Chaos, small and large
There are heaps of snow outside my door right now, and in that I’m hardly alone. From midwest to northeast we’ve had a huge disruptive blizzard. Some places have had the pleasure of an ice storm as well, which brings with it the threat of a power outage.
These events introduce a small bit of chaos into our lives. That disorder is almost always a mere annoyance, and a temporary one at that. And yet it can still make us very uneasy, because it points out how closely we live to real chaos, which lies just a power grid away for most of us.
Then there’s private chaos of a different sort. We’ve just had a reminder of that, too, within our virtual family here on the blog, with the announcement of commenter strcpy’s very serious illness. When illness strikes, all the usual plans and expectations are thrown into the air and life goes into another mode, a crisis one that focuses on treatments, with a whole new vocabulary and way of being to be learned.
And then there’s public chaos of the type brought about by the demonstrations in Egypt and the resultant instability there. It’s far away, and reaches us only through computer, newspaper, or TV screen. But for the people of Egypt it’s up close and personal, and it must be both exhilarating and terrifying.
I said it is far away for us, and that is true. But, just as the events in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century dominated our foreign policy for much of the latter half of that century, and the ascension to power of a strange mustachioed orator in Germany spelled doom for tens of millions of people around the globe, and the return of the turbaned Khomeini to Iran started that country on a repressive path that included supporting terrorism against us and our allies, so do events in Egypt today have the potential to affect us all in ways large and small. We just don’t know yet what those ways will be.
We experienced a real blizzard yesterday afternoon & night, about a foot of snow with wind gusts up to 50 mph. Drifts here in town exceed 4 feet in our neighborhood, in the countryside all roads are impassable. Of course its a magical wonderland for the kids who are building snow forts and having a blast. Ahhh, to be 10 years old again.
You are right Neo, civilization is a fragile thing. Something we take for granted until mother nature or (to quote Homeland Security) “a man made disaster” occurs. We are fortunate to live in a prosperous (relatively so at least in the midst of this deep recession) country and mostly stable society. We all should count the many blessing that come from being Americans.
Much of the rest of the world, as the events in Egypt show, is but a flash point away from violence and chaos. Its getting very ugly in Cairo and it looks like only the army can step in to prevent a cataclysmic civil war. We may be witnessing a major shift in geo-political alignments and it doesn’t look promising.
Here in Houston it’s so cold that we’re having rolling blackouts to preserve power.
I keep thinking about Strcpy, and can’t avoid worrying about Egypt. Hopes and fears, mostly fears in the latter case. Your point about micro and macro chaos is wonderful.
What a blog! I don’t think there’s another like it.
How many wake up calls do we need from the Middle East to get us drilling our own oil? Crazies can control the Suez Canal and the Straits of Hormuz. Solar and wind energy are not going to save the day. Five dollar gas would freeze our economy, and the Muzzies know it. Obama shutting down the Gulf and dragging his feet on drilling and nuclear is reckless and could destroy our economy. You can ignore reality but you can’t ignore the effects of ignoring reality.
mizpants: thank you.
Solar has its uses but it, along with wind, and other potential sources (such as tides) will never provide the energy that we need to increase the standard of living for a growing world population. For the short term (the next 30 years) we have no choice but to rely on fossil fuels. In the long term we need to invest (yes, one of the few areas where I favor government/private collaboration) in developing fusion reactors.
Meanwhile, we need more fission power plants. Lets set a goal of increasing our use of fission energy, as a percentage of our energy needs, to equal that of France within 10 years. Telling liberals we want to be more like France should make them happy.
My situation is serious but so far not dire.
Neo’s words are more powerful with the absence of facile bromides. They bring to mind what Tolkien had Gandalf counsel: To cast aside regret and fear. To do the deed at hand.
From midwest to northeast we’ve had a huge disruptive blizzard. Some places have had the pleasure of an ice storm as well, which brings with it the threat of a power outage.
