We can't make the days longer

so lets just try and make them better.

[theysayicanchangeit]

We are now in a climate change emergency

For over hundred years we have known that releasing increased quantities of carbon gases into our atmosphere is going to raise the global temperature and ultimately this will raise sea levels. Well, it has. We have to adapt, or suffer.

Our northern hemisphere air conditioning (the Arctic sea ice cover) has been transformed.  We are beginning to pay a very high price.  We must address this, through an emergency break on our fossil fuel consumption and farm animal husbandry. 

By 2005 the oldest sea ice was seriously denuded (old ice is red). The UN first warned of this in 1992.

By 2015 it was obliterated.

by 2018 we are down to 1% (1 part in 100) being older than 4 years old.  Gulp! 2018 Arctic Report Card: https://youtu.be/XntO9a-NpeM

[theysayicanchangeit]

Listening to the Conservative Party Conference today I am struck by how they can preach on the virtues of Brexit for business and the economy when the vast majority of business and economists were, and still are, against Brexit! The answer, is simple, ideology and the desire for power. They, like all 'faith communities', believe, without any hard evidence, that their vision is right and they won't have anything bad said about it, what ever holes the congregation see in the arguments. Lets hope they see the light soon and recant!

[theysayicanchangeit]

Bank bullying enters biometric dimension

Okay, I used FirstDirect because I wanted a telephone bank.  Now I don’t want a telephone bank.  Why?

I rarely call them these days and when I did call today they asked if they could use my voice print to log me in through security.  No I said.  I explained that I had a perfect system today; numbers and letters in my head and only known to me.  I am sure their system is less than perfect and less than 100% secure so why would I want to increase my attack profile and surrender some of my security.  Because its quicker, she says (her orthogonal reply assures me she isn’t listening to me).  No thanks says I. In that case she says, sweet as arsenic, I have to tell you that we will use your voice anyway for anti fraud protection.  What‽ , is that a threat or a promise?  You are bulling me! No we aren’t, we will not use your voice print for security.  I do/did not give you permission to voice print me (period) and yet you intend to use it for fraud prevention. Don’t care she says (still says the same after she has gone away and talked to her minder) we will do it anyway (use my voice for fraud prevention).  Okay, how‽ , without making a voice print (which is ultra sensitive personal information - to me at least), says I.  By listening to calls and checking if it sounds like you.  Now, hang on a minute, say I.  IF, you haven’t got my voice print, how will your computer do that!  It won’t she says, a person will listen!  [So, if she is to be believed, each time I call, some one is going to listen to me on an old call first (a psychic to know I going to call) and then listen in as I talk to the person I have been transferred to?].   I express my doubts but she assures me this is true and ‘nothing will have changed since I refused to allow them to record and use my voice print’.  I read recently that the UK’s Data Protection Act (DPA) is, according to the EU Commission, a defective implementation of Directive 95/46/EC and we can’t be told why, as publishing that would cause irreparable damage to international relations between the UK and the European Union (as confirmed in ICO Decision Notice FS50577377). Will the ICO be of any use supporting me or has it become too ‘business friendly’ and abandoned keeping up with technology and the public's interest?

[theysayicanchangeit]

Is exaggeration for effect okay?

I just heard Myron Ebell tell ‘The World at One’ that Donald Trump often exaggerated for effect and then when negotiations started drew back.  Okay, if this is his business style, fine, his choice but should we accept the same attitude when it comes to Climate Change, Muslims, military build up, trade negotiations, etc. Should the opposition behave similarly?

You know, I expect selective facts.  I also expect partial truths.  It is understandable that you don’t wish to present your opponent, with a free point (don’t we all do this sometimes?) BUT I am convinced that exaggeration is lying dressed up in soft language.  Untruth by either side in an argument is to be rooted out then the facts can be debated. 

