Zero-confidence and why I'm blacking out
Smári McCarthy
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Hi guys,
I'm about 64 e-mails behind on this list and people here tend to wax
verbose. Just wanted to explain in a few words why I've been inactive
for a while and why I probably will be very inactive in the next couple
of weeks.
Tomorrow at 13:30 UTC the Icelandic legislature will go into
discussion of whether to vote zero-confidence in the government,
disassemble the parliament and call for a general election. The decision
will come in after a vote at 18:30 UTC.
This is the culmination of two months of utter turmoil, and I can
envision that there will be much more turmoil in the weeks and months to
come. In between working like a madman on the Fab Lab project in
Vestmannaeyjar and running a security/privacy course in Reykjavík and
spending hours and hours traveling between those places, I've managed to
get myself somewhat involved in the movement that's trying to set things
right over here, with protests and meetings and whatnot in that vein.
I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow, but I hope this is all
the start of something good.
The question is, given the topic of our discussion here, given that
Iceland is probably about to change fairly radically in the next couple
of months, how can the principles being talked of here be made
applicable immediately in a useful way?
Remember that Iceland has practically no natural resources besides
fish, basalt rock, silica and fresh water, and has no history of
self-sufficiency at all.
Short answers please, or I shall have trouble finding time to read
them. :)
- Smári
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Bryan Bishop
> The question is, given the topic of our discussion here, given that
> Iceland is probably about to change fairly radically in the next couple
> of months, how can the principles being talked of here be made
> applicable immediately in a useful way?
I talked it over with the guys on the IRC channel-- the people should
declare a state of emergency (or, rather, a state of emergence :-),
and declare specific patent-free zones. All patents are null and void,
so you can use whatever proprietary tech you need to get things
rolling.
Also, government-sponorship of open-inspired projects, progress and
innovation. This means sharing-is-caring, 'public commons', which
means "full return on investment" on all projects. Nothing 'secretive'
and kept hidden away to privatized individuals, everything can be used
to build on to previous knowledge. Face it, many things have to be
relearned and invented on the fly to figure out how to positively deal
with this opportunity for radical change.
If you want some inspiration, the Pirate Party of Sweden was propelled
into success within a few weeks. There's much to learn from them.
Also, if you can kidnap Steve Hildebrand for this, that might work
too.
ben lipkowitz
copyright-free zone. be sure to obtain a promise stating they won't
raid/bomb you for the next ten years.
set up a "free guptastan" WSLE/data haven, and market it to eco geeks,
seasteaders, and anti-IP nerds. I'd move there.
use your fab-lab to make tools that can utilize raw basalt.
use gen-engineered organisms to extract trace elements from seawater.
do all this stuff everyone's been talking about forever but never does.
-fenn
Nathan Cravens
Its good to hear from you.
The Open Cafe Global Network is a wiki organizational format for local community supported Cafes. Its a seed for instant collaboration centered around food sharing. Your local network can begin meeting at a local park.
More relevant to this discussion list, a Workshop wiki provides an outlet for planning construction or manufacturing projects in a collaborative manner.
I created a page for Reykjavík here:
http://opencafe.wikispot.org/Reykjavík
Good Luck,
Nathan
Paul D. Fernhout
Some possibilities:
* grind up basalt to sell as organic fertilizer and promote fish growth
* use NASA's ideas to bootstrap self-replicating industry based on basalt
and geothermal and summer solar power
* sell geothermal power in a bigger way by making synthetic fuels
* set up more greenhouses
* exploit national sovereignty to the fullest
* create a center for fasting for health
* become experts in phage therapy
* accept and recycle nuclear and biological and other waste
* find a friendly billionaire who wants to try something different
* issue a currency backed by electricity or BTUs
* take a people and resource survey (maybe make a web site)
* create "free schools" and support home-based "unschooling"
* withdraw from the Berne Convention and set up server farms to host content
Good luck, and sorry to hear about your troubles.
--Paul Fernhout
=======================
The long version of the above points, with details and links:
Sorry to see you and your country suffering.
"Iceland protest ends in clashes"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7744355.stm
"A near-riot and parliament besieged: Iceland boiling mad at credit crunch"
http://news.scotsman.com/world/A-nearriot-and--parliament.4722970.jp
Sadly, Iceland needs to admit this:
"Obituary: Conservative Economic Policy"
http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/2007/10/19/obituary_conservative_economic/
"Conservative economic policy is dead. It committed suicide. Its
allegiance to market solutions, tax cuts and spending cuts, supply-side
nonsense, manipulative and corrosive ties to industry and the rich, have
left it wholly unable to cope with the challenges we face. Its terribly
limited toolbox simply cannot address the economic insecurities and
opportunities generated by today's global, interconnected, polluted,
insecure, dynamic, bubble-prone economy. ..."
