whoa. that's completely NOT where brand is coming from nam. i may have misrepresented if that's what you got from it.
generally he thinks that the ways that we are currently doing things have so completed screwed everything up that we need to radically overhaul how we approach things.
the argument for nuclear, for instance, goes something like this:
- coal, oil, and other carbon based energy sources are doing KNOWN damage, a lot of it, every day. it's not a matter of risk with fossil fuels; it's a matter of DAMAGE.
- we have proven that, no matter how hard we try, we won't have the political will or gumption to change our habits in significant enough ways to stem the changes we're inflicting on the climate and the land, not if conservation is the primary strategy.
- wind, hydro, and solar have been shown to only be supplementary alternatives, not primary.
- nuclear is clean and (despite the hoopla surrounding the past failures) significantly more safe and less destructive than fossil fuels.
- there are safer nuclear fuels than uranium. the only reason the industry went the uranium direction is because it had the dual potential to make energy AND weapons. there are other fuels which aren't weapons-worthy that would be better, cleaner, safer, and would create much less waste and risk.
- the storage problem (brand believes) is the biggest issue. and, in his mind, a short-term one. the amount of waste is not huge, small enough to be stored on-site in most places until a long-term solution can be figured out (50yrs or so). if we are committed, he is convinced that we can find a way to USE this waste as a resource rather than burying it and dealing with it as a liability.
he's definitely not a use-it-up/abandon-it type. he's looking for radical but also pragmatic solutions, solutions which will be accepted as monetizable for those who take that as their primary consideration, but also actual (rather than idealistic) improvements upon the current path.
i'm probably a bad paraphraser, because i tend to simplify, but he's a big thinker. i believe a lot of what he writes, but want to hear/read as many perspectives as possible, always. so far, his is one of the most thorough and seemingly beneficial approach to environmental triage that i've heard.
Just popped in to say that I'm up in a tree. Litterally. Were making Abe a swing, and I got the rope job. Shhhh. Don't tell husband, but this is the better half of the job.
Technology is one of the few things we (architects) can alter, we can make more efficient (or even generative) building and cities that use less resources. We can't ethically/morally/legally really control how much stuff people consume (beyond buildings) or population growth. so we're screwed if we get 9 billion people trying to live like americans (or even the japanese).
If you built a solar power plant with the same area as all the coal mines, you'd get more energy each year from that patch of earth. So why don't we?
Steven, now i know. I have read some of brand's writings. I get his arguments for nuclear, gmo and other stuff. I think is take is more we broke it now we have to fix it.
I certainly don't argue with that. I was do have some friends who do take the more malthusian sci-fi approach.
Do any of the tc ladies like this outfit as much as i do??
nam, I saw some of that fabric at F&S (of project runway fame, which makes it even harder to get good service there!) the other week and I kept coming back to that section of the shop to pet it. It has such a strange feel to it, wooly but with an incredible variety of grain pattern. I wouldn't have imagined it could be so great in such quantity, but she's really pulling it off.
nam I love the coat, can't really say about the rest of the outfit though I do like the boots and the hair.
Steven, this is where I disagree with Brand, or at least with your paraphrasing of Brand: we won't have the political will or gumption to change our habits .
Of course we can. I just watched the Hubble Telescope in 3-D Imax today (my first 3D imax experience - as good as the hype, at least!), and I've been immersed in space program information for the last two years. It's a tired trope but it's true: we can put a man on the moon. We can exist in outer space (under limited conditions). We can launch a 7 million pound hunk of machinery a quarter of a million miles above the surface of the planet. I'm awed every time I think about the Apollo program and how we willed and designed our way to a virtually impossible goal.
On a smaller scale, we can transplant a face from a cadaver to a living person and have video conversations with people halfway around the globe. There is practically nothing we can't do if we don't accept excuses like that will never happen.
People used to smoke in hospitals and restaurants. That changed. Cars didn't have seatbelts. Women weren't allowed to go to college or have a bank account. We had slaves, for chrissake. Changing all those things took enormous willpower on the part of visionaries in both the creative and political sides of progress.
GMO food used to solve "world hunger" is, IMO, solving a symptom without considering the actual problem. Poor distribution of resources and an unwillingness to make political changes are the problem, not lack of food.
Maybe Brand makes an argument that I'm ignoring or don't know about, but "we're too lazy to change things" isn't a valid one.
i maybe should word that differently then. and this is my opinion, living in a context of a lot of the worst behavers: almost 50% of us DON'T WANT TO change our habits - are in fact actively against it. i think that's a tougher battle than making it to space or transplanting a face. there are challenges and then there are intransigents.
and i should not be representing brand in any way. it's a tough enough book to read, much less paraphrase.
(and a LOT of people in kentucky still smoke in restaurants, even if not in louisville. not sure about hospitals, but i wouldn't be surprised. we also still don't have motorcycle helmet laws and have a large portion of our state's population that would rather pay a ticket than wear a seatbelt.)
nam, i had seen big pink, though unfortunately not in person.
i know liz and mike. donna does too. they're madpeople, it's not surprising that all that stuff was cut by hand. they're also crazy smart, both of them. on faculty at university of kentucky.
, manufacturers are starting to put sugar instead of HFCS into foods, due to consumer demand. Even though there isn't (so far) any confident science proving that one is worse than the other.
In America, we certainly used to be able to design our way out of any problem. More and more, it's getting to where we can market and spin our way out of any problem. Same result, different means.
