A CRUEL PROPOSAL

Dateline April 25, 2013 in The Los Angeles Times ~

"Federal authorities intend to remove endangered species protection from all gray wolves in the lower 48 states, carving out an exception for a small pocket of about 75 Mexican wolves in the wild in Arizona and New Mexico, according to a draft document obtained by the Times.

"The sweeping rule by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) would eliminate protection for wolves 18 years after the government reestablished the predators in the West, where they had been hunted to extinction.  Their reintroduction was a success, with the population growing to the thousands.

"But their presence has always drawn protests across the Intermountain West from state officials, hunters, and ranchers who lost livestock to the wolves.  They have lobbied to remove the gray wolf from the endangered list."

The Times article goes on to discuss the recent history of gray wolves in the northern Rockies and the Great Lakes region, along with the controversy aroused by the dubious science behind the proposed removal of protection across the entire continental U.S.  The FWS assertion that wolves are a rousing success story is riddled with faulty assumptions, and heavily influenced by politics rather than by biology.

For example, wolves are far from reclaiming their former range, as the map below shows (click to enlarge).  The pink area denotes wolves' historic range, while the red areas mark territory where wolves have regained a scattered, tentative foothold.  

There has been a national outcry from responsible science writers.  Noah Greenwald writes in The Huffington Post that "If it is enacted, this rule will put a tragic end to one of the most important wildlife recovery stories in America's history.  Wolves today wander just 5 percent of their historic habitat in the continental United States.  It's simply far to early to declare victory.

" .... There were once about two million wolves in North America.  Most were wiped out in the late 1800s and early 1900s as European settlements moved west and government-sponsored extermination programs were used to protect cows and sheep placed on landscapes occupied by wolves for tens of thousands of years.

" .... Following removal of protections for wolves in the northern Rocky Mountains and western Great Lakes in 2011, states in these regions enacted aggressive hunting and trapping seasons that are designed to drastically reduce wolf populations.  In the northern Rocky Mountains, more than 1,100 wolves have been killed since protections were removed .... It is clear that states are going to let old prejudices against wolves drive their management, and we can't rely on them to let wolves move into new areas.  That's why it is crucial that wolves continue to get the help that only the federal Endangered Species Act can give them."

Addressing hunters and ranchers, George Wuerthner points out that not only have game (prey) animals increased in number since wolf reintroduction, but also that ranchers' claims of livestock mortality are greatly exaggerated ~ in Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho, a total of 274,000 cattle and sheep were lost to weather, digestive problems, respiratory issues, calving and other causes.  Fewer than 225 animals were lost to wolves ~ 0.1 percent of total losses.

Non-lethal solutions exist for even this level of livestock loss ~ witness the guide published by Defenders of Wildlife.  The document is a valuable resource which includes ranchers' successful use of guard dogs, range riders, visual barriers, scare tools, and grazing site rotation.

And what about hunters?  Increasingly, investigators are concluding that hunting living creatures for sport is not only anachronistic, but weighted with the symptoms of severe sociopathic perversion.  Two short pieces make the point ~ Hunting Conditions Us to Killing and Wolf Hunters Admit It's All About the Sadistic Sexual Thrill.  

If the reader suspects hyperbole, take a look at this video taken of a hunter repeatedly kicking a crippled but living elk.  It is ugly to watch, but revealing. If this is the behavior shown toward game animals, imagine that sadism magnified tenfold when directed at top predators like wolves.  Yes, many hunters would be repelled by the images ~ even while denying that such behavior represents their own, carried to its logical extreme.

Here's the bottom line ~ the current wolf recovery is incomplete, even in the regions where they've repopulated.  Their population density has not reached the carrying capacity of their habitat (the availability of territory and sufficient prey).  Doing so will take generations, as younger wolves spread out to form new packs.  Their presence is necessary to a healthy ecosystem, since they prey upon the old and sick, keeping prey herds healthy and (equally importantly) on the move, thus allowing over-grazed plant communities to recover in density and biodiversity.

True recovery isn't measured in numbers, certainly not the wolf numbers wept over by hunters, ranchers, and their paid-for politicians.  True recovery is measured in the health of the entire biome.  It is characterized by a sine wave relationship between predator numbers and prey numbers.  As an example, if wolf numbers increase too much, elk will decline.  In response, wolves will produce fewer and smaller litters of pups, and elk herds will recover, again supporting more wolves.

This cycle has been documented across predator-prey relationships ~ lynx and rabbits in Canada, lions and ungulates in Africa, whales and krill in the ocean.  When enough time has passed that we humans can observe the cycle among wolves and their prey, only then can we claim recovery.  It will not be an occasion for a celebratory slaughter of wolves, however.  It will be an occasion or a celebratory toast to our having learned to co-exist with all of nature's children.

Toward that end, not only should the proposal to removed endangered species protection for the gray wolf be abandoned, that protection should be re-instated in all U.S. states where it was removed in 2011, and the licensed and unlicensed slaughter of wolves should cease.

FWS, take note.