Once it does, here are some possibilities to investigate:
Finely ground basalt can make an possible, if slow release, fertilizer.
http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=2240291
Maybe some chemistry might accelerate that? You have the power and heat to
do it, both locally and for export to the USA and Europe as "organic
fertilizer". Here is a company that sells such stuff:
http://www.fertilizeronline.com/rockdust.php
You could make all sorts of funny commercials about it with (obviously
unrealistic) plants popping up in a day from having "a little piece of
Iceland" in your garden. Don't go this far:
"South Pacific tragedy: The island that had (and lost) everything"
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/south-pacific-tragedy-the-island-that-had-and-lost-everything-784913.html
Investigate turning algae to edible food. Fish love to grow in cold water if
there is enough phytoplankton to eat. Try dumping some finely ground up
basalt in the ocean near shore.
While incredibly dangerous, here is NASA's ideas for a process to extract
various chemicals from raw ores using some nasty acids:
http://www.islandone.org/MMSG/aasm/AASM5E.html#f541
Geothermal could power it. In general, as was suggested, think about doing
what people have just been talking about, and following this plan:
"NASA: Advanced Automation for Space Missions"
http://www.islandone.org/MMSG/aasm/
This is obviously the biggest thing Iceland has physically going for it:
"Can Iceland's geo-thermal power re-heat its economy?"
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/11/20/eco.iceland/
You could attract investment to expand the geothermal energy program (and
solar, half the year) to produce hydrogen or synthetic fuels for export or
use in producing refined energy intensive metals like aluminum. Maybe
develop a power system that runs off the gradient of salinity between
glacial melt and seawater. Develop an OTEC system that exploits Iceland's
cold temperatures. Anyway, push Iceland as the future energy supplier to the
world -- the Saudi Arabia of geothermal energy, but close to the USA and
Europe. You might need to import wast biomatter to use as feedstocks for
liquid fuels using geothermal heat and maybe a process like this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_depolymerization
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changing_World_Technologies
In general, think hard about what value national sovereignty coupled with a
small population can give you as a special advantage. Please don't emulate
the North American Indian tribes in promoting gambling -- as that tends to
spread to the local population. But you could look to the Native Americans
in general for ideas. I wouldn't do this myself, but you could create a
tourist trade for experimenting under medical supervision with mind-altering
substances and equipment, going beyond the Netherlands.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcranial_magnetic_stimulation
There is some evidence that some of them can be used to break addictions
among other positive benefits. Ask the US CIA for advice on that. :-)
Create a fasting center for improved health and cater to the fasting tourist
trade.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=fasting++health
Create a center for phage therapy,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phage_therapy
mainly for US Americans with antibiotic-resistant infections, in cooperation
with groups like these:
http://www.phagetherapycenter.com/
"Phage Therapy Center Georgia is now accepting patients with diabetic foot
ulcers, urinary infections, tropic ulcers, bed sores, sinusitus, and
osteomyelitis -- including those with infections that are drug-resistant. "
Iceland is a shorter plain flight from North America (at least, from New
York City and surrounds).
You're not going to like this one -- have Iceland be the waste dump (or
recycler) of the world accepting nuclear and other toxic waste, as well as
regular waste. Use the heat from volcanoes to either burn up biological
waste or glassily the nuclear waste and then store it up north under the ice
sheet. Use the NASA HF Leach process above to turn regular waste into raw
materials for Icelandic industries. You might also be able eventually to
reprocess the nuclear waste for use in small nuclear powered desalinization
plants for towing to ports around the world.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desalination
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/nov/09/miniature-nuclear-reactors-los-alamos
http://www.primidi.com/2005/02/06.html
Have a conference inviting people like Amory Lovins and John Todd to get
more ideas.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amory_Lovins
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Todd_(biologist)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_McDonough
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Braungart
Follow up Marc Fawzi's idea of issuing a new currency backed by electricity
(so a New Icelandic króna is backed by a certain amount of kilowatt hours of
geothermal electricity or some number of geothermal BTUs). It could alse be
backed by ground basalt as fertilizer, see above. Investigate the ideas of
"social credit" in hopes of calming the riots.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Credit
Push the New Icelandic króna as a stable currency to replace the dollar,
backed by Iceland's geothermal potential.
