Posted by Graham in : General , collapse , survivalism ,
After three weeks of sub-zero temperatures and snow and ice in many parts, Ireland, like much of the rest of Europe, is experiencing considerable difficulty in continuing its post-industrial lifestyle.
Supplies of salt for the roads are stretched, and also gas supplies with industry being told to use coal or oil instead.
So far the main routes are being kept open and food supplies are getting through to all but the most remote households, but with ice storms on their way in the next few days from the east expected to worsen conditions in Europe and here over the weekend, shortages could become an issue. Already potato crops have been affected with thousands of tons of unharvested spuds destroyed in farms a round the country.
Water is also an issue in many towns and cities, with increased demand apparently caused by people staying at home more, and losses due to frozen pipes.
Some homes have also been without electricity as storms and snow damage lines and maintenance vehicles find it hard to reach them.
Already the schools have been closed for next week, and this includes my own college so Ill be grounded for the moment. Martin, who is from Chicago, thinks it is a joke the country is coming to a standstill. Hasn’t anyone here heard of snow tyres? Apparently not, Ive never heard mention of them.
It is 30-50 year events like these that test our mettle and preparedness- as a nation we are failing miserably, such disruption interferes with the Great Plan of Keep on Growing the Economy. We are just not set up for hunkering down and doing as little as possible- sledging and snowball flinging excepted.
What might have seemed fun for some up till now has been a real hardship for others, but the real question is, how long will it last? If they are already closing the schools it hardly looks like the authorities will be able to be more organised than they already are.
It looks highly likely to remain unchanged for the next two weeks but seemingly the last Big Freeze, sometime in the 1960s, lasted well into March, even April in some parts. Another 6-8 weeks of this is surely not something this country is ready for.
I’m someone who is supposed to be more prepared than most, but in truth I am only half way there.
Ive spent some of the time coppiceing next winter’s wood supply, the perfect activity for this time of year and weather, the first warming from the cutting of the wood being very welcome.
I have left the van over the bridge because the steep hill up here has been so icy, so it is possible to drive carefully and slowly into town, but I have only been out once this week and am keeping journeys to a minimum.
The cabin really comes into its own with the low winter sun warming the interior to a cosy 18 degrees most days by 11am. I don’t really need to light the range until the evening. Current wood supplies are probably OK for another three weeks; I could stretch it out longer if need be.
Water will be the first to go. It currently freezes each night but thaws out by lunch time. However, my main supply is currently rain water off a shed roof in a 1300L tank. With careful use I only have another maybe 8 or 10 days if there is no precipitation. I havnt investigated the well yet but presumably can break the ice and carry buckets.
One thing I have ample of is solar electricity. The sun is warm on the rocks and dazzling each day. No SAD this year! The electric chainsaw is getting some use, but otherwise apart from the computer I have far more power than I can use- not a situation I ever envisaged at this time of year.
I had made no special preparations for food but have a stock that would see me through a couple of weeks at least if I couldn’t get out at all, including two sacks of Bantry CSA spuds, and a supply of rice and pulses. There is still a couple of large squashes in the store and a few shallots left, but very little in the garden- just some leeks and a little kale. Oh, and some artichokes for when all else fails!
Contact with the immediate neighbours has been more frequent which has been nice, otherwise very quiet, leaving one to dwell on what real survival conditions would feel like, and whether, if the weather continues for long, it will come to that, and if it will be anything like the scenes from Cormac Mccarthy’s novel, now just released as a film, The Road .
Posted by Graham in : Health , Science and Rationaltiy ,
I paid a short visit to my parents in the UK during the Winterval, but by the time I got there I had developed full-blown tonsillitis and spent most of the time feverish and delerious in bed.
Fortunately I was able to get to a doctor who took my temperature, peered down my throat, made the diagnosis- my father had already guessed correctly- and prescribed some antibiotics. The visit lasted only a few minutes- there was no time for a lengthy lifestyle analysis or discussion of my psychological state and so could hardly be called “holistic” but the whole experience was pleasant one, the doctor was chatty and very affable, I hadnt even had to wait long, and most importantly, within 24 hours I had made a miraculous recovery and had no barely symptoms left at all after 48hours.
Now, this is just anecdotal of course and proves nothing- maybe I would have got better anyway- but since this was a very rare trip to the doctor- my mother refers to all doctors as “quacks” – it seems worth noting that it was as pleasant and as trouble-free an experience as I could have hoped for.
