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Author Archives: xraymike79
Greta Thunberg Speaks the Horrific Truth of Humanity's Fate
Posted by xraymike79 in Capitalism, Climate Change, Corporate State, Ecological Overshoot, Environmental Degradation, Inequality, Pollution
Abrupt Climate Change, Anthropogenic Mass Extinction, Climate Refugees, Collapse of Industrial Civilization, Coral Die-Off, Deforestation, Dr. Kevin Anderson, Ecological Overshoot, Exponential Growth, Extinction of Man, Financial Elite, Fossil Fuel Industry, Greta Thunberg, Hubris of Man, Hurricane Dorian, Jason Box, Keeling Curve, Methane Release from Thawing Permafrost, Micro-Plastic Pollution, Mid-Pliocene Era, Neil Adger, Nicholas P. Money, Permian-Triassic Mass Extinction, Rachel Warren, Resource Depletion, Sea Level Rise, The Great Dying, Will Steffan
When a 16-year-old girl named Greta Thunberg spoke with trembling anger of the unspeakable crimes today's adults are committing against her and future generations, a chill ran down my spine. She will be alive to see the pulses of rapid sea level rise, the unraveling of industrial agriculture, the mass migration of hundreds of millions of climate refugees, and the disintegration of Earth's biosphere. Today's world with the ever-worsening breakdown of the biosphere is much more dangerous than during the Cold War when the threat of imminent nuclear annihilation hung in the air like the sword of Damocles, as expressed by President Kennedy: "Every man, woman and child lives under a nuclear sword of Damocles, hanging by the slenderest of threads, capable of being cut at any moment by accident or miscalculation or by madness." Not only does the threat of nuclear war persist, the sword of abrupt climate breakdown now looms ever larger as governments are rendered impotent.
Scientists and the Red Cross recently warned the world is currently suffering at least one climate catastrophe per week and nearly two million people per week are needing humanitarian assistance. A UN global assessment confirms the planet is currently experiencing 2,500 conflicts over fossil fuel, water, food and land — conflicts directly related to the ongoing collapse of the earth's biodiversity. No civilization in history has faced a complete reshuffling of the planet's biosphere, let alone the ecological armageddon brought on by a Pandora's box of pollutants from industrial civilization. Microplastics are literally raining from the sky. Irrevocably out-of-step with the natural world, modern civilization is destroying its host ecosystem by altering the geochemistry of the planet. A mass extinction event unlike any in Earth's history is underway. Even if a small fraction of the global population survives this overshoot, it will take 10 million years for biodiversity to bounce back. Since atmospheric CO2 will ultimately be drawn down through a very slow natural process called sedimentation, the Earth will not reach pre-industrial CO2 levels again for more than 100,000 years. The last time CO2 levels were this high was 3 millions years ago during the Pliocene when temperatures were 3-4°C(5-7°F) higher globally than today, and sea levels were 15-20 meters(50-65 feet) higher. It was too warm for glacial ice sheets to even exist in the northern hemisphere.
At 412 ppm and rising, experts said temperature rises of 3-4C are likely now locked in.
What does any honest scientist have to say about mankind's prospects in a 4°C world:
"There is a widespread view that a +4ºC future is incompatible with an organized global community, is likely to be beyond adaptation, is devastating to the majority of ecosystems and has a high probability of not being stable."
Professor Kevin Anderson, Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research (Video, 58:00)
"We have already observed impacts of climate change on agriculture. We have assessed the amount of climate change we can adapt to. There's a lot we can't adapt to even at 2C. At 4C the impacts are very high and we cannot adapt to them."
Rachel Warren, University of East Anglia
"There is a growing sense of panic in those who really understand what a 4°C world might be like."
Prof. Will Steffan, Director of the Australian National University Climate Change Institute
"Thinking through the implications of 4 degrees of warming shows that the impacts are so significant that the only real adaptation strategy is to avoid that at all cost because of the pain and suffering that is going to cost."
Prof. Neil Adger, University of Exeter
"…there is also no certainty that adaptation to a 4°C world is possible. A 4°C world is likely to be one in which communities, cities and countries would experience severe disruptions, damage, and dislocation, with many of these risks spread unequally. It is likely that the poor will suffer most and the global community could become more fractured, and unequal than today. The projected 4°C warming simply must not be allowed to occur."
World Bank report (2012) Turn down the heat: why a 4°C warmer world must be avoided
"If we don't reduce greenhouse gas emissions and ultimately stabilize CO2 — and we also have to draw down a lot of carbon out of the atmosphere. If we don't achieve that, there's no real prospect for a stable society or even a governable society…"
Jason Box, Prof in glaciology at the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland
People are completely oblivious to our dependence on the complex adaptive systems that allow humans to exist and persist. To be clear, when the global temperature rises by 4°C within this century it will be faster than the blink of a geological eye, and we, along with 80% or more of the planet's species are finished. 96% of all marine species and more than two-thirds of terrestrial species perished during the Great Dying at the Permian-Triassic interface. Global mean temperature at that time rose an estimated 5-8°C over a timespan of 3,000-20,000 years. A 4°C rise over just two centuries will be a rate of warming 15 to 100 times faster than that past extinction event. At this speed of warming, regions would experience temperature spikes of 10-15 degrees above normal in some months. Ecosystems would implode and the services they provide that sustain us would be obliterated. Virtually every vertebrate species on Earth would disappear, along with most plants and many invertebrates.
At just 1°C of warming we are already seeing major ecosystems such as coral reefs unraveling. Hurricanes so powerful that they require a new category now barrel across the Atlantic ocean and completely decimate islands; the cataclysmic Storms of our Grandchildren that Hansen warned about have only just begun. Arctic permafrost melt has already exceeded 2090 projections. It was economist William Nordhaus that set the 2°C warming target in 1975, not scientists. What did he get for this dangerous speculation, divorced from empirics? The Nobel, naturally. These days he is saying 3.5°C is just fine. John Kerry says we cannot leave the climate emergency in the hands of the neanderthals in power, but I dare say that anyone promoting mainstream economic theory is guilty of omnicide. Capitalism's "extractivism" has turned the entire planet into a sacrifice zone.
Grand Bahama island before/after Hurricane Dorian made landfall, Sept 1, 2019
Humanity has essentially documented its own demise for the last half century while the Keeling curve inexorably rises faster than ever. As MIT Prof Daniel Rothman says, "When carbon levels in the atmosphere spike dramatically, the web of life collapses." We are now seeing a record 10ppm of CO2 rise every four years and have have failed to curb emissions growth let alone move towards any sort of carbon neutral world. Alternative energies remain a sliver of total global energy consumption. In fact, "the annual increase in global energy use is greater than the increase in renewable energy, meaning fossil fuel use continues to grow."
The rise of political 'populism' and the election of reactionary politicians in the U.S. and abroad has thrown yet another monkey wrench into any possibility of tackling the climate crisis. The demagogic Trump administration is simply burying any scientific evidence and ignoring its government's own research on such things as the recent surge in climate refugees from Latin America due to climate-induced food insecurity. Russia and Brazil have both encouraged and precipitated the wildfire infernos raging in their countries. The catastrophe unfolding in the Amazon is a direct result of President Bolsonaro's neoliberal policies designed to plunder the Amazon much like Trump's dismantling of the EPA and deregulation of corporations. Both ignore the science of climate change and the reality of ecological collapse. In the case of Russia's Putin, it was a cold economic calculus: "If the cost of putting out these remote fires is greater than the profit that could be made from selling the timber, they can decide to let it burn."
And then there's the global debt bomb of $250 trillion waiting to explode, not to mention the $200-250 trillion global carbon debt which increases by 16 trillion every year. Meanwhile, banks are quietly shielding themselves from climate catastrophe at taxpayers' expense by shifting risky coastal mortgages off their books and onto the federal government's Fannie and Freddie programs. Just as the U.S. government is leaving vulnerable countries to fend for themselves, so are private institutions unloading the risks onto the public. For those at the very top of our economic pyramid scheme who control public policy, dwindling resources will be kept first and foremost for them while everyone else is treated as collateral damage. This dereliction of responsibility, this cutting and running, is how the deteriorating conditions of the world are being handled. Throughout history, society's elite have shown the same arrogance and hubris in the face of impending calamity. For example, the Fall of the Roman Empire:
If you read the chronicles of the early 5th century AD, you get the impression of total mayhem, with barbarian armies crisscrossing Europe and few, if any, Roman nobles and commanders trying to defend the Empire. Most of them seemed to be maneuvering to find a safe place where they could find safety for themselves. We don't know what was the final destiny of Rutilius Namatianus but, since he had the time to finish his poem, we may imagine that he could build himself a castle in Southern France and his descendants may have become feudal lords. But not everyone made it. For instance, Paulinus of Pella, another rich Roman, contemporary of Namatianus, desperately tried to hold on his possessions in Europe, eventually considering himself happy just for having been able of surviving to old age.
We see a pattern here: when the rich Romans saw that things were going really out of control, they scrambled to save themselves while, at the same time, denying that things were so bad as they looked. We can see that clearly in Namatianus' poem: he never ever hints that Rome was doomed. At most, he says, it was a temporary setback and soon Rome will be great again.
Thunberg's speech alluded to such behavior by the polluting nations:
For more than 30 years, the science has been crystal clear. How dare you continue to look away and come here saying that you're doing enough, when the politics and solutions needed are still nowhere in sight. You say you hear us and that you understand the urgency. But no matter how sad and angry I am, I do not want to believe that. Because if you really understood the situation and still kept on failing to act, then you would be evil. And that I refuse to believe.
Yes, Greta, they are evil; they have access to every expert on the seriousness of the crisis and they are building walls and saving their own skin while continuing business-as-usual. Lest we forget, the fossil fuel industry's own scientists accurately predicted the life-threatening effects of its product decades ago and not only did they do nothing to stop it, they funded and orchestrated a vast network of climate denial propaganda which continues to this day and have raced to exploit even more fossil fuels from the melting Arctic. When you consider that billions of people are going to die as a result, their actions become by far the greatest crimes against humanity ever committed. Make no mistake, our society is trading a livable planet for an unsustainable way of life that is irreparably depleting finite resources and altering the earth for eons, making it uninhabitable for organized human societies. Each day of business-as-usual further degrades the planet's biodiversity.
"As the temperature rises, the patricians will seek refuge as polar migrants, or set sail on heavily armed ocean liners. Millions more will live in underground cities, anywhere to escape the sun. Dazzling reports of new methods for sopping up the gigatons of carbon dioxide will create ripples of enthusiasm and then fade in the next news cycle. Fisheries and agriculture will collapse, drugs will provide little solace, and everyone will curl up in a foetal position in the end, like the ash-entombed victims at Pompeii, whimpering in the inescapable heat. The likelihood of this outcome increases as the years pass and the smoke rises."
~ Nicholas P. Money, THE SELFISH APE: Human Nature and Our Path to Extinction
"The latest climate simulation models are projecting temperature increases of up to 7°C by the end of this century. Unless you have a magical faith in technology, then that level of temperature rise signifies the potential end of our species…"https://t.co/kdldvQXGCa pic.twitter.com/a5DUZOXOG9
— xraymike79 (@xraymike79) November 2, 2019
Weekend Funnies for the Depressed Collapsitarian #11
Posted by xraymike79 in Capitalism, Climate Change, Consumerism, Ecological Overshoot
6th Mass Extinction, Climate Breakdown, Extreme Weather Events, Fossil Fuel Industry, Greta Thunberg, Techno-Fix, Technocapitalism, The Anthropocene Age