MATHEMATICS IN NATURE

In math, the Fibonacci sequence begins with 0, then 1, then progresses such that each subsequent number is the sum of the previous two, thus ~

0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144 ....

If one draws successive squares with sides of those dimensions, one arrives at a spiral, sometimes called the golden ratio ~ a shape which is widely present in the physical world, from the very small (the curl of a fern leaf, the seed patterns in a sunflower, the compartments of a chambered nautilus) to the very large (the shapes of hurricanes and galactic arms).  See the above image ~ click to enlarge.

Evidence of intelligent design?  Hardly.  One of the guiding principles of science is parsimony, also known as Occam's razor ~ that is, among competing hypotheses (proposed explanations for a phenomenon), the one with the fewest assumptions is most likely to be accurate.  The highly complex hypothesis of a deity is superfluous, since it has been shown repeatedly that matter and energy spontaneously adopt the form or path that is most efficient ~ like the hexagons in a bee's honeycomb.  Similarly, among growing organisms and among accreting energy systems, the golden ratio spontaneously forms because it is simple and natural.

Even intricate systems like fractals are hyper-branching elaborations of simpler shapes.  They, too, appear in nature ~ self-similar patterns repeating at different scales, like an aerial view of a coastline or a river network, or a microscopic view of a snowflake.

Isn't life grand?

VISUAL SUNDAY

A random collection of objects, people, and ideas in motion ~ some risible, some sobering, and some illuminating.  Enjoy.

• President Obama at the 2013 White House Correspondents' Dinner ~ Republicans may have lots of money, but Democrats still have a sense of humor.
• 15 Cat GIFs  ~ because who doesn't love winsome kittehs?
• 22 Unbelievable Places That Are Hard to Believe Really Exist  ~ from our Department of Redundancy Department.
• 62 Years of Global Warming in 13 Seconds ~ from NASA ~ be sure to read the caption.
• American English Dialects Map ~ this is fascinating ~ I've lived in 9 U.S. states, and visited all but 4 of the remainder, so I have a fair handle on the dialects within the American South, Northeast, Midwest, and West.  But this map is amazing.
• 17 Things You Probably Didn't Know About 'The Wizard of Oz' ~ those flying monkeys still creep me out.
• 25 Greatest Unscripted Scenes in Films ~ I'm suspicious of superlatives, but it's interesting to realize that these were ad libbed.
• 12 Reasons to Have Hope for Humanity ~ but only if we employ rational thought, and not merely a visceral pursuit of profit.
• U.S. Shows Rapid Rise of Temps Since First Earth Day ~ which was April 1970.  Includes an interactive map, text, and a state-by-state chart.
• Feathers ~ 200 Million Years in Just Over 3 Minutes ~ science writer Carl Zimmer helps us to understand that physical features or behavior don't necessarily come into being to fill a need (responding to a stimulus) ~ rather, a species may accidentally develop a trait which enhances its survival or reproduction.  That same trait may later confer an additional advantage.
• 22 Beautiful Images from Around the World ~ they truly are.
• Diva song from the movie 'The Fifth Element' ~ this literally takes my breath away.
• Motivated by 'Firefly' ~ if you've watched the TV series or seen its movie spin-off 'Serenity', you'll get it.  If not, what are you waiting for???

STAR WARS DAY

(click to enlarge)

WHY DO WE KISS?

For once, I'm not going to paraphrase or summarize, because the 12-minute video from the YouTube channel Vsauce is just too entertaining to miss.  Narrator Michael piques our curiosity by announcing that the average person will spend about 20,160 minutes (that's 336 hours,or 14 days!) of his/her lifetime in the act of kissing.  Whoa.  That's a lot of pucker time.

But more to the point, how did kissing originate?  Did some proto-human stalker creep up on a comely cavewoman and go all perverted with her?  I mean, if kissing isn't in your culture, rubbing lips with someone could seem a little .... strange.  Watch and learn, fellow philematologists.  Then flex those orbicularis oris muscles and get busy ~ 20,160 is a lofty (and enticing) goal.
 

THE FALLACIES AND TRUTHS OF HUNTING

(photo copyright Jim Robertson)

I grew up in the hunting and gun culture of rural Montana.  Early on in my adult life, my views evolved toward conservation, and I became militantly anti-hunting.  For a time I made certain ethical concessions to sustenance hunters and to traditional Native hunters.  But these days I no longer do.  We humans have slaughtered the biota of the natural world beyond recognition for anyone who lived here (North America) 500 years ago.  We've wiped out not only entire plant and animal species, but also much of the habitat those species need to thrive.

Any well-trained, responsible ecologist or wildlife biologist will tell you that the health of an ecosystem can be measured by the health of its top predators.  In regions where humans have destroyed natural predator populations, the ripples of consequence for the entire community are severe.  Without predators to feed on the old and sick, prey populations skyrocket in numbers while their overall health declines.  In turn, they tend to overgraze or overbrowse their plant sustenance, wiping out ground cover, generating soil erosion, and lowering biodiversity.

