DayJar

marlomeekins: follow this artist on twitter

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 20:17:53 -0400

marlomeekins:

follow this artist on twitter

tateata: WTF HAPPENED IN STEUBENVILLE? - Laci Green i’m...

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 08:09:46 -0400

tateata:

WTF HAPPENED IN STEUBENVILLE? - Laci Green

i’m actually so angry

lustik: Christian Champin via Les arts plastiques de Sarah...

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 07:47:26 -0400

lustik:

Christian Champin via Les arts plastiques de Sarah Williams

Photo

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 21:43:48 -0400

a-bit-of-science: The Sundew, while not as famous as the Venus...

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 21:22:11 -0400

a-bit-of-science:

The Sundew, while not as famous as the Venus Flytrap, is a type of carnivorous plant. Each one of its leaves is covered with miniscule projections, which are tipped with what look like drops of morning dew. These ‘droplets’ are actually sticky secretions. Insects which are attracted to the plant by sweet secretions land on the leaves and become ensnared by the mucilage*, after which the sundew slowly digests the insect.

Mingjun Zhang, a biomedical researcher from the University of Tennessee has demonstrated that the adhesive secretions of the Sundew may be ideal for a range of medical procedures, particularly for the regrowth of damaged tissues. Theoretically, healthy cells can be delivered to the area of injury and they may integrate themselves into the body. However, these cells require a ‘scaffold’ to which they can adhere. These scaffolds provide physical support to the cells as they proliferate and differentiate. Ideally, the scaffold must be biodegradable, such that it will leave no trace.

Clearly, the scaffolds need to be stringently tested. Many engineers have spent a lot of time searching for the ideal scaffold. Zhang believes that the sundew mucilage might be just the thing they’ve been looking for. Not only is it natural and biodegradable, it’s also sticky enough to grip onto cells and elastic enough to “bend and stretch and shift as cells proliferate and tissues grow.”

In 2010, Zhang coated a silicon wafer with the substance and observed it under a microscope, noting that the adhesive was a complicated network of nanofibers forming a porous scaffold, with holes that were just the right size for cell attachment. Then, Zhang applied the mucilage onto glass slides and seeded it with living rat brain cells. A day later, the cells had adhered securely and proliferated wonderfully. 98% of the cells were viable. In 2011, Zhang showed that the adhesive could also be used with bone and skin cells. Zhang believes that with further research, the usage of this Sundew mucilage for wound recovery could be viable. In Zhang’s own words, “Nature does beautiful things. We should definitely learn from that.”

To read the article: http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20121106-insect-eater-heads-for-surgery

Image source: http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/photography/photo-of-the-day/australian-sundew/

*Mucilage is the scientific term for the adhesive substance.

Bad news is usually bad news

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 19:26:00 -0400

Why can’t we fix climate change and dependence on fossil fuels? Well, maybe we can, but why have we mostly stuck our heads in the sand, paralyzed?

The problem is the problem, which is to say, people run from bad things. It is difficult to speak about huge ticking time-bombs such as, say, climate change, in a realistic, practical way, because the vision of the potential future allows for terrifying and horrific scenarios. To look away may be no good, but to look at it is also no good! The truth of it is like the sun - it can burn you, blind you, dehydrate you…and yet to hide from it is starve, or at least burn your candle at both ends.

So is a little exposure, the middle path, the answer? This is, of course, where the sun metaphor breaks down. It is work and sacrifice and extra humility to respond positively to shards of bad news in a meaningful way. So when push comes to shove, few will act, because the apparent situation in front of you is what takes priority.

I don’t know what the answer is exactly, but I know that, for me, to simply reach an adequate understanding of the near-term material dangers for humanity was a long process. A process of taking in some sobering facts in the form of difficult-to-deny metrics and mechanics, and then of trying to understand what these material things meant in real, human, and sometimes, philosophical, terms.

The problem with this approach is that this was also emotionally paralyzing and not the least bit inspiring to anyone I knew whom I discussed it with. And with good reason: Tell the average person that we will soon not be able to feed 3 billion people, let alone 7 billion or 9 billion, and it sounds necessarily alarmist. Well, it should sound alarmist anyway - if it’s true, it’s alarming! The problem is that it sounds almost ludicrous - surely it can’t be true, it’s too intractable, how could we have allowed it? How could the people who constructed such a nightmare not have seen it coming, or not have cared to prevent it?

