Voyage Without Contact

On 5^th September 1977 Voyager 1 was launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida. Today (13^th November 2025) Voyager 1 will reach one light-day from Earth. One light-day is close to 26 billion kilometres. That’s a long way.

Yet, in astronomical terms it is not far at all. Although Voyager 1 has gone past the orbits of the outer planets of our solar system, it remains within the gravitational realm of the Solar System. A region of Space, known as the Oort Cloud, is considered to mark the edge of the Solar System’s gravitational influence. This vast “cloud” is where many of the comets that we see are thought to originate. Voyager 1 is not expected to reach this “cloud” for another few centuries and then remain within the cloud for perhaps thousands of years.

When Voyager 1 was launched we had not yet confirmed the existence of any planets outside the Solar System. It was not until 15 years later (in 1992) that the first exoplanet (planet outside the Solar System) was confirmed – and that planet was 2,300 light-years from Earth. Now, over 6,000 exoplanets have been confirmed to exist, with less than 4% of these likely to be Earth-like. However, current estimates put the number of Earth-like exoplanets in our galaxy somewhere in the range from 300 million to 40 billion.

But, contacting any life living on such exoplanets is highly unlikely.

The nearest known Earth-like exoplanet is Proxima b, circling the star Proxima Centauri, part of a triple star system in the constellation Centaurus. Proxima Centauri is 4.25 light-years from us, making it the nearest star to our own star – the Sun.

That doesn’t sound too far, does it – only a bit over 4 light years away.

However, do the mathematics. If Voyager 1 headed directly to Proxima Centauri, then it would arrive there in approximately 74,500 years – 74,452 years more than it has already travelled.

So, don’t keep watching your phone for updates on its arrival.

Now, consider this. Suppose Proxima b does have intelligent life living there. Suppose further, that those Proximians also launched a space probe, with the same technology we had, on the same day we did – 48 years ago. Then, it will be another 37,250 years before the two probes pass by each other in Deep Space.

Here’s yet another thought experiment. Suppose that a space probe emanating from Proxima b were to arrive on our planet Earth tomorrow. Then, that probe would have been launched 74,500 years ago. Can you recollect the state of the world all those years ago?

74,500 years ago we were sharing the planet with another member of the genus Homo – Homo neanderthalensis. Homo sapiens (as we came to be called) had left Africa, was about to arrive in Australia, and it was to be several thousand years before the Americas or the islands of the Pacific were settled. We had invented stone tools and were leaving our marks in forms of artwork on cave walls.

All those years ago we certainly had not invented the technology required to build a machine like Voyager 1 and be able to send it off into space.

This leaves us with two big questions.

Question 1: Are we ever likely to reach the stars?

Question 2: Are inhabitants from other star systems ever likely to reach us?

The answer to both questions has to be: Not likely, or at least with a very low probability.

That answer leads to two more important questions.

When are we going to realise that this is the planet we have, the only one we will ever have available to us?

When are we going to treat this Earth as our (only) home? 

Five Worst Inventions

Berlin Wall

A few days ago I was taking my (almost) daily walk along the beach, allowing the water to wash around my feet, ankles, and calves. I listened to the waves lapping upon the shore and the sound of gulls flying overhead. The sounds and sights were pleasant and calming.

As I continued walking and paddling I noticed a man coming towards me holding a mobile phone in front of him, peering at it. When we passed I waved and offered a cheery “good morning.” There was no reaction, he continued on, not seeming to notice his surroundings or my greeting.

I thought to myself, mobile phones have to be one of the worst inventions we humans have ever made. For the rest of my walk I thought about that, and wondered what would be my “top five” worst inventions? What criteria would I use to make such a judgment?

By the end of my walk I had come up with these three criteria for deciding on the “top five” worst inventions of humankind: 1. That the invention had a negative impact upon the earth and our relationship with nature, 2. That the invention served to increase the separation between us and exacerbate our intolerance of one another, and 3. That the invention worsened our mental health and/or our sense of well-being.

With these criteria in mind, here are my “top five” worst inventions. Please note that these are subjective and you may not agree, and may have a different “top five.” Also, each of these inventions may have their benefits, but, as I see it, the harms are greater. What are my “top five”? In no particular order they are:

Fences. The purpose of a fence is to either keep someone or something in or keep someone or something out. Their main purpose is to divide. Archaeological evidence shows that the first fences, often made of earth mounds, stones, or wood, appeared about 10,000 to 5,000 BCE. They arose in conjunction with sedentary agriculture and functioned to keep predators and scavengers out of crops, or to keep domesticated animals in.

Eventually, because of the transition from hunter/gathering to sedentary living, fences became walls around villages, towns, and cities. They were erected to provide security from opposing groups of humans. They also became markers of a new human feature – the privatisation of land. Take a walk in the countryside these days and how many times do you see a sign on a fence that reads, Keep Out, Private Property?

Walls (simply more elaborate fences) are used commonly to separate and divide. In the last 100 years two of the most well known walls have been erected: the Warsaw ghetto wall erected in November 1940 used to imprison 460,000 Jews in an area of just 3.4 km², and; the Berlin Wall, erected in August 1961, which divided the city of Berlin and separated families, friends, and lovers. Even today, walls exist in many cities of the world, and their purpose is to divide also. Most of us do not even think of them – they go under the rubric of gated communities.

