I thought you were my friend you degenerate creep. I didn't realize that I was taking advantage of your generosity when you agreed to let me use your blog space in order to protect my professional identity at the expense of yours. You've said some pretty nasty things about my work and now I'm paying you back with public slander. I hope you drown in obscurity and spend the rest of your life like one of those art directors we used to work with all the time who say "yeah, I used to paint. I should really get back into it." Enjoy your boring life in the suburbs. Go mow your lawn. Go barbecue hamburgers from SuperFresh in your backyard and take sunday trips to the beach. The rest of us real artists will be living high and dying in the streets. We'll be making poetry with our lives instead of saving for retirement and an RV. Enjoy your imaginary friends. Your real (ex)friends will be whooping it up at Ray's Happy Birthday Bar with the cool people, smoking, drinking, being evil till last call. What movie you gonna on-demand tonight? Maybe you can be bad and have a beer. Don't let the paperboy hit you in the balls with your Sunday Times when you step out on your porch with your morning coffee. Keep it real.
–LM
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Plastics, Or 13 Is Greater Than 2
According to a 2008 report issued by the American Chemistry Council's Plastics Industry Producers' Statistics Group, The Grand Total amount of Thermoplastic Resins produced in North America for the year-to-date period ending in March 2008 (January – March 2008) was 19,820,361 thousands of pounds, or 19,820,361,000 pounds, or 9,910,180.5 Standard tons.
This is the amount of plastic resin made from petroleum-based sources for the first quarter of 2008. Multiply by 4 and we have 39,640,722 for one year of production. Lets be generous and round that down to 30,000,000 tons.
Now lets try to replace Thermoplastic Resin with Polylactic Acid, or PLA, a plant-based resin that is said to be greener, compostable, and made from plant sources, most commonly corn.
Polylactic Acid (PLA)
2.5 kg of corn needed to produce 1 kg of (PLA)
1 standard ton = approx 907 kg, so 1 ton of PLA requires 2,267.5 tons of corn
A dry bushel of corn weighs 56 pounds. 1 standard ton of corn is equal to 35.7 bushels of dry corn. Thus 1 standard ton of PLA needs approx 80,950 dry bushels of corn.
According to the Iowa Corn Growers Association, the average yield of corn per acre is 183 dry bushels. Thus 1 standard ton of PLA needs approx 442 acres of cornfield.
30,000,000 standard tons of plastic resin made with corn-based PLA would require...
13,260,000,000 acres of cornfield
In 2007 the total acreage of farmland in the US was 2,262,000,000. That number is smaller now.
13 > 2.
This is the amount of plastic resin made from petroleum-based sources for the first quarter of 2008. Multiply by 4 and we have 39,640,722 for one year of production. Lets be generous and round that down to 30,000,000 tons.
Now lets try to replace Thermoplastic Resin with Polylactic Acid, or PLA, a plant-based resin that is said to be greener, compostable, and made from plant sources, most commonly corn.
Polylactic Acid (PLA)
2.5 kg of corn needed to produce 1 kg of (PLA)
1 standard ton = approx 907 kg, so 1 ton of PLA requires 2,267.5 tons of corn
A dry bushel of corn weighs 56 pounds. 1 standard ton of corn is equal to 35.7 bushels of dry corn. Thus 1 standard ton of PLA needs approx 80,950 dry bushels of corn.
According to the Iowa Corn Growers Association, the average yield of corn per acre is 183 dry bushels. Thus 1 standard ton of PLA needs approx 442 acres of cornfield.
30,000,000 standard tons of plastic resin made with corn-based PLA would require...
13,260,000,000 acres of cornfield
In 2007 the total acreage of farmland in the US was 2,262,000,000. That number is smaller now.
13 > 2.
