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Blade Runner

Poster for Blade Runner, the Director’s Cut (2007) depicting Los Angeles, after a nuclear attack in 2019. Here Deckard (protrayed by Harrison Ford) and Rachel (portrayed by Sean Young) are shown.

Part 1: For living humans

One of my fictional heroes is Angus MacGyver, portrayed by Richard Dean Anderson (1950 – ). I appreciate his non-violent problem solving that saturates the television series, that originally ran from 1985 to 1992, with specials beyond that. I have not watched any episodes of the 2016 restart. That appreciation, and my pacifist stance more generally, is undoubtedly related to viewing World War II, as the last major hot war, with the ideological aftermath resulting in a cold war. However, like many people, my values are being challenged with the Ukrainian reality of a Russian invasion.

In 1998, I attended a three-day seminar about violence in film. Each day, two separate movies were introduced, and we were asked to watch, reflect on and discuss these. Thus, in total, we examined six different films. None of these resembled anything like MacGyver, a fact I found disappointing. Rather, there was a focus on gratuitous violence, brutal acts lacking discernable literary, artistic, political or scientific value, according to one definition. While films from several different genres were presented, the organizers of the seminar were obviously very keen about science fiction.

I am not particularly interested in reading fantasy or science fiction. The outer edge of my comfort zone is found in magic realism. Part of the reason is that I have little interest in visiting other planets, or other times, when I have explored so little of this beautiful planet, in this modern, accessible age. However, there are some few science fiction films that attract me.

This weblog post builds on one of the films shown at this seminar. Three of the other ones were: A Clockwork Orange (1971), directed by Stanley Kubrick (1928 – 1999); Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991), directed by James Cameron (1954 – ); and, The Eel (うなぎ, Unagi, 1997) directed by Shōhei Imamura (1926 – 2006). The other two films are forgotten. One of the main presenters at the seminar was Norwegian novelist, children’s book writer, screenwriter and film critic, Erlend Loe (1969 – ).

Twenty-four years after this seminar, Putin’s War is raging in Europe. Violence is no longer of theoretical interest. Many wonder how people can use art and other pastimes to address their concerns about war. One could ask which artistic genres are more/ most effective at suppressing violence, at the same time that they stop dictators from usurping the rights of others. Among the more popular of these flavours are: film, music, painting, theatre and writing fiction. Not everyone has elevated gaming into an art form, but it is also included, as have physical representations in the form of 3D models and costumes.

People approach culture in different ways. In this weblog post, variations on a single work will be used as an example. That work is Philip Kindred Dick’s (1928 – 1982) novel, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968), set in San Francisco in 1992 or, in later editions of the book, 2021. It takes place after a nuclear war. Dick’s inspiration for writing this novel was Fear (1940), a psychological thriller/ horror short story, written by L. Ron Hubbard (1911 – 1986).

A. Written materials

The first cultural flavour looked at here involves written materials. The advantage of reading a novel or short story is that it invites readers to co-create using their imagination. One disadvantage, is that this co-creation involves abstract thinking. Another is that many people have dyslexia, and related conditions, that prevent their enjoyment of this approach.

Rather than just reading, a more productive approach is to reflect on the work in question, and to produce a new work based on it. This could be another novel or short story, but it could, just as easily, be a filmscript, a theatrical play, or a poem.

B. Audio

There are many people who prefer to listen to audio books/ podcasts, instead of reading. Hearing disabilities can also prevent people from using this approach. Searching for information about relevant versions of the novel on the internet, the first link I came across was a free audiobook. One advantage of an audio format, is that it allows both sound effects as well as music to be part of a product. Once again, it is possible for the average person to create their own audio products, if only for family and friends.

C. Film

Ridley Scott’s (1937 – ) dystopian, science fiction film, Blade Runner (1982) is the work being focused on in this weblog post. It was also one of the films focused on at the seminar on violence in film, in 1998. For me, it is especially appreciated for its inability to depict Los Angeles in 2019. In the film, flying cars (spinners) co-exist with pay phones. Even Chester Gould (1900 – 1985) was able to equip Dick Tracy with a personal device, the wrist radio, an icon that dates from 1946-01-13.

Seven different versions of Blade Runner have been released, many massaged primitively by Warner Bros, who were concerned about the film’s viability, when the initial release resulted in low attendance, and confused audiences. The Director’s Cut (2007) is regarded as the definitive edition.

The protagonist, Rick Deckard, portrayed by Harrison Ford (1942 – ), is a bounty hunter/ blade runner, adapt at killing escaped androids/ replicants. Deckard’s life, still portrayed by Ford, continues in the film sequel, Blade Runner 2049 (2017), directed by Canadian Denis Villeneuve (1967 – ). The events of the original film and its sequel involve two different time periods separated by 30 fictional years and 35 real years. It is uncertain if Deckard is human, or a variant of something that he is hunting. Dick, Ford and Villeneuve say human, Scott says replicant. Villeneuve also adds, that the question is more important than the answer.

Rachael (Tyrell) was a Nexus-7 replicant, portrayed by Sean Young (1959 – ) in the original Blade Runner. In Blade Runner 2049, she was portrayed by body double Loren Peta (? – ) with Sean Young’s facial features de-aged and overlaid using computer graphics.

Today, everyone can be a film maker using an ever present cell phone to record audio and video, there are many free and open source apps that can be used to edit content, and there are many mechanisms that can be used to deliver such productions to a waiting audience, including Odysee, PeerTube and YouTube. I almost wrote a reminder to people to film in landscape format, but then wondered if that was just yet another indication that I was raised in a different millennium. Younger people might also prefer to view films on their cell phones, and appreciate a portrait format.

D. Theatre

Theatrical presentations can be developed from scratch, from novels and other written works including screenplays. They can also be inspired by almost anything. Street theatre involves a dramatic performance in some form of outdoor public space. Typically, the audience is unaware of the event, before it erupts before them.

E. Games

Westwood Studios was started by Brett Sperry (ca. 1960 – ) and Louis Castle (ca. 1960 – ) in 1985 in Los Vegas, Nevada. Their 1997 point and click game of Blade Runner, is a sidequel = side sequel. Many gamers prefer to use the Japanese term, gaiden (外伝, = outside legends). In both cases it refers to an original story running parallel to an established plot in a film or novel, sometimes interacting with it.

Computer games are regarded as the most profitable of the various entertainment industries. While estimates of revenue vary, assorted source provide the following values, in billions of dollars in 2020: games: $ 180, film $ 100, professional sports $ 75, music $ 23.

F. Physical representations

One very satisfying moment in my teaching career occurred when an entire class of metalworking students told me they had taken over a 3D printer, and were going to use it for the next week to make the components of a 3D model of a 4 cylinder internal combustion engine. When it was completed and assembled even the least mentally endowed of the students understood, in detail, how an engine worked.

I have encouraged many of my fashion obsessed female students to make their own clothing. Some few have even followed that advice.

In terms of Blade Runner, the design and construction of vehicle (spinner) models would undoubtedly appeal to many young males. Yet, I suspect that the design and construction of clothing appropriate for Los Angeles in 2049, would have greater appeal to many young females.

Getting rather conventional clothing items, such as T-shirts, with artwork featuring Saint Javelin, a female icon carrying a modern shoulder anti-tank weapon.

G. Painting

There are many derivative works of art that can be found that are based on Blade Runner. Any search engine will provide a list of them.

In my opinion, the one painting that best depicts the horrors of war is Pablo Picasso’s (1881 – 1973) Guernica (1937). It commemorates the 1937-04-26 bombing of the town of that name by the Nazi German Luftwaffe’s Condor Legion and the Fascist Italian Aviazione Legionaria, destroying the town and killing a disputed number of people, possibly up to 1 650.

Pablo Picasso’s Guernica (1937)

H. Other activities

I would like to end this section by referring to Keri Smith (? – ), a Canadian conceptual artist. I know her best through one work, The Guerrilla Art Kit (2007). She has previously worked at Emily Carr University of Art and Design, in Vancouver. She is now on the advisory board of the Center for Artistic Activism, in New York city. Her main focus is on open works, a term invented by Umberto Eco (1932 – 2016), to describe pieces of art designed to be completed by the user. At 144 pages, The Guerrilla Art Kit, is sufficiently long. There is a section on etiquette, and another on tools. Much of it consists of 32 exercises, mostly fun yet provocative. Guerrilla gardening is one of my favourites, as is the portable idea dispenser.

Keri Smith, The Guerilla Art Kit (2007)

Part 2: For synthesizer fanchildren

One could argue, possibly even convincingly, that Part 2 is actually just flavour I. That is how it began, although flavours A to H were missing at the time. Re-reading the completed text, it was obvious that this section would appeal to about 1% of the intended audience, which would round off to about 0 readers. In addition, when written, it was based on the premise that a major manufacturer of synthesizers would make an inexpensive clone of the Yamaha CS-80. So far, this has not happened, and I have ended up buying an entirely different synthesizer.

Vangelis (born Evángelos Odysséas Papathanassíou, 1943 – 2022) composed the film score for the original Blade Runner film, largely using a Yamaha CS-80 analogue synthesizer. The Icelandic composer Jóhann Gunnar Jóhannsson (1969 – 2018) was hired to make the music for the sequel. To my ears it sounds similar to the original, but it was removed from the project by Villeneuve. Here is a sample of Jóhannsson’s theme for the film. He was replaced by Benjamin Wallfische (1979 – ) and Hans Zimmer (1959 – ). Here is a sample of a theme by Wallfische and Zimmer.

The Yamaha CS-80 analog synthesizer was made from 1977 to 1980. Initially, it cost US$ 6 900. Today, a used one can cost over US$ 100 000. It supported true 8-voice polyphony, meaning that it could play multiple independent melody lines simultaneously. It came with two independent synthesizer layers per voice, each with its own set of front panel controls, in addition to a number of hardwired preset voice settings and four parametric settings stores based on banks of sub-miniature potentiometers. This contrasted with one of its main competitors, the Sequential Prophet 5, that used programmable digital presets, to achieve equivalent results.

The CS-80 excelled in live performance. Its layered keyboard was both velocity-sensitive (like a piano’s) and pressure-sensitive (known as after-touch) but unlike most modern keyboards the aftertouch could be applied to individual voices rather than in common, and a ribbon controller allowing for polyphonic pitch-bends and glissandos. This can be heard on the Blade Runner soundtrack by Vangelis, as well as the composer’s soundtrack for the film Chariots of Fire, and the bassline of Peter Howell’s interpretation of the 1980 theme tune to the BBC science fiction show Doctor Who.

Almost forty years ago, in a 1984 interview Vangelis described the CS-80 as: “The most important synthesizer in my career — and for me the best analogue synthesizer design there has ever been.”

The CS-80 is one of three instruments most frequently described as the pre-eminent polyphonic analog synthesizer. The other two are the Sequential Circuits Prophet-5, and Oberheim OB-X.

There are two plug-in instrument software emulations of the CS-80 for usage in digital audio workstation, music sequencer, and other software which supports the plug-in formats that these instruments were implemented and released in: the Arturia CS-80 V, released in 2003, and the Memorymoon ME80 released in 2009.

As previously noted, when this post was first being prepared, it was expected that Behringer would announce the production of an equivalent clone, the DS-80. It all began with a tweet on 2019-04-30. However, no product has appeared, yet. Indeed, there are comments that chip shortages are causing production delays and cancellations. This is especially affecting low-cost synths.

For those who prefer hardware synths, Studio Electronics announced their new Boomstar SE80 synthesizer in 2014, which includes a cloned filter section of the CS-80.

Since 2018, Deckard’s Dream Mk2 (DDRM2), an analogue polyphonic synthesizer clone of the CS-80, has been available in two versions, a standard build or as a kit from Black Corporation in Japan. Yes, the name, Deckard’s Dream, is taken from the protagonist in the Blade Runner films!

At the time of writing 2021-12-29, the price of the built version is US$ 3 749 including worldwide shipping. This is a rackmount synthesizer with CS-80 inspired architecture and features that supports polyphonic aftertouch using compatible third-party external keyboards.

A Black Corporation Deckard’s Dream Mk2 synthesizer suitable for installation in a rack. Photo: Black Corporation.

Black corporation informs potential buyers that the DDRM2 offers eight voices, each with two identical layered parts consisting of a 100% analog voltage controlled oscillator made with discrete waveshapers, analog lowpass and highpass filter (each with their own cutoff and resonance settings,) noise generator, unique multi-segment filter envelope, and VCA + ADSR envelope. Each layer also features its own independent programming section for musical instrument digital interface (MIDI) polyphonic expression (MPE) based velocity and polyphonic aftertouch control of its filter cutoff and amplifier settings.

DDRM2’s perfomance section features global pitch control with coarse & fine-tuning sliders, layer 2 detune slider, independent keyboard range control for each layer, mix balancing between layer 1 and layer 2, global filter cutoff and resonance offsets, and a global low frequency oscillator (LFO) to control both layers’ filter/pitch/amplifiers simultaneously.

DDRM2 also has a programming sections for global MPE-based control over LFO parameters + pitchbend, as well as global key tracking control over the filter and amplifier settings of both layers. There is a global portamento/glissando slider that operates on both layers simultaneously. As expected, DDRM2 has MIDI control, with an ability to store 128 presets per bank, across 10 banks.

If one is interested in impressing neighbours, then there is no substitute for the original Yamaha. The price of a used model is beyond the means of most mortals. If one is interested in making music, then there are numerous choices. One of these is a Yamaha Reface CS, a 37 key mini synth, based on the CS-80, launched in 2019. It costs about US$ 450. This is considerably cheaper than a DDRM2, which is also too expensive in relation to its value. Perhaps the cheapest hardware solution is an Arturia Microfreak connected to an outboard effects = FX unit like Bluesky. This can recreate all of the DDRM2 and CS sounds, for about US$ 300.

Other fanchildren will remind you that there is no need for a hardware synth, when a software synth will be able to provide the same level of utility.

Update: This post was updated 2022-05-19 at 21:30 to note the death of Vangelis, today.

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Cadillac Desert Interpreted

Newer Oak Ridge National Laboratory United States Hydropower maps are available, but they lack the labeling of meridians of longitude, so that for the context of this post the 2014 edition is preferred.

This short weblog post was written in response to someone who found it difficult to understand Mark Reisner’s (1948 – 2000) Cadillac Desert: The American West and its Disapearing Water (1986, revised 1993).

Rather than struggling to read Cadillac Desert, readers are encouraged to examine a hydrological map of The United States of America. The country can be divided into a wet eastern half, and a dry western half. Admittedly, there is also a strip of wetness along the Pacific coast that extends almost as far south as San Francisco Bay. The east-west dividing line is not particularly neat, and doesn’t follow state boundaries consistently. So people resort to meridians of latitude. Both 100 W and 110 W have been used as the dividing line, but often go through the middle of more states. Thus some prefer to use 95 W.

What makes this book difficult for non-Americans to read is its failure to provide context. The book is largely a history of the Bureau of Reclamation and the United States Army Corps of Engineers, both American federal government agencies, that were more concerned with settlement policies in the western half of the United States, than they were with the area’s geographical realities. It assumes that readers are sufficiently acquainted with the geography of the west that they understand these water realities, as well as how federal institutions function.

The map also shows the numerous dams that have been build on the various Western rivers. The Grand Coulee Dam on the Columbia River created Lake Roosevelt. This dam is especially destructive for assorted species of Pacific salmon. Further south, there are also many extensive dams on the Colorado River and its tributaries. The Hoover Dam created Lake Mead, close to Los Vegas, in Nevada. Further north, the Glen Canyon Dam created Lake Powell located in Utah and Arizona.

The four major deserts in the United States are the Mojave Desert, 124 000 km2 in Nevada, Arizona and California; the Sonoran Desert, 260 000 km2 from Mexico through Arizona and into southern California; the Chihuahuan Desert 360 000 km2 from Mexico through Texas, Arizona and New Mexico; the Great Basin Desert, 490 000 km2, in Arizona, California, Utah, Oregon and Idaho. The Great Basin Desert is often divided up into several different desert ecoregions (3 – 8) shown in the map below.

Cold Desert ecoregions: 1. Thompson-Okanagan Plateau; 2. Columbia Basin; 3. Northern Basin and Range; 4. Wyoming Basin; 5. Central Basin and Range; 6. Colorado Plateaus; 7. Arizona/New Mexico Plateau; 8. Snake River Plain. Hot desert ecoregions: 9. Mojave Basin and Range; 10. Sonoran Desert; 11. Baja Californian Desert; 12. Chihuahuan Desert.

The title Cadillac Desert is not the name of a specific desert. Rather it refers to a very expensive desert, in contrast to, say, a cheaper Chevrolet Desert. Should I have written a book about the same topic, my choice of title would have been Gold-plated Desert. That is, a very thin but expensive coating that hides a base material underneath.

The book, Cadillac Desert, fails to interpret and describe water realities in terms of settlement and geography, with its focus on institutional history. There are other books that discuss the lack of water in the west. Perhaps the most enjoyable of these is, The West without Water: What Past Floods, Droughts, and Other Climatic Clues Tell Us about Tomorrow (2015) by B. Lynn Ingram and Frances Malamud-Roam.

This book documents the American West’s climate over twenty thousand years, with some explanations about past droughts and floods. It also looks forward, and predicts future climate impacts regarding water resources. One central question is what is a normal climate in the West, especially if the current relatively benign climate of the past century will continue. It also provides insights into paleoclimate research. This research shows that the area is subject to substantial climatic swings. Modern human environments are essentially artificial. Civilization is un/ ill-prepared for future climate changes. They end with a warning that residents must face the realities of the past, and prepare for a future where access to fresh water may be less reliable.

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Homebound

Homebound was sent as an entry in Bella Caledonia’s Scotland 2042 competition that describes Scotland in twenty years time, in 2042. In my letter accompanying the work, I asked it to be considered in the human category. This was because the organizers had wanted to distinguish three categories of writers: men, women and under 25 years of age. There was also a size limit of 1000 words. The submitted document’s word count was 998 words, 6 179 characters including spaces, 5 187 characters without spaces. That left two words to spare!

Bella Caledonia has existed an online magazine publishing social, political and cultural commentary since 2007-10, at the Radical Book Fair in Edinburgh. It was launched by Mike Small and Kevin Williamson (1961 – ). It also existed as a 24-page print magazine, at one time as a supplement to the Scottish pro-Independence newspaper, The National. This print version ended in 2017. It was named after Bella Baxter, a character in Alasdair Gray’s (1934 – 2019) novel Poor Things (1992). Gray later provided the site with a new version of his artwork.

