The NASA Mono Lake press release conference has heated up to a higher intensity. Here is follow up post this blogger contributed to The Daily Galaxy web site on December 13, 2010, that updates this blog's post of December 2, 2010.
Although I also feel NASA's Mono Lake research, per se, might be flawed in design, I believe NASA had a larger purpose for the press release conference: through suggestion and implication, I feel NASA has begun to prep the public to accept expanded definitions of life so to eventually introduce the public to their reality.
Also, the Mono Lake release seems to send some signals about NASA's internal positions on the "life problem" [at this time]. First, that DNA itself is robust, hence adaptive to many environments. Second, that NASA favors the DNA morphology as a venue of bioinformation. And third, that DNA is probably to be found throughout this solar system and perhaps beyond, although perhaps restricted to the "Goldilocks" zones of far systems (?).
Personally, I find it difficult to accept that DNA, in all its complexity, is a commonly occurring, and preferred, chemical structure found throughout the planets and solar systems. Why? Because it is hard to imagine that jiggling a planet-or-moon-sized boxful of many-ported Lego chemical blocks, mainly from the first 3 rows of the periodic table with some transition and higher elements thrown in, will generally produce the DNA morphology more often than many, many other possible chemical assemblages. (But, since I am not a computer which can easily generate and compare thermodynamic advantages of different complex morphologies, maybe DNA is a preferred structure! Who knows, maybe NASA?)
So, I feel NASA's implied emphasis on DNA is either naive or founded on specific evidence. But, as I don't feel NASA is naive, it is my expectation there will be more "releases" building up to hard evidence for extra-earth life based on DNA. The corollary to this evidence is that earth life is not spontaneous in origin but might equally have been seeded, since one could expect DNA to be also transported by passenger microbes on asteroids, meteorites, etc.. In this last respect, NASA seems to have been excited about the piggy-back transport scenario for a long time - just a thought.
Monday, December 13, 2010
Thursday, December 2, 2010
NASA's December 2, 2010, Web Conference on Astrobiology - Tantalizing, Wasn't It?
The December 2, 2010, NASA-TV streaming conference was for this blogger a kind of chilling experience in a Christmas morning sense ... but not for the science. I believe today's NASA panel, conducted in a familiar, entertaining, enthusiastic (and fetching) manner, was part of a public education seminar series that is designed to "prep" the general public for Disclosure -a Disclosure that "we" (NASA, global governments, leaders, military police at landing sites, ordinary citizens experiencing encounters, etc) have already experienced contact with ET and most probably that ET has been with us for a long time. This is a personal intuitive sense that the blogger does not equate to belief in, or declaring obeisance to, the popularized web and TV-based sensationalist (some say also "paranoid") voices. This blogger's personal belief is that ET is a real phenomenon and when publically "exposed" will very likely prove to be "mundane" (non-superpowered) in purpose, intelligence and general capabilities.
Scientifically, this blogger heard little news from what physical inorganic and organic chemists, and forward looking biologists and research physicians (and general forward-thinking citizens who are carpenters, plumbers, bookkeepers, etc) haven't already predicted or suspected for decades - the polling indicates that well over 50% of Americans believe in or accept the possibility of ET. Certainly, there have been many less mind-chained technologists, and lay persons, writing science fiction over the last century who have been visualizing life formsw based on non-water and non-phosphorous homologs. Michael Crichton's books are notable examples.
Almost 40 years ago, ths blogger personally developed and taught an advanced course in non-water based chemistry and electrochemistry, with biological implications and applications such as biosensors and replacement of carbon with other, homologous, elements. The most popular near-water model for HOMOLOGOUS chemical systems was even then believed to be based on Arsenic and its close neighbors in the periodic table (e.g., Germanium, Silicon, etc). The point being made is there are a host of elements just as likely as Arsenic to show up in exotic life systems.
So what else sent shivers thru this brain? It was the coincidence-that-is-non-coincidental timing of a clean and simple, public panel being held on this particular subject, exotic life chemistry, at this time of near-critical-mass-point of ufo sightings along with an increasing rate of "disclosures" by military guards, government officials, statesmen, nurses, and just ordinary citizens from all parts of the globe who are now telling, near the end of their time on this orb their stories about past and current ET encounters. These encounters number in the thousands - and even tens of thousands if one also includes alleged events in the abduction arena.(And notice how presentable, entertaining and down-to-earth the panelists conducted themselves while disclosing some striking implications.)
I expect there will be one or two more publically televised "education" events before the "good" news is let out that ET, our bio-chemical brothers, exist. Even the Vatican has moved to anticipate that eventuality with its announcement in 2008 that the good Patria feel it is "OK" for Catholics to believe in ET because they are our "brothers" though perhaps being different in their lack of original sin (a stateement with profound implications and whose exact meaning is still to be explained). But how our new family thinks, spiritualizes, behaves,now it's ethos is structured, etc. is another question. However, one imagines that if ET has revealed themselves, and we are still alive and the globe is not in ashes, then ET is not a threat from the perspective of our programmed, instinctive, naked-ape attack-or-flee reaction base. There might of course be bio-hazard dangers (and we have also heard in the more expansive (speculative?)ufo-ET network about quarantine sites for ET's in various areas of the US and elsewhere (Dulce, New Mexico, etc).
How ET might smell to us, how and what ET eats for energy (certainly not eating us, but think of ET as terrifically strong radishes, hmm), eliminates as waste (our earth's deep ocean, super hot thermal vents have led to the evolution/adaptation, of life to live on a sulfur-based biochemistry where thir waste products are allomorphs of pure sulfur), and what ET drinks are questions whose answers are delightfully up for grabs and yet to be answered. However, these points bring up articles in the speculative UFO web world that have presented alleged personal accounts of ET encounters and "weird" or unsettling smells and "awareness" that evince sometimes severe psychological stress - which are expected reactions from our human biology base.
For instance, Arsenic-based chemistry, though perhaps "operating" along similar (homologous) chemical paths as phosphate systems, most likely leads to metabolic wastes that incorporates Arsenic hydrides which tend to smell strongly of a garlic essence instead of the familiar rotten egg smell of human waste. Or think of Arseno-proteinaceous breakdown sludge instead of human-like coproplytes, or and think of really bad breath, perspiration, etc.
The ufo-ET web network has long reported first hand witness "accounts" (claims?) of the very terrifying effect of just the smell of ET - an immediate recognition by the human brain smell centers that the wafting odors don't fit into our 3-D stereo-configured smell receptacles which are evolved to accept and recognize not only differently shaped molecules but those within specific ranges of elecro-charge-density, etc. (Human sensing organs are very comprehensive and sensitive instrument arrays especially when combined with such our complex, "intuitive" central computing center, the human brain.)
The Nasa panel today, also very nicely explained, in an easily understood show and tell manner, that we humans are not biologically unique. Further, the NASA panelists implied that in the vast, chemically complex universe we should not be surpised to meet "life forms" (at least chemical-based life) that are sentient and perhaps more advanced than us: this technically trained blogger believes Life is a term that deserves deeper analyses than has been done at present and has broader meaning than our usually understood bio-organic definition ... and conceivably might occur as non-physical formats.
I believe, further, that NASA has more cards hidden in their hand but are waiting for the right near-time to show them ... now that the public, through the mainstream media (CNN, MSNBC, Fox, etc) is being educated to wider and higher expectations.
Scientifically, this blogger heard little news from what physical inorganic and organic chemists, and forward looking biologists and research physicians (and general forward-thinking citizens who are carpenters, plumbers, bookkeepers, etc) haven't already predicted or suspected for decades - the polling indicates that well over 50% of Americans believe in or accept the possibility of ET. Certainly, there have been many less mind-chained technologists, and lay persons, writing science fiction over the last century who have been visualizing life formsw based on non-water and non-phosphorous homologs. Michael Crichton's books are notable examples.
