Replying to LO30310 --
Dear At, dear LO'ers,
At, thank you for your intriguing thoughts. Together with the story of
Wilf Mbaga from Zimbabwe, it makes me not happy. But the sun is shining in
the garden, birds are singing and the mole is still active just below the
surface of the garden lawn. There, just a couple of metres next to me,
there is no avalanche of information. And that sight gives me still enough
rest and calmness to enjoy life.
> >A couple of weeks ago our dear host Rick was in Amsterdam.
> >During that memorable meeting Rick asked each of us what
> >our ideas were of the future of the world. My answer to him
> >was simmilar to yours - 'deafening' effects of information. And
> >I think that it will take some 15-20 years until the majority of
> >humankind have learned how to cope with it.
>
> What a foresight Rick has! I will come back to it later on.
>
> I will agree with you, but on the assumption that our educational
> instutions are aware of the problem and supply the means to solve it.
> However, the far majority, at least in South Africa, are not so that we
> have to think of a worser scenario for 2020 than the present.
At, we are talking about an immergence, the destructive branche of a
bifurcation. The falling apart in many divergent nuclei. My knowledge of
trajectories towards the edge of chaos and the subsequent bifurcation is
not enough to sustain my prediction. However, I guess that the changes in
this world are going so fast, that the dramatic point will be rather soon
(as I said, some 15-20 years). I have seen it with some other smaller
events that public behaviour, thinking, opinion and reactions could change
very fast. The rapidity of this change is partly enhanced by the very
information which could now circle around the globe within hours. Think of
the news of 11th september, within 24 hours it was known in nearly every
'corner' of the (spherical) earth.
In my book-in-becoming which is still in a state like like the 'excrements
of a baboon' (I know it yet too little to be sure that it is a Othona
cacaloides), there is a chapter in a common type of problems - too much,
or shortage problems. Some general schemes are given on how one could
tackle these types of problems. With the information avalanche, we deal
with too much information in too short of time. One possibility is to
increase the capacity of the road on which the information travels. One
could make the road longer or wider, thus in a way rarefy or dilute the
supply. I do not say that this is THE solution for the info-problem; it is
just one of the many possible directions one could think of. Why do I
mention this? It is because my thoughts were triggered by a passage in
At's contribution:
> Most of the surface of South Africa has changed vastly during the 20th
> century. Many living plant species got eradicated in the increasing
> aridness of some regions -- the "creeping desert". These plants species
> could not adapt to it whereas desert plants can.
The process of desertification is in many parts of the world a most
serious problem. Perhaps the things I want to write now are too much
offthe record of this list. Please see it as an analogue for many other
situations. The problem of 'becoming a desert' is partly due to the fact
that the water of sporadic rain showers runs off too fast. If there is a
shower, the water could run away within a couple of minutes from the bare
surface. I have seen it also in the NE of Brazil where similar problems
occur. There, one could wait sometimes up to 10 years before the next rain
will fall. I have once seen a very interesting report with a good
suggestion for soil improvement in such semi arid areas. It is based on
the principle that one should try to keep the rare water as long as
possible in the area and prevent it from running away in minutes. The
surface is usually not a flat plane, but undulating, with some valeys.
These valeys could be steep, or smooth depending on the type of bedrock.
The trick is that one diggs drains (say 20 cm deep) roughly following the
contourlines of the landscape. But, and this is the trick, these drains
are slightly inclined (only 1 or 2 degrees) towards the source of the
valeys. It means that rain water is forced to follow a long trajectory
upward in the valley. If along the valey slopes several of these drains
are constructed at distances of some 10 metres, the water will stay for
much longer times in that area and is able to penetrate the surface. One
should plant the small ridges along the drains with a special type of crop
which sustain with their roots these ridges and which produce some organic
material. Slowly some soil will thus be developed. I hope my description
is clear. At, possibly you have acquaintances among farmers and you could
discuss this method with them. What I could remember from that report is
that productivity of the land will increase in the beginning slowly, but
later one may pick the fruits from this treatment. And moreover, the
process of desertification is stopped.
It is only one but intelligent method of slowing down a flow.
The birds are still singing.
Best wishes,
Leo Minnigh
--"leo minnigh" <minnigh@dds.nl>
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