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All posts that do not belong in the categories of buddhism or philosophy goes in here. Please check tags for more details about what the post is about.

Is cloned food safe?

Warren Tang1 Comment

1.
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has decided to endorse that cloned food is safe. If given the go ahead FDA will allow the sale of cloned cattle, pig and goat, but not sheep, pending comments over the next three months and final approval.

But is cloned food really safe?

Sure, the direct result is just a cow, a pig, or a goat. But, surely, there must be a reason why nature “chooses” to make every single organism across species as well as within species different.

2.
This reminds me of the Borg Collective in Star Trek: The Next Generation. If one central area is attacked successfully the whole system collapses. That is not so far fetched. We have examples in our modern world. Disease is one.

Take Aids, for example. It is a virus which knows how to bypass the body’s defences. But not everyone is susceptible to the disease. You may be a Aids carrier but may not be HIV positive. In other words, variation helped contain Aids in this instance.

Variation in life has this important function. It simply means we react or relate differently to the same conditions. On the biological level this has saved us from completely being wiped out.

3.
Rat plagues work in the same way. I once watched an old Eastern European television documentary on a rat exterminator. He gave a step-by-step psychological guide to the rat socio-structure. There is always one rat which is smarter, or less trustful of the exterminator’s method. Literally. this man would feed the rats right out of his hand. He gained the trust of the rats infesting a farm. Once they trust has been created he begins to feed them rat poison out of his hand. But the rats ate the poison becuase of the established trust. Even as the other rats around them were dying the rats continued to accept the “food”. The remaining handful of rats which were cautious to his “gifts” were then killed with a rifle. In this way he was able to exterminate an entire rat population that had taken over a farm property. If some were left behind this would be disastrous because you then have supersmart, superwise rats the next time around.

4.
But coming back to cloned food, why are we in such a hurry to sell it? Are we in some kind of meat shortage that I do not know about? It seems it is all about money, and nothing else.

Why are we always trying to play God? Make yourself heard that you don’t want cloned food before it is too late, especially if you are an American citizen.

Don’t forget to have your say over the next three months with the FDA.

Will science save the planet?

Warren Tang1 Comment

My father came to visit recently. As a habit we try to see each other once a year. As he works for a multinational company he is always on the move flying around globetrotting to meetings. So getting together for a couple of days is usually all we can manage.

This also means he is very much a person who believes in business as a way of life. His business life is something I am not particularly fond of. Personally I want to be a teacher or academic even though these jobs are not without its own politics. It is really a pick from a bad bunch of livelihoods.

So it is during these couples of days that I get to talk to (read: argue with) him about business ethics and philosophy. This time we talked about the relationship between science and sustainability. We agreed that global warming that is happening right now and that something needs to give. However he believed science will create new technologies which have less impact on the environment, that it will eventually save the planet from death by consumerism.

And it is this belief in science that we differ.

To me there are two types of scientists – Observers and Manipulators. To the Observer science is a tool for investigating the nature of the universe. Observers want to know the fundamental laws of motion. So they invent things like calculus and telescopes to gain this knowledge. The object of their investigation is the world. It is to be looked at, to be learned from and to be understood. Observers do not touch the object that is under investigation. By contrast to the Manipulator science is a tool for tampering with the very nature of the universe. The Manipulator wants to know how much they can get out of the world. So they create things like machines for mass production and the electric light bulb for personal, and often short-term, gain. The objective of their investigation is to find ways to apply their knowledge for gain and to see how efficiently something can be produced for consumption. To the Manipulator the world is to be played with, to be harnessed and harvested, to be made a slave of its technological master.

Observers are the astronomers, the oceanographers, the meteorologists of this world; Manipulators are the research scientists, the inventors, the designers of this same world. So it is really a choice as to how we want to relate to the environment, what we choose to do with it or to do to it.

We need science to solve all the problems we wouldn’t have if there were no science.I believe that much of our problems are from the application of science in the form of technology, and that it has snowballed into something bigger because we have tried to use more science to solve these problems. So the advent of science is akin to opening Pandora’s Box or starting a vicous circle. While both seem to imply we cannot reverse the course, I do not believe science’s blunders are irreversible. It may be difficult but not impossible. And certainly using less technology and reverting to a simpler lifestyle will help.

So whether science will save the environment really depends on when we will listen to the Observers over the Manipulators. By nature Observers are the silent type and Manipulators are the loud type, and so their seems to be only ever one discourse – that of the Manipulator. This seems to mean it is not only important for the Observers to scream their silent scream as loudly as they can, but also for us to be listening for it.

Human/Nature

Warren Tang5 Comments

I have just started a course on the understanding of the natural environment. In it we are to given firsthand experience in observing what nature not just in the photographs or in the classroom. The aim of the class is also to show how to make our own instruments for the observation of natural phenomenon.

After the class and during the long drive home I recalled a question that has been puzzling me for two years now – what is the natural environment? It seems to me that every time we talk about the natural environment we talk about it without us – human beings – being involved in it. But are we not a product of the environment? Are we not really just another animal within the animal kingdom?

Sure we separate ourselves from the rest of the animal world. The binary opposites we, humans, use is animal and human. And with these terms we pretend to be rulers of some sort. Our practices show that we feel we have the right to choose how animals live (or die). We simply rank ourselves higher than the animals over whom we believe we own. In short, the world is our slave and property.

This is not new of course. Animal rights as a movement has already pointed this out. Animal testing is a contradiction in itself – the use of animals is justified they are similar enough to us (humans) to make the results valid, yet they are different enough from us (humans) to consider it not cruel to do the types of experiments we wouldn’t do to other humans in the first place. So which is it?

Assuming we are just another animal within the web of life, not one that is at its pinnacle, but one that is only one part of it. So what are we doing to this web and what is our role within this system? If we are to take our present way of living as an indicator then we are like a cancer. Ecosystems generally try to reach a self-sustaining mode. But humans try to destroy as much as possible for the sake of things called economy and nation. Sustainability seems to be the last thing on the minds of economies and nationhood, seeing not the larger picture but choosing a narrow view of life.

One has to ask are we higher creatures or just shortsighted animals within a capacity to not only deceive others but ourselves also? Or perhaps this is nature’s way of culling planetary overpopulation, or if you are religiously inclined God’s sick sense of humour.

The problem with trying to reduce greenhouse gases

Warren Tang3 Comments

You know the problem with greenhouse gas emissions and laws like the one passed by Governor Schwarzenegger is not that there aren’t people like him willing to do it but rather the process to see it through is a difficult one if not down right impossible. The BBC article raised two really good points about why it may not work.

Firstly, the rest of the US states and the federal bureaucrats must follow suit in order to have any effect. This is a big “if” which seems unlikely. The self-interest of America will always come first. And when George W Bush says it will hurt the economy the American public will believe him.

The second problem is that – according to the BBC again – is that those businesses which will be hurt by the law will simply pack up and go somewhere friendlier to their philosophy. That is why I do not see it making a big difference to the cause.

I may sound pessimistic but that has happened all too often before. And there is nothing different to this law being passed and other attempts like it.

So what is the solution? I do not know. But I know this much – our political practices must change. I do not know exactly what kind of political system needs to replace it (if it exists at all) but I know only it isn’t the one we have now. In short I am saying we need a new political paradigm.

California to cut greenhouse gas emission

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Arnold Schwarzenegger, the Governor of California, has signed a law to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the first US state to do so. This is in direct conflict with current White House policy which sees any reduction being detrimental to its economy. Governor Schwarzenegger who like President Bush is a Republican. The law aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 25% before 2020.

British prime minister Tony Blair has praised the law saying “[it] will echo right around the rest of the world”.

And that is exactly what we will have to wait for. California alone cannot fix the problem but if other US states follow suit then we may see realistic reductions. America is still one of the highest in output greenhouse gases. So any kind of lead by them will truly echo around the world.

