Back on the 14th January in a post called Now we are seventeen, I introduced the two miniature horses, Dancer and Grace, that came to be with us. In that post I mentioned,
Ready to leave
Jean is holding Dancer while Grace is waiting by the fence. Our original plans had been to take Dancer’s sister’s foal Allegra, but she was too stressed to leave her mother so soon; she is just six months old. As an interim, we borrowed Grace, Dancer’s last foal, until Allegra is ready to move homes.
Well yesterday Allegra was ready and came over to join Dancer while lovely Grace returned to neighbour Margo. Just wanted to share some pictures from yesterday.
Margo, her arm on Allegra, and her husband, Clarence, holding Allegra’s mother Keepsake. The two horses had come over together so as to offer comfort to young Allegra, now just 7 months old.
Allegra is on the left getting to know her new grounds. On the right is Aunt Chloe who came to spend the night here with Allegra to minimise any separation anxiety.
Close up of Dancer’s nose!
Don’t believe it! Another horse!!
I’m sure Pharaoh is wondering how long it will be before there are more horses than dogs!
My writings of the previous three days have explored the nature of man. The many ways that we struggle to understand so many issues in our lives. In particular the biggest issue of them all since we abandoned the life of the hunter-gatherer. Our very survival.
It would be so easy to beat oneself up. To stare in the mirror and despair at all the unfinished ideas that one has about being ‘sustainable’ shortly before jumping on one’s shiny new tractor, yet another symbol of our industrial civilisation. The hypocrisy, the double standards!
New tractor delivered last December.
But the mistake in any attempt at self-awareness is the assumption that you know who you are! Therein lays the problem.!
Marcus Peter Francis du Sautoy is a very smart person. This is how WikiPedia describes him.
Prof. Sautoy came to the realisation that the thoughts that make us feel as though we know ourselves are easy to experience. But where do those thoughts come from? Marcus Sautoy acknowledged that they are notoriously difficult to explain.
So, in order to find out where they come from Marcus subjects himself to a series of probing experiments. With the help of a hammer-wielding scientist, Jennifer Aniston and a general anaesthetic, Professor Marcus du Sautoy goes in search of answers to one of science’s greatest mysteries: how do we know who we are? ,
He learns at what age our self-awareness emerges and whether other species share this trait.
Next, he has his mind scrambled by a cutting-edge experiment in anaesthesia. Having survived that ordeal, Marcus is given an out-of-body experience in a bid to locate his true self. And in Hollywood, he learns how celebrities are helping scientists understand the microscopic activities of our brain.
Finally, he takes part in a mind-reading experiment that both helps explain and radically alters his understanding of who he is.
All of this is covered in a fabulously interesting episode from Horizon, the excellent and long-running BBC TV science and philosophy series. Thankfully, it made its way onto YouTube.
It is just under an hour long but I promise you it will capture you from the very first moment.
Enjoy. Even if you end up realising, as I did, what a strange person you are!
As Confucius reportedly wrote: Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance.
In a way this stunningly beautiful photograph is a reflection of our long relationship. Over the 33 years that we have been friends you and I have enjoyed many calm moments and tried to make sense of this crazy world. Yes, we have often disagreed about many things but never fallen out; not even come close to it. No better illustrated than me wanting you as my Best Man when Jean and I were married November 20th, 2010.
Payson, Arizona, November 20th 2010 Bridesmaid Dianne and Best Man Dan with the happy couple!
Your email to me of the 4th February was a difficult one to embrace; the Controversy Continues one. The last thing I wanted to do was to react impulsively because I knew you would disregard such a thoughtless response. After all, we have known each other’s views on the matter of climate change for a very long time.
Thank goodness I did sit on my hands. It allowed a more reflective part of my aged brain to compose a blog post on Learning from Dogs. The post that came out on the 12th under the title of Doggedly seeking the truth.
But the plain fact of the matter is that I profoundly disagree with the idea, as expressed in your email heading, that there is any controversy over the question of global warming resulting from man’s behaviours. I know from our years of friendship that you are open to all sorts of ideas. Meaning you wouldn’t be closed-minded to the biggest issue facing Homo sapiens andall the species on this planet, the one of anthropogenic global warming (AGW).
