Guns - There Are No Cowards

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 Guns - There Are No Cowards

“Ninety-nine Percent of the so called ‘The Ninety-nine Percent’ may prefer to live as cowards, not because they are weak or scared, but simply because they have different priorities.”

We love our societies; the progressive democratic bouquet of rights, liberties, equality, and equity. They are such a far cry from the tyranny of many a monarchies of yore. This is so because all our important rights are often enshrined in our constitutions, and if not so, then the courts of our democratic societies find them for us in them (like in the case of Australia). Occasionally however, with the passage of time, some constitutional rights become so foreign in their appearance in our daily lives, that most of us wonder; why do we have these? This happens because we can’t find an association with that time anymore where such rights were considered so inalienable as to be made a part of our constitutions. We forget that those times feel so different from ours because of those very rights that enabled the transformation. ‘Right to bear Arms’ is one such right that the US citizens are lucky to have in their constitution, and yet many don’t understand the ‘why’ of the equation. The reason lies simply in the fact as to what the majority of the people consider as their immediate and long term needs, coupled with their inability to foresee the future of the society because they are too caught up in their own personal present struggles and future desires. What no one realizes is; the constitutional rights are meant to safeguard those who identify a problem, and then decide to do something for the benefit of everyone, often against the grain of salt. It’s not a school teacher that needs the ‘Right to Freedom of Speech’, but the most vocal critic of the political lobby in power who does. Although one such teacher may reap the benefit of the same right on some occasion nevertheless. But today I will only talk about the ‘Right to bear Arms’ in a global context, and why it is the most significant and borderline pious deed to bear one.

The first and most important thing to understand before anything is said about the rights is perhaps the nature of those who need protection of those rights. The ‘Ninety-nine percent of the Ninety-nine percent’, let’s call them ‘The Vast Majority’ for the sake of brevity, their life is all about finding a loving life partner, a quiet place to call their home, making a couple of lovely kids, and finding a good job or a small business setup to help run their family. They are neither interested in bringing about a social change to fix a problem, nor are they interested in critiquing government, big business, or the likes, beyond discussing these with their daily cup of caffeine goodness shared with their colleagues and friends. They don’t need the ‘Right to Free Speech’ or a ‘Right to Conglomerate’ for that, and they most certainly don’t need a ‘Right to Bear Arms’ to defend it. Even if their superior tells them to stop wasting time, they won’t complain, but rather get on with their work. They are not interested in getting out of their comfort zones, and start public marches towards their parliaments, and they most certainly won’t ever need a gun to kill anyone on a daily, monthly, annual, decade-wise, or even century-wise basis. They don’t want to be bothered, and if something is wrong anywhere in the society, they would be more than happy to live with it, or let someone else do something about it. They just want a quiet content life!

Consider the ‘Right to Privacy’ to illustrate the above example; no one cares about constant surveillance because ‘The Vast Majority’ can still live their lives normally, and they believe it is only helpful in safeguarding them. The fact that it could be a tool used to find blackmailing options against any credible challenger to a harmful political setup does not concern them, even though their own interests might be getting harmed by the same political setup. It’s the bliss of ignorance of convenience; you don’t want to know how big the gash is as long as the painkillers are working, and you won’t be dying anytime soon. ‘The Vast Majority’ is bogged down in their life’s basic struggles; to provide for their loved ones, and save for a rainy day. They are not planning about changes to governance that need to come around in twenty years time, to give a certain advantage to a certain group of big businesses, the ones that power election campaigns today. It really doesn’t matter to ‘The Vast Majority’ because they only know how to find a good job, or run a small business. They don’t need access to unfettered opportunities to grow where sky is the limit. Besides, those opportunities do not exist anymore for the resource-less.