However, as I sat in the waiting room I couldnt help noticing a prominent sign advertising the services of Homeopaths and Reflexologists; if I hadnt been so sick and had there been more time I would have loved to have asked the kind doctor his views on promoting such fraudulent “remedies” in his surgery, and to have had a chat about evidence-based medicine and the public perception of in general.
All this is by way of prelude to drawing your attention to the new 10:23 campaign in the UK: “Homeopathy- there’s nothing in it”.
http://www.1023.org.uk/
This campaign is tackling head on the inconsistent postion of high street pharmacists like Boots who claim to have the best interests of their customers at heart and yet sell sugar pills and water as medicine.
One of the main excuses of homeopaths is that their methods are more “holistic”- they incude a lengthy interview covering many detials of the patients’ personal life before making proscribing the remedy, while allopathic medicine “only treats the symptoms”- the implication here is that there is always some kind of emotional/psychologiclal/spiritual component to illness.
Apart from the fact that this is largely mystical mumbo-jumbo- my tonsillitis for example was caused by the bacterium actinomyces and not by some kind of negative energy in my chakras- this whole process is side-stepped by the fact that anyone can just walk into a chemists’ shop and buy whatever type of sugar pill they fancy straight off the shelf. If homeopaths themsleves think that remedies should only be given by a trained practitioner after lengthy holistic interviews surely they should be coming on board fully behind the 10:23 campaign themselves.
The other aspect of this is that belief in quack medicine is inherently anti-science. I could give loads of examples from conversations I have had with mystically minded folk. Start by telling them that there is no scientific evidence to support the efficiacy of things like homeopathy and they will recount anecdotes along the lines of “homeopathy cured my hamster”, even though many conditions people seek treatments for- like the ‘flu- are self-limiting.
If like me you are more insistent, 9 times out of 10 they will attack science in general as being biased- “science has been wrong before” “science doesnt know everything” or most infuriatingly invoke something they call “the observer effect”- the idea that you can discount any scientific evidence whenever it suits you on the basis that the observer will affect what is being observed, possibly on the quantum level.
The claim here is that their own opinions are more vaild- infallible even- and less biased than science, which just displays a complete ignorance of the scientific method, which is by definition an attempt to overcome our own personal, subjective bias. Anecdotes are not evidence; lots of anecdotes do not constitute data.
I recently was discussing evidence-based medicine with a herbalist who had just completed a degree. I asked him about whether he had looked at clinical trials during his degree course; he had to some extent, but was quite happy to tell me that he didnt think it necessary to have evidence for everything.
His real interest it turned out was plant-spirit medicine and shamanism (which were not you will be relieved to hear covered on the degree); the degree was just a front to give more credibility for what he was really practicing. Since he made his own preperations from home-grown herbs I asked him how he could control the concentrations of active ingredients, which could vary wildly from plant to plant; his response was just to shrug his shoulders and say, “I know I make good stuff, the clients like it and know it is good stuff”. In other words, weather the treatments worked or not was immaterial; all that counts is can he sell them.
Another conversation I had on this topic was with someone I would certainly expect to support the role of science in the environmental movement, specifically climate change. When she questioned the value of evidence-based medicine, I pointed out that clinical trials on medical treatments are routine and trivial compared to say the incredibly complex body of evidence from many different scientific disciplines accumulated over decades that constitutes climate science; yet the evidence that homeopathy and other “alternative” therapies do not work is much less ambiguous than the evidence for climate change. I was shocked that her response was that there is no scientifc consensus on climate change, that science is all just a matter of opinion.
Quack medicine is not just an assault on science and reason but appears to lead people to abandon even the most basic standards of ethics, honesty and common sense.
Unfortunately, as I have covered on Zone5 many times, the environmental movement seems to have no discernment when it comes to quack medicine. Wherever you see the word “Green” or “Organic” you can be sure the homeopaths and the herbalists will not be far behind. Alternative therapists seem to make up a significant part of the environmental movement in general and are keen to protect their public image of progressive, natural and holistic alternatives to the nasty world of Big Pharma.
In fact, the persistence of these practices undermine our ability to understand and respnd to the much more serious issues confronting us and make the green movement the laughing stock of the more rational sections of society, and thereby feeds the climate change deniers’ case.
The 10:23 Campaign looks like being the start of a more direct way of tackling these issues head on, let’s all get behind it.