Books

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Infrastructure – A Field Guide to the Industrial Landscape, by Brian Hayes. W. W. Norton, 512pp.
This 500-plus page book entitled Infrastructure documents and explains everything manmade from oil refineries to manhole covers. It will even explain things like why US telephone exchanges are windowless (because the were thought during the cold war to better withstand a nuclear attack). Sounds like more of a homage to human ingenuity than postmodern critique. gleamed from the 16 September 2006 print edition of the Daily Yomiuri

A Moment of Crisis: Jimmy Carter, The Power of a Peacemaker, and North Korea’s Nuclear Ambitions by Marion Creekmore Jr. PublicAffairs, 406pp.
A look at how Jimmy Carter’s diplomacy saved the day in 1994. Only available in hardcover. gleamed from the 16 September 2006 print edition of the Daily Yomiuri

Scientific American Special Issue: Energy’s Future Beyond Carbon, September 2006.
An excellent special issue on “how to power the economy and still fight global warming”.

bttb

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I haven’t gotten personal on my blog in a while. I had kind of lost my way in the wilderness so to speak.

For sometime now I have been fretting over the name and the purpose of the blog. I was trying to create a website instead of a blog. While content is important I had forgotten about how to live with the medium. So let’s get back to the basics.

This blog started with my interest in the environment and its problems and so I will return to them. It’s a blog so let’s get personal again. I have an interest in postmodern theory and the Buddha so don’t hide it but don’t let it obsess me.

A name change, a new header image, a clean up of the design and we’re back on track.

And one more thing: this blogger is going back to university to get more educated about sustainability so he can write a better blog about it (I lied. I am going back to school but it isn’t about the blog).

New magazine on sustainability – “Sasutena”

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Japan – On the local scene a new magazine on sustainability is being published and will be available for free at university coop bookstores from October. The magazine Sasutena, short for sustainbility in Japanese, will be a quarterly publication.

According to the Daily Yomiuri newspaper the magazine is edited by Prof. Akimasa Sumi, 57, director of the Climate Research Center at Tokyo University and is published by Integrated Research System for Sustainability Science a group formed in April this year by nine universities and organizations which includes Tokyo University, Osaka University and National Institute for Environmental Studies.

Its purpose is to expand the awareness of the general public of this field of growing importance.

Honda to mass-produce bioethanol vehicles

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Honda has announced it will begin mass-producing compact cars which will run off bioethanol. Bioethanol is a type of alcohol which is produced from sugar cane and corn and is considered an environmentally friendly solution that meets the the Kyoto Protocol requirements of zero emission because the carbon dioxide emitted from bioethanol vehicles and absorption rates by plants comes to zero.

According to Japan’s Daily Yomiuri newspaper Honda will convert its Brazilian factories to produce about 30,000 vehicles annually because Brazil is the world’s leading nation in utilizing bioethanol in transportation.

Together with the Japan’s Research Institute of Innovative Technology, Honda has been able to produce ethanol efficiently from biomass (a renewable resource from plants). This means that the traditional resource of sugar cane and corn – a food source – will not be stretched or impinged upon.

This is a step in the right direction for the environment and for the Kyoto Protocol since nothing significant has come from car industry in a long while.

Interconnectness and Differance

Warren Tang2 Comments

In my last post I wrote about the Derridean concept of differance. The idea is meaning is made through the system of difference and that there is no self-contained inherent meaning in words.

Yet this formulation is neither new nor unique. Environmental philosophy’s concern for interconnected is one such instance.

In plain terms interconnectedness is about how all things in the ecosystem is connected, that nothing is an isolated entity without affecting other parts in the web of life. Just like meaning the words as system of difference interconnectedness suggests that everything is part of the system and cannot be separated from it. The loss of a species (or of even a single life) affects the balance and has consequences that simply cannot be observed or be known. Every “happening” in the system changes the the system.

Put in other words everything is absolutely relative and that a change in status of one thing changes the relation within the system. To think that each item within the system is isolated from each other is an ideal and not a reality for nothing exists in isolation except in the mind. It is a trick of the mind and a good one, one that has deluded us for a long time.

To me interconnectedness is a positive way of saying differance. The latter term is colder more scientific in its formulation. We only need to look at nature, the animals – the food chain – and the mountains and trees to see how everthing has a role in the web of life and that something cannot be seen as having no role in the system even if it seems it does not affect the system. We must respect and see the importance of everything. In short sustainability is about giving up our complacency going beyond our self-importance. And if we can do this then we will have advanced as a species.