So let me offer you some links that make it very clear as to the reality of what is happening to this planet.
Perhaps the reason that so many intelligent people ‘avoid’ the truth of what we are doing to this planet was voiced in a recent comment by Prof. Guy McPherson on Learning from Dogs, “Perhaps Upton Sinclair had it right, years ago: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”
Even though you and I are well past salary days it doesn’t alter the chilling realisation that comes from embracing the truth of climate change and global warming: The undermining of just about everything that we have embraced over our years. No wonder it’s so much easier to stay within familiar comfort zones! To remain hypocrites as Jean and I do!
Let me close with the words uttered by mother Dellarobia to son Preston in Barbara Kingsolver’s book Flight Behavior: “It won’t ever go back to how it was, Preston.”
“A delusion is something that people believe in despite a total lack of evidence.” Richard Dawkins.
Yesterday, I started down the road of determining how one gets to the truth of a complex issue. I called the post Doggedly seeking the truth. My proposition was effectively saying that just because a person believes in argument ‘a’ or argument ‘b’ that doesn’t of itself make ‘a’ or ‘b’ the truth.
Unwittingly, Martin Lack of the blog Lack of Environment reinforced that point in spades. He wrote in a comment to yesterday’s post:
The deliberate spreading of misinformation is a fundamental part of the industry-led movement to deny the reality of anthropogenic climate disruption. Alex Rawls is just part of this campaign and I therefore do wish that you would consult me before deciding to help publicise and/or lend credence to such nonsense.
Now I have every sympathy for Martin’s outpourings of feelings; his blog is based on the conviction of his own beliefs. A position of integrity.
But taken literally, Martin’s words, “consult me before deciding to help publicise” mean that he wishes to influence what I choose to write. Of course he didn’t mean to convey that.
Back to yesterday’s post. With Dan’s permission, I reproduced the personal email that he sent me with those two articles. Dan isn’t on the payroll of the Koch brothers or blindly following an “industry-led movement to deny the reality of anthropogenic climate disruption“, he is a thinking human who is yet to be convinced that AGW is as rational a process as, say, gravity!
Humans are not fundamentally rational; we are emotional beings who even in this 21st century have little real understanding of what a human being is. (Must be honest and say that this last sentence is a tickler for a mind-opening video on the nature of human consciousness coming out on Friday.)
So if Dan is not convinced about the effects that mankind is having on Planet Earth, then spare a moment to ponder about the millions of others around the world who are far less capable, even if they had the time and inclination, to adopt a rational, open-minded view of the complexity of AGW.
It gets even more convoluted. In Professor McPherson’s video that was presented yesterday, this gets said, “If we act as if it’s too late, then we becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy”. On the face of it, that’s obvious. But on Guy McPherson’s blog Nature Bats Last the video has it’s own post and includes a comment left by Daniel, from which I quote:
Guy,
There are so many insoluble dilemmas concerning industrial civilization, it’s almost impossible for anyone to attempt to propose a “solution”, or attempt to describe the work that now needs to be done, without becoming a hypocrite.
At this stage, hypocrisy is unavoidable. Beyond the point of overshoot, at least in our culture, all that’s required to be a hypocrite, is to be alive.
I have watched your presentation evolve over the last few months, and with this latest one, something struck me as peculiar. You’ve added this line:
“If we act as if it’s too late, then we becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy”.
Basically, implying that we shouldn’t accept that it’s too late. Yes?
The evidence that now exists, has established an immovable catastrophe, which is now, well outside human agency ( aside from the looming boondoggle of geo-engineering). This is what the evidence shows. We have effectively already become a self-fulfilling prophesy. The most dire warnings of the last three decades, have now become prophetic. What are eight non-reversible feedbacks if not a physical manifestation of a self-fulfilling prophesy?
To which Guy replies:
Daniel, you’re asking the same questions many others have been asking lately. I’ll try to respond with my next essay, which I’ll complete and post in a couple days.
Seems to reinforce the message. That we really shouldn’t be surprised at the delusions, games and power interplays going on, especially in the corridors of power, so to speak.