Almost 40 years ago, ths blogger personally developed and taught an advanced course in non-water based chemistry and electrochemistry, with biological implications and applications such as biosensors and replacement of carbon with other, homologous, elements. The most popular near-water model for HOMOLOGOUS chemical systems was even then believed to be based on Arsenic and its close neighbors in the periodic table (e.g., Germanium, Silicon, etc). The point being made is there are a host of elements just as likely as Arsenic to show up in exotic life systems.
So what else sent shivers thru this brain? It was the coincidence-that-is-non-coincidental timing of a clean and simple, public panel being held on this particular subject, exotic life chemistry, at this time of near-critical-mass-point of ufo sightings along with an increasing rate of "disclosures" by military guards, government officials, statesmen, nurses, and just ordinary citizens from all parts of the globe who are now telling, near the end of their time on this orb their stories about past and current ET encounters. These encounters number in the thousands - and even tens of thousands if one also includes alleged events in the abduction arena.(And notice how presentable, entertaining and down-to-earth the panelists conducted themselves while disclosing some striking implications.)
I expect there will be one or two more publically televised "education" events before the "good" news is let out that ET, our bio-chemical brothers, exist. Even the Vatican has moved to anticipate that eventuality with its announcement in 2008 that the good Patria feel it is "OK" for Catholics to believe in ET because they are our "brothers" though perhaps being different in their lack of original sin (a stateement with profound implications and whose exact meaning is still to be explained). But how our new family thinks, spiritualizes, behaves,now it's ethos is structured, etc. is another question. However, one imagines that if ET has revealed themselves, and we are still alive and the globe is not in ashes, then ET is not a threat from the perspective of our programmed, instinctive, naked-ape attack-or-flee reaction base. There might of course be bio-hazard dangers (and we have also heard in the more expansive (speculative?)ufo-ET network about quarantine sites for ET's in various areas of the US and elsewhere (Dulce, New Mexico, etc).
How ET might smell to us, how and what ET eats for energy (certainly not eating us, but think of ET as terrifically strong radishes, hmm), eliminates as waste (our earth's deep ocean, super hot thermal vents have led to the evolution/adaptation, of life to live on a sulfur-based biochemistry where thir waste products are allomorphs of pure sulfur), and what ET drinks are questions whose answers are delightfully up for grabs and yet to be answered. However, these points bring up articles in the speculative UFO web world that have presented alleged personal accounts of ET encounters and "weird" or unsettling smells and "awareness" that evince sometimes severe psychological stress - which are expected reactions from our human biology base.
For instance, Arsenic-based chemistry, though perhaps "operating" along similar (homologous) chemical paths as phosphate systems, most likely leads to metabolic wastes that incorporates Arsenic hydrides which tend to smell strongly of a garlic essence instead of the familiar rotten egg smell of human waste. Or think of Arseno-proteinaceous breakdown sludge instead of human-like coproplytes, or and think of really bad breath, perspiration, etc.
The ufo-ET web network has long reported first hand witness "accounts" (claims?) of the very terrifying effect of just the smell of ET - an immediate recognition by the human brain smell centers that the wafting odors don't fit into our 3-D stereo-configured smell receptacles which are evolved to accept and recognize not only differently shaped molecules but those within specific ranges of elecro-charge-density, etc. (Human sensing organs are very comprehensive and sensitive instrument arrays especially when combined with such our complex, "intuitive" central computing center, the human brain.)
The Nasa panel today, also very nicely explained, in an easily understood show and tell manner, that we humans are not biologically unique. Further, the NASA panelists implied that in the vast, chemically complex universe we should not be surpised to meet "life forms" (at least chemical-based life) that are sentient and perhaps more advanced than us: this technically trained blogger believes Life is a term that deserves deeper analyses than has been done at present and has broader meaning than our usually understood bio-organic definition ... and conceivably might occur as non-physical formats.
I believe, further, that NASA has more cards hidden in their hand but are waiting for the right near-time to show them ... now that the public, through the mainstream media (CNN, MSNBC, Fox, etc) is being educated to wider and higher expectations.
Saturday, July 17, 2010
America's Failures in Foreign Policy: The Role of Our Virtual Culture
Is America failing itself by being unable to develop complex models for our foreign policy objectives and behavior? It appears so, given the great similarities in how we attempted change, but failed, in Vietnam and Iraaq, and now again, it seems,in Afghanistan.
This blogger proposes the fault for our failure to achieve foreign policy success in these past cases, and future failures unless we change something, derives from the virtual, reduced-in-complexity, plots and worlds of America's pop culture which provides us with the models that shape our mental vision of the world and pre-selects the methods we repeatedly and ineffectually, use to intervene abroad and pursue our global interests.
As for our American culture and how it influences our foreign policy, Americans seem to be perpetually stuck with our heads in TV virtual (and incomplete) worlds written to provide immediate gratification for audiences and commercial sponsors. We then "grow up" (and not necessarily mature)trying to make foreign peoples, cultures and problems conform to some familiar, simplistic Hollywood script. The problem is our elected officials, in order to gain admission to office, have to play to the cultural electorate who have been reared on this stuff.
Richard Haass, Newsweek correspondent, writes about the need for America to reformulate it's mission, tactics and objectives in Afghanistan. A segment of his article was preleased in a Huffington Post article by Nicholas Graham,
"Richard Haass In Newsweek: Rethink Afghanistan Because Nation Building Is Not Working And We're Not Winning ":
Has America, because of its perpetually adolescent, immediate-gratification, short-term attention span, TV culture, become unable to think log term or subtly?
Are we stuck in a foreign policy point of view that de-emphasizes a real-world pursuit of complex policy objectives and instead focuses on promoting more easily (to Americans) understood, titillating gadgetry, TV-video-game features that usually consist of fancy or quasi-speculative "war toys", viz. Drone UAV's (unmanned aerial vehicles), huge main battle tanks, fancy anti-personnel weapons of all sorts, exotic framed B-2 flying wing bombers ala some "Terry and the Pirates Face Lost Nazis" film, and so on?
All the above suspicions seem to hold water. Our foreign policy, our economics, our energy "planning" - all lack a mature and steady, long term approach. We will continue to make this mistake while our culture remains overwhelmed by virtual foes, unreal weaponry and heroism, and of course while we still have deep bench money make man-sized versions of our cultural fantasies.
This blogger proposes the fault for our failure to achieve foreign policy success in these past cases, and future failures unless we change something, derives from the virtual, reduced-in-complexity, plots and worlds of America's pop culture which provides us with the models that shape our mental vision of the world and pre-selects the methods we repeatedly and ineffectually, use to intervene abroad and pursue our global interests.
As for our American culture and how it influences our foreign policy, Americans seem to be perpetually stuck with our heads in TV virtual (and incomplete) worlds written to provide immediate gratification for audiences and commercial sponsors. We then "grow up" (and not necessarily mature)trying to make foreign peoples, cultures and problems conform to some familiar, simplistic Hollywood script. The problem is our elected officials, in order to gain admission to office, have to play to the cultural electorate who have been reared on this stuff.
Richard Haass, Newsweek correspondent, writes about the need for America to reformulate it's mission, tactics and objectives in Afghanistan. A segment of his article was preleased in a Huffington Post article by Nicholas Graham,
"Richard Haass In Newsweek: Rethink Afghanistan Because Nation Building Is Not Working And We're Not Winning ":
Haass:We americans always seem to carry with us, around the world, a false, video game, bad guys-good guys interpretation of conflict and disagreement whereby we insist on forcing any foreign "issue" into a format looking like a 40 minute TV drama, full of blood and guts and ending in a simplistic "win" and a kiss, and "losers" who are usually blown up or at least killed off in some entertaining way. Have Americans lost our sense of reality? Is it always necessary to "win" in easily perceived terms? What about more subtle foreign policy successes?