More information on this week’s episode on the Pod Delusion:
http://poddelusion.co.uk/blog/
Fascinating account of the inside world of CAM and more insights into homeopathy here:
http://aillas.blogspot.com/2009/12/open-university-perspectives-on.html
Posted by Graham in : General ,
I am honoured to be included amongst some very illustrious and far more deserving names onto John Gibbons’ list of Those Making a Difference in 2009.
From the Irish Times Dec. 24th 2009. Full text below.
Seasonal salute to those making a difference
A mix of new voices and seasoned campaigners – here is a list of people at the front line of the ecological crunch, writes JOHN GIBBONS
THE YEAR ending was to have been the one when the world finally got to grips with climate change. Instead, post-Copenhagen, the global community “is left resembling an alcoholic who has decided to save up for a liver transplant rather than give up drink”, as a recent editorial in the Guardian newspaper put it dryly.
However, it’s Christmas Eve, and even this column has to take one week off every year to look on the positive side. And since my editor is probably off wrapping my present, this is the perfect opportunity to sneak in a non-peer-reviewed and entirely unscientific list of people who helped make a difference in 2009. Some will be offended at being omitted; others may well be offended at being included; apologies all round in advance. (more…)
Posted by Graham in : General ,
Jehovah! Jehovah! Jehovah!
The Atheist blogroll is a community building service provided free of charge to Atheist bloggers from around the world. If you would like to join, visit Mojoey at Deep Thoughts for more information. Ill add in the blogroll to my sidebar once i figure out how to do it.
That seems the most appropriate way to start the new year given that I want to announce that Zone5 is now officially listed on the Atheist Blogroll while Ireland sees the instigation of its new Blasphemy Law . The 25 Blaspemous quotes quoted here by Atheist Ireland make for hilarious reading, but especially dont miss No 25:
Dermot Ahern, Irish Minister for Justice , introducing his blasphemy law at an Oireachtas Justice Committee meeting, 2009, and referring to comments made about him personally: “They are blasphemous.” Deputy Pat Rabbitte replied: “Given the Minister’s self-image, it could very well be that we are blaspheming,” and Minister Ahern replied: “Deputy Rabbitte says that I am close to the baby Jesus, I am so pure.” So here we have an Irish Justice Minister joking about himself being blasphemed, at a parliamentary Justice Committee discussing his own blasphemy law, that could make his own jokes illegal.Blasphemy is certainly a bizarre concept in the modern world where we prefer to operate within frameworks such as “democracy” and “freedom of speech”.
The Irish government’s excuse for this appears to be that because ireland is becoming more multicultural these days, there are now lots more ways that people might take offence, so we need laws to protect them. There will be a widespread suspicion though that this law has been sponsored by the Catholic Church perhaps to deflect critisism of its apparent true function of instituionalised of child rape.
The whole thing begs the question of what is a religion of course, and indeed atheism as well as “science” and “rationality” are themselves often called a religion- by the religious, or by religious apologists- as a way of denigrating reason and skepticism, which is odd since you would think that, if religions are “true” then atheism should, to the religious, gain in stature should they take on the religious mantel… paradox upon paradox…
Another interesting case of this was that of Tim Nicholson who was sacked for contesting some of his companies’ policies on environmental grounds:
The case involved Tim Nicholson, 42, who was laid off last year from his job as head of sustainability at Grainger Plc, Britain’s largest residential-property company. Nicholson contended he was laid off because his views on the environment were not shared by Grainger executives, and he sued the company for unfair dismissal under Britain’s six-year-old Religion and Belief Regulations, which make it unlawful to discriminate against a person on the grounds of their religious or philosophical beliefs. Grainger argued that Nicholson’s climate-change convictions did not qualify for protection under the law. But in a landmark ruling on Nov. 3, Justice Michael Burton found that “a belief in man-made climate change, and the alleged resulting moral imperatives, is capable, if genuinely held, of being a philosophical belief for the purpose of [the 2003 law].”
This might be good for Mr. Nicholson but is a disaster for the environmental movement, which must promote itself as being based on science and reason if it is to retain any credibility at all. Many aspects of environmentalism, from Biodynamics to Fairy-worship, the naturalistic fallacies of the organic Movement and the de-la-la land of quack medicine could indeed be properly seen as faith-based and therefore religious, and should be rejected by self-respecting environmentalists, but climate change does not come into that category, despite being frequently critisised as such by climate deniers.