Right! Time for me to show my hand!
I am totally convinced that we humans are responsible for the rising levels of CO2 in the atmosphere and that this accounts for the majority of the abnormal weather events being experienced in so many parts of the planet.
I think I’m right. Therefore I give more weight to the evidence that supports my view that, guess what, reinforces me thinking I’m right.
Is that scientific? Of course not! Science is about producing reproducible outcomes. With, say gravity, that’s a piece of cake.
I’m not a scientist, far from it. Therefore the following statement may be unreliable. That the problem with producing an uncontroversial, hard-wired proof that man is screwing up (you see, I did say that I wasn’t a scientist) our planet is that we don’t have other planets with which to test the thesis. When it surely is an uncontroversial, hard-wired proof it will be too late!
Having said all that, tomorrow I will present the best evidence that I can find to support the notion that Dan’s beliefs are wrong.
Back to Casey and that scent:
Now where’s that scent now? Sweeny, help me! Hang on, let me finish sniffing your bum! Ask Ruby to help, she’s just by the fence.
We can never be as rational as dogs. But maybe if we learnt to live more in the present, as dogs do so well, the world would be a much simpler and sustainable place.
On the road, there’s little possibility to develop a lasting relationship. I throw a Molotov cocktail into the conversation, and then I leave the area.
On the road, I describe how we live at the mud hut. I describe the importance of living for today.[my emphasis]
Casey doing what dogs do so well – picking up a scent.
I have been pondering about how one gets to the truth of a complex issue. And there’s none more complex nor more essential in terms of the truth of an issue than Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW).
It was kicked off by an email received from Dan Gomez. Followers of Learning from Dogs will have seen mention of Dan’s name as he regularly sends me bits and pieces. Indeed, let me refer you to a post that came out last August, Feeling depressed? Join your pals in the pool! and this extract:
Regular followers of Learning from Dogs will know that Dan and I go back a long way; far too long! In fact the occasion of me becoming aware of Mr. Daniel Gomez was at a Commodore Computer dealers conference in Boston, Mass.
I was giving a talk promoting a UK word-processing program that I was marketing for the Commodore. That software was called Wordcraft and I think the year was 1979, possibly 1980. Anyway, I used the word ‘fortnight’, which back in England is a common word meaning two weeks. Immediately, a voice called out from the audience, “Hey Handover, what’s a fortnight?“
The session deteriorated rapidly thereafter! Dan and I became very good friends and his LA company Cimarron became my West Coast USA distributor for Wordcraft. And it was Dan’s sister, Suzann, who invited me down to Mexico for Christmas 2007 which led to me meeting my beloved Jeannie! Funny old world!
Dan is a smart cookie. He holds a degree in psychology, as well as being a very easy guy to get along with. We have been good friends for more than 30 years.
Anyway, back to the theme of the post; determining the truth of a complex issue.
Recently, Dan sent me an email with the subject heading of The Controversy Continues – A couple of Articles for your Digestive Tract….
The first article was:
Report shows UN admitting solar activity may play significant role in global warming
A leaked report by a United Nations’ group dedicated to climate studies says that heat from the sun may play a larger role than previously thought.
“[Results] do suggest the possibility of a much larger impact of solar variations on the stratosphere than previously thought, and some studies have suggested that this may lead to significant regional impacts on climate,” reads a draft copy of a major, upcoming report from the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
The man who leaked the report, StopGreenSuicide blogger Alec Rawls, told FoxNews.com that the U.N.’s statements on solar activity were his main motivation for leaking the document.
The second article was from the Dick Morris website, from which I offer this extract (if, like me, you hadn’t heard of Mr. Morris before, details are here):
According to Bloomberg News, US carbon emissions are down 13% over the past five years and that they are now the lowest since 1994. In fact, we are more than halfway to President Obama’s goal of a 17% reduction below our peak year of 2007.
….
Coal has fallen to only 18% of our energy use (down from 23% in 2007) and natural gas is up to 31%. Natural gas has half the carbon emissions of coal.
Evidence suggests that climate change and global warming are happening, but at a much slower rate than doomsday warnings suggested. We are now on track for an increase in global temperatures of one degree centigrade by 2100. This increase is not enough to cause major flooding or rises in sea levels.
