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So far my life is largly unchanged since Monday. I mean it's been two days and I thought it would be insane by now.
Instead, I still wake up at the same time every morning, still go to work, still see cars on the road...it's like nothing happened.
My coworkers are talking about this oil crisis with the same tone and interest as they talked about Anna Nicole last week. I think they are just getting snippits and headlines and they think it's like any other Yahoo News story of the day...worth a glance and a sentence, nothing more. Maybe they are just too busy with the mundane tasks of the day to spend any time wondering what this means.
When my coworker Kim turned to me for comment, I told her I was too busy to talk. We always discuss the latest news blurb, and it's usually a good distraction from paperwork. Last week we were talking about the VA shooting and what it could mean for gun control legislation. But this is so much bigger...I mean this is real and it isn't going to go away when the next hollywood starlet forgets to put on underwear. I want to tell her what I know, but she's basically a friend, and she's 7 months pregnant, and man, I just don't want to worry her. I'm torn because she needs to know, but what if she loses hope? What if all my coworkers knew what I knew? Would we still be sitting here working and chatting, or would we be home with our families and a notebook planning and strategizing and losing our minds from fear? I just can't be the bearer of bad news you know? All I can think is why hasn't someone come out yet to really drive home to Average Joe what is going on and why it's important?
Just when I thought my coworkers were completely in the dark about everything, something changed. Mike and Samantha who sit a few rows away from me started arguing about where to order food from for the meeting tomorrow. Normally this is a quick compromise and the issue is settled. But they just kept getting louder and louder about the relative merits of PF Changs vs Jasons Deli. Kim and I were kind of laughing at first, because it was just absurd. But then the mood changed, Mike and Samantha were taking this way too seriously. It never came to blows, but they had to be broken up. I got this image in my head of cows lined up in the slaughterhouse, breathing in the stench of the spilled blood of their kin. Scared you know, but not really sure why. Sure, no one is admitting even to themselves the possibility that life as they know it is about to end, but I think inside they are feeling that sense of impending doom slowly creeping up.
I wonder how much longer this denial is going to last. I wonder if I should even come to work tomorrow. I wish I could skip the next couple weeks because all this waiting is freaking me out. I don't want to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. I'd rather know my environment and what to expect.
OK, so I know everyone is posting about gardening and stockpiling and whatnot, but I feel that in the longterm after Oil Crash Monday, what it comes down to is how close you live to the train tracks. I may be uninformed, but were I your neighbor and caught unaware, I would jump over your fence and into your garden and steal your green beans and squash. So would everyone else in your neighborhood and beyond. Once we see that YOU are prepared, we are going to assume that everything we need is in your house...and that endangers your family. It's not really mean, it's survival. So I just want everyone to think, how close do you live to the railroad tracks? Because that is where the longterm supplies are going to be coming from, if any at all. I also want you to think, how can you be part of that supply. If you can stockpile and grow, can you be a provider? Can you give back and help others? Do you have a good source for insulin? What better chance than now to really be a citizen and make your mark in this world? Most of all, please try to think beyond how prepared you can be at your current location, have a plan for if you have to move, because I think we will all be refugees in contant flux. I wonder what kind of leadership is going to be available if even people in the know plan to hole up with their cute little gardens and first aid kits. I'm not bitching or trying to make enemies, I just thought I would put my train of thought out there. Obviously, family first, but there is going to be an incredible need in your town...how do you plan to be part of the solution and the new world?
If there is anyone near Austin, TX I'd love to strategize with you on how to give back and make a difference. Hitler took advantage of a bad situation and got quite a following. Let's learn from the past and make sure we (humans and citizens of the world) don't give up freedom for food this time. Sat, Apr. 28th, 2007, 08:32 pm
BIOMIMESIS
Last Updated 5/2/07
*In the interest of protecting NICO's privacy, I have removed the bulk of this post*
http://www-cdr.stanford.edu/biomimetics/
http://www.nae.edu/nae/bridgecom.nsf/weblinks/NAEW-4NHM98?OpenDocument
http://multispective.wordpress.com/tag/biomimesis/
What does this have to do with anything???
