Road Trip

Noticed yesterday that I haven't been to Aura in all my life so I decided to check the place out. So I took the car and drove towards the village taking the slight detour to visit their church which is some 3 miles away from the centre. While walking in Aura center, it came to mind I haven't been to Tarvasjoki either, so in order to conserve gas, I decided to visit the place too. There it came to mind that smaller roads are usually prettier. Eventually got back home. (There - c.35 min and back home - c.2h 30min of driving + short walks and stops to check on the map where I am, I guess this would not be so much fun with GPS). The whole trip took about 6 hours. Too bad I didn't take more images, it's surprising how f.e. forest management machinery is photogenic sometimes... Here's the approximate route:

And some views taken with the phone cam. Note to take the better camera along next time out, there are at least 6 more villages nearby I haven't visited.

the unknown soldier

Rail Bridge over Aura River in Aura

I guess I'm on this forest road but not sure...

ah, now I again know for certain where I am.

on planetary boundaries

(for non-north american readers) there's some discussion going on about a pipeline that is planned to be built from Canada to USA refineries near Mexican Gulf Coast. This would create 35 permanent jobs. And of course many more temporary jobs in the case of an accidental rupture of the pipe. This, I guess, is nothing new to at least for the couple of Russian readers here. But the thing is, the global boundary for the greenhouse gas effect, that leads to arctic amplification and subsequent meltdown of Greenland ice sheet, likely also West Antarctic ice sheet, will be easily surpassed by the greenhouse gasses produced in the production (search EROEI) and the burning of the said dilbit. I'm in a lucky position at +25m above sea level, and anyway I'm likely to die a bit before the shit hits the fan, so I'm not very active in the green energy tech, though I've cut a bit off my energy use. Maybe the North American leaders are of the same opinion. And their grandchildren. But anyway, here's a sample of the discussion by Ph.D Michael Tobis (who is researching Geophysics) at Planet 3.0:

"So here is my yell at the hurricane.

If you are thinking of getting a permit and building this thing, understand that there is no scenario in which it makes ethical sense to do that. Understand that it is your responsibility as a human being to take this into account. Understand that if you fail to do so, our responsibility to stop the operation does not go away.

Sooner or later a carbon restriction policy will be in place. And as we campaign for it, we will retain a special place in our hearts for a world in which there is no dilbit pipeline. The campaign to deauthorize this operation will not stop. As such, each additional investment you make in this infrastructure puts more money at risk. If you can’t account for the ethics of the situation, consider its politics.

Opposition to Keystone will not go away once the pipeline is built. We don’t want tar sands being dug up, we don’t want dilbit being piped, we don’t want tar being refined. We may not be able to give up oil cold turkey, but we do not need your crap. Even if you build your pipe, we will still fight to leave the tar in the ground where it belongs, and shut down the pipe.

This battle will not be over when the pipe is built. Your investment is at risk."

10000

The blog has reached a milestone. 10000 visitors in just 4,5667 years! Granted, about half of these are my own visits, but still! I was told by the teachers in high school that I have some writing skills (scoring in the highest 5% in the local school by their standards) but I like never imagined then my scribblings would be so widely distributed.

I dreamed of being a scientist and scientists use numbers instead of text to convey their work. Then the Soviet Union and eastern block collapsed for they wanted to take things easier and more laid back than the darwinian competitors in the west and the math skills required of a good scientist proved to be too much for my abilities back in the early 1990s, so the career choices in military or in science were put in the question. Anyway, I finally got the science degree from the local university (that's in the Coimbra-group), so the blog has some entries with 'science content'. My 'Pro Graduation'-study was about the use of fluorescence in the analysis (fig.8) of single mutations in DNA, so some knowledge of molecular orbitals in chelate compounds has seeped into my system. Thus, some heavy science might some time be included in the blog but I doubt it, since one intention to write the blog has been the simplifying of the science. The one hobby that hasn't entered the blog yet is the music (in finnish), but music doesn't easily fit in the theme of the blog. Once I planned to do a piece on the microintervals. This would require a proper audio software, though.

