I'm sitting in the railway station....

Yes I'm sitting in the railway station, got a ticket to my destination (London), but I'm not on a tour of one night stands....etc.  The Simon and Garfunkel song came into my head so it was meant to be the theme of today's blog post.  I'm on one of my visits to the UK when I try to cram as much into a week as possible and today I'm meeting a couple of colleagues in the capital.  The people-watching en route is fascinating.  I'm currently observing a guy at the automated ticket dispenser who has a shoulder bag with 'Homes & Communities Agency ' emblazoned on the flap.  So what's he up to?  Well I suppose the name of his organisation (unless he's borrowed the bag!) gives a clue as to the nature of his work, which sounds as though he might be in the business of helping others.  It's a pity he has to pay such extortionate prices for his rail tickets although no doubt the costs are ultimately borne by the taxpayer.

That guy is just one example of a growing number of people who are surrounding me, all going somewhere and like me, have airs of purposefulness and determination.  No one looks bored out of their minds, even if that's how they really feel!  By the way, none of the travellers appears to be "on a tour of one night stands....".  Sorry Simon and Garfunkel!  The lady seated nearest to me in the waiting room is reading the type of newspaper that has more pictures than text and appeals to people with right-wing political views.  A train has just arrived and the guy from the Housing & Communities Agency, together with two colleagues, has got on board.  People are still arriving at the station for the next train to London, which I will be boarding.

Now the UK is a developed country, which is going through interesting economic and political times.  When I look at this microcosm of the British population on the railway station, I have to ask myself, has society got it's priorities right?  Is the shuttling of millions of people around the country, each and every day, at vast expense to individuals, companies and taxpayers, as well as, of course, the environment, in the best interests of society?

....Well, ten hours have elapsed since the last paragraph and I'm on the return journey.  I've had two interesting meetings in the City plus a lot of hustle and bustle, and I've thoroughly enjoyed it.  London is a great city, with a cultural diversity that is invigorating.  My meetings were mentally stimulating and thought-provoking.  So have I made a positive contribution to society today?  It's debatable.  But thank you Simon and Garfunkel for being the inspiration for today's post.

Homeward bound!

The Human Footprint

The picture says it all.  The ingenuity of the human species is beyond doubt.  The results of our achievements are all over the world.  There isn't a part of the world that we haven't occupied or visited.  But one unfortunate downside of our intelligence and ingenuity is arrogance.  Many of our species have almost a complete disrespect for the one thing that is responsible for our achievements - the planet.  A planet that we share with millions of other species.

Now I have published a number of posts about climate change, particularly after I participated in a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on the subject, earlier this year.  Our carbon dioxide polluted atmosphere is a fact, not theory!  It can be measured at over 400 ppm and the destructive results of global warming are already being experienced.  But this blog post is not about climate change, it's about waste and more particularly, the disposal of waste.

As we walk through any countryside, it is highly likely that human disposals will be encountered.  Now if it were banana skins or apple cores that wouldn't be a problem, since both are biodegradable.  But when it's plastic bottles, plastic bags, aluminium cans, cigarette packets, etc, not only is it unsightly but the human act of dumping rubbish is totally irresponsible because of the damage to the environment.  What is really astounding is that the disposal of non-biodegradable rubbish is as a result of conscious human actions.  Now I know that many countries are making sizeable investments into waste management, including recycling.  There are also many examples of volunteers scouring the countryside and collecting waste.  But why is the rubbish there in the first place?  It is because many (and thankfully not all) individuals don't care.  They think solely of disposing their rubbish, wherever they are, regardless of the long term environmental problem they are creating.  Now I'm sure there is a Pareto principle at work here, with maybe no more than 5% of the population causing 95% of the problem but I have no real data to back that up. There is also undoubtedly learned behaviour involved.  When Dad throws an empty packet out of the car window, why wouldn't his children observing the act, think that's the right thing to do.

So that's it, I've got it off my chest........TAKE YOUR RUBBISH HOME!

The Ubiquitous Charger

We see them here, we see them there, we see them everywhere - battery chargers!  Phones, tablets, notebooks, torches, drills, .... etc, etc, need charging.  But do we have just one type of charger?  Oh no, there are different connectors, voltages, power requirements, which means there is a plethora of types of battery charger.  For many people it becomes a logistic nightmare to ensure their gadgets are charged when they need them.  Even the more organised who make sure they have routines to try to ensure they are never without juice, can be caught out by a power cut or charger failure - they don't last forever!