This whole issue is all the more relevant and disturbing given another story from this very young year of 2010, of a near fatal attack on the Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard who has been living under police protection since his 2006 cartoon of the prophet Mohammed with a bomb under his turban produced death threats from sections of the Mulsim community.
It seems horrific that the government of Ireland should pass laws to appease groups like this: “Say anything that makes our religion look anything but peace-loving and we’ll kill you!”
Perhaps there are however some cases in which blaspemy does indeed go too far, and some kind of legal restraints may need to be invoked to protect those who, like myself, follow The One True Faith:
Posted by Graham in : Kinsale , Permaculture , Renewable Energy , Tools and technology ,
It is now exactly 6 months since I set up my 600watt at Derryduff.
Having now reached the shortest days of the year I am in a position to evaluate its performance, and I can say it has served me very well. Obviously there has been a huge difference in power availability between summer and winter, but in fact the last 10 days here have seen constant sunshine -along with freezing temperatures- and I have probably had more power so far in December than October.
As I said in the earlier post, on a system like this you cut your cloth according to your measure, so giving an account of my energy consumption would be misleading- I would use more electricity if i had it! In fact though I use and need very little- on average 1-2Kwh/day would be loads to run computer, one or two lights, radio and some power tool use. Some days I would use more, and I made good use of an electric chainsaw during the longer days. The only major increase in power consumption is likely to come from a washing machine which I intend to get in the near future, the model I am looking at only uses 1.2kw per cycle, and would easily be achievable on any sunny day any time of the year.
I did run short of power a couple of weeks ago and have invested in a small petrol generator as a back up, mainly to protect the batteries, and to ensure I need never be without some power if I want it. I have only had to run the generator on a handful of evenings during cloudy weather when I have run the batteries down with power tools during the day; it would not however be too much of a hardship to do without the generator and only use power when available.
To increase power availability I could put up a wind turbine, but at this stage it might be better to invest in more batteries- I only have approx. 1000Amph storage at present- and maybe a couple more PV panels. This might be sufficient as I dont expect to be increasing my electricity consumption drastically any time soon. The great advantage of PV over wind is that there are no moving parts, no maintenance and they are modular- I can add in more panels whenever I have some spare cash.
In short I am satisfied that I can live just on a modest solar array even in cloudy gray Ireland. For my situation it has been a good option; for a family of four, maybe not unless supplemented by wind.
Best of all, the range was free- many thanks to Liam and Ger who were replacing it with an oil burner, and to Ciara who pointed them in my direction!
We also got to play with the PV demonstration panel we have at the Kinsale college.
The meter reads 3.19 amps from an 80watt panel.
Posted by Graham in : Food , Human Ecology , Overshoot , Population , book review , climate change , collapse , water ,
Peak Water Civilisation and the World’s Water Crisis
Alexander Bell
Luath Press 2009
Hardback 208 pp
If oil supply peaks and begins to decline times will be hard. Standard of living will decline and people may go hungry but they will be able to adapt by powering down and making do with less.
If water supply- for domestic use but also for irrigation- peaks and declines people have no option but to migrate.
UK journalist Alexander Bell spells out his thesis starkly in this fascinating and clearly written book: many of the world’s major regions are past or on the brink of peak water and face growing populations with declining supplies. (more…)
Posted by Graham in : General ,
Probably only friends and people who know me well will know that before I became interested in gardening and all things permacultural I was in fact a passionate chessplayer. This is way back in my youth, when for a few years while still at school I filled most of my free time studying chess books – the Sicilian Dragon, Rook and Pawn endings, the games of Bobby Fischer- and traveled to chess tournaments at weekends.
Although I dreamed of Grandmasterdom and did achieve some local success and did well in a few junior competitions, I was never a serious contender, which was just as well because it would probably have lead to a narrower and less richly fulfilled life than the one I have been blessed with.
I hardly play at all these days, not being anywhere near a chess club, and not inspired to play chess online (yet) but still regularly follow the top matches with great interest. Some of the players still competing at the highest levels are familiar to me still- the UK no. 1 Nigel Short is my contemporary and I remember seeing him play when still a teenager at the Britsh Championships in Brighton some 30 years ago.
As it happens Short is playing in a major event in London this week, the London Chess Classic where he is up against among others two of the top players in the world, ex-world champion Vladimir Kramnik and the Norwegian phenomenon Magnus Carlsen who at just 18years of age is currently the world number 1.
