Weapons of Mass Extinctions

Evolution via natural selection does not need any space rock to experience ultra large scale extinctions. If there are long periods of a stable general environment the extant species are reaching a point of extreme efficiency. The Earth, our Solar System, the Galaxy in our region are all aging and as such provide a background input into the dynamic nature of what we know as the Environment. The dynamics of life on our planet are the cause of the vast majority of environmental change that plays out against the backdrop of current state of what is left from our history.

If the environment is quiet and stable over long periods of time it is because the extant species are all holding their own against each other. None gain any ground against the other on the large scale of our planet. Little change happens genetically and the equilibrium gains strength. Then all it takes is for an external event like a volcano, an asteroid, intense solar activity, etc. to change the temperature of the Earth’s surface for a year to trigger a few species to lose their advantage and that is sufficient to start a domino effect of destruction by all the extremely efficient competitors on each other as the initial effect works it’s way through the system of life as it exists at the time. Then the overall system is reset to a point where the dynamic is once again restored. The result is a blossoming of new species appearing as a seemly never ending opportunities for new niches become available. 

Mass extinctions might be a periodic requirement of a dynamic Nature. A big space rock event would certainly work but it is not necessary for life to experience a mass extinction of Species. I’m just saying…

The most successful genus and maybe family

Ants, the most successful genus and possibly family of species. Amazing in so many ways, efficiency, social order, level of cooperation, physical abilities and limits. Each of which is certainly worthy of a paper. Their lineage is currently the most successful of all terrestrial species. The general direction of their evolutionary path can be determined by looking at what the trends are in the strengths of their collective survival strategies. We as a species will do whatever we have evolved to do. Whether it is good or bad can only be determined afterwards, from an evolutionary perspective. Ultimately we will continue to participate in creating the environment of us and of all existing species. The environment is continually being created, endlessly in time. That is what drives natural selection.

Our Curiosity

Our brain grew in proportion to how complex our environment became. Our curiosity drives us to explore the environment in our constant search for resources and threats. It is our curiosity that allowed us to comprehend the significance of a sharp rock to the point that we learned how to create sharp rocks. It is what gave us our comprehension of new environments that we found ourselves in as we searched for more resources. It is our curiosity that allows us to test what we find so we can expand our utilization of our surroundings and expand our repertoire of things we can utilize and thus consider as resources. It is the requirement of such a curious creature to communicate in a continually increasingly complex manner because we perceive more of our environment in a much deeper way; complex communications require language. It is our curiosity which has made our environment so complex and our brains grew in size and complexity to deal with it.

 

No other species lives in such a complex environment because only we have the power to perceive such an environment. Curiosity must be a genetic trait since it is fundamental to humanity.

Long Hair on an Old Guy?

I just completed my latest social experiment. I finally made it into a barbershop for a haircut. I have had my wife clip the ends periodically, probably cutting off several inches each time. Now it is almost all gone, nearly shaved. There are several things about the experiment where my assumptions were incorrect. For one I had no idea how slow hair grows. I was not prepared for the maintenance required. Most of all though I was surprised by the reaction of people, those that I knew and those who are strangers. Overall this was a great experiment, I’m going to have a difficult time dreaming up another one this good.

 

I suppose the experiment really began when I was in my twenties but I didn’t set it up that way. I had grown up during the dawning of the Age of Aquarius. In my youth most of my friends at one point or another had long hair. It was a way of life but for me it was not to happen. My parents were not liberated. They held that their identities and values were to be reflected in their children and visa versa. At the time and still today I respect my parents and what they have provided for me so it was not a big deal. However, after I left home I was working and employers of the day didn’t hire people with long hair so again I excluded myself from the “Longhairs”. One evening of playing cards and socializing with friends I commented that when I retire I was going to grow my hair long and not worry so much about what others thought of me.