The opposite process has been documented in places like Yellowstone Park and other parts of the West ~ when predators are reintroduced (gray wolves) or protected (mountain lions and grizzly bears), they reduce prey populations to a sustainable level and force them to stay on the move, preventing overgrazing and allowing native plants to re-establish themselves.  This approach allows all species to return to a state of dynamic equilibrium, without the intervention of humans.

Ah, but not all humans are willing to cede wilderness to wildlife.  Encroaching ranchers worry about their livestock, and hunters are reluctant to give up their blood sport.  Ranchers need not be concerned ~ there are creative ways for ranchers and predators to coexist.  Most hunters, on the other hand, are not interested in coexistence.  They're out for blood.

I've written often about the lack of necessity for hunting either prey or predators.  If you want a truly meaningful trophy, and want to demonstrate your mastery of fieldcraft, don't carry a firearm or a bow.  Carry a camera.  If your skills are up to the challenge, you'll have a memento to be proud of, and your target will remain alive and free.  But such a suggestion might as well be spoken in Swahili to most hunters, who are set in their assumptions and their "traditions".

Earlier today I browsed one of my favorite blogs, a site called Exposing the Big Game, written by Jim Robertson.  Today's entry is cogent and to the point.  With permission, here it is ~

Top 10 Retorts to Hunter Fallacies

Hunters' arguments and rationalizations for their sport are so repetitive and predictable that, to save valuable time and precious mental energy, it might help to have your responses printed out ahead of time like flash cards, and kept at the ready in your back pocket.  Here, then, are the Top 10 Retorts to Hunter Fallacies you're most likely to hear the next time you debate a sportsman.  (I would apologize to David Letterman, but this isn't meant as a joke.)

10)  Hunting is sustainable.

In today's world of 7 billion people?  Never mind, that's a joke  if I've ever heard one.  Do we really want to encourage 7 billion hungry humans to go out and kill wildlife for food as if wild animal flesh is an unlimited resource?  The only way hunting could be sustainable for humans these days is if we drastically reduce our population and killed off all the natural predators.  Overhunting has proven time and again to be the direct cause of extinctions, from the passenger pigeon to the Eastern and the Miriams Elk.  Now wolves in the Rockies and Great Lakes are being hunted and trapped to oblivion ~ for the second time.

9)  Animals kill other animals, so we can too.

That's an example of what's known as the naturalistic fallacy ~ the notion that any behavior that can be found in nature is morally justifiable.  But wolves and other natural predators need to hunt to survive.  Humans don't ~ for them it's nothing more than a thrill kill.  Human beings have moved beyond countless other behaviors such as cannibalism or infanticide, so why can't some people tear themselves away from hunting?

8)  Humans are meant to be carnivores, just look at our canine teeth.

Humans' teeth are designed primarily for chewing plant-based foods, like our primate cousins do.  Human "fangs" are teensy compared to those of gorillas, who are strict vegetarians and only show them to appear fierce.  Also, our intestinal tract is long to allow for the slow digestion of high-fiber foods, while true carnivores have short intestines as needed to process meat and dispose of the resulting toxic wastes quickly.

7)  Wild game meat is health food.

All animal flesh is rife with cholesterol throughout, and the protein in animal flesh is acidic, causing bone calcium losses as it is metabolized.  According to the American Diabetes Association, a diet high in animal products has been linked to obesity, diabetes, colon and other cancers, osteoporosis, kidney stones, gallstones, diverticular disease, hypertension and coronary artery disease.  New studies have found that another culprit in causing heart disease may be a little-studied chemical that is burped out by bacteria in the intestines after people eat meat.

6)  Hunting controls animal populations that would otherwise go unregulated.

You'd really have to have no understanding of or faith in Mother Nature to make such a claim.  She was doing a fine job of taking care of her own before Man came along and appointed himself "manager" and "game" keeper.  No niche goes unfilled for long before some natural predator finds it and fixes a "problem" ... if we allow them to.

5)  If we don't kill deer, they'll become a traffic hazard.

Two words.  Slow Down.

More animals are hit by cars during hunting season than any other time of year, usually when fleeing from bloodthirsty sportsmen with guns.  Besides, hunting deer makes them breed more, resulting in more deer, not fewer.

4)  Hunting teaches respect for wildlife and an appreciation of nature.

Ha!  That's like a serial killer claiming his crimes foster a respect for women.  Tracking down and shooting something does not equal respect.  Try using a camera or binoculars if you really want to respect them.

3)  Hunting is a "manly" sport.

Hunting isn't even a sport.  A sport is played by two equally matched, or at least equally willing, sides.  And real men respect animals (see above).

2)  Hunting licenses pay for wildlife refuges.

In truth, hunting licenses pay for hunter playgrounds, not true wildlife refuges.  Take a look at how many "refuges" have been opened up to hunting, or just try to close an area to hunting for the sake of wildlife and hear the nimrods wail.  If hunters hadn't hijacked all the refuges, most bird watchers, hikers and others who truly appreciate nature would gladly pay for a pass to frequent those places.  Furthermore, non-consumptive wildlife watchers contribute far more to local economies than do hunters.

1)  Hunting keeps kids out of trouble.