It's been a while since I've published one of these dark humor posts, but I think that as the catastrophic flooding, heat waves, and other extreme weather events continue to multiply and intensify and as more and more people start losing their minds, all we can do is laugh at the absurdity of our self-inflicted predicament. As has been said many times before, the Anthropocene carbon spike is just one of many symptoms from an overpopulated technocapitalist-driven world chasing too few resources, whether it be wild fish, potable water, rare earth minerals, or arable land. No one is putting the breaks on this race towards the abyss because no one is truly in charge, except for the cold and amoral calculator of corporate profits and stock market returns. In an age of "worse than expected" and "faster than anticipated", the true cost of environmental collapse cannot be fully appreciated because humans have never existed in a world that is 500ppm CO2e and accelerating. One thing is certain —most of Earth's mass extinctions were caused by a disruption in the carbon cycle which happened slowly over a much longer time span compared to today and without all the other human-forced pressures on the planet. All the technological advances and creature comforts we value today came at a rising environmental cost which is now impossible to repay since we have essentially 'sold the farm' in terms of the stability of the Holocene and the biochemistry of the planet. There's no techno-fixing our way out of this mess. We didn't build a durable civilization; we built a superficial and fleeting one blinded by delusions of technological grandeur and human superiority. So as we all slowly arrive at the fifth stage of grief, here's a toast to humans before the party ends…
And this cartoon is becoming more accurate as time passes and oil executives mourn for the loss of future profits…
Earth will be fine. Humans?…not so much 🤣
No need to plan for retirement, the beach will come to you…
I'm sure Greta Thunberg would have something to say…
A Final Warning to Planet Earth
15,364 scientists from 184 countries issue a 'warning to humanity' and present a radical agenda to protect planet Earth. We, the billions of people believing in human exceptionalism, categorically reject this agenda and issue in return a stark warning to planet Earth…We officially summon planet Earth to abandon its intransigent attitude and accept the inevitable: an extension of its biological and physical limits. Should planet Earth stick with its hardline ideological stance, it needs to be aware that mankind will never compromise and that we will seek a second planet. The universe is like our ambition: limitless…
Concerning Humanity's Future: Interview with Nick Humphrey, Climatologist and Geoscientist
Posted by xraymike79 in Climate Change, Ecological Overshoot, Environmental Degradation, Peak Oil, Pollution
6th Mass Extinction, Abrupt Climate Change, Antarctic Ice Melt, Desertification, Extreme Weather Events, Geoengineering, Monoculture Farming, Nick Humphrey, Nuclear Energy, Overpopulation
NOAA image of the "bomb cyclone" that struck the Midwest earlier this month, triggering flooding in three states and taking the lives of humans and livestock. The National Weather Service described it as "incredible" and a "Great Plains cyclone of historic proportions."
I first discovered the writings of meteorologist/geoscientist Nick Humphrey with his brutally honest essay The Conversation No One Knows How To Have and since then have followed his posts and comments. He has been featured or quoted in a number of publications such as Mother Jones, New York Times, Washington Post, and Science Alert. Few scientists will publicly tell you how dire things are, but Nick Humphrey is not one to shy away from the truth. What follows is a Q&A interview I held with him on a variety of questions concerning humanity's future.
ML: Can you give us a brief summary of your background and why you became interested in studying the detrimental effects of climate change?
I have been following news and research into climate change for about the past decade. However, I became more intensive in my personal research as a result of an apparent acceleration in climate impacts in the past 4-5 yrs. My study took me to look into the research of scientists such as Dr. Natalia Shakhova, Dr. James White, Dr. Peter Wadhams, Dr. James Lovelock, and Paul Beckwith. I also looked into the interdisciplinary connections between ecological and environmental variables by Dr. Guy McPherson.
There are two very important components of Earth's inertia.
1) Water (which can gain/lose a huge amount of heat with a gradual temperature change) and 2) Ice.
Ice, in my view, is the biggest climate regulator because it can do two things:
1) In the process of melting and freezing, heat is latent or "hidden". Meaning it does not contribute to temperature, but to melting (heat gain) or freezing (heat loss) of ice.
2) Ice is white, so as a result, it is a high reflector of visible light, preventing absorption of heat at the surface. So it has a double impact. As the planet loses ice because of warming temperatures, there is less total ice to melt and more heat goes into warming the oceans, land and atmosphere. It takes nearly 80 times more heat to melt ice than to warm the same amount of liquid water by 1 degree C/1.8 degrees F. The less ice there is, the lower the planetary albedo, resulting in more heat entering the climate system, creating a feedback loop to destroy ice faster and accelerating planetary heating. The loss of sea ice in the Arctic is a planetary catastrophe.
Trends in sea ice thickness are another important indicator of Arctic climate change. While sea ice thickness observations are sparse, here we utilize the ocean and sea ice model, PIOMAS (Zhang and Rothrock, 2003), to visualize mean sea ice thickness from 1979 to 2019. Updated through February 2019. https://sites.uci.edu/zlabe/arctic-sea-ice-volumethickness/
NH: In short, no, I do not think it is possible to transition to a net-zero carbon emission civilization within a decade. The idea itself is simply absurd because it would require basically returning to a pre-industrial society with none of the benefits which came from building the society provided by fossil fuels. There are some economists and environmentalists who believe you can have "green growth" but such growth leads to further environmental destruction as population and energy demands continue to grow exponentially. In order to go to a net-zero carbon civilization, you must first, ironically, increase carbon usage. More building of solar panels around the world, more building of wind farms, more building of electric cars, more concrete, more metal manufacturing, more highly polluting mining, not only of the land, but more rare Earth metals will be needed from the seas, harming ecosystems and polluting the oceans. Meanwhile, none of this stops climate change because, as you mention, there is already much damage in the pipeline.
ML: There are around 454 nuclear reactors around the world with several dozen more currently under construction. At least 100 U.S., European and Asian nuclear power stations are built just a few meters above sea level. With accelerated sea level rise and stronger storms on the horizon, we should be planning right now to decommission and close down these future nuclear disasters. What is your stance on nuclear energy?
NH: Nuclear reactions themselves are an effective way to produce energy. The problem is that, like any form of energy, it requires energy to produce it and leaves waste products. Fossil fuels are needed to build the nuclear reactors (especially all the concrete), water is needed to keep the reactors fuel rods cool, and nuclear waste results from the use of the reactors which must be stored safely for thousands of years. It requires civilization to function for thousands of more years to keep it functional and safe or alternatively decades to properly decommission them. Given sea level rise is accelerating with a doubling of approximately 7-10 years (possibly causing a meter of sea level rise as early as the 2040s-2050s, faster in some regions like the US East Coast), I do not believe we should be building more nuclear reactors and should decommission all others as quickly as possible to save what remains of the natural world from devastating impacts of nuclear failures if civilization collapses and humans are unable to care for those sites.
I make note, it is not only nuclear power stations on coastal areas which are of concern. Stations located along rivers are at risk as well…from increasingly larger floods, drying rivers which are used for cooling, and warming rivers which do not bring in cool enough water to keep the reactors cool. These events are already happening.
ML: What do you think about geoengineering schemes by scientists to dim the sun in order to reduce global warming and buy humanity more time to "fix" the problem? Proposed technology that could pull CO2 out of the atmosphere at the scale required is generally considered a pipe dream. At what point do you think our civilization will lose faith in technology to solve all our problems?
NH: Geoengineering schemes, to me, are equivalent to using a small band-aid for a large stab wound. It is and will be completely overwhelmed by what is happening. Spraying aerosols over the Arctic to try to cool the Arctic with increased summer cloud formation doesn't solve the fact that there is 500 ppm of equivalent carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere which cannot be removed with the speed and scale required. You are not dealing with regions where the geoengineering is being done in closed systems. You cool one area, other areas will respond by warming further. You cool one region, atmospheric and ocean circulations will develop and intensify to transport heat to the cooling area to try to equalize the temperature imbalance. Direct ocean heating from below the ice will make it difficult to grow thick ice and not allow ice to reform in the polar night. These heat balances have always existed of course, but it was still cool enough to allow significant ice to exist in the Arctic. The atmosphere is now too altered to allow widespread sea ice to exist in the near future and geoengineering doesn't prevent this or even delay it in a meaningful way.
ML: In the recent extreme flooding in the U.S. Midwest, farmers suffered devastating losses with similar food shocks on the rise around the world. How do you see the world feeding itself in such an uncertain future, especially when industrial monoculture is actually increasing worldwide?
NH: In short, I do not see a way for humans to feed themselves in an organized manner. Using the worse-case estimate for warming since pre-industrial times, the planet's land air and sea surface has averaged around +1.2 C relative to pre-industrial the past 5 years with a peak of +1.4 C in 2016. The Northern Hemisphere land masses (where most of the food on the planet is grown) are quickly approaching +2 C. And we are already seeing the impacts of both extreme heat and extreme precipitation events on crops which depend on stability at mild temperatures and an expected range of moisture. This will only worsen and in between +1.5-2 C, we will conservatively see a reduction of US crop yields by between 30-46% of recent levels. By +4 C, that falls to 63-82% as aridification —droughts which are never-ending— dominate the Great Plains/Midwest and California Central Valley with very extreme summer heat and occasional intense rainfall as well as destructive flood events, exacerbating soil erosion.
ML: Many mainstream scientists feel that to "work within" the system, they have to use language that politicians and economists can understand in order to maintain credibility, i.e. the "value of ecosystem services". Attempting to place a monetary value on every aspect of nature while externalizing the environmental cost of pollution is a major flaw of our economic system. Inaction by governments and corporations on climate change may have already condemned a large percentage of the global population to a premature death. Do you think ecocide should be an international crime?
NH: If ecocide were an international crime, we would all be guilty in some way. Obviously, I do not believe all humans are *equal* in terms of blame. A person living in the US is a far far larger consumer of energy with a bigger carbon footprint than a person in say, Kenya or Indonesia. And of course, the developing world receives cheap products (coal, plastics, etc) from the developed world. However, while greenhouse gas pollution is significant from countries such as the US and China, plastic pollution is significant *everywhere*. Mining pollution is significant everywhere. Deforestation either is or has been in the past significant from Canada to Europe, increasing in the Amazon, the continent of Africa, etc. Water is nearing depletion on the Great Plains, parts of Europe, Australia and falling quickly in the Amazon. We've required more energy on this planet for all the technologies which many would consider have enhanced human life and existence on this planet…improved infrastructure, medicines, monoculture farming which did allow for much higher and resilient production of crops, etc. But all of those "improvements" to the human condition come at a cost and that cost is the destruction of the natural world, and ultimately ourselves.
ML: I understand wealthy countries have much larger carbon footprints per capita than the rest of the world due to our unsustainable consumption patterns, but the other much overlooked factor is overpopulation. We are adding roughly 90 million more people onto the planet per year, many of whom are striving to attain a similar western standard of living. Is there any ethical way to control population growth or will nature be the final arbiter? What do you think is the maximum carrying capacity for the Earth's human population?
NH: Overpopulation is a major problem and factor in the mass extinction ongoing on the planet. However, given the scales required to fix the problem, I do not see a way to fix it which would fix the damage already done to the planet within the timeframes necessary. The only *ethical* means to control overpopulation is to educate a free population (in particular, women must have reproductive freedom) on the benefits to humans by improving the natural world. Laws will fail because it is ultimately an issue of personal physical sovereignty and humans will always fight for personal sovereignty over their bodies as it relates to sex and reproduction vs. govt interference. China's one-child policy had a lot of unintended consequences. There are other ways to try to "control" but ultimately, what would really be needed is population decline. Given humans are a relatively large land mammal, in order for Earth to have kept ecosystem stability, the human population would have to have stayed in the millions, spread thinly across hospitable regions of the planet as hunter-gatherers. The population of hunter-gatherer/early agricultural humans in the Early Holocene (10-12,000 years ago) is estimated at 1-10 million.
