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Thread: Perhaps We are but Insects on this Planet

  1. #61

    Smile

    Personally, I welcome global warming and rising of the oceans. That means my property will become more valuable as it becomes waterfront property.

  2. #62
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    Quote Originally Posted by Gary Keedwell View Post
    There are alot of people that believe Hurricane Katrina was a government plot.
    Anything is possible, but I think they're looking at the Katrina event from the wrong angle.

    If I lived in an area where the mean elevation can be measured in inches and is prone to being hit by hurricanes, and a hurricane destroyed my home and all my possessions and very nearly killed me, I'd try to learn something from the experience. "Hmm...maybe living here isn't that great an idea."

    But if somebody wanted to give me money to move back to that place afterward, I might tend to question whether they really had my best interests at heart. "Well, you really lucked out this time...but there's always next year. Here's your check."
    Yoga class makes me feel like a total stud, mostly because I'm about as flexible as a 2x4.
    "Design"? Possibly. "Intelligent"? Sure doesn't look like it from this angle.
    We used to be hunter gatherers. Now we're shopper borrowers.
    The three most important words in the English language: "Front Towards Enemy".
    The world makes a lot more sense when you remember that Butthead was the smart one.
    You can never be too rich, too thin, or have too much ammo.

  3. #63
    Quote Originally Posted by [U
    We[/U] are an incrdibly wasteful society
    Who is "we"? the entire world, or just us, the Americans. We as Americans consume more energy than anyone else in the world and we generate the most waste of anyone.

  4. #64
    Don't confuse me with facts. The truth is, we still don't know squat about anything. What happens with the weather 100 years from now or one day from now is only a prediction that has no basis in fact. It's only a fact after it happens. No sense in getting worked up over it. There is a greater power that we can't comprehend and never will. What will happen will happen.

  5. #65
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    If I'd had that kind of attitude 35 years ago, I'd be working at McDonald's today. So we disagree about what we as humans can do and what our effects on the world might be. Yah ho. Most of us seem to share similar values about personal responsibility and so on.

    I really have to question the other Ed's motivation in bringing this one up. Trying to rile things up for entertainment, given that you know this is a polarizing issue? Get your own views validated? Just curious. This is one of 2 or 3 you've started that are clearly controversial along predictable lines. And since the lines are so predictable, there isn't much likelihood of anyone changing their points of view. So what's the point?

    - Ed

  6. #66
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ed Falis View Post
    If I'd had that kind of attitude 35 years ago, I'd be working at McDonald's today. So we disagree about what we as humans can do and what our effects on the world might be. Yah ho. Most of us seem to share similar values about personal responsibility and so on.

    I really have to question the other Ed's motivation in bringing this one up. Trying to rile things up for entertainment, given that you know this is a polarizing issue? Get your own views validated? Just curious. This is one of 2 or 3 you've started that are clearly controversial along predictable lines. And since the lines are so predictable, there isn't much likelihood of anyone changing their points of view. So what's the point?

    - Ed
    Wow....You really know how to cheer a fellow up, sir. I still think it is interesting to hear from different people all over the planet on this or any subject. Since we have close to 70 posts...I guess I'm not alone? Did you hear of the British airline pilot that seen a mile long UFO? He saw it from 40 miles away. Amazing, huh?
    Gary K.

  7. #67
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    Yeah, that UFO is pretty amazing sounding, eh?

    Look, I was just complaining that the thread seemed devised to polarize. I have my political differences with people, but I just don't want those to be the subject here when we have interests in common that go past those differences. No intention to censor. Just calling a spade a spade as I see it.

    Spoken respectfully of your point of view,

    - Ed

  8. #68
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    Global Warming a Hoax?


  9. #69
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    Global hot air

    I do think what we do prove by these conversations is that we are simply a STUPID evolving species on a planet that we have no idea where it or we have came from. With sciences advancing at the rate they are what do you think people in 500 years will think of us. CAVEMEN.

    How can we take ourselves so serious when we know so little. Just imagine what they will think of us in 500 years when they talk about us going around the world in a big bean can with fire shooting out the back and hoping to get it stopped where it is supposed to.

    I go thru this same BS daily with people worrying about the lumber industry destroying the Amazon and no one mentions that we virtually have no lumber industry in the Amazon but people fall for it and send money to the con groups such as the WWF to spread fear , raise mony and live well while destroying the lives of innocent people.. Fear is big business , no fear, no problem , no needed to help a cause and finance the fear creators.