"After nearly nine years of war, however, continued or increased U.S. involvement in Afghanistan isn't likely to yield lasting improvements that would be commensurate in any way with the investment of American blood and treasure. It is time to scale down our ambitions there and both reduce and redirect what we do. ... The war the United States is now fighting in Afghanistan is not succeeding and is not worth waging in this way. The time has come to scale back U.S. objectives and sharply reduce U.S. involvement on the ground. Afghanistan is claiming too many American lives, requiring too much attention, and absorbing too many resources. The sooner we accept that Afghanistan is less a problem to be fixed than a situation to be managed, the better."
Has America, because of its perpetually adolescent, immediate-gratification, short-term attention span, TV culture, become unable to think log term or subtly?
Are we stuck in a foreign policy point of view that de-emphasizes a real-world pursuit of complex policy objectives and instead focuses on promoting more easily (to Americans) understood, titillating gadgetry, TV-video-game features that usually consist of fancy or quasi-speculative "war toys", viz. Drone UAV's (unmanned aerial vehicles), huge main battle tanks, fancy anti-personnel weapons of all sorts, exotic framed B-2 flying wing bombers ala some "Terry and the Pirates Face Lost Nazis" film, and so on?
All the above suspicions seem to hold water. Our foreign policy, our economics, our energy "planning" - all lack a mature and steady, long term approach. We will continue to make this mistake while our culture remains overwhelmed by virtual foes, unreal weaponry and heroism, and of course while we still have deep bench money make man-sized versions of our cultural fantasies.
Friday, July 9, 2010
The BP-Deepwater Oil Spill: A Rationale for International Coordination of Resources
The April 20, 2010, BP-Deepwater oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico appears to have consequences that extend beyond the shores adjacent to the failed drill rig, and have impact on the national and global scale. This regulatory-ecological-resource extraction-adverse event raises issues this blogger attempts to address concerning: (1) corporate powers and autonomy, (2) resource planning, (3) corporation-government-public liasing, (4) local, national and international resource planning, risk assessment and approvals for resource extraction, and (5) possible structures of coordinating organizations.
The Deepwater Gulf oil spill has raised the above issues plus questions about corporate power and autonomy, corporate self-regulation and the future of relations (conflicts) between corporate and public interests.
Some related questions:
(1) As we now know from the BP-Deepwater disaster, future resource-extraction adverse events may well involve damages that exceed the ability of just one corporation to pay. Is there a need for accountable industry collectives fund, identify resource locations, plan extraction and cover liabilities?
(2) What about damages that extend beyond just monetary compensation, i.e global scale damage to the environment, economies and populations? How can this case be covered and what organizational formats, policies and protections might be required? When is a resource plan appropriately denied because of these dangers? Wand who shall make this decision?
(2) Are these corporate-activity adverse events expected to get worse? Can they be prevented? What kind of organizational structures can serve to answer these questions?
The Deepwater Gulf oil spill raises significant issues, accusations, doubts and questions about corporate power and autonomy, corporate self-regulation and the future of relations (conflicts) between corporate and public interests. Yet these issues must be successfully met if humans are not to sanitize, sterilize and kill the planet's life and habitability.
At the time of this blog, estimates are from 100 million to 150 million gallons of crude have been released into the Gulf of Mexico. Being driven by Gulf currents, the oil spill is expected to inundate the beaches of US Gulf shore states. As of July 7, 2010, all 5 Gulf states are receiving tar balls on their shores - Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, Missouri. If the spill is not stopped, it is expected to eventually drift South along the Florida coast and then up the eastern seaboard of the United States. If still not stopped, the spill is expected to eventually impact Greenland, Iceland and northern Europe. Where ever the oil impacts, it will damage or destroy sea life, estuaries, wetlands and beaches. Regional economies may be decimated and populations might have to be relocated owing to the toxic nature of the oil components (benzene and similar hydrocarbons), the accompanying methane gas, the chemical dispersants used to break up the balls of crude oil, and even perhaps the radioactive nature of deep-origin crude oil itself.
But apart from "fault" or "how", there are perhaps larger issues generated by some simple "why's": why did deep water oil drilling occurr in the first place, and in general "why" does it appear there is trend towards inceasingly risky methods and scenarios linked with the search for scarcer and scarcer oil and other resources required by our national and global economies?
These "issues" lead to further questions that focus on the national and global scale and even give reason for changing the way nations and corporations relate to each other, and suggest organizational structures that might implement these relationships.
-have we reached a critical thresh hold in the (convenient) availability of raw materials required by national economies? (Are raw materials becoming more scarce and hence more difficult to extract from the planet? Are there increasing dangers of nation-to-nation conflict over depleting and/or more extraction-difficult resources?)
-Beyond the critical thresh hold of difficulty of extraction, are we seeing as with the BP-Deepwater oil spill a tremendously expanded potential for tangible (cost valuated)damage? In retrospect, did the original cap on BP's liability, $75 million (just 1.3% of BP's 2010 first quarter profits, $5.6 Billion), even approach a reasonable liability considering the global damage now projected?
-Are we seeing damages from careless, or even careful...it does not really matter anymore, business activities so huge they are beyond what one corporation or even an industry sector operating collectively can pay? (BP now has agreed to estblish a $20 BILLION catastrophe fund to cover lost wages, health problems, etc. resulting from the released oil.)
-More, are we now experiencing a thresh hold of business activity damages beyond which lie immense and terrible intangible consequences that are beyond compensatory (money) valuation, i.e. damages to global stability and habitability either not recoverable in a time frame we humans are comfortable with, or not recoverable at all. (The Gulf may be oxygen-stripped (lifeless) in part or whole for decades.)
- Has the scale of tangible and intangible damages resulting from business activities expanded beyond even what a single nation or even a group of nations can cope with as damages and required efforts to recover, or adjust, extend beyond national boundaries to involve the entire globe?
As corollary questions:
-have we reached, and rapidly going beyond, a critical, national and global population threshhold?
-are national governments and even industry sector collectives sufficient structures to effectively protect humanity from its business life?
There are conclusions and suggestions relative to the future of making use of the planet's resources - an evaluation and review process for the use and extraction of the planets resources:
- Organization of industry into related sectors who develop resource proposals, or long term plans, starting at the level of individual corporations, and with cooperation with national resource agencies, and eventually with an international strategic global resource planning and coordinating council.
- National resource management agencies who coordinate with local businesses, industry sectors, and evetually an international (global)combined resource planning and coordinating council.
-International Resource Management Council responsible for review and approval of resource plans and proposals from nations and industry sectors. Members of the Council represent industry sectors, nations and independents(non-profit ecological impact study associations, natural resource and animal preservation groups, etc.)
- a top level global coordinating body (evolved United Nations, etc.) whose jurisdiction might extend off-planet to monitor, codify and effect outer space leasing of planetary and asteroid territories and the extraction of their resources.
This blogger believes all of these structures will come into being sooner than later because the problems and damages with other Deepwater-like activities are looming right now and if they occur will add even more terrible and geographically widespread damages and threats to human life and the planet's habitability.
The Deepwater Gulf oil spill has raised the above issues plus questions about corporate power and autonomy, corporate self-regulation and the future of relations (conflicts) between corporate and public interests.
Some related questions:
(1) As we now know from the BP-Deepwater disaster, future resource-extraction adverse events may well involve damages that exceed the ability of just one corporation to pay. Is there a need for accountable industry collectives fund, identify resource locations, plan extraction and cover liabilities?
(2) What about damages that extend beyond just monetary compensation, i.e global scale damage to the environment, economies and populations? How can this case be covered and what organizational formats, policies and protections might be required? When is a resource plan appropriately denied because of these dangers? Wand who shall make this decision?
(2) Are these corporate-activity adverse events expected to get worse? Can they be prevented? What kind of organizational structures can serve to answer these questions?