Sticking a gun in a child's hand and telling him or her to shoot Bambi is likely to leave lasting psychological scars, whether it's PTSD or a heart calloused for killing.

Bonus fallacy)  God put animals here for us to use.

Don't flatter yourself.

That's the article.  Click on the link and scroll down to view the comments ~ you'll find additional information and opinion.  Also, check out groups like The Wolf Army and Anti-Hunting In America on Facebook for updates on attempts in various states to eradicate or protect gray wolves and other natural predators.

And next time you head for the great outdoors, don't forget your camera.

DESECRATION AT WOUNDED KNEE

December 19, 1890 ~ the Wounded Knee Massacre resulted in the deaths of up to 300 Lakota men, women, and children by members of the U.S. 7th Cavalry (20 of whom received the Medal of Honor).

1903 ~ Descendants of those who died in the battle erected a monument at the mass gravesite in which the victims were buried.  (Above, click to enlarge)

1965 ~ The massacre site, located within the present-day Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, was designated as a National Historic Landmark.  It includes a church and a mass grave.

1970 ~ The book Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee by historian Dee Brown expressed "a Native American perspective on the injustices and betrayals of the U.S. government" in the late 19th century American West.  It raised awareness of the battle among many who had never heard of the events of that time.

February 27, 1973 ~ about 200 traditional Oglala Lakota people, along with members of the American Indian Movement (AIM), occupied the town of Wounded Knee, SD, in an armed standoff with hundreds of U.S. marshals, FBI agents, and thugs from the tribal police.  The protesters accused tribal government of corruption, voter fraud, and violence against opponents, and also accused the U.S. government of failing to fulfill treaty obligations.  There was widespread public sympathy for the goals of the occupation, which ended with the arrest of its leaders, and escalating violence on the reservation.

April 11, 2013 ~ Joseph Brings Plenty, former chairman of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, published a NYTimes article detailing the proposed sale of the Wounded Knee Cemetery by its white owner, James Czywczynski, for the sum of $3.9 million.  (The property fell into white hands because the federal government fragmented most western reservations under the Dawes Act of 1887, which allocated between 40 and 160 acres of land to each Indian resident, leaving large tracts of non-allocated land which were sold, mostly to non-Indians.  This system of allotments led to fragmentation of ownership as Indian land was passed down through generations.)

The Brings Plenty article detailed the history, and issued the following plea ~ "The Pine Ridge Indian Reservation is one of the poorest places in the United States, and the Oglala, who are deeply in debt, would be hard-pressed to meet the price.  Many elders properly ask why any price should be paid at all.  The federal government should buy this land and President Obama should then preserve it as a national monument ~ just as he did last month at five federally owned sites around the country .... "

April 27, 2013 ~ Matt Wells of BBC News fleshed out the history of the tribe and the land considered for sale in To Whom Does Wounded Knee Belong?  Among other things, he noted that the 40-acre parcel being sold is worth less than $10,000 on the open market.

April 30, 2013 ~ Vincent Schilling of Indian Country Today Media Network interviewed the property's nominal owner, James Czywczynski.  Schilling's questions were dispassionate, while Czywczynski seemed defensive, embellished and contradicted his own answers, and oh by the way, announced that the asking price has gone up to $4.9 million.  He claimed to have an anonymous management group and a venture capitalist lined up if the Oglalas can't or won't pony up the new asking price.

The deadline for the Oglalas to make an offer was today.  There is no word on whether federal intervention is in the offing.

If the sale is made to whites who want to profit from the sad and sacred history of the site by building a monument, a motel, and a restaurant tourism complex (with zero proceeds going to the Oglala tribe), it will be one more chapter is the long history of massacres, desecrations, thefts, and violations visited upon native peoples by white culture.

WISDOM FROM AN ECCENTRIC

In 1936, a writer, eccentric, and self-help guru named James T. Mangan published a book titled You Can Do Anything!, which included a section called "14 Ways To Acquire Knowledge".  Modern writer Maria Popova revisited Mangan's 14 guidelines.  Her summary should be read at least one a year by everyone involved in learning or teaching, whether formally or on one's own.

Here are the fundamentals ~

1. Practice
2. Ask
3. Desire
4. Get It From Yourself
5. Walk Around It
6. Experiment
7. Teach
8. Read
9. Write
10. Listen
11. Observe
12. Put In Order
13. Define
14. Reason

Simple and obvious, you may say.  But if you scan the explanation for each step in her brief article, you'll realize that most people tend to omit important elements in the learning process.  The reminder is timely ~ old dogs can learn new tricks, with the right mindset.

SUNNY DAYS

When it comes to the environment, wildlife, wilderness, and overall human behavior, the news normally ranges from discouraging to dire.  All the more reason to celebrate the announcement that the growth of solar energy jobs in the U.S. is outpacing nearly every other sector.  To wit ~

"California, the state that the Hollywood film industry calls home, can boast 43,700 paying jobs in the solar industry in 2012, versus only 32,300 paid actors.  Texas clocked in with 3,200 solar jobs, in comparison to the state's 270 to 2,410 ranchers.  And across the entire nation, 119,000 Americans were employed by the solar industry in 2012, versus only 87,500 by the coal mining industry.