Fences serve to separate us. They also serve to maintain our dominance over domesticated animals.

Ploughs. Ploughs are also linked to our domestication of plants and crops. Ploughs allow us to turn a diverse area of land into mono-agriculture, which is dependent upon the addition of pesticides, fungicides, and artificial fertilisers to ensure crop production.

The first ploughs seem to be hand-held plough-like devices used by early Egyptians to clear rocky soil. By the 6^th millennium BCE oxen were being used to pull early ploughs in Mesopotamia and the Indus Valley.

As time progressed, ploughs became mechanised and automated. Ploughs have enabled huge multinational agriculture companies to wreak havoc upon the land with mono-cultural cropping.

Ploughs and plowshares are often referred to as the goal of pacifist and peace movements worldwide. The phrase, ‘They shall beat their swords into plowshares’ comes from the Bible (Isaiah 2.4). A statue bearing this sentiment is on display in the United Nations Art Collection.

Yet, as Stephen Jenkinson caustically points out, ‘From the land’s point of view, there is no difference between swords and plows.’ ¹

Guns. The first guns were invented in China around 1000 AD, following the invention there of gunpowder in the ninth century. Guns spread throughout Eurasia during the 14^th century, with the word gun coming to us from the Old Norse word gunnidr meaning war-sword. Hence, guns have been associated with warfare and violence since their inception.

It would be hard to propose a more lethal means of killing another human being (or animal for that matter) than a gun. Since the 14^th century guns have morphed into; arquebuses, muskets, pistols, revolvers, machine guns, cannons, artillery, mortars, howitzers, tanks, and the modern-day drones that enable dissociated and anonymous killing.

The ultimate “gun” today is undoubtedly the nuclear warhead. There are well over 12,000 nuclear warheads in the world today, held by nine different countries. Russia and the USA hold the majority of these with more than 5,000 apiece.

Guns have worsened the divide between us.

Automobiles. I tossed up whether to identify this worst invention as the combustion engine or the automobile (utilising the combustion engine.) However, since there are now many vehicles that do not use the combustion engine as its automotive power, I opted for the automobile.

Whether the motive power is the combustion engine or an electric engine (or a combination of both) the automobile has had a terrible impact upon the environment of the Earth. Automobiles take up huge amounts of space in many of the cities of the world. The amount of land devoted to them (roads, streets, car parks) can be as much as 25% of the city’s area. The pollutants that automobiles emit are well known, but what may not be so well known is the weight of vehicles that contribute to the wear and tear of tyres. Some research suggests that tyre wear contributes 2,000 times more particulate pollution than the exhausts. EVs (electric vehicles) are not immune to this, indeed are worse, as the weight of an EV is significantly greater than that of a combustion engine vehicle.

In 2023 I coined the term autobesity to label the problems of automobiles. The blog is accessible here.

Mobile Phones. The mobile phone has only been available commercially since 1983 yet it has probably been responsible for an increase in social isolation, cyber bullying, teenage anxiety and depression, e-waste, environmental degradation, an increase in electricity usage, and a dumbing down of our cognitive abilities than any other such contraption.

When the inventor of the mobile phone, Martin Cooper, was testing out his invention he walked across a street whilst speaking on his phone. He later admitted to a friend that doing so was ‘probably the most dangerous thing I have ever done in my life.’ He is correct. A study in the US in 2009 found that 5,474 people had been killed because of the use of mobile phones in traffic. Repeated studies show that the use of mobile phones are responsible for 25% – 50% of all police-reported vehicle accidents.

I have covered this topic in greater depth in a blog available here.

The Worst Is Yet To Come

One invention that is currently underway could easily be the worst yet. Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) has the potential to exacerbate all other problems, making them worse than they already are (if that is conceivable.)

The godfather of A.I., Geoffrey Hinton, has been warning us for a few years now. In a recent interview Hinton cautioned that ‘If you want to know what life is like when you’re not the apex intelligence, ask a chicken.’ A short (2 min) excerpt from the interview is here, a longer (21 min) clip is here.

Even though he recognises benefits of AI, Hinton warns that ‘unless we do something soon, we’re near the end.’ A chilling thought. The lessons from the other five worst inventions would suggest there may not be much hope of us doing something soon.  

Next week I will post my "Five Best Inventions" list.

Note:

1. Stephen Jenkinson, Come The Romans, on the CD Dark Roads, Orphan Wisdom, 2020

AI and EI are Not Compatible

Chief Sealth (A man
with high EI)

AI (Artificial Intelligence) has its proponents and its detractors. Like most technology through the ages, there are benefits and drawbacks. I’ll go a bit further than that though. Throughout human history most technologies have had significantly more and greater drawbacks than have been the benefits.

A surface deep inspection or a cursory examination might induce one to dispute this claim. However, consider this example of the introduction of cell phones, in a blog from three years ago. Cell phones and their use have introduced problems of: depression, anxiety, cyber bullying, e-waste, increased electricity use, uptick in CO2 emissions, environmental consequences of mining, nomophobia (cell phone addiction), social isolation, and cognitive impairment.

