Category Archives: History

Dark Energy, Plasma, and the Whedefugawe Effect

Posted on May 30, 2015 by gymnosperm

Early in the twentieth century, even as emergent nationalism made the world pregnant with a half century of mechanized war, the greatest advances in physics since Isaac Newton were taking place. Relativity and quantum redefined the universe as a dance … Continue reading →

Posted in History, Physics, Plasma | Tagged | Leave a comment

History on Ice

Posted on April 5, 2015 by gymnosperm

, This graphic of Greenland ice core temperature based on data by Alley has been making the rounds. I took a notion to plot human history against it and don’t know who to credit for the base graphic, but grateful acknowledge it as not … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate, Climate and Civilization, Climate Change, Geography, History | Tagged | Leave a comment

Oil and the Devil

Posted on March 8, 2015 by gymnosperm

  The concept of the devil in the Judeo-Christian/Muslim tradition seems to have its roots in an older Persian and possibly Indo-European notion of opposing forces of good and evil. The Christian conception developed into the elaborate scheme described by  Dante which was integrated into … Continue reading →

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The New Ptolemy

Posted on February 15, 2015 by gymnosperm

The evolution of consciousness since the Enlightenment can be thought of as the progressive, and unwelcome realization of human insignificance. We inhabit this rock, spinning in infinity*, the center of nothing, outweighed in biomass by ants. God still loves us, … Continue reading →

Posted in Anthropocene, Anthropology, Climate Change, History, Metaphor | Leave a comment

Ecology Now!

Posted on August 10, 2014 by gymnosperm

This exhortation has a strange ring to it now, and it is likely that no one under the age of fifty ever heard it, but  the image above is a poster of an actual flag created by the activist organization … Continue reading →

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Russians R Us

Posted on July 5, 2014 by gymnosperm

So perhaps you are red headed and fancy yourself Celtic. Well, I’ve got news for you. There may have been a few red genes somewhere but the Celtic genome and culture were centered in France and characterized by brown hair … Continue reading →

Posted in Anthropology, Geography, History, Plate Tectonics, Seismic Tomography | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

The Revenge of Gaia (and the Origional Sin)

Posted on November 9, 2013 by gymnosperm

Our brains are layered in the same way sedimentary rocks are. In our lower brains lie the basic functions: breathe, eat and drink, thermoregulate, and reproduce. These are Archean functions we share with all living things. All beautiful, non-predictive analogies can be … Continue reading →

Posted in Anthropology, Biology, Carbon Theology, History, Metaphor, Religion | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

A bit About Adiabatic, (Without the Devil)

Posted on June 27, 2013 by gymnosperm

Air does basically two things; either it warms and rises , or it sinks and cools. Winds follow the pressure gradients that emerge between these regimes. Ironically, cold air masses are warming and rising and warm air masses are sinking … Continue reading →

Posted in Anthropology, Carbon Theology, Climate, Climate Change, Global Warming, History, River | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Subjective and Objective

Posted on April 19, 2013 by gymnosperm

Those who have studied English might call this a “watershed”. As a carpenter and mountaineer I always objected to this term as imprecise because what is really meant is ridge or divide where water flows one way or the other. … Continue reading →

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Something In Us Loves a Witch

Posted on April 14, 2013 by gymnosperm

Something in us loves a witch. We’ve already explored the irrational behavior demonstrated by Prohibition and the Salem Witch Trials. See “Global Warming and Prohibition”. The nature of the human condition is that we are constantly confronted with forces beyond … Continue reading →

Posted in Anthropology, Climate, History, Metaphor | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment