Harold Squared

In my capacity as PLANETARY ADVOCATE AND SAVIOR(what, you thought only rich guys like Al Gore and Maurice Strong could declare themselves to be such?), I was taking inventory of the global chlorophyll, distribution circa 1998 to 2006. I noticed a distinct deficiency of this very important molecule in the open oceans principally between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. If as some propose there is a current and problematic surplus of carbon dioxide, why not fertilize these waters and encourage pelagic photosynthesis and thereby extract this allegedly injurious molecule from the atmosphere? Many varieties of seaweed are edible or otherwise useful or we could stash a bit in the abyss until we needed it, hey? These areas typically receive abundant sunlight year around and just a few tons of the right elements are all we would need for a test of the scheme.

Reminds me of Eddie the Flasher, used to lurk in the bushes down at the park. Oleanders, I think.

Nitrogen is not the only vital nutrient which plants compete for. The roles of potassium, phosphorus, and trace minerals can be most significant. As an example I am fairly certain that magnesium is vital to the structure of the chlorophyll molecules in all cases. Chlorosis can be caused by insufficiency of magnesium as well as nitrogen and even by a shortage of iron.

You are asking if the rate of mutation has increased, correct? What baseline are you comparing the alleged increase to? As for "desperation", this is a human emotion, common to married males of the species. "Gambling" is human behavior often exhibited but by no means confined to such males.

Gravitational force does not "increase with height" you have it backward. One weighs less on a mountaintop than in an adjacent valley. Try it sometime, all you need is a sense of adventure and a suitable scale. For similar reasons one weighs more at sea level at the poles rather that at sea level at the equator, both due to being farther from the planet's gravitational center and due to the centrifugal effect of planetary rotation. For completely different reasons plants are stunted or absent in the polar latitudes and taller in the tropics.

I am pretty damned sure my local ecosystem on the coast of Texas is not dependent of polar bears, elephants or wolves. I also have heard but can't confirm that there are more tigers in captivity in North America than currently live in the wild in Asia. Are these beasts then truly "wild"? In what way are they " vital" parts of the suburban ecosystem? Domestic cats which have reverted to their feral ways are the commonest predators hereabouts. Are they truly "domestic" or merely "commensal" in the truest sense of the word?

Another thing, pretty basic, is which, if any of the crops are legumes? Such plants contribute fixed nitrogen to the soil and aid in preservation of its fertility. Will any of said crops be used for forage for livestock? This is another pertinent question which readily comes to mind. Furthermore there is a matter of plant produced toxins, I have heard but cannot confirm that cucumbers leave such substances in the soil which poison tomato plants growing in that soil afterwards. As far as analysis of the data I suppose you could compare net yield in adjacent fields per ton of fertilizer used. The weather should be roughly the same as should exposure to pests. Naturally you would want to have all seeds come from the same lot as much as possible, maybe select samples at random for the presence of desired qualities. Then perhaps ask yourself, "What would Norman Borlaug do?"

Invasive plants include food crops, often consumed by other invasive species. The major vector for said invasive species, vegetable and otherwise, is human activity. Furthermore it would be nice to know if overtone, for example, is being admonished for mentioning non-plant species as he clearly has above. None of my business apart from moderation being an impartial activity free from petty personal animosities.

People rely on "invasive plants" for food to a great degree as our less obtuse colleagues may realize. Starvation is a proven means of genocide. With the passage of time even you may realize this point. Your fanciful campaign to eradicate such plants, carried to its ultimate logical conclusion, would necessarily entail such starvation. Checkmate. Oh hey! Almost forgot! If you want to see a fantastic documentary on invasive species check out "Darwin's Nightmare". It is about Nile Perch in Lake Victoria and is incredibly depressing, hopelessly wickedly awful, but just the content, not the film itself.

Leaving the planet comes to mind. Earth is not enough, and in fact is infested with all manner of nasty diseases and parasites, crushing gravity, seismic disturbances and wretched weather. Over most of the planet's surface unprotected humans swiftly perish in fact. Alien invasion fiction consistently neglects to mention the relative worthlessness of Terran real estate. It is absurd to consider the planet "overpopulated" with an entire continent, Antarctica, virtually destitute of human habitation.

If the technology to perform such an experiment is ever developed odds are that the dinosaur camp will not do so. Score one potentially for Team Mammal! Silly? Maybe, but consider the only Earth creatures to visit the Moon have been mammals.

Racism is currently out of fashion, yet this was hardly the case during the heyday of colonial exploitation and the rampant introduction of exotic species from one continent to another by imperialism. Genocide, however, is even more unpopular and would be the inevitable result of any serious attempt to eradicate "invasive plants" such as wheat, rice, or soybeans in North America, for example. Most food crops are not native to extensive regions where they are vital for human sustenance.

Alkaline rain has not been mentioned as a possible threat to my knowledge. So far, attempts towards the elimination of sulfer and nitrogen oxides seem to be safe and effective, albeit not without costs. Today's diesel fuel prices in North America are routinely greater than those of unleaded gasoline in a reversal of the price pattern observed prior to current regulations. Of course costs of the acid precipitation were reduced, the whole point of the exercise to begin with.