 

Thirty five years or so into the future and it was to become part of reality. I had forgotten all about making that statement until I was reminded of it. The reminder came one day when I was getting a little shaggy and decided to complain about the cost of haircuts. My wife recalled my comment about letting my hair grow and cajoled me into letting it grow with the suspended carrot of how many haircuts I could eliminate and the retirement wealth I could retain. A friend who was at the table that night in our twenties confirmed I had said it and commented that from his perspective I have never cared what others thought of me. He figured growing my hair long as a senior was just another example of me “doing my own thing” – to continue with the 60′s theme.

 

Obviously it didn’t happen over night. Now that it’s finished I am amazed at exactly how long it took. Still it was an experience I am glad I had. Like snowflakes each life is like no other that has happened before or those that are yet to come. Our experiences are to be cherished, good or bad, without one you cannot appreciate the other. During the time of this experiment I had many worthwhile experiences. At first as my hair began to get longer than I had ever had it, there was nothing good about it. It was a mess which could not be made to look good because it had no style. Cutting it to give it a style would have just made the whole process that much longer as there is no way to cut it longer only shorter. One day I eventually had it cut off in frustration. My wife laughed at me for quitting before I completed the task. I grew it again, this time with resolve.

 

It is said that time heals all wounds – it also grows hair. Given enough time “something” will grow almost anywhere. On my head that something was hair. It was not wonderful thick shiny healthy hair like you see on the ads for shampoo and expensive hair products. It was more like the dull dry unmanageable hair that you see growing on the heads of other old people. If you see an old person with nice luxurious hair chances are it is not theirs. It is the stuff they show in the commercials as the “before shot”. I had never thought of my self as a “before shot” kind of guy. Don’t get me wrong I am not someone who has ever seen myself as some sort of Adonis, in fact I think of myself as being very average. I am not short but I am not tall, I am not ugly but I am not good looking either. I am not stupid, well lets just leave it at that. Eventually it got long but how does one know when is long, long enough. I decided that long was achieved when you could comb it all into a pony tail at the base of the skull. Before that point it was just long hair but not long enough hair.

 

It was quite a relief when I could put it in a ponytail for the first time and get it under control. The pony was about an inch long but it was a ponytail. After all, control of ones hair is lost quite early on in the growing process. When you are used to having hair just long enough so it will lay down along the part it becomes unmanageable at about 2 inches. You have no concept of control when your hair is between 2 inches and a ponytail unless you have traveled this particular path. I suspect most women who decide to grow their hair long probably start out staging it and not being satisfied in increments. There are of course women who experience cancer treatment and as a result experience my type of hair growing experience but then I imagine at that place in time for them a bad hair day is pretty minor relative to what is important. A revelation only truly understood except by those who have survived sobering, life threatening type illnesses or accidents. My hat is off to them but I have ventured off topic. When you are running down this particular path a bad hair day doesn’t have anything to do with you just washed it and you cannot do a thing with it or you slept on it wrong.

 

In fact when I was asleep it was pretty much the only time I was not conscious of my hair. If a wind blows, or someone opens a door nearby, someone decides they want to run their fingers through it or perhaps just give it a tug as they pass by. It all counts toward a bad hair day. It gets messed up and tangled when you move your head. Who lives without moving their head? Baseball caps are great but even those do not get pulled down far enough to keep all your hair behind your ears and eventually even hair behind your ears can end up in your face. You feel it moving around behind you.

 

Finally you have reached the ponytail milestone. This whole experiment will be over soon right? You start measuring where on your head the hair reaches far enough back and try to guess how long it will take to grow the remaining distance to your receding hairline. You now can leave the house looking well groomed with a slicked back appearance to all who approach you from straight on. Until that wind picks up and everything which is not yet long enough begins to blow straight out leaving you looking like…? I guess old white guy afro kind of do. At least the attempt at a ponytail was an attempt at a hairdo. I finally had a “do”. I thought, “It won’t be long now.” Of course I was referring to the time not the hair.