Please feel free to read the whole Dick Morris piece here.
So on the face of it, two convincing reports, especially the one from Alec Rawls.
Professor McPherson
Now let me turn to Professor Guy McPherson; professor emeritus at the University of Arizona. Just take a peek at the professional recognition granted to Professor McPherson.
Guy McPherson writes a blog called Nature Bats Last. It is described thus:
This blog focuses on the natural world, with a particular emphasis on the twin sides of our fossil-fuel addiction: (1) global climate change and (2) energy decline. Because these phenomena impact every aspect of life on Earth, specific topics range widely, and include philosophy, evolution, economics, humanity, politics, current events, and many aspects of the human condition.
Less than 3 months ago, Guy McPherson visited Greenfield Community College in western Massachusetts to deliver his presentation “The Twin Sides of the Fossil-Fuel Coin: Developing Durable Living Arrangements in Light of Climate Change and Energy Decline.”
It lasts for just 40 minutes and needs to be watched. Why do I say needs to be watched? Because tomorrow I delve deeper into the challenges facing ordinary folk and watching the presentation and reflecting on the start of this post are very pertinent to following the scent of truth.
DA14, or to give it’s full name, Asteroid 2012 DA14, is calling by Planet Earth rather soon. To quote the item on the Planetary Society’s website,
Asteroid 2012 DA14 Discovery Enabled by Planetary Society Grant
On Friday, February 15, 2013, Asteroid 2012 DA14 will travel just 17,000 miles above the Earth – closer to our planet than the orbit of the communications satellite that broadcast the Super Bowl around the world. About half the size of a football field and with more than 100 times the energy impact of the nuclear bomb that fell on Hiroshima, DA14 will miss Earth this time around, but if it had impacted, this asteroid could have taken out any major metropolitan city on our planet.
The discovery of Asteroid DA14 was made by a small team of observers at La Sagra Observatory in Southern Spain, on February 22, 2012, enabled with a grant provided by The Planetary Society. One of the observatory’s telescopes had recently been upgraded with funds donated by The Planetary Society’s NEO Shoemaker Grant program. Its new camera enabled detection of fast moving objects like 2012 DA14 – requiring very fast imaging for discovery and determination of their paths. The upgraded instrument has far outperformed the Observatory’s other telescopes.
Now, we get to point the world’s telescopes at this 2013 close flyby and learn more about this asteroid and its orbit because of the support of our Planetary Society Members all over the world.
This asteroid won’t hit Earth, at least for many, many decades. But it is a reminder we live in a cosmic shooting gallery. We need to find, track, and characterize these objects and develop the technical and political capability to deflect an asteroid. It is not a matter of whether there will be a dangerous impact, it is a matter of when.
NASA have recently released a video, see below, but a search on YouTube will find more, some of which are more engaging than the rather dry style of the NASA release.
Have questions? Bet you do! Here are some of the answers to the obvious ones. Including these:
What is the time of closest approach
Feb. 15, 2013, 19:25 UTC (11:25 PST)
What is the closest approach altitude?
Approximate altitude above the surface of the Earth will be 27,330 km, 17,000 mi (34,100 km, 21,200 mi from center of Earth). That is closer than the altitude of geosynchronous satellites, e.g., satellite TV satellites, at 35,786 km (22,236 mi) altitude.
Will it be visible with the naked eye, how bright will it be?
It will not be a naked eye object. At closest approach, its brightness will be about a magnitude of 7. It will be bright enough that it could be seen with steady binoculars or a small telescope if you are on the side of Earth it will be passing.
What parts of Earth will have a chance to observe it telescopically?
Near closest approach when it is brightest, most of Europe, Asia, and Africa. It will pass from the southern hemisphere to northern hemisphere. Though it will be much dimmer, it is observable by larger telescopes for days to weeks before and after closest approach.
Finally, well done those gents that first spotted DA14.
Miguel Hurtado, Jaime Nomen, and Jaume Andreu Winners of a Planetary Society Shoemaker NEO Grant in 2010
Learning from Dogs 