AI is no different. Indeed, it is worse, as one of the purposes of AI is to optimise situations. The chance that AI will exacerbate every other single problem is highly likely. Yet, there is little or no discussion taking place around the likely consequences of AI. The proponents of AI are leading the charge, hailing the benefits, and drowning out the voices of those who wish to apply the cautionary principle.

I wish to highlight just one area of concern regarding AI – its environmental consequences.

The electricity and water usage of AI are both significant. In 2022 AI data centres were the 11^th biggest electricity consumers in the world. If they were a country, then they would rank just short of that of France.

Microsoft and Exxon Mobil have entered into a partnership in which Exxon plans to use Microsoft’s AI and claims that the use of this technology will enable them to increase production by 50,000 oil-equivalent barrels per day.

All of which contributes to CO₂ equivalent emissions.

Water use for cooling AI data centres is also sizeable. Researchers at Cornell University claim that the use of water for these centres has been kept a secret, and estimate that 4.2 – 6.6 billion cubic meters of water will be consumed by AI by 2027 – half the total usage of the United Kingdom.¹

A further environmental concern with AI is that of e-waste, with AI expecting to account for 12% of global e-waste by 2030.

AI at Odds with EI

When the environmental consequences of AI are considered we must conclude that Artificial Intelligence is incompatible with Environmental Intelligence (EI). A search for Environmental Intelligence will often land you on pages that speak of gathering information and data from the environment and then analysing the data gathered.

This is not how I intend using the term Environmental Intelligence (EI) here.

EI to my mind is better thought of as the intelligence innately found in nature and includes the intelligence with which we humans bring to our entanglement and inter-relationships with nature. Many have tried to capture this form of EI. One of the best is that of Chief Sealth (sometimes known as Chief Seattle) in a speech he gave to his tribal assembly in 1854. His speech is an excellent example of EI.

Many versions of this speech exist, all of which derive from second-hand sources, yet the underlying sentiment remains. This extract is from that of the film scriptwriter, Ted Perry, in 1970. I will not quote the whole speech (it is 5 pages long²); rather just two paragraphs that condense the ideas contained in Chief Sealth’s speech into the essential concepts.

‘This we know. The earth does not belong to humans; humans belong to the earth. This we know. All things are connected like the blood that unites one family. All things are connected.

Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons and daughters of the earth. Humans do not weave the web of life, we are merely a strand in it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves.’

This understanding of EI is clearly at odds with that of AI.

The two forms of intelligence are incompatible.

Yet, I read some highly visible so-called environmentalists utilising AI in their writing. This is disappointing. When I know that these authors use AI how can I be sure that what I read is their own thoughts or that of an AI-generated chatbot? I can’t.

Furthermore, it has been said that the easiest way to overcome a problem is to stop participating in it.

Just stop using AI! It is incompatible with EI.

P.S. This blogpiece has not been AI generated.

Notes:

1. Penfeng Li, et al, Making AI Less "Thirsty": Uncovering and Addressing the Secret Water Footprint of AI Models, Cornell University, 26 March 2025. https://arxiv.org/abs/2304.03271  accessed 16 April 2025

2. Chief Sealth speech cited in full in Seed, Macy, Fleming, Naess, Thinking Like A Mountain, New Society Publishers, Santa Cruz, CA, 1988, pp 67-73

One Second

When you are counting down to a catastrophe, or collapse, or a nuclear explosion, there is little difference between the second that separates 9 seconds and 10 seconds to go from the second that separates 89 seconds and 90 seconds to go. The ticking continues. The countdown goes on.

Anyone hearing that another second has ticked down towards doomsday should be concerned.

And that is what happened this week when the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists¹ revealed how close to midnight the Doomsday Clock now is. (Midnight is the metaphorical time at which doomsday occurs.)

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has been using the Doomsday Clock as a graphical way to illustrate how close the world is to doomsday since 1945. That is eighty years’ worth of watching the state of the world and how perilous it is, or isn’t.

This year (2025) they moved the clock from 90 seconds (one and a half minutes) before midnight to 89 seconds before midnight. A shift of just one second.

But, that one second is significant.

89 seconds is the closest the Doomsday Clock has ever been to midnight. The closest in eighty years!

In 2023 the hands of the clock were moved to 90 seconds before midnight; then, the closest ever to midnight. In 2024 the time remained at 90 seconds to midnight. Then this year, in a move of just one second, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists have shown just how concerned they are.

Amongst the reasons for the shift of that one second are:

·       Continued failure by national leaders and countries to address the issues raised by scientists over the past year.

·       The war in Ukraine

·       Conflict in the Middle East

·       Increasing size of nuclear arsenals

·       Rise in global temperature leading to increased climate impacts

·       Climate change given low priority by world leaders

·       Rapid advances in AI increasing the risk of terrorism

Any one of these threats is reason for concern. Lumped together we should be greatly concerned, for the threats do not function in isolation from each other. They interact and mutually enhance the dangers of each other.