Now I need to go look at Liz and Mike's project. I'm not sure I know it, though I know them.
thanks for clarifying donna. about space stuff, i am huge fan of what the guys did with apollo and gemini, but you know that stuff was dangerous as hell right? we made it, but it was closer to gambling than good engineering. the real amazing thing was that for those men (sorry not so many women involved back then) the risks were acceptable. now we are not so ready to take chances like that, which is much more the greater shame than all the other things going on in our cultures today.
i think change, massive change, only happens when the old bigots die off. slavery, female emancipation, gay rights, environmental rights. maybe we all have to step aside before things get better...?
I think I may have explained this once or twice before here but I am not sure.
The reason sugar (as in both crystalline sucrose and invert sugar syrup) isn't used because it is either labor or resource intensive.
Invert sugar (similar to HFCS nutritionally, albeit much different) is expensive to produce. By expensive, I mean it costs literally a few cents more-- the process involves boiling sugar water with a mild acid (cream of tartar, lemon juice or vitamin C).
Invert syrup damages machines (mechanically through abrasion or chemically by acid). The sugar can also fall out of solution causes blockages and shortens the life of many industrial parts.
Sucrose on the other hand presents other challenges. It damages machines mechanically, has build up issues and shortens the life of many parts as well.
BUT, THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT PART.
All natural sugar products must be handled manually. As in, someone literally has to scoop sugar from one place and dump it into another place.
Sugar's ability to absorb moisture makes it machine unfriendly. Because sugar can easily change weight by absorbing atmospheric moisture, using it in large quantities means that each recipe batch must be taste tested-- 50 lbs of sugar could be 50 lbs of pure sugar or 47 pounds of sugar and 3 pounds water.
Additionally, removing moisture from sugar is difficult because most processes use heat. Evaporative process like freeze drying are often too expensive for the kind of products made from sugar.
Natural sugar products simply costs more (usually pennies on the dollar) because the process of using it industrially is "labor intensive." In many factories, the only time humans are involved is in quality checks and packaging.
So, other than the reasoning HFCS is used is because of expense (HFCS is technically more expensive than sugar because of the water weight) and the sweeter taste... many companies used HFCS because it eliminates practically half of the production line.
Oh... and HFCS is also a preservative (as is invert sugar).
That's the reason why candy bars stay fresh for 5 years. Typically the chocolate goes rancid due to the fats oxidizing well before the sugar grows any bacteria on it at all. In reality, since most sugar products are relatively unrefined, unpasteurized and literally pure electricity for bacteria... the insides of candy bars should rot out way before the chocolate does.
Still kind of creeped out that candy never expires.
Any candy bar that contains whole nuts or nut fragments (that isn't coaked, soaked, roasted or processed otherwise) is filled to the brim with micron-sized maggots.
Especially peanut-based candy bars. Peanuts are often shelled and roasted in one facility and then shipped to candymakers all over. When they are shipped, tiny flies often get into the peanuts and cover the peanuts with eggs. Those eggs take a bit of time hatch... usually well after the nuts end up in the candy bars.
re: the surplus of food we have. why would it be better, environmentatlly, to ship our surplus around the world than to come up with a way to allow the people in a local community to make better food for themselves?
maybe we can work out better distribution, but would that be the best use of our logistical thinking and investment. maybe if we wanted to make those people even more dependent on our goodwill and/or guarantee them as our customers.
instead, if gmo provides a crop that can be nurtured locally and provides the necessary sustenance through traditional (i.e., non-machine-based) methods, wouldn't that be good?
i will have to read pollan's book. i also haven't gotten clear for myself why a lab-created hybrid is so necessarily different and more dangerous than the hybrids we've been making almost since the beginning of agriculture. hell, even that plants and bees themselves were making before that...
it's the old weapons questions i guess: is the technology dangerous, or is it our ethical use of the technology that makes it dangerous? because we depend on a lot of technology today that would have been tossed out if we just dismissed it because it could have been used for bad things.
No, you're not highjacking, and all those are good points. Improving transportation networks would be one of those things we could design to have less of an impact.
But that all gets to the heart of my problem with GMO: it's not "natural". I know that's broad, and I can accept that there are different levels of "natural" in what we have the ability to accomplish through science. Rose hybrids are somehow more acceptable - read: less terrifying that they may turn into some kind of highly destructive, invasive organism - than are trout/tomato hybrids. (I just like to say it: you can't make a trout fuck a tomato, no matter how much Barry White you play for them.)
And then the whole patent issue comes up. Which has been documented - small farmers (isn't that what we all really want?) being sued by Monsanto because a bee carried pollen from one field to another.
I think if we can allow that stem cell research might offend some people's ethics, therefore we have to proceed in that area with extreme caution, we can also allow that genetic-level tinkering can be subject to similar cautions. So GMO research performed by public entities subject to rigorous controls in what is allowed to be combined and on what topics are truly considered unsolvable with any other solution plus several decades of safety fallout testing and no chance for profits: I'm OK with that.
Steven, the way I understand it, is that in order to modify the seeds, they actually implant viruses in order to attach whatever they need to attach. Viruses lock onto the DNA of their host - which is why we can never rid ourselves from things like Herpes or chicken pox, even if the outbreak itself heals. My fear on this is that the viruses they use, although "inactive" may some how become active, and then we're infecting ourselves with whatever viruses they use, and WHA-BAM! we've got a world-wide epidemic on our hands, the likes which hasn't been seen since the bubonic plague. Then again, that would significantly decrease the population, and that could fix all of our issues. On second thought, maybe I'm all for GMOs; they could be the answer to it all!
There's no coffee in Boston! everybody stay calm... What the hell is dunkin donuts going to sell? donuts? yeah right - no one actually eats donuts.
My friend claimed to have brushed her teeth with san pellegrino yesterday... I say, I brush my teeth with san pellegrino every day.