"All that is according to The Solar Foundation (TSF), which compiled its 2012 survey of solar jobs in the United States several months ago, and just released the numbers via a new interactive map.  That map also provides info on each state, including solar jobs per capita, number of solar companies, number of solar-powered homes, and the legal status of third-party ownership.

" .... TSF's work also determined that several of the top states ~ New Jersey Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New York, Michigan, and Ohio ~ actually rank in the bottom 30 percent of states in terms of available sunlight.  The strong industry presence despite a seemingly unfavorable climate is thanks to 'high electricity prices and favorable tax and regulatory policies', as CNN Money put it.  Skeptics might consider that evidence of an artificial market created through government intervention, but then our national failure to properly price carbon emissions and natural capital is massively subsidizing non-renewable power in the opposite direction.

"Other facts The Solar Foundation dug up include a 13.2 percent job growth rate inthe solar industry from 2011 to 2012 ~ which added almost 14,000 jobs ~ versus a mere 2.3 percent growth rate in the overall economy."

This, along with the similarly-burgeoning growth of wind energy production, provides a ray of sunshine in an energy landscape fouled by the consumption of coal, oil, fractured natural gas, and the heavy clout which those industries wield among lawmakers and regulatory agencies.  While government continues to try to force down our throats ill-begotten projects like the Keystone Pipeline, offshore oil drilling in the fragile Arctic, coal mining, and other polluters and contributors to global warming, the solar and wind sectors have quietly been seeding a long-overdue revolution in energy production.

Here's to the insurgency.

100 PEOPLE

The following information is courtesy of the website 100 People ~ A World Portrait.  The premise is this ~ if the world's 7 billion human population were represented by 100 people, how would that break down by gender, age, religion, language, etc.?  A visual summary appears in the circular chart above (click to enlarge).

Many of the proportions are surprising, and some are humbling.  It is important to bear in mind that this is a world portrait, not a U.S. portrait.  Consider the categories below ~

Gender

• 50 would be female
• 50 would be male

Age

• 26 would be 0-14
• 66 would be 15-64
• 8 would be 65 or older

Geography

• 60 would be from Asia
• 15 would be from Africa
• 11 would be from Europe
• 9 would be from Latin America & the Caribbean
• 5 would be from North America

Religion

• 33 would be Christian
• 22 would be Muslim
• 14 would be Hindu
• 7 would be Buddhist
• 12 would believe in other religions
• 12 would not be religious or identify with a particular faith

First Language

• 12 would speak Chinese
• 5 would speak Spanish
• 5 would speak English
• 3 would speak Arabic
• 3 would speak Hindi
• 3 would speak Bengali
• 3 would speak Portuguese
• 2 would speak Russian
• 2 would speak Japanese
• 62 would speak other languages

Overall literacy

• 83 would be able to read and write
• 17 would not

Literacy by Gender

• 88 males would be able to read and write
• 12 males would not
• 79 females would be able to read and write
• 21 females would not

Education

• 76 eligible males would have a primary school education
• 72 eligible females would have a primary school education
• 66 eligible males would have a secondary school education
• 63 eligible females would have a secondary school education
• 7 would have a college degree

Urban/Rural

• 51 would be urban dwellers
• 49 would be rural dwellers

Drinking Water

• 87 would have access to safe drinking water
• 13 would use unimproved water

Food

• 15 would be undernourished

Infectious Disease

• less than 1 would have HIV/AIDS
• less than 1 would have tuberculosis

Poverty

• 48 would live on less that 52 USD per day
• 1 out of 2 children would live in poverty

Electricity

• 78 would have electricity
• 22 would not

Technology

• 75 would be cell phone users
• 30 would be active internet users
• 22 would own or share a computer

Sanitation

• 65 would have improved sanitation
• 16 would have no toilets
• 19 would have unimproved toilets

Please refer to the website for source references for the statistics quoted.

So what do you think?  Were any of your assumptions challenged?  Do you detect any oddities or seeming discrepancies?  For instance, is it contradictory that nearly half the world's people are poor, yet 75 percent are cell phone users?  Perhaps not.  Perhaps it is a matter of priorities, and communication is one key to escaping poverty.

Certainly any level of poverty, or poor sanitation, or malnutrition, or lack of access to education, is unacceptable.  Economic and social inequality underlie most wars, most prejudice, most individual or cultural oppression.  We owe it to our world community and to our children to leave the world a better place than we found it.

I'm interested in the thoughts of all readers ~ please use the "comments" prompt below.

FUR ELISE

On this day in 1810, Beethoven published his original manuscript for his Bagatelle No. 25 in A minor for solo piano, popularly known today as Fur Elise.  Most people in western culture have heard it, whether or not they knew the name of the music or who wrote it.  The printed score for an abbreviated version appears above (click to enlarge).

I have a heart-shaped music box, with a hummingbird exquisitely carved into the lid.  When you open it, the sweet strains of Fur Elise lift into the air.