The origins of Homebound date back to 1974. Working as a student archaeologist, I lived at one of the notorious Canadian residential schools, in Port Alberni, British Columbia. However, this school was not regarded as one of the worst! Other schools subjected First Nations children to inhumane treatment, that resulted in genocide. The Alberni Indian Residential School, as it was officially called, opened in 1890 under the Presbyterian Church. It burned down in 1917 and was closed for three years. In 1920 it was re-opened under the United Church. It officially closed in 1973. Many of the workers at the archaeological site had attended this school.

In preparation for this submission, I checked the current fertility rate in Scotland, and elsewhere. Without children, there is no future for humanity, but fertility has to be kept within bounds. In 2020, the latest date for which I could get figures (mainly from CIA produced, World Factbook), it was 1.29. The fertility rate for some other countries with name, rank and fertility-rate: Ireland, 124th, 1.94; United States, 141st, 1.84; Norway, 142nd, 1.84; China, 184th 1.60; Russia, 185th, 1.60; Canada, 193rd, 1.57; Ukraine, 194th, 1.56; Japan, 214th, 1.43; Taiwan, 226th, 1.14; and Singapore, 228th and last, 0.87. Total fertility rate (TFR) is “the total number of children that would be born to each woman if she were to live to the end of her child-bearing years and give birth to children in alignment with the prevailing age-specific fertility rates.” A TFR of 2.1 is regarded as a replacement rate. Thus, none of the countries mentioned here seem capable of replacing their populations. In Japan, many regard automation as the answer, in other places, it is immigration.

This submission focused on race relations, especially the negative impact of British colonization on First Nations people. Racism has also impacted many others, notably Chinese and East Asians (including British subjects from India, whose denial of entry into Canada was illegal, but supported by Canadian and British Columbia governments). With the word count limiting one’s freedom of expression, I opted to focus on First Nations. In a future post, I intend to discuss how colonial racism impacted the Chinese community.

One notable opponent to Asian immigration, from New Westminster, was former Premier, Richard McBride. He had many places named after him including a village, a mountain, a park, two schools and a boulevard. One of the schools, Richard McBride Elementary School in New Westminster was built in 1912 as a replacement for the Sapperton School. After it burned down, it was rebuilt, a task completed in 1929. In 2018, provincial funding allowed this school to be replaced.

There was, however, discussion about the name for the school. In a letter dated 2020-06-22, the Richard McBride Elementary School Parent Advisory Council writes:
During his time as premier (1903 to 1915), McBride advocated for “a white B.C.” and sought to shut out the “Asiatic hordes.” He worked hard to prevent “cheap” Japanese labour from competing in the fisheries and in “everything the white man has been used to call his own.”

McBride led the legislature in passing numerous anti-Asian measures, such as taxes on companies that hired Chinese labourers and legislation denying the vote to Asians and Indigenous people.

After the Conservatives formed the federal government in 1911, McBride urged Prime Minister Robert Borden to honour a promise to legislate against immigration from Asia.

McBride was premier at the time of the Komagata Maru incident, when the Japanese steamship carrying hundreds of Sikh passengers was prevented from docking and most of its passengers were barred from entering B.C. McBride was quoted as saying: “To admit Orientals in large numbers would mean the end, the extinction of the white people.”

As premier, McBride pursued a policy of making way for economic development and the expansion of cities by dispossessing Indigenous nations of their reserve lands.

McBride was also well-known as a leading anti-suffrage politician at a time when white women were gaining the vote across Canada. He believed extending the franchise to women would take away too much power from men.

See: https://www.newwestrecord.ca/local-news/new-west-district-gets-set-to-rename-richard-mcbride-school-3125606

Richard McBride Elementary School no longer exists. Long live, Skwo:wech Elementary School, opened at the beginning of the school year in 2021-09. The name means sturgeon in Halq’emeylem (the upriver dialect), a language understood by the local Qayqayt First Nation, but not actually in hǝn̓q̓ǝmin̓ǝm̓ (the downriver dialect). The school serves over 400 Kindergarten to Grade 5 students from the Sapperton neighbourhood in New Westminster. In promotional materials, it is stated that the school offers “diverse programs that support the social, emotional and academic enrichment of students. We feature both Montessori and regular programs, and host the StrongStart Early Learning Centre. Our Goal at Skwo:wech is to work together to foster a positive school community of socially and emotionally connected learners.”

The name connects people with Sto:la = Sturgeon River = the Fraser River, central in New Westminster’s history. Sturgeon represented a primary food source for Indigenous communities, before commercial fishing in the early 1900’s overfished them for their caviar. It is a slow moving, but long-lived fish, there is a sense of resilience. The name itself also reflects a value necessary for reconciliation, with a name that honours local Indigenous practices, culture and contributions. Sturgeons are also an integral part of Coast Salish myth. Some have also pointed out similarities between schools of fish and schools of learners.

New Westminster in 1892

The above map of New Westminster, is oriented as many of its citizens perceive their city, with the west on the left and the east to the right, with the north at the top, and the south at the bottom. Streets run south to north, avenues from east to west. Even numbered addresses are on the southern and western sides, odd numbered on the northern and eastern sides. Unfortunately, even these basic facts aren’t actually true. The compass near the bottom of the map helps explain it. Most streets run from the south-east to the north-west; most avenues from the north-east to the south-west. The exception is Sapperton, on the right of the map, where streets run in their true north-south and east-west orientation.

New Westminster was founded by the Royal Engineers, led by Colonel Richard Moody (1813 – 1887), to be the capital of the Colony of British Columbia in 1858, and continued in that role until the colony’s merger with the Colony of Vancouver Island in 1866. New Westminster was the largest city on the mainland, from that year until it was passed in population by Vancouver during the first decade of the 20th century.

The most prominent street on the map of New Westminster is Fifth Street, where my sister lives. The architecture is attractive. Some patriots might even call it majestic with traffic divided by a boulevard. This was to be lined with foreign embassies, but by 1871, when British Columbia entered Canada, this dream came to an end. Victoria had become the capital of the united colonies of Vancouver Island and British Columbia.

This is the background image on all of my computers, showing Greater Vancouver and the Fraser Valley to the right of the Salish Sea, with Vancouver Island on the left.

This weblog post ends with the submitted story,

Homebound

On board the sky blue C-5M Galaxy transport plane on its daily flight, scheduled to arrive at GLA, Glasgow Airport, at 10 in the morning, were Eileen Erskine, 97, her son Jack, 65, her grandson Nathan, 40, and his wife Ivy, also 40, and their daughter, Freya, 8. They were five of yet another 200 Canadian refugees being ferried in that day, this time the weekly flight from Vancouver, part of the four million that Scotland had agreed to repatriate. Each of them had their allotted 100 kg of baggage.

During the first two years of the flights only young, fully trained construction professionals arrived. They were the fore-troop, building out the housing and infrastructure for those to come later. Eileen had been born in Glasgow towards the end of the Second World War. Her parents had immigrated with her to Vancouver, where she had grown up. As housing prices escalated, she had been forced into the interior of British Columbia. Today, housing anywhere in Canada was worth nothing. The various First Nations own everything, the result of a Canadian Supreme Court ruling.

Refugee flights also arrived from Toronto and Halifax. Most of the passengers had been living in refugee camps in Canada since the beginning of 2040. The Erskines were allowed in now because Eileen had been born in Scotland.

When Britain gave reciprocal British citizenship to Australians, Canadians and New Zealanders, the First Nations of Canada, renamed the Canadian Nation, saw their opportunity to depopulate their sovereign country.

Deciding where all of the refugees should go was complex. People could apply for a particular country and location, but it was an algorithm that decided. Many of the refugees destined for Scotland, had one ancestor from there, often a result of highland clearances. Most were ethnically mixed, commonly with English, Irish or even Welsh, but often involving more exotic combinations. Many Scots-Irish were assigned to Scotland, despite arriving in Canada from Ulster. Everyone had to be moved by 2050. At its current rate only sixty thousand people made it to Scotland, in a year. That rate would have to ramp up to six hundred thousand a year, ten flights a day, to meet the timeline.

With all of these new immigrants, Scotland finally took action against the lairds. No corporation, family or individual could own more than one hectare; houses could not exceed 500 square meters. Excess lands and buildings had to be sold to local authorities, who could then either sell them onwards, or rent them out.

Similar flights were being made to the other British republics: Cornwall, England, Mann, Northumbria and Wales. European Canadians from France, Germany and most of the other countries still in the United States of Europe (USE), were not being treated this way. USE was skilled at getting its own way, but to its disadvantage. They, too, needed new immigrants because of the fertility crisis.

In Scotland, developing a green economy and repopulating the Highlands and Islands were priorities. Silicon Glen would extend into Silicon Highlands and assorted island offshoots. People with proven connections to the Lowlands, such as Eileen and her family, moved there. Greenness involved building wooden houses out of plantation woods such as Douglas-fir and Sitka Spruce, then rewilding Scotland with native species. It also involved growing several iterations of crops a year using hydroponics, and fish using aquaponics.

