There is something sublimely satisfying about a farm. An aura of peace, honest work, and sincerity expressed through the cultivation of life and life-giving foods pervades the hazy, romantic image it summons in the minds of people. This is not to say that the bucolic lifestyle does not require intense work, daily labor, and great exertions, but that the work is honest and understandable, unlike many of the things that occur in the modern world. However, at the same time, it is considered obsolete and an obstacle to progress that must be removed.
That is the situation confronting the farmers of India. Progress, represented by barons of heavy industry, demands that they sacrifice their lands. Factories, railroads, and other projects that corporations require to create massive mechanized complexes to feed the world's need for raw materials and completed products will grow on this land in place of fruits and grains. An Indian industrial revolution is supposed to provide the jobs to empower a new middle class, built up by the money that will trickle down to these new workers through factory work.
India's farmers vociferously object to that. Throughout India, $98 billion worth of investments are wobbling uncertainly as farmers squat, battle police, and otherwise prevent construction from taking place, or slowing it down to a snail's pace. The farmers are wary and distrustful, skeptical at the promises that development will bring them jobs and progress.
They're right to be wary. There are 550 million small farmers in India, a country where land transactions are so infrequent that there is no market value for land. To make matters worse for those subsistence farmers, the majority of their compatriots who lose their land to development end up unemployed and legally robbed as their lands do not fetch anything near true value. To top it off, when facilities such as Tata Motors' banished Nano factory appear, less than one job for every eight people left unemployed would have been created - and most of those jobs require skills few farmers even have.
The current situation arises from a misconception and a business trend. Historically speaking, industrial revolutions are considered a definitive step forward into the "modern" world, the inevitability of progress, the way to a more "civilized" life. Conversely, businesses deploy their production facilities for goods and services to the places where they can maximize profits and minimize costs. Through the arcane business models and sciences, corporations such as ArcelorMittal have determined that by building their factories in India, they'll gain greater profits.
However, industrial revolutions cause great disruptions and unmitigated suffering long before their benefits trickle down and "progress" occurs. In the original Industrial Revolution, as more farmland produced more food with less labor, unemployment rose in the countryside. The unemployed migrated to the cities searching for factory work. India's already dismal slums would swell with literally hundreds of millions of poorly educated and starving people, searching for jobs that are neither numerous enough nor able to hire them due to inadequate skill sets.
There's also the consideration of poverty. Poverty is the lack of basic human needs. But basic human needs are defined differently depending on time, country, and even town! Adequate and nutritious food, clothing, shelter and clean water are all universal human needs. But there are those who argue that health services, broadband Internet, and electricity are basic human needs. By those standards, all of humanity has been impoverished for the past 13,000 years, if not earlier. While subsistence farmers are by no means rolling in wealth, they do actually meet their universal human needs. By definition, they have adequate food. They have clothing, shelter, and clean water when the monsoons come. It's a hard life, but it gives them a job, a sense of satisfaction, a fulfillment of family duty and tradition.
There are other facts to consider. ArcelorMittal, for example, drafted a $20 billion dollar plan to build two steel mills in India that has currently been brought to a standstill. Why is ArcelorMittal building in India when there are literal hundreds of abandoned steel mills throughout North America and Europe with people eager to take those jobs? Those jobs would actually reduce unemployment on those continents, as opposed to creating unemployment in a Third World nation. Is it more expensive to negotiate with laborers in the First World than to build from scratch facilities that no one wants, that won't create enough jobs to replace the jobs lost, and that will be forced into cost overruns due to delays?
Most damning of all is the hubris involved. This ranges from steel giant Posco's innocuous (for a corporation)statement that they wished to transform an entire region through acquiring farm land and building a India's biggest steel mill to the audaciously wasteful, with Vedanta Resources trucking in bauxite ore from the other side of India to their under-construction aluminum refinery because the native tribes who live nearby worship the hills the company wants to mine. The modus operandi for most businesses is to take the path of least resistance and maximum profit, yet these giants prefer to dig in their heels rather than adapt, replace, or relocate.
The attitude that the farmers are in need of progress and must be lifted from their miseries into the modern world smacks of the old "white man's burden" undergoing cultural diffusion. With billions flowing into industrial facilities, business see a benefit. But as is typical, no one stopped to ask the farmers if the change the industrial barons were offering was the sort of change the farmers wanted. After all, with the world's largest largest aluminum refinery at stake, who cares about a few dirty, superstitious mountain yokels?
Friday, October 23, 2009
Sunday, June 28, 2009
The Hollow Union
Throughout the world, there are millions of people who assume that the European Union is the sole government of all of Europe, that each one of the individual nations that have fought and bled for the last thousand years has abrogated their sovereignty and become one big, happy, multicultural, centralized family. The reality turns that illusion into a running joke.
About sixty years ago, the European Coal and Steel Community was formed. This bureaucratic mouthful was intended to be a centralized control of the national coal and steel industries of its member states, and is the origin of the modern European Union. What followed were a series of treaty evolutions that culminated in the modern EU.
The EU shares a common currency, a common customs union, common passport, even a common parliament. There are committees, commissions, and all the other tools of a bloated bureaucracy to give it the appearance of functionality. But matters are far different in the deeper layers.
The best way to describe the EU is not as a government, but rather government-like. Why the qualifier? The reason is simple: the EU is not a real government, even by federation standards. It lacks real authority. In theory, it lays claim to final say on policy matters, as well as drafting budgets, choosing technocrat officials, and even holding regular elections to its parliament. But it does not have real power. One has only to witness the Iraq War, when Britain dismissed the European Union’s policy of refusal and deployed forces alongside the United States as one of many examples of individual nations guarding their own interests and their own way first.
In theory, the goal of the European Union is to create a continent-wide consensus, so that all its members can benefit. To that end, it requires a strong, centralized government able to push ahead with agendas and policies. So why is the EU lacking in that critical area? It is a logical question to ask, but the fact of the matter is that this powerless status is what has allowed the EU to grow into its current state, and allow it to continue.
What would happen if the EU suddenly gained that centralized power? What if issues that had been debated, stalled, and decided in the governments of each nation were suddenly in the purlieu of the European Union? All of Europe would definitely be interested in what was going on, but it would not be a positive interest. The fact of the matter is that everyone from Spain to Romania would be in an uproar. There would be protests, riots, calls for the end to the EU and the return to individual nations, with the solemn vow never to try such a foolhardy experiment ever again.
Unification of all of Europe under one technocratic government may be the goal of the EU, but the reality is that it’s really more like a glorified NATO; its constituents decide when, how, and if they want to. It’s a part-time European government that looks pretty sand sounds nice, a non-entity that will not intrude into national politics where it does not belong.
All the efforts in the halls of power to create a single European government have been defeated or resisted by the people who live in Europe. Be it the EU Constitutional Theory or the call for a single European financial market, each measure has gone down to defeated. Each nation looks to care for itself, as the economic meltdown of the past year has demonstrated, as Britain, Germany, and the rest only concerned themselves with the welfare of financial institutions and account holders in their own countries.
The biggest joke is how the European Union was born. The goal of the power brokers who began the baby steps toward the EU was continent-wide integration to avoid the extreme forms of nationalism which had demolished much of Europe in the aftermath of the Second World War. The people of Europe are not one big European family, let alone one big Terran family. They are Spaniards, Italians, Greeks, and so on above all else. Serbians detest Albanians, Ukrainians look with resentment toward Russia, even as France continues an attitude that is centuries old as the center of Europe.
The truth of the matter is, people like having groups. They like being a part of something bigger than themselves….as long as it is exclusive. They resent being forced to have people they do not want being included with them. It’s simply human nature. The day the European Union starts to encroach on their rights or the day it begins to accept non-European nations into its aegis is the day the European Union ends.