Set up indoor hydroponic greenhouses powered by geothermal and using
basalt-derived hydroponic chemicals and when needed, artificial lighting.
http://www.businesstn.com/node/949
Grow all your own vegetables, including custom salad greens for air shipment
to New York restaurants. Grow some of the "national sovereignty" stuff for
the medical tourist trade, and rethink some of these policies:
http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/faculty/rwinslow/europe/iceland.html
"Iceland is a party to the 1998 UN drug convention, ... There is negligible
cultivation and production of illegal drug in Iceland. Police occasionally
discover marijuana plants that are intended for personal use, but no
significant plots have ever been found. In 1998, police found 248 cannabis
plants up from 161 in 1997."
See:
"NORML Says Cannabis Should Be Regulated Like Tobacco"
http://norml.org/
Take an extensive survey of all resources in Iceland related to
manufacturing (people with skills, machinery, raw materials). Put up a web
site for this purpose. Start conversations about this in Iceland online.
Read the book "Neighborhood Power" by Coates and Hess, especially the vision
in the last chapter about a mostly self-reliant neighborhood.
http://www.amazon.com/Neighborhood-Power-Localism-David-Morris/dp/0807008753
Accept that Iceland's educational system must have failed for this to
happen, and scrap it *entirely*. For those parents who need to still work,
create "free schools" to supervise kids during the day, based on this model:
http://www.albanyfreeschool.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_school
For those families who can educate based at home, support "unschooling":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unschooling
as well as local self-directed learning centers. Essentially, make all
existing Icelandic schools like public libraries, where anyone in the
country can come to learn any skill they need. Call them (joke), "The
Schools of Xanadu", after a similarly named sci-fi short story by Theodore
Sturgeon.
"The Skills of Xanadu"
http://www.p2pfoundation.net/Skills_of_Xanadu
See also:
http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/chapters/3a.htm
"For some reason libraries are never age-segregated, nor do they presume to
segregate readers by questionable tests of ability any more than farms or
forests or oceans do. The librarian doesn’t tell me what to read, doesn’t
tell me what sequence of reading I have to follow, doesn’t grade my reading.
The librarian trusts me to have a worthwhile purpose of my own. I appreciate
that and trust the library in return. ..."
Offer these services to tourists and allow boarding students (at a very high
tuition, the US elite can afford it for their kids to learn how to live in
the upcoming post-scarcity society).
And I can't resist, sorry, maybe even think about renaming Iceland as
"Xanadu". It's catchier. :-)
"Olivia Newton John sings Xanadu"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tYWMO3HLgU
"Xanadu lyrics"
http://www.lyricsondemand.com/soundtracks/x/xanadulyrics/xanadulyrics.html
"Xanadu: The place where nobody dared to go...
The dream
That came through a million years
That lived on through all the tears
It came to Xanadu ..."
More suggestions here:
http://www.pdfernhout.net/post-scarcity-princeton.html
* create the "Iceland Center for Post-Scarcity Studies and Economic
Transcendence"
* create a local internet of free things
I think the earlier suggestions here -- creating a patent-free and
copyright-free economic zone and hosting web servers by withdrawing from the
Berne convention and similar treaties --- are also intriguing. Remember, the
USA was built on a disregard for foreign patents and foreign copyrights.
Iceland has plenty of power and cooling for huge server farms. Create a
proxy service costing US$20 a month to use that can only access a
whitelisted child-friendly subset of this content.
You could try to contact some billionaires directly to get a different sort
of bailout. You might have to offer to rename the country Buffetland or
Sorosland (sorry, but I'm not joking this time, it might get you the cash
you need -- what capitalist could resist having a country named after him or
her?).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_Buffett
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soros
Are there any billionaires with Icelandic roots who might give you a better
deal than the IMF?
Alternatively, start the "Iceland Project", modeled around the "Australia
Project" described here:
http://marshallbrain.com/manna5.htm
Here is the key thing to remember:
http://www.pdfernhout.net/post-scarcity-princeton.html
"""
Here is a sample meta-theoretical framework ... economists no doubt could
vastly improve on if they turned their minds to it. Consider three levels of
nested perspectives on the same economic reality -- physical items, decision
makers, and emergent properties of decision maker interactions. (Three
levels of being or consciousness is a common theme in philosophical
writings, usually rock, plant, and animal, or plant, animal, and human.)