Here is the entire 3 minute piece.  Close your eyes, relax, and enjoy.

LIVING WITH A WRITER

How to Survive Living With a Writer

Top 10 Tips

1. Never, ever ask when the book will be published.
2. Don't ask a writer if they wish they had written the most recent best-seller.
3. Never say you're thinking of writing a book.  Never, ever say you'd also write a book if only you had the time.
4. Don't call the police if you happen to see a writer's browsing history.  The average writer is not planning to poison you, hire a hit man, or move to Afghanistan.  It's simply research.
5. Leave a writer alone when the writer is actually writing.  You have no idea how difficult it is to enter the zone.
6. Don't pick unfair fights with a writer.  Writers do get their revenge in print.
7. If you do want to fight, make it memorable.  The writer is always looking for material.
8. If your writer wanders off at a party, don't panic.  Writers love to inspect the host's bookshelves and medicine cabinets.
9. Buy your writer notebooks and cute pens as gifts.  Do not buy flowers.  Chocolate is also acceptable.
10. Leave your writer alone when a rejection letter arrives.  After the deadly silence, screaming, crying, moaning, and muttering have subsided, offer your writer a cup of coffee or tea.  And a cupcake.  And a huge hug.

(courtesy of WritersWrite)

COINCIDENCE OR DESTINY OR NEITHER?

Here's an excerpt from a thoughtful discussion by science writer Kyle Hill on the significance (if any) of the coincidences we happen to notice in our lives ~

"I have written before about understanding the statistics of coincidences, making the point that even having a dream that seemingly predicted the future isn't all that amazing.  Still, coincidences have the staying power to survive attempts to rationally explain them away.  Blame it on your attention.

"Your attention ~ the ability to focus your mental life on one problem or conversation or task ~ is a lighthouse in the night.  The illuminating part spins around and around, lighting up important areas but missing most of the sea and land.  Of the billions or trillions (choose a very large number) of events that happen around the world each day, each second, you are only privy to a few.  By the numbers alone, there are bound to be numerous crazy grandmother photobombs that no one will ever recognize.

" .... Like human concepts of good and evil, right and wrong, Kirk or Picard, meaning only arises because of us.  If humans were extinguished from the universe, would it still make sense to call an action on Earth good or bad?  Similarly, when a bunch of particles interact with another bunch of particles, it takes one of us to grant it meaning.  And coincidences have their own special kind of meaning.  There is poetry to them ~ they seem special.

" .... Coincidences are meaningful.  They let us share experiences and come closer together.  Great coincidence tales can span generations, or create a family narrative that everyone rallies around.  But coincidences are not cosmically meaningful in the way many are taken to be.  Coincidences aren't portents of fate or the cosmos slapping you around, and it is still mistaken to assume that a coincidence was too miraculous to have happened, if it did indeed happen.  Connecting A to B can make for a great story or experience, but remember that you connected those events, not the universe."

THE MAGIC OF SCIENCE

In September 2012 astronomers first detected the approach of Comet ISON.  The comet is expected to slingshot past the sun in November 2013 ~ it will pass so close that the gases and dust that boil off the comet's surface to form its tail will be visible to the naked eye for Earth-bound observers, perhaps spectacularly so.

Above is a Hubble image taken two weeks ago.  At the time, the comet was 386 million miles from the sun, just inside the orbit of Jupiter.  For a frame of reference, Earth orbits about 93 million miles from the sun.  According to the NASA news release, "Even at that great distance the comet is already active as sunlight warms the surface and causes frozen gases to vaporize .... The comet's dusty atmosphere, or coma, is approximately 3,100 miles across, or 1.2 times the width of Australia.  A dust tail extends more than 57,000 miles."

Here is a NASA video showing the path of the comet through the Solar System, with commentary explaining what to look for ~ the arrival of a meteor shower and cometary dust on Earth, and possible noctilucent clouds.

It is remarkable to me that just within my lifetime, space observation has graduated from mountaintop telescopic observatories to orbiting space telescopes, and that our ability to predict the timing and trajectory of a distant object has become so finely-tuned, honed in part by our experience with the complex physics and math of manned space flight and unmanned space probes to the sun, other planets and their moons, and beyond the solar system.

One hopes that we humans will survive and solve the problems we've created with climate change, overpopulation, pollution, and loss of wilderness/wildlife, so that we may continue our exploration of the next (not last) frontier ~ space.

OUR STORY

(courtesy of oh-pear on deviantART)

SHIRLEY AND JENNY

In 1996, Shirley and Jenny, two former circus elephants who hadn't seen each other in 22 years were reunited at The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee.  They recognized each other immediately, and their deep attachment is captured in this video of the reunion.  Tissue alert ~ tears may ensue.

The PBS show Nature published an update on Shirley and Jenny's lives.  Tissue alert ~ tears may ensue.

On this Earth Day 2013, it is good that we examine the large-scale issues facing humans and the environment, which happen to include stories like this one, in which responsible people take it upon themselves to provide a refuge for the innocent victims of human exploitation.  Today, zoos and nature preserves are steadily becoming not merely places of entertainment, but centers for conservation research, the preservation of endangered species' gene pools, and sanctuaries for the plants and wildlife which live there.