Ultimately, nature appears to be "loading the gun" to make it difficult for the human population to grow much longer; and really, it will crash. The 6th mass extinction is underway and humans will be a part of this given we are at the top of the food web.
ML: Who, living today, serves as a role model and inspiration for you and in what way? Do you follow any particular philosophy in your life?
NH: I'd say one role model of mine is my father. He died in January 2017 after a battle with cancer. He spurred my interest in science as a child and was one who always strongly emphasized the importance of finding the truth, no matter how difficult it was or the barriers that happened to be in the way. Another is Dr. Albert Einstein, who had many personal flaws, but wanted to use science to improve society and found its uses for killing and destruction of life abhorrent. He spoke the truth even when it marginalized him. Also Dr. Neil DeGrasse Tyson, who works hard to communicate complex topics in a way that can be understood and appreciated by the average person.
My only philosophy in life is to live my life to the fullest, given the incredible changes underway, and bring truthful information to people who can see what's happening and want to know "why?". I'm an interdisciplinarian and work to bring a more comprehensive understanding of the predicament we face to anyone willing to listen.
ML: What do you think of the Dark Mountain Project whose members have "stopped believing in the stories our civilization tells itself"? What new stories should we be telling ourselves in this age of ecological catastrophe and extreme economic inequality?
NH: I'm not familiar with the Dark Mountain Project; however to answer the questions, I think we should stop telling stories about how grand our civilization is and celebrating its attempts to dominate Nature and impose fake human superiority. Civilization, which served the purpose of insulating humans from the dangers Nature posed, has destroyed Nature at the expense of its own growth. This was true long before the development of the modern fossil-fueled world. In order to be sedentary and not be dependent upon the local forces of Nature, we needed to build towns and cities. This requires destroying forests, damming rivers, taking over land with agriculture we would control the growth and development of. This means other species, who could not stop us, lost territory. Each improvement in protecting ourselves from Nature meant more population growth, more resource needs, more energy, which in turn meant more destruction and more attempts at control. Humanity, as a hunter-gatherer species, meant our growth was dependent upon what we could find for food and water within the bounds of the climate. Our ability to enclose and mass manipulate our environment and resources meant we could grow beyond our resources and, in the process, mass pollute the world. Civilization has been an 8,000 year attempt to win a war against Nature. A war we are losing because Nature —following the laws which have governed the Universe for 14 billion years— always wins.
Nature is in control, not humans. Even our current catastrophes which were sparked by humanity's activities were ultimately governed by the laws of Nature (physics, thermodynamics, chemistry, etc). We never were separate from it all, but a part of it. We should be telling ourselves to do what we feel is right to respect Nature and its unbreakable laws, accepting our place in the Universe as just one of many species which have a finite existence on this planet.
Nick Humphrey's blog can be found here: https://www.patreon.com/MeteorologistNickHumphrey
"Renewable" Energies, 6th Mass Extinction, Abrupt Climate Change, Alternative Energy, Antarctic Ice Melt, Climate Change Denial, Climate Tipping Points, David Buckel, Donald Trump, Douglas Theobald, Ecocide, Food Shocks, Fossil Fuel Industry, Greenland Ice Sheet Melt, Lee Kump, Loss of Biodiversity, Micro-Plastic Pollution, Nate Hagens, Omnicide, Overpopulation, Permian-Triassic Mass Extinction, Runaway Climate Change, The Anthropocene Age, The Great Dying
"My early death by fossil fuel reflects what we are doing to ourselves."
~ David Buckel
Today's global consumption of fossil fuels now stands at roughly five times what it was in the 1950s, and one-and-half times that of the 1980s when the science of global warming had already been confirmed and accepted by governments with the implication that there was an urgent need to act. Tomes of scientific studies have been logged in the last several decades documenting the deteriorating biospheric health, yet nothing substantive has been done to curtail it. More CO2 has been emitted since the inception of the UN Climate Change Convention in 1992 than in all previous human history. CO2 emissions are 55% higher today than in 1990. Despite 20 international conferences on fossil fuel use reduction and an international treaty that entered into force in 1994, manmade greenhouse gases have risen inexorably. If it has not dawned on you by now, our economic and political systems are ill-equipped to deal with this existential threat. Existing international agreements are toothless because they have no verification or enforcement and do not require anything remotely close to what is needed to avoid catastrophe. The 20 warmest years on record have been in the past 22 years, with the top four in the past four years, according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). Ice loss from Antarctica has sextupled since the 1970s and Greenland's pace of ice loss has increased fourfold since 2003. The Arctic ocean has lost 95% of its old ice and total volume of ice in September, the lowest ice month of the year, has declined by 78% between 1979 and 2012. With grim implications for the future, Earth's air conditioner —the cryosphere— is melting away.
An article from a few months ago lays bare the reality that throughout the past two hundred years and with recent "alternative" or "renewable" energy sources, humans have only added to the total energy they consume without ever having displaced the old, polluting ones. An alternative energy outlook report by Wood Mackenzie foresees that even in a carbon-constrained future, fossil fuels would still make up 77% of global energy consumption in 2040. The world economy remains hopelessly tethered to fossil fuels. We are kidding ourselves if we think there will be any sort of orderly transition to sustainability with which modern civilization appears to be wholly incompatible. We are, as Nate Hagens says, energy blind.
Modern civilization has become so intertwined with petroleum-based products that their remnants are now found in our excrement. It seems no living thing can escape microplastics, not even the eggs of remote Arctic birds. This should come as no surprise if you look at the scale of the problem. Plastic production has grown from 2 million metric tons in 1950 to roughly 400 million metric tons today(more than 99% of plastics made today are with fossil fuels and only a tiny fraction of it recycled). There are five massive oceanic gyres filled with pelagic plastics, chemical sludge and other human detritus; one of the these gyres, named the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, is three times the size of France and growing exponentially. The health and environmental effects are grim; organized society may not even be around to examine the long-term effects of these persistent synthetic materials:
"Health problems associated with plastics throughout the lifecycle includes numerous forms of cancers, diabetes, several organ malfunctions, impact on eyes, skin and other sensory organs, birth defects" and many other impacts, said David Azoulay, a report author and managing attorney at the Center for International Environmental Law…"And those are only the human health costs, they do not mention impacts on climate, impacts on fisheries or farmland productivity."
Making things more efficient and convenient has its limits, but humans keep trying to beat the consequences of Earth's dwindling natural resources while ignoring the environmental costs. Jevons paradox be damned! To make matters worse, the fossil fuel industry has employed a well-financed and highly effective global disinformation campaign to confuse and sow doubt in the public mind about the reality of climate change. And to top it all off, we have a leader who reinforces the ignorance of climate change deniers:
It's a cruel irony that this President's emergency declaration for building a border wall comes at a time when migration from Latin America is near a 40-year low and the majority of those now seeking asylum are families fleeing climate change-related disasters. This President and the craven politicians who line up behind him are an abomination! At a time when compassion, cooperation, and scientific reasoning are needed to deal with the multiple crises we face, politicians are instead conjuring up xenophobia, racism, and conspiracy theories. As inequality grows and the once-stable climate continues to unravel, expect the super-rich to barricade themselves behind heavily fortified mansions while treating climate refugees and the most vulnerable among us with extreme prejudice. A new study shows increasingly severe weather events are fueling the number of 'food shocks' around the world and jeopardizing global security:
These "food shocks" —or, sudden losses to food production— are hitting local communities hard, in addition to impacting the global economy, with long-term implications. "Critically, shock frequency has increased through time on land and sea at a global scale," the study notes. "Geopolitical and extreme-weather events were the main shock drivers identified, but with considerable differences across sectors."
Douglas Theobald, in his study at Brandeis University, calculated that there is less than a 1 in 102,860 chance that all life did not arise from a common ancestor. In other words, humans are related to all life on Earth and share much of their DNA with other organisms. Despite earning the title of 'superpredator', humans are dependent on intact and functioning ecosystems. Our chances for long-term survival are ultimately tied to the health of the planet, yet we are carrying out ecocide on a planetary scale. Being a mere 0.01% of all life on Earth, humans have managed to destroy 50% of wild animals in just the last fifty years and 83% since the dawn of civilization around 3,000 B.C.. Who knows how many plant species have gone extinct:
Hawaii is losing plant species at the rate of one per year, when it should be roughly one every 10,000 years. "We have a term called 'plant-blindness'… People simply don't see them; they view greenery as an indistinguishable mass, rather than as thousands of genetically separate and fragile individuals…"
The bedrock of our food, clean water and energy is biodiversity, but its loss now rivals the impacts of climate change. Without biodiversity, our food sources, both plants and animals, will succumb to diseases. Microbes and hundreds of different life forms interact to make soils fertile. Without them, soils will be barren and unable to support life. Monocultures can only be held together through artificial means(fossil fuels, inorganic fertilizer and toxic pesticides) and are highly vulnerable to diseases, yet industrial monoculture farming continues to dominate the globe. Most Worrisome are the recent studies indicating that biodiversity loss raises the risk of 'extinction cascades'. Insect numbers, the base of the terrestrial food chain, are in steep decline and starfish, a common keystone species in coastal ecosystems, are facing extinction due to some sort of wasting disease likely caused by climate change:
"Many of these outbreaks are heat sensitive. In the lab, sea stars got sick sooner and died faster in warmer water… A warming ocean could increase the impact of infectious diseases like this one…We could be watching the extinction of what was a common species just 5 years ago."
And here is Professor Stephen Williams discussing the recent mass death of Australia's flying fox bats in which 30,000 —a third of their remaining population— died in a single extreme heat wave:
"A lot of tropical species are much closer to the edge of the tolerances, so they very much are the 'canary in the coalmine' for the world in what's going to start happening with climate change…The fact that we're now seeing things endangered occur in places that you would've thought to be pretty secure, that's the scary bit…I suspect the next wave of extinctions is going to be mostly due to extreme events — extreme climate events like heatwaves."
These disturbing headlines indicate to me that the Sixth Mass Extinction is gathering pace and the real stock market underlying our very existence and survival is crashing before our eyes!!! Four of the last five mass extinction events were preceded by a disruption of the carbon cycle. When renowned paleoclimatologist Lee Kump was asked whether comparisons to today's global warming and that of past mass extinctions are really appropriate, he ominously said, "Well, the rate at which we're injecting CO2 into the atmosphere today, according to our best estimates, is ten times faster than it was during the End-Permian. And rates matter. So today we're creating a very difficult environment for life to adapt, and we're imposing that change maybe ten times faster than the worst events in Earth's history." Humans are recreating the past extinction known as The Great Dying at a much faster pace and at many more human-forced levels that leave no ecosystem on Earth intact.
By orders of magnitude, the human endeavor has grown much too large for the Earth to support; climate change, plastic pollution, and biodiversity loss are just a few of the symptoms of this global ecological overshoot. The people who have studied this problem for years and from every angle have come to the same conclusion —technology simply won't save us, but that won't stop humans from experimenting. By far the most effective way to reduce future emissions and resource consumption is to reduce human birth rates, yet the global population is still increasing at about 90 million people per year despite the geographic shift in fertility rates.
