The 1,000 “like” road marker disappearing in the rear view mirror…
The WP auto-post function just told me that I have accumulated 1,000 “likes,” which are all because the imaginary “you” have been appreciating what I’ve been pouring forth since June 22nd. It hasn’t been four months yet and I have so many “likes!” Who knew?!?
I’ve logged 87 posts (one was a repeat, so doesn’t really count and one was a reblog in respect for a new WordPress-induced friend) in 111 days, meaning that I’ve hit about 78% of the days between start and present. Not bad. Could be better. Let’s see if I can pick up the slack.
This border is gradual and becomes more real as any of us ascend into our atmosphere. While the troposphere contains ~80% of our air (which is a mix of gases as faithful readers already know), the stratosphere holds a mere 19% or so. As we leave sea level and go up mountains, there is less air, therefore less pressure exerted by the air upon us. By the time we get around to climbing Mount Everest, there is so little oxygen left in the lower pressures of atmosphere experienced at that altitude that climbers must bring their own. On the other hand, it gets much colder as we climb so there are two good reasons to remain close to flat land: (1) decreasing air and (2) decreasing temperature. This is all graphed out in the Pressure scale helpfully included in the following:
As a little imagination game, imagine that your roommate and/or spouse (depending on years of commitment) has just cracked open a rotten egg in your kitchen. The spreading smell represents earth’s atmosphere and you want to get as far away from that particular atmosphere as possible. The farther you remove yourself, the less the smell and (for purposes of this analogy only) the less atmosphere there is. Although you can’t really smell air, you can experience its absence quite profoundly (caution: side-effects may include a light-headed feeling, confusion, dizziness, shortness of breath, and death).
2. The air we can breathe and the earth we cannot.
While sea level and much mountain air is pleasant to breathe, inhaling earth of any kind results in clogged oral and nasal passages. If attempts to breathe earth are continued, bronchi and alveoli may become non-functional leading to a lack of air and at least some of the side-effects mentioned above. Do not breathe earth. While it is good for plants to stick their snouts deep within a nice chunk of earth, particularly when it is enriched with supplements, we must insist that you do not attempt to replicate their behavior. While a diagram of the earth coming into contact with air is not very exciting, there are many important processes that happen between the various solid surfaces, natural and human-made, and the air. Here’s a nice diagram of how the stuff we put into the atmosphere comes back for visits:
3. The air we can breathe and the water we cannot.
You would think this boundary is as boring as the one between the air and the earth and you would be incorrect. The atmosphere and bodies of water of significant size have a very dynamic interaction. This incredible time-lapse map of global oceanic currents (courtesy the nice people at NASA) shows their beauty, dynamism, local and transglobal effects, their overall complexity:
But these are only the surface manifestations of phenomena that reach into the clouds and oceanic depths as well. The following video, produced by NASA using data from a number of their satellites and narrated by Liam Neeson, starts with an explanation of how the earth is protected and affected from the sun’s energy output by the magnetosphere.
Chances are that you may have missed the thermodynamic heat pump that powers circulation in our oceans. It is called thermohaline (“temperature-salt”) circulation or conveyor belt. As surface water is warmed by the sun at the equator it is swept north and south toward the icy poles. There it is cooled. As cold salt water is denser than the warm variety, it sinks as it approaches the poles and is swept along the ocean’s floor back towards the equator and elsewhere around the globe. Given the complexity of the currents and circulation, it is thought that it may take up to 1,000 years for one unit of water (let’s say a cubic kilometer) to circulate back to its point of origin.
4. The water we cannot breathe and the earth we cannot breathe.
This is not our realm. We belong walking along the surface of the earth, breathing the atmosphere and drinking the purer forms of water. We must take our atmosphere with us when we move into the water or earth.
Our takeaway lesson? While you can only breathe the air portions of this very real barrier between the air and water or between earth and water, the effects that air, earth, and water have on each other is astonishingly complex and persistently in motion. Without this perpetual motion going on between the three of them, there would be no weather and no recycling of the gaseous and aqueous realms so necessary for us to live.
The fifth border is imaginary—human-made—compared to the four above. Here is one way of picturing it:
All these countries, all these governments, all these people divided up by imaginary lines cut into the earth and bleeding the blood of its citizens. Why do some people want to go elsewhere? Why are “violations” of these imaginary lines fraught with so much emotion, so much passion, so much need?
Here’s another way of looking at these imaginary lines:
At one end of the spectrum of net national incomes, we have Malawi, a country that is full of nice people who through no fault of their own barely scrape through a year on virtually nothing… and that’s the AVERAGE income! At the other end, we have Qatar, Monaco, the Scandinavian countries, some others (the names aren’t as important as the concept here). The average net national income across all countries is around $45,000/year.
The reasons the imaginary boundaries are important is that people who have governments that don’t work in the interests of the families who live there want to leave and find opportunity elsewhere, which makes their destinations nervous—probably for some good reasons. The destinations of choice all seem better from a distance as the people who want to leave their countries are doing fairly poorly. As more people arrive at their destinations, it is likely that the quality of life in that country will be overwhelmed by newly arrived citizens—and the existing citizens who were already doing poorly and will see a deterioration in their quality of life. On the other hand, the people who leave their countries of origin leave behind many family members, the culture and geography they know and appreciate, their way of doing things, which may have been that way for millennia and are much loved.
The solutions are not easy. I propose the following:
The countries that are not doing well by their citizens must determine why there are disparities in quality of life and correct them so that anyone who wishes can make a one-to-one comparison between their lives at home and their imagined lives elsewhere.
This will often mean that the people who are doing the best in those countries must find ways to share their success with more of their citizens. As it is often the case that wealth from natural resources, agriculture, etc., are harvested by the poor and enjoyed by those who are already comfortable, that seems to be an appropriate basis for sharing. Do corporations and governments own the natural resources of any particular country? I would think all citizens of the planet “own” them equally and that the corporations and governments are only there to ensure equitable distribution of them and any profits that arise from manufacturing.
The countries that are doing well must find ways to channel resources to the countries who are not. These resources must find their ways first to the people who need them the most. Once inequities in education, nutrition, safety, health, domicile and baseline income are addressed, more generalized issues (e.g. governmental corruption) must be addressed as well.
This kind of change is needed. The earth—on its own—figures it all out in spite of the various environmental disasters we keep visiting upon it. Now, we the people must figure out how to stop killing each other—or passively allowing each other to be killed—and work through the inequities that we allow to exist between us.
It is easy to come up with arguments that refute these positions: political, religious, racial, gender, class, family history, income, etc. It is better to stop arguing and get to solutions. We are all one thing and that thing is the human species. Let’s solve our problems so we can all stop with the stupidity.
Making Sense of Complications 