitting in the gap between the rich minority and the poor majority, for the first time in living memory cannot be sure their children will be better off than they are. Confronted by this austere prospect, this group – the natural allies of climate stability – will become unsettled.

The world’s nations are desperately looking for guaranteed techno-fixes to climate change. Democracy around the world has suffered as governments seek to lean on eco-technocrats to cut back on investment in education and health and invest instead in technology for climate mitigation and adaptation.

I really do believe that people can provide the answers – if only we could unleash the real power of that creative potential. Environmental innovation has to be about much more than technology. I’ve realized that, and I’m going to make it my business to ensure that as many other people as possible do too.

So where best to start than requesting your Television Stations to highlight Climate Change in their Weather Forecast.   Join me. This is a war against no enemy other than ourselves.

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Just building a clean tech innovation economy is not enough.

20 Wednesday May 2015

Posted by in Politics., Sustaniability, The Future

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A society that holds out for the younger generation prospects that are worse than those held out to their parents and grandparents is a society that has ceased to progress and begun to regress—one that has lost any claim to historical legitimacy even if it is technologically advanced.

The common experience for millions of young people is permanent economic insecurity.

Youth unemployment in the European Union stands at more than 23 percent, while in Spain it is 56.1 percent and in Greece 62.9 percent. There are 26 million young people in the “developed world” who are classified as not in employment, education or training (NEETS). Poverty and homelessness have become mass phenomena.

While the world may not be one big village in terms of lifestyle, it shares an image of “the good life” that’s proffered in movies, TV, and the Internet. That’s what teenagers in Afghanistan have in common with teenagers in England; they’ve been fed the same image of success in the global community and they know it’s inaccessible. They are angry and, ultimately, their anger has the same target — multinational corporations (and the governments that support them).

The political implications of these social transformations are far-reaching – ISIS.

Capitalism as we know it today—is an amoral culture of short-term self-interest, profit maximization, emphasis on shareholder value, isolationist thinking, and profligate disregard of long-term consequences—is an unsustainable system. Only today five of the biggest banks are fined Billions for fixing the Foreign Exchange Market.

Capitalism must change itself, from the inside. This kind of change will require a radically new leadership ethic, one driven by a new set of motivations and a broader understanding of wealth.

With global population rapidly marching toward 11 billion and with it the demand for food, health services, energy and security, we need to reexamine the models that have gotten us to this point.

There are far better men than I to undertake this reexamination.

The word “capitalism” was coined by the socialists and has historically described a system of state-granted privilege and plutocracy.“

Free market capitalism may be viewed as a system in which individuals make voluntary arrangements involving the exchange of capital.

Free market” implies voluntary arrangements, whereas “capitalism” has become (rightly so)  known as a system in which business and coercive state forces collude to serve whatever arbitrary interests may be lobbied for by the businesses or championed for reasons of power by the politicians.

If it’s a free market, it’s not capitalism. And if it’s capitalism, it’s not a free market.

So why bother trying to apologize for “capitalism” when “free markets” are what you (and I) really wish to obtain?  That is, if you really do believe in “free markets”, then you should probably distance yourself from the word “capitalism”.

The modern world is ruled by multinational corporations and governed by a capitalistic ideology that believes:

Corporations are a special breed of people, motivated solely by self-interest.

Corporations seek: to maximize return on capital by leveraging productivity and paying the least possible amount for taxes and labor. Corporate executives pledge allegiance to their directors and shareholders. The dominant corporate perspective is short-term, the current financial quarter, and the dominant corporate ethic is greed, doing whatever it takes to maximize profit.

Capitalist society is guided by the play of the market mechanism.

There is no better evidence of this than- The “recovery” of 2009-10 ensured that “too big to fail” institutions would survive and the rich would continue to be rich. Meanwhile millions of good jobs were either eliminated or replaced by low-wage jobs with poor or no benefits.

We’re living in the age of corporate dinosaurs that take the path of least resistance to profit; they’ve swallowed up their competitors and created monopolies, which have produced humongous bureaucracies.

There achievements are far to numerous to list here, but here are a few in no particular order.

Climate Change. Inequality of Opportunity, Stock Exchanges, Poverty, Wars, Lack of Fresh Water, Sovereignty Wealth Funds plundering the finite Natural Resources for short-term profit, Corruption, Privatization, People Trafficking, Drugs, ect  You could say without fear of contradiction that conditions are far worse today than at any time since the 1930s.

The nearly universal opinion expressed these days is that the economic crisis of recent years marks the end of capitalism. Capitalism allegedly has failed, has proven itself incapable of solving economic problems, and so mankind has no alternative, if it is to survive, then to make the transition to a planned economy, to socialism.