The Deepwater Gulf oil spill raises significant issues, accusations, doubts and questions about corporate power and autonomy, corporate self-regulation and the future of relations (conflicts) between corporate and public interests. Yet these issues must be successfully met if humans are not to sanitize, sterilize and kill the planet's life and habitability.
At the time of this blog, estimates are from 100 million to 150 million gallons of crude have been released into the Gulf of Mexico. Being driven by Gulf currents, the oil spill is expected to inundate the beaches of US Gulf shore states. As of July 7, 2010, all 5 Gulf states are receiving tar balls on their shores - Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, Missouri. If the spill is not stopped, it is expected to eventually drift South along the Florida coast and then up the eastern seaboard of the United States. If still not stopped, the spill is expected to eventually impact Greenland, Iceland and northern Europe. Where ever the oil impacts, it will damage or destroy sea life, estuaries, wetlands and beaches. Regional economies may be decimated and populations might have to be relocated owing to the toxic nature of the oil components (benzene and similar hydrocarbons), the accompanying methane gas, the chemical dispersants used to break up the balls of crude oil, and even perhaps the radioactive nature of deep-origin crude oil itself.
But apart from "fault" or "how", there are perhaps larger issues generated by some simple "why's": why did deep water oil drilling occurr in the first place, and in general "why" does it appear there is trend towards inceasingly risky methods and scenarios linked with the search for scarcer and scarcer oil and other resources required by our national and global economies?
These "issues" lead to further questions that focus on the national and global scale and even give reason for changing the way nations and corporations relate to each other, and suggest organizational structures that might implement these relationships.
-have we reached a critical thresh hold in the (convenient) availability of raw materials required by national economies? (Are raw materials becoming more scarce and hence more difficult to extract from the planet? Are there increasing dangers of nation-to-nation conflict over depleting and/or more extraction-difficult resources?)
-Beyond the critical thresh hold of difficulty of extraction, are we seeing as with the BP-Deepwater oil spill a tremendously expanded potential for tangible (cost valuated)damage? In retrospect, did the original cap on BP's liability, $75 million (just 1.3% of BP's 2010 first quarter profits, $5.6 Billion), even approach a reasonable liability considering the global damage now projected?
-Are we seeing damages from careless, or even careful...it does not really matter anymore, business activities so huge they are beyond what one corporation or even an industry sector operating collectively can pay? (BP now has agreed to estblish a $20 BILLION catastrophe fund to cover lost wages, health problems, etc. resulting from the released oil.)
-More, are we now experiencing a thresh hold of business activity damages beyond which lie immense and terrible intangible consequences that are beyond compensatory (money) valuation, i.e. damages to global stability and habitability either not recoverable in a time frame we humans are comfortable with, or not recoverable at all. (The Gulf may be oxygen-stripped (lifeless) in part or whole for decades.)
- Has the scale of tangible and intangible damages resulting from business activities expanded beyond even what a single nation or even a group of nations can cope with as damages and required efforts to recover, or adjust, extend beyond national boundaries to involve the entire globe?
As corollary questions:
-have we reached, and rapidly going beyond, a critical, national and global population threshhold?
-are national governments and even industry sector collectives sufficient structures to effectively protect humanity from its business life?
There are conclusions and suggestions relative to the future of making use of the planet's resources - an evaluation and review process for the use and extraction of the planets resources:
- Organization of industry into related sectors who develop resource proposals, or long term plans, starting at the level of individual corporations, and with cooperation with national resource agencies, and eventually with an international strategic global resource planning and coordinating council.
- National resource management agencies who coordinate with local businesses, industry sectors, and evetually an international (global)combined resource planning and coordinating council.
-International Resource Management Council responsible for review and approval of resource plans and proposals from nations and industry sectors. Members of the Council represent industry sectors, nations and independents(non-profit ecological impact study associations, natural resource and animal preservation groups, etc.)
- a top level global coordinating body (evolved United Nations, etc.) whose jurisdiction might extend off-planet to monitor, codify and effect outer space leasing of planetary and asteroid territories and the extraction of their resources.
This blogger believes all of these structures will come into being sooner than later because the problems and damages with other Deepwater-like activities are looming right now and if they occur will add even more terrible and geographically widespread damages and threats to human life and the planet's habitability.
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
MBA Follies: The Gulf Oil Spill: BP's Corporate Decision Making and Accountability, Human Culpability and Dereliction, And the Fallacy of Self- Regulation
The April 20, 2010, British Petroleum-Trans Ocean oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, only 40 miles offshore from Louisiana, has the potential to devastate the economies and sea life of the Gulf shore states and perhaps even impact the eastern United States and eventually Europe. The question of how the spill occurred, or who might be at fault has not yet been determined although there are indications that BP's, or the leasing company Trans Oceanic's, corporate cost-benefit decision making (risk analysis) at the least was a contributing factor that resulted in less expensive, hence weaker, equipment being in place when drilling penetrated a highly pressurized and highly explosive pocket of crude oil-methane gas at almost 20 thousand feet below sea level (15 thousand feet below sea bed).
The pricipal issue of this blog:
Has corporate decision-making wrecked the Gulf region and made it unlivable long term? (As of July 7, 2010, all 5 Gulf states are receiving tar balls on their shores.)
This blogger finds the BP Gulf Oil crisis (it has to be now called a crisis) a fascinating though tragic and sad consequence of a fallacious regulatory philosophy being taught/impplied in some business schools and a tenet of some eco-political thinking - that the best judge and monitorship of business activities are businesses themselves. This blogger's experience in a mid-career executive program at a leading business school was eye opening when he heard this proposed. And, admittedly as the cadence of this credo flowed smoothly across the lecture hall, "self-regulation" of business by business seemed to have an appeal
Corporate accountability, responsibility and “ethics” were presented to the blogger in a bottom line context that appeared to the blogger to be very different from human definitions and in many cases antagonistic to human interests and safety. That experience has stuck in this blogger's mind and has led the blogger to feel corporate America is far off-base in its perception of its social obligations to America and to the local communities where corporations operate. At the root of the matter, this blogger has come to several conclusions about the potential danger of attributing human qualities, and rights to corporations, in contradiction to the appparent current Supreme Court's perspective.
If one thinks about it for only a bit even, the lack of an ethics in the corporate world as humans understand ethics should not be a surprise - a corporation’s existence does not depend on the same essentials as required by humans, even though a corporation is a collection of humans. The corporation has its own set of existential priorities which are different from a human’s: a corporation does not breathe air, consume food, drink water, require houses, schools, etc. …in the normal sense. Corporations are uni-focused on the "bottom line", i.e. profitability, which is whether short or long term is the final measure and assurance of corporate success. Although, it can be argued, a corporation can certainly benefit from the infrastructures humans are motivated to create for themselves such as schools, shopping malls, roads, ports, and more.
Therefore, it is logical that cities, towns and governments tax corporations for using human infrastructures. And it should be logical that humans be constantly on guard against unthinking (rather, uni-focused)corporate damage to these essential human life-constructs, much like having a bear in your living room. Don't blame the bear, blame the person who foolishly believed the bear was deprived of watching the world series on the new flat screen tv.
Corporations do not have human ethical considerations. And this is very confusing to humans (including, this blogger believes, the US Supreme Court). For human safety and well being, this blogger believes corporations should be kept on a tight leash because corporate decision-making involves a different set of life-suppport factors as mentioned above. Thus in the case of oil-shale extraction, the close-focus of energy companies on potential over-use of precious water for steam extraction does not bear consideration from the corporation because once water is depleted, operations can be moved elsewhere, leaving a waterless (or polluted), bare region of gaping strip mines, or canals can be built(singled mindedly for minimum expense) to bring in water from, and hence deplete, other regions.