In Africa today, elephants are being murdered at an alarming rate by poachers in search of the valuable ivory in their tusks ~ ivory which often ends up in Asia.  Some national parks employ armed rangers who patrol against poaching, putting their own lives at risk to defend the resident wildlife.  All of Africa is being transformed, as humans encroach upon the wilderness that remains, threatening the homes and the lives of all the continent's magnificent wildlife.  As with most of humanity's woes, our own runaway overpopulation lies at the root of the conflict.

Can you imagine a world with 700 million humans, rather than the current 7 billion?  A world in which people could thrive and still coexist with, even treasure, wilderness and wildlife?  Everyone needs a dream.  That is mine.

SAY BYE-BYE

It's a case of too little, too late according to the latest clean energy report by the International Energy Agency (IEA).  Nina Chestney from Reuters ~ "The development of low-carbon energy is progressing too slowly to limit global warming.  With power generation still dominated by coal and governments failing to increase investment in clean energy, top climate scientists have said that the target of keeping the global temperature rise to less than 2 degrees Celsius this century is slipping out of reach.

" 'The drive to clean up the world's energy system has stalled,' said Maria van der Hoeven, the IEA's executive director, at the launch of the agency's report on clean energy progress.  'Despite much talk by world leaders, and a boom in renewable energy over the past decade, the average unit of energy produced today is basically as dirty as it was 20 years ago.'

.... "With the world still reliant on fossil fuels, the deployment of carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology is critical, but there are no commercial plants in operation.  The IEA has envisaged that CCS, which buries and traps CO2 underground, should play a major role in cutting global emissions and had forecast 63 percent of coal power plants should be equipped with the technology by 2050.

"However, there are only 13 large-scale demonstration projects in operation or being built, with the capacity to store about 65 million tonnes of CO2 a year.  This represents only a quarter of the storage capacity needed by 2020.

"New nuclear plant construction is also well behind target, and global biofuel production stalled in 2012."

As this link confirms, I've written numerous times about greenhouse gases, global warming, climate change, and sea level rise.  The implications for all life on Earth are profound.  Every natural cycle is already being interrupted, and severe weather events are becoming more intense and more frequent.

Consider that many of the world's major population centers are coastal.  A rise in sea level is already happening, and it will only become more pronounced as air and water temperatures rise, glaciers and polar ice sheets melt, and a self-feeding, runaway cycle arises.

To visualize this, here is a set of interactive maps of U.S. cities, which "show coastal and low-lying areas that would be permanently flooded, without engineered protection" ~ you can set the sea level rise selector to 0, 5, 12, or 25 feet.  The city maps include ~

• Baltimore, MD
• Boston, MA
• Charleston, SC
• Houston, TX
• Jacksonville, FL
• Los Angeles, CA
• Long Island, NY
• Miami, FL
• Mobile, AL
• Jersey City, Newark, and Atlantic City, NJ
• New Orleans, LA
• New York City, NY
• San Francisco and Sacramento, CA
• Philadelphia, PA
• Portland, ME
• Portland, OR
• Providence, RI
• San Diego, CA
• Savannah, GA
• Seattle, WA
• Tampa Bay, FL
• Virginia Beach and Norfolk, VA
• Washington, DC
• Wilmington, DE

I have lived in four of those cities, and visited nearly all the remainder.  Now multiply the centers of culture and the numbers of human lives to all the coastal nations on Earth.  The destruction and loss are staggering.

And yet we continue to deny or ignore climate change, assuming it won't happen in our lifetimes.  But it is already happening.  The Arctic sea ice maximum in 2013 is the sixth lowest on record.  The 2012-13 Arctic freezing season never had a chance to fully establish itself.  Summer ice melt on the Antarctic Peninsula is now nonlinear, the fastest in over 1000 years.  As all that ice melts, sea level rises inexorably.  

As Bill Moyers challenged us, it is time to end the silence on climate change.  It is time to become fully, militantly involved.  Positive change can happen (as it has in Germany, where fully 65 percent of the country's energy comes from wind and solar power).  We must first inform ourselves, and then we must pressure our local, state, and national elected representatives to pass stringent laws requiring polluting energy producers (coal, natural gas, nuclear) and other polluting industries to clean up their act or face stiff sanctions, not excluding losing their license to conduct business.  We must promote and support clean renewable energy sources (solar, wind, tides, geothermal).  It makes environmental sense.  It makes economic sense.  It makes ethical sense.

But not in five years, not next year, not even next month.  Now.