Corporate executives don’t care about the success or failure of any particular country, only the growth and profitability of their global corporation.

Global corporations are ruining our natural capital.  Four of the top 10 multinational corporations are energy companies, with Exxon Mobil leading the list. Global corporations have ravished the world and citizens of every nation live with the consequences: dirty air, foul water, and pollution of every sort. The world GDP is $63 Trillion but multinational corporations garner a disproportionate share — with banks accounting for an estimated $4 trillion (bank assets are $100 trillion). Global black markets make $2 trillion — illegal drugs account for at least $300 billion.

The past five years have demonstrated the impossibility of changing anything within the existing political system. Inequality has grown enormously. The stock market is booming, the Forbes 400 are richer than ever, yet the conditions for youth and workers are disastrous. War continues without end.

However the historical bankruptcy of capitalism does not bring about its automatic collapse as it will if not already doing so turn Climate Change into profits.

 It is from the market that the capitalist economy receives its sense.

So what if anything is to be done.

At the start of this post I said that Capitalism must change itself, from the inside.

Is this possible. Yes but only by making it pay for our values. By putting humanity back into human.

We needed to make the private enterprise economy work better in a redistribution of wealth and income toward greater equality.

This can only be done by placing:

A World Aid Commission on all High Frequency Stock Exchange Transactions, on all Foreign Exchange transactions (over$20,000) and on all Sovereign Wealth Funds Acquisitions. 

A capitalist economy is inherently unstable” It is one thing to recognize the instability of capitalism, but another to show that an alternative to it is possible.

Clearly no one has got a clue” about what might replace it.

What ever it is we can not going on tolerating a world … in which the needs of the many come before the greed of the few. It is time to recognize that “ Like what, exactly?” is an honest and profound question that demands straight and worked-out answers. And it is time to start working out those answers. I am not advocating abstract revolutionism here.

When questions about the future are bound up so intimately with day-to-day struggles, a new human society surely cannot emerge through spontaneous action alone. To transcend this impasse, people need to know not just what to be against, but what to be for, not just “ what is to be done,” but what is to be undone— what is it exactly that must be changed in order to have a viable and emancipatory socialism?

Unfortunately, this issue received almost no attention throughout most of the last century.

So it is only in recent years that any significant attention has been paid to whether another world is possible. But now, when the future of capitalism is a live issue, it seems to me that this issue needs to be understood as the central problem of revolutionary thought today.

The younger generation is “lost” not just in the sense that it has no future under capitalism, but also in the sense that it is increasingly “lost” to the ruling class and its political establishment. The forms through which the bourgeoisie seeks to maintain political control are losing their hold. Their conscious political experience has been dominated by unending economic crisis, war, the dismantling of democratic rights, political gangsterism and corruption.

And if that not bad enough The global economy is splintering with new and devastating trade agreements like the TTP.

If the function of the market as regulator of production is always thwarted by economic policies in so far as the latter try to determine prices, wages, and interest rates instead of letting the market determine them, then a crisis will surely develop.

It would be disastrous merely to call for socialism while ignoring the problems of mass unemployment. This brings me to the notion of developing socialism within capitalism, enlarging the space of the commons or whatever. Unfortunately, it cannot be done. It has been tried (for instance, in the Israeli kibbutzim ) and it does not succeed. The economic laws of the larger system will not allow it. If you buy from the capitalist world “ outside,” you also have to sell to it in order to get the money you need to buy from it, and you will not sell anything if your prices are high because your costs of production are high. And if you have debts, you have to repay them.

So it appears there is only the one option as I suggest : Make Global Capitalism contribute by a World Aid Commission.

We live in interesting times. The stakes are high. The time has come to face the future with sober senses. The good news is we’re witnessing the failure of global corporate capitalism. The bad news is we don’t know what will replace it.

Financial inequality in the 21st century is on the rise, and accelerating at a very dangerous pace turning into a conflict between billionaires.

Complete change will not happen overnight. It will not be built on the back of one investor or one innovative entrepreneur. It will be something that business owners, investors, political leaders, consumers and entrepreneurs must all work together toward.

Neither of these categories (Investor-Innovator) makes or produces anything but their wealth, which is really a super-wealth that has broken away from the everyday reality of the market, which determines how most ordinary people live.

Worse still, they are competing with each other to increase their wealth, and the worst of all case scenarios is how super-managers, whose income is based effectively on greed, keep driving up their salaries regardless of the reality of the market. This is what happened to the banks in 2008, for example.

So when you look at Climate change what you see is that it is true that it will take time to roll out the infrastructure and technologies to get off fossil fuels, and we will burn a lot of fossil fuel in the process.

