27/02: The end of the world?
It's a very interesting period in history. We're seeing a lot more wild weather; on the other hand, the wild weather is reported much more than ever before. We have conflicts occurring on a worldwide scale - not quite a world war but general unrest and terrorism linked to some dark cause that nobody has clearly defined nor explained to either side.
Nobody has explained to the Moslem terrorists that dead is dead and that there won't be 49 virgins for each dead terrorist but a fiery reception from a fellow with a tail, horns and a trident. If the Buddhists are to be believed then they may get reincarnated as dung beetles.
The current earthquakes and tsunamis are very interesting. The tektonic plates are moving more over the past decade then they have for several decades. They keep talking about "the big one" for San Francisco, which will probably come at some point in the future. In fact, it'll definitely come but whether it'll come this century or even this millennium is debatable.
The doomsayers are speaking loudly about doom and the end of the world. It reminds me of comic books I read as a child with fellows walking down the street wearing sandwich boards proclaiming "The end is nigh". If that's the best a lot of people can do then I feel sorry for them. Rather than sitting around stating that the end is coming, how about getting some ideas together about how to survive it all? Of course, I forgot - most doom and gloom mongers are just there to revel in the fear they create and would probably be the first to fall down a freshly opened crevice in the Earth.
People are predicting the end of the world in 2012 because that's when the Mayan calendar ends. The fact is somewhat different. The Mayans believed in cyclical time. I believe they had 7 cycles. Over the 1,500 years since the end of the Mayan empire, the cycles have probably ended simultaneously a few times. Why did they choose 2012 as an end of their calendar - perhaps it was more coincidence than anything else as all things have to end at some point. Why did Nostradamus say that Pope John Paul II would be the last ever Pope? Simple - he wanted to try to predict as many as he could then when he ran out of steam he simply said "and that's the last one". Several hundred years later, is anybody going to tap him on the shoulder to ask why he didn't predict more? The doom and gloom mongers are trying to make more out of it than actually exists. It's a simple get out to say "and this will be the last pope or year or whatever". Anybody that questions it will be answered "wait and see". The fact neither questioner nor predictor will be around is immaterial so a belief is founded based on some misguided mystic.
What amazes me is that people should all want to believe in the end of the world. Let's face it - the world probably will end at some point - either consumed by the Sun when it turns into a red giant or frozen into little ice cubes if the Sun just quietly expires. The world might even get demolished by a giant asteroid or as Douglas Adams would have it, demolished to make a hyperspace bypass. Trying to predict it seems very pointless without making adequate preparation to survive it.
How will we survive the end of the world? Certainly not by going to Mars! We may survive the end of the world by designing a giant space ship to take as many people as possible across the universe to another habitable planet. The big caveat there is that the whole ship will need to be repairable and everything, even the tools will need to be repaired in flight. Not only that but decay of the materials will need to be taken into account as such a journey may take several thousand years. Even if suspended animation were used with the astronauts being defrosted for a few weeks a time every 10 years or so then it's still a pretty difficult if not impossible venture. How would they cope if the planet chosen turned out to be full of flesh eating microscopic organisms?
Clearly the doom and gloom mongers are wasting everybody's time and patience. Nothing can be done to escape the doom and gloom they predict other than escaping the misery of listening to the blighters by leaving the room when they start flapping their lips and uttering their rubbish.
It's about the same with the climate change rubbish. The climate is always changing. Man-made pollution does not exceed the level emitted by volcanoes. A single volcano will emit far more greenhouse gas than the whole of mankind ever could. There are thousands of volcanoes. Better than worrying about climate change, plant some trees and make the landscape look nicer.
I find all the arguments in favour of energy-saving lighting to be very debatable. For example, I put in some florescent lighting and found that it has issues:
1. The florescent bulbs don't light as quickly as incandescent.
2. The florescent bulbs don't produce as much light.
3. The florescent bulbs trigger migraines.
4. The florescent bulbs contain mercury vapour which is hazardous. The incandescent bulbs do not contain anything toxic.
5. The florescent bulbs cost a lot more and don't last appreciably longer. In fact, on a cost per bulb basis, they cost more even in the long run than incandescent - including running costs. This is not theory - it's fact, based on my experience of running florescent and incandescent bulbs.
One of the biggest things that influence the cost of lighting is where the bulbs are made. I find if they're made in China, they just do not last as long as those made elsewhere. Just like everything else from China, they're sub-standard, shoddily made rubbish. Try bulbs that last a week!