So many hard decisions have to be made where ‘the facts’ have to be weighed, for and against. For me, saying, yes I accept your fact(s) however this fact of mine out weighs it is acceptable BUT introducing exaggeration in to this introduces a variable too far.  I sense a weakness in anyone who relies upon an opening gambit of exaggeration.  Quickly their statements are dismissed, because we don’t know what they mean, where will they roll back to.  Further, a sensible opposition will use the exaggeration to garner additional and stronger support than if you had taken a measured honest fact based stance from the start.  Yes, in taking the truthful approach, your weight on a particular matter might be debated e.g. Trump / Ebell have argued that the economic effects of Climate Change are minimal and the costs are huge (I think they are wrong), but saying “I don’t accept the scientific evidence that climate change is real”, as an exaggerated opening position, flies in the face of accepted reality.  It doesn’t advance debate or understanding, it only just muddies the pond.

‘Truth will out’. Shakespeare: The Merchant of Venice, 1596.

[theysayicanchangeit]

Irony of Canada’s oil sands

I read today about 400 plus small modular reactors (SMR) being planned for the 20′s.  They would be integral molten salt nuclear reactors and projected to push power production down to 1 cent per kWh.   They would be seal units, fuelled for life.  Recycling would then be closed cycle.  A prototype ran from 1964 to 1969 without fuss.

What would they be used for?  Creating steam to drive oil out of tar sands!  Its a mad mad world, but if this is the only way we can get cheap clean safe power production, lets bring it on! http://www.nextbigfuture.com/2017/01/terrestrial-energy-notifies-nuclear.html

[theysayicanchangeit]

The rich get richer whilst the poor get poorer.

In 2012 the richest person’s fortune was 60 billion.  By mid 2016 it was 90 billion dollars - a result of the ‘recovery’.  Nice. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZf53TcyRQ4&feature=youtu.be&t=18m50s

If you listen through a little to 22:00 you will hear that the bottom 10% of people fortunes fell over the last generation (a much longer period).

Thank you Professor Richard Wolff for bringing this to me.

https://wef.ch/2hUHGcF

#inequality

[theysayicanchangeit]

GM increased yield of 15% in an experimental crop

Genetic breakthrough: Crops helped to use more sunlight to grow. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-37988439

Given a substantial fraction of the planets population already spend 100% of their income on food and our need to provide 70% more food by 2050, something has to be done. 

[theysayicanchangeit]

Freakonomics Radio - How to Make a Bad Decision

http://www.stitcher.com/podcast/freakonomics-radio/e/48273174?autoplay=true

Humans are just walking bias machines!  A reason to automate?

[theysayicanchangeit]

Will your job be automated?

The BBC article in September 2015 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-34066941 suggested that tens of millions of jobs would be automated in the next 20 years.  I’d just like to point out they have 19 years left to their prediction and none have fallen yet.  I can send you a copy of the original research “THE FUTURE OF EMPLOYMENT: HOW SUSCEPTIBLE ARE JOBS TO COMPUTERISATION? ∗ Carl Benedikt Frey † and Michael A. Osborne ‡ September 17, 2013“ but you can probably find it for yourself.  Anyway, I think they may be quite wrong.  You see, as soon as people believe it will come true they will react and push back.  We/They all get one vote and unless you find some way to keep them from voting this unemployment and penury in to a black hole, it just won’t be allowed to happen.  Think Brexit, think Trump.

[theysayicanchangeit]

Hyperinflation or a race to the bottom?

Traditionally QE / printing money leads to hyperinflation in an economy.  This is old school and I argue that in the set of circumstances we are in, is not the case.  

Historically it has been the case that when one economy's or a number of poorly linked economy's do it, then hyperinflation soon follows.  When closely linked economy's do it or most are doing it then the competition is for deflation, and or for the lowest negative rate, that predominates. Negative rates are attempts to gain competitive advantage.  If you are not getting competitive advantage from the lower rate then you must go lower or do something else.  "Something else" is in short supply and so the pressure is for lower, for longer - a race to the bottom. 

