As I am apt to do in these moments, I called bullshit.

And then, with the help of the patient and curious party attendees, I organized an experiment.

We blindfolded Dalton and made him stand in the centre of a circle of human bodies (ours). Crucially, we left a gap in our circle, the width of one human body. We then made Dalton turn in a circle a few times, and asked him to identify where the gap was through echolocation. At first, we had a hard time not laughing while we watched him turn and click. So we botched the first few experiments by being too noisy and by revealing our relative positions. But we finally got quiet.

The first time that Dalton pointed directly to the open spot, I thought “good guess.” And then, I thought, “can you repeat that?” And then I thought, “we need more tests.” And test we did. We did it again. We moved the hole around. We took our experiment outside. We tried doing it ourselves to see if the blindfold was working. ¹ No one else could do it. But Dalton was right every single time.

When I think about it now, it’s less startling. But at the time I was amazed. Dalton, it turns out, has a great ear. He is, after all, a musician. But anyone can echolocate at home by doing this simple experiment. Blindfold yourself, preferably in a dark unlit room, and ask your friend to hold a text book in front of your face – or not. Try it about a foot away. Your job is simply to make sounds and guess whether the text book is raised in front of your face, or not. Keep track of your record of successes. Most people can do simple echolocation. Kinda neat though.

Anyway, some people are very good at echolocation. And, apparently, anyone can learn. But there’s a dark side.

A weekend-long rock camp for all adults, all genders, over 19. An experience like no other! Learn an instrument, form a band, write a song and perform like a rock star! No prior music experience necessary.

Anyway, the movie we watched that late summer night was an exploration of the possibility, and ultimate tragedy, of love between three people. Discussion, and argument, was a regular part of our social scene, and after the movie we entered into a rather energetic exchange about the possibility of many loves. We were teenagers and we were boys and girls. We were mostly all buddies. But there were sometimes crushes. My nemesis was there. Yes, I had a high school nemesis.

The group quickly fractured into for and against groupings. The for group consisted of me and one of my very best friends.

He and I developed, on the fly, the following collaborative strategy. We very quickly worked to broaden the notion of love. This occurred to our opponents as a bit of a cheap manouevre since the movie was obviously about the deep kind of romantic love that eventually led to life commitment and marriage. But we held that we had to be talking about the kind of love that is widely the topic of love songs and if we had to admit that the topic of love was limited to the notion of marriage that their argument would be rather circular since they seemed to be trying to presuppose their conclusion in the very meanings of their terms.¹ And while we defended our broad use of the concept of love, we still also maintained that it was possible for three people to be deeply, life partnerly, romanticly in love.

We then moved on to broaden the number of people involved. We argued for the possibility of three or more people being in love. Which is to say that it’s possible for more than two people to be in love. See our general method was to stake out as large a territory as possible so that the odds were stacked in our favour.

It struck my buddy and I as funny that our aggressors would find our basic position as so implausible. All we needed, to be right, was a single example. We were merely arguing for the possibility! And a contingent claim needs only one instantiation to be true! Some would even argue, that a contingent claim needs only one instantiation, in all possible worlds sufficiently similar to ours, to be true! Just imagine the infinite possible worlds that are reasonably similar in which there are more than two people in love! To argue against such odds was surely dogma, nay, madness!

It also struck my buddy and I as fascinating that our aggressors did not argue that it was wrong. There were no overt moral claims being made. The only tacit moral assumption that was made was that you shouldn’t do stuff that doesn’t work. That’s a pretty minimal claim and one that we were pretty sympathetic with. Imagine that, a room full of boys and girls arguing stridently and, I might add, quite articulately, and not a single person tried to argue that humans ought not to love outside of coupling. Our opponents argument was instead structure this way:

1. humans shouldn’t do stuff that doesn’t work

2. love between three people (ie more than two people) was impossible

3. therefore humans shouldn’t try to

Now sometimes this sort of tactic is used to cover up implicit moral considerations. Sometimes people don’t like to see themselves as having such powerful moral ideas so they just parse them in terms of what works and what doesn’t work. But, on reflection, I don’t think my friends had those powerful ethical claims swirling in their heads. I think they really were just concerned with what works. If I were to try to psychologize their errors in logic, I would suggest that they were instead making the common logical fallacy of a dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter, or as I would call this kind of hasty generalization in this particular instance, it’s-true-for-me-therefore-it’s-true-for-everyone.

