Month: August 2015

Forget Burning Man, Go To Ephemerisle

- Adam Clare

Ephemerisle is a libertarian Burning Man on the ocean. It’s goal is like Burning Man’s insofar that it exists to explore new ideas while throwing a big party. Ephemerisle is really trying to figure out how people can survive on the ocean for an extended period of time while finding solutions to the logistical aspects of doing so.

Ephemerisle participants need to figure out many things from waste management to how to generate electricity. On top of that, because it’s libertarian, do it all while creating some sort of economy.

I’m not into the American libertarian movement but I do like the idea of finding out how to live on the open seas in a sustainable manor.

Seasteading’s proponents say it isn’t impossible, it just has a funding problem: existing solutions cost money to implement, and the solutions that don’t exist yet cost money to develop. But even they admit it’s a hell of a funding problem. The funding necessary to launch even the simplest floating city was in the billions, leaving most proposed projects dead in the water, so to speak.
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Unlike Burning Man, where participants are still subject to the laws of the United States, Ephemerisle would offer attendants true autonomy from American government. Also unlike Burning Man, which bans cash transactions between participants at the event, Ephemerisle would embrace money and commerce, as a respected feature of society. And also unlike Burning Man, Ephemerisle would be unticketed, free to anybody who could get there.

If people liked the festival enough, Patri thought, they might start staying out there for longer year after year, and invite their friends. It would grow both temporally and in population. For that to happen, the island itself would have to grow, too. Over time, maybe these people would be motivated to solve a lot of seasteading’s hard engineering problems, so Ephemerisle could continue to grow.

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Other People’s Poop May Make You Happy

- Adam Clare

OK, that headline is bit out there but stay with me.

Poop transplants are proving super effective against a bunch of problems some people have with their bodies. Now there’s a field of research looking into why this works and how it can be used to impact our emotions.

Until then I’m going to stick to probiotics to encourage good bacteria growth in my internal ecosystem.

Aroniadis, like a number of researchers who study diseases of the gut, is now looking to a fresh idea that shows much promise—what she calls the ultimate probiotic: human feces.

Scientists are just starting to explore the mysteries of the trillions of microorganisms that inhabit our gut. Some diseases in which the gut’s “microbiome” may play a role are more obvious, like Crohn’s disease or irritable bowel syndrome. But this massive community inside our digestive tract is also thought to influence other more complicated metabolic conditions that are huge public health problems like obesity and diabetes, as well as seemingly unrelated diseases. For example, microbiome research is even a new frontier for understanding autism, as autistic kids have been shown to have abnormal or less diverse intestinal bacteria. There is a well-documented “gut-brain connection,” in the form of what’s called the enteric nervous system, which controls your digestive system but also is deeply linked with your brain—and thus your mood. Researchers are starting to show that this connection means that what’s happening in our guts may be affecting our behavior in ways we can barely even fathom.

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Watch Naomi Klein Talk About Capitalism

- Adam Clare

Irving K. Barber Learning Centre Lecture presented by the Vancouver Institute. Webcast sponsored by the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre. Naomi Klein is the author of the critically acclaimed #1 international bestsellers, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism and No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies which have each been translated into more than 30 languages. She is a contributing editor for Harper’s Magazine, a reporter for Rolling Stone, and a syndicated columnist for The Nation and The Guardian.

Victims of Kodaikanal Mercury Poisoning Protest Unilever

- Adam Clare

One of the worst disasters in India since the Bhopal incident, the Kodaikanal mercury poisoning continues to cause harm. Obviously this is not a good thing. What is good is that activists in the area are using every tool at their disposal to raise awareness and call for a boycott against Unilever.

Key demands of the campaign
The Governments of India and Tamil Nadu should ensure that Unilever

  • Cleans up the mercury contaminated factory site and surroundings to international standards that are adequate to protect the sensitive watershed forests of Pambar Shola.
  • Pays for long-term environmental monitoring for mercury buildup in the food chain in the forests and aquatic ecosystems in and around the factory
  • Provides adequate financial compensation to workers and arranges for long-term medical treatment, monitoring and rehabilitation for workers and their families.
  • Provide avenues for economic rehabilitation of the workers and their families.
  • Prosecute Unilever and its officials for their criminal negligence in Kodaikanal.

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Iceland Wants to Help Journalists Expose Real Threats

- Adam Clare

Iceland continues on it’s quest to be the ‘Switzerland of data‘ and is extending its program to do so for journalists. Part of the country’s plan to become a haven for people exposing the immoral and questionable behaviour of powerful people is already in action. Iceland is quickly achieving its goal of not only protecting data but also protecting people who analyze and process that data.

The motivation for Iceland to lead this charge comes out of a first-hand knowledge of how devastating a lack of transparency can be. Iceland’s financial crash of 2008 was catastrophic to the country, and few had answers until Wikileaks began publishing documents the local reporters were legally blocked from airing. The general public, justifiably feeling robbed, saw Wikileaks as the purveyor of important knowledge that they were being denied.
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While there is much to do, IMMI has not been without successes. In 2013, IMMI helped pass the Information Act, which helped broaden the public’s access to information as well as source protection, thus nudging some of IMMI’s core goals forward. A few days after our meeting, IMMI joined with other organizations to repeal Iceland’s 75-year-old blasphemy law, making blasphemy no longer an illegal act in the country.

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