 

This whole process has been accompanied by a wealth of learning about hair care. I had spent my whole life thinking hair care was the 10 – 30 seconds I spent combing it after a shower. Beyond that I would run my fingers through it if it felt like it was messed up and that was done without the need for a mirror. Hats occasionally left a ring shaped depression around my head for a while but everyone gets that when they take off a hat or cap with short hair. With long hair you get a wave that lasts until the next time you wash your hair. The same thing for an elastic holding the ponytail, it produces a wavy lumpy appearance at the back of your head which doesn’t go away.

 

To manage the tangles you can use hair products, I called it stuff but the industry calls it, “product.” Don’t call it stuff in a drug store, the young girl will feign ignorance and abandon you to look for someone else to assist. Older clerks will point and then look for someone else to help. Young women had th emost obvious reaction to old guys with long hair just as you might expect. Apparently, I have been told, young women think older men with long hair are just creepy. This is what you would expect from females who live in a society where there seems to be a significant portion of the population that has a predatory strategy. However that cautious nature only goes so far. When you talk to them about guys with long hair they will reserve judgment on young guys with long hair as long as it is not too long and the guy is good looking. Young men likely don’t really care one way or the other about old guys with long hair, at least from the way they interfaced with me it is not readily apparent what they thought. This is likely because they don’t see an old long haired guy as a player in the game they are competing in. There are always exceptions. Older folks especially those who are around the same vintage as I am are by far the most opinionated on the topic when presented with the opportunity to express themselves.

 

Older women who I know seem to be amused and think it is humourous that I would grow long hair unless they are typically involved with the academic community then they see it as fairly normal. I guess that means that academic males are more prone to grow longer hair. Other women display a look of apprehension and suspicion. I think women are programed to be cautious of guys who do not fit within some first approximation of normal. That is a good thing.

 

Men my age on the other hand often have an opinion on the matter. Guys I have known for a long time see it as pure foolishness and think it is a ridiculous thing to do. They look somewhat surprised each time we get together as if they cannot believe I am still screwed up. This reaction actually surprises me. I am certain I am the most eccentric one of the group and I am pretty sure they have always thought that way as well. It should be mentioned that I have known most of this particular group of fellows since I was in the eighth grade. I expected that they would have passed it off without regard because I have been different throughout our relationship. Others my age that I have not known prior make a cursory face indicating humour and then their reaction is over. Afterward the interaction seems to progress normally as if the hair has little or no impact, it is accepted as being part of who I am. A few older guys offered comments about my hair even if we had not been interacting up to that point. Usually the comments were well natured but not necessarily supportive. This was the way it was for the most part for an old guy with long hair.

 

However, I was able to ratchet it up a notch from time to time. This was accomplished by becoming a biker with long hair. Maybe it was all in my head. But when I got off my black Roadking with loud pipes dressed in all the leather with my hair in a braid down my back everyone seemed a little less friendly. Even the real biker type bikers, would react differently towards me. When a real biker type biker (the kind in the bike gangs) normally passes the average old dude with a Harley they pay zero attention to us. We really don’t share the same circle of life and the real biker doesn’t give a shit. When you have a ratty looking gray/blonde braid they check you out, just in case. You are still dismissed in short order but they evaluate you none the less.

 

In the end it was an enjoyable experience over all and it turned into a worthwhile learning experience regarding human nature. Because it took so damned long to grow I was able to run the experience for about 3 years. What should I do next?

Nature Is Still In Charge

We have example after example of how powerful nature is. That power so incredibly huge compared to our own. We build large machines to move dirt and then a storm comes along and shows us that more than we could move in a year is picked up and transported within minutes. A small rainstorm occurred this last summer interrupting one of our road trips. The downpour was sufficient to cause a mud slide that covered the road and washed over the jersey barriers. It all happened within a couple of minutes but it took several pieces of heavy equipment several hours to clean it up and get the road open again.

 

The super storm sandy, hurricane katrina, earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, forest fires, etc. even the little ones are huge compared to human activities. Many years ago I was in Las Vegas when a rain storm occurred and the results were amazing. We had just arrived shortly before and after unpacking and getting cleaned up we headed out to see the sights. We were about half a block from our hotel when the rain began. Before we could duck into a shelter of any sort we were completely soaked. I had never seen it rain so hard ever in my life. I didn’t know it could rain that hard.

