Monday, May 10, 2010

Third of Animals Face Extinction

From Jenna Orkin

Headlines
EU rescue aims to avert crisis
The EU's $1 trillion "shock and awe" rescue plan triggered a global stock rally, but left lingering questions about Europe's indebted economies.
Europe Slaps Nearly a Trillion on the Table to Bail Out...Uh... Itself?
Federal Reserve opens credit line to Europe
Rescue may only work in short-term
EU faces long-term battle
Felix Salmon: Too much, too late
Euro Shock-And-Awe Will Create Huge Short Squeeze--Followed By Air Pocket And Market Collapse
The euro bailout will be followed by a huge collapse
Europe's Giant Bailout Fund Ignores The Root Of The Debt Problem And Actually Makes Things Far Worse

Economy/US
Felix Salmon's Message To Investors: Get Out Of The Stock Market Right Now - from Elizabeth Miller
VIX Record Drop After Record Gain
Record volatility.
Not To Spoil Your Party, But We're Going To Have To Talk About California, New York, And Illinois Soon
Moody's: America's Debt Crisis Could Hit By 2013
Feds Probing JP Morgan in Silver Pit
Growth Busters - Movie

Oil Leak
Since Spill, Feds Have Given 27 Waivers to Oil Companies in Gulf
Way to go, Brownie.
Dome fails to stop Louisiana oil leak
Oil production hit for decades after BP spill
Scylla and Charybdis Department: Careful, Mr Obama. You need big oil
"If the fallout from the Gulf oil spill forces Americans off the roads, we’ll tip back into recession." Argentina Denounces British "Pirates" After Oil Discovery in Falklands

Terrorism/Intelligence
Giuliani: Political Correctness Has Led to Missed Signals on Terrorism
Liz Cheney: Obama's 'first instinct' to Mirandize terrorists
Video: Inside New York’s Spycam HQ
Toronto officials to issue ID cards to residents during G20 visit
Politician Assassinated in India
Dozens of S.African train commuters injured after explosion
From Secrecy News:
Last week, prosecutors in the case of Thomas A. Drake, the former NSA official who is charged with unlawfully retaining classified information that he allegedly disclosed to a reporter, asked the court to hold a pre-trial conference on the use of the Classified Information Procedures Act (CIPA) in that case.

Environment/Science
Eyjafjallajökull Ash Wreaking Havoc Across Europe, And It Could Get Even Worse
Third of animals 'face extinction'
Mice 'feel pain' just like humans
Cuba: worst sugar harvest in a century - from Rice Farmer
Evidence for interbreeding with Neanderthals, only Africans pure

And...
CEOs who look the part get paid more, researchers say
Russian politician claims he met aliens who wore yellow suits - from Rice Farmer

20 comments:

Anonymous said...

wow... the falklands oil dispute is a glaring example of how the battle for resources has already begun.

Anonymous said...

wow... the Falklands/Pirates articles is a perfect example of how the battle for resources has officially begun.

Weaseldog said...

On the mice feel pain article, science and scientists still have a Christian legacy to undo.

And that's in the belief that humans are fundamentally different than animals. From the point of view of religion, animals have been considered soulless machines. And thus can be treated unethically, because they aren't actually alive and conscious, in the sense that humans are.

Though individual scientist will dispute my argument, we can see a clear line of thinking from the renaissance down in which 'Christian' scientists of the 19th century continued the Church's thinking through the argument that if you can't prove that animals feel pain or have emotions, then it is true that they don't.

When in fact, the proper scientific position to take, (If you're not B.F. Skinner), is to say you don't know, when you can't prove something.

Consider the case of vision in dogs. Science didn't bother to prove that dogs could see color (one experiment was done, was inconclusive and considered the final word), so because it wasn't proven, scientists knew for a fact that they could only see black and white. This is in spite of the fact that they have been known to have rod (color receptors) in their retinas.

Now that experiments have been done to test it, it turns out that they can see color after all. Yet for years, because we didn't know if they saw color, it was a scientific fact that they didn't.

Weekend before last, I had the chance to babysit a tiger cub that had undergone corrective surgery for a botched declaw job. Every now and then he'd start limping, curl up his feet and make a wide grimace. I didn't need science to tell me that the poor fella was in pain. I'm an animal and I can also feel pain. I know what it looks like.

businessman said...