Likewise, and to the point, the analytical risk decision of Deepwater Horizon to save on drilling expenses by using less expensive (“cheaper” to us humans) safety shut-off equipment was a proper decision in a corpporate context which, if nothing negative had happend, would have meant additional corporate profits and substantial bonuses for human staff members in the decision and appproval chain. Besides, this decision was cemented by a successful corporate strategy concerning relations with Congress (campaign donations) that had resulted in a absurdly low liability cap of only $75 million, a little more than 1%% of BP's 2010 1st quarter profits of $5.6 Billion...and likely a very smaller fraction of BP pre-spill, reserve account. (Note: BP unfortunately but rightly, in the corporate strategy context, will not dip into its pre-spill reserve account but will penalize the dividend account so stock holders will suffer while the corporate body will not be affected. If BP staff are found to be negligent or acted flagrantly will there be stock holder law suits?)
The lesson learned from just these two examples and especially from the most recent oil spill in the Gulf region, is the following set of warnings:
- humans must not expect corporations to have/share human emotions, or needs.
- corporations have different needs than humans, or rather, corporations
do not breathe, eat, drink...as humans do.
- corporations need to be watched and regulated by independent (unbiased) parties on behalf of human safety.
- corporations should never be permitted to “self-regulate” (a ridiculous, non-term in the regulatory world).
The "ABC's" of institutional regulation posit that assured compliance with rules and guidleines to safe business activity is monitoring by independent agents. This is not a belief that business, or any other institution so monitored, has something inherently evil or untrustworthy about them, but only a requirement that goes hand in hand with the belief that regulation's first priority is "prevention" and NOT punishment.
Punishment focuses on the "after" something bad has happened. What is better than that the "Bad" never happened?! This is the rationale for giving priority to preventive regulatory laws guidelines and monitoring.
As an aside, business schools now have impetus to expand their curricula in the management sector by adding coursework on advanced regulatory techniques and decision-making. Techniques such as Morphological Analyses (Fritz Zwicky, Cal tech astrophysicist, 1967) will permit corporate executives to lay out (matrix sheet) and identify the key regulatory-risk factors that affect cost and liability.
But back to BP and Deepwater, regulatory-wise there was no failure of the regulatory system. Rather, human policy makers (Congress)insanely gave over their proper regulatory command and responsibilities to the regulated party, the corporate oil interests. It's just that Congress forgot, or never took the time to realize, or were easily convinced by corporate donations, that corporate needs and decison factors intrinsically compete with regulatory principles which basically exist to protect human safety. In this context there is no more misapplied concept than "self-regulation" which this blogger believes to be one of the most dangerous and fallacious tenets of some "conservative" and pro-business, business schools.
The real cost of of the BP Gulf oil "spill", or fiasco, will far outweigh the dollar value of cleanup because in the human world there are dollar costs and then there are intangible costs of traditions and lifestyle (loss of quality of life).
From a corporate viewpoint, it might not be even worthwhile to spend money attempting to stop and clean up the present damage as these efforts might have to go on forever.
The real question is whether, owing to by-the-book corporate decision-making based on cost-expense-profit considerations, a terrible and perhaps irreversible Pandora's Box has been opened on the Gulf environment and sea product industry. The Gulf region might come to be "sanitized, sterilized, uninhabitable, eliminated" ... for a long, long time.
The pricipal issue of this blog:
Has corporate decision-making wrecked the Gulf region and made it unlivable long term? (As of July 7, 2010, all 5 Gulf states are receiving tar balls on their shores.)
This blogger finds the BP Gulf Oil crisis (it has to be now called a crisis) a fascinating though tragic and sad consequence of a fallacious regulatory philosophy being taught/impplied in some business schools and a tenet of some eco-political thinking - that the best judge and monitorship of business activities are businesses themselves. This blogger's experience in a mid-career executive program at a leading business school was eye opening when he heard this proposed. And, admittedly as the cadence of this credo flowed smoothly across the lecture hall, "self-regulation" of business by business seemed to have an appeal
Corporate accountability, responsibility and “ethics” were presented to the blogger in a bottom line context that appeared to the blogger to be very different from human definitions and in many cases antagonistic to human interests and safety. That experience has stuck in this blogger's mind and has led the blogger to feel corporate America is far off-base in its perception of its social obligations to America and to the local communities where corporations operate. At the root of the matter, this blogger has come to several conclusions about the potential danger of attributing human qualities, and rights to corporations, in contradiction to the appparent current Supreme Court's perspective.
If one thinks about it for only a bit even, the lack of an ethics in the corporate world as humans understand ethics should not be a surprise - a corporation’s existence does not depend on the same essentials as required by humans, even though a corporation is a collection of humans. The corporation has its own set of existential priorities which are different from a human’s: a corporation does not breathe air, consume food, drink water, require houses, schools, etc. …in the normal sense. Corporations are uni-focused on the "bottom line", i.e. profitability, which is whether short or long term is the final measure and assurance of corporate success. Although, it can be argued, a corporation can certainly benefit from the infrastructures humans are motivated to create for themselves such as schools, shopping malls, roads, ports, and more.
Therefore, it is logical that cities, towns and governments tax corporations for using human infrastructures. And it should be logical that humans be constantly on guard against unthinking (rather, uni-focused)corporate damage to these essential human life-constructs, much like having a bear in your living room. Don't blame the bear, blame the person who foolishly believed the bear was deprived of watching the world series on the new flat screen tv.
Corporations do not have human ethical considerations. And this is very confusing to humans (including, this blogger believes, the US Supreme Court). For human safety and well being, this blogger believes corporations should be kept on a tight leash because corporate decision-making involves a different set of life-suppport factors as mentioned above. Thus in the case of oil-shale extraction, the close-focus of energy companies on potential over-use of precious water for steam extraction does not bear consideration from the corporation because once water is depleted, operations can be moved elsewhere, leaving a waterless (or polluted), bare region of gaping strip mines, or canals can be built(singled mindedly for minimum expense) to bring in water from, and hence deplete, other regions.
Likewise, and to the point, the analytical risk decision of Deepwater Horizon to save on drilling expenses by using less expensive (“cheaper” to us humans) safety shut-off equipment was a proper decision in a corpporate context which, if nothing negative had happend, would have meant additional corporate profits and substantial bonuses for human staff members in the decision and appproval chain. Besides, this decision was cemented by a successful corporate strategy concerning relations with Congress (campaign donations) that had resulted in a absurdly low liability cap of only $75 million, a little more than 1%% of BP's 2010 1st quarter profits of $5.6 Billion...and likely a very smaller fraction of BP pre-spill, reserve account. (Note: BP unfortunately but rightly, in the corporate strategy context, will not dip into its pre-spill reserve account but will penalize the dividend account so stock holders will suffer while the corporate body will not be affected. If BP staff are found to be negligent or acted flagrantly will there be stock holder law suits?)
The lesson learned from just these two examples and especially from the most recent oil spill in the Gulf region, is the following set of warnings:
- humans must not expect corporations to have/share human emotions, or needs.
- corporations have different needs than humans, or rather, corporations
do not breathe, eat, drink...as humans do.
- corporations need to be watched and regulated by independent (unbiased) parties on behalf of human safety.
- corporations should never be permitted to “self-regulate” (a ridiculous, non-term in the regulatory world).
The "ABC's" of institutional regulation posit that assured compliance with rules and guidleines to safe business activity is monitoring by independent agents. This is not a belief that business, or any other institution so monitored, has something inherently evil or untrustworthy about them, but only a requirement that goes hand in hand with the belief that regulation's first priority is "prevention" and NOT punishment.
Punishment focuses on the "after" something bad has happened. What is better than that the "Bad" never happened?! This is the rationale for giving priority to preventive regulatory laws guidelines and monitoring.