 

Needless to say we headed back to our room to get dry clothes on and try again. As we were once again heading out onto the strip the sun was shining and the ground appeared to be steaming. For whatever reason we were staying at a little motel behind the Flamingo and the street out front was now a river of muddy water. It had washed away all the cars and much of the road. Just carried it all away into what was at the time a large open stretch of desert. Since then I have been on a Caribbean island in the Dominican Republic during a tropical storm. It was not a hurricane thankfully but it was a pretty decent storm. We experienced strong winds and lots of rain. The other end of the island in Haiti several people died and the storm was considerably stronger there than it was at our resort.

 

One of the things that really hit home regarding this experience is that we had been on the island for over a week when the storm occurred and we were not real current on the news. We received word about the storm late one afternoon from the hotel personnel and they simply told us what services would be unavailable if the storm was bad and that we should stay inside our units and not go to the beach. It rained so hard you couldn’t see more than a few feet ahead of you. The palm trees were bent over so far you couldn’t believe they didn’t snap off or uproot.  Water washed across the ground. We slept soundly not knowing how close we were to deadly forces.

 

By the next afternoon it was a bit breezy but otherwise things were back to normal. The seas were rough for a day or two. The beach at our resort probably had a slope of at least 3 meters in height and the debris indicated that there wasn’t much of the beach that the waves didn’t utilize. A big storm would have been devastating and we probably wouldn’t have had much warning. The next day we were able to call home and assure everyone that we were fine. Nobody in my world had ever been in a storm like that.

Of course being a Canadian I have had my fair share of large snow storms and a few freezing rain storms but nothing too out of the ordinary. When you are at home as long as you have heat you are usually in pretty good shape for winter disasters. There are exceptions and things can change very quickly when the power goes out. 

 

Several times we have been in the mountains when lightning strikes have caused forest fires. Once we were staying at a mountain resort and a helicopter was getting water in a basket from the stream beside the gravel road only to find that further down the hill they were dumping the water on a small fire that was threatening to block the entire valley and the only access to the resort. The forest service is very quick to respond to fires.

 

Another time we came through a fire that was burning right beside the highway. Normally the road would have been closed to traffic but due to a wind change they had not anticipated the change in direction for the fire. That fire was eventually responsible for burning the entire valley for at least 100 kilometers. It probably also burned the next valley over but you cannot see that from the highway. This last summer we were traveling through northern Nevada and southern Oregon and we witnessed a fire that had been going on for some time. It appeared to have burnt everything in every direction for at least 50 miles. I am not sure how that one started. It certainly made a bleak landscape look even more so.

 

Fire is about the only natural phenomenon that we can invoke at will for our benefit and that is probably a good thing. Earthquakes, hurricanes, volcanoes are all way beyond our level of control. Nature is so much bigger than us. We are desperately trying to learn all there is but we are no where near understanding how all the complex systems are really working. We guess and usually fail. We resolve to fix the problems we have created but we cannot undo the havoc we have already generated.

 

As a species we have already eliminated natural selection, the great filter of life, from the evolution of numerous plants and animals. We breed animals for pets, for food, for sport and entertainment. We have created new species. We have also domesticated plants, altering them to improve some trait that fits our purposes. We have bypassed nature in the creation of novel ecosystems and in so doing we have destroyed the work of evolution with little regard for natural selection as a process. I am sure one day we will find out about the problems we have created with these acts.

 

But we aren’t going to wait around until we find out. We have already started modifying the genes of viruses, bacteria, plants and animals to better suit our needs. Whatever it is that we think our needs are anyway. Don’t get me wrong we need to know how all these organisms work and how they fit into the surrounding environment but we might be walking into a trap. A trap that we have created. Ultimately though we humans must keep one very important fact straight and that is that Nature is still in charge and it is far more powerful than anything we can manage.

