Crickets

Follow up to these posts

Climate change is a big, important issue for the European Union (EU) in all their policy-making. It is the primary issue behind closing down farms in The Netherlands. It is an issue for energy decisions like Germany's goal to shut down their nuclear plants ("climate neutral").

Regarding the forcible closing of farms, I raised a question of food security - namely, what will happen to the supply of food for the Dutch people and for the people who import Dutch meat? 

One answer to that question may be revealed now. This month the EU approved the addition of a fourth insect variety that may be added to foods. "House crickets" will be grown, starved for 24 hours, killed, and ground into powder. They will be added at the rate of 1%-2.5% into foods like manufactured snacks.

This author says that the policy may make sense to Europeans because they want to devote large land areas to solar farms and wind rather than to farming. That's the connection to climate change. 

But don't worry, the choice of whether to eat insects instead of meat is still a personal choice in Europe. So far.

Note: I didn't include a repulsive picture in this post. Google it.

Trans opponent

Follow-up to these posts

Not everybody has jumped on the powerful wave of gender transitions. The author of the immensely popular Harry Potter stories fights the current momentum of that wave. J.K. Rowling thinks that male and female sexes are biologically real rather than defined by a state of mind.

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In connection with women's rights, she really doesn't like it when men claim to be women: "Men defining what a woman is, what women should and shouldn’t fear, what women should and shouldn’t say . . [is the] ‘real’ misogyny: get a bloody mirror. That’s real misogyny, looking right back at you." She says woman is not a costume, an idea in a man's head, or a pink brain.

The number of girls transitioning to male in Scotland has grown by over 4000%, fed on "social contagion" through social media. She's worried about this. So she's been cancelled on Twitter, of course, and quit tweeting for a while to regain peace. She explains all this on her website.

She bravely fights for what she believes to be right . . as her fictional creation Harry did.

Bible museum 2

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

"Scripture and Science" opened as a new exhibit last week in the Museum of the Bible. Lots of artifacts are included. 

Nicolaus Copernicus published On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres in the year 1543, containing his model of the universe which put the sun rather than the earth in the center of it. A very old copy from 1566 is being displayed. It's a special copy - owned by Galileo himself.

Some of the great issues of today's world are addressed in the exhibit, one of them being the assumption that science and religion are always in conflict. The exhibit brings evidence to the contrary. 

Early religious figures in the "scientific revolution" (1543 to 1687) brought their principles into the work of studying the universe. They believed that the Creator instilled his own orderliness into the material world, so the universe can truly be studied and understood by humans who were created with His own rationality.

Much more from the exhibit can be found here.

Bible museum 1

Whether you are a believer or not, a visit to the Museum of the Bible located in Washington D.C. may surprise you. It's "an immersive, personal experience" designed to "invite all people to engage with the transformative power of the Bible."

CBS summarizes their own tour through it in this ~4-minute clip:

It's huge (the equivalent of a 17-story building) and located just a block from the Capitol.  Fifty-one thousand donors funded its construction, the biggest of whom was the Green family of Hobby Lobby stores, called "controversial" by this reporter.

(cont'd tomorrow)

Open AI 2

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

Open AI wrote the "chatbot" (ChatGPT) that some students are using. It was not designed for cheating, but to perform a task which you give to it in natural language (not code). A WSJ writer went back to an advanced placement English class to test it. She gave her assignment to the AI program, and it wrote an essay which got the teacher's approval.

When this AI tool launched last November, it had a million users within five days.

Generative models coming from Open AI can generate music and images as well as text, with spoken natural language prompts. The image below was generated from the prompt, "Teddy bears working on new AI research underwater with 1990s technology" 

Potential ethics problems abound. Deceit? Already happening. At this point, you won't know if a person or an algorithm (written by a person) wrote an article you're reading. Bias and manipulation? Sure, just write the algorithm to exclude any idea you don't agree with - like the social media companies do.

Elon's view is that people with good motives must be involved in the inevitable development of AI to move it in the right direction. He wants Open AI's research to be open-sourced, which means accessible, not secret.

Open AI 1

Open AI does research in artificial intelligence (AI). There's a for-profit wing which develops new commercial applications for sale, and a non-profit side with no commercial sales function. Elon Musk was one of the original founders back in December of 2015, but he's no longer on the board.

It reflects Elon's well-known fear that artificial general intelligence will eventually threaten human beings. A simple statement of their mission from the website: "to ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity."

(cont'd tomorrow)

Tech layoffs 2

 Follow-up to this post

Technology companies were laying off lots of employees last fall. It seemed like a big wave. It included Twitter, of course, where new owner Elon Musk was getting headlines for doing it to his new company. But now there's an even bigger wave. Lots of tech company CEO's are cutting labor costs.

Amazon is going to lay off over 18,000 people. In addition to that news last Wednesday, it was reported that Microsoft too is cutting jobs to reduce their workforce by 10,000. These are big numbers.

Google is joining the club. They announced their intention to lay off 12,000 people. A memo from the CEO outlines generous severance packages. He says that we are in a different sort of economy than we had the last two years when they were hiring.

After two years of high inflation, individuals and businesses both are feeling the pain and there could be a recession on the way. 

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Pipeline 2

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

Is the Keystone pipeline safe? If that means "risk-free," no, it is not. Next question: what different method of moving petroleum is safe? Again, if that means "risk-free," the answer is none.  No method is risk-free. 

Petroleum could be transported by tanker trucks. To move the volume that one pipeline (Dakota Access Pipeline) moves every day would require three thousand of those tanker trucks on our roads. Does that sound risk-free? Or  . . that volume could be moved by rail cars. It would require 815 rail cars to move the same amount. Not risk-free.

Another consideration might be carbon emissions. No environmentalist would want increased carbon emissions from 3,000 additional tanker trucks on the roads.

Petroleum products fuel our modern way of life. Beyond use as fuel, they are even found in the carbon fiber of wind turbine blades, not to mention electronics and smartphones. So we won't be eliminating our need for petroleum any time soon.

How to move it is a complex policy decision because there are important issues in conflict. As with every decision, all options must be considered. As the environmentalist said, the priority is to protect both people and planet.

from Energy Transfer

Pipeline 1

On his first day in office, the current president stopped construction on an extension to the Keystone pipeline. According to his energy department's December report, that decision cost up to 59,000 two-year jobs. It would have moved 830,000 barrels of oil per day from Canada to Nebraska where it would have linked with other pipelines.

Environmentalist activists had helped him get elected, and that's what they wanted. The price of power is inflated today, probably due partially to reduced access and supply of oil.

Safety was the issue. Most of the accidents in Keystone's history (it started service in 2010) have been small-scale, but just last month the biggest one happened in the state of Kansas. About 14,000 barrels of oil leaked into a rural creek, soaking part of a family farm. At 42 gallons/barrel, that's over a half-million gallons.

(cont'd tomorrow)

Wave is slowing

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

A wave of very extreme gender policies leaped into public life in recent years, all contrary to biology and common sense. Here are a few:

• Radical medical and surgical treatments for under-aged kids
• Biological males forcibly allowed into girls' showers
• Biological male athletes forcibly allowed to compete against girls

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Chloe's comment is right on. How can you do any of these things in good conscience? 

But the wave may be slowing:

• Florida now forbids transgenderism and other sensitive sexual discussion to children in school until fourth grade 
• Medical or surgical transitions to youth are outlawed in three states
• Opposition to biological males competing with girls is growing

Maybe lawyers will rush into the changing momentum with suits like Chloe's. They tend to do so, considering the history of opposition to tobacco and asbestos.

from Humanize

Trans per law

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

Long-term research is not definitive regarding sex-change transition. While some who go through that surgery seem to be satisfied, many are not. Some of them de-transition back. Over all, the outcomes (including suicide) are not conclusively positive. Go here to consider some of the available evidence.

So why have some courts demanded that the surgery be done on request? Where is the freedom of choice, the respect that is due to professionals who don't choose to perform it? 

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A hospital at the University of Maryland was judged guilty of violating anti-discrimination law because it refused to perform the sex-change surgery. 

