The Modern King Canute

    I don’t like repeating myself, but sometimes appropriate people do not hear, so repitition is necessary. Today I had the misfortune of hearing Obama making noise about trying to command the tide to stand in its place, specifically the tide of cyclical change in climate. Those who deny the validity of science still believe, in a few cases, the CO2 put into the atmosphere by human activities has led to an increase in surface temperatures. There are a few problems with that: CO2 is a very weak greenhouse gas, the increase in atmospheric CO2 has followed the increases in temperature, and temperatures stopped rising fifteen years ago, but during those years CO2 levels increased substantially.

    The characteristic that enables a gas to act as a greenhouse gas is that it is a molecular dipole, which means that one side of it has a positive charge and the other side has a negative charge. Most gases are not dipoles, except ones that have asymmetrical shapes. Water is quite asymmetrical, and it is a strong dipole. CO2 is perfectly symmetrical, so it is not a dipole, and it emits very little in the infrared part of the spectrum.

    While it is true that temperatures and atmospheric CO2 levels rise and fall more or less together; the temperature changes lead the CO2 levels. http://www.skepticalscience.com/co2-...emperature.htm. This is something that can be seen readily in many graphs of CO2 and temperature, so I won’t flog this any more than necessary.

    There was an excellent article in The Economist (link below) about the IPCC September 2013 report that reported that the change in temperatures over the last fifteen years was nil, even though atmospheric CO2 rose from 350 ppm in 1988 to October 2013: 393.66 ppm

    “The rate of warming over the past 15 years,” it says, “[is] 0.05ºC per decade...smaller than the rate calculated since 1951.” (From the IPCC report)

    And the comments and summary at this site: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/10/1...-policymakers/ says what I was planning to write. Some pieces are pasted below:

    The IPCC concedes for the first time that a 15 year-long period of insignificant warming has occurred since 1998 despite a 7% rise in carbon dioxide. It also acknowledges that on a longer (more climatic) time scale the rate of global warming has decelerated since 1951, despite an accompanying 80 ppm or 26% increase in carbon dioxide (312 to 392 ppm).

    If the theoretical underpinning of the CO2 theory of global warming were correct, then warming would have increased in that period when the CO2 concentration increased from 312 ppm to 392 ppm. That it did not shows that that theory is false.

    This is a turn about in this report from earlier reports: “It is very likely that the annual mean Antarctic sea ice extent increased … (by) 1.2-1.8% per decade between 1979 and 2012” (SPM-6).

    This section may be the most telling. It appears that the IPCC is accepting that proposition that there may not be any need for the panic that they had been trying to spread.

    8. “The transient climate response*** is likely in the range of 1.0 deg. C to 2.5 deg. C … and extremely unlikely greater than 3 deg. C” (SPM-12).

    By reducing the bottom of the range of TCR to 1.0 deg. C, the IPCC’s estimate of human-caused warming for the rest of the twenty-first century now overlaps with those many independent scientists who put the response in the range of 0.3 to 1.2 deg. C. (NIPCC, Chapter 1, Section 1.1.5). In setting the top of the range at 3.0 deg. C, the IPCC’s estimate now falls within the range of natural climate variation over the last 6 million years. Because it falls within the warm natural temperature limit that planet Earth has attained recently, any such change (should it actually happen) is unlikely to be “dangerous” (NIPCC, Chapter 1).

    Even with the IPCC admitting that climate change is not worthy of worry, Obama recently suggested that the U.S. should do something about it. That is dangerous, because it would not be difficult to start a new ice age or little ice age, at least. Having politicians play around with the atmosphere is much more frightening than anything that nature is likely to serve up.

    You can read the actual report at the IPCC site.

    Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis    http://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg1/#.Uo_B9KyznvM

    Please inform your representatives that there is no problem with climate, and that they should not muck around with the atmosphere, or they may create a real problem.

Income Distribution in the United States of America

A Brief Description with Causes and Curative Measures

To most people in the U.S. it is not news to learn that the top one percent of households make approximately twenty-two percent of the income, and the top twenty percent of households make more than fifty percent of the income. Many people don’t realize that the rather steep distribution is rather recent. In 1947 the top five percent of the people accounted for 17.5% of the income, and the top twenty percent 43%. And for comparison the middle fifth of the people received seventeen percent of the total income. It isn’t news that the top income people are making relativity more than they were a few decades ago, but the headline numbers usually spotlight the outliers, the top one percent, and those few people have done marvelously well. Comparing 2012 and 1947 we find that in 1947 the lower limit of the top five percent made $8,072, and the average of the top of the second and third quintiles (the closest I can get to the median) was $3,011. The comparable figures for 2012 were $210,000 and $ $63,163. The ratios of the top to the median were 2.68 and 3.32 respectively. The top of the income spectrum gained 24%. That is approximately an average increase of 0.37% per year over sixty-eight years. That isn’t much, but the bulk of the increase has been since 1993. From 1947 through 1992 the top quintile’s share averaged 41.9% with a range from 40.4 to 44.6. In 1993 the share started a rise that jumped to 47% in 1993 and continued generally upward since then.