Today we have competitive low / negative rates:

Swiss National Bank: -0.75%

Sweden’s Riksbank: -0.5%

European Central Bank: -0.4%

Bank of Japan: -0.1%

Bank of England: 0.25%

U.S. Federal Reserve: 0.4%

Reserve Bank of Australia: 1.5%

This is broken capitalism at work not creating a boom but scraping the barrel towards a bust - may be a mega-bust of falling asset values.

When will the people, the governments see that this repeated failure of capitalism is a feature and not a curable fault of the system.  A system that consolidates wealth and power in the hands of an ever tightening few.  When will the peoples of the world see that a great Post Capitalism future exists and the sooner we scrap - not fix, but scrap - the proven failed system of organisation and move on to a more stable and equitable economic system, the better.

http://happyplanetindex.org/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Happiness_Report

https://www.oxfam.org/en/pressroom/pressreleases/2016-01-18/62-people-own-same-half-world-reveals-oxfam-davos-report

[theysayicanchangeit]

Seeking autarky has been tried before

Autarky, as a policy goal, has been a feature of every fascist state.  What now for the UK?  Our future isn’t written.

[theysayicanchangeit]

The UK is no longer a democracy

Professor Larry Diamond describes democracy as having four characteristic features: 

* A political system for free and fair elections for choosing and replacing a government.

* Citizens active in the civic and political life of the state.

* Equal human rights protected for all.

* A legal system applied equally to all citizens.

I argue there are countless examples that show that none of these apply in the UK any more.   I wonder how many countries are democracies by this definition?

Is it any wonder that populations world wide are so cynical about politics? 

[theysayicanchangeit]

I was thrown an idea today, to define a “free range human”, only to find the concept was well defined already.

[labourpress]

Priti Patel should come clean and tell us which rights she wants to cut - Angela Eagle

Angela Eagle MP, Shadow First Secretary of State and Shadow Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, commenting following prominent Brexit campaigner Priti Patel’s calls for cuts to rights at work, said:

“The mask has slipped. Tory and UKIP campaigners for Brexit are determined to leave the EU so they can slash rights at work.

“These are the rights that working people depend on; from paid holidays, to parental leave and protection from discrimination. Priti Patel should come clean and tell us which rights she wants to cut.

“The EU is good for businesses and good for working people too. It protects workers’ rights, and makes us all better off. That’s why Labour is campaigning hard to remain.”

[theysayicanchangeit]

A friend keeps on banging on about “post reality truth”.  I see a worker voting for Brexit as like a turkey voting for Christmas.  This is Priti Patel trying to create a post reality truth.  I can’t believe the people of the UK will be so deceived‽

[theysayicanchangeit]

A member of the "fifth estate" standing up to be counted.

I particularly like new portmanteau words like “corporalitic” smuggled in (see if you can find “corporalitic elites”).  I wonder does it allude to ‘corporate arthritic’ of ‘corporation politic’; let me know your view. Good luck to the blogster, for putting their thoughts ‘out there’.  I wish more did the same, I’m tired of the same news what ever mainstream channel I’m reading / watching / listening to.

[theysayicanchangeit]

Product, price, place and promotion are passé. Consumer wants and needs, cost to satisfy, convenience to buy and communication or the catechism for our times.

Bob Lauterborn Lauterborn, B. (1990). New Marketing Litany: Four Ps Passé: C-Words Take Over. [Online] Available from: http://rlauterborn.com/pubs/pdfs/4_Cs.pdf [Accessed 7th December 2015].

[theysayicanchangeit]

A day out in Birmingham on the bike might be nice, I said.  Lets look for a City motorbike parking map - oh good the council have one - http://www.birmingham.gov.uk/bikinginbrum It says “Birmingham City Council recognizes the benefits of motorcycles to the city centre and wants to highlight the facilities available".

Trois! 3 !!  Only three !!!  You clearly don’t recognize the benefits of bikes then do you!