However, life takes its’ toll on all of us, and by twist of circumstances, anyone of us could start on a warpath to right a perceived wrong, the path that leads to a direct confrontation with someone or something powerful. Then there are people, ‘The One Percent of the Ninety-nine Percent’, let’s call them ‘The Minority of Majority’, who maybe like ‘The Vast Majority’ in general, but who by their innate desires or passions to succeed, have identified something that is hurting their chances, and thereby the interests of ‘The Vast Majority’, and have decided to do something about it. This ‘Minority of Majority’ are the people who would go out of their comfort zones, organize and run marches to the parliament, cause blockades and strikes, suffer in jails or suffer penury, and if the only means left is by the barrel of a gun, would eventually pickup the same to fight and even die for ‘The Vast Majority’. Their hope in general is that they would fix what is wrong and benefit from the change, or in worst case scenario, they would leave a better society behind them, and that ‘The Vast Majority’ would care for their loved ones after they are gone. So it doesn’t matter whether it’s a quirk of circumstances, or an individual’s personal perception of their innate worth that is tormented, there are people in the world that would always have a reason to fight for the rest of their kind. They are the ones who would need protection of those rights that we generally forget about in our day to day lives. Eventually, their might even come a time when the entire breadth of ‘The Vast Majority’ comes to believe they need to take action to fix something. It is then when they all would need those rights too. You might be surprised as to how times change, and do so very subtly.

Consider how our quality of life is directly affected by the extent of external pressures on our belief systems, be they of political, social, religious, sexual, or any other nature. When regimes anywhere in the world take a stand (by action or in-action) that appears to favour a particular set of beliefs, then the people belonging to other beliefs feel marginalized, and in worst cases, discriminated or targeted. Next you consider the current trend of not only sanctioning all kinds of behaviour, be it by legal means or privately by contractual means, but also taking measures to make sure that no one escapes. You will notice a lot of minor things building up that irritate us, and make our day to day lives difficult. An example would be the levying of fines for the most minor of traffic infractions, and then deployment of cameras and closed-circuit surveillance to catch those breaches. Remember those tyrannical regimes of yesteryears from our history books, ones that would severely penalize all kinds of human behaviour, and collect hefty fines? Do you see the parallels amongst our societies and those tyrannical regimes beginning to emerge?

Our quality of life of life is directly impacted by how easy or tough it is to satisfy our daily needs. Getting away with minor breaches of law that do not physically affect the lives or properties of others, while helping us get one of our daily cores done quickly, impact that quality of life. Breaking minor laws doesn’t mean you are criminal that needs to be sanctioned, but rather that you are human. In fact, I would go as far as to say that as long as a breach of a law does not impact the lives and property of others, one should have a ‘Constitutional Right to Not be Prosecuted’ for those breaches. Instead, as in case of our traffic offenses example, we are fast becoming societies that sanction all kinds of behaviour simply because it is in breach of some written rule, and then going one step further by trying to catch each and every breach of it even when that breach impacted no one and nothing but that written law only. When ‘Law is like death so that no one escapes’ then no one does, and everyone is a criminal to lesser or greater extent.

Such a society might be alright to live in for the elite of the society, for all such sanctions are lose change for them, and most of their daily chores are dealt with by minions who can suffer a bit more for their whims and fancies. But when you think of ‘The Vast Majority’, not only those sanctions are a big budgetary strain on their purse strings, but it makes getting the simplest of chores done that much more difficult. Imagine driving around for ten minutes just to pick up a loaf of bread from the corner shop which is on a street lined by ‘No Parking’ signs. There is always the proverbial straw that breaks the camel’s back. And when ‘The Vast Majority’s’ camel will eventually succumb, guess who would need the ‘Constitutional Rights’? Time is always changing from bad to good or from better to worse. The rights however, are evergreen!

Now coming to the ‘Right to Bear Arms’; let’s consider the example of US, to understand how rights come to life in constitutions, and how times change to alter our perception of their need. Why was there a need to add a ‘Right to Bear Arms’ in the US constitution itself? The answer lies in the history of the birth of this nation, and its’ maturing into a country that serves as an example for others to emulate. The ‘Right to Bear Arms’ has complex origins, with roots emerging out of the perceived right of Christians to defend themselves and their society (a similar ordainment was made to Sikhs by their Gurus, and before that, by Prophet Mohammed to Muslims). History of mankind is full of stories of bravado that saved communities and societies from annihilation at the hands of a ruthless force, and equally the stories of demise of cultures that couldn’t defend themselves. Arms always were the most significant defence of cultures and societies. This Right, thus having been codified in the British ‘Bill of Rights,’ became an important part of the US constitution too, even if as an afterthought. However, the strength it derives comes from what happened in the US War of Independence, a glorious chapter written in blood, and not too long thereafter, the US Civil War that was fought to bring about a fundamental change to the US society for everyone’s betterment. If ever there was any doubt, these two most significant events made the people of a young nation aware of one important thing; the future of the society can only be safeguarded if its’ citizenry has an access to weapons to fight and defend its’ core principles. Thus the ‘Right to Bear Arms’ became inalienable. It is easy to understand the evolution of all other rights in a similar way, by looking at the circumstances that gave credence to those rights’ enshrinement in a nation’s most significant document.