About sixty years ago, the European Coal and Steel Community was formed. This bureaucratic mouthful was intended to be a centralized control of the national coal and steel industries of its member states, and is the origin of the modern European Union. What followed were a series of treaty evolutions that culminated in the modern EU.
The EU shares a common currency, a common customs union, common passport, even a common parliament. There are committees, commissions, and all the other tools of a bloated bureaucracy to give it the appearance of functionality. But matters are far different in the deeper layers.
The best way to describe the EU is not as a government, but rather government-like. Why the qualifier? The reason is simple: the EU is not a real government, even by federation standards. It lacks real authority. In theory, it lays claim to final say on policy matters, as well as drafting budgets, choosing technocrat officials, and even holding regular elections to its parliament. But it does not have real power. One has only to witness the Iraq War, when Britain dismissed the European Union’s policy of refusal and deployed forces alongside the United States as one of many examples of individual nations guarding their own interests and their own way first.
In theory, the goal of the European Union is to create a continent-wide consensus, so that all its members can benefit. To that end, it requires a strong, centralized government able to push ahead with agendas and policies. So why is the EU lacking in that critical area? It is a logical question to ask, but the fact of the matter is that this powerless status is what has allowed the EU to grow into its current state, and allow it to continue.
What would happen if the EU suddenly gained that centralized power? What if issues that had been debated, stalled, and decided in the governments of each nation were suddenly in the purlieu of the European Union? All of Europe would definitely be interested in what was going on, but it would not be a positive interest. The fact of the matter is that everyone from Spain to Romania would be in an uproar. There would be protests, riots, calls for the end to the EU and the return to individual nations, with the solemn vow never to try such a foolhardy experiment ever again.
Unification of all of Europe under one technocratic government may be the goal of the EU, but the reality is that it’s really more like a glorified NATO; its constituents decide when, how, and if they want to. It’s a part-time European government that looks pretty sand sounds nice, a non-entity that will not intrude into national politics where it does not belong.
All the efforts in the halls of power to create a single European government have been defeated or resisted by the people who live in Europe. Be it the EU Constitutional Theory or the call for a single European financial market, each measure has gone down to defeated. Each nation looks to care for itself, as the economic meltdown of the past year has demonstrated, as Britain, Germany, and the rest only concerned themselves with the welfare of financial institutions and account holders in their own countries.
The biggest joke is how the European Union was born. The goal of the power brokers who began the baby steps toward the EU was continent-wide integration to avoid the extreme forms of nationalism which had demolished much of Europe in the aftermath of the Second World War. The people of Europe are not one big European family, let alone one big Terran family. They are Spaniards, Italians, Greeks, and so on above all else. Serbians detest Albanians, Ukrainians look with resentment toward Russia, even as France continues an attitude that is centuries old as the center of Europe.
The truth of the matter is, people like having groups. They like being a part of something bigger than themselves….as long as it is exclusive. They resent being forced to have people they do not want being included with them. It’s simply human nature. The day the European Union starts to encroach on their rights or the day it begins to accept non-European nations into its aegis is the day the European Union ends.
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Sixty-Fifth Anniversary of D-Day
To the grandfathers, fathers, uncles, brothers, on both sides, who fought because they wished to protect freedom or to protect their loved ones, and gave their lives.
To these heroes, lost in the swirls of time and page upon page of dusty orders of battle and military records.
To the men who inspired this boy to love history because of their bravery, their stubborn will, their determination to be men in a world that now condemns us for striving to have even half the balls these men did.
I salute you, and promise that so long as I live, your courage will always be remembered and honored.
To these heroes, lost in the swirls of time and page upon page of dusty orders of battle and military records.
To the men who inspired this boy to love history because of their bravery, their stubborn will, their determination to be men in a world that now condemns us for striving to have even half the balls these men did.
I salute you, and promise that so long as I live, your courage will always be remembered and honored.
Friday, May 29, 2009
The Future is Green
After decades of environmental education, humans have become both more aware of the effects of their daily activities on their planet, and more hostile against organizations that fail to meet their social responsibility to the rest of mankind. As a result, “going green” has become a catch phrase amongst businesses, an ongoing, highly publicized trend that has companies competing to become the most environmentally friendly in the eyes and pockets of consumers. Money, resources, and intelligence are being funneled into these clean technology efforts. These new advancements are not only a trend, but a necessity for the continuation of humanity.
As I noted before, going green is an ongoing trend in business. For example, Ford is concentrating its efforts in manufacturing their EcoBoost engines, designed to improve fuel efficiency and reduce carbon dioxide emissions without sacrificing power, with the handy bonus of being manufactured in an economically struggling area. Designs have been crafted to install wind turbines into broken electrical towers, thereby turning the towers into wind energy powerhouses and providing an energy boost to a ready-made grid, as well as complementing newly built electrical towers. These designs also handily avoid the complaints that wind turbines mar the beauty of the scenery. It's not just obvious targets like cars that are being made environmentally healthy: products as mundane as media converters and LCD TVs have been "greened", substantially reducing the energy these products consume, thereby reducing their long term strain on energy supplies, the environment, and even the electricity bill.
The proliferation in solar technology is also proceeding at an impressive rate. Taiwan recently finished construction on a solar-powered stadium that generates all of its electricity from solar technology. The fifty-thousand seat arena is sheathed in 8,844 solar panels that fuels a system so powerful that it takes six minutes to power up the stadium’s entire lighting system, on top of powering thousands of lights and the two jumbo vision screens and feeding the majority of the local area's power needs. Israel, a nation forever vulnerable to military attack and energy supply disruption, is backing the efforts of a kibbutz to turn farmland into fields of solar panels, turning the desert into a power plant. A growing band of farmers in the south of France are putting up solar panels to supplement farm incomes as well as supply power to the area.
Just as solar technology is running the gamut from the massive corporate project to the entrepenuerial level, it is also receiving upgrades. Research is progressing on a way to manufacture solar cells as easily and cheaply as printing presses produce paper money. With each passing year, new cells are created that are ever more efficient, with companies pressing onward to create better cells. Even nanotechnology has been applied to produce more advanced, sophisticated, and efficient solar cells.
And those efforts are simply the ones focused on improving existing technology. Billions of gallons of gasoline are being targeted for replacement not only with ethanol from food crops, but with biofuels made from plants specifically for that purpose. Hydrogen gas pure enough to power a fuel cell has been created through combining enzymes with non-food cellulose like woodchips. Artificial photosynthesis is being explored, with some seeking to emulate the full process while others seek to stop at the step that releases hyrdrogen. There are plans to experiment with powering data centers with methane gas from landfills, and there is even a fantastic design to create what is called a traveling-wave nuclear reactor that would turn non-fissile material into the fuel it needs, permitting a reactor to run for centuries without needing fresh fuel.
That isn't to say that everything going on in the world of green technology is wonderful. In the same way that there was a real estate bubble that burst in the United States, Ireland, Britain, Spain, and elsewhere in the world, there is currently a biofuel bubble that is already nearing the bursting point. There are billions in cash invested into dozens of biofuel ventures, from start-ups funded by venture capitalists to energy company sponsored research efforts. The biofuel industry will be completely unable to meet the government mandates for biofuel consumption for decades, especially as meeting those standards would require only building hundreds of fuel factories, each with price tags at half a billion dollars, andeach surrounded by literal thousands of hectares of prime farmland, thereby reducing food-growing capacity.
Biofuel is a logistical nightmare, unsustainable by economies of scale or simple competitiveness. The billions being thrown into it is waste, as alternatives to both cheap oil and biofuels exist, the prime example being direct conversion into bioelectricity, which is more efficient and yield more energy than both. There's also the problem of opportunity cost; green jobs, or jobs derived from green technology, cost two and a half times more than jobs derived from cheap fuel like oil. With the billions of dollars the United States government is spending on green jobs, less jobs will result, a rather brutal indiction in a time of global unemployment.