Good post Weaseldog. In my mind science seems to be dictated by fashion in the moment, and how many scientists they can get to agree on a conclusion together. What was impossible and ridiculed yesterday becomes today's scientific fact. And anyone who disagrees with today's scientific fact gets ridiculed also.

And then, as more sophisticated measuring techniques and equipment become available, the person who was ridiculed yesterday becomes the person who was really right the entire time.

gamedog said...

Weaseldog: I'm glad you brought that up, I'd originally skimmed the headline presuming it related to nervous system response or something else far less obvious. I find it difficult to understand how these "scientists" got funding for such work, when it is quite clear to anyone who is not completely removed from nature. I would not have believed anyone could be so far removed if you had not pointed it out!

This looks like another example of
Post-normal science


I'm finding it strange there seems to have been a drop-off in the comments lately, just when collapse seems to be accelerating. I wonder if people are feeling "trapped in the headlights" or busy busy with personal preparations.

Don Hynes said...

Another trillion in bad paper to "cure" the debt crisis in Europe and round the world. This is madness. Bernanke in Wonderland just reaches for another pill...

Unknown said...

Just as humans and animals have understood and used gravity long before Newton showed us how to explain it, I've seen collapse coming for 20 years and it took MCR to explain it's mechanism.

Science in general, and structures in particular have always fascinated me. Maybe I'm just a little bit "savant" but I recognize patterns and the recurring nature of the ones that are stable, thus the following observations.

The current paradigm of rapid growth and endless consumption describes the structure of cancer.

As MCR relentlessly describes in his book Collapse, the laws of thermodynamics states that areas of high concentration will spread themselves out. The laws of diffusion and dispersion state the same thing. A monetary system that concentrates wealth instead of spreading it around goes contrary to the laws of physics and will fail.

But the question that has haunted me for years is why people can blithely go on with business as usual, even when it's leading to their doom. Every time I try to explain to people that what's happening the response is always the same. "No, come join the little lemmings. We're going to run over the cliff. It'll be Fun!"

Several years ago a study was published with the title "Mistakes were made but not by Me" on the idea of cognitive dissonance. What I took from it was that, common to all humans (except perhaps psychopaths) was the personal understanding that "I am a GOOD." Now if I were to think that everyone else who is GOOD would HAVE TO see things just like I do, we have the basis for the organizing ourselves into tribes/religions/cultures which are GOOD, and setting others apart as BAD.

If we cannot find a way of explaining to the deluded that they are wrong without making them feel that they are BAD, therefore setting off their defense mechanisms, we will never be able to bring any sanity to what is happening and to what is surely to come.

ecosutra said...

I think about moving to Portland, so far ahead of the game, networking sustainability. But then there is Mount Hood. If that explodes you can kiss Portland goodbye. Is all this off shore drilling effecting the increase in earthquakes and Volcanoes all over the world? I am starting to think that the 30,000 off shore wells sucking out oil at incredible rates will it connect to earthquakes and Volcanoes? Now with the new technology that takes oil at 18,000 feet below the earth, come on, it will surely bring more and more earthquakes and volcanoes. Where is one to lifeboat?

Tahiti? Its below the southern hemisphere and away from nuclear fallout. Great surf, get a bunch of sail boats, and share an energy ship collects waste into hydrogen and follow a fleet of green cruise ships with fuel cells, greenhouses, and a livestock ship too. Water world. That is a fun idea actually.

The trail of tears is a tragic story of our past, about the "relocation" of the Cherokee, Choctaw, and the Seminole people by George Washington and Andrew Jackson. Did you know that the harsh winter brought flash floods and caused famine for the relocation? Its like the Mothman prophecy. We dont need the moth, we can see tomorrows disasters as clear as day. I knew the floods were coming. I have it documented on my Twitter account back this winter, I said we were going to see the worst flooding in history.

Relocation. Its the greatest change you are going to make. Especially me and the other 36 million people living in the desert of southern California. The San Joaquin Valley soil is soon to be salted to where you cant grow anymore food on it for 1000 years. This is a huge problem California Permaculture Ecologist are very aware of. They said less than 5-10 years left growing food on this disastrous landscape. The same goes with Israel, Egypt, and Arabian Peninsula. Farming arid landscapes, the salting soils are overshooting the PH balance after decades of rotating crops. California salted the soils to the bitter end. And then you have the Sacramento Basin over spilling from erosion, bringing in the sea, salting the water and killing off the water supply. These are inevitable tipping points happening now that make the relocation as undeniable to me as Peak Oil and its role as an element in the collapse.