[url]http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/data/historical/inequality/[/url]

[url]http://www.census.gov/prod/2000pubs/p60-204.pdf[/url]

There are many reasons for the increase in the spread, but we can primarily blame inequitable income taxes, the inattention of corporate shareholders, and regulations that have made it easier to send jobs to other countries rather than pay to costs of doing business in the U.S.  During the same period of time mutual fund managers, such as Vanguard and Fidelity, went from being a tiny part of the securities market to a very large part of it, and the money managers have little or no reason to become in corporate governance , unless there are issues that are costing them money, and salaries are simply one of the costs of doing business, and as long as they continue to make money from an investment in a corporations stock, there is no reason for them to complain about salary expenses.

On the other hand, when we look at the proportion of the complete income pie that each quintile has now and in the past.

_________________________  quintiles

year__________first_____second__middle____fourth____top

2012__________3.23_____8.33____14.36_____23.04____51.04

1994__________4.2_____10.0_____15.7_____23.3______46.9

1984__________4.7_____11.0_____17.0_____24.4______42.9

1947__________5_______11.9_____17_______23.1______43

Ave. ’93 – ’12___3.53_____8.85____14.84_____23.19_____49.62

Ave. ’47 –’92____4.96           ____11.74____17.38_____23.87____42.05

(Data extracted from Census Bureau reports) [url]http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/data/historical/inequality/index.html[/url]

It is perfectly clear that the top quintile has been increasing its proportion, and that the bottom quintiles have been losing ground. It is interesting that the top quintile actually lost share from 1947 until the early 1980’s, dropping from 43% in 1949 to as low as 40.5% before it started gaining an even larger share in the last twenty years. The bottom quintile has had a relatively stable proportion and actually gained share from the late 1940’s until the mid 1980’s, since then it has lost ground. The years cited above give a good idea of the complete spreadsheet, and the averages show the overall action. Clearly the rates of change have been quite small, but the cumulative changes have been significant, especially since 1994, except for the fourth quintile which has barely changed.

There do not appear to be any specific reasons for the changes since 1993, except for NAFTA (North American Free Trade Association), which became effective January 1, 1994. The politicians who pushed NAFTA through insisted that it would not hurt Americans, but production and jobs have continued leaving the U.S.A., a trend that started well before then, but accelerated after NAFTA came into effect. The politicians insisted that NAFTA would not hurt American workers, but it certainly appears that it has; although there probably have been other policy changes that also had effect.

To be honest, I had not expected to find NAFTA as a major cause of increased income inequality in the U.S., but it makes sense when one thinks about it. Manufacturing jobs have left the country, so lower and middle income people have lost income, but the same corporations that have moved manufacturing out of the country have kept executive and marketing jobs in the U.S. The two bottom quintiles have had the largest percent reduction in income share, and many manufacturing positions are in those quintiles, while the executives and marketers have income in the two top quintiles.

The high regulatory barriers for manufacturers make it difficult and expensive to manufacture in the U.S.A., but the regulatory barriers are much lower in Mexico, Central America, and other places in the world. While NAFTA makes it very easy to ship manufactured goods from Mexico to the U.S., it is not difficult to import from other countries. Environmental regulations and labor regulations are also place higher barriers for manufacturers in the U.S. and all of those and other regulations, are factors that have led to the reduction of manufacturing and manufacturing jobs in the U.S.A., especially in the last twenty years.

Even with the huge regulatory burden in the U.S. there are some politicians who are pushing for an even greater regulatory burden and the recent addition of required medical benefits and possibly more regulations in regard to the delusional idea that CO2 is causing “climate change”

There are some people who want to lop off the tall poppies, rather than helping the smaller to grow taller. That reflects a perspective that has seldom done much good for anyone. It is preferable to allow people to become rich, than to prevent anyone from doing well. I will admit that I have not provided all of the relevant information, which is a huge amount, but even this small amount indicates that laws that give preferred treatment to some have been largely responsible for an increase in income inequality in the last twenty years. The Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution clearly bans unequal treatment in state laws, and the Fifth Amendment requires Congress to treat everyone equally, but Congress regularly gives advantages to some, and federal laws often require the states to treat people unequally.

It would be simple and easy to eliminate most regulations on people doing business. A good place to start would be with any suggestion that employers must provide medical insurance to employees, but minimum wages, and regulations that are intended to do something about climate change should also be eliminated, and there are various other regulations that do nothing except get in the way. Are we interested in haveing a viable economy? If so, then people should be allowed to do business.

What have you observed?

Curing Obesity

    I has come to my attention that there is a great deal of concern with the number of people who are obese; although the people who are concerned with the level of obesity tend not to be obese, and indeed there are obese people who are completely unconcerned with the situation, but the causes and cure for obesity are relativity simple in most cases. While there are some people who have glandular problems that lead to obesity, and there are some other medical conditions that can also lead to obesity, but in most cases it is caused by more nutrients being absorbed in the gut than are used metabolically. The mix of intestinal flora certainly is not the cause for this in all cases, but changing the mix of intestinal flora can cure obesity in many, or most, cases, and this cure would require little or no change in eating habits.

