North of 49

A very nice young lady asked a question of me the other day. "Why do we do things we know are bad for us?" It is a very simple question with no hidden meaning or wherefores and futhermores strewn through the text. No this is one sentence is a simple question which would take volumes to answer. I'll put this in a personal context, I have been told for years that this is bad for my health and I have had friends pass away from cancer and I have seen the effects of emphysema on an aging body yet I still smoke! Why do I smoke cigarettes? The easiest answer and a true one is that I lack the will to quit. This easy answer brings us to a few questions, am I an idiot, mentally incapacitated to the point where reality and logic have flown out the window? Can free will have a negative effect on the human organism? Why is there a dichotomy in the will, everyone to a degree has it so why do some inherently have what I would call well balanced lives when there are others like myself wh...

Australia has really made some records these past few years. 2010/11 has been the wettest year in one part of the country. The strongest cyclone in memory came on shore just north of the area of Queensland that was hit with flooding. Not unusual as there are cyclones that go through the area from time to time. Then in another part of that southern continent they haven't seen much rain so it is one of the driest years in recent memory. I don't think this one blip amounts to anything at all but when you have a bunch of blips it means something is on the friggin radar screen! The time, if I read all the info correctly, is past for blaming climate change on one thing or another. Certainly we should try to minimize our impact on the environment but not to the exclusion of the idea that we maybe way too late to turn this trend around. The feedback loop created by snow and ice melt will most definitely speed up this change. I am thinking that we should be thinking of and implementing ...