Bureaucrats loved the opportunity to create exceptions. Refugees thought to have connections to the Hudson Bay Company, were sent to the Orkneys, which was prime recruitment territory for the fur trading company. Of course, not all of these descendants were required to leave Canada. Those with First Nations heritage were allowed to stay in Canada, something a DNA test could prove.

Fur traders were not the worst of immigrants to Canada, if only because of their dependency on native trappers. Gold miners were often only interested in get-rich-quick schemes. When these failed, as they most often did, the former miners took to homesteading, taking the lands already occupied by the First Nations people, and often giving them European diseases that killed them off.

The Canadian Nation dealt more harshly with Scottish descendants, in part because the first prime minister of Canada, born John Alexander McDonald in Glasgow, infuriated past and present indigenous people, because federal policies he enacted, encourage their genocide, from gold miners, settlers and the residential school system.

With the Canadian Nation owning all of the land in Canada now, it was payback time, and the descendants of British settlers suffered the most. Except it wasn’t suffering at all. Scotland needed young workers!

Immigration reinforced English. Scots and Canadians spoke the same language, although with different dialects and vocabularies. At the Canadian refugee camps they were educated in green skills that could be put to immediate use on their arrival in Scotland. They also received a social education that gave them an understanding of Scottish history, but also a history of the European exploitation of Canada, and how this negatively impacted the First Nations peoples.

One of the many concerns was how long it would take the new citizens to drive comfortably on the left side of the road. Native born Scots wondered how many lives would be lost before the new immigrants consciously looked right, first, before crossing roads. Some worried that an upcoming plebiscite would change the country to driving on the right. The new citizens were restricted to autonomous vehicles. An agreement with Stellantis, and a reconstructed Linwood auto factory resulted in a new, electric and autonomous MPV, the Hillman Husky: a brand name that united the past with the future, a model name that appealed to most Canadian refugees, and a product that looked after most transportation needs.

Eileen soon arrived at her new home, an assisted living centre, in Laurieston. The tenements she had grown up with had disappeared, as had the towers that replaced them. “Absolute luxury,” she declared, as she ate her dinner of haggis, neeps and tatties, “Its good to come home, finally.”

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Earth Day 2022

Blue Marble by NASA/Apollo 17 crew, either Harrison Schmitt (1935 – ) or Ron Evans (1933 – 1990), 1972-12-07.

The first Earth Day was held fifty-two years ago, on 1970-04-22. Officially, it includes events coordinated globally by EarthDay.org. Unofficially, anybody can do whatever they like. This year’s event happens on Friday, 2022-04-22, with an official theme: Invest In Our Planet. This weblog post is being published almost a week in advance, so that people will have some time to reflect on what they want to do.

When I visited the Earth Day website, to gain an understanding of what this year’s theme really means, I was underwhelmed. One section read: “The fashion industry is responsible for over 8% of total greenhouse gas emissions.  Sustainable Fashion refers to a clothing supply chain that is ecologically and socially responsible. Now is the opportunity to shift the industry and consumers away from the fast fashion model and toward sustainable practices in sourcing, production, distribution, marketing, and consumption.” Sadly, there is not much helpful detail. I am left wondering who, if anyone, is going to implement these sustainable practices? Who is going to do anything?

I am not impressed with the new European Union eco-labels for fabrics. From 2023 all clothes and shoes sold in the EU will include colour-coded labels informing customers about the products’ environmental impact. But the Make the Label Count campaign says the system of measurement developed in 2013 is misleading, outdated and not in line with the EU’s climate goals. Fossil fuel-derived fibres, such as polyester, will be certified as more environmentally friendly than natural fibres, such as wool and cotton. These will score red. Microplastic pollution, biodegradability and renewability are excluded from the assessment criteria. Thus, I will not pay attention to any of these labels.

Most of my clothing is made of natural materials, wool and cotton especially. I wear them for many years. For example, my spring and summer jacket was purchased in 2008. It should last the rest of my life. I wear my chinos until they wear out, and even then, they are transformed (through the miracle of a personal relationship with a textile craftsperson) into shorts. My shirts and underwear are cotton. Most of my shoes (4 pairs) are Allbirds, made of wool but with Sweetfoam soles made from sugarcane. This was the most ecological brand of shoes that I could find, that fit my feet, even if I would prefer them to offer a slightly wider variant.

75 Gigajoules

A Stanford University study has shown that the good life in terms of happiness involves the consumption of about 75 GJ of energy per person annually. Quoting from the abstract: “We analyze the maximum global performance of nine health, economic, and environmental metrics by country, determining which metrics increase with per capita energy use and which show thresholds or plateaus in maximum performance. Across the dataset, eight of nine metrics, including life expectancy, infant mortality, happiness, food supply, and access to basic sanitation services, improve steeply and then plateau at levels of average primary annual energy consumption between 10 and 75 GJ person−1 computed nationally (five metrics plateau between 10 and 30 GJ person−1). One notable exception is air quality (energy threshold of 125 GJ person−1 across 133 countries). Averaged across metrics, the 10 countries (with at least seven metrics) showing the best performance given their per capita primary energy use are Malta, Sri Lanka, Cuba, Albania, Iceland, Finland, Bangladesh, Norway, Morocco, and Denmark. If distributed equitably, today’s average global energy consumption of 79 GJ person−1 could, in principle, allow everyone on Earth to realize 95% or more of maximum performance across all metrics (and assuming no other limiting factors). Dozens of countries have average per capita energy use below this 79 GJ energy sufficiency threshold, highlighting the need to combat energy poverty.”

Personal efforts

In part because Earth Day begins and ends in words, I won’t be doing anything officially to support it, but here is a short list of my current personal priority issues for saving planet Earth from a 1.5 (or more likely 2.0) degree C increase in temperature, and a lower carbon footprint in the future.

Insulation

I am fortunate to live in a house that I own together with Patricia, and to have the ability to undertake improvements. Not everyone is in full control of their housing. Some people rent rather than own, others live in condominiums = self-owned apartments. Thus, many individuals and families are at the mercy of others, including home-owner associations. However, we do live in a cold climate, that requires heating. With the construction season started, this year’s highest priority task is to increase the thickness of insulation in the ceiling. We discovered shortly after moving into the house in 1989, that it was essentially uninsulated in the walls, but was insulated in the ceiling.

All of the walls have been upgraded to a minimum of 100 mm of insulation. Two of the four walls that meet the worst of arctic winds, have been upgraded further, so that most of the length of these walls now has 250 mm of insulation, although there are a few meters that have only 200 mm. This year the focus is on increasing ceiling insulation from 200 to 400 mm. Throughout the pandemic there has been a construction boom in Norway, resulting in product and labour shortages and increased prices. Fortunately, most of the material needed for this year’s improvements were purchased before 2020, and have waited patiently to be used.

The other task is to install a balanced ventilation/ heating/ cooling system that will recycle heat, but not air, and will be connected to an air-to-air heat pump that should reduce energy consumption further.

Transportation and Travel

This year could be the year that we transition from an internal compustion engined (ICE) vehicle to an electric vehicle (EV). But transportation involves much more than just owning a car. In terms of driving, I am thinking that we should not drive more than once a week to our municipal centre, Straumen (26 km, round trip) for grocery shopping. About once a month we could allow ourselves a trip to Steinkjer that offers a wider selection of products (an additional 40 km, round trip). There would be an annual visit to Trondheim (240 km, round trip). Some social visits could come in addition. Norwegian Friends of the Earth has been particularly concerned about the use of tires, and their contribution of plastics to the environment.

In terms of air travel, we would like to prioritize one more trip to British Columbia to celebrate Patricia’s sister’s 80th birthday, and one more trip to California, to visit our daughter. We have decided that we can visit much of the rest of the world through documentaries. However, it must be admitted that excursions into warmer parts of Europe during the winter, are appealing. However, trains can be used to get there!

Food

We continue to buy much of our dairy products and eggs from local farmers. This involves walking to the farms. While not vegetarians, we try to eat less meat. We also avoid almost all restaurant food, if only because of their excessive salt content.

Music

In many weblog posts in 2021, and even now in 2022, music has been a major theme. Here, I would like to address the carbon footprint of the music industry, assisted – in part – by a recent Guardian article, that stated that on Earth Day about 100 international, intergenerational and eclectic musicians will release material exclusively via Bandcamp (with the platform waiving its fees) and with the income generated being distributed among causes working at the frontlines of the climate emergency.

On EarthPercent’s website, a somewhat different story is told. They state that for every track sold, a minimum of £1.30/$1.30 goes to our grantmaking programme, after deducting only third-party platform fees and applicable taxes from the purchase price. No EarthPercent operating costs are deducted.

The two sources also disagree about how much philanthropic funding is directed towards the climate crisis. The Guardian states less than 3%, EarthPercent states less than 2%. Regardless, EarthPercent encourages all participants in the music industry to divert a small percentage of their income, to the most impactful climate causes/ projects/ charities selected by an independent expert advisory panel, with the financial goal of raising $100m by 2030.

I do not support the music industry, with the exception of including YouTube links to specific songs in weblog posts. At a personal level, my musical content was converted to audio files from CDs, at a time when it was legal to do so. This is what I play. I do not stream anything. I do not attend concerts. I do not buy new CDs. I do not buy vinyl. I am attempting to go one step further, making my own music, but this is a long and arduous process.