The countries of the visitors here has been a surprise to me. I can't anymore list all the countries you represent, but an incomplete list would be: USA, GB, Finland, Australia, New Zealand, France, Israel, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Peru, Brazil, Canada, Spain, Italy, Romania, Russia, (South) Korea, Moldavia, Germany, South Africa, Ukraine, Belorussia, Morocco, China, Sweden, Norway, Netherlands, Estonia, Argentina, Chile, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and about 10 more that I can't recall now. You know who you are, thank you for visits.

On other news, another milestone has also been reached.

map projection

What's the proper name for this?

untrustworthy narrator

"...So, in response to your question, in 4005 BC there was this handsome and not-at-all misogynist northern guy in upper Levant who met an ugly dark-skinned girl from south, she had crossed the gates of tears to get to this lavish land of Paradox. He had sex with her and whoopsie-daisy, in 4004 BC she birthed two beautiful children, one male and a one female. When the girl from the south wondered “How will our children get along in here?” the man answered: “oh, there’s the whole world waiting for them”. The girl asked ” What’s the world?”, and the guy answered:”that’s just a word I made up. It’s all this that surrounds us. I doubt there’s much use for it because one should always know what one is talking about.”

"Actually I'm not so sure of the date of the story, there were so many zeros that I've forgotten the correct number of those, and what is zero anyway, might have been 3 or 5.

"So... the girl and the boy went on to marry and have children of their own, and This is why some artists nowadays sing "Brothers and Sisters...!" The quite not so white boy liked both of his wives and the other was called Eve. The girl loved both of her husbands too, and one was called Adam. What the other ones were called, has escaped my knowledge as I'm culturally bound to a belief system. Well, it was so long ago that I might have forgotten and mistaken these names too. Sorry. let's go on with more modern stuff. "

early commentary on peak oil

attempting to translate (without comments), J.Leskinen song 'Öljyshake' (1981) about (I guess) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_Empress

Oil shake

1.The decline of the western world is right at the door

For a long time have they fed the viper on the floor

why won't they apply their heads to any works they do?

Shake oil shake

2.The former cavarly men have the dollars of fine men.

There is something very badly wrong somewhere when

the only place that has it good is Saudi-Arabia.

Isn't there anything but oil on energy?

shake oil shake

3.I saw a tongue colored like crude oil, and I've been shaking since

An oil tanker carrier is a dangerous vessel

in a mist navigating, won't find the checkpoint

and with its oil it carries a flammable cargo

Shake oil shake

4.A tankerful may acquire some bombs and tanks

the superpowers drill the virgin earth like them

rapists and they present their victory dance, but

maybe the Quran should be among their readings too?

Shake oil shake

5.now they sit inebriated with oil shake drinks in drugstores...

sorry the original has much better rhymes and clearer references to historical happenstances. not sure of the last word.

Soup of Mysteries part III

Previous chapters are found at Soup of Mysteries and Soup of Mysteries II. They might still go through some revision if God (unspecified regligion and duties in polytheistic non-Taoist religions, in the case of Taoist pragmatism, please consider this an attempt at humorous description of the universe and its workings) willing.

As was told in the last story, the entities called HeBeLis observed much diversity to be present in their attempt to create a stable flow of positrons eliminating the difficult electrons. Let us hear the great prophet Tom Lehrer chant of the diversity found. Other prophets have much discussed of the proper order of these, though every type is needed somewhere in the world. Anyway, those that aren't directly involved with unifying positrons with electrons, are currently called stable nuclides and make up much of what we perceive to be in existence outside our immortal souls. From here on the story of Creation shall involve more earthly matters, thus it is vitally important to keep in mind that electrons are a part of this universe where Gods' work isn't always easily percieved, and thus the table of electrons must be presented and memorized.

If we take a deeper look on this fully experimental table we see that the electrons are mischievous and very exitable so they do not follow any exact rule, and accept that all is not gold that glitters, we can begin to marvel the Creation as it is manifested in this rotating ball of fire, wind, earth and water. The fire is usually understood differently, but that is a minor issue here.

Now that we've all memorized the Creation of the Earth and sky let us then hear the preacher Robert Krulwich of how the unliving pieces of rocks came to be. http://www.npr.org/blogs/krulwich/2010/09/14/129858314/my-grandson-the-rock

Clearly, life is potent. How God created blobs, bacteria, algae, and other forms of life will be the subject of our next evening of the tale of the Creation. Be well and praise the Lord, for he may tax us with curious but all too sensible taxes.