Over time, I have come to see that there are multiple “shockers” in a realization such as this. It’s not just that we’ve mismanaged our economy, our food supply, our population, and our environment - though these alone are hard realizations to swallow. It’s also that we sense an immense moral abdication by large groups of people who perhaps should have known better - in some cases a real, pernicious, self-serving elitism; in others, a focus on immediacy to the exclusion of long-term priorities; but more likely just a complete lack of will to understand the significance of our actions.

And it’s also the unsettling feeling that we must consider the possibility that so much of the success of our modern advances lies in a series of almost uncontrollable indulgences and urges - urges to reproduce, to control more people, to luxuriate in more things, to live longer and better and faster than is really possible for everyone. In short, that we are, much more than we care to consider, not in control of ourselves, and simply growing, like an algae bloom in a pond, or bacteria in a petri dish, at an exponential rate.

And it all comes back home to one’s self and one’s lifestyle, possibly. And this is what I struggle with now. Not whether there is a crisis, nor whether something can be done, nor whether I can be the one to do some of it, but whether I, as an American of economic privilege, can actually feel clean of conscience, ever again.

But perhaps I am too severe.

7knotwind: bergstudio: Amazing edit of Kubrick’s one point...

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 18:18:04 -0400

7knotwind:

bergstudio:

Amazing edit of Kubrick’s one point perspective genius - so many iconic scenes -

It is fantastic to see all of these in relation to one another-
Emphasizing a clear, strong and consistent aesthetic…

I agree, the video’s a pretty cool edit. I am compelled to ask, however: Could we not have found a piece of music from a Kubrick movie as the soundtrack? :)

Learning Permaculture

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 06:58:32 -0400

I think I am not going to run out to the woods and build a log cabin. Instead, I am going to stay nearby my bed as I learn.

Hey, she forgot to mention either the energy or the food...

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 18:29:38 -0400

Hey, she forgot to mention either the energy or the food production parts! What gives?

Photo

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 08:50:18 -0400

"I was raped by four men in one evening. I got drunk and tried to say no. What did my predators do?..."

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 08:49:59 -0400

“I was raped by four men in one evening. I got drunk and tried to say no. What did my predators do? They told me to drink more. They shoved a bottle in my face and told me to keep drinking. Drink till I was drunk enough to fuck them. I blacked out. They urinated on me. They assaulted me. They shoved foreign objects in my body, anally and vaginally. They took videos. I was just 16 years old. The video was sent around my entire school, and I was bullied every single day of my senior year of high school. I lost all of my friends. I was physically and verbally abused by peers and people I once called friends. Someone tried to set me on fire in the hallway during passing period. Nobody sympathized with me. Nobody cared about the fact that because of these events, I was trying to kill myself every single day. I was cutting myself, making myself puke, showering upwards of fifteen times a day because I felt filthy. I was scratching and peeling the skin off of my body because I was dirty. I looked at myself like I deserved what I got. The world saw me as dirty, so I began to see myself that way, too. My rapists were praised by my peers for their deed. I never had a voice. When I first learned about the Steubenville incident going to trial, I was overjoyed. Because Jane Doe’s story was my story, and if anyone deserved justice, it was her. She would get the justice I never got. She would change the tide of the rape culture movement. Despite the horrific events that occurred, I knew that the justice served would help ease her pain. But she didn’t get justice, and now she has to witness this news coverage, favoring and sympathizing with her attackers. Pain is not an accurate word to describe what she is feeling right now. Pain is the simplest term you could use. As a rape victim and an aspiring journalist, I am disgusted with the way this case was reported on. Jane Doe’s rapists deserve their suffering in prison. They deserve more. They do not deserve to be sympathized with. They made their stupid decision, and they deserve whatever consequences come their way. If you don’t want to be labeled as a rapist, don’t fucking rape.”

- Anonymous comment left on the CNN petition demanding they apologize for sympathizing with the Steubenville rapists (via 88844888)

Whoops, peak fossil fuels might not stop run-away climate change.