However, despite the obvious drawbacks, there is plenty to support about green tech. We live on a planet of limited resources and limited viability. Green technology expands the uses of our resources, reduces the damage to our planet, and allows to sustain more people. Not only that, this green techonology increases the viability and reduces the cost of space colonies and space exploration. Green technology encourages us to think long term. In three generations of searching, we have yet to find another world like ours. Perhaps in the future we’ll find such a world, but for now, we have this one chance, one world, one home, and we must take care of it.
Sources
The Biofuel Bubble
Which Is Better—Biofuels or Bioelectricity?
Ford To Build Cleaner Engine At Ohio Plant
Allied Telesis Upgrades its Media Converters to Ship with Energy Star-Compliant Power Supplies
JVC LCD TVs Beat New Energy Star Standards
Wind Turbine Towers Win Metropolis Next Generation Prize!
Green Jobs, Ole: Is the Spanish Clean-Energy Push a Cautionary Tale?
Hydrogen Fuel From Woodchips And Other Non-food Sources
Next-Gen Green Data Centers: Powered by Methane?
Storing solar energy by turning over a new leaf
Taiwan’s Solar Stadium is 100% Powered by the Sun
Biggest Solar Deal Ever Announced — We’re Talking Gigawatts
A Solar Dream from Israeli Kibbutzim
French farmer is new sun king
New technology enables solar cells to be printed like money
TR10: Traveling-Wave Reactor
Sanyo hits world record for solar cell efficiency
Nanotechnology Researchers Make Solar Energy Advance
As I noted before, going green is an ongoing trend in business. For example, Ford is concentrating its efforts in manufacturing their EcoBoost engines, designed to improve fuel efficiency and reduce carbon dioxide emissions without sacrificing power, with the handy bonus of being manufactured in an economically struggling area. Designs have been crafted to install wind turbines into broken electrical towers, thereby turning the towers into wind energy powerhouses and providing an energy boost to a ready-made grid, as well as complementing newly built electrical towers. These designs also handily avoid the complaints that wind turbines mar the beauty of the scenery. It's not just obvious targets like cars that are being made environmentally healthy: products as mundane as media converters and LCD TVs have been "greened", substantially reducing the energy these products consume, thereby reducing their long term strain on energy supplies, the environment, and even the electricity bill.
The proliferation in solar technology is also proceeding at an impressive rate. Taiwan recently finished construction on a solar-powered stadium that generates all of its electricity from solar technology. The fifty-thousand seat arena is sheathed in 8,844 solar panels that fuels a system so powerful that it takes six minutes to power up the stadium’s entire lighting system, on top of powering thousands of lights and the two jumbo vision screens and feeding the majority of the local area's power needs. Israel, a nation forever vulnerable to military attack and energy supply disruption, is backing the efforts of a kibbutz to turn farmland into fields of solar panels, turning the desert into a power plant. A growing band of farmers in the south of France are putting up solar panels to supplement farm incomes as well as supply power to the area.
Just as solar technology is running the gamut from the massive corporate project to the entrepenuerial level, it is also receiving upgrades. Research is progressing on a way to manufacture solar cells as easily and cheaply as printing presses produce paper money. With each passing year, new cells are created that are ever more efficient, with companies pressing onward to create better cells. Even nanotechnology has been applied to produce more advanced, sophisticated, and efficient solar cells.
And those efforts are simply the ones focused on improving existing technology. Billions of gallons of gasoline are being targeted for replacement not only with ethanol from food crops, but with biofuels made from plants specifically for that purpose. Hydrogen gas pure enough to power a fuel cell has been created through combining enzymes with non-food cellulose like woodchips. Artificial photosynthesis is being explored, with some seeking to emulate the full process while others seek to stop at the step that releases hyrdrogen. There are plans to experiment with powering data centers with methane gas from landfills, and there is even a fantastic design to create what is called a traveling-wave nuclear reactor that would turn non-fissile material into the fuel it needs, permitting a reactor to run for centuries without needing fresh fuel.
That isn't to say that everything going on in the world of green technology is wonderful. In the same way that there was a real estate bubble that burst in the United States, Ireland, Britain, Spain, and elsewhere in the world, there is currently a biofuel bubble that is already nearing the bursting point. There are billions in cash invested into dozens of biofuel ventures, from start-ups funded by venture capitalists to energy company sponsored research efforts. The biofuel industry will be completely unable to meet the government mandates for biofuel consumption for decades, especially as meeting those standards would require only building hundreds of fuel factories, each with price tags at half a billion dollars, andeach surrounded by literal thousands of hectares of prime farmland, thereby reducing food-growing capacity.
Biofuel is a logistical nightmare, unsustainable by economies of scale or simple competitiveness. The billions being thrown into it is waste, as alternatives to both cheap oil and biofuels exist, the prime example being direct conversion into bioelectricity, which is more efficient and yield more energy than both. There's also the problem of opportunity cost; green jobs, or jobs derived from green technology, cost two and a half times more than jobs derived from cheap fuel like oil. With the billions of dollars the United States government is spending on green jobs, less jobs will result, a rather brutal indiction in a time of global unemployment.
However, despite the obvious drawbacks, there is plenty to support about green tech. We live on a planet of limited resources and limited viability. Green technology expands the uses of our resources, reduces the damage to our planet, and allows to sustain more people. Not only that, this green techonology increases the viability and reduces the cost of space colonies and space exploration. Green technology encourages us to think long term. In three generations of searching, we have yet to find another world like ours. Perhaps in the future we’ll find such a world, but for now, we have this one chance, one world, one home, and we must take care of it.
Sources
The Biofuel Bubble
Which Is Better—Biofuels or Bioelectricity?
Ford To Build Cleaner Engine At Ohio Plant
Allied Telesis Upgrades its Media Converters to Ship with Energy Star-Compliant Power Supplies
JVC LCD TVs Beat New Energy Star Standards
Wind Turbine Towers Win Metropolis Next Generation Prize!
Green Jobs, Ole: Is the Spanish Clean-Energy Push a Cautionary Tale?
Hydrogen Fuel From Woodchips And Other Non-food Sources
Next-Gen Green Data Centers: Powered by Methane?
Storing solar energy by turning over a new leaf
Taiwan’s Solar Stadium is 100% Powered by the Sun
Biggest Solar Deal Ever Announced — We’re Talking Gigawatts
A Solar Dream from Israeli Kibbutzim
French farmer is new sun king
New technology enables solar cells to be printed like money
TR10: Traveling-Wave Reactor
Sanyo hits world record for solar cell efficiency
Nanotechnology Researchers Make Solar Energy Advance
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
The Sacredness of History
History is the past, those things that have come before. Even as you read this, the words you saw before have become a part of history. The preservation of past events for future generations has been an obsession of mankind for as long as we have been able to walk upright. Oral traditions transmitted messages and testimony from one generation to the next, millennia before the creation of the written word. Admittedly, the use of oral transmission is filled with flaws, as history becomes legend, legend becomes myth, and things become forgotten, but the essence of the story is conveyed to its intended audience.
This means that, ultimately, history is the record of everything we as a people have done, and all the lessons we have learned. History is essentially the greatest story told by humanity, never ending and continuous so long as there is a single person who still lives, and never forgotten so long as a single book remains. The past defines the present and creates the future, so it is important not to forget. Without history, there is neither an identity in the present nor a future to create.
As the past is preserved through the hands of historians, this means that how the story is told is helplessly in the hands of humans. Obviously, this is a flawed process. The instinct of man is to make himself look good while making others appear much worse than they really are. While there are historians who seek the truth, there are others who seek to demolish heroes and conceal that which inconveniences them.