Humans recognized decades ago the threats they are now facing, yet nothing was done due to political inaction and industry malfeasance which continues to this very day. The scientists who wrote The Limits to Growth decades ago were expecting our political institutions to take action back in the 1970s, but they were met with ridicule and now we stand at the doorstep of modern civilization's collapse. Political inaction and regulatory capture by the fossil fuel industry appear to be intractable barriers that have condemned the human race to a hellish future. Anyone waiting for some sort of seminal climate change event that is going to galvanize the world's leaders into action will be tragically disappointed. If seeing the world's coral reefs dying, its glaciers disappearing, permafrost melting, and the steady uptick in extreme weather and wildfire events does not spur them to action, it is much too late to hope that any single event will ever do so. The time to act would have been before we were seeing all these environmental degradations and tipping points, not afterward. There is no way to put the CO2 genie back in the bottle. The Earth cannot even begin to reach a new climate state until humans stop emitting the roughly 40 to 50 gigatonnes of CO2 per annum and stop altering and destroying global ecosystems. This fact is our daily nightmare.
A myth that many uninformed people hold is that biospheric health will quickly bounce back after we humans get our act together. Nothing could be further from the truth. Much of the damage we are already seeing is irreversible on human time scales. Positive feedbacks were already occurring at less than 1°C of warming. Many carbon sinks are on the verge of becoming or have already become carbon sources. As we race toward a nightmarish future with no realistic way to stop, we leave behind a "forever legacy" that will haunt mankind for the rest of eternity.
There is No 'Easy' Way to Avert the Collapse of Civilization
Posted by xraymike79 in Climate Change, Consumerism, Ecological Overshoot, Environmental Degradation, Inequality, Peak Oil, Pollution
Antibiotic-Resistant Pathogens, Authoritarianism, Automation, Carrington Even, Climate Change, Collapse of Industrial Civilization, Complexity Trap, Cyberwarfare, David Eagleman, Digital Dark Age, Donald Trump, Global Surveillance Network, Hyper-Nationalism, Jonathan Huebner, Joseph Tainter, Militarized Police Force, Net Energy and Societal Complexity, Peak Antibiotics, Peak Oil, Six Easy Steps to Avert the Collapse of Civilization
Six years ago David Eagleman, a neuroscientist and American writer, delivered a lecture entitled 'Six Easy Steps to Avert the Collapse of Civilization'. I got the urge to review his advice and critique how well we have followed it. Below are his abbreviated steps along with my commentary on each one:
[1.] "Try not to cough on one another."
Over the course of numerous microbe generations amounting to a small fraction of a single human lifetime, pathogens have mutated and adapted faster than the antibiotic defenses human's have built. Through a combination of factors—medical, social and economic—our war on pathogens is being lost, and these superbugs could be the next global pandemic. The danger grows with mankind's expanding ecological footprint: a rising world population, the widespread use of antibacterial drugs in humans and agriculture, the speed and intensity of an international transport system, and so on. As history has shown, pandemics have always been a consequence of humans breaking down the interface between man and Earth's wilderness. A recent study highlights this fact:
Tackling antibiotic resistance on only one front is a waste of time because resistant genes are freely crossing environmental, agricultural and clinical boundaries, new research has shown.
Analysis of historic soil archives dating back to 1923 has revealed a clear parallel between the appearance of antibiotic resistance in medicine and similar antibiotic resistant genes detected over time in agricultural soils treated with animal manure…
…"Unless we reduce use and improve stewardship across all sectors — environmental, clinical and agricultural — we don't stand a chance of reducing antibiotic resistance in the future."
As of yet, humans are not heeding this advice in any coordinated manner as another new study reveals that antibiotic use and resistance is increasing globally while new antibiotics discoveries have nearly halted. China and India, for instance, have poor regulatory and environmental enforcement:
The NHS is buying drugs from pharmaceutical companies in India whose dirty production methods are fueling the rise of superbugs, write Andrew Wasley & Madlen Davies. There are no checks or regulations in place to stop this happening – even though the rapid growth in antibiotic resistant bacteria in India is spreading across the world, including to the UK and NHS hospitals… government-commissioned study found superbugs would kill more people than cancer by 2050 if no action is taken, and cited pollution in pharmaceutical supply chains as a major problem. – Link
"If you want to see where resistance is occurring in animals, look across the pond to China. They play by a whole different set of rules," he[Dr. Larry Hollis] says. "Whenever a new antibiotic is developed, the Chinese see the patent filings, figure out how to make it, and without any regulatory structure, it goes straight to animals. By the time it's available here, the antibiotic is already showing resistance." – Link
India is a global center of antibiotic manufacture. 80% of the active pharmaceutical ingredients used by pharmaceutical companies worldwide, including the United States and Europe, are made in China. Following their manufacture, most of these ingredients are exported to India for processing and subsequent worldwide sale. The good manufacturing practices in China and India do not include environmental safeguards. "Unfortunately, environmental regulations are currently left up to national regulators, who are not inclined to do much. In India, the effluent discharge load of ciprofloxacin in 2007 was 45 kg per day – the amount consumed in Sweden, which has a population of 9 million, over 5 days," said Dr. Gandra. – Link
Our hospitals can't even keep track of how many people are dying from these superbugs. So it seems disease-carrying bacteria shall inherit the Earth, but truth be told, they have always been the dominant forms of life. A population of eight billion people provides a rich substrate for them to colonize and feed upon.
[2.] "Don't lose things."
In modern times there has been a large decline in hard-copy forms of record-keeping with ever more material being transferred onto digital formats, especially news reports and visual/auditory records, but the ephemeral nature of our digital media makes it prone to disappearing. Virtually all of the most useful and important artifacts of our time are digital and very little of it is intended to survive. Much of the 20th Century and beyond will be a vast gaping historical black hole except for the plastics, radiation and soot entering the geological record:
Digital information itself has all kinds of advantages. It can be read by machines, sorted and analyzed in massive quantities, and disseminated instantaneously. "Except when it goes, it really goes," said Jason Scott, an archivist and historian for the Internet Archive. "It's gone gone. A piece of paper can burn and you can still kind of get something from it. With a hard drive or a URL, when it's gone, there is just zero recourse."…
…If a sprawling Pulitzer Prize-nominated feature in one of the nation's oldest newspapers can disappear from the web, anything can. "There are now no passive means of preserving digital information," said Abby Rumsey, a writer and digital historian. In other words if you want to save something online, you have to decide to save it. Ephemerality is built into the very architecture of the web, which was intended to be a messaging system, not a library… – Link
The slow creep of technological obsolescence or a sudden cosmic disaster like a Carrington Event could usher in a 'Digital Dark Age', making any historical electronic documents unreadable. Google's Vint Cerf says we've grown complacent in how media is stored. He warns that we may find ourselves lost in a bit-rot future unable to access important media documents, scientific data, etc., but leaving behind any kind of record on an overheated world could be a moot point if there's no one left to read it.
[3.] "Tell each other faster."
Communication speed has increased exponentially with technology but the infrastructure that supports it is very vulnerable. Aside from the growing threat of cyber-attack, it's been documented that the most common cause of communication failure is due to the destruction of physical infrastructures. Roughly 200 undersea fiber optic cables link the world's telecommunications, but they are "poorly armored, rarely patrolled and only occasionally monitored." The possibility of human saboteurs is ever-present for landlines as well. These systems are usually the first sites to be targeted in wars and crackdowns by authoritarian governments.
Telecommunication infrastructure is also threatened by natural disasters such as earthquakes, hurricanes, and severe weather which can sever cables and flood underground equipment. A study from a couple of years ago found an increase in severe weather has led to a doubling of major power outages across the country in the past decade.
Telling each other faster has not made one iota of a difference in preventing the unmitigated disaster of global warming and climate change. If after decades of climate conferences, libraries filled to the brim with studies and data, and now the imminent death of the largest organism on the planet—the Great Barrier Reef of Australia, we still cannot collectively take this existential threat seriously, then failure and death will be our just deserts.
[4.] "Mitigate tyranny."
Hyper-nationalist movements are on the rise around the world, and they can be a precursor to authoritarianism. A country by country guide and analysis of fascism and the far right in Europe can be found here. Hyper-nationalism can lead to racism, vicious cycles of revenge, and genocide in which a segment of the population is scapegoated for society's failures. With the appointment of Steven Bannon to Trumps's presidential inner circle, the darkness of Trump's worldview should be evident to most. Trump will soon have America's militarized police forces at his behest and the world's surveillance network at his fingertips, enabling him to act on his penchant for vindictiveness in far-reaching ways.
Trump won't bring back coal because it would mean destroying the natural gas industry which has grown to displace the use of coal in recent years. Trump is going to learn how hard it is to change the dynamics of our energy system. Previous presidents have hit that same wall. Besides, automation is taking over all the blue-collar jobs of Trump's supporters. All those "big league jobs" promised by Trump just went up in smoke:
…research shows that the automation of U.S. factories is a much bigger factor than foreign trade in the loss of factory jobs. A study at Ball State University's Center for Business and Economic Research last year found that trade accounted for just 13 percent of America's lost factory jobs. The vast majority of the lost jobs — 88 percent — were taken by robots and other homegrown factors that reduce factories' need for human labor. – Link
[5.] "Get more brains involved in solving problems."
Physicist Jonathan Huebner says in his study that rates of global innovations judged significant to human beings have been declining in recent decades, in fact it's halved in the past hundred years. Joseph Tainter in his own study has come to a similar conclusion:
Over the last 40 years, the number of patents per inventor has decreased by 20% and the number of inventors per patent has increased by almost 50%. Although the quality of patents is unknown (it can not be measured quantitatively), it seems we nowadays get less bang for the buck compared to half a century ago. Larger, interdisciplinary research teams cost a lot more money as they need the support of administrative personnel and formal institutions. This decrease in productivity has been masked by the fact that the whole enterprise (research & development) has grown in absolute terms (i.e. more scientists and more money being poured into R&D). – Link
This decline in innovation is directly related to diminishing EROI of our energy resources and the limits of complexity. As Jonathan Miles said in Want Not, "This is our condition. We do not solve problems. We replace them with other problems." The myriad of crises bearing down on us defies comprehension and certainly won't be solved by applying more of the same techno-fix thinking.
[6.] "Try not to run out of energy."
The EROI of fossil fuels, the master resource of industrial civilization, has been in decline for some time and a recent report sheds light on this:
A new peer-reviewed study led by the Institute of Physics at the National Autonomous University of Mexico has undertaken a comparative review of the EROI of all the major sources of energy that currently underpin industrial civilization—namely oil, gas, coal, and uranium.
Published in the journal Perspectives on Global Development and Technology, the scientists note that the EROI for fossil fuels has inexorably declined over a relatively short period of time: "Nowadays, the world average value EROI for hydrocarbons in the world has gone from a value of 35 to a value of 15 between 1960 and 1980."
In other words, in just two decades, the total value of the energy being produced via fossil fuel extraction has plummeted by more than half. And it continues to decline… – Link
No other energy source has the energy density of fossil fuels and the existing alternative or "renewable" energy sources won't power our current set of living arrangements. Although technology is extending the Fossil Fuel Age, running out of economically recoverable fossil fuels means a radical change in society, if such a thing as 'society' can persist in the aftermath of biospheric collapse. I suppose a seventh bullet point is in order and would say something along the lines of, "It's an ill bird that fouls its own nest."
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Republic of Lakotah – Mitakuye Oyasin