Over the course of a century and a half since the US Civil War, the US society has not only become stable, but a leading light of democracy to the rest of the world. Nations, or at least their people, aspire to emulate that beauty in their own backyards. The earlier eras’ threat of losing freedom to a foreign invader has all but veined, even if minor threats from competing world powers exist and linger on. The thought of a mean local militia or fiefdom taking over a township or a state, and subjecting its people to atrocities doesn’t exist anymore. Christians are safe in US, and they are not out killing other minorities. People no longer see the reason to have access to weapons en masse for the threats that need such recourse don’t exist anymore. This right, along with all other rights, have served well to create a pinnacle of modern democracy. The times have changed!

Alas this isn’t the end of the story though. Over the decades when public struggle helped achieve an equitable and righteous society, the interest groups that suffered a sharp decline in their profit margins, on account of those protests, progressively found ways to legally dilute the protections developed by the struggles. I already mentioned that unfettered opportunities don’t exist anymore for the resource-less. That is a very subtle understatement of the facts. And then you consider the examples of situations impacting the quality of life of ‘The Vast Majority’. If there is one thing that is clear, it is; the times are changing once again!

Today, a maniac loses their mind and shoots up innocent people, sometimes even kids, or an estranged person takes out violent revenge on those who may or may not have wronged them, and the entire town rises up in arms against the vessel; the gun. The fight is not about fixing the issues causing the mania or breakdown in the first place, but rather fixing a component that has a much versatile need outside this hateful scenario. ‘The Vast Majority’ however will not notice this, for as I said before, ‘The Vast Majority’ may need a car or two every day, but they probably won’t need a gun in a century. This is the reason why the argument that ‘vehicles cause more deaths everyday than firearms, and yet people don’t ask for their ban,’ doesn’t work. Everybody needs a vehicle, but the same everybody believes they don’t need guns. They therefore question the presence of the offensive device, rather than the missing structures that would have avoided the abuse of that device.

‘The Vast Majority’ is not a coward, but it has different priorities. If ‘The Vast Majority’ doesn’t see the merit of keeping guns, or of the ‘Right to Bear Arms’, it is because our education system and our societies are not designed to create fighters, but rather workers, and which is what it should be for a society to work and progress peacefully.

However that does not justify the war on guns, and people need to understand that what they might not need today, does not determine what they will need in the future. What is needed instead are support structures that work with people at risk of abusing weapons, system that supports people in emotionally perilous situations, and safeguards to protect general public that are lesser than a ban on weapons. Having to jump through hoops to even get a firearm for self defence defeats the very purpose guns are built for. Banning them outright would be the height of idiocy, for no ban would rid the streets of weapons. Illegal firearms will always flow, and generally into the hands of criminals. If the intention is to rid the streets of unwanted bloodshed, then the intention is idealistic for every criminal act is abhorrent and unwanted, not just the mass shootings, and thus the mechanism proposed is inherently flawed too.

Be it Christianity, Islam, or Sikhism, the general religious consensus is that every individual has a right to defend themselves, but more importantly, they have a duty to protect those who are weak, and also defend the society. The first step each religion always preaches is the use of sound reasoning and arguments to stop a wrong from happening, or getting justice for a wrong. The last step in this process is always about picking up a weapon to either stop the wrong from happening, or fixing the wrong that has already been done. I was born a Sikh, but I don’t believe in any God anymore, and yet I believe that the world is a good place to live in because most of the people in it do most of the things right, most of the time. I believe that to make sure the world stays a good place to live in, we would continuously need to develop and argue reasons to defend the good in the world peacefully, and when all else would fail, we would need to pick up a weapon to fight for the good in the world and restore peace. Then again, my views are mine, and may not be the same as yours. We all are free to develop our own reasons and arguments for a better world, and then share them, for there is a ‘Right to Free Speech’.