FYI - there was a major water line break in the Boston area water system over the weekend - so they had to tap into reserves from reservoirs, which isn't treated (which means, you have to boil water first). Cambridge was unaffected because they have their own fancy filtered water system which they harvest directly from the tears of unicorns...you can't have Harvardians drinking the same water as the rest of us plebs...
Ken, I'm becoming malthusian, esp. with the Jevons Paradox/K-Bp. but increasing out technological efficiency is the ONLY way out of the mess we're in cause we can't kill everybody who drives an SUV and lives in a McMansion, and the teaming masses want air conditioning. maybe we're doomed, but I'm going to go kicking and screaming.
Barry... I can't solve the SUVs or McMansions! But the air conditioning to me at this point is non-negotiable.
Modern electronics just put out too much heat! And so many things inside the home today are easily damaged by humidity. Without air conditioning, much of that "technological efficiency" becomes highly problematic.
However, I have done some calculations and cost estimates and found that neighborhood/block chilled water systems are extremely efficient, can be combined with geothermal cooling/heating (ground storage) and can easily be retrofitted into many buildings that currently have and do not have air-conditioning.
Of course, chilled water systems require highly urbanized areas.
I keep telling people at the rate we're going-- we need to either chose option a) plastics, computers and air conditioning or options b) driving and McMansions. We don't have the energy to have both.
Ken that stuff about Jevons Paradox and Khazzoom-Brookes Postulat i think i might have heard before (on Archinect) maybe by unicorn? Is that right unicorn?
tumbles totally agree regarding matching prints and the lady i posted's approach. Although i did love the coat and boots.
Yes, I have said things along similar lines but have no explicit used the terms for either because it is much easier to explain the principal.
Jevons paradox
Fuel efficiency in automobiles simply makes people drive more miles rather than consume less gasoline. At least according to several analysis by urban planners, gasoline consumption will stay a relative constant no matter the fuel efficiency of the cars consuming it.
That's not to say that having cleaner cars is bad. It is just that it does nothing in terms of saving actual energy.
An interesting twist on this phenomenon, New Urbanist schemes do not alter the amount of trips one drives in a day. In fact, New Urbanist schemes often increase the number of and frequency of trips. Those trips are much smaller. VMT (vehicle miles traveled) does decrease significantly... but operating large vehicles at slow speeds in stop-n-go traffic is terribly inefficient! The energy savings is minimal in this aspect as well.
This is one particular reason I am not fond of diesel vehicles, new or old. The particulate pollution and the number of contaminates in diesel is appalling! It'll help curb global warming but your lungs and brain stem will rot out.
Khazzoom–Brookes postulate
This one I have mentioned in terms of electrical usage in modern homes.
With the waning use of some appliances (like hair dryers and clothes irons) combined incredible achievements in efficiencies in standard appliances, American homes should be consuming less and less energy to do the same tasks!
But that isn't the case. We buy a new dryer to skim 200 watt hours off of every operating. We then turn around and buy a 350 watt television or a 500 watt computer.
Air-conditioning, heating (in some schemes), laundry and food storage have been energy bandits. But they aren't the blame anymore. Consumer electronics are now reaching the 50% mark of home energy consumption. And every time newer better electronics become cheaper and cheaper to operate, people buy more and more of them.
Think of this way... in 2005, a single person may have had a computer, a cell phone, a wireless router, a gaming console and a small tube tv.
By 2015, the same single person will probably have... a desktop, a laptop, a netbook, a tablet, a reader, a wireless cellular internet card, a smartphone, a wireless router/server, a 40"+ >200mhz television, a smaller secondary television, a dvr, a home data storage unit, a fiber line, multiple gaming consoles, a smart remote... and to top it all off, bluetooth everything.
I know at least two people who have increased the number of lights they owned and leave them on all the time because of CFLs. Their power bill is technically lower than what it use to be... but not by very much. I think they might be saving one kwh. They do have three times the amount of lights though!
I think what it comes down to is budgetary issues-- if your power bill has always been 300 dollars a month, you will continue to spend 300 dollars a month no matter how efficient or inefficient your appliances and electronics are.
And that could be said with gasoline as well. A large part of our economy is built on this notion.
It was in Time magazine recently where someone said Apple was the intersection of Liberal Arts and Technology. That it provides technology that has a more "human" touch to it.
Perhaps that's what we need more of! But I fear Liberal Arts intersection Architecture would just lead to a bunch of Beaux Arts beer halls and attaching as many naked bodies to every facade as possible.
My son is way to smar and tricky. He knows that he gets a few jelly beans if he poops in the potty. So all day today he's been breaking it up into as many trips as he can just so he can have more jelly beans. That stinker!
or at least it is funny in my current deliriously jetlagged condition... it is 2:30 in the morning here and i'm to that point of tiredness where i'm so tired that i'm not tired... argh... must sleep so that i can be productive at the archive tomorrow...
hilarious sarah about the potty and the jelly beans
i haven't read anything about it lately, but i think the use of viruses in modifying genetic code is a real issue, is it? its along the same lines as how penicillin is made using genetically modified bacteria...isn't it? the viruses are denatured.
growing up we had lots of farmers who collected horse urine to make birth control pills (from the estrogen) but now that too is produced by bacteria according to my cousins, and the fields of birth-control horses are gone. my guess is we all are using the products of genetically modified creatures in daily life and are simply not aware of it.
the argument of jevons paradox i have heard before, but did not know there was a name that could be put to it. thanks for that awesome intro to the topic. now i need to work out how to sneak it into a lecture on modern architecture. environmental issues are so interestingly complicated.
btw, nick sowers post on the school blogs this week is quite good (of course) and worth reading, as are most of the blogs nowadays come to think on it. amazing stuff going on by interesting people.
we all are using the products of genetically modified creatures in daily life and are simply not aware of it.