text:
Science, Tech, Math › Science
Major Lipids and Their Properties
KATERYNA KON / SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY / Getty Images
Chemical Laws
Projects & Experiments
Medical Chemistry
Famous Chemists
Anne Marie Helmenstine, Ph.D.
Chemistry Expert
Ph.D., Biomedical Sciences, University of Tennessee at Knoxville
B.A., Physics and Mathematics, Hastings College
Dr. Helmenstine holds a Ph.D. in biomedical sciences and is a science writer, educator, and consultant. She has taught science courses at the high school, college, and graduate levels.
Lipids are a diverse group of fat-soluble biological molecules. Each major type has distinct properties and is found in certain locations.
Triacylglycerols or Triglycerides
The largest class of lipids goes by different names: triacylglycerols, triglycerides, glycerolipids, or fats.
Location: Fats are found in many places. One well-known form of fat is found in human and animal tissue.
Function: The primary function of fats is energy storage. Some animals, such as polar bears, can live off their fat stores for months at a time. Fats also provide insulation, protecting delicate organs and generating warmth.
Example: Margarine, a butter substitute, is made from vegetable oils and sometimes animal fats (typically beef tallow). Most kinds of margarine have a fat content of about 80 percent.
All steroids are hydrophobic molecules derived from a common four fused carbon ring structure.
Location: Cellular membrane, digestive system, endocrine system.
Function: In animals, many steroids are hormones, which enter cells and initiate specific chemical reactions. These hormones include the androgens and estrogens, or sex hormones, along with corticosteroids such as cortisol, which is produced by stress. Other hormones exist as part of various organisms' cellular structures, adding fluidity to cellular membranes.
Example: The most common steroid is cholesterol. Cholesterol is a precursor for making other steroids. Other examples of steroids include bile salts, estrogen, testosterone, and cortisol.
Phospholipids are derivatives of triglycerides that consist of a glycerol molecule with two fatty acids, a phosphate group on the third carbon, and often an additional polar molecule. The diglyceride portion of a phospholipid is hydrophobic, while the phosphate is hydrophilic.
Location: Cell membrane.
Function: Phospholipids form the basis of cellular membranes, which play a significant role in regulating homeostasis.
Example: Phospholipid bilayer of the cellular membrane.
What Are Lipids and What Do They Do?
Fats, Steroids, and Other Examples of Lipids
Fat Definition and Examples (Chemistry)
10 Things You Don't Know About Fat
Selective Permeability Definition and Examples
Types of Organic Compounds
Cell Membrane Function and Structure
What Are Proteins and Their Components?
How Steroid Hormones Work
The Anatomy and Function of the Human Liver
What Are Amphipathic Molecules? Definition, Properties, and Functions
Biology Prefixes and Suffixes: -ase
Salivary Amylase and Other Enzymes in Saliva
Biological Polymers: Proteins, Carbohydrates, Lipids
The Purpose and Composition of Adipose Tissue

