Friday, December 11, 2009

Renewable Energy for the Poor Nations

If poor villages in impoverished countries want green electricity in their community I have a few suggestions to get it happening. Renewable energy systems are perfect for their situations if they live in isolated small villages as individual mini systems can be put in separately. If enough happen, they can be put on a grid. Wind power, solar power and methane generators are perfect.

One way is to get a charity, or to create a charity, where people or organisations can "Give Power to the Poor", so that the village clinic, school and/or community centre can have a power supply. Of course it would be tax deductible and with advertising rights.

Another way is to create a cottage industry for the locals, like with micro-economic loans, where a workshop with the power supply supplying power. That way, by making their product they can buy the stuff back for their own benefit. As this is actively more empowering then a charitable handout system, it may get more co-operation from proud people. However, consulting the people about which power supply and which industry is probably wise, as trying to impose it on them is just rude. When looking at products to produce, local resources are a key factor. If there is lots of sand and not much water, glass products could be better then nurseries. If there is lots of water but not much metal, nurseries or pickled fish may be the way.

Another way is to do a swap. If they work for a certain time for the U.N. or a charity, they, as a community can earn themselves a wind turbine, or solar panels, or a methane generator. That way, again, it isn't just a handout, and helps the people feel like they got it themselves, which is resentment free for all involved and dignified.

Sunday, December 6, 2009

What To Do If Woodchipping Leaves Town

If you are living somewhere where the main form of income for the town is woodchipping and pulp, it can be devastating to the community if the company closes. Here is an idea for a back up plan for those effected by the changes in supply and demand, fashion and business viability.
Hand crafted furniture, household goods, art and craft are always popular. Good quality items make the same primary product - wood - vastly more valuable at the point of purchase. Handcrafted work by respected craftspeople increase with value as it antiquifies (gets old). Learning skills in wood turning, carpentry, cabinet making, wood carving, etc. to make artifacts that are both practical (useful) and aesthetic (looks good) are a way to stay in the wood game (I'm presuming you live where wood is), raise the value of your product, and use less of your resources more effectively. You could diversify from small, relatively cheap objects like cheese boards or picture frames, to big stuff like wardrobes or bars. It also uses less energy and is far more satisfying as a worker then feeding the wilderness (and your lives) into a machine.
If paper pulping was the industry, recycling paper is very fashionable and moves with the current methodology and attitudes. Recycling office paper and newspapers to make new office paper is both economical for the producer and savvy for the environment. Creating other recycled paper products like toilet paper has a very loyal customer base. Also, hand-made paper recycling for cottage industries is a loved product by people who love all things crafty and rustic. Cards, art supplies, and unique writing paper and envelopes are products that people will pay far more for then mass produced "Hallmark" styled items. And they are more enjoyable to produce for the worker, as it is more creative and has very little guilt involved, feeling more like being part of something to be proud of telling your youth about.

Sex Drive and Evolution

Animals from temperate regions reserve sexual activities to the late winter/early spring period every year, so that there is plenty of food and energy for the gestating female and the young offspring, as well as there being plenty of food (numbers and other species) for the hunters of the ecology. They also tend to migrate a fair bit, for food and water supplies. Animals from tropical regions have an all year round supply of food, so tend, like the plants, to breed all year round. They do not need to migrate so much as they have all they need.
From this we can deduce that humans must have evolved primarily in tropical regions, as they tend to breed, or copulate, any time of the year. However, it is common to see a lot of people coupling up in spring, and less so in winter (more often break ups), so temperate influences must have effected our evolution, but it is definitely secondary in it's influence.
Also, being monogamous seems to be the vast majorities presumption, although most do not remain in the same monogamous relationship for life. Pairing permanently seems fairly rare when choice is involved. Serial monogamy, with one or two being very long term, is the most common "how it turns out". Polygamy seems rare, and temporary, whether the person(s) are male or female. Usually if more then two are involved in a romantic relationship, there is tensions involved with the truth being denied. However, some rare folk manage different systems by pragmatic and mature methods, using honesty and sensibility.
Status, like most animals, seems to effect behaviour in the mating habits of people.
Also, in the animal world, sexual activity, promiscuity and time spent rutting, determines the shape and size of their groins. If they mate for life, such as birds, they tend to have small penises and don't spend much time in the act. They don't need to, because procreation is mostly guaranteed once they have a mate. They spend more energy looking pretty, clever, good at nesting and/or tough to win the female in the beginning.
However, if the female is promiscuous, having either many partners in one impregnation, such as insects, or changes partners seasonally, the males get bigger penises, spend more time in the act, and get fancy adaptions (like spores or knobs or the ability to leave his severed penis in the vagina) in the groin. This is because he is not guaranteed to be the father, so he has to outdo his rivals. You can interpret that as you wish when you consider human sexuality, female and male behaviour, and the size of the male penis and their staying power. Amusing, isn't it?