The most dangerous of the latter are the historical revisionists. First, I will add a qualification to this. Revision, in and of itself, is not necessarily bad. Revisiting facts when research has put them in a new context is no more evil than correcting a typo on a paper. Take, for example, the dig at Gobekli Tepe in Turkey. Large, clearly sculpted stones have been found here, covered in intricate carvings. What makes the find unique is the fact that the artifacts are 13,000 years old, almost three times the age of the Egyptian pyramids. Not only does Gobekli Tepe predate “history,” it defies the common state at that time by being a farming community in a world of hunters and gatherers. This first settlement in beautiful and lush terrain was abandoned when man wore away the countryside, resulting in the present-day desert and probably setting the foundation for the legend of the Garden of Eden.
However, for every revision, there is an equal and opposite counter-revision. Take the controversy over the height of Napoleon, Emperor of France. He was a bogeyman to scare British children (and adults!) while he lived…while subject to endless propaganda that he was a tiny tyrant. Unfortunately, this minor slur stuck in popular culture, despite strong evidence that Napoleon was actually a respectable 1.7 meters, the average height for his time.
Revisionism is another beast entirely. Revisionism takes the evidence of the past and discards it in favor of a completely false assertion. Take, for example, the revolting attempted usurpations of the accepted truth to Cleopatra VII, who enchanted Julius Caesar and Marcus Antonious, and Charlotte, wife of George III of England. Black authors have attempted to claim that these women were either black or of black descent. In the case of Cleopatra, this patently false assertion is bludgeoned by blunt reality; as a Ptolemy of Egypt, Cleopatra belonged to an in-bred Macedonian royal family that had no trace of any Nubian blood. Charlotte, and by extension the British royal family, are claimed to be descended from the black mistress of a Portuguese king, a claim refuted by noted genealogists.
The most heinous revisionism, of course, goes into the category of Holocaust deniers. It honestly is not enough to say that this sort of thing should be accorded the status of a crime. The Holocaust is one of humanity’s best documented atrocities; the Nazi penchant toward paperwork and bureaucracy provided an incredible amount of firsthand genuine sources that are irrefutable by any standard historical research method. What makes it worse is that these denials do not come from dedicated analytical research, but rather, from political opportunists out to improve their standing amongst their audience or to grandstand on the global stage.
The goal of a historian is to preserve the past accurately for the future. Revisionists are not historians, because they seek to change the past for their present. There is no worse nightmare for a historian than for the truth to be buried under a cascade of revisionist lies, and no worse fate for a society than to believe falsehoods without a shred of collaborating evidence. After all, if an identity is built on a lie, it's as sound as a house built on sand.
This means that, ultimately, history is the record of everything we as a people have done, and all the lessons we have learned. History is essentially the greatest story told by humanity, never ending and continuous so long as there is a single person who still lives, and never forgotten so long as a single book remains. The past defines the present and creates the future, so it is important not to forget. Without history, there is neither an identity in the present nor a future to create.
As the past is preserved through the hands of historians, this means that how the story is told is helplessly in the hands of humans. Obviously, this is a flawed process. The instinct of man is to make himself look good while making others appear much worse than they really are. While there are historians who seek the truth, there are others who seek to demolish heroes and conceal that which inconveniences them.
The most dangerous of the latter are the historical revisionists. First, I will add a qualification to this. Revision, in and of itself, is not necessarily bad. Revisiting facts when research has put them in a new context is no more evil than correcting a typo on a paper. Take, for example, the dig at Gobekli Tepe in Turkey. Large, clearly sculpted stones have been found here, covered in intricate carvings. What makes the find unique is the fact that the artifacts are 13,000 years old, almost three times the age of the Egyptian pyramids. Not only does Gobekli Tepe predate “history,” it defies the common state at that time by being a farming community in a world of hunters and gatherers. This first settlement in beautiful and lush terrain was abandoned when man wore away the countryside, resulting in the present-day desert and probably setting the foundation for the legend of the Garden of Eden.
However, for every revision, there is an equal and opposite counter-revision. Take the controversy over the height of Napoleon, Emperor of France. He was a bogeyman to scare British children (and adults!) while he lived…while subject to endless propaganda that he was a tiny tyrant. Unfortunately, this minor slur stuck in popular culture, despite strong evidence that Napoleon was actually a respectable 1.7 meters, the average height for his time.
Revisionism is another beast entirely. Revisionism takes the evidence of the past and discards it in favor of a completely false assertion. Take, for example, the revolting attempted usurpations of the accepted truth to Cleopatra VII, who enchanted Julius Caesar and Marcus Antonious, and Charlotte, wife of George III of England. Black authors have attempted to claim that these women were either black or of black descent. In the case of Cleopatra, this patently false assertion is bludgeoned by blunt reality; as a Ptolemy of Egypt, Cleopatra belonged to an in-bred Macedonian royal family that had no trace of any Nubian blood. Charlotte, and by extension the British royal family, are claimed to be descended from the black mistress of a Portuguese king, a claim refuted by noted genealogists.
The most heinous revisionism, of course, goes into the category of Holocaust deniers. It honestly is not enough to say that this sort of thing should be accorded the status of a crime. The Holocaust is one of humanity’s best documented atrocities; the Nazi penchant toward paperwork and bureaucracy provided an incredible amount of firsthand genuine sources that are irrefutable by any standard historical research method. What makes it worse is that these denials do not come from dedicated analytical research, but rather, from political opportunists out to improve their standing amongst their audience or to grandstand on the global stage.
The goal of a historian is to preserve the past accurately for the future. Revisionists are not historians, because they seek to change the past for their present. There is no worse nightmare for a historian than for the truth to be buried under a cascade of revisionist lies, and no worse fate for a society than to believe falsehoods without a shred of collaborating evidence. After all, if an identity is built on a lie, it's as sound as a house built on sand.
Sunday, March 22, 2009
The Sham of the AIG Outrage
Imagine, if only for a moment, that you decide that you want to modify your house. You've decided to give it an extra floor, so that it will increase in value, thereby increasing your personal wealth. You decide to get a contractor, and promise to pay him a bonus, regardless of whether he does a good job. In fact, you even decide to make it so you pay his bonus so long as he works for you on your house and other projects. Now imagine that the contractor has wrecked your house, and you have to spend even more money to put it back to something resembling sturdy. Would you still have to pay that bonus you promised?
As people are discovering much to their dismay, the answer is “yes.” AIG, that insurance behemoth that played such a large role in bringing about the current economic crisis, has recently been contractually obliged to pay out bonuses to their Financial Products Division. This part of the company can arguably be held responsible for all of the disasters that made a fundamentally strong company a beggar on the government dole. Losses of over $61 billion are nothing to sneeze at, especially when more losses are potentially present as the Financial Products Division struggles to unravel the complex toys they created.
Unfortunately, letting AIG fail is about as viable an option as expected. Part of the reason it cannot be allowed to go the way of extinction is because of how much the current financial system depended on AIG and its credit default swaps to protect themselves from their own investments. As a matter of policy, CDS were taken out as a sort of insurance policy should the securities created from pooling mortgages together fail. Obviously, with the same short-sightedness displayed by subprime lenders, AIG happily got into the swaps with the delusion that housing would never go through a business cycle again. Not only that, CDS are not regulated, so people who did not even own those securities could insure them: in essence credit default swaps are bets on whether or not something will fail, with the bet-maker paying an insurance premium while the house holds onto the bet. Should the bet not be paid off, the contract system falls apart, institutions have no reason to trust each other, and things become even worse than they are.
This is where the retention bonuses come in. After the market began to display the first stench of rot, the underwriters at FPG declined to stop their reckless insuring. AIG sensed that the end was near, as did many of its employees in the Financial Product Division. Aware that rats abandon sinking ships first, AIG realized it needed those same rats to unravel the mess they had created. It quickly offered them money; each one who stayed would get a bonus in 2009, and each one who stayed after that would get one in 2010. This internal deal was dutifully sealed in contracts, and the matter forgotten under the wave of defaults, trouble, and contraction that has been the economic upset.