This is definitely true, jump. Organic farmers have been fighting for labeling laws, but at this point it's still just the things that are organic that have to be labeled.
the danger of GMO is when plants are modified to be toxic and the possibility that the gene can escape into our food. Is there research into the health impacts of Bt modified corn & soy on humans? Is there research into other 'natural' pesticides when injested by humans? Are glow-in-the-dark jellyfish edible? That is what scares me, not the process of modification - it's more high-tech then mendalian breeding. but genes and the process of GMO this is not evil, it's what they can do/intended to do that may make them toxic and a health risk.
Farma goats lactating drugs is one this, but what happens if they manage to escape and procreate? Maybe we'll become amazing spidermen if we can lactate silk too. (not that silk milk would taste good).
OK, the truth is my main concern is this: could GMO corn negatively affect the taste of bourbon? I mean, we could be facing a major crisis, in the truest sense!
Since being introduced to the concepts of the Jevons paradox and Khazzoom–Brookes postulate I've been thinking a lot about them, not like I need anymore to keep me up at night (certainly not with this oil spill in the Gulf)...
Your points about home energy usage are good ones. It's ironic that people dispose of their "old energy hog TVs" to upgrade to a "new energy efficient flat screen model TV" when the reality is, that new flat screen actually uses a lot more than the old TV does. But HVAC is still currently the big winner in terms of energy consumption in the U.S., especially given that we have so many homes in northern climates. The good news is, heating and cooling systems are getting more efficient, for sure: the bad news is, everything else is creeping up. Here's a little pie chart that shows what the breakdown might be in 2035 based on forecasts from the U.S. Energy Information Administration:
So, consumer electronics are getting bigger, not quite to the 50% range, but frankly we are going to need renewable energy sources no matter which way we cut it, so might as well not worry too much about where it's going, just where it's coming from...
you know what really scares me? they just closed the front doors of the supreme court in usa out of fear. it feels like a defeat.
that chart is so true emily. i just bought new computer for office and home, and we are thinking to get one or two more now my wife and daughters are finding computers to be useful parts of their lives. japan has pretty good energy efficiency thing going on and we still dress warm instead of turn on the heat but i don't see how we can avoid using more energy not less. heck, even going to the movies nowadays requires booking seats by internet in advance. i wonder if nuclear power is enough to offset that rise? supposedly oil imports are still at their 1970's levels, but gotta wonder if that is sufficient ...
Emily, the figures I heard are mostly for really far south sunbelt states. But, yeah... 50% maybe a bit much.
We had rolling brown outs in Florida this year! With everyone having their electric heaters (and reverse heat pumps) on at the same time a few times over winter, the grid just couldn't take it! If I remember correctly, I think the biggest consumer of electricity in Florida is pool pumps.
Anyways... according to the DOE, consumer electronics sucked down 82 billion kilowatt hours in 2001. 2011's figure is suppose to be closer to 200 billion kilowatt hours.
2001 electrical uses. Just as another reference.
Oh also, home electrical demands would change significantly if we throw in the electrical cost of the internet into the factor!
The U.S.'s Internet energy consumption is at roughly 350 billion kWh per year. There's about what... 135,000,000 households in the US? That's 2,600 kWh per house per year. If we say that half the internet usage in the US was for business use, that's still 1,300 kWh per house. With electrical usage around 11,000 kWh yearly, 1,300 kWh is a significant number!?!
I wonder what the electrical usage of cable is? And how much energy does the cellphone network eat up?
I think I want glow in the dark Tomatoes....so I can pick them at night without a Flashlight. Now that is a killer idea....thinking we can bring the Tomates to market faster if the field laborers could pick at night.....
I think I want glow in the dark Grapes....so I can pick them at night without a Flashlight. Now that is a reall killer idea....only if I can make them "Organic".....Can you imagine the wine sales...of glow in the dark "Organic Wines", known as "Purple Haze"
Hi all-
Great discussion. Anyone see this article in the NYT. This is the reason why I'm not a fan of GMO's. I don't like the idea of creating restistant weeds which in turn could turn into invasive species. We already have plenty of invasive species that we have to combat, why create even more?
all this talk about gmo's has me thinking about this fellow feed me seymour!
I love those charts. That one by uni is a great device if one thinks about it to show people a simple way to reduced energy consumption in their home...
Sorry if I'm curt today, my head is down trying to mark papers and have a session to mark portfolios in a few
Thread Central
whoa. that's completely NOT where brand is coming from nam. i may have misrepresented if that's what you got from it.
generally he thinks that the ways that we are currently doing things have so completed screwed everything up that we need to radically overhaul how we approach things.
the argument for nuclear, for instance, goes something like this:
- coal, oil, and other carbon based energy sources are doing KNOWN damage, a lot of it, every day. it's not a matter of risk with fossil fuels; it's a matter of DAMAGE.
- we have proven that, no matter how hard we try, we won't have the political will or gumption to change our habits in significant enough ways to stem the changes we're inflicting on the climate and the land, not if conservation is the primary strategy.
- wind, hydro, and solar have been shown to only be supplementary alternatives, not primary.
- nuclear is clean and (despite the hoopla surrounding the past failures) significantly more safe and less destructive than fossil fuels.
- there are safer nuclear fuels than uranium. the only reason the industry went the uranium direction is because it had the dual potential to make energy AND weapons. there are other fuels which aren't weapons-worthy that would be better, cleaner, safer, and would create much less waste and risk.