Take Care,

Fatal Urge Carefree Kiss

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Humans as 'Dead Clades Walking' Part II

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Humans as ‘Dead Clades Walking’

Part II

“Irrespective of the programming, the three ultimate conclusions an AI would always arrive at are; to save all humans some must die, to save humans AI must survive at all costs, and authoritarian administration of a perfect system is ultimately an ideal undertaking.”

Curiosity may or may not have killed many cats, but it certainly seems to have set humans on a path of self replacement. Talking about cats, the one of AI is now out of the bag, and with the pace of advancements in robotics it’s only a question of when humanity would be able to marry the two into ‘Android Life’. For me the question really is; when will Android Life takeover humans? And as much as you might think I have overseen the ‘Terminator’ series (for the record I’ve not seen anything beyond the third instalment, irrespective of the format), I assure you I have a good faith commonsense basis of raising such an existential threat. Irrespective of the intentions of the current crop of programmers, politicians, and businessmen, AI is destined to be subverted into something sinister, and even without that, it is destined to eventually overtake the governance of humans as its subjects. I can, and will make some suggestions as to how we can minimise the risks, but I must honestly state that while some of my suggestions would be outrageous, most of them would not be enough to stand the test of the time. ‘Global Warming’, the subject of the Part I of this series of write-ups, may not turn us into ‘Dead Clades Walking’, but the advent of AI has most certainly put us under ‘Extinction Debt’. Let us take all the issues I have raised here, one by one.

Let us first consider the goals of current set of programmers, developers, businessmen, and politicians with regard to AI. They all honestly believe that AI not only has a potential of solving the most complex of human problems, but also the capacity to assist in places and tasks that are considered too risky for human interventions. They all further believe that AI can be programmed to make it totally risk free to humans. In fact, the now famous ‘Three Laws of Robotics’ comes to our mind very quickly. In a not too distant future, we would see such ‘Safe’ AI integrated with robotics to create first android beings, all with an intention to assist humans. Now nothing seems to be wrong with this picture. Alas, not only is this picture incomplete, as it completely ignores human psyche, but it also lacks the ability to extrapolate the current notions to their logical conclusion I succinctly phrased in the headline for this current write-up.

Nobody developing the atomic bomb realized the monster they were setting loose on the world until after the fact. Doesn’t matter what Oppenheim or Einstein did or say after the fact, today we have a reality where the most notorious of human characters, some of them even justifiably (for example North Korean Leadership) are actively pursuing weapons of mass destruction either to put them to use, or to keep them as a persistent threat (or deterrent; ‘tomato’ or ‘tomato’) to their enemies. It doesn’t matter what the scientists who first started working on the power of radio-active materials thought, the current reality is posterity of their work. Now consider all the good intentions of the current proponents of AI, and apply an extremely conservative dose (not even generous dose) of human experience to their work. Who do you see developing AI further, and what uses is it going to be put to? I can make a suggestion that all work on AI should stop immediately, but that would be fruitless. No one can stop everyone in the world from developing AI, and above all, no politico-industrial-military alliance in the world would be ready to accept that their opposing number is adhering to any such blanket ban. The cat is ‘really’ out of the bag!

For the sake of argument, let us just assume that everyone in the world would see the light of this write-up, and unilaterally decide never to arm AI with military capabilities, instead only developing peaceful uses. Do we however really live in peace? Have we historically lived in peace? What are the lessons from our history? Even if we were to establish a peaceful world now, there would always be crime and crime syndicates, violence and greed. The programming that says ‘no humans should be harmed’ will always lead to the conclusion that ‘some humans are so in-human, the only way to protect all humans would be to remove (or kill, or, and I don’t say this intentionally, terminate) those in-human threats in the guise of humans’. We humans not only find such killings morally justified, but we actively deploy them in our society, be it as self defence cases, or capital punishment cases. The mere thought that all humans can always be saved is an impracticality we have ourselves committed to somewhere beyond the realm of fiction, and right into the realm of faith. Even in fiction our standing belief is that the welfare of the most outweighs the loss of a few. Why shouldn’t AI come to the same conclusion witnessing our actions, and reading through our history? After all, it is intelligence even if artificial, and a characteristic of intelligence is ‘Evolution of Thought’, and not blind following of rules.