As an aside, business schools now have impetus to expand their curricula in the management sector by adding coursework on advanced regulatory techniques and decision-making. Techniques such as Morphological Analyses (Fritz Zwicky, Cal tech astrophysicist, 1967) will permit corporate executives to lay out (matrix sheet) and identify the key regulatory-risk factors that affect cost and liability.
But back to BP and Deepwater, regulatory-wise there was no failure of the regulatory system. Rather, human policy makers (Congress)insanely gave over their proper regulatory command and responsibilities to the regulated party, the corporate oil interests. It's just that Congress forgot, or never took the time to realize, or were easily convinced by corporate donations, that corporate needs and decison factors intrinsically compete with regulatory principles which basically exist to protect human safety. In this context there is no more misapplied concept than "self-regulation" which this blogger believes to be one of the most dangerous and fallacious tenets of some "conservative" and pro-business, business schools.
The real cost of of the BP Gulf oil "spill", or fiasco, will far outweigh the dollar value of cleanup because in the human world there are dollar costs and then there are intangible costs of traditions and lifestyle (loss of quality of life).
From a corporate viewpoint, it might not be even worthwhile to spend money attempting to stop and clean up the present damage as these efforts might have to go on forever.
The real question is whether, owing to by-the-book corporate decision-making based on cost-expense-profit considerations, a terrible and perhaps irreversible Pandora's Box has been opened on the Gulf environment and sea product industry. The Gulf region might come to be "sanitized, sterilized, uninhabitable, eliminated" ... for a long, long time.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
MBA Follies : The Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Corporate Environmental Ethics
Of course the quick and dirty summary on corporate environmental responsibility is there is no reason a corporation should waste a minute of its time on the environment since that is the responsibility of government and the public (cities, towns, states, etc). Corporations operate on the principles of profitability and on the separation of function/roles between corporation and government. This means the corporation is soley concerned with making use of the environment hence generating profits, taxes (lessened by clever use of loop holes)and jobs. This is the foundation of good business and America should wake up to this. This is not to demonize business, but to say that the public, by its ignorance or preferences or laziness, shares responsibility for whatever evils corporate behavior generates.
That a corporation might ruin an environment or deplete a non-renewable resource is not its responsibility...although any reasoned person would quickly point out that a depleted resource automatically equates to an end of corporate profitability sooner or later so corporations should pay attention to these matters. But, a corporation is focused on near-term bottom line profits so any consequence further out in time than 90 days or 6 months, and usually just 30 days, is not a primary concern relative to the pressures of "now", at least in America's business world.
A sigificant case illustrating the nearsightedness of corporate attention (British Petroleum and its subcontractors, including Halliburton) has to be the huge oil spill about to swamp the coasts of the southern U.S.. Apparently, BP decided not to install full drilling safeguards against blowout and explosions. What is certain though, is BP lobbied hard along with other oil companies for the relaxation of regulatory requirements that many believe would have prevented this accident.
Did BP do wrong to fight more stringent regulations? This blogger thinks "NO"!. In the context of the saved cost of extra strength drilling pumps and stronger back-pressure valves, and especially given the successful Big Oil lobbying for Congress to limit oil spill liability to only $75 million (when first quarter PROFITS were $4-5 Billion), BP's management deserved praise from its board of directors and stockholders. That 11 human lives were lost in the blowout was a risk the crew members acknowledged when they signed on for the jobs, and they were paid premium wages for their risk taking; one also assumes BP offered adequate life insurance policies to handle the human life collateral losses.
So what's the problem, America? You know the nature of the corporate game. You elected pro-business Presidents and congress persons, or at least bought into the hype of "business is America's business". Sounds so rhyming and "right", right? And what about those wimpy tree huggers who even want to regulate over-fishing? Until it now looks like this might well be the end for a long time of nice sandy beaches, and the fishing industry along all the Gulf states and eventually along most of the East coast as well. Well, what's the overall national 5-6 year bottom line going to look like for lost oil profits, the closing of seafood industries and the loss of a lot of jobs?
This is the issue: corporations are not "ethical" or "moral" in the sense that humans understand, corporations are only profit oriented (as they should and must be to survive) and profit goals are balanced by the closest thing corporations can come to ethics which is risk assessment. Risk assessment even considers the "cost" of lying and the liability cost of loss of life. In this context, it is dumbfounding why the Supreme Court recently ruled, to this blogger, so strangely in favor of corporations as being near-equivalent to human citizens. This is a big mistake and will bring drastic consequences before it is reversed.
That a corporation might ruin an environment or deplete a non-renewable resource is not its responsibility...although any reasoned person would quickly point out that a depleted resource automatically equates to an end of corporate profitability sooner or later so corporations should pay attention to these matters. But, a corporation is focused on near-term bottom line profits so any consequence further out in time than 90 days or 6 months, and usually just 30 days, is not a primary concern relative to the pressures of "now", at least in America's business world.
A sigificant case illustrating the nearsightedness of corporate attention (British Petroleum and its subcontractors, including Halliburton) has to be the huge oil spill about to swamp the coasts of the southern U.S.. Apparently, BP decided not to install full drilling safeguards against blowout and explosions. What is certain though, is BP lobbied hard along with other oil companies for the relaxation of regulatory requirements that many believe would have prevented this accident.
Did BP do wrong to fight more stringent regulations? This blogger thinks "NO"!. In the context of the saved cost of extra strength drilling pumps and stronger back-pressure valves, and especially given the successful Big Oil lobbying for Congress to limit oil spill liability to only $75 million (when first quarter PROFITS were $4-5 Billion), BP's management deserved praise from its board of directors and stockholders. That 11 human lives were lost in the blowout was a risk the crew members acknowledged when they signed on for the jobs, and they were paid premium wages for their risk taking; one also assumes BP offered adequate life insurance policies to handle the human life collateral losses.
So what's the problem, America? You know the nature of the corporate game. You elected pro-business Presidents and congress persons, or at least bought into the hype of "business is America's business". Sounds so rhyming and "right", right? And what about those wimpy tree huggers who even want to regulate over-fishing? Until it now looks like this might well be the end for a long time of nice sandy beaches, and the fishing industry along all the Gulf states and eventually along most of the East coast as well. Well, what's the overall national 5-6 year bottom line going to look like for lost oil profits, the closing of seafood industries and the loss of a lot of jobs?
This is the issue: corporations are not "ethical" or "moral" in the sense that humans understand, corporations are only profit oriented (as they should and must be to survive) and profit goals are balanced by the closest thing corporations can come to ethics which is risk assessment. Risk assessment even considers the "cost" of lying and the liability cost of loss of life. In this context, it is dumbfounding why the Supreme Court recently ruled, to this blogger, so strangely in favor of corporations as being near-equivalent to human citizens. This is a big mistake and will bring drastic consequences before it is reversed.
Friday, April 16, 2010
MBA Follies: Goldman-Sachs Alleged Subprime Fraud
On January 29, 2010, and last March 9, 2009, this blogger previously expressed or referred to suspicions that Goldman-Sachs investment house might have gamed the sub-prime mortgage world by shortselling based on insider information, thus causing or significantly contributing to its collapse. Therefore, today's headline allegation of G-S fraud (funny-business shortselling) comes as no surprise. But will this lead to just a shadow-charade puppet show with no final convictions or even conclusions, or will something substantial be gained from all the public scrutiny of how business is done inside Wall Street? This blogger believes there will be a public flogging, not a beheading but it will still hurt a lot for G-S principals, and that regulatory reforms will be installed ... rather, re-installed.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
A Lagos State of Mind: A 21st Century Meme to Those in the Know
You know. The Lagos thing, the unnamable name, the unique city of the demi-globe. The feeling when eyes open to a sunny, wood smoke wafting, grilled meats tantalizing, cool morning full of expectancy: there is yesterday's business to finish and today's new business to discover. People to meet and places to go. Broiling "suya" on the air. Maybe a stroll through the market on Balogun with a kabob of Suya (broiled goat kidney with superb dry-rub), yet-unkown but certainly already gestating drama where in a flourish of life affirmation, one might gift a market lady with a larger than normal gratis just to show one's appreciation of the human interaction that led to an apparent, but rarely real, bargain and tip. This gesture would be rewarded with the typical but always fresh Nigerian sales exclamation "You dash me?", as if such a gifting had never occured before (yet it has, many times, in the daily life of the market) but the phrase and joyfulness nevertheless always sounds as if the speaker is newly so surprised and amazed that he or she is so fortunate to be not only a witness to the noblisse gesture but to the more, he or she is furthermore the actual and real life recipient of the gesture. "Wah, you dash me??!!!" spoken with the questioning, mock innocent accusation that is the signature of spoken Yoruba where so much is carried by nuance and tonality. Yes, market lady, we have, the two of us, joined together in that 1000's of years old ritual of giving and acceptance that is mutually pleasing and brings smiles to all around who are privileged to witness and hear the joy and significance of this marketplace ritual.