Battery performance has increased six-fold in the past century, whereas performance of the electronics they power has increased 10,000% in the past 35 years.  This means that as computing technology, in one form or another, takes over our lives and demands more and more electrical power, battery technology struggles to keep up with it.  So despite having automated lifestyles, we still have to remember to charge the bloody batteries!  Also, for the environmentally-conscious amongst us, just feel your charger when one of your devices is being charged.  It gets warm, which means some of the electricity being consumed from the grid is being wasted to produce heat.  So we are burning more fossil fuel and creating more carbon dioxide emissions than we need to.

OK, I've had a good moan so what's the solution?  Well I've no doubt that battery technology will improve and there are also some attempts to standardise on phone and tablet chargers with the move towards the 5v USB standard.  But there is something that all of us can do immediately to reduce the consumption of electricity from fossil fuels - use the sun!

I don't want this blog post to be an advertisement for solar-powered battery chargers, but there are plenty on the market.

The manufacturer of the one illustrated here, claims it will charge many of the popular phones and tablets.

I am sure technology will come to our rescue eventually.  That said, I have no doubt the ubiquitous charger will be around for many years to come!

Political Earthquake?

The result of the European elections was described by the French Prime Minister as "an earthquake".  Every article I have read has its own analysis and, as always, we are in danger of paralysis by analysis.  What does the apparent anti-European swing, notably in France and the UK, really mean?  Well, let me give you a personal view.  I believe what we have recently witnessed is a symptom of a disaffection by voters with politics and politicians.  The state of the world economy can at best be described as fragile and individual nations are experiencing varying degrees of economic discomfort.  This is particularly evident in Europe where 26 million are out of work.  The widespread austerity programmes continue to leave a bitter taste and frankly, a large proportion of the population is totally pissed off!

Now, in my opinion, the reason many people do not have faith in politicians, or indeed the political system, is because promises of economic recovery fail to materialise.  Why?  Well maybe it's because what is being promised is never achievable.  We are being seduced by the promise of economic growth and I don't know of any political party that would have the balls to shy away from that commitment.  Yet to believe in perpetual growth on a finite planet, one must be mad or an economist!  But because most leaders haven't taken that fact on board, the world's economy is in a state of rebalancing, which essentially means the richer developed countries will take some pain, whilst the poorer developing countries will see some gain.  Now that seems logical to me yet no politician will ever admit it and consequently nations try to fight it.  We produce things we don't need merely to create employment and demonstrate economic growth.  In the process we deplete valuable natural resources and pollute the atmosphere.

So in my opinion the result of the European elections is not necessarily people saying they want to be in or out of Europe, but people protesting against their lot with a capital P.  Let's be thankful that the European protests are mainly through the ballot box rather than on the streets.  People are not stupid and they really care about issues like poverty, housing, food security, wealth distribution, atmospheric pollution, etc, etc, etc.  How we organise ourselves to tackle these issues is far less important than understanding the solutions.  Outdated political ideologies, dogma and rhetoric are boring.

So let these election results be a wake up call.  We need to be honest about the global issues, what needs to be done and the impacts on our personal situations.  It's not going to be easy but with good, strong leadership, based on honesty and transparency, there must be a sporting chance of success........we'll see!

Keep Out - It's Mine!

As I continue to grumble daily at world events - yes I really am a grumpy old man! - I realise how the root of so many conflicts is PROPERTY.  People, groups of citizens, nations claiming OWNERSHIP of something tangible, like land, or if you really want to be wacky, intangible, like software.  The French anarchist, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, coined the slogan "Property is Theft".  In his 1840 book 'What is Property?', he wrote:

"If I were asked to answer the following question: What is slavery? and I should answer in one word, It is murder, my meaning would be understood at once.  No extended argument would be required....Why, then, to this other question: What is property? May I not likewise answer, It is robbery!, without the certainty of being misunderstood; the second proposition being no other than a transformation of the first?"

There have been many debates about Proudhon's philosophy and there is inevitably a natural reaction to individuals accepting the premise that they don't OWN anything!  We were all fortunate to be born on this planet.  However, some were more fortunate than others to have been born in prosperous locations.  Whilst others were very unfortunate to have been born into communities where poverty and starvation are rife.  To a large extent the different environments are man-made by successive territorial claims over many generations.  So we now have a modern world with territorial boundaries established by homo sapiens and only respected by homo sapiens.  Within these national territories the planet's resources are used and abused by humans in accordance with some haphazard rules of ownership.

As I write this blog post, I am gazing across MY garden.  I know it's MINE because it has boundary fences and nobody can enter without my permission!  But having said that, there are many creatures in MY garden - birds, hedgehogs, geckos, snakes (yes, we've got those!), land crabs (those as well!!), insects, bats, lizards........to name but a few.  Do they know they are in MY garden.  No they don't and why should they?  It's as much their garden as it is my garden and without them, as well as the trees, plants, shrubs and other life forms, the place would be empty and sterile.

