Suggested Discussion Outline

[johnkarls]

.

The following outline is respectfully suggested –


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A. Comments About Specific Chapters of “How The World Really Works: The Science Behind How We Got Here and Where We’re Going” – 60 minutes

Our tradition is to devote the first portion of each monthly meeting to going through the focus book, chapter by chapter, to invite important comments that are specific to a particular chapter. After all, each participant (except, perhaps, “first timers”) have taken the time to read the focus book and her/his opportunity to opine on anything in the focus book should NOT be denied.

Chapter 1 – Understanding Energy – Fuels and Electricity

Chapter 2 – Understanding Food Production – Eating Fossil Fuels

Chapter 3 – Understanding Our Material World – The Four Pillars of Modern Civilization

Chapter 4 – Understanding Globalization – Engines, Microchips, and Beyond

Chapter 5 – Understanding Risks – From Viruses to Diets to Solar Flares

Chapter 6 – Understanding the Environment – The Only Biosphere We Have

Chapter 7 – Understanding the Future – Between Apocalypse and Singularity


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B. Discussion Issues – 60 minutes

[NB: If anyone has additional items, please post them in this section of www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org]


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Chapter 7 – The Four Pillars of Modern Civilization – (1) ammonia – the gas that feeds the world, (2) plastics – diverse, useful, troublesome, (3) steel – ubiquitous and recyclable, (4) concrete – a world created by cement


Our author, Prof. Vaclav Smil is Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of Manitoba. He is the author of over forty books on topics including energy, environmental and population change, food production and nutrition, technical innovation, risk assessment, and public policy. No other living scientist has had more books (on a wide variety of topics) reviewed in Nature. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, in 2010 he was named by Foreign Policy as one of the Top 100 Global Thinkers.

The Washington Post book review (viewtopic.php?f=698&t=2206&sid=bdd776d1 ... e4a62ff17e) says –

Prof. Smil, “is no climate denier….he comprehends and acknowledges the risks posed by accumulating atmospheric carbon dioxide…..Smil reminds us that, as damnably carbon-intense as they are, fossil fuels are undeniably useful, and versatile. That is why the world adopted them to replace other energy sources over the past 150 years or so…..Specifically, humankind uses 17 percent of the world’s primary energy supply just to make four materials — ammonia (for fertilizer), steel, cement and plastic — resulting in 25 percent of all global carbon emissions. These substances, Smil explains, are ‘pillars of modern civilization,’ crucial to feeding, housing, transporting and — through medical devices or hospital construction — healing billions of people. Not only are there no readily available substitutes for these materials, but also there are no practical low-carbon ways to produce enough to meet current demand. And the world must actually expand their production as Africa and Asia modernize.”


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The “Paris Climate Accord” of 2015 Is NOT Intended To Solve Global Warming – Only Mitigate It Somewhat


The PCA's long-term temperature goal is to keep the rise in mean global temperature to below 2 °C (3.6 °F) above pre-industrial levels, and preferably limit the increase to 1.5 °C (2.7 °F), recognizing that this would ONLY reduce the effects of climate change. To stay below 1.5 °C of global warming, emissions need to be cut by roughly 50% by 2030.

Accordingly, by its own terms the PCA does NOT solve Global Warming.

Moreover, China, for example, still brings on line every week a new monster-size coal-fired electrical-power generation plant.

[NB: The PCA’s predecessor, the “Kyoto Protocol” of 1997, exempted completely China and India – the world’s two largest carbon polluters.]


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Thorium Fission – Solving Global Warming 100% WITHOUT Military Action


At this point in our 7/20/2022 meeting, I will ask the question featured in all of our many meetings over the years on Global Warming –

“Does anyone favor invading militarily, for example, China to prevent it from bringing on stream every week one new monster-size coal-burning electrical-power generation plant.”

[NB: Nobody has ever answered affirmatively. And the only economic alternatives to fossil fuels have been hydroelectric, which is severely limited by the scarcity of dammable rivers, and nuclear power. So unless one is prepared to use military force, it seems obvious that nuclear is the answer to solving Global Warming since adopting it is in the economic self-interest of each nation.]

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As stated in many of our campaigns aimed at our nation’s decision makers –

Thorium/fission was proved feasible in the 1960’s when the U.S. National Nuclear-Research Laboratory at Oak Ridge TN conducted a successful 18-month continuous demonstration project comprising a thorium-fueled nuclear reactor. President Nixon caused the nation to turn away from thorium (and toward uranium and plutonium) because thorium is incapable of exploding or being utilized to produce nuclear weapons.