    It has been shown scientifically that different sets of flora will result in different amounts of various nutrients being absorbed. One twin study in Africa found that one of a pair of twins developed Kwashiorkor, while the other, who had different flora did not develop Kwashiorkor. The two had the same diet and living conditions, and after flora were transferred from the unaffected twin to the other, he recovered from Kwashiorkor. Obese people could be treated similarly.

    We would introduce to the guts of the obese flora that are known to consume nutrients and leave residue that could not be retained by the body. The procedure would be as follows: First, we would have to kill off most of the regular flora. This could be done with a synthetic antibiotic or with garlic or another dietary antibiotic. When the gut was cleared of flora we would introduce a collection of flora that would contain flora that would consume carbohydrates, sugars and starches, before they could be absorbed, and the residue would be CO2 and C2H6O; neither of which can be converted to fat. The CO2 would be voided, while the C2H6O would be metabolized immediately and the residue would be more CO2 and H2O.

    Admittedly there would be a drawback to this method, all that CO2 would be vented as gas, and most people find that embarrassing and unpleasant, but a little embarrassment is a small price to pay compared to a life being obese. On the other hand there would be that advantage of having all that C2H6O, ethyl alcohol. One could arrange one's eating habits to take advantage of the byproduct of the obesity cure at convenient times. In fact, it is possible that some people have been using this method for generations.

    Alas, this method for curing obesity may be subject abuse, because C2H6O can cause intoxication. Alternatively, it could be looked upon as a cheap way to get drunk. Because of the nature of this method, there would be no drinking, so one could become drunk without anyone noticing the process, and it probably would cost considerably less than buying alcoholic beverages. The two items that would have to be taken to prepare the gut would be fairly inexpensive, perhaps five dollars each, and the rest would simply be eating a meal. One might want to change one’s eating habits a little, because a high carbohydrate diet would result in more alcohol.

Ethics of Longevity

As a general matter, anything that leads to longer life and/or better health is ethically good, but the steps that will lead to especially long lifespans may have some ethical problems for some people.

It has been suggested to me that the matter of transplants has ethical pitfalls, but transplants are a stopgap measure. The long-term solutions all involve using an individual’s own DNA and culturing new parts with the same DNA, but there are people for who that is not an option, because they have genes that promote cancer or other dangerous medical conditions.

There are a few way around this, but none are safe and effective as producing replacements from the individual. If there were no effort to have longer life spans, then over the long run these genes would die out. Yes, there is an ethical dilemma, but it will solve itself over the long run. Just as Heidelberg Man is no longer around and the genes of H. sapiens Neanderthalensis have been distributed around the world, the genes of those who would not be able to use their own DNA for replacement part would eventually be lost as sets; although there would still be remnants of the genes spread among other people.

The history of hominids, and all evolution, has been a matter losing those genes that prevented the species from evolving and the spread of genes that improved the species in some way. While that may seem cold blooded, rather like breeding cattle for better tenderloin, but that is how evolution works; the bad genes are lost, and the good genes replace them. It is hard to determine it for sure, but it appears that longevity has been one characteristic that has spread among humans, and that tendency seems to be accelerating. While average life span has risen greatly in the last couple hundred years, the increase has come from lower infant mortality, and the typical lifespan has stayed around the three score and ten of the Bible. (Yes, life span does vary drastically from country to country.) 

Another trend, at least in urbanized countries, has been a tendency to defer children until considerably later than the historical norm. This is breeding for people who will be fertile at later ages or for a longer time, and that suggests that life span might lengthen to accommodate that, or humans could return to the earlier state and women might retain fertility throughout their lives, as is the case with chimpanzees and gorillas.

Regardless of which ways in which humans will change, change we will. The human genome has been in flux since humans first split off from other great apes, and the change will continue. Whether there is any ethical problem with that would depend on one’s ethics. I see no problem with saying to some people that they are incapable of undergoing certain medical procedures that would lengthen the lives of some, while it probably would lead to the deaths of these others.

As a hypothetical example: If twenty percent of humans can gain the ability to turn telomerase on and off without developing cancer, as sea squirts can, while the other eighty percent develop multiple cancers that are terminal in most cases when this process is done to them, then is it ethical to allow people to have this treatment, assuming that there is a screening test to determine in advance who will probably die from the procedure and who will have a greatly expanded lifespan?

It is my opinion that the procedure should be allowed, and the procedure and screening test do not yet exist, so I am just hoping. Evolution will continue whether we want it to or not, and changes in lifespan is just one of the many changes that probably will happen within the next few centuries. I suppose that some would say that this is an example of medical care being “rationed”.

Where do you stand? Do you want more chances to live for a very long time, or do you want no one to have that chance? Or do you want the human genome to be untouched by human nature?

Yes, there are some interesting questions.