- the storage problem (brand believes) is the biggest issue. and, in his mind, a short-term one. the amount of waste is not huge, small enough to be stored on-site in most places until a long-term solution can be figured out (50yrs or so). if we are committed, he is convinced that we can find a way to USE this waste as a resource rather than burying it and dealing with it as a liability.
he's definitely not a use-it-up/abandon-it type. he's looking for radical but also pragmatic solutions, solutions which will be accepted as monetizable for those who take that as their primary consideration, but also actual (rather than idealistic) improvements upon the current path.
i'm probably a bad paraphraser, because i tend to simplify, but he's a big thinker. i believe a lot of what he writes, but want to hear/read as many perspectives as possible, always. so far, his is one of the most thorough and seemingly beneficial approach to environmental triage that i've heard.
Just popped in to say that I'm up in a tree. Litterally. Were making Abe a swing, and I got the rope job. Shhhh. Don't tell husband, but this is the better half of the job.
hi all... i'm at JFK airport in NYC waiting for my flight to amsterdam... free internet is a lovely way to waste layover time...
hi [green] thread central!
something I've been using in my lectures (think I've posted this before) is:
I=P*A*T
I=environmental impacts
P=population
A=affluence aka consumption
T=technology
Technology is one of the few things we (architects) can alter, we can make more efficient (or even generative) building and cities that use less resources. We can't ethically/morally/legally really control how much stuff people consume (beyond buildings) or population growth. so we're screwed if we get 9 billion people trying to live like americans (or even the japanese).
If you built a solar power plant with the same area as all the coal mines, you'd get more energy each year from that patch of earth. So why don't we?
Proof.
http://m.flickr.com/#/photos/15301603@N00/4571442545/sizes/m/
Steven, now i know. I have read some of brand's writings. I get his arguments for nuclear, gmo and other stuff. I think is take is more we broke it now we have to fix it.
I certainly don't argue with that. I was do have some friends who do take the more malthusian sci-fi approach.
Do any of the tc ladies like this outfit as much as i do??
Via NYt on print with print
steven that should read, no i know
a less stretched version
and steven have you seen that Big Pink thing i highlighted in the EP this week?
nam, I saw some of that fabric at F&S (of project runway fame, which makes it even harder to get good service there!) the other week and I kept coming back to that section of the shop to pet it. It has such a strange feel to it, wooly but with an incredible variety of grain pattern. I wouldn't have imagined it could be so great in such quantity, but she's really pulling it off.
nam I love the coat, can't really say about the rest of the outfit though I do like the boots and the hair.
Steven, this is where I disagree with Brand, or at least with your paraphrasing of Brand: we won't have the political will or gumption to change our habits .
Of course we can. I just watched the Hubble Telescope in 3-D Imax today (my first 3D imax experience - as good as the hype, at least!), and I've been immersed in space program information for the last two years. It's a tired trope but it's true: we can put a man on the moon. We can exist in outer space (under limited conditions). We can launch a 7 million pound hunk of machinery a quarter of a million miles above the surface of the planet. I'm awed every time I think about the Apollo program and how we willed and designed our way to a virtually impossible goal.
On a smaller scale, we can transplant a face from a cadaver to a living person and have video conversations with people halfway around the globe. There is practically nothing we can't do if we don't accept excuses like that will never happen.
People used to smoke in hospitals and restaurants. That changed. Cars didn't have seatbelts. Women weren't allowed to go to college or have a bank account. We had slaves, for chrissake. Changing all those things took enormous willpower on the part of visionaries in both the creative and political sides of progress.
GMO food used to solve "world hunger" is, IMO, solving a symptom without considering the actual problem. Poor distribution of resources and an unwillingness to make political changes are the problem, not lack of food.
Maybe Brand makes an argument that I'm ignoring or don't know about, but "we're too lazy to change things" isn't a valid one.
i maybe should word that differently then. and this is my opinion, living in a context of a lot of the worst behavers: almost 50% of us DON'T WANT TO change our habits - are in fact actively against it. i think that's a tougher battle than making it to space or transplanting a face. there are challenges and then there are intransigents.
and i should not be representing brand in any way. it's a tough enough book to read, much less paraphrase.
...and he's much more optimistic than i am.
(and a LOT of people in kentucky still smoke in restaurants, even if not in louisville. not sure about hospitals, but i wouldn't be surprised. we also still don't have motorcycle helmet laws and have a large portion of our state's population that would rather pay a ticket than wear a seatbelt.)
nam, i had seen big pink, though unfortunately not in person.
i know liz and mike. donna does too. they're madpeople, it's not surprising that all that stuff was cut by hand. they're also crazy smart, both of them. on faculty at university of kentucky.
i love the project steven.
made it to altamonte springs safey. training tomorrow.
nite all.
, manufacturers are starting to put sugar instead of HFCS into foods, due to consumer demand. Even though there isn't (so far) any confident science proving that one is worse than the other.
In America, we certainly used to be able to design our way out of any problem. More and more, it's getting to where we can market and spin our way out of any problem. Same result, different means.
Now I need to go look at Liz and Mike's project. I'm not sure I know it, though I know them.
i side more with brand. i am also optimist.
thanks for clarifying donna. about space stuff, i am huge fan of what the guys did with apollo and gemini, but you know that stuff was dangerous as hell right? we made it, but it was closer to gambling than good engineering. the real amazing thing was that for those men (sorry not so many women involved back then) the risks were acceptable. now we are not so ready to take chances like that, which is much more the greater shame than all the other things going on in our cultures today.
i think change, massive change, only happens when the old bigots die off. slavery, female emancipation, gay rights, environmental rights. maybe we all have to step aside before things get better...?