Both conventional uranium fission and proven thorium/fission share all of the following advantages: (a) producing no greenhouse gases; (b) eliminating the dependence of the U.S. and its allies on members of OPEC (the long-standing Organization of Petroleum-Exporting Countries) and, in the case of Europe, natural gas imports from Russia (in addition to oil & gas imports from OPEC); and (c) eliminating the gaping U.S. balance-of-payments deficit and resulting piling up of our foreign national debt.

However, proven thorium/fission has the following advantages over conventional uranium/fission –

[These advantages are virtually identical to those listed by Dr. Victor Stenger in The Huffington Post – https://www.huffpost.com/entry/lftr-a-l ... _b_1192584.]

(1) LFTR’s (Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors) require minimal containment chambers because meltdowns are physically impossible since LFTR’s operate near atmospheric pressure (this is both a safety and cost factor).

(2) LFTR’s do not require elaborate cooling systems because they operate well below the boiling point of molten salt and can be passively cooled (this is also both a safety and cost factor).

(3) Thorium is so stable that, as mentioned above, it is impossible to make a nuclear weapon from thorium which is why the U.S. turned to uranium and plutonium instead of thorium.

(4) Thorium has such an incredibly-high “burn-up” that there is virtually no long-lived radioactive waste.

(5) LFTR’s can safely consume uranium from decommissioned nuclear warheads and from spent uranium-reactor fuel rods. Indeed, the Oak Ridge MSRE in the 1960’s was able to use U-235, Pu-239 and U-233 at the same time as thorium. [NB: Since former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of NV prevented the opening of Yucca Mountain NV as the repository for our spent uranium-nuclear fuel rods, the spent uranium-nuclear fuel rods have been left on site at each uranium-nuclear plant to remain cool in the equivalent of home swimming-pools even though many of those uranium-nuclear plants are situated in high-volume air corridors!!!]

(6) Because LFTR’s are economically practical in small sizes, they can be mass-produced in factories and assembled near electrical demand so that the huge energy losses during electricity transmission are virtually eliminated -- though to replace huge uranium reactors, it would only be necessary to assemble several of the small modular thorium reactors into a larger plant.

(7) In addition, thorium is so plentiful that proven thorium supplies are capable of supplying 100% of the world’s energy (not just electricity) for more than 1,000 years. Indeed, virtually all of India’s “sand” beaches comprise thorium.
[Our calculation was 80 years of “proven” reserves of uranium for current (electricity only) usage multiplied by 3 (the minimum abundance factor of “proven” thorium reserves vs. “proven” uranium reserves) multiplied by 99 (usable thorium energy content vs. usable uranium energy content) multiplied by 5.8% (the percentage of total worldwide energy including transportation fuels, that comes from nuclear plants) = 1,378 years.]

[ThEC15 was a worldwide conference on thorium research that was held in Mumbai, India, in 2015 by the Government of India and two of its agencies, BARC and NPCIL, along with HBNI and IThEO. The ThEC15 website (http://www.thoriumenergyworld.com/thec15-mumbai.html) contains 127 papers and speeches by 46 speakers from 30 different nations.]”

*****End Of Our Typical Comments On Thorium Fission*****


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Nuclear-Powered Food Factories That Make Farms Obsolete


Our author, Prof. Smil, claims that one of his “Four Pillars of Modern Civilization” (ammonia) is necessary for farming AND FARMING IS ESSENTIAL TO CIVILIZATION.

We posted the following on 5/17/2021 at viewtopic.php?f=639&t=2062&p=2820&hilit ... f17e#p2820 --

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Usually, we do NOT prepare reports on meetings that do not produce one of our Six-Degrees-Of-Separation E-mail Campaigns.

HOWEVER, there was one aspect of our 5/12/2021 meeting that is important to preserve.

It pertains to Sections E-8 thru E-13 of the Suggested Discussion Outline for the meeting.

Those sections describe our long-standing observation that plants use their chlorophyll (the green in plant leaves, etc.) TO USE SOLAR POWER in order to convert carbon dioxide and water into oxygen and sugar (6CO2 + 6H2O > C6H12O6 + 6O2) – which is the energy that animals access in breathing oxygen to burn the sugar, creating carbon dioxide in the exact reverse chemical reaction (C6H12O6 + 6O2 > 6CO2 + 6H2O).