At a first level of perspective, the world we live in at any point in time
can be considered to have physical content like land or tools or fusion
reactors like the sun, energy flows like photons from the sun or electrons
from lightning or in circuits, informational patterns like web page content
or distributed language knowledge, and active regulating processes
(including triggers, amplifiers, and feedback loops) built on the previous
three types of things (physicality, energy flow, and informational patterns)
embodied in living creatures, bi-metallic strip thermostats, or computer
programs running on computer hardware.
One can think of a second perspective on the first comprehensive one by
picking out only the decision makers like bi-metallic strips in thermostats,
computer programs running on computers, and personalities embodied in people
and maybe someday robots or supercomputers, and looking at their
characteristics as individual decision makers.
One can then think of a third level of perspective on the second where
decision makers may invent theories about how to control each other using
various approaches like internet communication standards, ration unit tokens
like fiat dollars, physical kanban tokens, narratives in emails, and so on.
What the most useful theories are for controlling groups of decision makers
is an interesting question, but I will not explore it in depth. But I will
pointing out that complex system dynamics at this third level of perspective
can emerge whether control involves fiat dollars, "kanban" tokens,
centralized or distributed optimization based on perceived or predicted
demand patterns, human-to-human discussions, something else entirely, or a
diverse collection of all these things. And I will also point out that one
should never confuse the reality of the physical system being controlled for
the control signals (money, spoken words, kanban cards, internet packet
contents, etc.) being passed around in the control system.
The above is somewhat inspired by "cybernetics".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cybernetics
"""
It's important to shift to that perspective to see that what is failing
right now are some *arbitrary* control system ideology at the third level.
The physical level and the decision maker level of Iceland (and the world)
is still fine. Only the ideology level is broken.
Some humor for tough times:
"Confessions of a Recovering Economist" by Jim Stanford
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=37&ItemID=3996
"""
Good evening. My name is Jim. And I am an economist. It is seventeen
days since I last uttered the phrase "supply and demand." But the demon
still lurks, untamed, within me. ...
Every other addiction has a Twelve Step program, laced with tough love
and blunt self-honesty. Why not a Twelve Step program for economists? God
knows, they've done enough damage with their arrogant, drunken
prescriptions. Here's how each and every economist can face up to their
inner demons, and make their own small contribution to setting things right.
Step 1: Admit you have a problem. Like they say at the AA meetings,
this is half the solution. Where economists are concerned, however, it's
easier said than done. Getting a substance abuser to face the facts of their
addiction is nothing compared to convincing an economist that they're hooked
on elegant but useless mathematical models, and authoritative but
destructive policy advice. Where economists are concerned, we're talking
denial with a capital 'D.'
Step 2: Accept that all your efforts to explain the world have failed.
The 'market' is the holiest symbol in all of economics. It's magically
automatic and efficient. And supply always equals demand. The whole
profession of mainstream, 'neoclassical' economics is dedicated to the study
of markets and how they can be perfected. The problem, however, is that in
real life these idealized 'markets' don't explain much at all. Powerful
non-market forces determine most of what happens in the economy - things
like tradition, demographics, class, gender and race, geography, and
institutions. Indeed, what we call the 'market' is itself a complex,
historically constructed social institution - not some autonomous, inanimate
forum. Power and position are at least as important to economics, as supply
and demand.
...
Step 10: Make a list of the countries and people you have harmed.
Billions of human beings, entire continents, even the planet itself - all
have been devastated by the glaringly misguided dictates of economists. Even
some of the most orthodox practitioners at the World Bank and the
International Monetary Fund will now quietly admit that their domineering
advice to developing countries in recent decades - liberalize trade,
liberalize finance, downsize government, and wait for the invisible hand of
the market to work its magic - was completely and devastatingly wrong. Of
course, these institutions still actively perpetuate the poverty and
hardship which their own false recipe books did so much to create. But large
cracks are appearing in the intellectual dominance and self-confidence of
orthodox economics. Cataloguing the damage is an effective and damning first
step in tearing down the edifice.
Step 11: Make amends to those countries and people.
Every Twelve Step program requires the recovering addict to humbly commit to
fix up their own mess. Economists are no different. This is the time for
recovering economists to step to the front of the room and make personal
pledges to undo the damage that has been wrought in the name of supply and
demand. Commit to studying what's wrong with markets, as opposed to how
beautifully perfect they are. Work to empower rank-and-file folk, instead of
dominating them with your apparent but phony expertise. Start to imagine
economic ideas that could change the world, rather than invoking economic
mumbo-jumbo to justify inequality and explain why it's inevitable.