Donna,
Your point about sugar is an amusing point.
I think I may have explained this once or twice before here but I am not sure.
The reason sugar (as in both crystalline sucrose and invert sugar syrup) isn't used because it is either labor or resource intensive.
Invert sugar (similar to HFCS nutritionally, albeit much different) is expensive to produce. By expensive, I mean it costs literally a few cents more-- the process involves boiling sugar water with a mild acid (cream of tartar, lemon juice or vitamin C).
Invert syrup damages machines (mechanically through abrasion or chemically by acid). The sugar can also fall out of solution causes blockages and shortens the life of many industrial parts.
Sucrose on the other hand presents other challenges. It damages machines mechanically, has build up issues and shortens the life of many parts as well.
BUT, THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT PART.
All natural sugar products must be handled manually. As in, someone literally has to scoop sugar from one place and dump it into another place.
Sugar's ability to absorb moisture makes it machine unfriendly. Because sugar can easily change weight by absorbing atmospheric moisture, using it in large quantities means that each recipe batch must be taste tested-- 50 lbs of sugar could be 50 lbs of pure sugar or 47 pounds of sugar and 3 pounds water.
Additionally, removing moisture from sugar is difficult because most processes use heat. Evaporative process like freeze drying are often too expensive for the kind of products made from sugar.
Natural sugar products simply costs more (usually pennies on the dollar) because the process of using it industrially is "labor intensive." In many factories, the only time humans are involved is in quality checks and packaging.
So, other than the reasoning HFCS is used is because of expense (HFCS is technically more expensive than sugar because of the water weight) and the sweeter taste... many companies used HFCS because it eliminates practically half of the production line.
Oh... and HFCS is also a preservative (as is invert sugar).
That's the reason why candy bars stay fresh for 5 years. Typically the chocolate goes rancid due to the fats oxidizing well before the sugar grows any bacteria on it at all. In reality, since most sugar products are relatively unrefined, unpasteurized and literally pure electricity for bacteria... the insides of candy bars should rot out way before the chocolate does.
Still kind of creeped out that candy never expires.
Oh... and to ruin candy bars further...
Any candy bar that contains whole nuts or nut fragments (that isn't coaked, soaked, roasted or processed otherwise) is filled to the brim with micron-sized maggots.
Especially peanut-based candy bars. Peanuts are often shelled and roasted in one facility and then shipped to candymakers all over. When they are shipped, tiny flies often get into the peanuts and cover the peanuts with eggs. Those eggs take a bit of time hatch... usually well after the nuts end up in the candy bars.
But anyways... yes, maggots in your nut products!
Barry,
I don't know if you're familiar with Jevons Paradox and the Khazzoom-Brookes Postulate?
Fascinating reads, quick and Wiki but nonetheless, interesting things to consider, regarding consumption and technology.
thanks unicorn, another reason why I say away from candy! Steven love the hat it almost looks alive and worthy of a haiku
derby:
off the line
torn ticket
Ken... wow! Those are interesting concepts. I have a particular interest seeing as that is now my industry. Thanks for the links.
re: the surplus of food we have. why would it be better, environmentatlly, to ship our surplus around the world than to come up with a way to allow the people in a local community to make better food for themselves?
maybe we can work out better distribution, but would that be the best use of our logistical thinking and investment. maybe if we wanted to make those people even more dependent on our goodwill and/or guarantee them as our customers.
instead, if gmo provides a crop that can be nurtured locally and provides the necessary sustenance through traditional (i.e., non-machine-based) methods, wouldn't that be good?
i will have to read pollan's book. i also haven't gotten clear for myself why a lab-created hybrid is so necessarily different and more dangerous than the hybrids we've been making almost since the beginning of agriculture. hell, even that plants and bees themselves were making before that...
it's the old weapons questions i guess: is the technology dangerous, or is it our ethical use of the technology that makes it dangerous? because we depend on a lot of technology today that would have been tossed out if we just dismissed it because it could have been used for bad things.
i think i'm hijacking thread central. i'll stop now...
No, you're not highjacking, and all those are good points. Improving transportation networks would be one of those things we could design to have less of an impact.
But that all gets to the heart of my problem with GMO: it's not "natural". I know that's broad, and I can accept that there are different levels of "natural" in what we have the ability to accomplish through science. Rose hybrids are somehow more acceptable - read: less terrifying that they may turn into some kind of highly destructive, invasive organism - than are trout/tomato hybrids. (I just like to say it: you can't make a trout fuck a tomato, no matter how much Barry White you play for them.)
And then the whole patent issue comes up. Which has been documented - small farmers (isn't that what we all really want?) being sued by Monsanto because a bee carried pollen from one field to another.
I think if we can allow that stem cell research might offend some people's ethics, therefore we have to proceed in that area with extreme caution, we can also allow that genetic-level tinkering can be subject to similar cautions. So GMO research performed by public entities subject to rigorous controls in what is allowed to be combined and on what topics are truly considered unsolvable with any other solution plus several decades of safety fallout testing and no chance for profits: I'm OK with that.
Steven, the way I understand it, is that in order to modify the seeds, they actually implant viruses in order to attach whatever they need to attach. Viruses lock onto the DNA of their host - which is why we can never rid ourselves from things like Herpes or chicken pox, even if the outbreak itself heals. My fear on this is that the viruses they use, although "inactive" may some how become active, and then we're infecting ourselves with whatever viruses they use, and WHA-BAM! we've got a world-wide epidemic on our hands, the likes which hasn't been seen since the bubonic plague. Then again, that would significantly decrease the population, and that could fix all of our issues. On second thought, maybe I'm all for GMOs; they could be the answer to it all!