100 million children get squat

 

Every once in a while it is good to take the temperature of the species, determine the pulse, check on the general health of it. Today it looks pretty good depending on whether you are a glass half full or a glass half empty sort of individual. But your perspective on the health of us as a species can also depend on what issues you feel are the most important indicators of that health. I came across an issue the other day which I for one rarely even think about even though it is closely related to what I consider to be the most significant feature of humans, our brains. Are we utilizing them to their maximum potential?

 

We have survived from previous iterations of creatures developing “big brains”. We say “big brains” proudly and we should. It is good to be human. These “big brains” have afforded us the ability to not just exploit the environment for the resources we need but we have developed the ability to manipulate the environment to produce the resources we need and make them more readily available to us. Other species do this as well but not on the scale that we can do it.

 

It is our big brains which have evolved to lead us through life. We need to feed them. We need to create the environment where our big brains can thrive and be all that they can be. Currently we do that with education. Mothers and the extended family of the tribe used to provide this education. Then we created school systems to take over some of the responsibility for educating our young minds so that we could guarantee a better – more consistent – result. Wikipedia’s world population demographics suggest about 86% of us can read and write to some degree. I guess that means we are doing well. We have the task well in hand right? Well maybe, maybe not. According to Wiki the world population is about 7.05 billion people spread out over the globe. According to Wiki’s global demographics about 26 percent of us are children under the age of 15, that equates to a number of 1.8 billion. These are big numbers. Where am I going?

 

The other day I was listening to Fareed Zakaria on his TV news show and he did a little segment on children in Ethiopia who are illiterate and the are being raised by illiterate parents. The point of the show was to say look what is happening with regard to our technology. A bundle of pad computers were dropped off without any instructions or other input from anyone and apparently within 20 minutes one small boy found the power button and got this machine turned on. Within some short period of time which I did not pick up on the children of the village were self learning our alphabet and hence learning to read. The video that accompanied the piece showed the children singing the alphabet song in English. The whole thing remarkable and awe inspiring, it generated a tear in my eye. Then Fareed quickly slammed me down into the dirt emotionally when he said they were part of the 100 million children in the world who do not get an education in school.

 

Well of course my mind took off and 24 hours later I have a somewhat scrambled idea of where we are. I am still not sure if we as a species are doing well or not when it comes to maximizing or attempting such a measure of the human capacity when it comes to utilizing the “big brain”. On the surface, 100 million soles is but 1% of the human population. It is however 5% of the total number of children under 15 years old. First off before we get too carried away I have been asking if the 100 million is even an accurate representation of the statistic. Unicef has similar numbers but it is always somewhat difficult to compare numbers from different sources without delving too deep into any one study to find the assumptions made. Unicef appears to reflect a study from years prior to 2007 and Wiki appears to reflect a more current measure. In any case let us say the 100 million is probably reasonable for the accuracy which we require to take the pulse of humanity.

 

So 5% is not a great number but overall it is not bad really if that was the whole story. As one might imagine the bulk of those 100 million are not located in Europe or North America. In fact the majority of these 100 million children are located in Africa. Now the numbers start to look different. If you take the African population then those children represent a number much closer to 10% of the total African population. The alarming thing for me is that we are not looking at 100 million young bodies who do not get a good education – the number represents those who get no formal education. How many children get less than 5 years of instruction? How many children never progress beyond adding and subtracting numbers? How many children never learn about people in other parts of the world? These numbers are likely much larger than the 100 million discussed in these reports. We as a species have to work on this issue. If we as a species are moving toward involving all of us jointly to communicate and share then we at least need everyone to get a basic education so that nobody is excluded from participating. This issue seems to be one of political system. Even in Canada we struggle to deliver all the necessary resources for providing a quality education to everyone especially in remote areas of the country but we try. In much of Africa it appears nobody is even trying. People we are wasting a resource that is very precious. These children are essentially getting squat.