Then, of course, the bonuses came due, right after a wave of government cash infusions that promptly went to pay off institutions such as Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank and Californian municipalities that took out credit default swaps. The government, of course, knew they were coming, as AIG had quietly informed the government and told them they had no legal way out. Treasury lawyers reviewed the same contracts and were forced to agree. The bonuses would have to be paid as they were for this year, but immediate work was done to curtail them for 2010.
The worst part, of course, is that the government, in its earlier haste to bailout the financial system, failed to put in language to prevent circumstances such as these in the earlier wave of bailouts. Much to its good fortune, however, public opinion turned on AIG rather than Congress. People are furious that a company that has received billions of dollars is paying out millions in bonuses. Firstly, to put things into better context for those who cannot perceive the difference, a billion is one thousand million. AIG has received $170,000 million, and is paying out $165 million in retention bonuses.
Nor does it help that the populist rage is being stoked by politicians and public figures alike. Obama in particular has been keen to play two-face. Faced with slipping poll numbers and diminishing public support, he has been the loudest in a pack of dogs baying for blood. The fact that bonuses were coming due was a well-known fact that was only brought to the forefront through Obama's well-timed efforts, even as he attempts to keep the private investors from jumping ship, leaving the government holding the bag. It is also a convenient distraction for the $9 trillion (9 million million) deficit his economic plans and budgets will inflict.
Comedians like Steven Colbert have gotten into the act, as well. The day after Colbert called for the mobs to sharpen their pitchforks, AIG issued a corporate memo that sounded more like a college campus advisory against rape, including such classics as not to wear AIG branded items (provocative clothing) and to travel in groups. Nor does it help AIG's case that its paperwork is showing a gap of $53 million between what it said it would pay and what it actually seems to have paid, along with the niggling detail that people who had left AIG in the time since the bonuses were agreed to were actually receiving them.
The populist rage is sufficient that AIG executives have rallies on their literal doorsteps, as activists protest outside their lush homes. Armed guards and heightened security measures have AIG employees fearful for their lives, senior executive down to office staff who do no more than supply paper and clean bathrooms. It has reached the point where some AIG employees are paying heed to their government-appointed chairman's request that they return their bonuses.
Fear is a powerful motivator, but as usual, the government has gone one step too far. In the closing days of the week, the House of Representatives passed a measure that would tax those who chose to keep their bonuses by an extraordinary 90 percent. This measure is, at best, illegal as well as a threat. Longtime readers will recall that I once advocated that all executives at bailed out firms return their bonuses, retroactive to September 2008, and may be wondering as to my seeming turnabout. As I explained through my analysis of the FOCA bill, the devil is in the details.
The measure that passed the House is flawed for a number of reasons. Firstly, it would not be a 90% tax. On top of federal taxes, money is subject to state and local taxes. That alone would boost the actual money paid to 102 percent. In effect, the people receiving the bonuses would be paying for the privilege of being taxed, a measure that most of the mob would heartily endorse but which is counterproductive at best. By applying this measure now, in the midst of the clean up, it encourages companies to pay back the bailout money immediately, dipping into funds they lack, causing themselves and the financial system greater instability. Lest we forget, the entire purpose of the bailout was to promote financial stability and prevent a systemic collapse.
Secondly, the law itself is unconstitutional. Congress is prevented by the Constitution from making taxes retroactive and targeting a specific, named group for higher taxation. By pushing ahead with this measure, not only are fundamental laws being violated, but a dangerous precedent created. If the measure actually succeeds, what is to stop future governments from taxing everyone at 90 percent? The slippery slope begins with a first step, and this one is more dangerous than most. Thirdly, the money would not go back to the company that arguably needs it, but straight into the maw of the hungry government budget, where any returns would be minimal, at best. Again, by creating this precedent, it becomes easier to justify excessive taxes on everyone to pay for more items no one needs or wants.
In contrast to my own measure, I will point out that while retroactive, it did not tax anyone. It was a measure designed to target those most responsible for the mess to give back their huge and ill-gotten gains to the companies they helped mismanage and virtually destroy. The difference between the government tax and my return measure is that the money would go straight back into the coffers of the ailing company, helping give it a little more cash to attempt to survive the strain in the financial system, it would not force anyone to pay more than they actually made, and it survives the litmus test of legality, while the House's tax is illegal, would go straight into paying Obama's massive deficits, and would help no one.
The public is outraged over the AIG bonus debacle, and their feelings are justified. However, in the midst of this populist fury, others such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are also handing out bonuses, able to rest easier because the flak AIG is taking keeps the public from noticing them. Not only that but the outrage is being manipulated and used for political grandstanding in a non-constructive way, turned into the type of media circus that distracts people from more urgent, complex issues. Even as people protest and threaten AIG with death, metaphorical and literal, people continue to ignore the slow but definite recovery of the Dow before a dime of the government stimulus package is paid, as the government prints out $300 billion in cash, as inflation rises and what the common man makes becomes worth even less. The devil is in the boring, crucial details.
Sources
Gold futures rise more than 4% to above $920
Fannie Mae to Pay Bonuses of Up to $1M for Four Execs
The 102% Tax
How AIG Became Too Big to Fail
Obama budget could bring $9.3 trillion in deficits
AIG Offices patrolled by Armed Guards
Protesters visit AIG officials' lavish Conn. homes
Some Will Pay Back AIG Bonuses
Official: AIG bonus estimates grow $53 million
'Don't wear anything that says AIG on it': Under-fire insurer gives employees security tips as fury over bonuses grows
AIG’s Liddy Acknowledges ‘Distasteful’ Retention Pay
AIG names firms that got bailout cash
Obama Will Take "Every Legal Avenue" to Block AIG Bonuses
Congress played major role in AIG bonus mess
AIG has $61.7 billion loss, new U.S. aid may not be last
Jim Rogers: Let AIG Go Bankrupt, Not America
As people are discovering much to their dismay, the answer is “yes.” AIG, that insurance behemoth that played such a large role in bringing about the current economic crisis, has recently been contractually obliged to pay out bonuses to their Financial Products Division. This part of the company can arguably be held responsible for all of the disasters that made a fundamentally strong company a beggar on the government dole. Losses of over $61 billion are nothing to sneeze at, especially when more losses are potentially present as the Financial Products Division struggles to unravel the complex toys they created.
Unfortunately, letting AIG fail is about as viable an option as expected. Part of the reason it cannot be allowed to go the way of extinction is because of how much the current financial system depended on AIG and its credit default swaps to protect themselves from their own investments. As a matter of policy, CDS were taken out as a sort of insurance policy should the securities created from pooling mortgages together fail. Obviously, with the same short-sightedness displayed by subprime lenders, AIG happily got into the swaps with the delusion that housing would never go through a business cycle again. Not only that, CDS are not regulated, so people who did not even own those securities could insure them: in essence credit default swaps are bets on whether or not something will fail, with the bet-maker paying an insurance premium while the house holds onto the bet. Should the bet not be paid off, the contract system falls apart, institutions have no reason to trust each other, and things become even worse than they are.
This is where the retention bonuses come in. After the market began to display the first stench of rot, the underwriters at FPG declined to stop their reckless insuring. AIG sensed that the end was near, as did many of its employees in the Financial Product Division. Aware that rats abandon sinking ships first, AIG realized it needed those same rats to unravel the mess they had created. It quickly offered them money; each one who stayed would get a bonus in 2009, and each one who stayed after that would get one in 2010. This internal deal was dutifully sealed in contracts, and the matter forgotten under the wave of defaults, trouble, and contraction that has been the economic upset.
Then, of course, the bonuses came due, right after a wave of government cash infusions that promptly went to pay off institutions such as Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank and Californian municipalities that took out credit default swaps. The government, of course, knew they were coming, as AIG had quietly informed the government and told them they had no legal way out. Treasury lawyers reviewed the same contracts and were forced to agree. The bonuses would have to be paid as they were for this year, but immediate work was done to curtail them for 2010.