One second may not sound like much. But when we are running out of time each second counts.

Notes:

1. https://thebulletin.org/

Next Shiny Thing

Popular myth tells us that magpies are attracted to shiny objects. Research, however, tells us that this is largely an urban myth.

Humans, on the other hand, do seem attracted to the next shiny object. Let’s briefly look at a few examples:

·       Late 19^th century: Oh look, a horseless carriage. I’ve got to have one.

·       1950s: Oh look, a television. We have to have one in our house.

·       Late 1970s/early 1980s: Oh look, colour TV. We have to get rid of the black and white and get a colour TV.

·       1990s: Oh look, a mobile phone. I have to have one.

·       Early 2000s: Oh look, a smartphone. I’ve gotta get one.

·       2020s: Oh look, someone’s driving an EV. I’ve got to have one.

All these shiny objects have mesmerised us, gained our attention, stimulated our dopamine pathways, and satisfied (for a short while) our desire for the next best thing.

Yet, all the shiny objects illustrated above could arguably be said to have created more problems than they have solved. Each, in their turn, have been discarded for the next shiny object. We asked few, if any, questions about what the consequences of each shiny thing might be.

We are addicted to the next shiny thing. This addiction even has a psychological name (although a pop-culture one, not a clinical one) – Shiny Object Syndrome. Appropriately, the acronym for this is SOS!

What is the next shiny thing?

What shiny thing has had the quickest uptake in recent years? When ChatGPT was released in November 2022 it reached its first one million in just 5 days. In comparison, it took Facebook 10 months to gain its first one million subscribers, and Netflix even longer – 3 ½ years.

It looks as though Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the next shiny thing.

Not only is the progression of AI something to be wary of, but already AI datacentres emit around 2.5% - 3.7% of global Greenhouse Gas Emissions (GHGs.) That is greater than the whole aviation industry. AI’s carbon footprint will only increase.

ChatGPT is an example of the fourth level (Reasoning AI) of AI progression. Those who develop and think about AI postulate 10 levels of AI. As each level is attained humans lose more and more control over its development.

Level 6, for instance, is identified as Super-Intelligent AI and is claimed will eclipse the intellectual capacity of all human beings combined.

The speed at which AI is developing and the closer we get to self-aware AI (Level 7) the closer we come to humans becoming unnecessary.

There is every likelihood that AI will be our final shiny thing.

Seeking the next shiny thing may be the undoing of humanity.

Wisdom Overshoot

On the front cover of his masterful book Overshoot¹ William Catton succinctly defines overshoot as ‘growth beyond an area’s carrying capacity.’  Carrying capacity, he defines as the ‘maximum permanently supportable load.’

William Catton made a coherent and irresistible case for overshoot being at the heart of our present-day environmental disasters. In attempting, via technology, to use our ingenuity and innovative powers to increase the Earth’s carrying capacity we have succeeded only in reducing it. We have way overshot the Earth’s carrying capacity, manifesting that in species extinction, climate chaos, and air, land, and sea pollution as just a few examples.

Behind the technological reasons for overshoot we can also identify another category of overshoot.

Our collective ability to innovate, invent, and fabricate systems, technology, and facilities has overshot our wisdom. What do I mean by this?

When we innovate, invent, and fabricate we ask ourselves questions such as: How can we make this happen? What resources do we need for this?

These are questions that call on our intelligence and our knowledge. These questions are framed within paradigms of progress and human exceptionalism.

They are not questions that ask us to reflect upon the consequences of our innovations, inventions, and fabrications.

They are not questions that call upon our wisdom.

Wisdom would ask, in each and every case: Should we do this?

There are innumerable instances in our past where we have not asked this question, or if we have, have ignored the answers. In just the past 200 years, we have failed to ask such a question of innovations such as: the internal combustion engine, atomic fission, weapons development, artificial intelligence, mobile phone systems, monocultural agriculture, “green” energy, the private automobile, …

Yet, if we were to honestly and robustly look into the outcomes of each of these, we would find disastrous effects and results.

Towards the end of his book, William Catton asks: ‘What must we avoid doing to keep from making a bad situation unnecessarily worse?’

His question has to be answered with – avoid our desire to continuously innovate, invent, and fabricate.

In the place of these we must give greater emphasis upon wisdom and the willingness to seriously consider the consequences of our actions, not just for ourselves, but primarily for future generations. Furthermore, within those future generations must be included birds, fish, mammals, insects, trees, fungi, ferns, rivers, mountains, sierras, and all the other phenomena that go together to make up the natural world.

We cannot afford for our intelligence to continually overshoot our carrying capacity of wisdom.

Notes

1. William R Catton, Jr., Overshoot, University of Illinois Press, Urbana & Chicago, 1982

Magic Wand

At the end of his interviews with guests, one of my favourite podcasters¹ asks of them each the same question: ‘If you could wave a magic wand and there was no personal recourse to your decision, what is one thing you would do to improve human and planetary futures?’

As I listen to his guests’ replies I sometimes wonder how I would answer that question.

I’ve come up with an answer.

Get rid of mobile phones. And all the surrounding paraphernalia that goes with them.