If you'd care to speculate. I mean, patent law has been applied to living organisms and these days corporate responsibility for creatures so developed must follow. So there is that. What else comes to mind?

As I understand it grain fed beef has more fat than grass fed. Caloric value of the meat is related to how lean it is and certain cuts of the same cow are leaner than others, plus the method of preparation greatly influences total calories consumed. So all other things should be equal to make a valid comparison. In general the entire purpose of sending cattle to feed lots is to fatten them up, so grain fed = fatter, given the above caveats. Helpful?

No harm meant, colleague. FYI, yours truly is a member of said group and so entitled to make such little jests. I suppose what humans have done they can in most cases undo, and my point about Europeans generally and Anglophones in particular is perfectly valid in that they are responsible for the proliferation of rabbits, et al, deliberately and otherwise. Adaptation continues, as one might expect. Contemplate this, if you will accept this idea as a sort of olive branch: why not develop tailor made viruses targeting the said noxious life forms? For example tinker with tobacco mosaic virus to eradicate the noxious weed? Or the coca bush, the opium poppy, and cannabis sativa? The war on drugs turned biological. Maybe we could win it with such a strategy. Or at least quit pulling crabgrass. In any case you have made a quite excellent point regarding the cost of exotic species and I thank you for it. Good point about the means and methods used above, too. I am reminded of the oystermen who ground up every starfish they found, only to find every bit of starfish growing into an entire starfish. Most counterproductive. Dumping herbicide all over only benefits Monsanto in the end. Is it possible or desirable to consider eradication of corporations while we are at it? Darwinism as applied to economics, there's a new thread idea, but where to put it? Any suggestions? Wandering far afield again there. Apologies all round, but why not frame the idea as "noxious vs banign" rather than "native vs non-native"? After all, yours truly is native to the Goodole U.S. of A., yet not Native American. And incontestably noxious, according to most. Yet another thought- a virus which renders the infected plant less attractive to pollinators. Any interruption of the reproductive cycle would have an effect, the thing to do is to identify the weakest point of the cycle and target the strategy accordingly, or would you differ?

Indeed. Very recently bovine and porcine insulin was the best one could get but now humulin carries the day, not from the human pancreas but from your basic primordial slime. Popular Science is supposed to have a bit on lab grown leather at the moment, timely for the topic? Maybe.

It is more complicated than you might expect, but you might start by checking out respiratory acidosis/alkalosis on Wikipedia. Search "metabolism" too. Perseverance will win the day, that and curiosity. Godspeed and good luck in your search for knowledge.

Microgravity. Even then, the largest and strongest skeletal muscles are in the human legs so it would make more sense to graft on great webbed feet and leave the hands free for a multitude of other tasks. The miracle of dexterity is what has given us, at long last, the power of flight, and such flights as no bird has ever dreamt of, at that.

Why stop there? Let's consider the animal kingdom as well. Cane toads, walking catfish, the wily mongoose, AND that most dangerous of animals, the English speaking white person, scourge of two continents and various other infestations around the globe. Just kidding, hehehehehe... Actually this subspecies of humanity is responsible for quite a lot of other invasive species from water hyacinths to starlings. Hail Darwin!

The exhaust of modern diesel engines is cleaner than the intake air thanks to design modifications such as exhaust gas recirculation and diesel exhaust fluid utilization. Ultra low sulpher fuel is the only legal fuel in use today. Unfortunately the amount of SO2 belched into the atmosphere by volcanic eruptions cannot be as well regulated.

An interesting documentary on the subject is "King Corn". The original purpose of domesticated animals was to turn inedible vegetable matter into food. Feeding them food and turning it into another sort of food lacks efficiency. Nowadays thanks to GMO biotechnology human insulin is produced by bacteria. Who is to say that in time other bacteria cannot produce bio identical protein for our consumption? Would the resulting pork or beef protein be taboo? Would human flesh produced by such methods be? Could we assemble, in time, replica organs viable for transplants by such means? Food for thought, indeed...

Fans of this topic and sex research generally are referred to Mary Roach's "Bonk". An amusing overview of the field suitable for almost all readers.

Agreed. I am surprised that no one has mentioned precession, the "wobble" of the planet's axis of rotation, a small and slow but detectable phenomenon. The reversal of the magnetic poles remain a fascinating enigma and one of great relevance to our technology, worthy of more scrutiny, or would you agree?

The most convincing support of any theory is its predictive accuracy. Every forecast of the IPCC to date has been inaccurate. Hurricane Sandy, only attributed to AGW after the fact, as have been so many other adverse, and ONLY adverse weather events of an unusual nature. "Acts of God" in another age- now caused by the Almighty AGW... What models predict and what can be observed are two very different things. Returning to elementary physics, foes of that ole debbil CO2 routinely claim that the oceans will soon be too acid due to excess dissolved gas, but fail to notice that a warmer world will force more dissolved gases out of solution. This can be verified first hand thus. Pour two glasses of soda and put one in the fridge and one on a tabletop. Observe which goes flat first. In this case kitchen physics demonstrates that the AGW camp cannot have its cake and eat it too.