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Peak Oil
When the oil runs out, what will we run on? Ethanol has been dead in the water since Bush left town, but just to put in perspective what are needs are, here are some important numbers to crunch:
86,000,000 acres of corn in US by 2008 numbers
1 sq mi = 640 acres
86,000,000 / 640 = 134,375 sq miles of corn in US
US = 3.79 million sq miles, 3.5% used to grow corn
1 acre of corn = 328 gallons of ethanol
1 gallon of ethanol requires approx .003 acres
137,800,000,000 gallons of gasoline burned in 2008
137,800,000,000 gallons x .003 acres = 413,400,000 acres needed to supply enough ethanol to meet the demand for gasoline by 2008 standards.
that's 4.8 times more land needed to grow corn (but not for food)
16.8% of US land would be needed to grow enough corn to meet US gasoline demands by 2008 standards
2007 total acres of farmland approx 2,261,000,000 acres
about 18% of total US farmland used to grow food by 2007 numbers (the numbers have fallen since) would be needed to supply the amount of ethanol to meet the demands of consumption based on what was used in 2008 (that number has increased since).
No oil = fucked, but then again, we do have atomic weapons and other means of coercing the third world to hand over their land. Is there any surprise that the US is sending forces to Costa Rica to practice war games (46 warships, 200 helicopters)? New Axis of Evil. Hey man, we gotta grow corn somewhere...
Ethanol = fairy dust and unicorns, but we always have the tar sands, right?
This, of course is only considering motor fuels. We still haven't talked about plastics (and high fructose corn syrup).
Eat well tonight.
86,000,000 acres of corn in US by 2008 numbers
1 sq mi = 640 acres
86,000,000 / 640 = 134,375 sq miles of corn in US
US = 3.79 million sq miles, 3.5% used to grow corn
1 acre of corn = 328 gallons of ethanol
1 gallon of ethanol requires approx .003 acres
137,800,000,000 gallons of gasoline burned in 2008
137,800,000,000 gallons x .003 acres = 413,400,000 acres needed to supply enough ethanol to meet the demand for gasoline by 2008 standards.
that's 4.8 times more land needed to grow corn (but not for food)
16.8% of US land would be needed to grow enough corn to meet US gasoline demands by 2008 standards
2007 total acres of farmland approx 2,261,000,000 acres
about 18% of total US farmland used to grow food by 2007 numbers (the numbers have fallen since) would be needed to supply the amount of ethanol to meet the demands of consumption based on what was used in 2008 (that number has increased since).
No oil = fucked, but then again, we do have atomic weapons and other means of coercing the third world to hand over their land. Is there any surprise that the US is sending forces to Costa Rica to practice war games (46 warships, 200 helicopters)? New Axis of Evil. Hey man, we gotta grow corn somewhere...
Ethanol = fairy dust and unicorns, but we always have the tar sands, right?
This, of course is only considering motor fuels. We still haven't talked about plastics (and high fructose corn syrup).
Eat well tonight.
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
United Nothing
Forget the notion of rewriting history. Lets talk about hand-crafting reality. In 1990 United Nations resolution #660 condemned the invasion of Kuwait by Saddam Hussein. There were numerous other resolutions passed which included economic sanctions, naval blockades, authorizations for the use of force, and formation of military coalitions. In addition to this invasion and the siege of the Kuwaiti people, Saddam murdered many of his own people which included the use of chemical weapons.
This same United Nations officially recognized Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge as the rightful government of Cambodia until 1997. Under this regime between 1975 and 1979 over 2 million Cambodians died, most killed during the "cleansing", and many more from starvation and disease in Pol Pot's agrarian revolution.
Both Saddam and Pol Pot were psychopaths. Both men were guilty of mass murder and unspeakable crimes against humanity. One was protected by the UN through "official recognition" and one had two wars waged against him by UN sanctioned coalitions in which hundreds of thousands of people died, was eventually removed from power, convicted for his crimes in an international dog-and-pony show trial, and executed.
We've heard the official story justifying the use of force against Saddam as a fight for freedom of an oppressed people and the disposition of an evil and dangerous tyrant. I'm fairly certain that no one knows the official story justifying the official recognition of Pol Pot who is responsible for atrocities so heinous as to be described as the incarnation of Hell on Earth.