The label phone is out-of-date these days. For sure, the very first ones were phones, but nowadays they are also, inter alia; a camera, a news service, a video recorder, an entertainment centre (movies and music for example), a dictionary and encyclopedia, a calculator, a calendar and appointments diary, and ….

Getting rid of mobile phones, to my mind, could significantly improve human and planetary futures. Consider a few of the issues that would derive from a world without mobile phones.

There would be less anxiety and depression in the world. Research indicates that mobile phone use can become addictive (it even has a name – nomophobia) which in turn leads to greater levels of anxiety and depression.

Excessive use of mobile phones has been shown to result in eye swelling and other eyesight problems.

The “blue” light of mobile phones interferes with the ability to fall asleep and increases the chances of insomnia.

Many people use earplugs with their mobile phones. Excessive use of these has been shown to cause ear problems.

Ironically, since phones are supposed to be communication devices, mobile phone use leads to less communication between people. In turn this leads to greater levels of social isolation.

Cyberbullying is a term that has had to be invented to describe the bullying that becomes possible with mobile phones and other electronic media. A Headspace² survey in Australia in 2019 found that well over 50% of young Australians experienced cyberbullying.

Mobile phone use contributes to less physical activity, resulting in a number of health issues.

There is some (albeit inconclusive) research indicating a connection between mobile phone use and cancer.

The use of mobile phones whilst driving increases the risk of an accident by four times.

More than 5.3 billion (yes – billion) mobile phones were thrown away in 2022. Stacked flat these would form a pile that would rise 1/8^th of the way to the moon – further out into space than the orbit of the International Space Station.

Mobile phones get replaced once every 18 months, on average globally. Only 12.5% of these are recycled to some extent.

E-waste (of which mobile phones are a significant quantity) contribute 70% of all global toxic waste. 80% of the e-waste produce in the US gets exported to Asia, where workers (many of them children) get exposed to the toxic fumes when the waste is burnt following the extraction of the precious metals.

Between 400 litres and 2 million litres of water is required to produce just 1 kg of lithium, and essential mineral in making mobile phones. And that is just one of the many minerals required.

Having a mobile phone continuously at hand dumbs us down. The convenience of looking up information requires much less thinking than does undertaking honest and sincere fact finding. Those that would manipulate our minds know this well, and hence we become exposed to false news, misinformation, and downright lies.

What if mobile phones did disappear? Would that improve human and planetary futures? Maybe.

The mental health of young people might improve, or at least not get worse.

Our sense of community might return.

We might find a renaissance in the pleasures of one-to-one conversation and the return of the art of letter writing.

The Earth would be less exploited and may be able to cope better with the amount of waste we produce.

The health of workers in Asia (and elsewhere) might increase.

We might start to enjoy simple pleasures of outdoor activity again.

Does anyone have a magic wand?

Notes

1. Nate Hagens, https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/

2. Headspace is a non-profit organisation dealing with the health and wellbeing of young people in Australia.

What Noise Annoys An Oyster?

When I was a boy one of the songs I often heard on the radio (a precursor to the iPhone) was by Max Bygraves – What Noise Annoys An Oyster? It was just a humorous ditty with a catchy tune I could sing along to. The song answered its own question. ‘A noisy noise annoys an oyster most.’

What that noisy noise was is not elaborated upon in the song.

Recently, I have begun pondering the source of noisy noises. What constitutes a noisy noise? Moreover, what is the noisiest noise? There would appear to be at least two ways to answer the first of these.

A noisy noise could be the loudest noise.

Or, a noisy noise could be one that is unrelenting. One that keeps nagging away at your eardrums.

I did some research. The loudest natural sound is that of the Blue Whale, whose mating call can be as great as 188 dB (decibel) and heard from hundreds of kilometres away underwater. The loudest sound ever in recorded history is said to have been the Tunguska Meteor in Siberia in 1908. This meteor exploded some 5 – 10 km above the Earth’s surface, so leaving no impact crater, but emitted a noise of 300 dB or more. The Krakatoa eruption in 1883 produced a similar noise level and was heard 2,000 km away. Sailors within 60 km had their eardrums shattered, and thousands of people close by were killed. In comparison, an earthquake of magnitude 5 on the Richter scale can be as much as 230 dB.

All these are sudden events of relatively short duration – although I have not checked how long the mating season is for a Blue Whale.

They are also all extremely loud. A level of 85 dB is often quoted as the maximum level of toleration for a human before hearing damage is done. Normal human speech is around 55-65 dB, and a human scream can be from 80 – 120 dB. Upper safe noise levels for humans are usually set at around 75 – 80 dB.

But, what of continuous and unrelenting noise?

Unsurprisingly perhaps, the species on Earth that is the noisiest in this regard is us. We humans are incredibly noisy. Most of that noise is not from our voices, but from our technology.

Household technologies such as vacuum cleaners and dishwashers are close to the safe threshold for humans, at around 70 – 75 dB.

Other everyday technologies however are above the safe zone. Consider a few examples: Leaf blower 80 – 90 dB., lawn mower approx. 95 dB., and chainsaws around 105 dB. No wonder your ears hurt each weekend when the neighbourhood starts mowing lawns, blowing leaves around, or cutting up firewood.