What explains our collective failure on climate change? Why is it that instead of dealing with the problem, all we seem to do is make it worse?

Here’s is the inconvenient truth: when you tell people what it would actually take to radically reduce carbon emissions, they turn away.

What would it take to radically reduce global carbon emissions and to do so in a way that would alleviate inequality and poverty? The World Aid Commission.

Just building a clean tech innovation economy is not enough. We have to reinvent our economy from the ground up if we are to successfully address these challenges.

CLIMATE CHANGE IS GOING TO CHALLENGE EVERYTHING THAT CAPITALISM OR ANY SOCIAL SYSTEM STAND FOR.

What we need is “ethical capitalism,” Business leaders must become servant leaders, leaders who serve not just themselves and share holders, but leaders who serve employees, customers, the community, the planet, humanity, future generations, and life itself.

Science has made huge steps, society has not.

The sooner we fix Capitalism the sooner we move to the future we imagine.

If anyone has a better idea, I would be all ears. 

 

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Fresh Water. Essential for human Survival or a Commodity for Profit.

30 Monday Mar 2015

Posted by in Uncategorized

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The most valuable commodity in the world today, is not oil, not natural gas, not even some type of renewable energy. It’s water—clean, safe, fresh water and it is being privatized for short-term profit. 

A gift of nature, or a valuable commodity? A human right, or a luxury for the privileged few? Will the agricultural sector or industrial sector be the main consumer of this precious resource? Whatever the answers to these and many more questions, one thing is clear:

That water will be one of the defining issues of the coming decade, not the internet, not the current conflicts, not poverty or Inequality, nor climate change, or the far of distant stars. 

SAVE THE PLANET, WHEN WE DON’T KNOW HOW TO SAVE OURSELVES. 

Some estimates say that 768 million people still have no access to fresh water.

Water isn’t traded on commodity exchanges yet but you would wrong to think that the most valuable commodity more valuable than oil will remain so.

These days we hear that sustainable development is the only way forward. There will be no sustainable development while the water issues remain unsolved.

It is our responsibility that fresh water does not become a commodity to be exploited for short-term profit to pump out billions in profit.

The Oil Industry wastes 2 million gallons each day in California Fracking.

Across the world Nestlé is pushing to privatize and control water resources. In 2000 at the world Water Forum Nestlé successfully lobbied to stop water being declared a universal right. Profits over people and corporate rights over human rights.

There is now a hunting season on local water resources by multinational corporations looking to control them. This means billions in profits with us paying 2000 times more for drinking water because it comes in a plastic bottle.

Safe water will become a privilege only affordable for the wealthy.

What are our Out of Date World Organisations doing to safeguard the human right to water other than more verbal diarrhea. (They are discussing the goals)

The World Water Forum which is described as a mouthpiece for transnational companies and the World Bank are falsely claiming to head the global governance of water. (See Below)

Water is essential for human survival and well-being and important to many sectors of the economy. However, resources are irregularly distributed in space and time, and they are under pressure due to human activity. Today, freshwater is used unsustainable in the majority of the regions of the world.

Everyone is demanding more of everything, more houses, more cars and more water. And we are talking of a world where temperatures are forecasted to rise by two to three degrees Celsius, maybe more. The situation is already dire.

China’s energy needs alone will grow by 100 percent by 2050. Since 1990, half the rivers in China have disappeared.

 

Globally, water pollution is increasing.  Around 60 percent of the worlds nation’s groundwater resources are already polluted.  In developing countries, an estimated 90% of waste water is discharged directly into rivers and streams without treatment.

At present, most water policy is still driven by short-term economic and political concerns that do not take into account science and good stewardship. State-of-the-art solutions and more funding, along with more data on water resources, are needed especially in developing nations.

Here are some hard facts.

Fragmentation of river systems due to dams is the single greatest threat to freshwater ecosystems’ health.

There are an estimated 800,000 dams worldwide, including around 45,000 large dams (over 15 metres high) and 1,000 mega-dams over 100 meters high. Over 60% of the world’s 227 largest rivers have been fragmented by dams, diversions and canals . An estimated 60 to 80 million people have been displaced by dams and nearly 500 million people have had their lives and livelihoods negatively affected.

Some 20 percent of the world’s aquifers are facing over-exploitation, and degradation of wetlands is affecting the capacity of ecosystems to purify water supplies.

People use 54% of the planet’s “blue water” (water that flows through rivers, lakes, and groundwater). Estimates suggest that this may increase to 70% by 2025.

2.3 billion people live in river basins which are under water stress, where less than 1,700 cubic meters of water is available for each person per year. If current consumption patterns continue, at least 3.5 billion people will live in water-stressed river basins in 2025 – half the world’s projected population.