Based on these two examples and the inconsistent application of power and interest in human rights, one must ask what the function is of the United Nations? To whom do they answer and who do they serve? Whose agendas do they support? Who holds them accountable? What about the accountability of governments that misuse UN authority to pursue their own agendas?
Maybe its time to pass People's Resolution #1.
This same United Nations officially recognized Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge as the rightful government of Cambodia until 1997. Under this regime between 1975 and 1979 over 2 million Cambodians died, most killed during the "cleansing", and many more from starvation and disease in Pol Pot's agrarian revolution.
Both Saddam and Pol Pot were psychopaths. Both men were guilty of mass murder and unspeakable crimes against humanity. One was protected by the UN through "official recognition" and one had two wars waged against him by UN sanctioned coalitions in which hundreds of thousands of people died, was eventually removed from power, convicted for his crimes in an international dog-and-pony show trial, and executed.
We've heard the official story justifying the use of force against Saddam as a fight for freedom of an oppressed people and the disposition of an evil and dangerous tyrant. I'm fairly certain that no one knows the official story justifying the official recognition of Pol Pot who is responsible for atrocities so heinous as to be described as the incarnation of Hell on Earth.
Based on these two examples and the inconsistent application of power and interest in human rights, one must ask what the function is of the United Nations? To whom do they answer and who do they serve? Whose agendas do they support? Who holds them accountable? What about the accountability of governments that misuse UN authority to pursue their own agendas?
Maybe its time to pass People's Resolution #1.
Monday, July 12, 2010
Howard Zinn
You know, its funny, the little picture of Howard Zinn on the back of my copy of A People's History of the United States kind of reminds me of this guy I see sitting by the lake near my house. He's there every day. He parks his car in the same spot, on a curve in the street where its close to the path that goes around the lake. He has his mesh folding chair, a cup of coffee, his cigarettes and a book. I imagine that his wife likes that he gets out of her way every day to do his alone thing, and that she has her alone thing. He's an old guy, and a smoker, and I picture him living in a cluttered old house that smells heavily of very old cigarette smoke. I've been seeing him for years and I've had these images of him for a long time.
When I bought A People's History, it ordered it slightly used from half.com. When it arrived, it had the same old cigarette smoke smell that I imagined guy by the lake's house to have. It still has it, and I often bury my nose in the pages to smell it. For some reason, since the picture of Zinn on the book jacket looks like guy by the lake, and since it smells the way I imagine his house to smell, I can't seem to get past this feeling that it came from his house, that it was his, or that he's Howard Zinn. I suppose that I'll always have this association between A People's History and the guy by the lake, even when I'm an old man and my wife looks forward to me taking my alone time.
The most important passage in the book comes in its final pages. Zinn declares: "As we pass from one century to another, one millennium to another, we would like to think that history itself is transformed as dramatically as the calendar. However, it rushes on, as it always did, with two forces racing toward the future, one splendidly uniformed, the other ragged but inspired."
I wonder if his wife let him have his alone time every day.
When I bought A People's History, it ordered it slightly used from half.com. When it arrived, it had the same old cigarette smoke smell that I imagined guy by the lake's house to have. It still has it, and I often bury my nose in the pages to smell it. For some reason, since the picture of Zinn on the book jacket looks like guy by the lake, and since it smells the way I imagine his house to smell, I can't seem to get past this feeling that it came from his house, that it was his, or that he's Howard Zinn. I suppose that I'll always have this association between A People's History and the guy by the lake, even when I'm an old man and my wife looks forward to me taking my alone time.
The most important passage in the book comes in its final pages. Zinn declares: "As we pass from one century to another, one millennium to another, we would like to think that history itself is transformed as dramatically as the calendar. However, it rushes on, as it always did, with two forces racing toward the future, one splendidly uniformed, the other ragged but inspired."
I wonder if his wife let him have his alone time every day.