Yet, even these are not our noisiest creations. A pneumatic drill for example produces 110 dB. Our city streets are extremely noisy. A car horn registers 120 dB as does the siren of an emergency vehicle. Sporting events and music concerts have levels of up to 110 dB. Go out to an airport and you’ll hear a jet aircraft take off at 130 dB.

City dwellers are beset by a continuous noise level of 60 dB or more. This constant noise level is enough to lift blood pressure and raise heart rates above normal levels. Chronic noise of this level can elevate stress levels, cause loss of concentration, and be a factor in sleep deprivation. Simply put, living in cities can be unhealthy for you.

Sadly, unhealthy noise levels are not restricted to cities.

What of the other life forms on this planet? Does the ever-present noise generated by humans have an impact?

It sure does.

Our noisy noise detrimentally affects the mating, communication, and navigation patterns of many animals. Even supposedly protected nature areas are not immune to the presence of human noise. Noise levels can be 2 – 10 times the normal background noise levels in these areas.

The effect of human noise upon animals has only recently begun being studied and analysed. However, already the damage is being witnessed. A 2019 research paper looked at data from more than 100 species (including amphibians, arthropods, birds, fish, mammals, molluscs and reptilians.)¹ The paper concluded that: ‘We found clear evidence that anthropogenic noise affects a wide range of species from a variety of different taxonomic groups.’

Disturbingly, the researchers noted that, ‘it is likely that we underestimate the effect of noise.’

The oyster in Max Bygraves’ song was correct. Noisy noises do annoy oysters – and just about every other animal (including us humans) on the planet.

Note:

1. Hansjoerg P Kunc and Rouven Schmidt. The effects of anthropogenic noise on animals: a meta-analysis, The Royal Society: Biology Letters, November 2019. https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsbl.2019.0649 accessed 16 July 2024

Small Is Beautiful: 50-year Re-reading

When I was 21 years old I read a number of thought-provoking and transformative books. One of these was Small Is Beautiful by E.F. Schumacher.¹ Published in 1973 Small Is Beautiful is one of those books that had an enormous impact on a generation that was beginning to realise the importance of environmental issues.

Now, fifty years on I have read it once more. How does this re-reading today compare with fifty years ago? What has changed? Did my initial reading really transform me? What did Schumacher have to say fifty years ago that still applies today?

As the sub-title - A study of economics as if people mattered – suggests, Schumacher was keen to examine, and possibly retrieve, economics from the morass within which it had mired itself. Indeed, is economics of any use at all was one of Schumacher’s questions:

“If (economics) cannot get beyond its vast abstractions, the national income, the rate of growth, capital/output ratio, input-output analysis, labour mobility, capital accumulation; if it cannot get beyond all this and make contact with the human realities of poverty, frustration, alienation, despair, breakdown, crime, escapism, stress, congestion, ugliness, and spiritual death, then let us scrap economics and start afresh.”

Challenging words fifty years ago. No less challenging today. Indeed, more so, if we consider the changes that have taken place over the past fifty years.

Although not primarily a book about environmental issues, Schumacher did have some apt observations to make. He noted that we are part of nature, yet in our battle with nature even if we win the battle, we will find ourselves “on the losing side.” He noted too that “nature always knows where and when to stop,” yet we (humans) continue to act as if economic growth can go on ad infinitum. Asking “what is enough?” Schumacher claimed that the economist is not in a position to reply, for the economist has no concept of enough.

Schumacher was keen to espouse ideas of appropriate technology and small, decentralised economies and technologies. In championing appropriate and small-scale technology he noted that our use of technology to solve problems often only generated more, and worse, problems. Citing a contemporary of his, Barry Commoner (an American biologist and ecologist) he noted that “the new problems are not the consequences of incidental failure but of technological success.”

Fifty years on and Schumacher’s warnings cannot be consigned to history. Indeed, many of them have come to pass.

Furthermore, things have sped up and additional harms and difficulties have come about. For example, when Schumacher was writing, the terms global warming, the greenhouse effect, and climate change had not entered our vocabulary. Nor had the basic cause of it all -overshoot. In 1973 when Schumacher was writing his book, humanity was still operating within the boundaries of one Earth. But only just! Within a year of publication our consumption, waste, and pollution activities required more than one Earth to cope. Fifty years later, at a global level, we require 1.7 Earths!! William Catton’s ground-breaking book, Overshoot, was a decade in the future.²

Had Schumacher known the full magnitude of these, would he have written a different book?

I suspect so. He would possibly have been more strident in his criticism of technology. He would probably have put greater emphasis upon our exploitation of nature and the Earth.

I doubt that he would have changed his mind about the underlying ills of the world. He said it then, he is likely to have said it today, “We are suffering from a metaphysical disease, and the cure must therefore be metaphysical.” Indeed, he may have stressed this much more, and have explored our metaphysical disease in greater depth.

Schumacher addresses our metaphysical disease not in great depth. However, what he does say about this disease is worth listening to. For example, he notes that, “The beginning of wisdom is the admission of one’s own lack of knowledge.”