Bill Mollison says it the best, "Cities are places for people to die in"

Im ready for an expedition, can ya tell?

RanD said...

Genesis 1:20-31 generously informs the reader that God made all living things, not just man, living souls. Thus, those who claim to be Christians or scientists, yet do not consider species other than Homo sapiens to have or be living souls, are neither Christians nor scientists. But then much, if not most, human behavior has long been dictated by fashion and belief rather than reason and knowledge.

agape wins said...

5,10,10;3:22pm
Elmo said, & I agree; the problem is where, and how to start?

I thought no one ever came close(in modern time), but now it seems it almost happened Twice during WWI, I am researching it , in my old man/snail way!
Surely some wizz here can find out when/how, which one was bottom up,
& which Top down? The next question; why did they fail, & then what can We TODAY do differently to insure Success?
THINK!
I will state my opinion, possibly later.

Elmo said...

Anyone with a dog will tell you that they are just as alive and emotionally aware as you or I. Now about cats....

Unknown said...

Kota, I think you would enjoy reading a book called Ishmael by Daniel Quinn. It purports to answer the question you've been asking.

Or you could start with these 2 essays:

http://www.ishmael.com/Education/Writings/southwestern.cfm

http://www.ishmael.org/Education/Writings/The_New_Renaissance.cfm

Weaseldog, I suspect, has already been down this road.

Elmo said...

I could assert that you, yourself, have no emotions; and you could spend the rest of your life running experiments, and still never be able to definitively prove that you do! At some point, you have to just take it on faith.

Metem said...

Ms. Orkin, couldn't see a way to send you suggested articles to link to other than here in the comments. I thought this might be of interest.

"Last February, Spain’s intelligence service began investigating alleged suspicious efforts by foreign financial speculators to destabilize the Spanish economy. According to newspaper El País, the Spanish government asked the country’s Centro Nacional de Inteligencia (CNI) to probe links between speculative moves in world financial markets and a series of damaging editorials “in the Anglo-Saxon media”. There are indications that the National Intelligence Service of Greece (EYP) is following in the CNI’s footsteps. In February . . . several news outlets suggested that the EYP was cooperating with Spanish, Irish and Portuguese intelligence services in investigating a series of coordinated speculative attacks on money markets, most of which allegedly originated from London and Washington."

http://www.rieas.gr/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1217

toner deeski said...

Cats enslaved humans 4000 years ago.

Unknown said...

Wow, things are happening all over the place now.

I don't like the greece situation. I'm afraid that it will can end in a revolution that will get german, french and british boots on the ground. We have to wait and see how it plays out but I have a chill down my spine and a bad bad feeling about this. And if europe falls? I don't want to think about it yet.

And the oil spill looks like it will fuel, no pun intended, the already harsh import competition between Usa and China. If the gulf of mexico is going to be problematic then we have taken two steps instead of one towards the unthinkable. We need that oil. Nature have to wait it's turn.

Tyler Havlin said...

Corporations becoming more powerful than entire nations.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/jim-rickards-goldman-can-create-shorts-faster-europe-can-print-money

gamedog said...

When milking the markets is this obvious...

FTSE adds 5% on €750bn EU aid move

FOREX-Euro falls as market doubts rescue package

Morning markets: FTSE slides

how long before the teat dries up!

Unknown said...

"1/3 of Animals Face Extinction"

Try the novel, "The Creation", by E.O. Wilson.

http://www.amazon.com/Creation-Appeal-Save-Life-Earth/dp/0393330486/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_8

A very interesting read from one of the best. I love it when these scientists reach their seventies and decide that candy coating information is a waste of time.

gamedog said...

Seems George Ure (Urbansurvival.com) spotted the creation of a whole bunch of GLOBAL quantitative easing from the Fed, which surprisingly (or not!) didn't make the MSM

"I suppose I should tell you how the Big Rally was funded Monday. The Fed took the extraordinary step of...

authorized temporary reciprocal currency arrangements

"What really happens is - in effect - the world just created a couple of trillion of 'play money' which has to go somewhere and into currencies that are failing, countries that are failing, and indirectly it slops over into markets that are failing as well. We get a paper rally and "Disaster is averted!" which of course, it isn't but appearances are kept and the sheep stay neatly flocked."

Seems the wheels nearly fell off BIGTIME, but now they're holding them on with blue tac!