I was gratified and surprised then to read a story on Chess Vibes by Arne Moll in which the author weaves together the themes of his early skepticism about chess computers with… climate change skepticism:
During the last few days, with the eyes of the entire world on the Copenhagen Climate Summit while climate ‘skeptics’ demand equal time in the debate and attempt to confuse public opinion with misinformation and politically motivated arguments, I was often reminded of how I myself used to look at chess computers in the 90s. As aggravated as I am now about the lowly tactics of today’s climate skeptics, I’m afraid back in the days I was a kind of computer-skeptic, too, in the sense that I found it very, very hard to believe chess engines could ever replace or imitate the best of human chess thinking. I simply couldn’t imagine a lifeless machine suggesting a subtle long-term positional exchange sacrifice.
He goes onto give a very good definition of a skeptic as being someone who will change their view if new evidence comes along but points out rather astutely that -from the point of view of a climate change denier- “Being a skeptic is only useful if the evidence is on your side”. It is worth reading down through the comments on the Chess Vibes article and comparing them with discussions on climate change sites- I am gratified that most of the chess fans there seem very rational and well able to handle the nuanced arguments about the science of climate change, and the nature of science in general.
While the likes of Carlsen and Short battle it out over the 64 black and white squares in London a much more serious challenge is taking place inside and out of the conference halls in Copenhagen. Though the chances may be slim, lets hope a strategy can be found that doesnt involve too many unsound sacrifices, and the professional climate change deniers, working so hard around the clock to misrepresent the science, can be once and for all checkmated.
Brilliant debunking of the leaked emails by Unity here.
Posted by Graham in : General ,
I just listened to the debate on the Pat Kenny show on Wednesday between Australian mining magnate and climate change denier Ian Pilmer and Irish Times journalist Pat Kenny. It is really hard to know whether Kenny is as ignorant on the subject of climate change as he makes out or whether he to is directly or indirectly in the pay of Big Oil/Gas/Coal etc..
He claimed the next day that only one comment was received by the show in support of John- is that in any way credible?! I couldnt listen on the day but heard the archived version of the show today and sent in my response to the pat Kenny show:
Dear Pat
I just listened to the “debate” between Ian Pilmer and John Gibbons which was broadcast on your show on Wednesday December 2nd.
At this stage in the game, with the evidence for anthropogenic climate change so clear and the predictions form the climate models that Pilmer dismisses coming in right on time- viz the recent flooding due to increased sea surface temperature in the this country- it is truly shocking to have the national broadcaster be involved with such a misrepresentation of the science. The climate is changing right under our very noses, destroying lives and livelihoods not just for the poor in far away places but our very own friends and neighbors here at home.
Pilmer is indeed a charlatan and John was very brave to call him that on air; he has already been completely discredited by George Monbiot whose criticisms of his book have not been in any way addressed by Pilmer; you are surely aware of this.
While it is completely obvious that many in the mining industry have clear vested interests, and the evidence for an orchestrated climate denial industry has been clear since before Kyoto, the suggestion that Gibbons and other journalists have a vested interest in fear-mongering is outrageous and absurd.
Your stance of “showing both sides of the argument” is completely corrupt ; you may as well ask respectable scientists and journalists to debate the flat earth society for “balance”.
The damage you are doing as a climate change denier to the public understanding of the most important scientific issue of our time is severe; in my opinion you have forfeited your right to play the role you have and wiled the influence you you. You should resign from your position on RTE and retire to your home where you at least will be presumably sufficiently well healed to survive the coming catastrophe.
Sincerely
Graham Strouts
The charge of a religious faith-based approach on the side of the established science is one we are familiar with whenever debating quackery or pseudo-science; an excellent overview of how science actually works is found here on RealClimate.
Posted by Graham in : Atheism , Podcast , Science and Rationaltiy , climate change ,
This week’s Pod Delusion features a fascinating interview with the wonderful Ariane Sherine, creator of the Atheist Bus campaign and editor of the one essential Christmas gift this year, The Atheists’ Guide to Christmas.
The Atheists’ Guide is a brilliant anthology of atheist and science writing, comedy, fiction and even a section on silly party games, and the best thing about it is that half the profits go to the Terrence Higgins’ Trust
Pod Delusion #11 also includes some other great topical material on the Climate change email leaks (yes, these prove beyond doubt that climate change is a scam) and the new campaign against Boots for selling homeopathic remedies that they admit don’t work. Don’t miss!