Our Freshwater Living Planet Index (which tracks changes in populations of 714 species of fish, birds, mammals, reptiles and amphibians found in temperate and tropical lakes, rivers and wetlands) showed populations of freshwater species fell by 35% between 1970 and 2007 – a larger decline than in marine and land ecosystems. In tropical regions the decline was almost 70%.

Around 10,000 of the world’s 25,000 known fish species live in fresh water. An average of 300 new freshwater fish species are discovered every year.

Wetlands around the world provide goods and services to people worth an estimated US$70 billion a year.

Climate change is predicted to have a whole range of impacts on water resources. Variation in temperature and rainfall may affect water availability, increase the frequency and severity of floods and droughts, and disrupt ecosystems that maintain water quality.

Over the last 50 years, the frequency of severe flooding and the damage it causes have increased, in part due to the degradation of freshwater ecosystems.

In parts of the United States, Europe, Australia and New Zealand, over half of wetlands were destroyed in the 20th century, and many more were degraded across the rest of the world.

Water running into sink

 

Freshwater is a highly valuable resource for a large number of competing demands, including drinking water, irrigation, hydroelectricity, waste disposal, industrial processes, transport and recreation, as well as ecosystem functions and services.

There is only one direction for water prices at the moment, and that’s up.

The United Nations estimates that by 2050 more than two billion people in 48 countries will lack sufficient water.

Approximately 97 percent to 98 percent of the water on planet Earth is saltwater (the estimates vary slightly depending on the source). Much of the remaining freshwater is frozen in glaciers or the polar ice caps. Lakes, rivers and groundwater account for about 1 percent of the world’s potentially usable freshwater.

95 percent of the world’s cities continue to dump raw sewage into rivers and other freshwater supplies, making them unsafe for human consumption.

Agriculture is responsible for 87 % of the total water used globally. Fresh water is crucial to human society – not just for drinking, but also for farming, washing and many other activities. It is expected to become increasingly scarce in the future, and this is partly due to climate change. Approximately 98% of our water is salty and only 2% is fresh. Of that 2%, almost 70% is snow and ice, 30% is groundwater, less than 0.5% is surface water (lakes, rivers, etc) and less than 0.05% is in the atmosphere.

Climate change will have several effects on these proportions on a global scale. The main one is that warming causes polar ice to melt into the sea, which turns fresh water into sea water, although this has little direct effect on water supply.

The direct impact of climate change is not the only reason.

The increasing global population means more demand for agriculture, greater use of water for irrigation and more water pollution. Rising affluence in some countries means a larger number of people living water-intensive lifestyles, including watering of gardens, cleaning cars and using washing machines and dishwashers.

Rapidly developing economies also result in more industry and in many cases this comes without modern technology for water saving and pollution control. Therefore concerns about climate change must be viewed alongside management of pollution and demand for water.

If we allow poverty related to water to exist in other countries, then we can expect jealousies between nations to rise, and we can expect acts of vengeance from those who are jealous. It is already a source of conflict in some parts of the world such as the Indus River, which runs between India and Pakistan. Another one would be, in fact, in Iraq, where the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers, rising in Turkey, flow into Syria, then into Iraq. And, in fact, much of Iraq’s water supply is from Turkey.

Fresh Water is why Palestinian must strive for a one nation-state solution with Israel.  It is why we must stop oil exploration in the Arctic.

By the middle of the 21st century, 2 billion to 7 billion people will be severely short of water. The WHO estimates that more than 5 million people die each year from diseases caused by unsafe drinking water. By 2030, global demand for water will outstrip supply by 40 percent, a surefire recipe for war.

It takes some 5000 liters of water to produce 1 kg of rice.

General Electric Chairman Jeffrey Immelt said the scarcity of clean water around the world will more than double GE’s revenue from water purification and treatment by 2010—to a total of $5 billion.

Saudi Arabia is expected to invest more than $80 billion in desalinization plants and sewer facilities by 2025 to meet the needs of its growing population.

While China is home to 20 percent of the world’s people, only 7 percent of the planet’s freshwater supply is located there.  Asian countries will have severe water problems by the year 2025. (demand is increasing)(supply is decreasing)

In France agricultural production is exempt from the Polluter – pays -principle and that it continues to deteriorate the quality of groundwater with impunity.

The state of the world’s fresh water warns that decreasing water supplies could lead to epidemics and international conflict.  Over the next 20 years, the average global supply of water per person is expected to drop by one-third.

What does the future hold? 

How can water resources be managed sustainable while meeting an ever-increasing demand?

We always have the same amount of water.