    Here is a letter I have sent to the Government here in Peru to try and open some eyes, it may interest you.

    Raising forest revenues and
    Employment in Peru


    For this paper Loreto is used as a focal point for both the existing problems and solutions of the forestry industry of Peru as it is the only data I have available..

    PROBLEMS: Unemployment and poverty in unprecedented numbers.

    Illegal timber harvest. ?¿

    Government mismanagement of forest resources.

    INRENA is a drain on the government financially


    Unemployment and poverty in unprecedented numbers.

    It is almost impossible to believe that in one of the richest areas of the world the people live in miserable poverty due to government mismanagement of its natural resources.

    Loreto has 368,851 square hectares of land and lets assume that less the rivers, cities , small scale farming and cocaine plantations there exists 90% forest or 331,965 hectares of forest land. Based on several forestry studies it can be assumed that each hectare has a minimum of 70,000 bf of timber of various species the most usable but some not.

    This gives us a total timber board footage available resource figure for Loreto of
    1, 400 ,000,000,000 board feet of timber only in the concessions and titled land . Government timber production figures for Loreto suggest that the total production of Loreto is 24,000,000 bf or basically nothing annually.

    Example: Loreto has 368.851 km²in total
    The state of Oregon in the US has 251.418 kmin total
    To make it worse half of Oregon is a natural desert

    Oregon produces 4´450´000.000 bf of wood annually
    Loreto produces 24.000.000 bf anually

    What does this mean ¿ Oregon is 32% smaller than Loreto
    Loreto produces .005% of what Oregon produces

    Why is the biggest employment base in Loreto driving mototaxies or cultivating cocaine when Loreto is surrounded by unmatched and wasted rotting natural riches ¿ Answer, the government is not managing its biggest natural resources properly , either the people or the forest..

    Attachment Number 1 is a census showing income , education etc. of a typical Loreto village.



    Illegal Timber Harvest Problem

    The illegal timber harvest is an over used and misunderstood term used by people who are honestly mistaken and ignorant of the problem and those who wish to cash in on the ecologist scare tactics for their own benefit.

    A few types of illegal timber harvest:

    A family with an income of $20 a month cutting wood on their own land for sale without paying S/.800 Nuevo Soles for a photocopy study and waiting months for a forestry permission. ILLEGAL

    The biggest actual illegal timber harvest is because of the forestry concessions being located several kilometers from any river for access or removal of harvested wood. The lumbermen doe not have the resources to build roads and buy hundreds of thousands of dollars in equipment to work as the law demands. RESULT , the lumbermen buy timber from the villages on the rivers and charge it against their concession. ILLEGAL

    With over 20,000,000 hectares under concession it is wonderful that the legal logging as per the law is basically impossible, as if it was possible to implement it would be the biggest deforestation project in the history of the world. Whatever forester can tell you that to selectively harvest a forest using modern mechanized methods you loose 5% of the forest for roads and skid trails only. Using this proven and well documented fact the law would destroy 1,000,000 hectares if implemented. This does not include the thousands of miles of roads from the rivers thru village lands to get to the concessions.

    Fortunately the illegal harvest by the river communities is sustaining the forest and limiting the damage that would be done if a “legal” harvest was made.

    SOLUTION:

    Modify the forestry law to make it possible to manage a natural resource and permit the people of Loreto to live.

    The law has to be modified to allow people to work legally , openly and productively to better their lives . Why is it necessary for a small land owner with title to 20 or 40 hectares to pay some forester who knows nothing about the trees on his land S/.800 soles minimum for permission to selectively cut a few trees for legal sale when no on objects to the slash and burn of his land to try and raise yucca and corm for his family.
    LET THE MAN WORK LEGALLY so he does not have to slash and burn to try and exist.

    EXAMPLE:

    My company has been fortunate in obtaining the only permit to cut cants with a chainsaw and carry them out by hand on their backs because of the terrain.. RESULT: The families that were earning S/.40 -50 per week cutting down the forest to make charcoal are now earning up to $/.1000 per week selectively cutting on our property. They now have a life , the children have clothes and are in school and the world is open to them. This should be available to all Loretanos that wish to better their life. These people earn more than the laborers working in cocaine.

    The average chain saw for this work costs about $400 US and the small lumberman is out of debt and profitable in one month. Lets say that 30,000 families went to work in this form. Each family would produce an average of 700 board feet of wood per week and earn $/.1050 before expenses.

