Quality of Life

Some people like to say, "Eat well, do good, get exercise, and die anyway," as some sort of excuse for partying, being unhealthy and/or being inconsiderate. This logic has no place in a happy, fulfilling and successful life. Regardless of when you die, you want the life you live today, and tomorrow to be the best life you can possibly have. There is no excuse for not doing the best for yourself and the best you can for those you love. Even if I were going to die in six months, I still would continue my diet exactly as I do (if not do even better) because I want the highest quality for my life. The quantity is quite irrelevant.

~Raederle Phoenix Jacot

"Are you really sure that a floor can't also be a ceiling?" ~ M. C. Escher

Friday, July 22, 2011

Can We All Live In A Space The Size Of Texas?

This article originally took me 8 hours to create. I loved the concept but there were some problems with my original design, and also I neglected to make some of the most important points. I've completely renovated every aspect of the article. The re-write took me 20 hours. Please come check it out at its new home on Raederle.com.

1 comment:

Raederle said...

Davy wrote me:

Very fascinating post! One major issue I see with this is that you'll have 6 billion or so people in a space the size of Texas, and like it or not, as population increases, so does crime. Even if you were to create this utopian community/city where everybody has the same amount of land/space and everything we need is accessible, you're still going to have human nature kick in and people will want to control it all and get larger pieces of the pie. This is precisely why humans migrated all over the world.

Davy went on:

Also, what do you propose for utilities to provide electricity? We'd probably need to turn Nevada and Arizona into giant solar fields? Would that even generate enough electricity for 6 billion people? Could we do it with some well placed nuclear facilities? And what about water? We would need to figure out if there is an aquifer that would allow for enough wells to provide fresh water for 6 billion people - and that is unlikely. Perhaps a massive desalination facility(ies) along the gulf coast, but that might produce some environmental impact (or provide us with an endless supply of fresh sea salt).

I replied:

Well, the entire purpose of the article was to illustrate the fact that the planet is not over-populated. It wasn't to suggest that we should all move to one area together. I also was illustrating that much of what we have now is wasteful, and that is why it seems like there isn't enough Earth to go around. The fear that we are running out resources, that there isn't enough Earth to go around, etc, is what causes people to behave so irrational and greedy. But by no means do I think it's a good idea to put everyone on the planet in one lump together. It's possible that several of the air-port sized places I mentioned could be all devoted to solar power, and several more could all be filled with windmills. I know that wouldn't be enough alone though. I have no idea how much space it would take to generate enough electricity for the world population with our current technology. I do know, though, that technology is constantly coming up with a better solution, and if we were focusing on Earth-friendly power options, then we'd be coming up with some new incredible way to power more with less damage every few months. Just looking to open minds, reduce fear, and inspire new ideas. :D