And, accordingly, those sections describe our long-standing position that nuclear energy, say from small thorium-fission reactors, should be able to SUBSTITUTE FOR SOLAR POWER in driving that chlorophyll-photosynthesis reaction (6CO2 + 6H2O > C6H12O6 + 6O2) in a food-production factory - making conventional farms obsolete.

While positing that it should not be that difficult to ascertain what there is about chlorophyll (since it consists of chemicals) that enables it to harness light to drive the chemical reaction 6CO2 + 6H2O > C6H12O6 + 6O2.

With a view to synthesizing those chemicals in such a way that they can harness other energy sources, such as nuclear power, to drive that chemical reaction.

The aspect of our meeting to be preserved???

Our member who proposed the topic for our 5/13/2021 meeting was Dennis Cecchini.

Dennis is a retired executive who began his career as a chemical engineer.

[BTW along with our long-time member George Kunath, Dennis is a member of a small Saturday-morning men’s breakfast group at Baltusrol CC in NJ. Both George and Dennis participate in our monthly meetings by Zoom.]

Now that Dennis’ expertise with such issues is understood, Dennis opined that (A) not only should it be possible to identify the chemical compound in chlorophyll that enables it TO USE SOLAR POWER to drive photosynthesis (6CO2 + 6H2O > C6H12O6 + 6O2), but (B) it should also be possible to identify other chemical compounds that can also serve as a catalyst that could USE SOLAR POWER AND/OR NUCLEAR POWER to drive 6CO2 + 6H2O > C6H12O6 + 6O2.

Our thanks to Dennis for his expert insight.

*****End Of Our Posting Entitled “Nuclear-Powered Food Factories That Make Farms Obsolete*****


BTW, if farms are made obsolete, approximately 5 billion hectares or 38% of the global land surface, can be returned to forests/meadows/etc. that, like the Amazon Rainforest, will once more be concentrated on eliminating greenhouse gas (6CO2 + 6H2O > C6H12O6 + 6O2).

[FYI, the 5 billion hectares statistic comes from the United Nations which estimates that about one third of the 5 billion hectares is used for cropland (whose output is eaten by humans and other animals to produce CO2) – and that the other two-thirds is used for grazing livestock (which produce CO2 and whose existence would no longer be necessary) – parenthetical comments are ours.]

Of course, human diets require more than sugar for energy (C6H12O6 + 6O2 > 6CO2 + 6H2O).

For example, Yours Truly takes daily –

Vitamin A – 2400 mg.
Vitamin B Complex – 1048 mg.
Vitamin C – 1000 mg.
Vitamin D3 – 25 mcg. (1000 IU)
Vitamin E – 180 mg.
Aspirin – 325 mg.
Calcium – 600 mg.
Collagen – 1000 mg.
L-Serine - 8000 mg.
Ocuvite – Adult 50+
Omega-3 from Fish Oil – 1000 mg.

As your proverbial “one-armed wallpaper hanger,” hopefully someone else can “chase the rabbit” of researching whether such dietary supplements can be produced to scale in the absence of conventional farms.


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Prof. Smil’s Unpardonable Dismissal of Nuclear Power


On p. 211, Prof. Smil says –

“Techno-optimists, who promise endless near-miraculous solutions, must reckon with a similarly poor record. One of the best-known (and embarrassingly well-documented) failures has been the belief in the all-encompassing power of nuclear fission. Many people appreciate the partial success achieved by nuclear generation (it produced about 10 percent of the world’s electricity in 2019, with shares at 20 percent in the US and, exceptionally, about 72 percent in France) is just a fraction of what was widely expected before 1980….”

Has Prof. Smil never heard of “Hanoi Jane” aka Jane Fonda and her starring role in “The China Syndrome” (1979) which spooked the public about the dangers of nuclear power.

And has Prof. Smil failed to notice how the mainstream media has ever since 1979 continued to spook the public.

Prof. Smil should educate himself on the safety of thorium fission (please see above).

After all, as noted in Q&A E-7 of this month’s Second Short Quiz –

“thorium fission is…..incapable of producing a nuclear explosion – indeed, the largest thorium reactor is the earth itself which is why molten lava billows from any rupture in the earth’s surface and why the center of the earth is 7,000 degrees Fahrenheit which is hotter than the sun’s surface…..”