    This would mean an annual harvest of 1,000,000,000 bf of currently unusable lumber and direct income of $/.1,500,000,000 annually to the loggers. This would create hundreds of manufacturing jobs and export income which is currently nonexistent
    And bring a minimum $1,000,000,000 US vs now $24,000,000 into Loreto from export sales.. I don’t know the gross product figures of Loreto but I think a billion dollars is a lot of money to Iquitos. With 20,000,000 hectares under concession or in the hands of villages there exists 1,400,000,000,000 board feet of timber and a 1 billion bf annual harvest will be unknown and not nearly reach the recommended sustainable harvest.

    The forestry taxes paid on this volume could make INRENA self sufficient and not a drag on the government and they could afford to hire some up to date experts.


    Modify the law to permit the man to use the community chainsaw to cut some cants for sale in Iquitos and a chain reaction will start every couple of weeks one more.. There is this false front in Peru always put forward by the experts that cutting wood with a chainsaw is wasteful but letting millions of mature trees fall over and rot and the people going hungry and uneducated is good. The fact is that cutting cants with a chainsaw and bringing them to town for resawing yields more form a tree than traditional logging plus it does not damage the jungle as mechanized logging . Attachment Number 3. My friends you are not governing and managing your people and resources you are failing your responsibilities horribly.

    Just something for thought, how was it possible to make a new forestry law without knowing what species are in the forest. This is like selling a business without taking an inventory. I may be wrong but I don’t think that of the unknown hundreds or thousands of species in Peru less that exist 100 complete vouchers including the wood samples in the combined libraries of INRENA , the Molina and other Universities.

    Just another thought. Why have the “experts” classified the most valuable woods in the world that exist in Peru as firewood ? $30 and up per board foot for firewood and Mahogany is on CITES for $2.00 per board foot. Please explain.

    Make Peru a leader in the forestry industry and the Government should self certify its forestry activities as sustainable. It is difficult to say that there is a forestry industry at this time as Peru is a net importer of wood but it can be done..

    Whatever technical help you may require I probably have available or at least have access to the proper people.

    MARKET:

    This does not seem very complicated , China is the biggest buyer in the world of hardwood flooring of the types that Peru has in abundance and does not put importance to. And China has a huge trade deficit with Peru. They are obligated to buy what they want and need to balance the deficit. It sounds easy to me.

    The big word in Peru is “democracy” and that means that the government is obligated to free the people from obsolete bureaucracies and let them work.

    Regards, Jim King
    Iquitos, Peru



  10. #70
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    Quote Originally Posted by Gary Keedwell View Post
    Thank-you Ed for the voice of reason among the sea of hysteria. In the mean time, I hope everybody drives 12 miles a gallon SUV's so we can run out of oil so future generations can use science and common sense and use energy that pseudo- intellectuals will have a hard time picking apart.
    Gary K.
    If common sense were so common wouldn't everyone have it? As it is I think it should be called uncommon sense. Remember on the average man kind lives around 73 years, if we live with in reason a moderate life style & contribute the best we can to society have we really done all we are supposed to?
    Last edited by Bart Leetch; 07-08-2007 at 4:53 PM.
    I usually find it much easier to be wrong once in while than to try to be perfect.

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  11. #71
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    Gee I was hiking this weekend at the Helderberg escarpment in NY and found seashell fossils. One of the signs talked about the glacial lake 10k years ago where Albany is now. I kind of think the planet is going to do what it plans to do. We just happen to make the biggest hives on the planet at this point.
    Attached Images Attached Images
    I could cry for the time I've wasted, but thats a waste of time and tears.

  12. #72
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    Parasites

    It seems to me that, since our history here is measured in tens of thousands of years and the planet's history is measured in millenia, the presumption that we, as a species can do anything to ensure our long term survival is rather arrogant.

    I believe we are simply parasites taking advantage of the host but having little effect on the long term existance of the host. If we poison the planet in 50 years and all die out, the planet will continue to exist. If a mutant strain of Ebola or influenza wipes us out, the planet will continue to exist. While I would like to see the air and water remain as clean as possible, I have no illusion that by not watering my lawn, I will ensure the continued survival of our species.

    my $.02

    Jim
    Growing older is mandatory.
    Growing up is entirely optional.

    Remember; it's never too late to have a happy childhood.

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