I’m surprised that the PC media haven’t gone after the Weather Channel for its recent use of violent metaphors, such as winter storms “pummeling” or “battering” or “pounding” the Northeast, winter “delivering knockout blows,” etc. As we all know, such language incites unstable minds to ugly deeds. It’s only a matter of time until someone in my neck of the woods shoots their snowblower.
On a serious note: ongoing prayers for strcpy. If the cancer centers in the Southeast can’t help out, there’s an excellent brand-new cancer hospital in New Haven.
Our big sumac tree in our courtyard yielded one mighty 40-foot branch with a CRACK! and a splintering crash.
Ice, ice, baby.
It grieves me to see it. I’ve loved the light through the leaves.
Almost all Northern Hemisphere outside tropics is now covered with snow, in many regions volume of precipitation is historically high. Nothing of this was predicted by meteorologists, so the predictive power of their models is now seriously undermined. This is no news for me, though, I knew this long ago from general theorems about chaotic systems behavior, but for general public the chaotic behavior of real world complex systems looks weird and scary. People were brainwashed worldwide to believe in omnipotence of science, so they feel anxious that the future can not be predicted even its most general features.
And Mubarak demonstrated again how deviously smart and resourceful he is in the dark art of political manipulation. He won almost without a shot, making everybody to chose between continuation of his rule and chaos of civil war. And all western politicians are now neck deep in shit, their irrelevance at open display for everybody to see.
devilishly, of course, not deviously.
Neo, I hope you and your snowbound readers are continuing to stay warm in all this bitter cold weather.
For reasons unbeknownst to me, I’m still having trouble commenting here. Anyway I hope this one gets through.
Something I’ve been meaning to blog about and haven’t yet is a cancer resource book that I discovered last fall after a good friend in Wyoming lost her grown son to cancer in just two weeks. Anyway, I got this recently published and exquisitely researched book and read it voraciously when I returned to Tennessee.
It’s called ‘Outsmart Your Cancer’ by Tanya Harter Pierce. It is one of the most amazing, if not THE most amazing books I’ve ever read. All I can say is if you have cancer, have ever had cancer, have metastisized cancer and are losing hope after traditional treatments with mediocre results or have a loved one who does, run don’t walk to order/ buy this book. Today.
It is treasure without measure. The research Tanya has done is staggering and it—the history of the cancer industry here—will shock the pants off you.
This is not a book on snake oil cures or thinking nice thoughts. Instead, it is an unparalleled resource for cancer help.
She devoted four chapters on Protocel that are alone worth the price of admission.
Hate to be so enthusiastic, but when and if you read even the first 6-7 chapters, you will be too. And speechless. I hope your reader or his friends and family can get this resource to him and put it to use.
Hope Sergey is right. Otherwise, Obama has long wanted go down in history as the second FDR; he may have his wish! Too bad for the rest of us though.
Best wishes for strcpy.
Do US media provide TV coverage of Cairo clashes? I am watching now a live translation from Tahrir square via Euronews channel, where army tries to separate pro- and anti-government protesters by tanks and cargo trucks. A new Mubarak’s supporters arrive from provinces, armed by sticks, hoes and knifes. They seem to outnumber now anti-government protesters.
I hope he only goes down in history as the second FDR.
I fear it will be much worse than that.
One thing I have to applaud the tyrants and thugs for is that they sized up our idiot-in-chief instantly. If only the American people had as well.
A certain disorder in an Obama address
Kindles in the middle-east a wontoness…
armchair pessimest says:
“Obama has long wanted go down in history as the second FDR; he may have his wish!”
Have you seen the new Times cover? Saw it yesterday: the “new” Obama embracing Ronald Reagan who surely is spinning in his grave!) with the caption “Why Obama loves Ronald Reagan so much.”
And I just saw a clip today of Andrea Mitchell who commented on some show over the weekend that the Republicans are wrongly co-opting Ronald Reagan. He’s doesn’t belong to them.
(Maybe she’s hoping to replace Keith Olbermann on MSNBC….?)