LED lighting is very interesting and a neat development. Again, they're expensive and with a very debatable life. The quoted figures of 30,000 hours, 50,000 hours and 100,000 hours are quite frankly unbelievable. Continuously on, a bulb with a quoted life of 10,000 hours would last about 18 months. Switching the bulbs on and off is where the problems come as surges in current are not kind to electronics. A bulb switched on and off several times a day is not likely to last as long as one left continually on. By the time 18 months is up or even more than 6 months for most people, the warranty period (if any) has expired and the manufacturer is away with your money.
Again, current LED lighting isn't as bright and doesn't have the optical range of incandescent lighting. With the brighter LEDs, the control circuitry becomes an issue. The LEDs may last a long time but if the control circuitry isn't as good as the LED then it's no better than any ordinary light.
I'm not really in favour of most of these modern forms of lighting though I do like the sound of LED lighting. Rather than making more efficient lighting and more efficient electronics, instead of making this the sole concern as it pretty well is at the moment, I'd rather the emphasis be placed on domestic power generation. This would have much more knock-on effect than reduction in power consumption. If every house roof has solar panels then the quantity of power generated would exceed any possible savings from more efficient gadgets. The drive for more efficient gadgets would come from householders who didn't want to pay the power company for power but who wanted to use more gadgets in their house off their own electricity. Everything's being done backwards - as normal.
So, in this world where natural disasters are increasing and where terrorism is a big thing, it makes sense to be self-sufficient in things such as power. If a terrorist strike took out the transformers or the power plants then large areas would suffer. Those with their own generating capacity would, of course, benefit. I cannot understand why South Carolina does not require builders to do as they do in California, to put solar panels on the roof of each house. Even if that power were only fed into the grid, it would mean a massive reduction in the power needed to be generated. That would have a bigger effect on greenhouse gasses and pollution than absolutely anything else.
In other news, I was idly considering Schlieren photography. Looking online, I see lots of interesting flash adaptations. The requirement of Schlieren photography is that the flash be a point light source aimed at a concave mirror from as close to the lens axis as possible. This has the effect of making the air visible instead of invisible. Thus, it's possible to see the air moving as something passes through it and possible also to record this movement with a high-speed photo. The flash adaptations I was looking at were wild and wacky home-brew concoctions made by assorted amateurs. I already know my construction will be pretty simple, involving black construction paper and ordinary white paper. Many seem to use silver paint but in truth, I find silver paint does not reflect quite as well as white as it's more grey than reflective.
Nobody has explained to the Moslem terrorists that dead is dead and that there won't be 49 virgins for each dead terrorist but a fiery reception from a fellow with a tail, horns and a trident. If the Buddhists are to be believed then they may get reincarnated as dung beetles.
The current earthquakes and tsunamis are very interesting. The tektonic plates are moving more over the past decade then they have for several decades. They keep talking about "the big one" for San Francisco, which will probably come at some point in the future. In fact, it'll definitely come but whether it'll come this century or even this millennium is debatable.
The doomsayers are speaking loudly about doom and the end of the world. It reminds me of comic books I read as a child with fellows walking down the street wearing sandwich boards proclaiming "The end is nigh". If that's the best a lot of people can do then I feel sorry for them. Rather than sitting around stating that the end is coming, how about getting some ideas together about how to survive it all? Of course, I forgot - most doom and gloom mongers are just there to revel in the fear they create and would probably be the first to fall down a freshly opened crevice in the Earth.
People are predicting the end of the world in 2012 because that's when the Mayan calendar ends. The fact is somewhat different. The Mayans believed in cyclical time. I believe they had 7 cycles. Over the 1,500 years since the end of the Mayan empire, the cycles have probably ended simultaneously a few times. Why did they choose 2012 as an end of their calendar - perhaps it was more coincidence than anything else as all things have to end at some point. Why did Nostradamus say that Pope John Paul II would be the last ever Pope? Simple - he wanted to try to predict as many as he could then when he ran out of steam he simply said "and that's the last one". Several hundred years later, is anybody going to tap him on the shoulder to ask why he didn't predict more? The doom and gloom mongers are trying to make more out of it than actually exists. It's a simple get out to say "and this will be the last pope or year or whatever". Anybody that questions it will be answered "wait and see". The fact neither questioner nor predictor will be around is immaterial so a belief is founded based on some misguided mystic.
What amazes me is that people should all want to believe in the end of the world. Let's face it - the world probably will end at some point - either consumed by the Sun when it turns into a red giant or frozen into little ice cubes if the Sun just quietly expires. The world might even get demolished by a giant asteroid or as Douglas Adams would have it, demolished to make a hyperspace bypass. Trying to predict it seems very pointless without making adequate preparation to survive it.
