A Great Discussion Web Site for Religious topics

If you are a person that is interested in discussions with people of varying levels of belief and non-belief the best site in the world to hold discussions is iidb.org -> The Internet Infidels Discussion Board.

I'm on this site frequently as Old Ygg. Sometimes I'll pose rediculous questions, sometimes I'll ask serious questions and on this site where there are so many questions it is often hard to tell the difference.

Most of the people there are curteous, but not all. Expect that you should be able to back up any statements you make on this discussion board.

There is also another good reason for people to go to this site - if they are atheists, agnostics, secular humanists or any other variety of philosophical thinker - it is a place where you can speak your mind and be the free thinker you are - and be in the company of friends.

Monthly Gas Bill

So, this month my gas bill was $235 . This is incredible to me - the only thing I use gas for is heating the house and heating household water.

Just last night I was watching Dirty Jobs - where a new senior citizens home was being built - with a large number geothermal wells.

These wells were all 90 or so feet in the ground and helped to alleviate the power consumption of the final structure.

60 million barrels of oil a year could be saved if all the schools in the USA employed similar technology.

Now, this isn't that much when you consider that some numbers indicate we consume 19 million barrels a day, but saving 60 million barrels of oil is still significant - it purchases us three days more oil on the year than if we continue with our current usage profile.

So, when I move in to my next house, I'd certainly love to put in such a system. A combination of a wind turbine, geothermal heat source and some solar panels might reduce my oil profile significantly.

But the value isn't there just for a single household to do it. The value is to convert large numbers of homes to it, so that maybe we set up all the schools with geothermal power, then a significant percentage of homes and save another 60 million barrels of oil and we end up with 6 days less of oil consumption next year than this year.

All this construction certianly comes with a cost - and uses oil to be implemented. So, maybe the first year this is a wash. Then in the following years we could start saving more barrels of oil.

Of course, our population (and the world's population) continue to increase and demand will still increase even with implementing these kinds of measures. Without implementing these kinds of measures; however, we will have less energy for everyone (and higher prices).

So, there is little choice. We need to work to start saving energy resources. My gas bill this month is $235 - what will it be next year?

Second Introduction

So, it has been a very long time since I have posted on this blog and a great many thing have happened since my last posting.

My wife and I had two miscarriages during the time I was blogging. Then my mother-in-law died - and unknown to everyone my wife was pregnant a few days before her death.

You can imagine that the hope engendered by being pregnant was tempered both by the past spontaneous abortions and by my mother-in-laws death.

Fortunately, the third pregnancy went full term and our second child (out of 4 pregnancies) was born. His name is Corwin and our first child is Random, both boys. It would be nice to have a third child, but the emotional wringer of the spontaneous abortions as well as age and higher risk of disease and economics all factor in the decision. Corwin is only 5 months old now and certainly we wouldn't want to have the next one too soon - as that also increases the chances of a spontaneous abortion.

Well, I certainly have hopes for the future. I hope my boys will have better lives than I've had, even if what I've had so far isn't so bad. It is in the core of my mind that the future should be better than the past.

So, now, this blog is for both of my boys. Hopefully, in reading these blogs when they get older they will get some idea of who I am as well as ideas about the world around them.

New Species Threaten the Earth

This CNN article should be cause for alarm for everyone.
Antarctic ice melt reveals exotic creatures

Quote From CNN article: "Looking down 2,800 feet into the icy water -- a comparatively shallow depth -- they found fauna usually associated with seabeds about three times that deep, in places where the creatures must adapt to scarcity to survive.

There were blue ice fish, with dorsal fins like ribbed fans and blood that lacks red cells, an adaptation that makes the blood more fluid and easier to pump through the animal's body, conserving energy at low temperatures....

Among the hundreds of specimens collected, the scientists identified 15 possible new species of shrimp-like amphipods, and four possible new species of cnidarians, organisms related to coral, jellyfish and sea anemones, the scientists said in a statement."

Does the above quote scare you? Perhaps not. Perhaps you have put together what I have from that article.

Damage is done to environments by foreign species introduction. With the melting of these ice shelves we have a massive introduction of foreign species - species from another time. Most of these species have probably died off due to circumstances of their times. That does not mean that those circumstances continue to exist in the present. Perhaps the starfish in this article may survive better than existing starfish and cause damage to the environment at the same time.

We have a massive task ahead of us and no one is even discussing it. These foreign species from another time need to be isolated from our current environment. They could be carrying diseases that current species have no protection from.

Since it is apparent that no one is being pro-active in this aspect we may run in to new species replacing old ones in a reverse form of evolution, we may find new diseases in existing species some of which definitely do not need the help over the edge and we may luck out and the biodiversity being delivered in to our ecosystem will replace species that are being lost presently due to our direct actions.

Hey, anyone want to comment? Am I insane or some misled prophet of doom? Of course, one should realize that I do not mean that horrible things will happen. What I mean is that horrible things could happen and that we increase those chances by not dealing with the invasion of past species in to our current ecosystem.

Then again, maybe the new starfish will be edible by humans and replace the dwindling species of sea life.