The worst part, of course, is that the government, in its earlier haste to bailout the financial system, failed to put in language to prevent circumstances such as these in the earlier wave of bailouts. Much to its good fortune, however, public opinion turned on AIG rather than Congress. People are furious that a company that has received billions of dollars is paying out millions in bonuses. Firstly, to put things into better context for those who cannot perceive the difference, a billion is one thousand million. AIG has received $170,000 million, and is paying out $165 million in retention bonuses.
Nor does it help that the populist rage is being stoked by politicians and public figures alike. Obama in particular has been keen to play two-face. Faced with slipping poll numbers and diminishing public support, he has been the loudest in a pack of dogs baying for blood. The fact that bonuses were coming due was a well-known fact that was only brought to the forefront through Obama's well-timed efforts, even as he attempts to keep the private investors from jumping ship, leaving the government holding the bag. It is also a convenient distraction for the $9 trillion (9 million million) deficit his economic plans and budgets will inflict.
Comedians like Steven Colbert have gotten into the act, as well. The day after Colbert called for the mobs to sharpen their pitchforks, AIG issued a corporate memo that sounded more like a college campus advisory against rape, including such classics as not to wear AIG branded items (provocative clothing) and to travel in groups. Nor does it help AIG's case that its paperwork is showing a gap of $53 million between what it said it would pay and what it actually seems to have paid, along with the niggling detail that people who had left AIG in the time since the bonuses were agreed to were actually receiving them.
The populist rage is sufficient that AIG executives have rallies on their literal doorsteps, as activists protest outside their lush homes. Armed guards and heightened security measures have AIG employees fearful for their lives, senior executive down to office staff who do no more than supply paper and clean bathrooms. It has reached the point where some AIG employees are paying heed to their government-appointed chairman's request that they return their bonuses.
Fear is a powerful motivator, but as usual, the government has gone one step too far. In the closing days of the week, the House of Representatives passed a measure that would tax those who chose to keep their bonuses by an extraordinary 90 percent. This measure is, at best, illegal as well as a threat. Longtime readers will recall that I once advocated that all executives at bailed out firms return their bonuses, retroactive to September 2008, and may be wondering as to my seeming turnabout. As I explained through my analysis of the FOCA bill, the devil is in the details.
The measure that passed the House is flawed for a number of reasons. Firstly, it would not be a 90% tax. On top of federal taxes, money is subject to state and local taxes. That alone would boost the actual money paid to 102 percent. In effect, the people receiving the bonuses would be paying for the privilege of being taxed, a measure that most of the mob would heartily endorse but which is counterproductive at best. By applying this measure now, in the midst of the clean up, it encourages companies to pay back the bailout money immediately, dipping into funds they lack, causing themselves and the financial system greater instability. Lest we forget, the entire purpose of the bailout was to promote financial stability and prevent a systemic collapse.
Secondly, the law itself is unconstitutional. Congress is prevented by the Constitution from making taxes retroactive and targeting a specific, named group for higher taxation. By pushing ahead with this measure, not only are fundamental laws being violated, but a dangerous precedent created. If the measure actually succeeds, what is to stop future governments from taxing everyone at 90 percent? The slippery slope begins with a first step, and this one is more dangerous than most. Thirdly, the money would not go back to the company that arguably needs it, but straight into the maw of the hungry government budget, where any returns would be minimal, at best. Again, by creating this precedent, it becomes easier to justify excessive taxes on everyone to pay for more items no one needs or wants.
In contrast to my own measure, I will point out that while retroactive, it did not tax anyone. It was a measure designed to target those most responsible for the mess to give back their huge and ill-gotten gains to the companies they helped mismanage and virtually destroy. The difference between the government tax and my return measure is that the money would go straight back into the coffers of the ailing company, helping give it a little more cash to attempt to survive the strain in the financial system, it would not force anyone to pay more than they actually made, and it survives the litmus test of legality, while the House's tax is illegal, would go straight into paying Obama's massive deficits, and would help no one.
The public is outraged over the AIG bonus debacle, and their feelings are justified. However, in the midst of this populist fury, others such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are also handing out bonuses, able to rest easier because the flak AIG is taking keeps the public from noticing them. Not only that but the outrage is being manipulated and used for political grandstanding in a non-constructive way, turned into the type of media circus that distracts people from more urgent, complex issues. Even as people protest and threaten AIG with death, metaphorical and literal, people continue to ignore the slow but definite recovery of the Dow before a dime of the government stimulus package is paid, as the government prints out $300 billion in cash, as inflation rises and what the common man makes becomes worth even less. The devil is in the boring, crucial details.
Sources
Gold futures rise more than 4% to above $920
Fannie Mae to Pay Bonuses of Up to $1M for Four Execs
The 102% Tax
How AIG Became Too Big to Fail
Obama budget could bring $9.3 trillion in deficits
AIG Offices patrolled by Armed Guards
Protesters visit AIG officials' lavish Conn. homes
Some Will Pay Back AIG Bonuses
Official: AIG bonus estimates grow $53 million
'Don't wear anything that says AIG on it': Under-fire insurer gives employees security tips as fury over bonuses grows
AIG’s Liddy Acknowledges ‘Distasteful’ Retention Pay
AIG names firms that got bailout cash
Obama Will Take "Every Legal Avenue" to Block AIG Bonuses
Congress played major role in AIG bonus mess
AIG has $61.7 billion loss, new U.S. aid may not be last
Jim Rogers: Let AIG Go Bankrupt, Not America
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Artificial Life
The meaning of life is often the most crippling question facing a sentient being. The many questions that we can apply toward the meaning of life have rarely prompted people to ask what life is. We know it when we see it; it is a programmed instinct of being able to tell between inanimate matter, living beings, and dead bodies. However, humans need more structure than simply ‘knowing it when we see it’. As such, the official definition of life has become a ‘self-sustaining chemical system capable of Darwinian evolution’. This generalized explanation is lacking in more detail, but the scientists of the world have begun efforts to provide those details, with the same boundless enthusiasm and thoughtlessness as their efforts in AI.
A new field of science known as synthetic biology will be the most responsible for discovering the basic way to create life. A small beaker filled with liquid is the first step toward learning to manufacture life in the same way we now manufacture semiconductors and microchips. This beaker is the linchpin of an experiment known as AEGIS - Artificially Expanded Genetic Information System. While it is not self-sustaining as yet, it is evolving, fulfilling the basic requirement of this experiment. Not only that, but these scientists are already experimenting with existing life forms, producing bacteria that can produce anti-malaria medication, for example.
These experiments sometimes feel like the mere tip of the iceberg when it comes to the advancements being pursued. The gene that produces enamel, the irreplaceable hard substance that coats and protects teeth has been located. A way to safely create stem cells by delivering the necessary genes to reprogram cells has been discovered. The genome code of the multitudes of common cold virus variants have been processed, mapped, and turned into a sort of family tree that gives scientists a better idea of how to defeat the perennial nuisances. Altered immune cells have been produced that are able to shrink, and in some cases eradicate, large tumors in mice by targeting a specific kind of protein. Ribosomes have been identified as the ones responsible for translating the messages carried in the genetic code of all organisms into the workhorse molecules of the cell. AEGIS itself is filled with eight artificial nucleotides in addition to the original four that make up every DNA strand. Cloning is advancing from animal experimentation to theoretical application to humans.
These last three are probably the most disturbing. Ribosomes have been identified as the central processing unit of the cell, as important as mitochondria and the nucleus in the functional operation of life. In the last few days, ribosomes have been created artificially. One of the fundamental building blocks of life has been successfully created by human hands. AEGIS has eight artificial nucleotides on top of its four natural ones. It has been successfully proven that the genes activated in the development of a normal human activate inside of a cloned embryo. In one short month, the power of God has come within the grasp of mankind.
Certainly, such technology has useful applications. Or so we are told by the scientists who dabble in invention of these new tools, who claim that these new techniques will aid in the production of new drugs, chemicals, and bacterias. For all the positive talk, however, even the scientist who helped create the artificial ribosome will not deny that a huge step has been taken toward the production of synthetic lifeforms. Essentially, this means that a huge step has been taken toward the abuses that mankind is capable of when it crosses ethical lines it should have best left alone.
Unfortunately, this is not even a vaguely alarmist statement. Artificial nucleotides, the manipulation of genes, and the creation of synthetic ribosomes means that the ability to create life is limited only by human imagination. DNA is similar to computer code, so setting up lines of code inside a receptive empty cell, powered by ribosomes that can process DNA that has never been witnessed on this planet, is not even far-fetched, but the likely norm. On top of that, efforts to engineer life are already underway, although this example will be reverse engineering. Chickens, who have had their genome studied in exhausting detail, will be used as the baseline to recreate dinosaurs, creatures that have been extinct for over sixty-five million years. While the paleontologists that are assisting in the project claim that reverse engineering chickens into dinochickens would result in positive advancements for mankind, I am dubious as to their claim that dinochickens would never escape and become a distinct wild species. One has only to explore the Galapagos to witness evolution in action, where there are dozens of bird species that evolved from a single common ancestor. They also seem to reject the possibility of parthenogenesis, asexual reproduction, a process commonly observed in reptiles. Moving chickens back into their reptilian origins has the distinct possibility of bringing this trait about as well, and while dinochickens may not be such a great threat, it only takes a single scientist with a rich, misguided group of investors to create a real problem.
Moving away from the dubiousness of bringing back dinosaurs is an even more alarming possibility: bringing back the long dead Neanderthals. Before anyone can claim that it is impossible to bring back the Neanderthals, let it be known that more than than 63% of the Neanderthal genetic code has already been sequenced. As time goes on, more complex tools of genetic manipulation are being developed. While it is not possible to bring back Neanderthals at present, they are sufficiently similar to humans that hollowed out human egg cells can be as the original structure to code and for all intents and purposes clone a Neanderthal.
There cannot be any doubt that people would want to bring back Neanderthals; humankind is able to take up the strangest causes, and scientists have already taken up the cause of bringing back extinct creatures like the ibex, which was briefly cloned before lung defects caused it to fall once more into extinction. Scientists are convinced that Neanderthals hold one of the keys to working what makes us human, so it is only a matter of technology and time before they decide that the resurrection of a species that became extinct before humans had the power to casually inflict oblivion would benefit their analysis.
However, what would be the point? Neanderthals became extinct because our ancestors out-adapted them. Our ancestors had slightly larger brains and enjoyed some secret advantage that we have no cognizance of. What would be the point of bringing back Neanderthals, who would always live in our shadow? Even if we succeeded in bringing them back, remember the physical differences between man and Neanderthal. Humans are programmed to reject that which is different to them, and Neanderthals fall within that area known as the uncanny valley, looking similar to humans, but not similar enough to avoid rejection. With sloped foreheads and chinless skulls that prevent any misidentification as humans, no amount of pithy tolerance speeches would overcome instinct. Neanderthals were much stronger than our ancestors, with the typical male equipped with arms that could shame a weightlifter. Not only that, humans are competitive enough with each other; how do you suppose we would react to a stronger, less intelligent rival going for the same jobs, living in the same space, and attempting to get the same food we do? Genocide would be the least of their new worries.
What of clones? The same genes that turn on in a naturally gestated baby are turned on in a clone. Cloned human embryos demonstrate many of the hallmarks of healthy genetic development. This breakthrough would mean that people can produce healthy cloned stem cells to replace damaged tissue and failed organs. People would be able to recover from fatal conditions, accidents and diseases in a fraction of the time and expense that it currently takes to keep them alive long enough to repair them or await an organ transplant. However, the same procedure that can clone organs can clone a human being.
It is almost a certainty that many governments will ban human cloning. It is also virtually a certainty that people will break those laws. Imagine how much a narcissist would be willing to pay to have a clone of himself take his place when he finally leaves this world. Imagine how much people would be willing to pay to clone a lost loved, to clone a genius so their legacies would continue, to clone a beauty to satisfy insatiable lust. As cloning techniques are practiced, they become less expensive as innovation improves production and cuts cost. In the same way that computers were once the purlieu of the government before becoming cheap enough to be purchased by the average household.In effect, a new market for human flesh will arise.
Production of clones would actually cheapen human life. After all, there is no need to be concerned about being careful, avoiding war, or any other of a thousand actions that we weigh against our continued existence when it would become so easy, so inexpensive to produce a fresh body to take its place. Who would care about going to war when it takes a mere eighteen years to raise a battalion of clones for battle? Who would care about sexual slavery when clones are easy enough to "put to work?" Who would care about industrial conditions when clones can be replaced? Sure, they might think like us, look like us, act like us, and think like us, but if humans are still willing to enslave each other in our 'enlightened' times, why would any logical thinker believe that we would treat clones any better? Especially when they would 'merely' be copies of homo sapiens?
The last implication involves not reverse evolution, nor present day DNA, but genetic engineering. Recently, the owner of a fertility clinic was obliged to withdraw an offering for designer babies, where couples would be allowed to determine the future offspring’s hair, eye and skin color by testing the embryos. While the measure was deemed distasteful and condemned as impossible by current science. However, as in all things, how long will it take before this becomes a reality? One that is frequently practiced and meddled with by morally indifferent genetic engineers? Already China has a gaping sex ratio because its families already prefer men to women, and use prenatal screening to discard girls. How long would it take before people paid to produce an oversupply of geniuses? What relevance would genius have when everyone would be equally as brilliant?
In the words of one of the practitioners of this new and arcane science, the underlying goal of synthetic biology is to make biology easy to engineer. By the estimation of other scientists, synthetic life is only ten years away, beating AI by a decade. As usual, they say nothing about whether they should engineer biology, and by extension, life. The ethics are left on the side as they continue to experiment. The future cannot be stopped. Whether we survive a future of synthetic life is another matter entirely.
Sources
Research Breakthrough: Human Clones May Be Genetically Viable
'Dinochicken' scheme puts evolution in reverse
Scientists expect to create life in next 10 years
Origin of Life On Earth: Scientists Unlock Mystery Of Molecular Machine
Synthetic life form grows in Florida lab
Saving the World, One Molecule at a Time
Researchers make stem cell breakthrough
Researchers crack the code of the common cold
Neanderthals could walk again after discovery of genetic code
New Artificial DNA Points to Alien Life
Targeted Immune Cells Shrink Tumors In Mice
Designer baby plan nixed for now by fertility clinic
BBC - Science & Nature - Wildfacts - Neanderthal
Harvard Scientists’ Discovery Opens Door to Synthetic Life
Toward Synthetic Life: Scientists Create Ribosomes -- Cell Protein Machinery
Making Every Baby Girl Count
A new field of science known as synthetic biology will be the most responsible for discovering the basic way to create life. A small beaker filled with liquid is the first step toward learning to manufacture life in the same way we now manufacture semiconductors and microchips. This beaker is the linchpin of an experiment known as AEGIS - Artificially Expanded Genetic Information System. While it is not self-sustaining as yet, it is evolving, fulfilling the basic requirement of this experiment. Not only that, but these scientists are already experimenting with existing life forms, producing bacteria that can produce anti-malaria medication, for example.