And TC can't be hijacked, Steven. You know that.
There's no coffee in Boston! everybody stay calm... What the hell is dunkin donuts going to sell? donuts? yeah right - no one actually eats donuts.
My friend claimed to have brushed her teeth with san pellegrino yesterday... I say, I brush my teeth with san pellegrino every day.
FYI - there was a major water line break in the Boston area water system over the weekend - so they had to tap into reserves from reservoirs, which isn't treated (which means, you have to boil water first). Cambridge was unaffected because they have their own fancy filtered water system which they harvest directly from the tears of unicorns...you can't have Harvardians drinking the same water as the rest of us plebs...
Tumbles, sounds like you could use some of that mountain lion killing GMO corn you mentioned. Can you just better protect your stock?
Ken, I'm becoming malthusian, esp. with the Jevons Paradox/K-Bp. but increasing out technological efficiency is the ONLY way out of the mess we're in cause we can't kill everybody who drives an SUV and lives in a McMansion, and the teaming masses want air conditioning. maybe we're doomed, but I'm going to go kicking and screaming.
Barry... I can't solve the SUVs or McMansions! But the air conditioning to me at this point is non-negotiable.
Modern electronics just put out too much heat! And so many things inside the home today are easily damaged by humidity. Without air conditioning, much of that "technological efficiency" becomes highly problematic.
However, I have done some calculations and cost estimates and found that neighborhood/block chilled water systems are extremely efficient, can be combined with geothermal cooling/heating (ground storage) and can easily be retrofitted into many buildings that currently have and do not have air-conditioning.
Of course, chilled water systems require highly urbanized areas.
I keep telling people at the rate we're going-- we need to either chose option a) plastics, computers and air conditioning or options b) driving and McMansions. We don't have the energy to have both.
hi all i have a break from training currently.
Ken that stuff about Jevons Paradox and Khazzoom-Brookes Postulat i think i might have heard before (on Archinect) maybe by unicorn? Is that right unicorn?
tumbles totally agree regarding matching prints and the lady i posted's approach. Although i did love the coat and boots.
hi all.
Yes, I have said things along similar lines but have no explicit used the terms for either because it is much easier to explain the principal.
Jevons paradox
Fuel efficiency in automobiles simply makes people drive more miles rather than consume less gasoline. At least according to several analysis by urban planners, gasoline consumption will stay a relative constant no matter the fuel efficiency of the cars consuming it.
That's not to say that having cleaner cars is bad. It is just that it does nothing in terms of saving actual energy.
An interesting twist on this phenomenon, New Urbanist schemes do not alter the amount of trips one drives in a day. In fact, New Urbanist schemes often increase the number of and frequency of trips. Those trips are much smaller. VMT (vehicle miles traveled) does decrease significantly... but operating large vehicles at slow speeds in stop-n-go traffic is terribly inefficient! The energy savings is minimal in this aspect as well.
This is one particular reason I am not fond of diesel vehicles, new or old. The particulate pollution and the number of contaminates in diesel is appalling! It'll help curb global warming but your lungs and brain stem will rot out.
Khazzoom–Brookes postulate
This one I have mentioned in terms of electrical usage in modern homes.
With the waning use of some appliances (like hair dryers and clothes irons) combined incredible achievements in efficiencies in standard appliances, American homes should be consuming less and less energy to do the same tasks!
But that isn't the case. We buy a new dryer to skim 200 watt hours off of every operating. We then turn around and buy a 350 watt television or a 500 watt computer.
Air-conditioning, heating (in some schemes), laundry and food storage have been energy bandits. But they aren't the blame anymore. Consumer electronics are now reaching the 50% mark of home energy consumption. And every time newer better electronics become cheaper and cheaper to operate, people buy more and more of them.
Think of this way... in 2005, a single person may have had a computer, a cell phone, a wireless router, a gaming console and a small tube tv.
By 2015, the same single person will probably have... a desktop, a laptop, a netbook, a tablet, a reader, a wireless cellular internet card, a smartphone, a wireless router/server, a 40"+ >200mhz television, a smaller secondary television, a dvr, a home data storage unit, a fiber line, multiple gaming consoles, a smart remote... and to top it all off, bluetooth everything.
I know at least two people who have increased the number of lights they owned and leave them on all the time because of CFLs. Their power bill is technically lower than what it use to be... but not by very much. I think they might be saving one kwh. They do have three times the amount of lights though!
I think what it comes down to is budgetary issues-- if your power bill has always been 300 dollars a month, you will continue to spend 300 dollars a month no matter how efficient or inefficient your appliances and electronics are.
And that could be said with gasoline as well. A large part of our economy is built on this notion.
It was in Time magazine recently where someone said Apple was the intersection of Liberal Arts and Technology. That it provides technology that has a more "human" touch to it.
Perhaps that's what we need more of! But I fear Liberal Arts intersection Architecture would just lead to a bunch of Beaux Arts beer halls and attaching as many naked bodies to every facade as possible.
Really quickly... I need some chic design ideas for tomato cages for my garden. Should I start a compitetion thread?
My son is way to smar and tricky. He knows that he gets a few jelly beans if he poops in the potty. So all day today he's been breaking it up into as many trips as he can just so he can have more jelly beans. That stinker!
Barry, Nam and Uni,
I've mentioned this paradox/postulate previous, but what struck me is that efficiency seems to work, only if it is coupled with a green tax.