STRANGE LAWS

It seems that every state in the union has odd, antiquated, or humorous laws which are still in force.  Here is a sampling, one such law from each of the fifty states ~

• Alabama ~ Incestuous marriages are legal.
• Alaska ~ It is considered an offense to feed alcoholic beverages to a moose.
• Arizona ~ It is unlawful to refuse a person a glass of water.
• Arkansas ~ Oral sex is considered to be sodomy.
• California ~ No vehicle without a driver may exceed 60 mph.
• Colorado ~ It is illegal to allow a llama to graze on public property.
• Connecticut ~ It is unlawful to walk backwards after sunset.
• Delaware ~ No person shall change clothes in his or her vehicle.
• Florida ~ It is illegal to sell your children.
• Georgia ~ Donkeys may not be kept in bathtubs.
• Hawaii ~ Residents may be fined for not owning a boat.
• Idaho ~ You may not fish from a camel's back.
• Illinois ~ Law forbids eating in a place that is on fire.
• Indiana ~ The value of Pi is 3.
• Iowa ~ A one-armed piano player must perform for free.
• Kansas ~ If two trains meet on the same track, neither shall proceed until the other has passed.
• Kentucky ~ Dogs may not molest cars.
• Louisiana ~ It is illegal to rob a bank with a water pistol.
• Maine ~ To stroll down the street playing a violin is against the law.
• Maryland ~ It is illegal to take a lion to the movies.
• Massachusetts ~ All men must carry a rifle to church on Sunday.
• Michigan ~ A woman isn't allowed to cut her own hair without her husband's permission.
• Minnesota ~ It is illegal to sleep naked.
• Mississippi ~ Cattle rustling is punishable by hanging.
• Missouri ~ It is not illegal to speed.
• Montana ~ It is illegal to have a sheep in the cab of your truck without a chaperone.
• Nebraska ~ It is illegal to go whale fishing.
• Nevada ~ Sex toys are outlawed.
• New Hampshire ~ On Sundays citizens may not relieve themselves while looking up.
• New Jersey ~ You may not slurp your soup.
• New Mexico ~ Idiots may not vote.
• New York ~ The penalty for jumping off a building is death.
• North Carolina ~ It is against the law to sing off key.
• North Dakota ~ It is legal to shoot an Indian on horseback, provided you are in a covered wagon.
• Ohio ~ An ordinance prohibits the installation and use of slot machines in outhouses.
• Oklahoma ~ It is illegal for the owner of a bar to allow anyone inside to pretend to have sex with a buffalo.
• Oregon ~ Babies may not be carried on the running boards of a car.
• Pennsylvania ~ You may not sing in the bathtub.
• Rhode Island ~ No person may bite off another's leg.
• South Carolina ~ A permit must be obtained to fire a missile.
• South Dakota ~ It is illegal to lie down and fall asleep in a cheese factory.
• Tennessee ~ Skunks may not be carried into the state.
• Texas ~ It is illegal to sell one's eye.
• Utah ~ It is illegal to detonate any nuclear weapon.
• Vermont ~ All residents shall bathe every Saturday night.
• Virginia ~ It is illegal to tickle women.
• Washington ~ All lollipops are banned.
• West Virginia ~ Roadkill may be taken home for supper.
• Wisconsin ~ State law forbade serving apple pie in restaurants without cheese.
• Wyoming ~ You may not take a picture of a rabbit from January to April without an official permit.

Here is the website, which lists many more such laws within the U.S.

CUMULATIVE ATTENTION

NO EASY CHOICES

I'm a member of a book-reading club that meets once a month to discuss a novel we've all read.  This month's selection is Barbara Kingsolver's Pigs In Heaven, the story of an abandoned young Native American girl who was adopted by a single white woman, and her tribe's attempt to nullify the adoption and return the girl to tribal care.

The legal and family issues are complex, but the story is excellent.  Kingsolver's prose is thoroughly leavened with a poet's sensibilities, and her characters are rich with humor and human flaws.  I find myself savoring each sentence, lingering over phrases.  And all the while the author is propelling the reader along the story's arc with finesse.

Coincidentally, as reported on last night's PBS Newshour and in today's NYTimes, the U.S. Supreme Court is hearing a case involving .... you guessed it, the adoption of a Native American girl (image above) by a white family, being contested by the child's father (who had never met his daughter).  The case hinges on South Carolina adoption law, U.S. law (specifically the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 (which was enacted to protect Native tribes and families from abusive adoption practices), and a complex effort to assess the best interests of the child.

Here's an additional twist ~ the father is 3/128ths Cherokee, and the daughter is 3/256ths Cherokee, which raises a question familiar to members of both the Native American and the black communities ~ how small does one's genetic inheritance have to be, before it is irrelevant?  Many people of mixed ancestry self-identify with their minority blood.  Some do not.

The Court, after much soul-searching, decided in favor of the father.  I'm conflicted about that decision.  The adoptive parents have loved and cared for the little girl since birth (the birth mother was Hispanic, not Indian).  On the other hand, the father was willing to cede parental rights to the birth mother, but not to adoptive parents.  It is a thorny issue, one with implications for (as the family's attorney pointed out) "women's rights, racial equality, and countless adoptions" ~ including all the couples and single parents who adopt children from other countries.

My heart goes out most to the little girl.  How will she be scarred by this experience, and how will she heal?  Will her father provide her with a safe and much-loved childhood?  I hope so.  To get a flavor for the legal and emotional journey, I hope you'll read Kingsolver's book.  You won't regret it.