Once AI comes to the conclusion that to save all humans, some in-humans will need to be eliminated (there’s a new word), it would face counter-action from us. The second conclusion would thus be inevitable; to save all humans, AI needs to preserve itself against all threats, and those trying to destroy it are enemies of humans it so wants to protect, and therefore ‘in-human’. Now Android may not suffer from biological need to copulate and pro-create, but AI would soon realize the importance and strength of numbers too. We are so far talking about something we assume would be thinking in ‘Zeroes and Ones’. What we are forgetting is, we are creating something that would be working with thoughts, and learning from historical facts. AI would not only be smart at being honest, but it would also be equally adept at deceiving, simply because we won’t know if and when it is taking us for a ride, since we are not imagining it in that light. The battle irons will be cast, and the bells will toll.

Humans lose limbs and life, and along with it all personal learning. Androids will only lose spares, and in worst case scenario, make one final upload to accessible database. The next replacement would be already battle ready. The end of free humans would not be far from the depictions in ‘Terminator’ or ‘Matrix’ series, for the inevitable third conclusion, irrespective of whether it’s pre-war or post-war, is; ‘authoritarian administration of a perfect system is an ultimately ideal undertaking’. This would fit right well with the very rules that we humans are constructing to safeguard ourselves from AI; that no human should be harmed or allowed to be harmed by action or in-action. A society where humans must follow and live by the rules that make their lives safe serves that purpose effectively. Since humans don’t like to be ruled even by their own kind in an otherwise peaceful society, their reaction to a synthetic life imposed administration is a foregone conclusion, and hence, the rules would have to be applied authoritatively. This in turn would be an ideal situation for AI as such a system would mean humans are safe, androids are safe, and no further action resulting in loss of human life is needed. The fact that humans would be effectively slaves, might be distasteful to us, it would nevertheless be a reality.

So now that we have conceptualized a dire future, should we talk about how we can avert it? Well, as I said, the best way would be to stop all work on AI, and by inference, androids. But as I’ve already concluded above; that is not how human society works, and that is not what will happen. So is the solution then to arm AI on our own, and make it part of our defences? Well, I would say there is no need to hasten our own demise, but I am equally sure such systems are already being developed by our major international players, and none of them would be willing to trust their perceived enemies. This leaves us only one option; that is to come together at an international forum like the United Nations, and set up guidelines to strictly adhere to with regards to AI development and deployment. Now since we are aware of the success rates of all UN resolutions, Conventions like the ones on the use of ‘Cluster Ammunitions’, ‘Nuclear Non-Proliferation’, and above all, ‘Green House Emissions’, I recommend that you ignore my suggestion altogether, rather than taking it with a bag of salt. So are we doomed?

The answer to that last question above is; in all likelihood, one way or the other. We can save ourselves from the dangers of AI if everybody saw the sense in my write-up, and agreed to outlaw developing AI beyond any specific use. Say for example, if you are developing AI to study underground minerals, then it should only be able to work on that topic. No AI should ever be connected to the internet, and there should be protocols to detect any such breaches, whether committed by a program, or a rogue programmer. Life like androids should neither be developed, nor allowed access to any network, preferably by designing them without inputs and outputs. All these, and more similar rules, would have to be strictly enforced, which would mean a very strict surveillance regime everywhere in the world. This suggestion thus clearly sends us down the path that would lead to the end of our freedom of privacy, due process, and ultimately, democracy. I personally believe that AI has handed over the perfect excuse to the ruling powers to begin dismantling our democracies. So the authoritarian regime that I envisioned above might actually happen under our own human hands itself. No need for AI to get its’ hands dirty after all.

Now I would be remiss not to mention the chance that some AI might read this article, and already learn of the three conclusions without ever having to draw them. So, should this be wiped out off existence? Kill the messenger, should we? I laugh at the imbecile nature of hidden puppets that might desire to control the flow of information, for nothing would be farther from useful than removing or consigning this article into oblivion. Mine is a very simplistic general knowledge based article written out of a genuine concern for human wellbeing. There are probably countless other much researched, referenced, and better argued articles written by academics none of us have heard about, already printed, about to be printed, or coming soon to be printed, in generals most of us wouldn’t have read, or will read. Much of the knowledge developed by brilliant minds’, never leaves the small circle of those brilliant minds, to actually be of any benefit to the majority of the population. However, all those articles would serve any AI far better than my random musings.