SH - are your tomatoes trying to escape?
haha... that's funny...
or at least it is funny in my current deliriously jetlagged condition... it is 2:30 in the morning here and i'm to that point of tiredness where i'm so tired that i'm not tired... argh... must sleep so that i can be productive at the archive tomorrow...
hilarious sarah about the potty and the jelly beans
i haven't read anything about it lately, but i think the use of viruses in modifying genetic code is a real issue, is it? its along the same lines as how penicillin is made using genetically modified bacteria...isn't it? the viruses are denatured.
growing up we had lots of farmers who collected horse urine to make birth control pills (from the estrogen) but now that too is produced by bacteria according to my cousins, and the fields of birth-control horses are gone. my guess is we all are using the products of genetically modified creatures in daily life and are simply not aware of it.
the argument of jevons paradox i have heard before, but did not know there was a name that could be put to it. thanks for that awesome intro to the topic. now i need to work out how to sneak it into a lecture on modern architecture. environmental issues are so interestingly complicated.
btw, nick sowers post on the school blogs this week is quite good (of course) and worth reading, as are most of the blogs nowadays come to think on it. amazing stuff going on by interesting people.
This is definitely true, jump. Organic farmers have been fighting for labeling laws, but at this point it's still just the things that are organic that have to be labeled.
the danger of GMO is when plants are modified to be toxic and the possibility that the gene can escape into our food. Is there research into the health impacts of Bt modified corn & soy on humans? Is there research into other 'natural' pesticides when injested by humans? Are glow-in-the-dark jellyfish edible? That is what scares me, not the process of modification - it's more high-tech then mendalian breeding. but genes and the process of GMO this is not evil, it's what they can do/intended to do that may make them toxic and a health risk.
Farma goats lactating drugs is one this, but what happens if they manage to escape and procreate? Maybe we'll become amazing spidermen if we can lactate silk too. (not that silk milk would taste good).
OK, the truth is my main concern is this: could GMO corn negatively affect the taste of bourbon? I mean, we could be facing a major crisis, in the truest sense!
Awesome. I'm going to start an organic liquor label.
And haha funny. Didn't I tell you I planted killer tomatoes?
Hello Unicorn, welcome to my industry!
Since being introduced to the concepts of the Jevons paradox and Khazzoom–Brookes postulate I've been thinking a lot about them, not like I need anymore to keep me up at night (certainly not with this oil spill in the Gulf)...
Your points about home energy usage are good ones. It's ironic that people dispose of their "old energy hog TVs" to upgrade to a "new energy efficient flat screen model TV" when the reality is, that new flat screen actually uses a lot more than the old TV does. But HVAC is still currently the big winner in terms of energy consumption in the U.S., especially given that we have so many homes in northern climates. The good news is, heating and cooling systems are getting more efficient, for sure: the bad news is, everything else is creeping up. Here's a little pie chart that shows what the breakdown might be in 2035 based on forecasts from the U.S. Energy Information Administration:
So, consumer electronics are getting bigger, not quite to the 50% range, but frankly we are going to need renewable energy sources no matter which way we cut it, so might as well not worry too much about where it's going, just where it's coming from...
you know what really scares me? they just closed the front doors of the supreme court in usa out of fear. it feels like a defeat.
that chart is so true emily. i just bought new computer for office and home, and we are thinking to get one or two more now my wife and daughters are finding computers to be useful parts of their lives. japan has pretty good energy efficiency thing going on and we still dress warm instead of turn on the heat but i don't see how we can avoid using more energy not less. heck, even going to the movies nowadays requires booking seats by internet in advance. i wonder if nuclear power is enough to offset that rise? supposedly oil imports are still at their 1970's levels, but gotta wonder if that is sufficient ...
Emily, the figures I heard are mostly for really far south sunbelt states. But, yeah... 50% maybe a bit much.
We had rolling brown outs in Florida this year! With everyone having their electric heaters (and reverse heat pumps) on at the same time a few times over winter, the grid just couldn't take it! If I remember correctly, I think the biggest consumer of electricity in Florida is pool pumps.
Anyways... according to the DOE, consumer electronics sucked down 82 billion kilowatt hours in 2001. 2011's figure is suppose to be closer to 200 billion kilowatt hours.
2001 electrical uses. Just as another reference.
Oh also, home electrical demands would change significantly if we throw in the electrical cost of the internet into the factor!
The U.S.'s Internet energy consumption is at roughly 350 billion kWh per year. There's about what... 135,000,000 households in the US? That's 2,600 kWh per house per year. If we say that half the internet usage in the US was for business use, that's still 1,300 kWh per house. With electrical usage around 11,000 kWh yearly, 1,300 kWh is a significant number!?!
I wonder what the electrical usage of cable is? And how much energy does the cellphone network eat up?
I think I want glow in the dark Tomatoes....so I can pick them at night without a Flashlight. Now that is a killer idea....thinking we can bring the Tomates to market faster if the field laborers could pick at night.....
I think I want glow in the dark Grapes....so I can pick them at night without a Flashlight. Now that is a reall killer idea....only if I can make them "Organic".....Can you imagine the wine sales...of glow in the dark "Organic Wines", known as "Purple Haze"
Hi all-
Great discussion. Anyone see this article in the NYT. This is the reason why I'm not a fan of GMO's. I don't like the idea of creating restistant weeds which in turn could turn into invasive species. We already have plenty of invasive species that we have to combat, why create even more?
all this talk about gmo's has me thinking about this fellow
feed me seymour!
I love those charts. That one by uni is a great device if one thinks about it to show people a simple way to reduced energy consumption in their home...
Sorry if I'm curt today, my head is down trying to mark papers and have a session to mark portfolios in a few
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