"""
And from:
http://www.humorproject.com/doses/default.php?number=1
"""
"There are three things which are real:
God, human folly, and laughter.
The first two are beyond our comprehension.
So we must do what we can with the third." (John F. Kennedy)
"""
Good luck.
--Paul Fernhout
Smári McCarthy
Hash: SHA1
nonsensical to me at first glance.
I appreciate these suggestions and will see how they can fit into the
grant scheme of things. :)
- Smári
sm...@yaxic.org http://smari.yaxic.org
(+354) 662 2701 - "Technology is about people"
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Paul D. Fernhout
Where does soil come from? Weathered rock is the base of it. Then there is
also organic matter which comes from nutrients absorbed from weathered rock
that have been mixed with air and water by the action of living plants. So,
you can see that the foundation of all agricultural wealth is rock, and
time. :-) Soil also has components like rock, sand, and clay that effects
various characteristics of how water percolates through it and how well it
holds nutrients (the clay part and the organic matter part both hold the
nutrients against leaching).
Here is a a free garden simulator I co-wrote:
http://www.gardenwithinsight.com/
You can see an example of a "soil texture triangle" on that page.
Those nutrients eventually leach or erode into water and are carried to the
sea and make it salty and are deposited into sediment that eventually gets
pushed under the earth and turns into magma and shows up in volcanoes again.
The reason why so many agricultural towns like the now buried Pompeii were
built near volcanoes despite the obvious danger of eruptions is because the
newly weathered soils from the last eruptions are so fertile.
Even if Iceland does not have much "time" to deal with the crisis in terms
of growing food, other people like in the USA have time to wait for rock
fertilizer's slow release to enrich their soil. But, it takes a lot of
energy to grind up rock, and Iceland has both the energy and the exposed
rock. When it has time, it can use these fertilizers locally.
I first read about this idea of finely ground volcanic rock in the context
of fertilizer for Africa. Note that usually people are impatient for their
plants to grow, so they want to boost them with more specialized fertilizers
that focus on only a few nutrients, like from phosphates, as described hree:
http://www.lenntech.com/chemistry/fertilizers.htm
"Growing plants are nourished by certain constituents which they absorb from
the soil and air. The chief elements drawn from tho soil are potassium,
calcium, sulphur, phosphorus, and nitrogen; other elements such as silicon,
iron, sodium, magnesium, and chlorine are taken up to a less degree. The
natural weathering of the minerals in the ground usually provide the
elements necessary to plant life; but the supply of potassium, phosphorus,
and nitrogen may be insufficient and become exhausted by frequent
repetitions of the same crops on the same land. The soil becomes less
productive, and finally the crops are failures. To supply this continued
drain on the soil, fertilizers are employed. ... Land rock is mined by
stripping off the overlying earth, and digging out the phosphate rock with
pick and shovel. ..."
I include that link as it has a general description of turning such rock
into fertilizer (though focused on phosphate rocks). But organic agriculture
understands that the micronutrient are important too, and is in the R.W.
Widdowson book,
http://www.amazon.com/Towards-Holistic-Agriculture-Scientific-Approach/dp/0080342116
when you apply to much of such strong fertilizer, the micronutrients are
driven out by a statistical process and your plants are less healthy (and so
may be the people who eat them). That may be one reason US people are obese
-- the body keeps eating because it is not getting enough of what it needs
from these sick plants (which could not grow without pesticides to keep the
bugs at bay, because the plant both through breeding and micronutrient poor
soils don't have what it takes to manufacture "plant defense compounds" for
themselves.)
Here is a better resource focusing specifically on the idea of "rock flour":
http://www.ibiblio.org/ecolandtech/orgfarm/remineralization/remineralization.selected-writings
"""
The concepts of remineralization and utilizing rock flours is not new, nor
without substantial research precedence. As a brief historical overview, the
recent history of remineralization shows that it has been researched and
explored by three different groups:
First, nutritional biochemist Julius Hensel pioneered remineralization in
the 1880's with his book BREAD FROM STONES and a modest agriculture
movement cane into being. Since the late 1930's many scientists have done
research on remineralization in Germany and Central Europe for agriculture
and forests.
An example in forestry is a study which showed that in the case of new pine
seedlings remineralized with basalt rock dust, there were gains over the
untreated area after the sixth year. After 24 years the wood volume of the
treated area was four times higher than in the untreated area. It was only
after 60 years that the advantage tapered off.