The bizarre thing about human ownership is that we assign a monetary value to our possessions.  It is quite likely that scarcity of land, property, or both can drive prices upwards.  So the monetary value of our property can increase through no effort on our part.  But one person's gain is another person's pain and as the rich get richer, the poor get poorer and life's lottery for survival continues unabated.  The tension between rich and poor, haves and have-nots, increases conflict and provides excuses for war........and we think that's civilised!

If I were a bird or a fox or a squirrel, and I viewed the antics of human beings, I would probably be impressed at their collective intelligence and achievements, but amazed at their arrogance and selfishness.  Somehow the mindset of ME and MY has to give way to WE and OUR, where the latter embraces ALL life on OUR planet.

Is this Utopian nonsense?  Unfortunately it probably is, but only because our arrogance and selfishness permit it to be.

Parting is such sweet sorrow.

We've just had family to stay with us for a few days.  The visit was not without a few problems.  We can usually guarantee wall-to-wall Turkish sunshine at this time of the year, but it wasn't to be this time!  Our guests arrived in a thunderstorm and the weather remained unsettled throughout their stay, reverting to blue skies and sunshine on the day of their departure.  The second spanner in the works, was the fact that my wife and I were suffering from a bug, which meant that neither of us were our normally bubbly selves.  Then to cap it all, on the day of departure one of our guests noticed that one of her ears was missing a diamond earring that was normally attached.  At the time of writing and after much searching, it still hasn't been found.  But despite all these problems, we had a great time!

When you're excited about a planned event, it is only natural to want everything to go well so it is disappointing if there are negative forces like the ones I have described.  But if the relationships are strong and resilient, then the positive forces will far outweigh the negative forces.  So the ability to ride the storm is, in my opinion, a test of how any group of people relate to each other, regardless of whether they are family, friends, colleagues or acquaintances.

I believe that the real test of a relationship is the feeling experienced when saying goodbye.  "Parting is such sweet sorrow" is a line from the play Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare.  Juliet is saying good night to Romeo.  "Sweet sorrow" is clearly an oxymoron, but it can describe a feeling experienced by people who have strong feelings for each other and know that any separation is not forever.  So there is the sorrow of parting but the sweetness of knowing that they'll meet again.

We're a funny old species we humans!

Myopic Thinking

When I watched the news on TV this morning, I saw an item explaining Europe's vulnerable position with respect to gas supplies from Russia, particularly in the light of the crisis in Ukraine.  It was explained that about 50% of Europe's gas comes from Russia.  The country-to-country variations are quite significant.  For example, 80% of Bulgaria's gas, compared with 0% of the UK's gas, comes from Russia.  OK, I get the message, Europe is concerned about energy security.  But then the news report became somewhat bizarre.  It was suggested that the G7 energy ministers were considering ways of reducing the dependency on Russia for gas supplies.  Ah, I thought, maybe this is the opportunity to accelerate the use of renewable energy sources.  But no, what was being proposed was a network (the gas equivalent of an electricity grid) to link the European countries, so that, for example, fracking gas from the UK can feed into mainland Europe, as well as imported gas (also from fracking) from the USA.

This displays all the symptoms of myopic thinking.  A hopefully short-term relationship problem with Russia, over its stance towards Ukraine, has triggered Europe and its American ally to invest in a very expensive and long-term programme to cut off Russian gas imports - a classic example of knee-jerk political thinking.  But what's most disturbing is that even though carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, at greater than 400ppm, should be a real cause for concern, the G7 energy dumbos are planning to invest to exacerbate the problem.  Surely the current crisis in Ukraine should, if nothing else, be a catalyst for every European country potentially affected by the supply of gas from Russia, to put real effort into becoming self sufficient on energy from renewable sources?  The technology is available, so what's the problem?  It is probably cost.

Gas is grossly under-priced, because the costs do not include the premium that should be paid by the producers for the damage to the planet.  Those costs will currently be picked up by future generations.  I don't know how to quantify fossil fuel damage.  Maybe it's not possible.  In which case the simple rule should be, use renewable sources wherever it is possible, regardless of the acquisition and support costs.  Naive thinking on my part?  I don't think so.  Political myopic thinking benefits only the individual politicians and not society at large.  The use of economic justifications to support their actions is misleading and dangerous.  There is no shortage of man-made money, but the natural defences to combat atmospheric pollution are demonstrably beginning to fail - look at the continuous reduction of the Arctic ice cap.

So let's not get carried away with the current European energy crisis.  Al Gore once said:

"As many know, the Chinese expression for 'crisis' consists of two characters side by side.  The first is the symbol for 'danger', the second the symbol for 'opportunity'."