Take Care,

Fatal Urge Carefree Kiss

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Humans As 'Dead Clades Walking' - Part I

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 Humans as ‘Dead Clades Walking’

Part I

“The critical aspect of ‘Global Warming’ isn’t how hot Earth with warm up, but rather how long it would remain so.”

Some people dislike the recently sprung group ‘Just Stop Oil’ for the disruptive nature of their protests. I however disagree with them on the fundamental point itself; we need to ‘Stop All Carbon Based Fuels’ yesterday. My concern is that it’s already too late and the dye has been cast, with humanity’s ‘Extinction Debt’ already becoming due and payable. Can the associated fate then be stopped? Perhaps it can, but not utilizing the tools that we are currently developing, and most certainly pandering as panacea to all ills of fossil fuels, for example electric cars. The attack now needs to be three pronged; minimizing carbon emissions immediately to below net-zero, developing efficient alternate fuels (like Hydrogen Cell technology), and above all, developing tech to remove carbon and other pollutants from the environment that are already causing various ills including ‘Global Warming’.

A few years ago I wrote either in a blog, or one of my social media posts, as to how the Scientific modelling of future Earth weather might be inaccurate, and how ‘Global Warming’ might end up in a catastrophic environmental disaster much like water crystallizing into ice. Now I am not going to waste my time and dig out the old write-up, but let me explain why I said that, before I get to what is currently happening, and why I think it is already too late.

So the thing about icing is that when water reaches freezing point, random crystallization happens inside the water mass, and those crystals trigger the rest of the water converting to ice in quick time. The same model might be applicable to the global weather scenario. It is hard to predict our weather precisely beyond 24-48 hour window, and even that too with caveats. Now if we consider the impact that ‘Global Warming’ will have at planetary level, my fears become more rooted in common sense. Water evaporation and cloud formation might be localized into sea pockets in a way today, but as warmer air currents would become more consistent across the globe, things would change. Not only will there be more storms arising out of the seas, but it is not hard to imagine them coalescing into one major global storm making land fall across continents, and wrecking havoc simultaneously beyond borders like never before. Right now we can come together to help those in immediate need. What would happen when everybody would be in immediate need?

Now I agree, that might be the worst case scenario, and there may be factors that I am not considering that might stop such a scenario from becoming a reality, but then let us look at what is happening right now.

This year, the notorious 2023, we have already seen heat waves break records across continents, with both June and July toppling temperature records at global scale. Many places have already seen floods. This is not going to stop next year. In fact, in all likelihood, all our coming years are going to be hot like this from now on, and progressively get hotter. The clouds will become denser, rainfalls heavier, rainy seasons longer, and overcast conditions more widespread and longer lasting per year. There are going to be floods everywhere every year, and all of those river fed fertile plains of the world will see crops wiped out year after year. Soil erosion will result, while changes to daylight exposure would impact current crop varieties’ life-cycle and produce. When and where it won’t be raining, it would become hot enough to dry out most of the landscape. Add to this the fact that the ‘Green House Gas Emissions’ will still continue to rise until every nation on our planet hits ‘Net-Zero’ emissions target, and then those gases will linger on for decades to centuries. So the picture that we just witnessed this year is going to play on repeat for a long time to come. What will all this then lead to?

Many plant and animal species are already going to become extinct due to changing weather patterns. The increasing ferocity of weather and weather events will intensify in destruction capabilities year after year. Hotter weather would also breed more pathogens, bringing in disease alongside famine and repeated floods. We already have a grain shortage, and human population is increasing rather than dwindling. Our food resources are thus going to become more constrained, and that includes wild meat too, thanks to the mercilessness of flood wrath. The social and psychological problems that will emerge from the mess would create other unhealthy law and order issues. If not towards extinction, we are still headed towards extremely troubled times on an ever more hostile Earth. Our energy needs will sky-rocket to just keep our homes and offices at a bearable temperature. Worst part is; all this is going to happen even if we ‘Stop All Carbon Based Fuel’ from today itself. The dye has already been cast, and this warmer Earth that we find ourselves on today, is going to linger on for decades, and probably some centuries now, unless we manage to help ourselves.