Second, is a more recent development called agrogeology and this research
has been carried out mainly in Canada, Brazil, Tanzania, the Canary Islands,
and West Africa -- especially on laterite soils. Because of the intense
tropical rainfall, NPK fertilizers are washed out in only a few weeks and
cannot be stored by the soils, and are especially harmful to the
groundwater. Rock fertilizers not only give nutrients over longer periods to
cultivated plants, but also improve the ion-exchange-capacity of soils by
forming new clay minerals during the weathering of the fertilizer.
Third, is the grass roots movement concerned with the premise of John
Hamaker in the book THE SURVIVAL OF CIVILIZATION that remineralization is
not only the key to restoring soils and forests, but in the larger context,
absolutely necessary and urgent to reduce levels of carbon dioxide in the
atmosphere and stabilize the climate.
This movement began with Hamaker's writing in the early 1970's and expanded
in the 1980's into a global network consisting of ecologically concerned
individuals and organizations, farmers and gardeners, scientists and policy
makers.
To facilitate networking and the flow of information and to promote
remineralization as advocated by John Hamaker and Don Weaver, SOIL
REMINERALIZATION, A NETWORK NEWSLETTER, began in 1986 and became
REMINERALIZE THE EARTH magazine in 1991. The magazine, published and edited
by Joanna Campe, has networked to people all over the world and has
collected research and a wealth of anedotal results of farmers and
gardeners, and for silviculture and foresters to substantiate the results of
remineralization. The most recent results of these efforts are two manuals
which contain the following listing of research reports.
...
"""
More from there:
"""
How It Works:
Powdered rocks and gravels are Nature's "fertilizer." Glaciers and volcanoes
are the primary methods She uses to produce the powder. But those methods
are very slow, and the job of re-mineralizing needs to be done right away.
We need to use efficient machines to grind gravel into powder, so that the
soil life can get to the minerals that are trapped in the rocks
When powdered gravel is applied to the soil, a marvelous thing happens. The
microbes in the soil (and in the guts of earthworms) "digest" the powder,
and extract whatever useful elements they find. The higher plants then
extract the mineral rich juices from those microbes, and pass them down the
line to the animals.
Given an abundance of minerals (like zinc, copper, calcium, etc.), and
water, the soil microbes, earthworms, plants, and animals THRIVE because the
minerals are critical to every function of living things. The worms bore
miles of tunnels, which aerate the soil. The microbes work extra hard to
glue the soil particles into spongy "crumbs." The plants develop huge root
systems, which resist drought. Insects are repelled by the healthy juices of
the plants. Foods become more flavorful and satisfying. Both yields and
quality increase. The plants become more heat and frost resistant. Diseases
become rare events. And so on. The minerals are truly the FOUNDATION of all
life on earth!
Plants need a balanced "diet" just like people do. Too much of a good thing
can be very harmful. That's a problem with compost, manures, and chemical
fertilizers; they release to much of some nutrients (like Nitrogen and
Phosphorous) and not enough of others (such as the many trace minerals). And
to make matters worse, they are very soluble in water, which means that the
plants are FORCED to absorb them, throwing the plants out of balance.
Powdered rock, on the other hand, is practically insoluble, and so it cannot
cause an imbalance, nor can it pollute the ground water or streams. It could
make a World of difference.
"""
Lots more on that page.
And Googling will give you lots of links:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=rock+dust
Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rock_flour
And a great site:
http://www.remineralize.org/resources.php
(But it does show you have lots of competition -- but who can compete with
Icelandic energy at cheap prices? Think of it as the Alcoa deal to make
Aluminum in Iceland but without Alcoa or the cost of shipping any ore to
Iceland. :-)
Note that *breathing* rock dust for an extended time can cause stuff like
"Silicosis, pulmonary fibroisis, lung disease", so be careful. Ideally, the
plants would be automated. Ask NASA from their Mars mission staff on advice
in making machinery that can survive the dusty environment on Mars. See also:
"Robots Set To Change The Face Of Australian Mining"
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/robot-00g.html
"The Arthur C.Clarke/Isaac Asimov vision of robotic industries, science
fiction only a few years ago, is poised to become reality in the Australian
mining sector driven by the twin needs for safety and efficiency. Dr Hobbs
says research teams at CSIRO are trialling and developing a range of giant
robotic mining devices, that will either operate themselves under human
supervision or else be "driven" by a miner, in both cases from a safe,
remote location. "It is all about getting people out of hazardous
environments," he says. Robots will be doing jobs like laying explosives,
going underground after blasting to stabilize a mine roof or mining in areas
where it is impossible for humans to work or even survive. ..."