The industrial approach to music is easy for listeners. Pay a regular sum of money (or listen to some ads) and you will be able to listen to (some) music using a streaming service. Pay somewhat more, and you will be able to download it, more still and it will be provided on a CD or vinyl record. Pay something outrageous, and you will be able to attend a concert.

The focus of the music industry is on the promotion of specific groups and individuals, who may be no better or worse than many others. Industry players then attempt to control this music to maximize their return on investment from the production of: CDs, vinyl records, streamed content, concerts. At the same time, they promote the excessive, luxurious lifestyle, enjoyed by a few performers, which only creates more disparity in the world. This disparity leads to an overheating of the world, in part because it prevents the less privileged from making improvements to their lives, such as an ability to replace the burning of fossil fuels with greener substitutes.

Environmentally, music concerts are particularly bad. They not only involve the movement of a band, its roadies and its equipment, but up to tens of thousands of fans (as in enthusiastic people, not mechanical devices that blow air). All this movement creates a serious carbon footprint.

Personally, I am not convinced that kinetic dancefloors, that harness crowd energy, or travel advice apps, will cut carbon emissions significantly. Instead, if people need live entertainment, they should enjoy locally produced music, produced by local musicians, in local venues. Even better, if a person is interested in music, they can make it themselves!

There are many different approaches to music. Here in Inderøy, which is a microcosm of what is happening in Norway and developed countries more generally, there are many different choirs: some are just for men, or women, or children; some are mixed for all genders of adults; some focus on just part of the municipality, while others are for all of it.

There are marching bands with woodwinds, brass and percussion instruments, that will be playing at a wide variety of venues on two upcoming holidays, Labour day (2022-05-01) and Constitution day (2022-05-17). Some of these bands march, some don’t.

Traditional music, often involves the Hardingfele (Norwegian) or Hardanger fiddle (English), often considered Norway’s national musical instrument. It is similar to a violin, typically with eight strings (in contrast to four on a standard violin) and thinner wood. Four of the strings are strung and played like a violin, the remaining understrings, simply resonate. Traditional, and not-so traditional dance bands play music at local events for people who like to dance.

There are also a wide variety of smaller bands that practice together, playing mainly for themselves, or at a few local festivals or other events. Increasingly, they place their music on YouTube.

Yet, the most important group involves solo musicians, who sing or play for their own personal enjoyment. There is some form of music for almost everybody, and the carbon footprint of playing that music does not have to be very high!

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Synclavier

A Synclavier II was introduced in 1980. Many claim its fame is due to its cost, which was originally between $200 000 – $300 000. The largest system built and sold by New England Digital Corporation cost $500 000

Dartmouth College deserves praise for its role in starting advanced technological companies in rural environments. One of the first of these was New England Digital Corporation (NED). The company began life in Hanover, New Hampshire (NH), population 9 119, in the 1980 census, then moved to Norwich, Vermont (VT), with a population then of 2 398, located 2.4 km north-east of Hanover, and later to White River Junction, VT, with a current population of 2 286, located 9 km south of Hanover.

A location with a small population can become world famous for its products, but those products have to be carefully selected. In addition, product design will probably need some input from external experts, rather than relying on the efforts of a single entrepreneur, working alone, in a remote area.

On almost every corporate website, and many others, there is a section titled, Our Story or About. The wording is interesting, because it is usually not called Our History, for that would imply some truthiness. With Our Story or About there is more wiggle room for wishful thinking, and self-aggrandizement, and less need for objective facts. On the Synclavier website, the role of external experts needed to make the Synclavier successful has been reduced/ wiggled away. Here, the focus will be on some of the experts that made Synclavier the success it was.

As a university, Dartmouth College, in Hanover, NH is notable for several reasons. It is a rural university, without urban distractions. In the 2021 US News university ranking, Dartmouth College is #13 nationally, and #226 in the world. In 2016, Thayer became the first US national research university with a graduating class of engineers that was over 50% female. In the 1960s, Dartmouth was world famous for its invention of the Basic programming language, released 1964-05-01. In 1978, it became world famous for its founding of the Thayer School of Engineering’s entrepreneurship program, at the Cook Engineering Design Center. At Cook, they solicit industry-sponsored projects for degree candidates to work on. Prior to this, in 1975, one of the first such project resulted in the Synclavier.

Without the support of Dartmouth’s faculty members, it is unlikely that the Synclavier would have existed. The Synclavier has its origins with Jon Appleton (1939 – 2022), a professor of digital electronics, and Frederick Johnson Hooven (1905 – 1985), a part-time professor of engineering. They worked with Dartmouth Thayer School of Engineering research professor Sydney Alonso (1936 – ) and Cameron Warner Jones (ca. 1955 – ), at the time an undergraduate student. These last two apparently met in the university computing centre. They discovered a common interest, that resulted in the Synclavier.

From 1957 to 1961 Appleton was a student at Reed College in Portland, Oregon. During the 1962–1963 school year, he was a music teacher in Sedona, Arizona. From 1963–1966 he was a graduate student at the University of Oregon in Eugene, Oregon. During 1966–1968 he was hired by Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan, to establish an electronic music studio. When the university officials reneged on their promise to develop this studio, Appleton resigned and accepted a position at Thayer school of engineering, at Dartmouth College. He took a leave of absence from Thayer in the mid-1970s to become the head of Elektronmusikstudion (EMS) = Centre for Swedish electroacoustic music and sound-art, established in 1964. It is run as an independent part of Musikverket = Swedish Performing Arts Agency. It is located in Stockholm, Sweden.

Hooven held thirty-eight U.S. patents and devised numerous other inventions that were not patented. His engineering career started before he graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1927. In 1925, at DayFan Radio, he designed improved radio receivers. After graduation he worked for General Motors (GM) where he designed a brake shoe system used on all GM vehicles for twenty-five years.

From 1930 to 1931, Hooven designed automobile suspension systems at Dayton Rubber Company. During 1931 and 1932, he designed a blind aircraft landing system for the American Loth Company. In 1932 he independently produced the first successful high-fidelity crystal phonograph pickup. He worked as vice-president and chief engineer for Bendix’s Radio Products Division from 1935 to 1937, where he developed the first automatic steering system for unmanned flight. From 1937 to 1957, he was self-employed working on product research and development.

In 1957 Fred Hooven went to work for the Ford Motor Company where he supervised the design and development of assorted automobiles. When he left Ford in 1967 he once again become a consultant, but also an adjunct professor of engineering at Thayer, becoming a part-time professor in 1975. He remained in that capacity until his death in 1985.

Civilian inventions include the first radio compass (1936); an automobile ignition system (1948); the first heart-lung machine (1952); the Harris intertype digital electronic phototypesetter (1955); and a front-end drive system for automobiles (1962).

The Synclavier I was released at the end of 1977. It used FM synthesis, re-licensed from Yamaha, and was sold mostly to universities. The initial models used a computer with synthesis modules, later enhancements added a (musical) keyboard and a control panel.

The Synclavier II was released in 1980. Once again, external help was needed. Synthesist and music producer Denny Jaeger suggested that FM synthesis be extended to allow four simultaneous channels to be triggered with one key depression to allow a fuller synthesized sound. This became a key selling point of the model.

Alonso and Jones made significant contributions to the design. Alonso was awarded US Patent 4108035 for a musical note oscillator, in 1978; US Patent 4178822 for musical synthesis envelope control techniques, in 1979; US Patent 4279185 for Electronic music sampling techniques, in 1981; US Patent 4680479 for a method of and apparatus for providing pulse trains whose frequency is variable in small increments and whose period, at each frequency, is substantially constant from pulse to pulse, in 1987; and, US Patent 4726067 for a method of and apparatus for extending the useful dynamic range of digital-audio systems, in 1988. Jointly, they were awarded US Patent 4345500 for their high resolution musical note oscillator, in 1982; and, US Patent 4554855 for their partial timbre sound synthesis method, in 1985.

The original keyboard, referred to as the ORK, was nothing more than an on-off switch. A weighted velocity and pressure-sensitive keyboard, the VPK was licensed from Sequential Circuits. It was identical to that used on their Prophet-T8 synthesizer.

The main contribution made by Synclavier was the development of hardware cards that could be fitted into computers. This included cards for a real-time CPU, input and output, analog-to-digital and digital-to-analog conversion (ADC/ DAC), as well as memory. All of these needed to be programmed to function.

As newer models emerged, Synclavier became less dependent on external consultants, Synclavier music workstations/ digital synthesizers/ polyphonic digital samplers were made from the late 1977 to 1993. Wikipedia provides an overview of these. In 1993 Synclavier went bankrupt, its intellectual property was taken over by a bank, then sold to a Canadian company, Airworks, which itself then foreclosed. This gave Jones the opportunity he needed to buy back critical assets and to restart Synclavier.

Jones pursued other interests than building synthesizers. His bachelor thesis is about an XPL Language Compiler, a simple, small, efficient dialect of the computing language PL/1. PL/1 had been developed by IBM in 1964 to replace Algol, Cobol and Fortran. A variant, Scientific XPL, was used on New England Digital’s ABLE series computers, for laboratory automation and computer networking, as well as controlling music synthesis hardware.

Between 1982 and 1984, Jones studied the double bass with Stuart Sankey at Indiana University, Jacobs School of Music, and was active with the Evansville Philharmonic Orchestra.