We didn’t know the term, “polyamoury” then ². But it’s interesting for me to think back to that discussion now, because I’m still, in the very least case, committed to the possibility that someone can make it work.

When it comes to stones and cake, the difference in longevity is mostly about the chemical makeup of the medium. There has to be a serious disaster to utterly destroy a stone sculpture. But degrees of permanence is not always so straight forward. Take Wikipedia, for example. There is a huge community of volunteers and a few paid staff that keep it running. And if Wikipedia lasts a hundred years, and it could, then it will not be simply because of the chemical properties of the medium. It will still exist be the sheer organizing effort of the community of supporters.

Violins are more like Wikipedia ¹ than a stone sculpture. It doesn’t take much effort to utterly destroy a violin. You would need much less than an earthquake to do so. Heck, our bunny rabbit could easily reduce one to toothpicks in about a day. But despite their relative frailty, violins tend to last well. They generally last longer than people do. Sometimes many centuries.² And this is evidence of the extent to which they are cared for by artists and artisans. It turns out that the violin is designed so that there is very little that you can’t repair.

It’s not every day that you meet a violin maker. But I did. And a couple weeks ago Galen Hartley showed me his workshop, his current violin in progress (nearly finished!) and the rough outline of the next one.

Him: I know I should be working right now … but the police actions were so fucked up …

Her: Yeah, no, I’m pretty sure the police are supremely fucked up as well. There are dozens of videos coming out of events of the weekend. Those people don’t have to do those things but they do. So they are just as fucked up as the powers that enable them to.

Him: Yeah, that’s true too … I can imagine that it would be hard to not be caught up in the fucked up culture of the police, that special mix of power, entitlement and legitimized use of violence …

Her: Yeah but they chose to become cops in the first place. if they get caught up in the culture of policing, it’s because they chose to be police. What they’re doing here is no different, fundamentally, than what they do most of the rest of the time. it’s the logical conclusion. I just have zero sympathy for someone who finds themselves in that position. I have these moments watching the videos where I think, none of these people had second thoughts about this? are any of these cops going to come forward and speak out about how fucked up this is? probably not. even if they are there in all their gear, they don’t have to be beating people up but they do, over and over again. people don’t do things that they can’t justify to themselves one way or another. They think they’re right. Each of these individuals is making decisions at any given moment and they think they’re making the right decisions. no sympathy here. :(

Him: Yeah, I agree with all your points … I guess I just want to be able to find ways of connecting and understanding … after the revolution, if you know what I mean, they will be part of society too … it feels too easy to just write them off. That said, when it comes down to who I have in my life, I’m not sure that I could be intimate with anyone who had chosen to be a cop. I’m ambivalent about it, I guess. Although I don’t want that to get in the way of having an honest discussion and critique of what they are doing.

It also seems, in this case, that they were so directly empowered by the state to take the violence to this level, so we also need to be critiquing that part of what made the violence possible – not instead of, but as well as critiquing the police.

Her: right, i feel ya =)

Luckily, I found this guy who had a solution to the missing photos issue. I actually didn’t implement his solution yet, but I downloaded the iPhone Explorer and found the photos on my phone and backed them up on my desktop. Now I’ll wait for Apple to provide a fix. The photos are there, they just need to be accessible via the iPhone camera roll.

The Wolverine Way – by Douglas H. Chadwick from Wild Collective on Vimeo.

So, 1 EVU is about 262,000 barrels, which is about 11 million gallons, which is about 44 million litres.