So, essentially I'm suggesting you sell your basalt rock to a very small
subset of patient US Americans. :-) But very finely ground-up, as we are not
that patient. :-) As Iceland gets back on its feet, you can use it locally
in a big way and maybe become a big exporter of food in the summer months
(and then take six months off to play or travel in the winter).
Here is an overview of how many organic gardeners there are in just the USA
(there are a lot more in Europe):
http://www.gardenresearch.com/index.php?q=show&id=2896
"Organic gardeners: 5% or about 5 million"
While only a small fraction, that's more that 10X the population of Iceland.
Many of these may be sympathetic to the plight of a people harmed by IMF and
conservative policies -- say 50%. :-) That overall percent of people
interested in organic methods is also growing, as people realize spraying
intensive fertilizer and pesticides on their laws is risky for their own
health and the health of their community. (They need the pesticides, since
as above, the plants look lush but are unhealthy deep down.)
From something I linked to before, people in the USA are willing to pay
retail about US$50 for a fifty pound bag (23kg):
http://www.fertilizeronline.com/rockdust.php
So I might guess the wholesale cost of such a 50lb (23kg) bags delivered
might be US$15 or so. How much can you produce rock dust for in Iceland in
terms of energy, labor, and maybe shipping costs to the USA?
Of course, then you have to market it, which can be hard, but you have a lot
of publicity right now (even if a lot of it is negative). There are probably
a lot of people cheering you on. You might sell "rock dust" futures even.
:-) Of course that is part of how we got into this mess. :-)
The overall retail market in the USA for all gardening products is discussed
here:
http://www.gardenresearch.com/
"According to results of the recently completed 2007 National Gardening
Survey retail sales of lawn and garden products to consumers totaled $35.102
billion last year."
So, if 5% of that is organic, that's about US$1.5 billion. If you can reach
1% of that, you would have annual revenues of US$15 million.) Not a big
amount as you might need with a GDP of $20 billion to support. :-(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iceland
But, there is Europe. And you might be able to grow the overall organic
market in the USA. So, it might not solve the financial crisis by itself.
But it might be an optimistic part of the solution.
A much bigger potential market is *farmers* who might buy a lot, considering
the USA has been busy for 200 years essentially mining its soils to
destruction and so is ready for some long term solution. Consider:
"Fertilizer market: Watch it grow"
http://www.canadianbusiness.com/markets/commodities/article.jsp?content=20080511_198708_198708
"Consider (in case you haven’t lately) diammonium phosphate, a fertilizer
that aids in photosynthesis. Its U.S. Gulf price (its price at the port of
New Orleans) has more than quadrupled over the past 15 months, to about
US$1,150 per tonne. The Vancouver price of potash, a rich source of
potassium, has jumped to between US$325 and US$500 per tonne — up from
between US$172 and US$353 in January 2007. The Arab Gulf price of urea,
which provides nitrogen for root, stem and leaf growth, has risen to more
than US$400 per tonne from US$300 per tonne. In all, fertilizers have been
among the fastest-appreciating commodities over the past year."
Those are prices for concentrated fertilizers of course. Fossil fuels are
usually used to mine them or make them from nitrogen in the air, which is
why the prices are going up. You'd have to work through the global pricing
of "rock flour" in various places. Key might be whether transporting the
rock dust was more expensive than the energy to make it locally. Even if
that is the case, this idea still might make sense as part of increasing
Icelandic self-sufficiency in food over the long term. And since you have a
lot of silica and a lot of energy, making greenhouses (or domes) from glass
to extend the growing season is a possibility (as are growing with
artificial lights). Again, NASA might be able to help here, in terms of
adapting plans for Lunar greenhouses, since almost any place on the moon
gets sun for about two weeks then darkness for about two weeks.
I guess, since finely ground rock embodies a lot of energy from the mining
and grinding, you could also add an aspect of "rock dust" to the "New
Icelandic króna"' where part or all of the currency would be exchangeable
(at a port in Iceland :-) for rock dust. I don't know how much it would cost
to ship, since it is obviously dense. But ores are shipped by boat all the
time (or fertilizer as above), so I'd expect it would be possible. Whether
you bag it in Iceland or ship it unbagged is another issue. You might not
have the raw materials for bags easily available. A partnership with another
place that could make cheap bags (biodegradable paper?) might be needed.
