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1. Pick up the nearest book ( of at least 123 pages).
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people.
That's a bugger of a meme for people who have a lot of books lying around in fairly immediate reach! Michael observes that the nearest book to me "[c]ould be a brain-numbing law book, could be Simon's draft of a Newt Gingrich manga." As it turns out, the very nearest book to me is Garner's Legal Writing in Plain English, but in the interest of not boring the pants off of everyone, I'll grab two others sitting within easy reach on my desk (yes there's precedent), and let people figure out what they are in the comments (it's not hard):
He grinned broadly at them and headed off to the staff table, still swinging the polecat. "Wonder what he's been getting ready?" said Ron, a note of anxiety in his voice. The hall was starting to empty as people heaed off toward their first lesson.
He sent it to the printer with the simple heading "Mr. Justice Stewart." He did not want it to be anything more than a memo. Anything suggesting that it was a separate opinion, an alternative draft, or even a dissent, would be threatening to the chief.
Group blogs make tagging easier! I tag my co-bloggers Pat, Tully, Fern and Rafique, and for the fifth, just to think outside the usual gang, Patterico.
Our RSS feed
Curses! I hate memes. But it
Curses! I hate memes. But it involves the greatest material invention of civilization (books) so....
a close second
Followed closely by the light bulb- so that we can read at night.
I thought the second was
I thought the second was indoor plumbing, but maybe that's just me. :-)
Having just had to read by
Having just had to read by candlelight earlier this week, I'm inclined to go with the lightbulb. ;)
sigh...
Simon, if all the lights went out and Simon'sWife lit candles, I don't think she was expecting you to read.... :)
Okay, my guess for the last one: "Men in Black: How the Supreme Court Is Destroying America." Yes? No?
Nope: it's "The Brethren" by
Nope: it's "The Brethren" by Woodward & Armstrong.
Well, the first one is
Well, the first one is obviously Harry Potter. One of them. :) Without knowing who "he" is, it's tough to say which HP it would be. :)
The second - oh, something I haven't read. The Nine?
Kreitz & Tully - you both chose non-eco friendly inventions. :) Congrats.
Hint: It's the book that
Hint: It's the book that Rosen wishes that The Nine is. ;)
Beg to differ. Indoor
Beg to differ. Indoor plumbing is inherently ecologically superior to the obnoxious localized pollution of "outdoor" plumbing. As anyone who has ever spent a week in a camp of many can attest. In fact, the leech-field septic system is about as eco-friendly as you can get in waste disposal, and for cities modern sewage treatment plants produce outflow water that is cleaner than the rivers into which it is discharged.
And how is electricity not watt-for-watt enormously cleaner than simple fire? You should see Aspen in high season, when all those rich folks simply MUST have their fireplaces going for the proper ski resort experience. Worst long-term air pollution in history? London before electricity.
Try Guatemala, today, for
Try Guatemala, today, for another example. The entire country gets blanketed in thick smoke during the dry season when there are prolonged conditions of inversion. From the window of an airplane, it appears as though there's a massive forest fire over the entire region.
Ahh; but you can change to a
Ahh; but you can change to a composting toilet and save the environment even more. Avoid the need for city funded services all together and you get your own compost to use as you please. Just don't forget to service it. ;)
Oh goody, a half a million
Oh goody, a half a million people in one medium-sized city wrongly servicing their composting toilets and throwing the resulting bio-active effluent out onto the soil! THAT will really clean up our groundwater and river runoff!
Sorry, modern sewage treatment is still as eco-friendly and sanitary as it gets, especially in terms of resource efficiency. There's also the agency problem to consider--maintaining public health with a centralized system is a helluva lot easier than trying to monitor thousands and thousands of small installations for the proper servicing and maintenance required. The word "typhoid" does sort of leap to mind there.
"Saving the environment" sure seems synonymous with "kill all the humans" somedays.
No argument with me on that.
No argument with me on that. I threw that out in a joking manner. I've had some arguments with some of the crazed environmentalist around here on this subject. The maintenance issue is the largest concern. Modern sewage treatment is pretty much the order of the day for large populations. Now maybe some modifications in the way we do things, like using recycled and treated "grey" water for toilets instead of potable water could be a useful; but there are expensive infrastructure issues to deal with.
Now, out in rural areas, something like a composting toilet might be the better choice. If I get the chance to move to where I would ultimately like to wind up, I could see myself installing that kind of system. It is not for everyone. Heck, I would say it would only work for a small subset who are willing to deal with it.
Yep yep. Key words being
Yep yep. Key words being "expensive infrastructure issues"--you'd have to double both the distribution and collection infrastructure for mass re-use of grey water in a municipality, and that's before you retro-fitted all homes with dual drainage (waste versus grey water) to hook up to the city system. But modern sewage treatment makes centralized grey water recycling somewhat redundant, as the waste plant water effluent is just sterile water. And you can still get some grey water re-usage in your own home, if you're willing to put in your own infrastructure. One of my neighbors uses grey water (dish and clothes wastewater) recycling to keep his lawn watered in the summer. I'm not clear on the details of the system he built, but he's an engineer, the city passed it on inspection, and his lawn doesn't die.
For places where central sewer is not available composting toilets are quite a viable choice--because your alternatives are expensive full septic or an outhouse or a walk behind the bushes....
A bigger problem for municipalities as far as pollution goes is stormwater drainage, which generally does not go through treatment plants. And washes all the surface gook right through to the nearest watercourse.
Grey water approach would
Grey water approach would make sense in new communities and developments. It would probably be even more effective in new commercial and industrial areas along with agriculture. Grey water is more of a resource conservation effort than an environmental one.
Stormwater issues will always be a major pollution issue. It really falls back to the issues similar to up river vs. down river. The cost of protecting the quality of the water for down river uses is of very little concern to up river users since they garner little benefit from the extra costs. Effective solutions in stormwater management, in many cases, seem to require regional solutions; but even priorities within a region will vary greatly. Stormwater gets tied up into water resource management and then gets lost among higher priority issues. Once again, it all comes back to cost and benefit. Benefit is highly subjective depending upon your actual location in the system.
"Saving the enironment" sure
That was my point. :)
I completely believe that modern technology actually helps the environment - energy isn't free, so there is always an incentive to figure out ways to save it.
Composting toilets are disguisting. So the lefties on campus put up a "10 Things to Give up for Lent to Be Green" sign (because, in their world, the Bible mandates socialist structures and earth-worship). Included among the things to give up? HOT SHOWERS. I'm surprised that they didn't take the opportunity to complain about disposable razors and bras, while they were at it.
I'm surprised that they
Sometimes, if someone is not using something, they forget they exist.
I completely believe that
I completely believe that modern technology actually helps the environment
Only because the facts support you! ;-)
:p
(Laughing)
Hey, watch it. I worked in nanotech for a few years... some of it was to design ultra-high-tech, earth-saving stuff for the military. Make it lighter, and it saves fuel. Make it more efficient, and it saves fuel. Make it last longer, and it saves on disposal costs.