The six billion people of Planet Earth use nearly 30% of the world’s total accessible renewal supply of water. By 2025, that value may reach 70%. Yet billions of people lack basic water services, and millions die each year from water-related diseases.

And you Wonder why we have terrorism.

Water is a basis of international conflict.

Basic human needs for water should be fully acknowledged as a top international priority. Education and research will be essential to providing the knowledge, skills and technology needed to combat fresh water scarcity in the future.

 

The World Water Forum is a large-scale international conference that is held every three years since 1997 in cooperation with the public, private sectors, academia, and industries.

It was first launched in an effort to facilitate international discussions on global water challenges.

The last Forum attracted more than 35,000 participants in Marseille 2012.

This Council is made up of.

  • 15 heads of State, of governments and European Commissioners.
  • 145 represented countries.
  • 112 Ministers, Vice-Ministers and Secretaries of State.
  • 176 national delegations and international organisations taking part in the Ministerial Declaration.
  • More than 750 elected officials among which 250 mayors and 250 parliamentarians.
  • More than 500 sponsored persons.
  • 3,500 NGOs and civil society representatives.
  • More than 2,600 children and youth.

Like all our Unfunded World Organisations it is an other gossip shop that lacks financial clout to make a differences.

There is only one way we can guard our Fresh Water we must Buy It.

Which can be achieved by Placing a World Aid Commission on all High Frequency Trading, on all Foreign Exchange transactions ( over $20,000) and on all Sovereign Wealth Funds Acquisition.

We than can create Drought Banks, that give Farmers an allocation of water.  He must then decide what is the best return he can get from that amount of water on his property.  It might be a big wheat crop or a small cotton crop.  It doesn’t matter.  The water is the fixed in the equation, not the type of crop.

Drought in China: Chongqing Municipality

folsom lake

Foot Note:

Just in case you think that all of this is Hog Wash:

Here are over 80 organizations (community, academic, governmental, funding, and more) working on water and sanitation issues in multiple countries around the world.

Technologies are actually available but most of them are too expensive or far to time consuming to implement simultaneously with ongoing progress and changes.

Even within the European Union an estimated 20 to 30 million people do not have access to safe sanitation, and little action has so far been undertaken to address this problem.

The question is not whether we can afford it but can we afford not to do it?

For example, what is the cost of no action? Water is already under severe pressure and this will only increase with climate change. We cannot afford to lose the services and benefits that a healthy aquatic ecosystem provides. We need clean water in sufficient quantities for our living and for economic activities. In order to keep that, we need a determined action to protect water resources.

The global population is likely to reach 9.1 billion in 2050, if not sooner. While this alone has potentially dire consequences in terms of pressures on natural resources, especially water,  Climate change sets its own agenda,

The world is changing faster than ever and becoming more and more complex.

Uncertainties about water availability and demand are increasing, as are the associated risks to development and well-being of people, societies and the environment. Unless we can generate the awareness and political will to react now, the crises we are experiencing now are likely to escalate and the odds of meeting our developmental goals will degenerate. This is why the most recent economic crisis could be seen as an opportunity; it provides an occasion for reflecting on a desired collective future.

For once we might act as one to the benefit of all. The future of the planet and the human race both depend on it.

Water is a common heritage of humanity and of future generations and must be protected as a public trust in law and practice. Water belongs to the Earth and other species. Water might teach us how to live together. How to tread more lightly on the earth — in peace and respect with one another.

Just in case you want the whole picture.

Click to access WWDR4%20Volume%201-Managing%20Water%20under%20Uncertainty%20and%20Risk.pdf

 https://youtu.be/sQZd2_1q2F0

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Here’s a Question. Is it time to redefine what it means to be a nation?

10 Wednesday Dec 2014

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This is a vast subject governed by innumerable historical beliefs some of which are set in concrete and blood so I am going to discuss this subject in two parts.

Part One:

If I happen to offend anyone that has lost or might suffer the loss of a love one in defense of their Nation with anything I write in these posts I apologize.

I am not advocating that we should abolish the sense of Nationhood rather that we must look at what it means as there is going to be in the next hundred years a massive remix of people whether we like it or not. 

Population mobility is accelerating and across the globe, people have become far more able and willing to re-locate in search of better employment prospects and a higher standard of living; or increasingly as a lifestyle choice where borders have remained open to them.

The theory of development that has been force-fed into dominant economic discourse all over the world is now contributing as to one of the main reasons we see immigration. With the predictions of climate change in the future this immigration can only increase.

In 2010 there were 214 million international migrants and if they continue to grow in number at the same pace there will be over 400 million by 2050 (IOM 2010).

Forced migration, where people have to move as a result of climate change, conflict and war, threaten to dwarf these numbers.