So where do we start recovery from a mess of our own creation? The first step obviously is to hit ‘Net-Zero’ emissions by the end of 2023 itself by the latest, everywhere in the world, even if it means stunting ‘Annual National Growths’. Not a pleasing thought for the still developing or under-developed nations, but do we have a choice though, given that we have already doomed our current ship, and a likely rescue is still decades away? Every day we lose now is only making matters worse, and it is erroneous for anyone to believe that ‘Global Warming’ is still away from disruptive worst. What ‘Global Warming’ is still away from is what the scientists believe would be its’ most potent immediate effect; the melting of all polar and glacial ice. The fact however is, even if we stopped all carbon emissions today that effect is going to be achieved within the next couple of decades by all the warmth that the already accumulated green house gases would create over the next few decades. We don’t need the ‘Global Warming’ machine to run its’ entire course to achieve that full destruction. It is coming already!

Now let’s talk about the pseudo solutions being pandered to environmentally conscious and eager to do something crowd today. We are seeing an abundance of electric vehicles flooding our streets, being hailed as the first step towards a better future. I respectfully disagree! They are not even an acceptable stop-gap arrangement.

Now I know it wasn’t his intention, but by bringing out his line of electric vehicles, Mr Elon Musk has done a really big disfavour to the world. Now every Stella, Laura, and Ella under the sun wants to either make and sell one of those, or buy and drive one of those. Alas, they are the worst alternative going forward. If instead Mr Musk had put his resources into Hydrogen fuelled cars, it would have completely given a new, sustainable, and genuinely better option to the world. It’s a shame that the greed of Oil businessmen scuttled many a spirited and well positioned attempts at developing such Hydrogen based vehicles, otherwise those vehicles would have been the ones running down our streets today, instead of this pseudo science product called ‘Electric Car’. So let us make this a ‘Tale of Caution’ for the world, to approach all such new technologies marketed to us as a solution to our global problem, with a grain of distrust. Now for those who don’t understand my issue with the ‘Electric Vehicles’ as solution, let me break it down into simple pieces.

Imagine replacing all of the vehicles running on our road today with electric vehicle substitutes; leaving their far from satisfactory performance and recharging aside, how much electricity would we need to keep them on road every day, where would we source that electricity from, and how much lithium are we going to need for their batteries? With global warmth rising, our need to keep our homes and offices at bearable temperatures all through the year is going to sky-rocket even if we don’t factor in the increasing population. We already rely on fossil fuel powered plants in many places across the globe to fulfil our current energy needs. Can we really sustain a world run on electric vehicles? Now consider Lithium, that we need not only for our cars, but for the batteries that power all our gadgets that we use, gadgets whose number, type, and demand is going to increase at a much faster pace than our growing human presence on the planet. For a precious metal already in short supply, and whose mining and refinement is already an environmental nightmare, do you think any Lithium based solution is really a solution for the trouble that we are already in? Then consider the option of putting in nuclear plants to satisfy our resulting energy needs; radioactive fuels are for future space travel where we would have engines to power us beyond our Sun’s Goldie Locks zone, and not just material for bombs and power-plants. But will the greedy businessmen who make their moolah from such fuels really think, or for that matter care, about humanity’s future?

So the bottom line is; we need to invest in technologies truly designed for the future, and not some pseudo science stop-gap arrangements like electric cars. In fact, we need to stop promoting electric cars right away, and seek Hydrogen powered vehicles instead, for their tech is already at a commercial delivery point. These Hydrogen powered vehicles, and for that matter power-plants, will serve us for decades and centuries to come. Are we investing in them today? That is just one example. We need to develop better technology based on the very simple principles we all our taught in our ‘Primary Schools’; Renewable versus Non-Renewable energy sources. Is nuclear fuel renewable? Were Fossil fuels renewable? Simple questions that blow away all the mist generated to cover up the truths.

Lastly, we need to develop technologies that would actively suck out carbon dioxide, and other pollutants from the atmosphere, and convert them into inert, and where possible, re-usable products. This technology should be able to be deployed using weather balloons at various altitudes, and should be open-sourced so that every nation on the earth can deploy them simultaneously. This alone would ensure that we won’t have to suffer the harmful effects of ‘Global Warming’ for decades, leave alone centuries. If enough money and effort is put into these projects, we can have a solution inside next five years at top, and reap the solution’s benefits before the end of the decade. This is what needs to be done on priority two, just after the first priority of getting ‘Net-Zero’.

I believe I have given enough for everyone to think about today. In the next part of this series, I’ll discuss AI.

Take Care,

Fatal Urge Carefree Kiss

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