Chloe Cole (yesterday's post) is outspoken in her opinion that it was way too easy for her to get the drastic surgery at the age of 15. Even without any religious or moral considerations, scientifically and rationally there's not enough evidence to put the law of the land behind automatic access to it.

from MSN

(cont'd tomorrow)

De-trans story

Parents are the primary protectors of their children. They provide a long-term perspective that the child can't get from just a few years of life. Unfortunately for Chloe Cole, nothing held her back from drastic, unchangeable surgery that she soon regretted but will have to live with.

Chloe started taking puberty blockers at the age of 12 or 13, then chose double mastectomy surgery for herself at the age of 15. 

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Very publicly, she is telling the world that she wishes someone had held her back, that the adult advisors in her life had refused to take that action.

"Now that I've seen it all," Chloe says, "I just can't imagine operating on a kid like that in good conscience."

Go to this Twitter account to see her say this.

Change course

It takes courage to re-evaluate and change course. This environmentalist was a true believer,  investing all his effort into what he thought would make the world a better place. But he also kept his eyes open, kept on observing and thinking about his work, and ultimately changed his mind about his course in life.

As he says, the best policies will be those that look honestly at all the energy options open to us and make choices to protect both people and the planet. It looks like The Netherlands didn't pay enough attention to the needs of its people (see this week's previous posts).

Our energy policy choices moving forward need to consider these factors: reliability, affordability, security, scalability, land use. 

Amazing fact - solar farms require 75 times the land that a typical nuclear plant requires to provide 1000 MW of energy. Wind farms require 360 times the land that a nuclear plant requires.

Food insecurity

Global poverty and famine have declined greatly over the past few decades. A bigger portion of the people of the world are fed and educated than ever before. It's been reported many times in recent years, though many still don't know about it.

But that progress has stalled because of pandemic consequences and the Ukraine war. Now the United Nations is talking about a "food crisis." In an official message last October, they said that "A staggering three billion people cannot afford a healthy diet; the war in Ukraine has triggered surging food, fertilizer, and energy prices . . ."

Very inflated prices of food are already here, and there will be more. We in the West can manage the inflation and mostly sustain our diet. But countries with less robust economies will struggle. There won't be as much wheat or sunflower oil going to those countries as foreign aid because Ukraine produces a big part of the world's supply - and you know that Ukraine is hugely disrupted now.

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You could say that The Netherlands, also a big exporter of food, picked a bad time to forcibly cut food production. They're going to shut down farms, restrict meat production, and make life more difficult for their farm families.

Dutch farms 3

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

Looks like Dutch farmers are losing this conflict (protests started in 2019) with their government. Last summer the government of the Netherlands announced their plan to force 2000-3000 farmers to sell their farms.

"Climate Change" is the reason given. The government wants to cut nitrogen output in half by 2030. They claim that meat is the villain, and they're getting ready for that shortage which is  coming. A city west of Amsterdam has placed a ban on advertising meat in public places, to take effect in 2024. 

One agriculture expert thinks the campaign against meat is "shortsighted and misconceived." She says it's happening because "poor research and misconceptions blame meat for being a major contributor to climate change without understanding any of the nuances of that statement.”

According to another agriculture expert, Europe in general is taking steps similar to The Netherlands'. America, though, has a different approach. “The U.S. is saying they can reduce livestock emissions while producing more food and they’re going to do it through technology and innovation.” 

Sounds like a more reasonable approach.

from Beef Central

Dutch farms 2

(cont'd from yesterday's posts)

Maybe the farmers are right, in a way, about being disrespected. You'd think that food producers would have a "say" in national discussions about food. But it looks like the decision to reduce food production and the size of farms is a done deal. It's moving ahead.

Food production does create pollutants. But does it follow that the solution is to cut off food production? Isn't that awfully drastic? No, the politicians are just fine with that. "The end result is expected to be close to a one-third reduction in the numbers of pigs, cows and chickens in the country.

One of them says, “We have to move away from the low-cost model of food production.” So his plan for his country is that food will become more expensive and less accessible. 