For the world as a whole at the moment 13% primarily considered themselves as “citizens of the world”, 38% put their Nation-State first, and the larger remainder put local or regional identities first.

There is no getting away from it that Identity is becoming more multi-faceted and whereas multiculturalism has been firmly rooted in racial constructs, ideas about difference has developed in other directions.

Sexual orientation, gender, faith and disability and other aspects of identity are now firmly in the public sphere and contributing to notions of personal identity alongside national identity.

Identity is increasingly complex. As well as the now routine hyphenating of nationality, faith and ethnicity, the consequence of people from different identity groups sharing the same society has also led to the growth of ‘mixed race’ or multiple identities.

This group is now the fastest growing minority in Britain and many other countries.

Inter-marrying, building new virtual networks, and creating real and tangible personal relationships at all levels is currently changing nations from the inside out.  ( What once was Christian will be Muslim. What once was American will be Spanish Mexican, What once was German will to Northern African and so on.)

States – and especially their political elites – have inevitably tried to cling to the idea of clear national boundaries and governance and any suggestions of the loss of sovereignty or the advent political plurality are quickly contested. (For example the recent Resignation of the Israel Government over changing its Constitution to place Jews in a privileged position of citizenship. )

There are now 20 cities with more than 1 million foreign-born people and another 59 cities worldwide with a presence of 100,000 or more foreign-born residents.

These include 11 cities with an immigrant presence of between 500,000 and 1 million people, for example in Argentina, Canada, USA, Russia and Israel (Clark, 2008,).  This is not simply about numerical growth however, migrant communities are also increasingly diverse and this inevitably leads to much greater complexity within nation states, particularly in the Western economies, which are often the target countries for migration.

The extent of population movement is such that all western economies are now characterized by ‘super’ or ‘hyper’ diversity with cities, like London, Stockholm, Toronto, New York and Amsterdam with over 300 language groups.

This is beginning to re-define our notion of multiculturalism which had previously been seen as the then essentially White countries coming to terms with migrants from a limited number of former colonies.  Relationships are now much more complex and community relations are multi-faceted, no longer simply revolving around majority/minority visible distinctions underpinned by distinct sociology-economic positions (Cantle 2012).

The reality is however that national and cosmopolitan identities now also need to sit alongside each other – they are not opposed – something that multiculturalism has never acknowledged.

Governmental responses to date have been ambivalent.

The changing nature of personal identities, with the separate components shaped by increasing diversity in terms of faith, present locality, and ethnicity – as well as an apparently declining sense of nationality is changing what it means to be Irish, English, French, American. Take your choice from Australia to Canada and you finds this taking place.

For the most part, Governments have attempted to reinforce their view of national identity through such measures as the teaching of national history and promoting national citizenship and identity. By steadfastly retaining the pretense of the integrity of national borders and governance, and by attempting to deny the interdependence brought by globalization, they reinforce a fear of ‘others’.

They appear not to want to grasp or lag behind the current reality of multi-faceted identities within their communities and may well find that the new phenomenon of social media will begin to create new transnational relationships which transcend traditional power structures.

Already there is clear evidence of a decline in traditional democratic traditions across Europe, with election turnouts and political party membership in decline. There is also some evidence of the growth of new political movements from the indignados in Spain to that led by the comedian Grillo in Italy and the current lack of trust and disconnection from mainstream parties suggests that these movements could grow still further.

In the UK, along with many other countries, there have been attempts to restrict immigration and to ensure that those immigrants that do come are able to speak the native language and past various tests based on attitudes and knowledge of customs and history (Cantle, 2008).

There has been little by way of any systematic attempt to engage with globalization through intercultural education and to enable people to become more at ease with diversity and globalization

Identity remains promoted on the basis that it is fixed and within boundaries.

Sen, Suggests that conflict and violence are sustained today, no less than the past, by the illusion of a unique identity (Sen, 2006).

He argues that, the world is increasingly divided between religions (or ‘cultures’ or ‘civilizations’), which ignore the relevance of other ways in which people see themselves through class, gender, profession, language, literature, science, music, morals or politics. He challenges ‘the appalling effects of the miniaturization of people’ and the denial of the real possibilities of reasoned choices.

Interculturalism should be part of this response and has been proposed on the basis of a progressive vision (Cantle, 2012) to support the necessary changes, replacing multiculturalism which became completely out of step with this new world order.

The era of transnational relationships, the growth of diasporas, new and pervasive international communications and travel, mean that such policies are no longer tenable. ‘Interculturalism’ can provide a new positive model to mediate change across regions and nations and recognize the multivariate relationships across all aspects of diversity.

When power resides with a global elite, and the economic crisis links our fate across borders, we are, it seems, all ‘citizens of the world. A ‘global village’ mediated through electronic communication.