His DSP (Digital Signal Processing) engine allowed C Code to run on Windows and MacOS. Moreover, side-by-side testing was carried out with original equipment to ensure the systems sounded identical. Arturia’s Synclavier V was released in its own right to widespread critical acclaim in May 2016. He also brought Synclavier V software synth to Arturia to be included in their V Collection plug-in suite.

In 2019, Jones released Synclavier Go!, an iOS version of the synthesizer, repurposing much of the original DSP engine so that it runs on an iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch. It provided over 1 000 preset timbres, 19 preset libraries and over 100 lossless-quality samples/ sound files. It supports portamento, arpeggiate, mono/poly triggering, and other keyboard modes.

Sources: Jon Appleton; Fred Hooven; Synclavier; Play Synthesizer.

Related

1: Of the readers receiving notifications of weblog posts, only one lives in New Hampshire, at Keene, located about 100 km south of the other NH and VT locations mentioned here. Before I was adopted as an infant, my original first name was Richard. I have good reason to believe that I was named after him. Hello, Dick!

2: My niece, Cally, is currently a student at Oakland University, the Michigan university that had originally hired Jon Appleton to start an electronic music studio. Hello, Cally!

3: On 2022-04-01, I acquired a new toy/ learning machine, a Behringer MS-1 monophonic analogue synth. At a price of NOK 3600/ US$ 400, it is only 0.2% of the cost of the cheapest original Synclaver!

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Mother of Biology

Maria Sibylla Merian, Metamorphosis of the silkworm, from Studienbuch (Book of Studies).

Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-04-02 – 1717-01-13) was born in Frankfurt am Main, she is notable as an entomologist and scientific illustrator. She spent much of her life living in what is now Germany and the Netherlands, where she died, but also two years in the Dutch colony of Surinam, in South America. Today, it is 375 years since she was born.

After her father, Matthäus Merian der Ältere (1593 – 1650), a Swiss-born engraver/ publisher, died when she was three, her widowed mother, Johanna Sybilla Heim(ius), remarried Jabob Marrel (1613/4 – 1681), a still-life painter, in 1651. Merian received her artistic training from Marrel.

Many Dutch dissenters also moved to Frankfurt, seeking refuge from persecution in the Netherlands. They turned their attention to silkworm breeding and the silk trade towards the end of the 16th century. Maria Sibylla Merian’s earliest nature studies had their origins in this context. She started to collect insects as an adolescent. At 13, she raised silkworms.

In 1665, Merian married Johann Andreas Graff, an apprentice of Marrel. In 1668, her first child, Johanna, was born. The family moved to Nuremberg in 1670. In addition to painting and other artistic activities she gave drawing lessons to unmarried daughters of wealthy families, which helped her family financially, and gave her with access to private gardens, where she could collect and document insects.

She published her first book of natural illustrations in 1675. In 1678 a second daughter, Dorothea Maria, was born, and the family moved back to Frankfurt am Main. In 1679 she published the first volume of a two-volume series on caterpillars, opening with a presentation of the silkworm’s life-cycle.

Merian’s marriage was unhappy, and she moved in with her mother after her stepfather died in 1681. The second volume on caterpillars appearing in 1683. Each volume contained 50 plates that she engraved and etched. These documented the process of insect metamorphosis, and recorded the plant hosts of 186 European insect species. She also included descriptions of insect life cycles.

In 1683, Merian travelled to Gottorp, in Schleswig-Holstein, where she became attracted to the Labadist community, founded by Jean de Labadie (1610–1674). He originally came from the Bordeaux region of France. Later, the community moved to Walta Castle, at Wieuwerd in Friesland.

In 1685, Merian moved with her mother, husband, and children to Friesland. The Labadist community generated income from farming, milling and craftsmenship. Children were tutored communally. Women had traditional roles. A printing press was set up, to disseminate writings by Labadie and others, including Anna van Schurman, (1607 – 1678) painter/ engraver/ poet/ scholar and defender of female education. Another member, Hendrik van Deventer (1651 – 1724),[skilled in chemistry and medicine, set up a laboratory and was regarded as a pioneering obstetrician.

Here, Merian studied natural history and Latin, used as a scientific language. On Friesland’s moors she observed frog development, collecting and dissecting them. Merian’s mother died in 1690, and Merian moved, with her daughters, to Amsterdam in 1691. In 1692, her husband divorced her, and her daughter Johanna married Jakob Hendrik Herolt, a successful merchant in the Surinam trade.

In 1699, Merian and her younger daughter, Dorothea Maria Graff (1678–1743), travelled to Surinam to study and record the tropical insects native to the region. This was financed by selling 255 paintings. For two years she travelling throughout the colony, sketching local animals and plants, recording local/ native names and describing local uses.

Merian criticised the colonial merchants for their obsession with sugar. She took a broader interest in local agriculture, especially the vegetables and fruits that could be grown in Suriname, such as the pineapple. She also condemned their treatment of slaves. One such enslaved person assisted her in her research, and allowed her to interact with other Amerindian and African slaves.

In 1705, she published Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium. Merian’s Metamorphosis has been credited with influencing a range of naturalist illustrators. In Metamorphosis, she writes: “I have been concerned with the study of insects since my youth. I started with silkworms in my native Frankfurt. Later I realized that other caterpillars developed into much more beautiful diurnal and nocturnal butterflies.”

Because of her documented observations of butterfly metamorphosis, she is often considered to be the founder, and a significant contributor, to the field of entomology. Through her studies, Merian discovered many facts about insect life, earning her the title of mother of biology.

Maria Sibylla Merian from 1679, possibly by Jacob Marrel

More information about the life and work of Merian can be found in an article by Tanya Latty.

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Joule

Logo for the Système International d’Unités created by the Bureau international des poids et mesures.

This post presents general material about SI ( Système International [d’Unités]), created by the Bureau international des poids et mesures. It started out as a presentation of the joule in particular. In addition, a number of personal prejudices about units of measurement are freely presented.

What appeals to me about SI is that fact that it is a system, not an arbitrary collection of units. Its units are the only ones with official metric status since 1960.

There are seven base units: the second (symbol s, the unit of time), metre (m, length), kilogram (kg, mass), ampere (A, electric current), kelvin (K, thermodynamic temperature), mole (mol, amount of substance), and candela (cd, luminous intensity). The system allows for an unlimited number of coherent derived units, which can always be represented as products of powers of the base units. Twenty-two coherent derived units have special names and symbols. It may not be perfect, but it is consistent, which makes it easy to use.

Since 2019, the magnitudes of all SI units have used seven defining constants to express their values. These are: the speed of light in vacuum c, the hyperfine transition frequency of caesium ΔνCs, the Planck constant h, the elementary charge e, the Boltzmann constant k, the Avogadro constant NA, and the luminous efficacy Kcd.

For most of my life, I have been trying to forget the number of feet or yards in a mile. I can’t. Yet, I cannot easily express a mile in inches. I would have to take one of those numbers I am struggling to forget, and multiply it by either 12 or 36, respectively. In contrast, there is no problem converting metric units. 1 km = 1 000 m = 1 000 000 mm.

If anyone wonders why I use a space as a separator, it is because both a comma (,) and a period/ point (.) are used to indicate the start of decimal fractions. Most of the time I use a period/ point (as is the preference in English speaking countries), while most continental Europeans, including Norwegians, use a comma. Yes, I am capable of using a comma, if required. The keys are right beside each other on my computer keyboard. On paper, the symbol I use deliberately looks like something in between – an elongated period/ point, or a truncated comma.

The so-called Imperial system is not international. In terms of liquid measure the system employs four units: 4 gills = 1 pint; 2 pints = 1 quart; 4 quarts = 1 gallon. In the American system a gallon is 3.785 litres or 231 cublic inches. This American system deviates in several areas from the one Brexiters are wanting to reimpose in England, and the one I grew up with in Canada. Here, a gallon is 4.54609 litres or 277.4194 cubic inches. The Imperial system of units was first defined in the British Weights and Measures Act 1824. It continued to be developed through a series of Weights and Measures Acts and amendments.

Of course, this only applies to liquids. Dry materials have their own system where one starting point is the dry gallon. The US fluid gallon is about 14.1% smaller than the dry gallon, while the Imperial fluid gallon is about 3.2% larger. The system involves: 2 pints = 1 quart; 4 quarts = 1 dry gallon; 2 dry gallons = 1 peck; 4 pecks = 1 bushel; 10 pecks or 2.5 bushels = 1 barrel.

For me, dry units of volume were just something to memorize. It was not until a librarian from Wisconsin described the basket I was using to transport grass clippings from a lawn to a compost heap, as a bushel basket, that I began to understand the size of that unit. Thank you, Jane.

Imperial measurements of length are equally convoluted. Here are some, and their relationship to a foot, a unit that is precisely defined as 0.3048 m. A twip = 1/ 17 280; a thou or mil = 1/ 12 000; a barleycorn = 1/ 36; an inch = 1/ 12; a hand = 1/ 3; a yard = 3; a rod = 16.5; a chain = 66; a furlong = 660; a mile = 5 280.