Friday, July 9, 2010
Human Morality
Most people assume that you need both religion and government in order for there to be any kind of moral code in society. This idea cannot be any more misguided. In fact, it is ironic to turn to these sources for moral guidance, given the fact that both have a very poor moral track record. The immorality of government is plainly obvious, and if you ask most people, they would say that governments are corrupt and operate outside the supposed law and order that they implement. Religion has been the source of countless numbers of egregious violations of human rights, including genocide and other atrocities over the course of history. The faithful have gone as far as cherry-picking their religious texts in order for their beliefs to correctly correspond with what humans already know about right and wrong. Thus both systems have been proven by human behavior to be contradictions of the moral codes they seek to reinforce. It is only through thousands of years of conditioning that we still maintain the belief that humans are incapable of deciding for themselves what is moral and what is not without divine or government help.
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Is The Universe Deterministic?
To answer this one must also ask whether or not the universe was created with us in mind.
If a butterfly flaps its wings, could it create a chain reaction of events that 4,000,000 years later would cause us to misplace out car keys, and in doing so, cause us to leave the house 30 seconds later than we would have, thus allowing us to miss the fatal car crash we would have otherwise be involved in? If it did, was our life meaningful enough to the universe as to determine our outcome in this rather convoluted way?
Are ripples in a pond caused by deterministic forces in the universe? Or are they caused by some random event, creating random patterns as they bounce off of the shores and criss-cross each other?
A key turning point in my life was a job I was offered in 1999. During my time there, while I was separated from my first wife, before my divorce was finalized, I met the woman who I would later marry and with whom I would start a family. Maybe my kids will grow up to be key players in human history. Was this chain of events precipitated by a decision made by someone or some force on the quantum level in the universe, or did my wife and I just impress the right people at the right times with our resumes?
Determinism equals solipsism. Examining the origin of the universe this way is a lot like tearing down a building and reconstructing it from the top down, or "hindsight is 20/20". We exist in a random soup of particles and energy. Isn't that beautiful enough?
If a butterfly flaps its wings, could it create a chain reaction of events that 4,000,000 years later would cause us to misplace out car keys, and in doing so, cause us to leave the house 30 seconds later than we would have, thus allowing us to miss the fatal car crash we would have otherwise be involved in? If it did, was our life meaningful enough to the universe as to determine our outcome in this rather convoluted way?
Are ripples in a pond caused by deterministic forces in the universe? Or are they caused by some random event, creating random patterns as they bounce off of the shores and criss-cross each other?
A key turning point in my life was a job I was offered in 1999. During my time there, while I was separated from my first wife, before my divorce was finalized, I met the woman who I would later marry and with whom I would start a family. Maybe my kids will grow up to be key players in human history. Was this chain of events precipitated by a decision made by someone or some force on the quantum level in the universe, or did my wife and I just impress the right people at the right times with our resumes?
Determinism equals solipsism. Examining the origin of the universe this way is a lot like tearing down a building and reconstructing it from the top down, or "hindsight is 20/20". We exist in a random soup of particles and energy. Isn't that beautiful enough?
Friday, July 2, 2010
Alex Jones Is A Paranoid Freak
Alex Jones and other like-minded people are half right. Riots, martial law and FEMA detention camps are a real possibility. But it's not the Tea Party and its not white Christian gun owners that they're after. These people are more than willing to wave the flag and bleed for country and turn to Jesus. The real threat to the Establishment are the people in black helmets with clubs. The anarchists. These are the people who scared the shit out of the cops in Toronto. They're a threat because they have growing numbers and they violently oppose the Establishment, capitalist greed and amoral authority. They spread their message quickly and effectively across the globe through social media on the internet. They also can and will manifest in cities around the world as more corporate bullshit and government lying persists. Each time the economic powers get together to meet they will be there. Toronto was a victory for them because it showed the cops and the city government that they meant business. Each little victory makes them stronger and their numbers increase. It won't be long before we see soldiers and armored vehicles in Canadian and American cities being used to protect the capitalist interests against this rising tide of resistance. Bullets will fly, heads will roll and blood will spill. Fortunately for Alex Jones, he and other paranoid, redneck blue bloods will be on the safe side of the fence.
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