Globalism, global civil society, global consciousness and cosmopolitanism were to sweep away tribalism of nations to clear the path for a new and better world in which humanity would finally achieve unity and share happiness.

Globalization frees and unites us. Increased freedom of movement, a revolution of communication, the hyper-acceleration of cultural production, have together created a fertile ground for innumerable imagined communities, unrestricted by the limits of geography.

What is now called globalization is only the backlash of an age-old process, constantly fostered by capitalist expansion, which started with the constitution of rival national units, at least in the core of the world economy.

It is very hard to find any trace of this optimistic view of globalization

For me the world economy is evidence of the pervasive ideas of Liberalization, Privatization and Globalization as panacea for all the problems our countries faces today.

World-wide solidarity among workers, disadvantaged and oppressed appears to remain an ideal than a reality and anti-immigrant sentiment is on the rise in the many parts of the world.

The world is certainly globalized and is still globalizing but the old nations and nation-states have not withered away.

If you take Europe it does not exist except as a discursively constructed object of consciousness so it follows that Europeans also do not exist as a people with shared past, other than conflict. Europeaness consists as much in the way of values, interests,and beliefs, modes of justification, etc are mediated and negotiated as in a specific set of identifications. European identity or being European has not seriously undermined the centrality of nationalism in the modern world.

There is little point in contesting the  ‘emptiness’ of so many arguments for global citizenship. It is easier to be a global citizen if you are secure in your rights as a national citizen.

The logic that ‘only if the rich get richer will the poor live better! is a joke.

So why are Nation-states forfeiting their sovereignty in order to support global and regional markets, by selling their natural resources and future infrastructure to Sovereign Wealth Funds. The idea that the Welfare State has failed its citizens is sold through the mechanism of the Public Private Partnership, to pave the way for the take over of public assets by private interests.

The handing over common owned resources by interlinking of rivers, mining projects and disinvestment corroborated by the stock market fly in the face of Nationhood. (see previous Posts) For example in 2007, the total volume of trade by private corporations world over was over $1171 trillion. The sum of the earnings of all countries was a mere $66 trillion, almost twenty times less!

It needs to be understood that the financial power of the multi-nationals’ private business is huge.

The sovereignty of the state is no longer linked to a territory, nor are today’s communication technologies or military strategy, and this dislocation does in fact bring about a crisis in the old European concept of the political Nation.

The nation’ is frequently presented under the banner of Globalization as an outdated inconvenience, a domain of racism and intolerance.

New kinds of national identity are being forged.

A conversion from an ethnic to a multicultural and cosmopolitan community are evolving with alternative forms of belonging. That modernity is almost unthinkable without capitalism (despite any such attempt to render modernity as a democratizing force tied to a conception and experience of time).

Divisions in society are no longer based on citizenship, but rather on economic factors: access to employment, housing conditions and education opportunities.

So is it time for us to redefine the meaning of Nationhood. To rewrite and rethink our individual and collective destinies. Can we turn away from the future of the past and embody the logic of a future to come.

States now need to come to terms with the new circumstances that confront them.

The composition of western societies has become far more dynamic and complex. Ideas about personal and collective identity have inevitably begun to change as a consequence.

While states attempt to assert their relevance in a global age through both multiculturalism and top-down nationalism, new models of identity and strategies of participation need to be developed to deal with the co-existing phenomena of national experience and cosmopolitanism.

We all know that it is all but impossible for races and cultures that have differences going to the root of their immigration to be assimilated into a united whole.

It is my view that a Nation without a written Constitution that enshrines equality across the board can no longer offer Nationhood.

Because the concept of Citizenship and Sovereignty that emerged during the 17th/19th Century have become outdated and remains to this day significantly flawed.

The state remains a very powerful force in the lives of many people and is the most significant unit of democracy in the developed world. For many, being a citizen of a particular state, having absorbed the traditions and cultures, being subject to its laws and economic regulation and taking part in the polity, a sense of belonging is still very evident. This is a key point.

As an elite of politicians, businessmen and media executives literally fly over the great unwashed it is important to recognize that the nation, by now understood as both an antagonistic and unequal grouping as well as the potential for collective sovereignty, really is dead for many of those in positions of global power.

Nationalism will have to develop a new way of comprehending the world.

The answer to all of this will have to wait for the next post.

Why?

Because our Politicians are driven by the economy and not by what their people need to live fulfilled lives.

In the Corporate world Nations only exist in the contested space of conversation. In part two we will address this concept.