The spill gushing started on April 20th 2010.

The public relations strategy cover up by BP, and BP experts, have been steadily underestimating the flow of oil.^{2 3} It is interesting to note that prior to the rupture, BP had estimated the worst case flow rate of about 162,000 barrels a day. ⁴ That’s about 6.8 million gallons, or roughly 0.6 EVUs per day.

Steve Wereley, an engineer from Purdue University, initially thought the leak may be 70,000 barrels or roughly .25 EVUs per day. Later, publishing with Ian R. MacDonald, John Amos and Timothy Crone, they collectively estimated the flow at between 40,000 barrels and 100,000 barrels a day. That’s between .15 EVUs and .38 EVUs per day.^{5 6} It’s refreshing to read their article because it so clearly indicts BP in regards to their refusal to allow effective third party measurement of the flow.

So do the math

We’re coming up on two months of gushing oil. If you take the lesser estimate, we’re looking at about: 60 days x .15 EVUs = 9 EVUs

If you take the greater flow rate, we’re looking at about: 60 days x .38 EVUs = 23 EVUs

In conclusion

Looks like the BP oil catastrophe has so far gushed between 9 and 23 times the amount of oil that the Exxon Valdez dumped.

For Further Reading

1. Is America’s Chernobyl in Canada’s Future
2. Are We Poisoning Ourselves or What?
3. Dispersant is a Cover Up and a Toxic Chemical/
4. BP Executive Denies Oil Plume

Another kind of objectivity is related to the knowledge garnering process. I am referring here to the process by which we get knowledge. It’s no surprise that people who are more, shall we say, invested in the conclusions of a discovery process, are more likely to skew the results of that process.

Another kind of objectivity is related to the integrity and particular disinterestedness of the person making claims. So if I’ve been asked to count the pencils in your office, the number I arrive at is probably not controversial… unless I sell pencils.

Okay, so this isn’t rocket science. Everyone gets this. Moms get this. Dads get this. Kids get this. Don’t ask sales people if they like the product. Don’t expect an objective analysis from GM about Toyota. We trust people in certain contexts, given their expertise and investments in those context.

Ah, there’s a sticky point.

The folks that have the expertise in some contexts are also often the people with the biggest investments. This is because science is expensive. Science is, more and more, the slave of industry. It can be hard to find experts at arms length from critical issues. It’s even harder when industry hacks, industry front groups, and industry lobbyists are challenging and marginalizing the views of other experts. The tobacco lobby and the global warming denial industry are both excellent examples of how powerful this can be.

Latest estimates from scientists studying the disaster for the US government suggest 160-380 million litres (42-100 million US gallons) of oil have already entered the Gulf. Most experts believe there is more oil gushing into the sea in an hour than officials originally said was spilling in an entire day. — guardian.co.uk, Helen Pidd and agencies, Friday 11 June 2010 10.07 BST

Well we have a guest here in Victoria right now – a bunch of guests. And they’re all packing. Navies from six countries, and some eight thousand sailors have descended on our little town. And the USS Ronald Reagan is the largest and the meanest, I think. Supported by several submarines, and nuclear missile enabled, this is a machine that’s packing serious heat. And it’s manned by thousands of soldiers willing to serve, protect and attack on command – and who generally don’t demonstrate any understanding of the history or impacts of colonization, gendered violence or racialization. But they’re committed to our protection, right?

That said, I couldn’t help but marvel at the sheer size and cost and capacity of this titan of the ocean. A modern titan.

photo by Darcy Merrick

It Will Take Maturity & Patience

said the latest Chinese fortune. Now no silver spoon. Now no second piece of
cake. Both of us deprived children, before a blackboard in a French provincial
town: children who do not understand the inflection, hands behind backs
standing in the corner because the two girls have a smash on each other.
Yes I had a thing for you from the get-go, a thing hard to bury alive.
Submarine, aqua & teal green buoyed me up, angst my bride.