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Whether it's getting WIFI for your guests, sorting out iPod docking stations, giving your guests access to Sky TV without a dish or installing sensors to send you an instant message each time someone opens your holiday home front door, here at Holiday Home Stars, we have it covered.
Please explore our Digital Services, and if you need any advice or help in any of these areas, please contact us.
– without WIFI, you are probably losing bookings. We can help..


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Talk starts at 1:30 PM.
Tickets: £2 members, £4 visitors, Payable at the door, including tea or coffee.
Refreshments mid-morning lunchtime and afternoon. You can buy food at the Community Centre.
The North Cheshire Lacemakers Group meets at Helsby Community Centre, Helsby, Cheshire, from 10:00 am to 4:00 pm on the 2nd Saturday in January, March, May, July, September and November usually with a speaker and a lace supplier.
February, April, June, October and December meetings are from 10:30 am to 3:30 pm on the 2nd Friday. Friday meetings are usually spent making lace and chatting. There is also a member's sale table.
There is no meeting in August but a trip may be arranged. The group has a newsletter, "Pillow Talk" published in March, July, and November. A subscription is £11.00/year for Lace Guild members, £13.50/yr for non-members, Young Lace Makers free.
Further information about the group and how to join can be found on their excellent website.


text:
require 'spec_helper'

