Life

“Pamela A. Martin, an assistant professor of geophysics at the University of Chicago, calculated that if Americans were to reduce meat consumption by just 20 percent it would be as if we all switched from a standard sedan — a Camry, say — to the ultra-efficient Prius.”

New York Times article that backs up what I was trying to say about eating less meat months ago. (it gets a little lengthy on the second page)

Not as cool of a way to be green perhaps, but great that everyday Americans who can’t afford a new Prius have options to make a dent in their personal greenhouse gas emissions.

We’ve all been raised by television to believe that one day we’d all be millionares and movie gods and rock stars…but we won’t.

According to Forbes Magazine, our very own Wichita Kansas seems to be a hotbed of employment opportunity for the coming year ahead.

Fascinating.

Of course, Salt Lake City, Utah is ranked no. 1, so i’m not sure that they’re factoring in mormons and christian conservatives…

http://www.forbes.com/2008/01/11/jobs-economy-growth-lead-careers-cx_mk_0110cities_table.html?boxes=custom

I didn’t. I never do. The whole thing seems a bit hyped up. But maybe it really is a good idea and I’m just being a snob?

Check out this Salon article about the various ways you can opt out of junk mail, coupons, and catalogs. Considering I have two grocery bags full of mail trash, this seems like a very good idea.

Sociology is the study of patterns of social relationships. The other sciences seem to be the study of other sorts of relationships. H. Krebs, a lurker on this Coop, wonders why in the hell won’t anyone write a book about grand concepts that sweep across disciplines (philosophy, physics, law, biology, economics, religion, psychology, chemistry, anthropology, linguistics). She suggested we start with duality and brainstorm a list. So, I thought I’d start the list with duality, list some other things on my own, and the open it up for said storm of brains. Turns out, my list didn’t get any longer. I know this post is ridiculous, but as Tony Soprano would say with a shrug, whaddaya gonna do.

Duality. Examples: (wave/particle as in quantum mechanics) (mind/body as in Decartes) (signs/signifiers as in semiotics) (yin/yang) (id/superego as in psychoanlaysis) (mass/energy as in Einstein) (structuralism/poststructuralism) (modernity/postmodernity) (base/superstructure)

Note that many of these divide up the world into two, yet really describe them as one system in which opposing forces are at work to shape diachronic change–i.e., the unity of opposites, or more precisely and interestingly, dialectics, though it’s prob very passe to talk dialectics these days…but in case you think it’s only Marx and Hagel, note that it’s sort of an organizing concept in Taoism, too.

Okay, and I tried to think of some other things that can’t get lumped in the above taxonomy. Spirals/circular stuff…nope, that’s all wrapped up in an explanation of dialectics. Okay… entropy! There you go–thermodynamics, fragmentation, nyce. Except the more I think about that, the more I think that it’s just another way of thinking about the workings of the above concept. Stick with me, I’m an amateur at this:

So, within a system there is a continuum of forces generally divisible into two categories–e.g., the light and the dark side, in the Star Wars formulation, or the solid and the scattered, etc. There are two possible ways (probably both) that these two components of the binary articulate. 1) Synthesis: They build and play off each other (see, again, dialectics). 2) Entropy: They’re conflicting and increasingly falling to pieces.

It’s not bullet-proof, but it’s cool-sounding in my head right now. And the only other category of sweeping concepts that I can think of is power. Power is about how things (like those things above) interact, are subject to one another, relate to one another. There is power in both synthesis and in entropy. So it’s like the seran wrap concept that stretches across all the other concepts I came up with, and holds them together with its awesome explanatory power.

So power is the Occam’s razor of all theories (keeping in mind that within power, there are competing theories in the structuralist/post-structuralist vein, as in coercion/consent, Machiavelli/Foucault)? I’ll buy it. You?

So currently in Dubai there is dwindling of oil reserves, a huge upsurge in international (US) investment, key members of staff who are receiving huge benefits from their positions in office via their deferred multi-million dollar stock option plans, and well, michael jackson.

Tourism in Dubai

About Dubai - Wikipedia Specifically read the Economy and Human Right and Labor sections.

Halliburton in Dubai

Halliburtion quarterly report has some kinks

Could someone please explain to me what the fuck is going on? I mean, you know, besides the obvious.

And, as a payoff for all of this noise, here’s Michael.

and i’ll add one more since i fucked up. (good call liz. way to keep me honest)

Michael is now normal?

Alupa–what are the Californians saying?

Blackwater

Dead Soldiers

Hilary and Obama: The Gaze

More Candidates: A Send Up of that Vanity Fair Cover

These links are to exceptional posts on two very interesting blogs. If you’re in to that sort of thing, browse further.

I haven’t read it all, but I love it from this, From neuroscience to Nietzsche. A sobering look at how man may perceive himself in the future, particularly as ideas about genetic predeterminism takes the place of dying Darwinism.

Tom Wolfe on Your Soul Dying.