Youruba spoken is the drum and the drum is of Yoruba. The two modes of communication in Lagos, and Yorubaland are so very much a symbiotic pairing. So much is drum. "B's are mouthed in a push of air both soft and purposeful as "Bwaa" and sometimes as "mBwmm". So the drum. The Yoruba Gods speak thru their specific drums and gave rise tothe New World "Voodoo, a religious belief focused on the intercessionary spirits to Vodon, the Orishas,...
Lagos is a state of mind. Lagos itself is a mass of life and a massive, crowd-large theater. All bustle and hustle. To survive, one has to join in. Then one becomes aware that as an initiated player on stage now, everyone one previously viewed nervously as impossibly glib and hustle-full are now your audience who are equally entertained by one's newly-donned thespian cloak...hopeful of your survival but not especially assisting and expecting to be properly entertained, too, by your efforts to cope. It is as if one is being judged and listened to, while being hustled, as if to evaluate whether one has acquired a certain panache, a style, enough vim and verve, nerve and audacity in one's even normal dealings, for the rest of the crowd to stop worrying about you and rejoice as they might celebrate the maturing of a favored small child. I have seen mature, seasoned and hard American businessmen literally frozen in step when emerging from Lagos airport (Murtala Mohammed) and barely able to turn back into the apparent safety of the airport lounge where...all is not a safe as might be expected for to turn back from the challenge of Lagos, before even one step into the Lagos whirl, dooms one to be looked at by the airport hustlers as cooked meat on the stick. More on this another day.
Northern Nigeria. Muslim without the politics and anxiety of the Middle East. Religious mien, prayer and conduct is the emphasis. The radio droning on and on with broadcast payer and Koranic readings in every settled background whether camel clogged Katsina or the riverside villages in western Sokoto. The still largely absence of the Mid-East "difficulties" results in a Muslim atmosphere that is stoically pure and clean. Under those circumstances one can appreciate and admire the religion of Mohammed.
The Griot traditions of oral historian/poet bring the past alive. If one is fortunate enough to have an audience with a genuine hereditary griot one might be confused thinking that one is impolitely easedropping on a conversation let's say between colonial Englishmen speaking about today's news only to occasionally hear references to give-away anachronisms that reveal the griot is speaking in the voices of participants in events that happened several centuries before.
Youruba spoken is the drum and the drum is of Yoruba. The two modes of communication in Lagos, and Yorubaland are so very much a symbiotic pairing. So much is drum. "B's are mouthed in a push of air both soft and purposeful as "Bwaa" and sometimes as "mBwmm". So the drum. The Yoruba Gods speak thru their specific drums and gave rise tothe New World "Voodoo, a religious belief focused on the intercessionary spirits to Vodon, the Orishas,...
[Voudou, Voodoo, Vudu] is a WestAfrican religion based on vodun spirits and other elements of divine essence that govern the Earth, a hierarchy that range in power from major deities governing the forces of nature and human society to the spirits of individual streams, trees, and rocks, as well as dozens of ethnic vodun, defenders of a certain clan, tribe, or nation. The vodun are the centre of religious life, similarly in many ways to the cult of intercession of saints and angels that made Vodun compatible with Christianity, especially Catholicism, and produced syncretic religions such as Haitian Vodou. Adherents also emphasise ancestor worship and hold that the spirits of the dead live side by side with the world of the living, each family of spirits having its own female priesthood, often hereditary.I will no doubt return to this blog in days to come and embellish this thought.
Lagos is a state of mind. Lagos itself is a mass of life and a massive, crowd-large theater. All bustle and hustle. To survive, one has to join in. Then one becomes aware that as an initiated player on stage now, everyone one previously viewed nervously as impossibly glib and hustle-full are now your audience who are equally entertained by one's newly-donned thespian cloak...hopeful of your survival but not especially assisting and expecting to be properly entertained, too, by your efforts to cope. It is as if one is being judged and listened to, while being hustled, as if to evaluate whether one has acquired a certain panache, a style, enough vim and verve, nerve and audacity in one's even normal dealings, for the rest of the crowd to stop worrying about you and rejoice as they might celebrate the maturing of a favored small child. I have seen mature, seasoned and hard American businessmen literally frozen in step when emerging from Lagos airport (Murtala Mohammed) and barely able to turn back into the apparent safety of the airport lounge where...all is not a safe as might be expected for to turn back from the challenge of Lagos, before even one step into the Lagos whirl, dooms one to be looked at by the airport hustlers as cooked meat on the stick. More on this another day.
Northern Nigeria. Muslim without the politics and anxiety of the Middle East. Religious mien, prayer and conduct is the emphasis. The radio droning on and on with broadcast payer and Koranic readings in every settled background whether camel clogged Katsina or the riverside villages in western Sokoto. The still largely absence of the Mid-East "difficulties" results in a Muslim atmosphere that is stoically pure and clean. Under those circumstances one can appreciate and admire the religion of Mohammed.
The Griot traditions of oral historian/poet bring the past alive. If one is fortunate enough to have an audience with a genuine hereditary griot one might be confused thinking that one is impolitely easedropping on a conversation let's say between colonial Englishmen speaking about today's news only to occasionally hear references to give-away anachronisms that reveal the griot is speaking in the voices of participants in events that happened several centuries before.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Why Is There A Health Care Reform Stalemate? Because There's A Language Disconnect, ...!
With auto insurance, every new driver can find auto insurance. Differences in rates depending on age are understood by everyone as routine.
After one accident maybe there's a rate increase depending on fault. After three or more accidents the driver gets penalized, the rates increase or the driver might get dropped. Even in these cases, the actions of the auto insurance companies are not only acceped but the public, tho maybe grudglingly, empathizes with the decisions as "just business". Even the driver's family usually steps in with a supportive "hey, cousin Bob maybe it's time you start using the BUS".
So cousin Bob loses his auto insurance and stops driving. Is that the end of Bob's getting around town? NO! Because Bob has ...OPTIONS!!!
Cousin Bob can use the public bus and can still get out and about, and affordably too. And everyone is happy or at least OK - the families, and Cousin Bob. And no one blames the auto insurance companies who are happier than a pig in XXX to get rid of the risk.
Now substitute "health care" for "auto" in this story and the problem becomes clear. America is not being served well by an insurance-model health care system where unhealthy, younger clients are simply dropped like bad drivers....because there is no option to go to! No one can or should expect Cousin Bob to simply die once he gets too sick to insure. But, like with auto insurance, a public health care option seems natural and should be part of the health care picture. In America, though, there is no health care option to private insurance unless one can qualify for medicare.
And the problem in Washington is the public option is a politically taboo subject for the Republicans....so, stalemate..and it is not even possible to discuss an option.
