advanced nuclear energy for enriched life (ANEEL)


see tweeted article, archived*


2021-10-24T20:10−07* / at the about* post – at bit.ly/dateposted – anyone can link to this post from its date: October 24, 2021
*a link – or not; see a note on notes and links and a disclaimer / … and maybe browse or search the archive*
Posted

For thou knowest not the hour …


October 3 fireball was NASA Picture of the Day for October 12*


2021-10-18T00:0020:46−07* / at the about* post – at bit.ly/dateposted – anyone can link to this post from its date: October 18, 2021
*a link – or not; see a note on notes and links and a disclaimer / … and maybe browse or search the archive*


see also: item on CBC website* … and one on Globe and Mail website, cached* 

fireball over SE British Columbia at 11:33pm local time on October 3, so 2021-10-03T23:33−07 … or 2021-10-04T06:33Z
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Mark Curtis: The Guardian is calling for more money …





2021-10-14T0621−07* / at the about* post – at bit.ly/dateposted – anyone can link to this post from its date: October 14, 2021
*a link – or not; see a note on notes and links and a disclaimer / … and maybe browse or search the archive*
Posted

on power (Jonathan Cook)

Power is the force that shapes almost everything about our lives and our deaths. There is no more important issue. Understanding power and overcoming it through that understanding is the only path to liberation we can take as individuals, as societies and as a species.

Which is why it should be simply astonishing that no one in the media, supposedly a free marketplace of ideas, ever directly addresses matters of power – beyond the shadow play of party politics and celebrity scandals.

And yet, of course, this lack of interest in analyzing and understanding power is not surprising at all. Because the corporate media is the key tool – or seen another way, the central expression – of power.

Very obviously power’s main concern is the ability to conceal itself. Its exposure as power weakens it, by definition. Once exposed, power faces questions about its legitimacy, its methods, its purposes. Power does not want to be seen, it does not want to be confined, it does not want to be held accountable. It wants absolute freedom to reproduce itself, and ideally to amass more power.

That is why true power makes itself as invisible and as inscrutable as it can. Like a mushroom, power can grow only in darkness. That is why it is the hardest thing to write about in ways that are intelligible to those under its spell, which is most of us, most of the time.*


2021-10-13T16:20−07* / at the about* post – at bit.ly/dateposted – anyone can link to this post from its date: October 13, 2021
*a link – or not; see a note on notes and links and a disclaimer / … and maybe browse or search the archive*

emphasis (bolding) added to the excerpt above
understanding power (!*) / search on author’s website
understanding power (!*) / search on this website
understanding power (!gb) / search on Google Books
understanding power (!a) / search on Amazon

read a copy of the tweeted article on archive.today*

pinned tweet


a post that cites a tweet may not have much more to do with that tweet; this post is an example

a post that cites a tweet may do much more; the post dated 2021-04-05 – the date of the tweet displayed there as a footnote – is an example: it shows the relevant page of Garner’s Modern English Usage


2021-10-03T09:36−07* / at the about* post – at bit.ly/dateposted – anyone can link to this post from its date: October 3, 2021
*a link – or not; see a note on notes and links and a disclaimer

a larger version of the tweeted image above is featured in the post waste not, want not, be well

Posted

the white rhino of old-growth forests: almost gone, and when it’s gone, it’s gone

the red dots represent what most people think of as old growth

the map above and pie chart below are from a Wilderness Committee piece cited in a tweet*