NASA Technology

So far, we have achieved a lot in the space technology department. We have gone from weather balloons in the early days, to moon landings, space stations and satellite technology, that is used every day by a vast amount of people. The key substances used for these frontier pushing explorations is something we have had for millenia: metals and metal alloys. Since the iron age we have used these things. However, there is a question I have here: Why, when we are going into the domain of lifting things off the ground and moving them about like asteroids, are we using some of the heaviest and densest substances we know? Strength is one reason, but hard things are brittle, which isn't necessarily the best type of strength available. I suggest using other types of substances. That stuff called "frozen smoke" is an area that could be experimented with. Organic shapes and flow could be looked at. Ocean animal shapes, especially the fast moving, could be looked at. Air compression devices could be created by observing the breathing systems of deep diving animals.
There has also been research into telekinetics (using quantum wave/not wave) which has only been partly successful. I think research into ancient "beliefs" about energy transference could bare fruit here. Energetic "counter weighting" could be a concept of use, like dark matter. I think a "new" understanding of energy and dimension could be the next stage. Looking at ideas from very old times such as early peoples and civilisations who achieved near impossible feats with current quantum ideas could bring us back into a Renaissance of times gone deep into the past. Anyway, there is food for thought.

Irish Glass Blowers

Because of the relatively recent G.F.C. (global financial crisis), glass blowers in Ireland have lost the glass blowing company that had fuelled their community. As the glass blowers are already skilled, I have an idea (God help us all!).
If the glass blowers of Ireland set up cottage industries blowing "hand-made" drinking glasses, mugs and jugs for Guinness beer and loudly put "Made in Ireland" or "Made in Eire" on it, it would sell really well. There are people of Irish heritage that are living all over the world who want anything that reminds them of their roots. Particularly in America and Australia or other previous colonies of the U.K. There are also a lot of people who drink beer. There are also a lot of Irish pubs all over the world. Hand-made products also have a "specialness" about them, like something from the "old days". There are a lot of already made business paths to sell the products via, such as bottle shops, Irish pubs and the usual housewares specialists. You could make them a "must have" for Irish pubs with a campaign along the lines of "It isn't real Guinness if it isn't in an Irish mug".

Koala Waste as a Pest Reduction Technique

Koalas are an Australian animal that eats only certain types of eucalyptus tree leaves. They are marsupials that spend a lot of time intoxicated by their specialised diets. Because they only eat certain types of eucalyptus, they have specialised digestive processes that use certain types of bacteria to help break down the usually toxic oils in the leaves. Because the tree that is being grazed on simply reacts as though a predator (usually an insect) is eating it, it sends extra chemicals (insecticidal) to the region being grazed on to put off the eater. This increases the chemical insect repellent quality of the food being digested. It is full of antibacterial qualities.
If you used koala waste products (urea and manure) on gardens, it could reduce the number of insect pests that attack the plant growth around there. It could also reduce the number of other wild animals wishing to reside there (such as possums), as manure is a signal that something else is already living there (territory marking). Also, it breaks down as a compost product, feeding the soil.
Another idea could be to dilute the manure/urine in water and spray crops as both a fertiliser and a pesticide. Food for thought anyway!

Fibonacci Sequence in Technology

In microchipping, small is good. There has been all kinds of chemistry and physics used to make electronics smaller and smaller. I think microbiology can help.
Extremophilic bacteria are used already to help release gold in mines. As gold is the best electrical conductor it is perfect for microchips, as a little is all that is needed. If you used the microbes in actually putting the gold into the right spots, using Fibonacci Sequences, you could save a lot of delicate mechanical "handiwork".
Experiments have been done with using bacteria on disks for random changes in design ideas and music. This is very avante garde and chaos theory, but I think it could be taken to new levels. Some Fibonacci Sequences predict the organic activity of plant life. If you applied this to laying down organic paths for bacteria, myocelia or yeasts etc. to grow so that it can be used as part of the technology. The bacteria grows and dies, leaving their physical mass behind to used as a path. In some systems the bacteria can be living. Of course, metal changing/consuming extremophilic bacteria are an obvious candidate, but other types of organisms could be explored. As well as chemicals.

How to Seduce Your Woman

Here is a simple idea for seducing your female love interest. If you give her a romance novel, which you have read and understood, and is as close to your own scenario with said love interest, set up the same sexual tensions or settings as the book. When she is three quarters through the book and totally absorbed by it, make your move. She is probably hot and bothered with defences down. She will have a one track mind at that stage.
If you wish to seduce a male, give them an appropriate (straight or gay) magazine and leave them alone for a 10 or so minutes. At the point where they want a private moment to masturbate with the visual stimuli, make your move.
It isn't that hard to do, humanity doesn't need many excuses to have sex most of the time. Giving them stimulation in books and magazines saves a lot of time, effort and money.
We all know that people's frontal lobes usually shut off when they are sexually aroused, so they become temporarily stupefied. So if you do it, make sure you prevent disastrous forms of stupidity.