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WHERE DO WE GET OUR Thought’s FROM:

08 Monday Dec 2014

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Increasingly today, we are being asked to analyze environmental projects or activities whose effects will be spread out over hundreds of years. Prominent examples include: global climate change, radioactive waste disposal, loss of biodiversity, thinning of stratospheric ozone, groundwater pollution, minerals depletion, and many others.

Recently I posted some thoughts on Artificial Intelligence and the changes that technology will bring to our existence.

Now before I go any further perhaps this post should carry a warning that you might end up confused.

WHERE DO WE GET OUR THOUGHT FROM.

Here I am not talking about what frames our thoughts.  Like your present circumstances or your culture, your education, and the like. What I am interested in is exploring the source of thoughts.

You might ask why.  The answer is that there is not much mental shelf space left in the world to tackle its problems as we are all attracted by anything that commands our attention.

So lets hope the following commands your attention.

I suppose the first thought is that Human beings require language in order to become conscious of a thought. Language is indispensable for us in order to get access to thought. On the other hand, language – because of its sensible character – obscures thought (which by itself is insensible).

Perhaps Artificial Intelligence will be able to circumvent the obstacle of language and access concepts and thoughts directly.

Now there is a thought for you.

There are multiple versions of reality science but very few of them address or make comments on the purpose of the universe or the reason for life.

You are today where your thoughts have brought you; you will be tomorrow where your thoughts take you. – James Allen (author of As a Man Thinketh)

THAT LEADS ME TO THE GREATEST THOUGHT OF ALL:  Creation itself must have been an act of thought.

Long before the Big Bang which is mathematically indescribable there had to be a thought that brought the BIG BANG into consciousness?

From where did it come?  Not the Big Bang, but the thought to create it in the first place.

These things are not explained by science. Consciousness does not come from a combination of chemicals as it is a non-material energy.

So we must ask ourselves just how we can convey a certain piece of information to someone else if we are not able to represent this information to ourselves in conscious thought.

The Big Bang as a single point or particle falls well short of supplying any conceptual thought of what caused it in the first place.

For years, we’ve heard about the power of positive thinking, but without the ability to communication of one’s own thoughts to another which appears to be entirely dependent on representing and recording one’s own thoughts to yourself we can never raise ourselves to the level of specifically conceptual thinking.

If we disregard how thinking occurs in the consciousness of an individual, and attend instead to the true nature of thinking, we shall not be able to equate it with speaking.

Power of thinking denote a special mental capacity.

First, language is used to assist memory, or the representation and recording of one’s own thoughts; and second, it is used as a required vehicle of communication of one’s own thoughts to other people human. Language is needed to develop and/or employ our faculty of reasoning, on the one hand, but at the same time reason has to be presupposed to a certain degree in order for language to be possible.

But then again language is not required to grasp or become aware of thoughts about invisible things – does not by itself imply that the thoughts themselves could not be without language. Like the slips of the tongue, a blush full face, or mere movements of a face muscle, can only too well convey information about the thoughts or attitudes of the conveyor, and even indirectly about what these thoughts and attitudes are about.

Therefore thought depends in certain ways on language, or on symbols in general.

If you consider it we cannot find a convincing reason for the indispensability of language for thought.

However sense-impressions determine almost by themselves the course of our ideas, as is the case in animals.

So is it going to be possible for Artificial Intelligence to invented language without reason? Through symbols that we use to memorize ideas in such a way that we can call them up more or less at will.

So where does that leave us.

Without senses we would never think of them. So does it mean that language constitutes thought, so that the latter could not be without the former?

The power of pure thinking can set the stage for some inspiring change.

O! Just in case you have had a thought don’t blame me.  Shut down the left hemisphere of your brain that controls speech and thought and perhaps you will have discovered Artificial Intelligence.  As positive thinking changes the brain in a physical way, pure thinking can do the same.

 

Let’s have your THOUGHTS.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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people generally discount the future

there are that the universe consists of pure thought

 

 

 

When you understand how the brain works somewhat better, you can use that information to literally enhance your own perspective, broaden your own sense of your capacities and, with that awareness, learn to focus on other things knowing that if you focus on other things consistently you can change what’s there. You can change the way that real estate is used.

”When you understand how the brain works somewhat better, you can use that information to literally enhance your own perspective, broaden your own sense of your capacities and, with that awareness, learn to focus on other things knowing that if you focus on other things consistently you can change what’s there.

You can change the way that real estate is used.”

how to reboot our brains in a positive, pure direction

 

 

 

 

 

Or does it merely mean that we could not become aware of our thoughts or could not grasp them without language?

 

A new perception would let these images sink into darkness and allow others to emerge. without symbols we would scarcely lift ourselves to conceptual thinking.concept is first gained by symbolizing it; without symbols we could not become aware of things that are physically absent or insensible.