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 08:27:10 -0400

Whoops, peak fossil fuels might not stop run-away climate change.:

Climate change per unit of emissions may not be tightly constrained.

Great TED talk about climate change: “…but I’m...

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 08:15:28 -0400

Great TED talk about climate change: “…but I’m a blogger so I can depress you.”

mothernaturenetwork: Why microalgae is the future of green...

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 07:30:00 -0400

mothernaturenetwork:

Why microalgae is the future of green energy

What’s a problem in backyard pools could be a solution to reducing greenhouse gases through algae streetlights and algae biodiesel.

I sure hope it works! Not to sound cynical, but it probably won’t. For instance:

The algae street lamps do double duty – providing emissions-free light while scrubbing the air of carbon dioxide.

So…would we be able to manufacture enough of these to replace an earth’s worth of forests, plus enough to capture the carbon we’ve released from fossil fuels too? Perhaps, but not likely. Keep plugging away, though.

But other researchers have been able to generate electricity – albeit tiny amounts – from algae.

Tiny amounts of electricity - so, not enough to run a hair dryer or toaster oven, I imagine? Well, maybe they’ll up it somehow. Keep amping that algae-juice!

One ray of hope:

Making biodiesel out of microalgae, Calleja notes, doesn’t distort world food markets by diverting edible grains, such as corn, for use as fuel. The demand for corn to be converted to ethanol has lead to price increases for food in some parts of the world.

So at least we could run a vehicle on it a short distance without starving to death. That is something. I’m not being sarcastic, there, it really is. Can’t wait to see how much time, space, material, and energy input it takes to fill a gas tank with the stuff.

Re-Inaugural Post

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 07:04:44 -0400

I’ll be changing the focus of this blog now. I’m going to shift away from just re-posting, and instead post interesting stuff about things like permaculture, climate change, and, sometimes, an alternative view of economics, with some of my commentary attached.

But also, I will post some philosophical ramblings.

I have been thinking about some things for a while now, some things that weigh heavily on my conscience and my actions. And every time I try to just let go and live, I find that unresolved questions keep coming to the fore, unresolved questions that generate paralyzing tension, anguish, and hopelessness. I have faith that it is really finding satisfactory answers that will put my mind - and my life in general - at ease, if it is possible at all.

My questions are moral and philosophical ones about the world and about the future of the human race. Questions about how I should live my life. Questions about what purpose my actions have.

I’ve let two genies out of the bottle: Fiirst, I had to go explore how and why my current way of life is completely and utterly unsustainable, and second, I had to go and search my feelings and thoughts to arrive at the understanding that I desperately need to do what’s right, purposeful, and helpful. I understand these things intellectuallly or mechanistically, but how to find the right balance that allows me to both keep living and not feel regularly disgusted, bored, or guilty with my choices and actions…well, that has mostly eluded me. I probably live too much in my head.

I need answers, answers of a personal sort. Answers like…will joining a work-share CSA make me feel better about the future? Will I need to change careers to something that doesn’t depend on computers? (I’m a software engineer.) Is driving my car simply unsustainable, or is it also morally reprehensible?

Those are real questions for me, actually. I’m trying to figure those out now. I guess I’m asking for help. Moral guidance. I don’t know anymore what is right. Do you?

areaofinterest: by Michael Chase

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 06:27:15 -0400

areaofinterest:

by Michael Chase

Photo

Thu, 07 Mar 2013 21:45:25 -0500

fat-birds: Saw-Whet Owl. We’ve got lovely owl, angry owl, and...

Thu, 07 Mar 2013 21:11:57 -0500

fat-birds:

Saw-Whet Owl.

We’ve got lovely owl, angry owl, and now, anxious owl.

Photo

Thu, 07 Mar 2013 20:37:55 -0500

ikenbot: Saturn’s Hexagon This is a view of Saturn’s north...

Thu, 07 Mar 2013 20:04:15 -0500

ikenbot:

Saturn’s Hexagon

This is a view of Saturn’s north polar region, taken by Cassini’s Imaging Science Subsystem (ISS) on February 26, 2013. You can see the rings in the top of this image as well as its mysterious hexagon. — Val Klavans