These experiments sometimes feel like the mere tip of the iceberg when it comes to the advancements being pursued. The gene that produces enamel, the irreplaceable hard substance that coats and protects teeth has been located. A way to safely create stem cells by delivering the necessary genes to reprogram cells has been discovered. The genome code of the multitudes of common cold virus variants have been processed, mapped, and turned into a sort of family tree that gives scientists a better idea of how to defeat the perennial nuisances. Altered immune cells have been produced that are able to shrink, and in some cases eradicate, large tumors in mice by targeting a specific kind of protein. Ribosomes have been identified as the ones responsible for translating the messages carried in the genetic code of all organisms into the workhorse molecules of the cell. AEGIS itself is filled with eight artificial nucleotides in addition to the original four that make up every DNA strand. Cloning is advancing from animal experimentation to theoretical application to humans.
These last three are probably the most disturbing. Ribosomes have been identified as the central processing unit of the cell, as important as mitochondria and the nucleus in the functional operation of life. In the last few days, ribosomes have been created artificially. One of the fundamental building blocks of life has been successfully created by human hands. AEGIS has eight artificial nucleotides on top of its four natural ones. It has been successfully proven that the genes activated in the development of a normal human activate inside of a cloned embryo. In one short month, the power of God has come within the grasp of mankind.
Certainly, such technology has useful applications. Or so we are told by the scientists who dabble in invention of these new tools, who claim that these new techniques will aid in the production of new drugs, chemicals, and bacterias. For all the positive talk, however, even the scientist who helped create the artificial ribosome will not deny that a huge step has been taken toward the production of synthetic lifeforms. Essentially, this means that a huge step has been taken toward the abuses that mankind is capable of when it crosses ethical lines it should have best left alone.
Unfortunately, this is not even a vaguely alarmist statement. Artificial nucleotides, the manipulation of genes, and the creation of synthetic ribosomes means that the ability to create life is limited only by human imagination. DNA is similar to computer code, so setting up lines of code inside a receptive empty cell, powered by ribosomes that can process DNA that has never been witnessed on this planet, is not even far-fetched, but the likely norm. On top of that, efforts to engineer life are already underway, although this example will be reverse engineering. Chickens, who have had their genome studied in exhausting detail, will be used as the baseline to recreate dinosaurs, creatures that have been extinct for over sixty-five million years. While the paleontologists that are assisting in the project claim that reverse engineering chickens into dinochickens would result in positive advancements for mankind, I am dubious as to their claim that dinochickens would never escape and become a distinct wild species. One has only to explore the Galapagos to witness evolution in action, where there are dozens of bird species that evolved from a single common ancestor. They also seem to reject the possibility of parthenogenesis, asexual reproduction, a process commonly observed in reptiles. Moving chickens back into their reptilian origins has the distinct possibility of bringing this trait about as well, and while dinochickens may not be such a great threat, it only takes a single scientist with a rich, misguided group of investors to create a real problem.
Moving away from the dubiousness of bringing back dinosaurs is an even more alarming possibility: bringing back the long dead Neanderthals. Before anyone can claim that it is impossible to bring back the Neanderthals, let it be known that more than than 63% of the Neanderthal genetic code has already been sequenced. As time goes on, more complex tools of genetic manipulation are being developed. While it is not possible to bring back Neanderthals at present, they are sufficiently similar to humans that hollowed out human egg cells can be as the original structure to code and for all intents and purposes clone a Neanderthal.
There cannot be any doubt that people would want to bring back Neanderthals; humankind is able to take up the strangest causes, and scientists have already taken up the cause of bringing back extinct creatures like the ibex, which was briefly cloned before lung defects caused it to fall once more into extinction. Scientists are convinced that Neanderthals hold one of the keys to working what makes us human, so it is only a matter of technology and time before they decide that the resurrection of a species that became extinct before humans had the power to casually inflict oblivion would benefit their analysis.
However, what would be the point? Neanderthals became extinct because our ancestors out-adapted them. Our ancestors had slightly larger brains and enjoyed some secret advantage that we have no cognizance of. What would be the point of bringing back Neanderthals, who would always live in our shadow? Even if we succeeded in bringing them back, remember the physical differences between man and Neanderthal. Humans are programmed to reject that which is different to them, and Neanderthals fall within that area known as the uncanny valley, looking similar to humans, but not similar enough to avoid rejection. With sloped foreheads and chinless skulls that prevent any misidentification as humans, no amount of pithy tolerance speeches would overcome instinct. Neanderthals were much stronger than our ancestors, with the typical male equipped with arms that could shame a weightlifter. Not only that, humans are competitive enough with each other; how do you suppose we would react to a stronger, less intelligent rival going for the same jobs, living in the same space, and attempting to get the same food we do? Genocide would be the least of their new worries.
What of clones? The same genes that turn on in a naturally gestated baby are turned on in a clone. Cloned human embryos demonstrate many of the hallmarks of healthy genetic development. This breakthrough would mean that people can produce healthy cloned stem cells to replace damaged tissue and failed organs. People would be able to recover from fatal conditions, accidents and diseases in a fraction of the time and expense that it currently takes to keep them alive long enough to repair them or await an organ transplant. However, the same procedure that can clone organs can clone a human being.
It is almost a certainty that many governments will ban human cloning. It is also virtually a certainty that people will break those laws. Imagine how much a narcissist would be willing to pay to have a clone of himself take his place when he finally leaves this world. Imagine how much people would be willing to pay to clone a lost loved, to clone a genius so their legacies would continue, to clone a beauty to satisfy insatiable lust. As cloning techniques are practiced, they become less expensive as innovation improves production and cuts cost. In the same way that computers were once the purlieu of the government before becoming cheap enough to be purchased by the average household.In effect, a new market for human flesh will arise.
Production of clones would actually cheapen human life. After all, there is no need to be concerned about being careful, avoiding war, or any other of a thousand actions that we weigh against our continued existence when it would become so easy, so inexpensive to produce a fresh body to take its place. Who would care about going to war when it takes a mere eighteen years to raise a battalion of clones for battle? Who would care about sexual slavery when clones are easy enough to "put to work?" Who would care about industrial conditions when clones can be replaced? Sure, they might think like us, look like us, act like us, and think like us, but if humans are still willing to enslave each other in our 'enlightened' times, why would any logical thinker believe that we would treat clones any better? Especially when they would 'merely' be copies of homo sapiens?
The last implication involves not reverse evolution, nor present day DNA, but genetic engineering. Recently, the owner of a fertility clinic was obliged to withdraw an offering for designer babies, where couples would be allowed to determine the future offspring’s hair, eye and skin color by testing the embryos. While the measure was deemed distasteful and condemned as impossible by current science. However, as in all things, how long will it take before this becomes a reality? One that is frequently practiced and meddled with by morally indifferent genetic engineers? Already China has a gaping sex ratio because its families already prefer men to women, and use prenatal screening to discard girls. How long would it take before people paid to produce an oversupply of geniuses? What relevance would genius have when everyone would be equally as brilliant?
In the words of one of the practitioners of this new and arcane science, the underlying goal of synthetic biology is to make biology easy to engineer. By the estimation of other scientists, synthetic life is only ten years away, beating AI by a decade. As usual, they say nothing about whether they should engineer biology, and by extension, life. The ethics are left on the side as they continue to experiment. The future cannot be stopped. Whether we survive a future of synthetic life is another matter entirely.
Sources
Research Breakthrough: Human Clones May Be Genetically Viable
'Dinochicken' scheme puts evolution in reverse
Scientists expect to create life in next 10 years
Origin of Life On Earth: Scientists Unlock Mystery Of Molecular Machine
Synthetic life form grows in Florida lab
Saving the World, One Molecule at a Time
Researchers make stem cell breakthrough
Researchers crack the code of the common cold
Neanderthals could walk again after discovery of genetic code
New Artificial DNA Points to Alien Life
Targeted Immune Cells Shrink Tumors In Mice
Designer baby plan nixed for now by fertility clinic
BBC - Science & Nature - Wildfacts - Neanderthal
Harvard Scientists’ Discovery Opens Door to Synthetic Life
Toward Synthetic Life: Scientists Create Ribosomes -- Cell Protein Machinery
Making Every Baby Girl Count
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