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China’s Strategy -- A Realistic "Conspiracy Theory"

Per www.cia.gov’s World Factbook, 62% of China’s electricity comes from fossil fuels, 18% from hydroelectric dams, 2% from nuclear plants and 18% from unspecified “renewable” sources (which could mean burning animal dung for all the “transparency” provided and possible “word games” with the definition of “renewable”!!! Why can’t the CIA specify how much is “wind” if any, how much is “solar” if any, and what the rest is???).

Meanwhile, per the CIA World Factbook, China’s crude-oil production is only 3.77 million bbl/day, requiring 6.71 million bbl/day of imports.

It is no secret that China has been at the forefront of developing thorium-fission in general, and advanced small-module thorium-fission reactors (SMR’s) in particular.

So why is China apparently waiting to deploy them???

Could it be that China is waiting for America to commit economic suicide by converting its economy to highly-uneconomic wind & solar, following which China will convert its economy to cheap thorium fission???


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Possible Action Campaigns???


[Please see the many thorium-fission campaigns among our 50 campaigns over our 16.5 years of existence listed in viewforum.php?f=23&sid=bdd776d166909f9d0e65fde4a62ff17e -- the most recent is the 10th item on the list – our 2019 letters to the Democratic Presidential Candidates and the Moderators of their first five debates at viewtopic.php?f=23&t=1781&sid=127ffbf55 ... 99e91d0539.]

2020 Presidential Candidates Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO) are nuclear enthusiasts who have sponsored on behalf of Bill Gates, two pieces of legislation facilitating nuclear power – the Nuclear Power Energy Innovation and Modernization Act which became law 7/14/2019, and the Nuclear Energy Leadership Act which they introduced 3/27/2019 and key provisions of which became law as part of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021.

HOWEVER, contacting the MONOLITHIC Media is hopeless – after all, the topic of Global Warming itself (much less nuclear power) was never raised in any of the ELEVEN Democratic-Party Presidential Debates 2019-2020 despite all of our efforts (please see two paragraphs above).

Query: Are there any Republican Senators/Congress-persons who might support, if they assume power following the mid-terms, “turning the ship around” from wind/solar to nuclear??? [BTW, who were the Republican Co-Sponsors of the aforementioned nuclear bills???]

BTW, the Paris Climate Accord does NOT specify how countries reduce carbon emissions – indeed, the U.S. has met its requirements due to natural gas fracking since natural gas, though a fossil fuel, is cleaner than fuels derived from crude oil. Accordingly, thorium fission would be “Jim Dandy” for complying with the PCA.

[solutions]

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---------------------------- Original Message -----------------------------
Subject: Your Dietary Supplements
From: Solutions
Date: Thu, July 14, 2022 7:51 pm PDT
To: ReadingLiberally-SaltLake@johnkarls.com
Attachment:
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Dear John,

I read with interest your list of personal dietary supplements in the Suggested Discussion Outline.

Could you please explain your rationalia for some of the more unusual supplements such as L-Serine and Ocuvite?

Your friend,

Solutions


---------------------------- Original Message -----------------------------
Subject: Re: Your [i.e., My] Dietary Supplements
From: ReadingLiberally-SaltLake@johnkarls.com
Date: Fri, July 15, 2022 8:12 am MDT
To: Solutions
Attachment:
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Dear Solutions,

Thank you for your e-mail.

FIRST, if you post this e-mail exchange on our website as you often do -- then since the information is more in the nature of a footnote, please post it as a so-called “reply” to the Suggested Discussion Outline rather than as a separate Topic.

And please give the so-called “reply” a humble topic such as “Footnote Re Dietary Supplements.”


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I take Ocuvite to prevent macular degeneration.

When you get to my age of 80 (I highly recommend against doing so), you admittedly acquire much of what you think you know from other octogenarians (i.e., 80-year-olds).

Many that I know (and several much younger) have lost their eye sight due to macular degeneration.

The “common wisdom” among octogenarians is that Ocuvite prevents macular degeneration – I have never met, nor heard of, an Ocuvite user who developed macular degeneration.


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L-Serine

Alzheimers is associated with certain genes that are dominant in males and recessive in females.