Give gist of research below by website:
http://multispective.wordpress.com/tag/biomimesis/
Human thought, may be (in part) an emergent phenomena of the “smaller thoughts” happening at the deeper cellular level. [It may also be emergent phenomena of other dynamics (many). Think of human thought as (partially) an “echo” of what your cells, tissues and organs are thinking. I was thinking the word “pre-cognition” may be fitting here to name that type of cellular thinking, but that word is loaded with meaning already. In a previous blog I alluded to it simply as “intra-cellular communication”. If we can agree that most entities that communicate are conscious (to one degree or extent or another) then we may agree that this cellular entity is “thinking” or processing information in an intelligent way. (to one degree or another). Fuck! Wasn't I just working on this theory in relative privacy and wondering if there was scientific interest in this? How very convenient. lol
“Author Robert Wright argues that history has an arrow: That humans have continued to evolve — if not biologically, than culturally and technologically — toward greater complexity and intelligence. He also explains the concept behind his book, “Nonzero”: That life is a nonzero sum game, where there can be more than one winner, and that civilization evolved thanks to such endeavors, which reward cooperation, rather than competition. His guarded optimism is tinged with a deep worry over the growing prevalence of grass-roots hatred. His hope: that the intelligent pursuit of self-interest will actually be the world’s salvation. Robert Wright is author of The Moral Animal and NonZero. He also hosts an excellent interview series called meaningoflife.tv. (Recorded February 2006 in Monterey, CA. Duration: 19:54)”
What I take from this: "intelligent pursuit of self-interest will actually be the world’s salvation."
Is this tying to something like the Oil Crisis will force us back toward suvival rather than luxury and basically solve many of the social / economic problems we are currently facing? Or am I missing the point here? lol
http://www.nae.edu/nae/bridgecom.nsf/weblinks/NAEW-4NHM98?OpenDocument
To examine the interaction of engineering and biology is natural, indeed inevitable, if we consider engineering for what it truly is: a continuation of biology by other means. Engineering achieves this through the creation of artifacts - that is, machines - that extend and complement our biological faculties. In the process, modern engineering has created knowledge and techniques that make it possible to intervene with increasing success in living systems - to quantify aspects of their physiology; to diagnose and treat with electromagnetic or acoustic waves and with elementary particles; to create devices for doing genetic engineering; and to replace diseased tissues and organs.
Bio Nanobots?
http://www-cdr.stanford.edu/biomimetics/
Biomimesis: to mimic life, to imitate biological systems)
This research is aimed at developing a new class of biologically inspired robots that exhibit much greater robustness in performance in unstructured environments than today's robots. This new class of robots will be substantially more compliant and stable than current robots, and will take advantage of new developments in materials, fabrication technologies, sensors and actuators. Applications will include autonomous or semi-autonomous tasks such as reconnaissance and de-mining for small, insect-like robots and human interaction tasks at a larger scale. The research involves a close collaboration among robotics and physiology researchers at Stanford, U.C. Berkeley, Harvard and Johns Hopkins Universities.
The "Sprawl" family of hand-sized hexapedal robots are prototypes designed to test ideas about locomotion dynamics, leg design and leg arrangement and to identify areas that can be improved by Shape Deposition Manufacturing. Sprawl robots are some of the fastest (up to 5 body-lengths per second) and most robust (hip-height obstacles) legged robots out there. They are the result of close collaboration between roboticists, manufacturing engineers and biologists.
Shape Deposition Manufacturing (SDM) is a developing Rapid Prototyping technology in which mechanisms are simultaneously fabricated and assembled.
This cycle of material deposition and removal results in three key features: - Building parts in incremental layers allows us complete access to the internal geometry of any mechanism.
- This access allows us to embed actuators, sensors and other pre-fabricated functional components inside the structure.
- By varying the materials used in the deposition process, we can spatially vary the material properties of the mechanism itself.
The resulting mechanisms can have almost arbitrary geometry, embedded actuators and sensor and locally-varying stiffness properties, making them more robust and simpler to control.
Sat, Apr. 28th, 2007, 06:32 pm
NICO 4/28
Last updated 5/2/07 *in the interest of protecting NICO's privacy, I have removed the bulk of this post*
NICO PICTURES http://s177.photobucket.com/albums/w222/Iniscool/ NICO VIDEO on YOUTUBE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Xq1WheazY4
A message that Nico should see. Tell him, would you?
Posted by "Every Sunday" on April 23rd 2007
"Every Sunday" Youtube profile
http://www.youtube.com/everySunday
TRANSLATION of BULGARIAN in NICO VIDEO
"Look, I've used every contact I could. You sent Andreas on a wildgoose chase... Very funny... Now I'm left holding the bag/ in a no- way situation/ in a pickle too. Just make your point clear. At a certain moment the company weakened/ yielded its position drastically. We are at your side. We claim that a wise move. But your support will make a big difference. Espesially if you are there to protect her.The door is closing, Thomas. Get inside or you'll get stuck on the outside... in the cold... for a very long time. "
ASST DIALOGUE ON NICO VIDEO: http://community.livejournal.com/worldwithoutoil/5185.html |
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