The result of trying to dodge the public health care option is a series of awkward "patch-quilt" attempts to create substitutes for a public option without really having a public option or even without having an option to for-profit insurance. Thus, the stumbling forth of "mandated" insurance which is an absurd frankenstein of self-delusion and words-stuck-in-mouth.
And this is the point of why all this health care reform debate has been so lengthy, traumatic and seemingly without solution. There is a LANGUAGE DISCONNECT.
INSURANCE IS NOT COVERAGE!! Health care insurance companies do not exist to serve the public or the nation. They exist to make profit, either that or go under.
Health care insurers operate just like any other insurance companies: if you become a risk (get sick) the companies will drop you! Ha, you say?! Well, that's what their stockholders expect them to do...plus, it's all above board and written down in the company charter.
The health care debate should not be about insurance. The health care insurance sector is doing just fine, thank you. But, America's health care system is gonzo, too expensive (17% of GDP), not covering everyone (40+ million uninsured), and getting worse.
The solution? First get the language straight, then apply logical analogies like the above story. We need public alternatives to private health care insurance, or better - a public, one source health care system.
After one accident maybe there's a rate increase depending on fault. After three or more accidents the driver gets penalized, the rates increase or the driver might get dropped. Even in these cases, the actions of the auto insurance companies are not only acceped but the public, tho maybe grudglingly, empathizes with the decisions as "just business". Even the driver's family usually steps in with a supportive "hey, cousin Bob maybe it's time you start using the BUS".
So cousin Bob loses his auto insurance and stops driving. Is that the end of Bob's getting around town? NO! Because Bob has ...OPTIONS!!!
Cousin Bob can use the public bus and can still get out and about, and affordably too. And everyone is happy or at least OK - the families, and Cousin Bob. And no one blames the auto insurance companies who are happier than a pig in XXX to get rid of the risk.
Now substitute "health care" for "auto" in this story and the problem becomes clear. America is not being served well by an insurance-model health care system where unhealthy, younger clients are simply dropped like bad drivers....because there is no option to go to! No one can or should expect Cousin Bob to simply die once he gets too sick to insure. But, like with auto insurance, a public health care option seems natural and should be part of the health care picture. In America, though, there is no health care option to private insurance unless one can qualify for medicare.
And the problem in Washington is the public option is a politically taboo subject for the Republicans....so, stalemate..and it is not even possible to discuss an option.
The result of trying to dodge the public health care option is a series of awkward "patch-quilt" attempts to create substitutes for a public option without really having a public option or even without having an option to for-profit insurance. Thus, the stumbling forth of "mandated" insurance which is an absurd frankenstein of self-delusion and words-stuck-in-mouth.
And this is the point of why all this health care reform debate has been so lengthy, traumatic and seemingly without solution. There is a LANGUAGE DISCONNECT.
INSURANCE IS NOT COVERAGE!! Health care insurance companies do not exist to serve the public or the nation. They exist to make profit, either that or go under.
Health care insurers operate just like any other insurance companies: if you become a risk (get sick) the companies will drop you! Ha, you say?! Well, that's what their stockholders expect them to do...plus, it's all above board and written down in the company charter.
The health care debate should not be about insurance. The health care insurance sector is doing just fine, thank you. But, America's health care system is gonzo, too expensive (17% of GDP), not covering everyone (40+ million uninsured), and getting worse.
The solution? First get the language straight, then apply logical analogies like the above story. We need public alternatives to private health care insurance, or better - a public, one source health care system.
Friday, January 29, 2010
President Obama's First Year, Pt. 2: The Economy and Recession (and MBA Follies #)
Right out front, this blogger believes one or more large banking/investment companies short-sold America into a recession. Maybe the same dynamics accounted for the Great Depression of the 30's, maybe not. However, this time around the culprits are for the most part self-admitted short sellers, but they claim, so far, they didn't do anything wrong (which claim might be supported on one of those in-crowd, yes-there-is-a-fox-in-the-henhouse-but-it's-here-to-keep-the-peace kind of rationales).
"Short-selling"? Essentially, the money sector principals (e.g., Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan-Chase) while agressively selling the sub-prime derivatives of shaky motgages, were betting those same derivatives would fail. The big trick, though, was different departments in the same companies were engaging in these cross-interest activities, which was supposed to protect these oompanies from conflict of interest which is a mild way of saying they hoped to stay out of jail for inside trading.
So the key point of this preface is the question: did G-S, and/or JPMC banking departments "cross the hall" and discuss their sub-primes with their brother departments, the special investment groups, who were structuring and touting their own investment issues whose eventually stupendous financial success depended on the eventual tanking of the sub-primes. (Take a breath.)
One assumes any congressional "look-see" commission will begin with finding if cross-talk happened. But one never knows does one?
And just why did the sub-prime market tank? Well, mainly because of the MBA Folly of assuming real estate prices would climb forever. (As if the "dot-com" tanking had happened in another universe.) But then there was another factor that played a big-big factor in blinding good-minded MBA types - the Magic Formula. Just about every business fairy tale in the last 20 years has a magic formula tucked somewhere down in the bedding. And, MBA types do love their formulas...makes thing so tidy and easy to remember. This magic formula was not understood, or it was misunderstood or it was just quoted by name just to look savvy, by nearly everyone. Plus, plus, the formula wasn't even developed by a business type, just a small-world-view mathematician...and you know how dweeby they can be.
But let's not blame the honorable mathematician, his formula checked out...within the parameters of strict mathematics validation. The problem was, it is claimed, no one plugged into this sturdy formula the simple matrix option where the grand upward market price trend would somehow, heaven forbid, turn sour, i.e. reverse and downtrend. Maybe, (?) this is forgiveable in the then enthusiasm of all the MBAs making so much commission, but more likely it is not forgiveable. Instead, it is likely someone did the dastardly thing, plugged in a downturn, which occurs in the nasty real-world, and got scared out of their mind since what they saw would cause angels to trade in their wings.
More to come....
"Short-selling"? Essentially, the money sector principals (e.g., Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan-Chase) while agressively selling the sub-prime derivatives of shaky motgages, were betting those same derivatives would fail. The big trick, though, was different departments in the same companies were engaging in these cross-interest activities, which was supposed to protect these oompanies from conflict of interest which is a mild way of saying they hoped to stay out of jail for inside trading.
So the key point of this preface is the question: did G-S, and/or JPMC banking departments "cross the hall" and discuss their sub-primes with their brother departments, the special investment groups, who were structuring and touting their own investment issues whose eventually stupendous financial success depended on the eventual tanking of the sub-primes. (Take a breath.)
One assumes any congressional "look-see" commission will begin with finding if cross-talk happened. But one never knows does one?
And just why did the sub-prime market tank? Well, mainly because of the MBA Folly of assuming real estate prices would climb forever. (As if the "dot-com" tanking had happened in another universe.) But then there was another factor that played a big-big factor in blinding good-minded MBA types - the Magic Formula. Just about every business fairy tale in the last 20 years has a magic formula tucked somewhere down in the bedding. And, MBA types do love their formulas...makes thing so tidy and easy to remember. This magic formula was not understood, or it was misunderstood or it was just quoted by name just to look savvy, by nearly everyone. Plus, plus, the formula wasn't even developed by a business type, just a small-world-view mathematician...and you know how dweeby they can be.
But let's not blame the honorable mathematician, his formula checked out...within the parameters of strict mathematics validation. The problem was, it is claimed, no one plugged into this sturdy formula the simple matrix option where the grand upward market price trend would somehow, heaven forbid, turn sour, i.e. reverse and downtrend. Maybe, (?) this is forgiveable in the then enthusiasm of all the MBAs making so much commission, but more likely it is not forgiveable. Instead, it is likely someone did the dastardly thing, plugged in a downturn, which occurs in the nasty real-world, and got scared out of their mind since what they saw would cause angels to trade in their wings.
More to come....
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