My paternal grandmother had developed Alzheimers by 70 years of age, as a result of which my father (and two of his four brothers who did not die young of cancer) all developed Alzheimers.

[My father, who was an attorney & bank CEO, remained intellectually active (reading & discussion groups) which enabled him to avoid Alzheimers until approx. age 90 – he passed away at 94.]

So why L-Serine???

The NYC Harvard Club on 5/4/2022 presented a webinar on “Plants, People, and Culture: The Science of Ethnobiology” by Michael Balik and Paul Alan Cox (Garland Science Publishing – 2nd Edition 9/2/2020).

Balik and Cox are life-long friends from their days in a Harvard PhD program and from their mutual interest in studying ancient/isolated populations for insights into their health for possible applications to modern society. Today –

Michael J. Balick is Vice President and Director of the Institute of Economic Botany and Senior Philecology Curator at The New York Botanical Garden. He has studied the relationship between plants, people, and culture in the Amazon Valley, Central and South America, the Middle East, Asia, and Oceania.

Paul Alan Cox, recognized by Time Magazine as a “Hero of Medicine” for his ethnobotanical search for new medicines, was awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize for his conservation efforts with indigenous peoples. He founded the island conservation organization Seacology and is Director of the Brain Chemistry Labs in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

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Our NYC Harvard Club Moderator for the webinar was Janet Mindes, a Columbia U Medical School Prof of Brain Stimulation & Therapeutic Modulation.

Following the traditional 30-minute presentation, the 30-minute Q&A period focused entirely on Paul Alan Cox and his study of L-Serine!!!

He studied L-Serine in the portion of The Hebrides where Rodgers’ & Hammerstein’s “South Pacific” (1958) was filmed.

He found that most of the population in that isolated area typically lived past 100 while still maintaining VIRTUALLY ALL of their physical AND MENTAL ability!!!

Accordingly, he had completed an FDA study to prove that L-Serine is safe and is in the midst of several FDA studies (which should be wrapped up in the next 12 months) to prove that L-Serine is effective for maintaining mental ability in general and preventing Alzheimers in particular.

His current FDA studies involve taking 30,000 mg/day of L-Serine because, though considerably higher than the intake of the South Pacific population he was studying, his FDA-study subjects had started taking L-Serine much later in life and needed to “catch up.”

My question during the Q&A period was “Are there any side-effects from adding L-Serine to one’s list of daily vitamins?”

Paul Cox’s answer was that (1) he can’t officially answer that question under FDA rules BUT HOWEVER (2) the FDA already recognizes 8,000 mg/day as safe AND UNOFFICIALLY (3) the Phase-1 trial with 50 participants who received 30,000 mg/day produced no adverse side effects, (4) it would appear that safety is NOT an issue and the only real issue is effectiveness which is promising or they would NOT be in their Phase-2 trials for various things (which should be wrapped up with FDA approval in another 12 months), and (5) BTW, the average American already gets 2,200 mg/day as part of her/his regular diet.

So I began taking the 8,000 mg/day that the FDA already recognizes as safe.

And would have begun taking 30,000 mg/day, unofficially joining Prof. Cox’s FDA study, if I had thought ordering that much from Amazon would not have triggered a “red flag” resulting in being “perp walked” out of my residence in front of my neighbors.


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Sorry the second answer was longer than you might have anticipated.

Thank you again for your e-mail.

Your friend,

John K.


PS – Almost invariably, our NYC Harvard Club webinars feature books that are just being published – NOT something like “Plants, People, and Culture: The Science of Ethnobiology” by Michael Balik and Paul Alan Cox (Garland Science Publishing) whose SECOND EDITION was published nearly TWO YEARS earlier on 9/2/2020!!!

Accordingly, it would be fair to infer that our Moderator for the webinar from the NYC Harvard Club Program Committee (Janet Mindes, a Columbia U Medical School Prof of Brain Stimulation & Therapeutic Modulation) was aware that FDA studies appear likely to show in another year that L-Serine is effective in preventing Alzheimers (and that the FDA has long-since recognized that 8000 mg/day of L-Serine is safe).

And that Prof. Mindes wanted to give fellow NYC Harvard Club members a “Heads Up” so that they could begin their own treatment, at least at the rate of 8,000 mg/day.

And that since 100% of the questions in the Q&A period were about L-Serine, Prof. Mindes deserves a “Gold Star” for Mission Accomplished!!!