 

All species experience the fact that some members will exist in local environments which are richer than others regarding resource availability but it appears that we have the ability to level the playing field somewhat. There will always be disparity between regions of the world for physical resources but maybe that doesn’t hold true for intellectual resources.

 

Of course this is just one aspect of how well our species is doing. There are many other issues that can be explored to take other pulses and temperatures to determine the health of our species. We need to address this issue. As a species we can do better.

I said I was a generalist and generally I am right

 

I previously posted a statement that I am the ultimate generalist and I stand by that because I am generally right. I will accept that I am not considered funny anywhere on the globe but not with that one. Society has recently decided that being a generalist can mean being diseased and they call it ADD. Humans who exist at the extreme specialist end of the strategy likely get included in the autism and OCD categories. We are all on a continuum somewhere between two extremes.

 

There was a time when I decided to try becoming a specialist or at least see if I could make the transition deeply enough to accomplish something measurable and concrete and hopefully worth the effort. It was a major step for me and one that did not just happen. First I had to define a project that would be interesting and at the same time constitute an accomplishment worthy of a specialist, as I see them. I also thought it would be nice if it impacted my life to the better.

 

At the time we had just bought our first house and had two small children. I was surrounded by new friends, they were all in the same life phase and none of us had 2 nickles to rub together. The neighborhood had become my world, my primary environment. Outside of that one square block was the office where I went to earn money for 40 hours per week or my mom’s house where my family could eat for a free. My mind could travel elsewhere but my feet were anchored to that environment looking for novel ideas to test this desire to specialize in something that was going to improve my life, something that was capable of catching my attention for a long enough period of time, and it had to be something which was truly doable.

 

It had to be a true test of my ability to force myself into the strategy of a person who not only likes seeing the detail but needs to see the detail, who is essentially my opposite because it is just part of their makeup to be that way. Their fundamental strategy for survival in this world. Besides what generalist wants to admit they are not capable of focusing on a specific aspect of something in order to understand how it works. Not I. This decision had several points of input at least these were the ones I consciously knew about. In no particular order:

• my neighbor Myran. A bit of a nerd, a geologist. We were breaking the concrete in his basement floor to install a bathroom. Obviously he was developing his basement at the time and a few of us, with not enough money to have a life of our own, were there to help swing the sledge hammer. None of us had a muscle to share but as a team we got it done. Anyway at the moment when we had finally broken through the concrete where the drain was going to be located and before we could breakout the trench we would need to hook it up to the city service Myran was on his knees to analysis the crushed gravel below. He seemed so excited to explain what he found and how it got here.
• There was a TV series called Nova and it was written and presented by the the very notable Dr. Carl Sagan. He was like a poet in the way he was able to explain the ‘stuff of the universe’. I was hooked. I would never make it all the way through an episode before my brain was full and I was off on a thought journey of my own. There is never an end to interesting thoughts when you are listening to specialists talk. Sorry my attention span is only so long when others are talking.
• Mount St. Helen erupted. Myran comes into this one as well but it was the geophysicists talking about what was happening and why. That really caught my attention because it seemed so fundamental to our environment. We are trying to understand the world that we live on, the planet, the part of the universe which due to proximity is important within our immediate environment. An aside, at this point in the discussion, when I talk to the great unwashed as it were relative to science, they often ask, “why do we waste time studying about stuff in space, it does us no good?”

 

I decided I would quit work and attend university to get a science degree. I was committed there was no turning back I had my project. So now I have a degree in geophysics. I was so able to get so deep into being a specialist that after my BSc. I lined up a grad degree program but decided to return to being me before I pulled the trigger on the program. Life is interesting isn’t it?

 

I imagine it would be equally difficult for a specialist to become a genuine generalist and to see where I live. It was a hell of a journey but OMFG was it worth it? It can be done and it should happen often. I think there is great value in changing perspectives. I apologize for my poor writing skills. I am slowly, at least I hope it is slowly, losing my abilities to communicate. My mind however is crystal clear, until I move on.