module StrongPassword
  describe DictionaryAdjuster do
    describe '#is_strong?' do
      let(:subject) { DictionaryAdjuster.new }

      it 'returns true if the calculated entropy is >= the minimum' do
        allow(subject).to receive_messages(adjusted_entropy: 18)
        expect(subject.is_strong?('password')).to be_truthy
      end

      it 'returns false if the calculated entropy is < the minimum' do
        allow(subject).to receive_messages(adjusted_entropy: 17)
        expect(subject.is_strong?('password')).to be_falsey
      end
    end

    describe '#is_weak?' do
      let(:subject) { DictionaryAdjuster.new }

      it 'returns the opposite of is_strong?' do
        allow(subject).to receive_messages(is_strong?: true)
        expect(subject.is_weak?('password')).to be_falsey
      end
    end

    describe '#adjusted_entropy' do
      before(:each) { allow(NistBonusBits).to receive_messages(bonus_bits: 0) }

      it 'checks against all variants of a given password' do
        password = 'password'
        adjuster = DictionaryAdjuster.new
        expect(PasswordVariants).to receive(:all_variants).with(password).and_return([])
        adjuster.adjusted_entropy(password)
      end

      {
        'bnm,./' => 14, # Qwerty string should not get adjusted by dictionary adjuster
        'h#e0zbPas' => 19.5, # Random string should not get adjusted by dictionary adjuster
        'password' => 4, # Adjusts common dictionary words
        'E_!3password' => 11.5, # Adjusts common dictionary words regardless of placement
        'h#e0zbPas 32e2i81 password' => 31.0625, # Even if there are multiple words
        '123456' => 4, # Even if they are also qwerty strings
        'password123456' => 14, # But only drops the first matched word
        'asdf)asdf' => 14, # Doesn't break with parens
        'asdf[]asdf' => 16 # Doesn't break with []s
      }.each do |password, bits|
        it "returns #{bits} for '#{password}'" do
          expect(DictionaryAdjuster.new.adjusted_entropy(password)).to eq(bits)
        end
      end

      it 'allows extra words to be provided as an array' do
        password = 'administratorWEQ@123'
        base_entropy = EntropyCalculator.calculate(password)
        expect(DictionaryAdjuster.new(extra_dictionary_words: ['administrator']).adjusted_entropy(password)).not_to eq(base_entropy)
      end

      it 'allows minimum word length to be adjusted' do
        password = '6969'
        base_entropy = DictionaryAdjuster.new.adjusted_entropy(password)
        # If we increase the min_word_length above the length of the password we should get a higher entropy
        expect(DictionaryAdjuster.new(min_word_length: 6).adjusted_entropy(password)).not_to be < base_entropy
      end
    end
  end
end

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


T20 cricket is a revelation and provides unique betting opportunities. This article, written by a pro cricket punter, discusses numerous strategies that he uses for success.
Find out how to evaluate each team correctly and know which type of player has the biggest impact.
The Big Bash League provides plenty of opportunities to find some value in a variety of markets, provided you go into the tournament with the appropriate strategies.
The Analysts' detail some steps to follow when looking to unearth a wager on one of the world's biggest T20 tournaments.
Assessing the relative strengths of the bowlers within each side is very important because there is no doubt that it is bowlers – more so than batsmen – that win T20 matches. The Perth Scorchers are the most successful team in the history of the BBL, reaching the final in four of the six seasons and never finishing lower than third, including two top-placed finishes from the past two seasons.
The Scorchers have built their legacy on the back of a highly-skilled and specialised bowling attack as evidenced by the fact that five of the top 15 wicket-takers in the history of the BBL have played for Perth, whereas only two of the top 15 run-scorers have turned out for the Scorchers. Moreover last season when Perth finished top of the table with just two regular season losses, none of their top-order batsmen boasted a strike-rate higher than 130, however they had five bowlers with a strike-rate under 20 and four with an economy rate of 7.50 or lower.
Similarly last season's champions the Strikers won the title off the back of having five of the top eleven wicket-takers in the competition, with three of those bowlers conceding less than 6.50 runs an over. So if you spot a couple of teams that look similarly unbalanced, it is always shrewd to assign more credence to the side that has the stronger bowling attack.
The Big Bash and other T20 Leagues around the world offer plenty of opportunities to find some value in a variety of markets, provided you go into the tournament with the appropriate strategies.
The Analysts detail some steps to follow when looking to unearth a wager on T20 tournaments.
Whilst unbalanced sides don't always finish as champions they do open up a number of betting opportunities within the BBL – particularly on side markets like Highest First 6 Over Total, Most Sixes and Total Sixes. Identifying imbalances or mismatches between teams can be a highly effective way of spotting some value. When canvassing over each squad be sure to mark down who will opening the batting and open the bowling, the hitting power within the side and how effective the death bowling is.
When you identify a disparity, either pick the most relevant side market or make the most of the mismatch with the timing of your Match Odds trades.
For example if you have a powerful pair of opening batsmen up against some notably wayward opening bowlers you can either back the batting side to have the Highest 6 Over Total, or simply back the batting side in the Match Odds at the start of their innings.
Another example would be backing a team in the Most Sixes market who have a highly proficient suite of death bowlers, while two poor bowling attacks playing against each other often result in an overs result for Most Sixes. If you do have two ordinary bowling attacks coming up against each other then an alternate strategy would be to simply back both sides in the Match Odds when batting.
Always remember that there are two sides to the equation when exploring these markets – for example whilst you need big strong batsmen to hit sixes, you equally need canny and accurate bowlers to not concede too many sixes. Bowlers are not just crucial to winning games of T20 cricket, they are also pivotal when it comes to considering imbalances between sides and making the most of these via the various markets available.
The Big Bash League provides plenty of opportunities to find some value in a variety of markets, provided you go into the tournament with the appropriate strategies. The Analysts details some steps to follow when looking to unearth a wager on one of the world's biggest T20 tournaments.
One of the key things to remember when gauging the merits of a BBL side is that T20 matches are more often won by significant contributions from a handful of players, rather than the entire XI chipping in. While captains and coaches will have you believe that they could not have got over the line if not for each and every player "executing their role", it's important to remember that some roles are much more pivotal than others.
Take last season's runners-up the Hobart Hurricanes, for example. Between them, four players – Darcy Short, Ben McDermott, Dan Christian and Jofra Archer – scored 59% of their runs and took 53% of their wickets over the course of the tournament. That means that 25% of total players used contributed over half of all runs and wickets which highlights how each side should be assessed on their top few strongest players, rather than the composition of their full squad.
Furthermore when evaluating the strength of those top players, or indeed any players within a BBL side, it's crucial to focus purely on their abilities within T20 cricket and not oversell or underestimate them unfairly based on their proficiency in other formats.
A highly successful test or even one-day player does automatically guarantee a T20 master, however this is one of the most common pitfalls a punter can fall into. Even if a side contains a collection of "big name" players, be sure to closely examine their records in the shortest forms of the game as it can often be the more unheralded specialists who actually bring more value to their team.
Additionally when you sit down to rank the merits of each player in T20 cricket it's important to look at the right stats. With batsmen, more weight should be assigned to a higher strike-rate, rather than the traditional statistical approach of using a batsman's average.
That's because an innings of 25 off 25 balls will in all likelihood be detrimental to their team's chances of winning, whereas a knock of 16 off 8 balls can be advantageous at any point throughout a team's innings. Averages are naturally lower in T20 cricket given the pace of the format and while a batsman who scores consistently does provide value, if they regularly operate at a lethargic strike-rate they are likely doing more harm than good.
The same theory, however, does not quite apply to bowlers as the times when bowlers operate generally dictates which is the most important statistic with which to assess them. For example you might have a bowler who has acquired a favourable average on the back of picking up cheap wickets at the death, yet their astronomical economy rate indicates that they are not particularly effective in their role.
Conversely you may have a bowler with an excellent economy rate who bowls through the middle overs, but a poor strike-rate suggests they don't ask sufficient questions of the opposition during that period and as a result they put their death bowlers under increased pressure.