In surveying, much of the emphasis is in determining area, typically the acre, in the Anglosphere. Here the rod is particularly useful: 4 rods = 1 chain; 40 rods = 10 chains = 1 furlong. Whole number multiples of a rod can be used to determine area in acres. A perfect acre is 40 rods by 4 rods or 160 square rods or 10 square chains. To gain a rough understanding of area in units that I understand, I take the area in acres and divide it by 250. This gives an approximate area in square kilometers. In metric units, a prevalent standard unit of area is the hectare, which is 100 m by 100 m = 10 000 square meters. There are 100 hectares in one square kilometer.

At sea, other measurements are used that are subdivisions of the nautical mile (n.m.) = 1 852 meters. These are fathom = 1/ 1 000 n.m. = 1.852 m = 6.0761 feet (and not 6 feet, as myth would have it, although the British Admiralty allowed – some would say encouraged – this deviation); cable = 100 fathoms = 1/ 10 of a nautical mile = 185.2 m.

In the seamanship and navigation courses I have taken in Norway, a nautical mile is used extensively. In 1 degree (°) of latitude or longitude = 60 minutes (‘). 1′ = 60 seconds (“). While distances vary along parallels of latitude, that run east to west, the distances are constant along meridians of longitude that run north to south: 1’ = 1 n.m. and 1° = 60 n.m.

In an interconnected world, there is a need for a common language of measurements. Take speed, as an example. While your local meteorologist uses m/s, your local Harley-Davidson motorcyclists may be using miles/hour (refusing to use km/h, even in Europe). 1 m/s = 3.6 km/hour, exactly = about 2.237 miles per hour. Most people cannot judge speeds precisely, but rely on instruments – including speedometers – to tell them. Thus, it should be possible to set up some approximations that could help with transitions.

I survived a speed limit transition in Canada, 1977-09-01, when motor vehicle speed limits went from mph to km/h. My (imperfect) recollection of the speeds were: 10 mph = 20 km/h; 20 mph = 30 km/h; 30 mph = 50 km/h; 40 mph = 60 km/h; 50 mph = 80 km/h; 70 mph = 110 km/h. Those with better memories can contact me, and these will be corrected. The highest speed limit in Canada is 120 km/h found on British Columbia’s Coquihalla Highway.

At the time there were complaints that 30 mph was actually only 48.28 km/h. However, it was also pointed out that the average Canadian driver drove at speeds that exceeded the speed limit. It was judged more appropriate to use round numbers. The opposite problem arose with 20 mph = ca. 32.19 km/h while the new speed limit was only 30 km/h.

In terms of accident prevention, speeds in m/s gives relevant information to drivers, who know that they have to react to events within seconds. While a speed of 10 km/h is about 2.78 m/s, it can be regarded as 3 m/s. With this approach, speed limits become: 10 mph = 20 km/h = 6 m/s; 20 mph = 30 km/h = 9 or more likely 10 m/s; 30 mph = 50 km/h = 15 m/s; 40 mph = 60 km/h = 18 or more likely 20 m/s; 50 mph = 80 km/h = probably 25 m/s; 70 mph = 110 km/h = 30 m/s.

The Bureau international des poids et mesures (BIPM) is an intergovernmental organisation, with 63 member-states and 40 associate states/ economies, that sets measurement standards in four areas: chemistry, ionising radiation, physical metrology, and coordinated universal time. It is based in Saint-Cloud, on international territory located in a suburb almost 10 km west of Paris, France. It was founded 1875-05-20. This date continues to be celebrated annually as World Metrology Day.

There have been many proposals for metric base units. The first was developed by Carl Friederich Gauss (1777 – 1855), who proposed using millimetre, milligram and second in 1832. In 1873, a British Association for the Advancement of Science committee that included both James Clerk Maxwell (1831 – 1879) and William Thomson (1824 – 1907) recommended centimetre, gram and second. This became known as the cgs system, and was officially adopted in 1881. In 1881, Rudolf Clausius (1822 – 1888) proposed erg as the official energy unit, from ergon = work/ task in Greek. It was officially adopted in 1882, but lost its official status on 1978-01-01.

Wilhelm Siemens (1823 – 1883) proposed joule as a unit in 1882, to honour James Prescott Joule (1818 – 1889) for his work in thermodynamics. Originally, it was defined in terms of amperes and ohms. This tended to make it an electrical unit. However, in 1946 it was redefined in terms of newtons and meters, to make it a more generalized and acceptable unit of work. In 1948, the joule became the preferred unit of heat, effectively replacing the calorie. It can always be defined in terms of base units: kg⋅m2⋅s−2

The problem with calories. First, there are two different types of calories: large calories or kilocalories = 1 000 small calories or gram calories. These are related to the energy needed to raise either 1 kilogram or 1 gram of water, respectively, 1 Celsius = 1 Kelvin. The small calorie was included in the SI system, but it was replaced by the joule in 1948. 1 small calorie = 4.184 J; 1 large calorie = 1 kilocalorie = 4.184 kJ. These can most easily be expressed as 4 J or 4 kJ, respectively.

Adding to the confusion, there are also watt-hours. The international unit of time is the second. 1 Wh (watt-hour) = 60 x 60 = 3 600 Ws (watt-seconds) = 3.6 kWs, which is just another name for a joule. So, 1 Ws = 1J.

The size of rechargeable batteries is increasingly expressed in terms of electric charge (Ah). I regard this as a marketing ploy to increase the apparent energy capacity of a battery. People want to know how long a battery will last before it has to be recharged. The electric charge in itself is uninteresting, because it has to be multiplied by the voltage used. This varies. I have computers that use 10.8 V, radios that use 13.8 V, electric power tools that use 18 V, a lawnmower that uses 40 V. Most of the time there is a caveat on the battery, stating that this is the maximum voltage.

The 40 V electric lawnmower battery I held in my hand a few seconds ago is rated at 5.0 Ah. It also states that it provides 180 Wh of energy, not the 200 that should be expected by multiplying 5 x 40. Part of the reason for my skepticism about using Ah as a metric, is that it does not take voltage drop into account. Internal resistance, and chemical transformations in the electrolyte are two reasons for this decline in voltage. Regardless, I expect battery manufacturers to provide me with realistic values for the amount of energy I can use, before charging.

For traction batteries used in electric vehicles, kWh is the common unit, in part because many people do not know (or even care about) the battery voltage. On modern vehicles this can vary from 200 to 800 V.

What I hope is that electric battery suppliers will provide energy values in joules. The 180 Wh in the lawnmower battery noted above is 648 MJ. This is about the size of the smallest battery pack used in a scooter. The smallest battery pack for a car is currently about 20 kWh traction battery offers 72 GJ; 40 kWh = 144 GJ; 60 kWh = 216 GJ; 80 kWh = 288 GJ; 100 kWh = 360 GJ. A battery pack for a locomotive might be 2 400 kWh. However, I would appreciate more standardized batteries using preferred numbers, as developed by Charles Renard (1847–1905). If the R5 were implemented it would lead to traction batteries of 630 MJ, 1 GJ, 2.5 GJ, 4.0 GJ, 6.3 GJ, 10 GJ, 16 GJ, 25 GJ, 40 GJ, 63 GJ, 100 GJ, 160 GJ, 250 GJ, 400 GJ, 630 GJ, 1.0 TJ, 1.6 TJ, 2.5 TJ, 4.0 TJ, 6.3 TJ and 10 TJ for assorted vehicle types, covering everything from scooters to locomotives.

Metabolism refers to necessary processes to keep a body functioning. Standard metabolic rate (SMR) is the rate of energy expenditure per unit time by animals at rest. Basal metabolic rate (BMR) is a special case of SMR used with endothermic aka warm-blooded animals. In humans, BMR is the amount of energy per unit of time that a person needs to keep the body functioning at rest: breathing, blood circulation, controlling body temperature, cell growth, brain and nerve function, and contracting muscles. BMR accounts for about 60 to 75% of an individual’s energy expenditure. There are suggestions that a mean BMR could be somewhat over 6 MJ per day.

It is often suggested that the average human consumes about 2 000 – 2 500 large calories of food per day, in round numbers. This is somewhere around 8 – 10 MJ per day, in yet more round numbers.

For joules to be understood in kitchens and the heads of people on diets, there will also be a need to internalize values. On one website, a list of 45 common food products was presented, along with the calories of each. One of these was a banana, medium which offered 105 calories. Bananas vary in size, and I am uncertain exactly how big a medium banana is. I am sure that I have eaten small bananas that provide only 80 calories, and larger ones that have 120. Thus, I am going to state that on at least some days, my banana only has 100 calories. Since 1 large calorie has about 4 kJ, this item will provide me with 400 kJ of energy. I do not see using joules, instead of calories, as an insurmountable challenge.

On a personal note: One Norwegian has been director of the Bureau, Ole Jacob Broch (1818 – 1889), from 1883 (some sources say 1879) until his death. At various times he was a mathematician, physicist, economist and government minister. He was born in Fredrikstad, Norway, from where I trace my Norwegian ancestry. The spelling of his surname is precisely how Norwegians want to spell my forename, unless they know better.

Related, future posts. Prolog, provides information about the Prolog programming language. Cooksum, examines metabolism, “the sum of the physical and chemical processes in an organism by which its material substance is produced, maintained, and destroyed, and by which energy is made available.” In particular it looks at the work of Herman Pontzer. The content of these four posts, will be used in Cookbase, a nutritional knowledge base being developed as a kitchen tool. It builds, a database of ingredients and their characteristics, recipes with number of servings, ingredients and quantities, preparation instructions etc.