the image below is page 8 of an independent report reviewed in a TJ Watt post*

note the human in the photo at top right

from the report summary:
• The provincial total area of old forest (~13.2 million hectares) matches our total.
• The vast majority of this forest (80%) consists of small trees:
› ~5.3 million hectares have site index* 5 –10; another ~5.3 million hectares are at SI 10–15.
› Small trees characterize many of BC’s natural old forest types, including black spruce bog forests in the northeast, subalpine forests at high elevation, and low productivity western red cedar forests on the outer coast.
› Large areas of this old forest type remain because the trees are too small to be worth harvesting (under today’s prices).
• In contrast, only a tiny proportion of BC’s remaining old forest (3%) supports large trees:
› ~380,000 hectares have a site index 20–25, and only ~35,000 hectares of old forest have an SI greater than 25.
› These types of forests match most people’s vision of old growth. They provide unique habitats, structures, and spiritual values associated with large trees.
› Productive old forests are naturally rare in BC. Sites with the potential to grow very large trees cover less than 3% of the province. Old forests on these sites have dwindled considerably due to intense harvest so that only 2.7% of this 3% is currently old (see pie charts below). These ecosystems are effectively the white rhino* of old-growth forests. They are almost extinguished and will not recover from logging.
› Over 85% of productive forest sites have less than 30% of the amount of old forest expected naturally, and nearly half of these ecosystems have less than 1% of the old forest expected naturally. This current status puts biodiversity, ecological integrity and resilience at high risk today.

*site index (SI) refers to the height of dominant or codominant trees at age 50; it is used as a measure of site productivity and to estimate tree growth over time; example: a site index class of 5–10 means tree seedlings will grow between 5 and 10m tall in 50 years across the range of sites included in the class; similarly, a site index of 20–25 means trees are expected to grow between 20 and 25m tall in 50 years



2021-09-20T20:14−07* / at the about* post – at bit.ly/dateposted – anyone can link to this post from its date: September 20, 2021
*a link – or not; see a note on notes and links and a disclaimer / … and maybe browse or search the archive*

see also Miyawaki forests (!?) / not old growth but good growth even so
Posted

the 20-year war on terror has cost $8 trillion and killed 900,000 people (Brown)


from the Costs of War project at Brown University:
The research team’s $8 trillion estimate accounts for all direct costs of the country’s post-9/11 wars, including Department of Defense Overseas Contingency Operations funding; State Department war expenditures and counterterror war-related costs, including war-related increases to the Pentagon’s base budget; care for veterans to date and in the future; Department of Homeland Security spending; and interest payments on borrowing for these wars. The total includes funds that the Biden administration requested in May 2021.

The death toll, standing at an estimated 897,000 to 929,000, includes U.S. military members, allied fighters, opposition fighters, civilians, journalists and humanitarian aid workers who were killed as a direct result of war, whether by bombs, bullets or fire. It does not, the researchers noted, include the many indirect deaths the war on terror has caused by way of disease, displacement and loss of access to food or clean drinking water.*



2021-09-13T20:55−07* / at the about* post – at bit.ly/dateposted – anyone can link to this post from its date: September 13, 2021
*a link – or not; see a note on notes and links and a disclaimer / … and maybe browse or search the archive*

see also Afghanistan* / site search
Posted

how it is: the graphic truth on Labor Day


two graphs from a Jacobin article by David Sirota*



tweet below with animated gif also in another post on inexcusable inequality*




2021-09-06T16:02−07* / at the about* post – at bit.ly/dateposted – anyone can link to this post from its date: September 6, 2021
*a link – or not; see a note on notes and links and a disclaimer / … and maybe browse or search the archive*

The animated GIF in the tweet above is all about taxing income. “If you’re interested in taxing wealth,” says Columbia law professor Michael Graetz, “the estate tax is the only mechanism the federal government now has.”*
/ spoiler alert: “… the estate tax is entirely avoidable.”* (Robert Lord, tax attorney)
Posted

nuclear option: five-minute video mashup on thorium MSRs by Kirk Sorensen


Kirk Sorensen (!?)


2021-09-05T21:12−07* / at the about* post – at bit.ly/dateposted – anyone can link to this post from its date: September 5, 2021
*a link – or not; see a note on notes and links and a disclaimer / … and maybe browse or search the archive*

relevant entities: Terra Power, Thor Energy, Flibe Energy, General Electric, Moltex Energy, Transatomic Power Corporation, ThorCon Power, Terrestrial Energy, Mitsubshi Heavy Industries


2021-10-09
Posted