By the way, I realized as I woke up this morning that I could have suggested
that, if the nation is going to take on the financial obligations of
mismanaged private companies in Iceland (the banks), then it makes sense to
at least convert those obligations to the "New Icelandic króna" backed by
the output of geothermal energy (electricity or BTUs). The catch is of
course, that people have to come to Iceland to collect on that energy right
now. :-) But that is not as far fetched as in seems, for example Alcoa would
see the long term value in holding such currency because it already makes
use of Icelandic energy. So, it would be a futures based currency, with the
government having promised that as Iceland's geothermal energy resources
continue to be developed (a previous linked article said only a fifth were
exploited) that a lot of the energy results would be exchangeable on a
first-come-first-served basis to whoever held the currency (obviously, you'd
still want everyone to comply with strict environmental regulations). The
government would also perhaps be promising to cooperate (as it saw fit) with
outsiders who wanted to develop geothermal resources using their own
technology investment in order to redeem their "Icelandic energy króna"
(which it likely plans to anyway). It's of course in the nature of most
currencies that not many people actually redeem them any time soon and they
just get traded. (Again, another way we got into this mess. :-)
Eric Hunting
resources; geothermal energy. My suggestion would be to rethink the
physical structure of communities in the context of Iceland's abundant
natural energy resource. Iceland is the only nation in Europe with the
potential to heat and power all communities and industry virtually for
free, farm all the food it needs continuously year round, and power
all transportation on domestic energy. By all rights, it should have
been the first energy-independent and carbon-neutral nation in Europe.
That there are still municipal power stations running on import oil
given the number of years Iceland has had geothermal energy on-line is
insane. It's largely underutilized this energy potential by letting ad
hoc development dictate the structure of its communities and simple
procrastination dominate its national policy. It has led the world in
geothermal energy development but still treats this 100 year old
technology like an experiment. There's still more geothermal
deployment in California! It needs to re-examine the viability of
dispersed and peripheral communities that compel unnecessarily
dispersed or fractured infrastructures. People need to question the
places and types of architecture they choose in the context of the
logistics of their natural energy resource. Like most western nations,
they have too many people living where they need not be resulting in
systemic inefficiency of the habitat that encourages fossil fuel
dependency and unnecessary complication and cost in comprehensive
geothermal utilization. Iceland needs planned urban communities with
tightly integrated infrastructures, arcologies, designed around the
optimal utilization of its geothermal energy. There's been co-housing
in Iceland since at least 1930. There needs to be a recognition of
what that mode of living means in logistical terms and an application
of that to civil planning. Perhaps it's the lack of a history of self-
sufficiency that has caused Icelanders to overlook the actual
potential for it that's at-hand. Perhaps it's too much Danish
influence on the history of its cities and town. Perhaps its the
chronic cultural fatalism. A nation of just several hundred thousand
western educated scandinavian progressives sitting on top of 1500
terawatts of potential clean energy has little excuse for not already
being in a post-scarcity situation. They should already be Abu Dhabi
of the North.
Eric Hunting
erich...@gmail.com
Marcos
around here! Probably out of fear that other smart people might do the
same! Its a great opportunity indeed.
"set up a "free guptastan" WSLE/data haven, and market it to eco
geeks,
seasteaders, and anti-IP nerds. I'd move there. "
a bunch of open manufacturing geeks working for it for free =) I bet
they(we?) could make gold out of ice ;)
Its great all the ideas about resources usage, but i think you guys
might be forgetting one of the most important issues, which were the
one that brought all this in the first place: "zero-confidence in the
election. "
efficient ways of preventing all the problems that arise from specific
government systems (coupled with currency systems, like corruption),
and how to free people from excessive bureaucracy so they are the most
efficient possible to persue arts, science, etc and hopefully foment
ever greater renaissances. I would like to help in this area if
possible. I may begin saying one of the most important conclusions
I`ve reached is `decentralization`, tipically, the more the better, in
all areas, like food, production, etc. Which seems to be the common
ideal of this list in essence, right?
If you can make it work in Iceland, it may spread around, and raise
the adoption of open manufacturing, which would be what this list
strives for, and I would like to help if possible =) You could prove
to the world how great humans can be when they work together.
I hope I wasnt too naive ^_^
Good luck! And if there is anything I can do to help I will. =)
Kindly,
Mark.