How will we survive the end of the world? Certainly not by going to Mars! We may survive the end of the world by designing a giant space ship to take as many people as possible across the universe to another habitable planet. The big caveat there is that the whole ship will need to be repairable and everything, even the tools will need to be repaired in flight. Not only that but decay of the materials will need to be taken into account as such a journey may take several thousand years. Even if suspended animation were used with the astronauts being defrosted for a few weeks a time every 10 years or so then it's still a pretty difficult if not impossible venture. How would they cope if the planet chosen turned out to be full of flesh eating microscopic organisms?
Clearly the doom and gloom mongers are wasting everybody's time and patience. Nothing can be done to escape the doom and gloom they predict other than escaping the misery of listening to the blighters by leaving the room when they start flapping their lips and uttering their rubbish.
It's about the same with the climate change rubbish. The climate is always changing. Man-made pollution does not exceed the level emitted by volcanoes. A single volcano will emit far more greenhouse gas than the whole of mankind ever could. There are thousands of volcanoes. Better than worrying about climate change, plant some trees and make the landscape look nicer.
I find all the arguments in favour of energy-saving lighting to be very debatable. For example, I put in some florescent lighting and found that it has issues:
1. The florescent bulbs don't light as quickly as incandescent.
2. The florescent bulbs don't produce as much light.
3. The florescent bulbs trigger migraines.
4. The florescent bulbs contain mercury vapour which is hazardous. The incandescent bulbs do not contain anything toxic.
5. The florescent bulbs cost a lot more and don't last appreciably longer. In fact, on a cost per bulb basis, they cost more even in the long run than incandescent - including running costs. This is not theory - it's fact, based on my experience of running florescent and incandescent bulbs.
One of the biggest things that influence the cost of lighting is where the bulbs are made. I find if they're made in China, they just do not last as long as those made elsewhere. Just like everything else from China, they're sub-standard, shoddily made rubbish. Try bulbs that last a week!
LED lighting is very interesting and a neat development. Again, they're expensive and with a very debatable life. The quoted figures of 30,000 hours, 50,000 hours and 100,000 hours are quite frankly unbelievable. Continuously on, a bulb with a quoted life of 10,000 hours would last about 18 months. Switching the bulbs on and off is where the problems come as surges in current are not kind to electronics. A bulb switched on and off several times a day is not likely to last as long as one left continually on. By the time 18 months is up or even more than 6 months for most people, the warranty period (if any) has expired and the manufacturer is away with your money.
Again, current LED lighting isn't as bright and doesn't have the optical range of incandescent lighting. With the brighter LEDs, the control circuitry becomes an issue. The LEDs may last a long time but if the control circuitry isn't as good as the LED then it's no better than any ordinary light.
I'm not really in favour of most of these modern forms of lighting though I do like the sound of LED lighting. Rather than making more efficient lighting and more efficient electronics, instead of making this the sole concern as it pretty well is at the moment, I'd rather the emphasis be placed on domestic power generation. This would have much more knock-on effect than reduction in power consumption. If every house roof has solar panels then the quantity of power generated would exceed any possible savings from more efficient gadgets. The drive for more efficient gadgets would come from householders who didn't want to pay the power company for power but who wanted to use more gadgets in their house off their own electricity. Everything's being done backwards - as normal.
So, in this world where natural disasters are increasing and where terrorism is a big thing, it makes sense to be self-sufficient in things such as power. If a terrorist strike took out the transformers or the power plants then large areas would suffer. Those with their own generating capacity would, of course, benefit. I cannot understand why South Carolina does not require builders to do as they do in California, to put solar panels on the roof of each house. Even if that power were only fed into the grid, it would mean a massive reduction in the power needed to be generated. That would have a bigger effect on greenhouse gasses and pollution than absolutely anything else.
In other news, I was idly considering Schlieren photography. Looking online, I see lots of interesting flash adaptations. The requirement of Schlieren photography is that the flash be a point light source aimed at a concave mirror from as close to the lens axis as possible. This has the effect of making the air visible instead of invisible. Thus, it's possible to see the air moving as something passes through it and possible also to record this movement with a high-speed photo. The flash adaptations I was looking at were wild and wacky home-brew concoctions made by assorted amateurs. I already know my construction will be pretty simple, involving black construction paper and ordinary white paper. Many seem to use silver paint but in truth, I find silver paint does not reflect quite as well as white as it's more grey than reflective.