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Cooktimes

In discussing this post with Trish, she decided that the cookbook she owned that best suited my personality, was Michele Evans, Fearless Cooking Against the Clock: Great Gourmet Menus in Minutes (1982). The advantage of this cookbook is that it works at the menu (in contrast to dish) level. The recipes in the book are divided into 15 minute, 30 minute and 60 minute “quick and easy” preparation times. Each recipe has been timed, so that the cook can plan accordingly.

Chapter 1, The Larder, begins with: “A well-stocked larder is essential for convenient and efficient quick cooking.” After a short introduction, it is divided into eight sections, named below, along with the number of ingredients in each section in parentheses: Herb and spice shelf (34), Canned products (11), Miscellaneous baking, bottled and packaged ingredients (43 – sometimes with many separate items listed under each ingredient), Dairy products (7), Fresh foods (6), Frozen foods (7 – but with 5 separate types listed under vegetables), Wines, spirits and liqueurs [solely for cooking] (13), and Kitchen supplies (7).

Chapter 2, Cooking Equipment, is similar in arrangement. There is an introduction, followed by five sections, named below, along with the number of items found in each section: Implements and equipment (53), Pots and pans (31), Miscellaneous (5), Knives (9), and Serving essentials (20).

Chapter 3, Strategies for Quick Cooking, will have all ten of its rules quoted here. 1. Select a menu. 2. Make a shopping list of those ingredients not in supply. Keep an ongoing shopping list in the kitchen. 3. Shop for first-quality ingredients at a convenient time. 4. Set table in advance, if possible, and have serving dishes, coffee cups and saucers, etcetera ready for immediate serving. 5. Read each recipe thoroughly before starting to cook. 6. Set out all ingredients needed for each dish on the menu, unless they require refrigeration or freezing. 7. Set out all pots, pans, cooking equipment and utensils needed for preparing meal. 8. Work at a steady pace; don’t poke or race. If there are others present who can help by washing and drying lettuce or chopping vegetables, welcome their assistance. 9. Keep waste basket near the work area and clean up as you work, when possible. 10. When it is convenient, serve main courses and vegetables in same serving dish or platter.

The chapters after this are: 4) 15-minute meals, occupying 64 pages. 5) 30-minute meals, using 76 pages. 6) 1-hour meals, over 98 pages. All three of these chapters are subdivided by main ingredient, typically a meat category, such as seafood, poultry or beef. 7) Holiday meals, has 56 pages, after an initial dinner party planning section, holidays appear chronologically through the year. 8) Cocktail parties has only 16 pages. After describing the bar, it looks at the topic by season. The last chapter, 9) Children’s parties, is only eight pages long. The book ends with an index, with 31 pages of entries.

While most menus and recipes are for four people, exceptions are made for celebrations where holidays typically involve 6, 8 or 12 people. Valentine’s day provides a menu for two. Cocktail parties are huge affairs, involving 12, 25 or 50 people. Birthday parties are for 12.

Evens has also written:

  • The Salad Book (1975)
  • The Slow Crock Cookbook (1975)
  • Fearless Cooking for Men (1977)
  • Fearless Cooking for One (1980)
  • Fearless Cooking for Company (1984)
  • Fearless Cooking for Crowds (1986) [8 to 50 people]

This is the third of an unspecified number of posts about cooking instructions for people who eat to live. All of these posts (will) begin with cook, which can be used as a search term to find previously published posts.

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World Plumbing Day

Friday, 2022-03-11 is world plumbing day 2022! Starting today, I am using this day, once a year, to inspect the plumbing at Cliff Cottage. It was inspired by an event on Sunday, 2021-07-25 when wastewater from the washing machine started to back up over the bathroom floor. The piping leading from the washing machine was clogged. It had probably gone at least a decade since the piping was last checked.

After an hour’s work spread over two days, everything worked normally again. To prevent these sorts of emergencies in the future, I decided that the best way was to perform preventative maintenance once a year. I googled plumbing day, and discovered it was an event happening around the world, on this date that started in 2010.

There are several similar days throughout the year that I won’t be celebrating, in part because they are too similar: World Water Day = 03-22; World Cleanup Day = 09-15; Global Handwashing Day = 10-15; World Toilet Day = 11-19. Yes, on this weblog, International Standard ISO 8601 is used for dates, in the format YYYY-MM-DD. Here, only MM-DD appear.

It is very easy to avoid/ postpone preventative maintenance activities. Thus, a fixed date, once a year, helps people schedule activities. In Norway, 12-01 is set aside as Smoke Detector Day. Batteries on all of the smoke detectors in the house are replaced once a year on that date, with the older batteries recycled to power less critical operations, or given to the public library that has taken over the techno workshop.

Other days that could be useful for doing related maintenance and other work, include: Global Recycling Day = 03-18; World Gardening Day = 04-14; Naturalists may prefer Naked Gardening Day, which is the first Saturday in May, In 2022 that is 05-07.

Voluntary Assignment: Are there other days in the year that should be set aside/ used for various maintenance activities? If so, please share these as a comment.

Not just days, but years and decades

Since this is 2022, it is the International Year of Artisanal Fisheries and Aquaculture. Artisanal fishing consists of various small-scale, low-technology, low-capital, fishing practices undertaken by individual fishing households, often coastal or island ethnic groups that make short fishing trips close to the shore. In 2023, it will be the International year of Millets. Millets are highly variable small-seeded grasses, widely grown around the world as cereal crops or grains for fodder = animal feed, and human food. Millets are important crops in the semiarid tropics of Asia and Africa (especially in India, Mali, Nigeria, and Niger). 97% of millet production occurs in developing countries. The crop is favoured due to its productivity and short growing season under dry, high-temperature conditions.

The period from 2021 to 2030 is the United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration. It would also be fun to hear from other people on how they are approaching this task.

World Water Day (03-22) was an event I managed at Leksvik senior secondary school. The municipality of Leksvik (now amalgamated with Rissa to form Indre-Fossen) is adjacent to Inderøy. It hosted numerous companies making water related products, everything from domestic faucets, long-length infrastructure piping and and valves for ship ballast systems, to containerized desalination equipment. Many of the companies producing these products have now sold off their product lines, or moved, either abroad or to other parts of Norway. The school received funding to start a project with a focus on energy and water. In 2008, I was hired as project manager. My focus was on building and using submersibles = remotely operated vehicles (ROVs). I also transformed the building housing the project into Nautilus, a virtual submarine. It took its name from the Jules Verne’s (1828 – 1905) fictional submarine featured in his novels Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (1870) and The Mysterious Island (1874). When I worked there, the school celebrated World Water Day from 2009 to 2015.

Note: When published it was claimed that World Water Day and World Goth Day shared the same date. They do not. World Water Day is 03-22, while World Goth Day is 05-22. Updated: 2022-03-23 at 19:30.

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Maddalena Casulana

Artemisia Gentileschi, St Cecilia Playing a Lute, circa 1610–1612, Spada Gallery, Rome.

Maddalena Casulana (c. 1544 – c. 1590) was an Italian composer, lutenist and singer of the late Renaissance, and the first female composer to have had a book of music printed/ published, in the history of western music. Between 1568 and 1583, three books of madrigals were published under her name, although only one of those has survived complete.

Madrigals are secular = non religious, in the vernacular = the daily language of the people living in a place, polyphonic = having several voices, through-composed = different music for each stanza of lyrics, and unaccompanied = no rhythmic or other instruments are used. While there can be two to eight voice, three to six are most common. Metre varies between two or three tercets = three lines of poetry in a stanza, followed by one or two couplets = two lines of poetry in a stanza = grouped set of lines.

To celebrate Women’s Day 2022, music ensemble Fieri Consort will perform newly rediscovered songs composed by Casulana, on BBC Radio 3. The Fieri Consort was founded in 2012 and initially consisted of young ensemble singers based in London. It is un-conducted, typically with one or two voices to a part.

The painting illustrating this post is by Artemisia Gentileschi, (1593 – c. 1656) titled St Cecilia Playing a Lute. It was made sometime in the period 1610–1612, and is currently in the collection of the Spada Gallery, Rome. She is considered among the most accomplished seventeenth-century painters, producing professional work by the age of fifteen. While St Cecilia Playing a Lute is associated with Casulana, the painter was born after the composer’s death.

Musicologist Laurie Stras, professor of music at the universities of Southampton and Huddersfield, has found the lost alto partbook of Casulana’s 1583 book of five-voice madrigals, so that 17 madrigals have been added to her surviving repertoire.

In the 15th and 16th centuries, vocal/ instrumental polyphonic music was handwritten/ printed using partbooks, a separate one for each part. Sometimes, one or more of these partbooks go missing. Here, it was the alto parts for these madrigals.

An article in the Guardian includes information about Stras’ detective work, in finding the missing partbook.

Wikipedia provides a number of interesting articles that provide insight into topics presented here. These include:

An article on Madrigals, with more detailed information about their history and evolution.

An article on Casulana provides biographical information, as well as more detailed musicological information, especially about her extant compositions. There are also links to musical scores.

An article on Artemisia Gentileschi also provides many examples of her artwork, in addition to biographical information about her.

Happy Women’s Day, 2022!