Turns out that the root meaning of the word “pencil” takes us back to fourteenth century French: pincel is a fine brush from hair, and pinceau is, roughly, an artist’s brush. But these French words come from the Latin, penicillus, which, you guessed it, shares it’s history with the word, “penis.” Surprise. Turns out that the latin term, penis, means tail, or even, a little tail. ¹

In honour of pencils and also in honour of our little art club I’ve posted a few sketches by Vincent van Gogh. I chose these particular sketches because they each use such wonderfully different techniques. ²

And just because a minority government gets a non-confidence vote in the House, a whole new election doesn’t have to get triggered. When a government falls, it’s just not true that the only option is to have an election. But you hear this falsehood spoken often. You hear journalists say it. You hear newspaper editors say it. And you hear big business say it. And of course, lately the Conservatives have been saying it.

When a minority government falls, any other portion of parliament can come forward with the intent to form government. The majority of Canadians voted against Harper’s Christians last election. I would prefer a coalition.

“Well, the dispersant is a toxic pollutant that has been applied in the volume of millions of gallons and I think has greatly exacerbated the situation. I think the whole idea of using a dispersant is wrong, and I think it’s part of the whole pattern of BP trying to cover up and hide the body. They don’t want us to see how much oil, so they’ve taken this oil that was concentrated at the surface and dissolved it. But when you dissolve it, it’s still there, and it actually gets more toxic, because instead of being in big blobs, it’s now dissolved and can get across the gills, get into the mouths of animals. The water below the floating oil was water. Now it’s this toxic soup. So I think that in this whole pattern of BP trying to not let people know what’s going on, the idea of disperse the oil is a way of just hiding the body. But it actually makes the oil more toxic, and it adds this incredible amount of toxic pollutant in the dispersant itself.” – CARL SAFINA

Novel situations, of course, make it difficult to remember what to do. Global warming is a novel situation. Oil gushing into the gulf in the deep deep water, is a novel situation. That the Tories are choosing to remove the requirement for environmental assessments seems somehow related.

If you want to relinquish ALL control of your computer to Western Digital, then this is a good choice. If you get annoyed with software that auto-starts, can’t be shut off, and consumes virtually all computer capacity for extended periods of time “categorizing your files”, then stay away from Western Digital Smartware (I prefer to call it “Dumbware”). I bought the 1TB Essential and it will be my last Western Digital purchase. My second drive was a Seagate — and that’s where I’ll stay. Software developers and distributors who usurp control (apparently because they know what I want to do better than I do), should look forward to a purgatory of infinite loops! — Ron Williams – December 18th, 2009 at 1:27 pm EST

For ad men, that’s pretty good.

The book is called The Age of Persuasion, How Marketing Ate Our Culture. I’m totally enjoying it. But here’s what I’m talking about. In the preface, he reflects on the radio show he launched in 1995:

In the summer of 1995, I launched a twenty-five radio series, O’Reilly on Advertising, on CBC’s Radio One, eager to fill what I saw as a huge information void. Of the thousands of books, films, courses, and programs about advertising and marketing, few, if any, were created by people within the industry for people outside the industry.

Then turning to his more recent radio show, he adds:

This program has allowed me to fill another curious void: the thousands of works critical of the impact of advertising and marketing on modern life and culture are created, almost without exception, by people who have never worked within the advertising business.

Wow. If true, that is totally significant. it means that people who work in the advertising business don’t criticize themselves, the techniques of their trade or the affects they have on our communities. Ever. Wow. That is a huge criticism that O’Reilly almost, but not quite, made of advertisers. ²

The point I’m trying to angle towards is this. There is no one better suited to sell us on sales, than a salesperson. And advertising is sales. So there is no one better suited to sell us on advertising, than an advertiser. Well… maybe a salesperson. But do you get my point? Advertisers everywhere are advocates for their various clients now and then and once in a while. But advertisers everywhere are advocates for their jobs, their careers, and their industry, all of the time.

The question is, what are we buying?