There must be a better way to solve this than to force food insecurity on the people.

from FEE

(cont'd tomorrow)

Dutch farms

Dutch farmers don't feel respected. But disrespect is not their main problem. They are actually being threatened by their government. 

High courts in The Netherlands handed down a judgment that the country was not making enough progress toward cutting CO2 emissions in the campaign against climate change. In response, the government is pressuring farmers to cut way back on their herds of livestock, maybe reducing their numbers up to 50%.

That's like telling any other business that they must stop producing or selling half of their products. It's a heavy blow to farm families, with potentially serious consequences. Farmers in 2019 started demanding respect for their businesses and organizing big protests, using equipment to block traffic and food distribution centers. 

You have to wonder what else the government considered beyond just CO2 emissions. The Netherlands is the second biggest exporter of agricultural products in the world after the U.S. What will happen to their economy? What will happen when the supply of meat to their own citizens is drastically cut?

"What will happen then?" It's the absolutely essential question in decision making.

from Wikipedia

(cont'd tomorrow)

AI will do it

Our education model in the U.S. is crumbling and changing (here, here, here). Another blow to the institution of public schools is taking place: students in significant numbers are having someone else do their homework and take their tests for them.

That someone is not a person. It's artificial intelligence, which can both write essays and pass exams for students who choose to cheat rather than earn a good grade by their merit.

Why is it a threat to the way we educate our kids? Because employers in the real world outside of school must get an accurate picture of what the applicant knows and can do without outside help from AI. 

Grades may become meaningless, if they aren't already. 

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from The College Fix

Fear of acting

A lot of wisdom is available at PragerU. In this video, some advice about how to handle certain fears. 

An irrational fear can hold us back from a fuller life. There's a strategy that can be used against irrational fears.

If

Shipping update

Follow-up to subject of this post

Shipping industry turmoil started in the pandemic (2020-2021). Costs soared to ship products (like furniture, electronics, etc.) from overseas. Ports were backed up with dozens of ships. A combination of increased demand and a lack of dock workers (covid-related) drove up shipping delays and costs.

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Here we are now in 2023, and those situations have largely corrected themselves. Conditions are now near normal pre-2020 levels . . and the cost of shipping those goods has also returned to near normal. But while costs are going down, demand is collapsing.

Orders for manufactured items from China is down a whopping 90%, while shipping companies have way too many ships and containers (20'x8' or bigger). There will be more losses for them because most shipping customers plan to decrease ocean freight spending in 2023.

We'll be coming out of the economic turmoil of pandemic lockdowns for some time yet. This turmoil will show up somewhere in our inflation problem.

from CNBC

Underperform 2

(cont'd from yesterday's blog)

So this governor supports parents. Last July he signed universal school choice into law. All families have the freedom to choose, and that portion of their taxes which would have passed to public school will now go to the school where their kids actually go.

It applies to every child of every economic class. Now no child is trapped in an under-performing government school because of the expense. Parents have the freedom to send their child to the school that will meet their needs.

According to the sponsor of the legislation, "“In Arizona, we fund students, not systems, because we know one size does not fit all students.”

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from Heartland Daily News

Underperform 1

Parents in large numbers are disappointed with their kids' schools, a big trend in the last couple of years. When they objected to school boards and administrators, they were often told that they had no right to object - that they must humbly submit to schools' decisions on what their kids would learn.

So there is a war being fought over who has the ultimate responsibility and authority in children's lives. Many parents refuse to hand over the right to protect their kids to the government.

At least they want to choose what school would give their kids the best education. In most places, they are legally free to choose a non-public school . . but they would have to pay all the fees while their taxes still fund that under-performing public school. The movement for "school choice" would re-direct the parents' taxes to the school their child attends.

Sometimes they're able to elect government officials who will help. It looks like that happened in the state of Arizona, where their governor says: "Fifty-plus years ago politicians stood in the schoolhouse door and wouldn’t let minorities in, today union-backed politicians stand in the schoolhouse door and won’t let minorities out. Many of our poor kids and children of color are trapped in a failing school. It’s time to set these families free."

from Discovery Institute

(cont'd tomorrow)