Today, fifty years on, we have a lot more knowledge, yet we seem to have less wisdom. Wisdom askes the question, what should we do? Knowledge asks the question; how can we do this? without considering the possible consequences. Schumacher was correct fifty years ago, yet we have not yet acknowledged our lack of knowledge.

Perhaps the most important counsel that Schumacher can give us in reading his book fifty years on comes in the final sentences of Small Is Beautiful:

“Everywhere people ask: ‘What can I actually do?’ The answer is as simple as it is disconcerting: we can, each of us. work to put our own house in order. The guidance we need for this work cannot be found in science or technology, the value of which utterly depends on the ends they serve; but it can still be found in the traditional wisdom of (humanity.)”

Fifty years after I first read this book, I now think I understand Schumacher’s ideas with greater clarity.

Notes:

1. E.F. Schumacher, Small Is Beautiful: A Study of Economics as if People Mattered, Abacus, London, 1974. Previously published by Blond & Briggs Ltd., Great Britain, 1973

2. William R Catton, Jr., Overshoot: The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change, University of Illinois Press, Urbana and Chicago, 1982

Large Language Models: Destroyers of Communication

This blog is on a topic I know little about. However, I do know three things. First, I know how to listen to my inner-tutor (my intuition) and second, I know how to listen to experts in the field. Third, and most importantly, I know how important trust is to the building and maintenance of community and global well-being.

Large Language Models (LLMs) are computational models that enable language generation and processing. Probably the most well-known expression of LLMs is ChatGPT.

When I listen to my intuition and the thoughts of experts, I grow increasingly wary of, and sceptical of, LLMs and Artificial Intelligence (AI) in general.

AI poses many threats and risks to humanity and the rest of the world. To mention just a few here: 1. The energy use by AI is doubling every 100 days, 2. Studies are now being show that LLMs are learning to lie and deceive, 3. Universities and other institutions are being challenged by the issue of plagiarism and originality of thought because of LLMs, 4. Inbuilt bias (gender, race, class, sexuality etc) occurs in the ‘harvesting of words’¹ that LLMs undertake, 5. AI undermines democracy and privacy.

I want to focus here on another issue, that of trust.

First though, we must discuss what communication is and is not. Communication is not simply the passing on of information. As with many words in the English language, communication comes to us via Latin, in this case, communicare. In Latin this word can be translated as: to share, divide out, join, unite, participate in, impart, inform.

Communicare itself derives from communis, meaning in common. Com = with, together, and unis = oneness, union.

When we understand this, we realise that communication is much, much, more than simply passing on information.

Communication is a means to commune, a way of building and maintaining relationships. Wholesome communication is a cornerstone of healthy communities.

This is what AI destroys.

Relationships are built on trust, and that is what LLMs undermine.

A study undertaken by the University of Queensland in 2023 of over 17,000 people from 17 countries showed that three out of five people were wary of trusting AI systems.²

Not trusting AI systems is one thing. Not trusting each other is another. AI does nothing to mitigate the already high levels of mistrust and polarisation in the world. It may indeed exacerbate it.

The reason for this is that LLMs are not a communication tool. They are simply an information tool. They pass on information, without regard to the veracity of the information gleaned and generated.

Let me pose a scenario, which is likely to become more prevalent in the future. Suppose I am in communication with someone and have built a relationship of trust with that person. When I read something from them I do not question that what I read is that person’s own ideas and thought.

But then, what happens if I discover that that person has begun to use ChatGPT (or other AI) to generate what they write? Will I accept that the words are indeed those of the person I am in communication with?

If all I am interested in is the information in what I read, then I will possibly be accepting of the material.

However, if my concern is more that of maintaining a relationship with that person (including the exchange of information) then knowing that the material has been generated by AI, and not by the person themselves, my trust in future interactions with that person is likely to be diminished. In other words, the communication between us is seriously undermined.

LLMs, and AI generally, is poised to damage levels of trust between people. When trust is destabilised then relationships founder, and polarisation follows.

Already, the levels of inter-personal (and inter-national) trust are decreasing, and polarisation  increasing.³ AI exacerbates this trend.

AI is destroying true communication.

Notes:

1. Harvesting of words: a term used by Tracey Spicer in a public presentation on Artificial Intelligence, 8 June 2024. Spicer is the author of Man-Made: How the bias of the past is being built into the future, Simon & Schuster, Australia, 2023.

2. Gillespie, N., Lockey, S., Curtis, C., Pool, J., & Akbari, A. Trust in Artificial Intelligence: A Global Study. The University of Queensland and KPMG Australia. 2023, doi:10.14264/00d3c94

3. For example, in the US less than 40% of people felt that ‘most people can be trusted.’ Dan Vallone et al., Two Stories of Distrust in America, More in Common, New York, 2021.

Nuclear: Not Now

I was recently told about a film/documentary directed by Oliver Stone. Released in 2022 Nuclear Now is an unabashed pro-nuclear energy documentary. Stone’s film promotes nuclear as the method by which climate change is to be averted.

Since the disasters of Chernobyl and Fukushima many countries around the world have been cutting back on their nuclear energy programs. Nuclear Now attempts to make the case for halting that decline and rebuilding the nuclear business.