I have a confession to make. It's something that I've only told three people before – Bess, Matt and Jenn, to be exact – but I think I'm finally ready to come clean with you, too. Here it goes.
I talk to myself when I'm getting ready. Well, more precisely, I talk to myself as if I were talking to someone else when I'm getting ready.
Surely I'm not the only one who does this.
This reminds me of one time, in college, when I was in a conversation with an acquaintance and said something like, "You know how sometimes, when you're alone, you pretend like you're on a reality tv show?" Her blank stare made me realize for the first time that maybe this wasn't a common thing to do.
Granted, that was in the early 2000s, when reality tv was still relatively new, and I was wrestling my way through a particularly strong obsession with Laguna Beach. Maybe she didn't have cable.
On any given morning, just after my shower, I'll pour a cup of coffee and do my makeup while sitting at the coffee table in the living room. I like to take my time, and I'd rather sit and play with my makeup than stand and try to lean awkwardly over some bathroom counter.
When that's done, I'll head to the bathroom to dry and style my hair. Usually, by this time, Bryan's awake and in the shower. And since I've been up for awhile and have at least 1.5 cups of coffee pumping through my veins, and since he's trapped in the shower unable to make a quick exit, I like to use this time to ask him serious questions that he can't dodge away from.
I get dressed once my hair is done, and this is really the key time. After I've coordinated my outfit and accessories, I sneak in front of a mirror where Bryan can't see me. Sometimes, I'll close the door. Then, I stand squarely facing the mirror, pucker my lips so my cheekbones look really good, and look myself up and down, turning left and right. And then, it's the final moment – the last step before I walk out the door.
Using my left hand, I flick my hair over my left shoulder. Then, quickly, I do the same on my other side, flicking my hair over my right shoulder with my right hand. This is where the conversation comes in.
I imagine I'm in the middle of a very juicy gossip session with a girlfriend. Like, I've just learned something so scandalous, and I've pulled my friend away from a crowd, into a corner, where I'm telling her all of the tawdry details as she listens with wide eyes. And then I say this.
EVERY. DAY. I do this every day. Why do I do this every day? I don't even gossip like that with my real friends in my real life. I have no idea where this came from. Honestly, I think I was doing this subconsciously for months before I even realized that I was doing it.
Truth be told, sometimes this happens in public, too, like when I'm checking myself out in the mirror of a public restroom or the window of a business or a tinted car window as one does. I don't even do it on purpose. It's like a reflex. I'll regain consciousness just as I'm mouthing the words "she knows" and staring deep into a reflective surface.
So there you go. There's my deep, dark secret. That seems normal… right?


text:
Q: How to run apache beam locally? I'm trying to run a python apache beam script on my local machine to do some simulation. I have put 'DirectRunner' in my options. However the p.run() gives me an error "TypeError: Receiver() takes no arguments"
Any ideas why this would occur ? I'm using Spyder as IDE.
EDIT: Here is an example of code, it takes a list of messages in the form of:
{ "Val_1": 1, "Val_2": 56, "date": "2019-04-01T15:00:04.340778" }

split it and put it in form of
(1, 56, 2019-04-01T15:00:04.340778)

then save it to to a text file.
p = beam.Pipeline('DirectRunner')
(p | 'ReadMessage' >>  beam.io.textio.ReadFromTextWithFilename('input/inputs.json')
                    | 'Processing' >> beam.ParDo(Split())
                    | 'Write' >> beam.io.WriteToText('input/results.txt'))
p.run().wait_until_finish()

Error:
"TypeError: Receiver() takes no arguments"

A: You do not need to specify 'DirectRunner' as an argument, if you do not specify any runner i.e. leave it blank, it defaults to running using the DirectRunner.
This should run fine.
    p = beam.Pipeline()
    (p | 'ReadMessage' >>  beam.io.textio.ReadFromTextWithFilename('input/inputs.json')
                        | 'Processing' >> beam.ParDo(Split())
                        | 'Write' >> beam.io.WriteToText('input/results.txt'))
    result = p.run()
    result.wait_until_finish()

if __name__ == "__main__":
    run()

A: You execute your Python Beam file just like any regular file, assuming you specified your Pipeline as a DirectRunner, which you did with
p = beam.Pipeline('DirectRunner')

Apache Beam currently has limited support for Python 3.x . If you try to run the word count example, it will yield the same error. It will be fixed in the future, as they are currently working on the full support for Python 3.
When you want to deploy your Python Beam code with the Google Cloud Platform, I highly recommend to switch to Python 2.7.
You can track issues here
However, I cannot say what exactly your Split function does, so I provide you with a minimal working example, so that you can test your Beam installation.
import apache_beam as beam
import ast

# The DoFn to perform on each element in the input PCollection.
class Split(beam.DoFn):
    def process(self, element):
        val = ast.literal_eval(element[1])
        output ='('+','.join(map(str, val.values())) + ')'
        return [output]

def run():
    p = beam.Pipeline('DirectRunner')
    (p | 'ReadMessage' >>  beam.io.textio.ReadFromTextWithFilename('input/inputs.json')
                        | 'Processing' >> beam.ParDo(Split())
                        | 'Write' >> beam.io.WriteToText('input/results.txt'))
    result = p.run()
    result.wait_until_finish()

if __name__ == "__main__":
    run()

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


The Alzheimer's Association on Maui offers free services, education and support to people with living with Alzheimer's disease or other related dementias and their families and caregivers. We offer educational workshops year round, hold support group meetings and work with medical professionals on training staff and patients. In addition to this, we fundraise to support these efforts and contribute to research efforts. Our two signature events on are the Walk to End Alzheimer's (Oct 26) and The Longest Day (ongoing until June 21).
We are currently hoping to find volunteers to support our local and national efforts in outreach, communication education, and for our signature events.


text:
Q: choose random block of numbers without repetition I have a list of numbers from 1 to 100. I need to choose a block of numbers of a random size.
For example, first time choose number 5 to 21
second time choose number 50 to 66
Continue choosing a block of numbers until all numbers have been chosen, i.e., I cover the whole range (which is 100). The numbers should not be repeated in any block, meaning that the ranges should be unique.
I need a general algorithm not related to a specific programming language.

A: *

*Slice your list up into random sized blocks (pick a random size; slice that off; repeat until list is empty).

*Random-shuffle the blocks (Fisher-Yates)

*Return blocks in the shuffled order

The answer to any "random, but non-repeating" algorithm is always "shuffle."


Hong Kong-listed Tencent Mobility was granted Overseas Investment Office approval to buy up to 100 percent of video game developer Grinding Gear Games for more than $100 million.
Tencent Mobility - an online communication, advertising, and gaming service provider - was granted consent to acquire up to 100 percent of the shares in Grinding Gear Games, 80 percent upfront and the remaining 20 percent over approximately six years, a summary of the decision released today said.
While no amount was disclosed, the need for OIO approval was triggered because it exceeds $100 million.
"Tencent Mobility Ltd has satisfied the OIO that the individuals who will control the investment have the relevant business experience and acumen and are of good character. Tencent Mobility Ltd has also demonstrated financial commitment to the investment," the OIO said.
According to the OIO, the shareholders of Grinding Gear Games "wish to realise the value of their investment and to allow the company to grow, by utilising the international connections of Tencent Mobility."
Tencent Mobility is majority owned by Hong-Kong investors and is the world's largest online games company. Its total revenue in the first quarter of 2018 was US$11.7 billion.
Auckland-based Grinding Gear Games is best known for creating the 'Path of Exile' online video game that has around 2 million players signed up.


Al Fin Energy: Useful Article on "The Pricing of Crude Oil"
The Reserve Bank of Australia provides a useful article on "The Pricing of Crude Oil," by Stephanie Dunn and James Holloway.
The crude oil market is significantly larger than that for any other commodity, both in terms of physical production and financial market activity (Table 1). The value of crude oil production is more than twice that of coal and natural gas, 10 times that of iron ore and almost 20 times that of copper. Crude oil is the most widely used source of fuel, supplying around one-third of the world's energy needs. It is also used to produce a variety of other products including plastics, synthetic fibres and bitumen. Accordingly, changes in the price of crude oil have far-reaching effects.
The pricing mechanism underlying crude oil is, however, not as straightforward as it might appear. Almost all crude oil sold internationally is traded in the 'over-the-counter' (OTC) market, where the transaction details are not readily observable. Instead, private sector firms known as price reporting agencies (PRAs) play a central role in establishing and reporting the price of oil – the two most significant PRAs being Platts and Argus Media.
It is important to understand the ways in which oil prices reflect fundamentals of supply and demand -- and the ways in which oil prices can at times swing away from the basic fundamentals.
All mechanisms of pricing are subject to manipulation by persons of vested interest. While safeguards can certainly be built into systems to try to minimise such manipulation, even the safeguards on the safeguards are subject to manipulation and circumvention by sufficiently motivated and savvy groups and individuals.
Investors and interested observers must keep all of that in mind as they monitor the states of various markets.