This blog, however, argues – Nuclear: Not Now.

Stone’s documentary, and Oliver Stone himself, begin with a false premise, prompting him to ask the wrong questions. In turn, this leads to erroneous answers.

The false premise is that climate change is a problem to be solved. Beginning with this premise, the film asks: ‘How can we produce more electricity and still cut down on carbon emissions to halt the climate crisis?’ (my emphasis) Stone’s answer to this question – nuclear energy.

However, climate change is not a problem to be solved. There are at least two falsities in this assumption. First, climate change is a symptom, not a cause of something damaging. The cause, if anything, is humanity’s overshoot of planetary boundaries, with climate change being one of those boundaries. Secondly, climate change is part of a much larger phenomenon – a predicament. A predicament is multi-faceted, complex, and inherently unsolvable. A predicament has an outcome (or outcomes) which cannot be predicted, and certainly unable to be controlled by human intervention.

Because of this basic misunderstanding of what climate change is, and how it is manifested, Nuclear Now asks the wrong questions, and hence, gets the wrong answers.

Just Suppose

However, let us make an assumption of our own. Let us suppose that nuclear energy is one of the options available to us to reduce carbon emissions. If it is an option, then how viable is it?

Even with this (futile) assumption, the answer to whether nuclear energy is viable must still be – No!

What follows are just four areas in which the film is in error, or at least, misleading.

1. No climate gases. This claim is ludicrous. From the mining of uranium, to its transportation, to the construction of reactors, to the storage of nuclear waste, the entire nuclear process emits GHGs (Greenhouse gases). The entire process must be considered, not simply the final production of electricity in a built nuclear reactor.

2. Nuclear energy kills far less people. Appealing to this argument is akin to asserting that the death rate from car accidents in my country is okay because it is less than that of a neighbouring country. This argument, is actually an argument for reducing entirely our dependency upon electricity and other energies. The film claims that because the deaths from nuclear accidents have been limited that the technology is safe. Ironically, the film gives the example of the Bhopal chemical disaster in India. A gas leak at the Union Carbide Corporation factory in 1984 resulted in the deaths of an estimated 8,000 people in the first two weeks, and a similar number since. Well over half-a-million people suffered various injuries as a result of the leak. Undoubtedly the US based company (Union Carbide Corporation) as the majority owner of the factory considered it to be safe also! Until the disaster!

A number of other examples of industries that kill people at a greater rate than nuclear are presented in the film. All the examples given (and many more) begs these question: Is industrialisation killing us? Is industrialisation safe? But, these questions never get asked in the film.

Of the nuclear accidents that have happened the film suggests that ‘poorly designed reactors,’ ‘controls were not in place,’ or that ‘human error’ were the cause of these accidents. Yes, all this may be true – human beings are fallible. We do make mistakes. However, if these mistakes and poor designs have led to accidents in the first few decades of nuclear energy, how much more likely is it that mistakes of a human-nature will occur during the coming thousands of years (for that is the length of time that nuclear waste remains toxic and lethal)? The consequences of such a human mistake could be significantly greater than the Bhopal disaster.

3. The increase in use of solar and wind-powered energy are contrasted with that of nuclear in the film. The film notes that these ‘renewables have been going on top of fossil fuels, not replacing them.’ Exactly, and so too has nuclear. During the heydays of reactor construction and operation, the electricity produced by nuclear did not replace that of fossil fuels – it added to the use of electricity. This is a classic example of the Jevons Paradox at work. A paradox that the film makes no mention of.

Jevons Paradox states that when a fuel is made cheaper, more accessible, or simply available, then the use of that fuel will increase, not decrease. Greater numbers of nuclear reactors will increase the consumption of electricity, not decrease it!

4. The most grievous point the film makes about nuclear is that it must be scaled up quickly. The film makes the point that approximately 400 nuclear reactors currently supply 10% of the world’s electricity needs. ‘Reactors,’ the film claims, ‘could be built on a factory scale.’

But, what would this mean? One person who has attempted to answer this, and has done the calculations required, is Dr Simon Michaux, a professor of physics, mining, and geology. Dr Michaux’ arithmetic shows that at current levels of reactor building, decommissioning, and replacement, the earth has about 300 years worth of Uranium reserves.

However, if the world were to ramp up the construction of nuclear reactors, as Stone would want, then those reserves would be depleted within 75 years. Even then, with such a vigorous and aggressive program, less than 70% of fossil fuels would be phased out. Imagine how quickly reserves were to be depleted to reduce the use of fossil fuels by even 50%!!

The real problem (if a ‘problem’ is conceded) is that the question is not nuclear vs fossil fuels. It is a question of supply vs demand. Our demand keeps increasing. Increasing supply is not going to solve that.

IN the final moments of the film, Stone comments ‘We may have reached a point where Earth is asking us – “do you know what you are doing?”’

Exactly! Sadly, the film/doco Nuclear Now does not answer the Earth’s pressing interrogation.

Notes:

1. Dr Simon Michaux, interviewed by Nate Hagen in Minerals and Materials Blindness, The Great Simplification, 18 May 2022