Many southerners see the Confederate defeat of 150 years ago as a defeat for a form of civilization that they admire--chivalry, graciousness, hospitality, independence and self sufficiency. These are laudable traits, but that's not what the Civil War was about. The wealthy southern landowners portrayed their cause as being that, as part of the pro-war propaganda. It was indeed about a way of life--the wealthy landowners could not see a way of maintaining themselves in the style to which they had become accustomed without slavery and the repression of the black race. When the ugly truth about what the war was really about was brought to the fore, they of course did their best to revise history, change the subject, and find new ways of getting extremely cheap labor, many of which continue to involve repressing poor blacks, and other poor people.
50 years ago at the height of the civil rights movement and the centenary of the Civil War, many of these repressions were blocked by federal action. The confederate battle flag, of which there had been only a handful during the war itself and had been called "the southern cross", had become a symbol for the Ku Klux Klan, and was re-purposed to represent resistance to the civil rights movement. And of course the good things about the southern way of life. Most southerners believed the happy lie, but southern blacks and educated others knew exactly what it really meant, and cringed when they saw it. Most of the ex-confederate capitols flew some version of it for a time, and a few incorporated it into their state flag.
There are some good southern values and history worthy of preservation. But the flag does not represent them. Revisionism and denial of the horrors of history is not a cause worthy of defense. That is what the confederate battle flag represents, and since Appomattox, always has. Those that died serving the confederacy were victims of an evil regime, just as slaves were. All deserve to be mourned, even if they were deluded during their lifetime.
There are lots of causes that seem lost but are worth fighting for. Until last week, getting the flag off of government properties seemed hopeless, but today it seems inevitable. (I worry though, that pro-gun advocates are using it as a stalking horse to stop the conversation we should be having about gun control) Theodore Roosevelt tried to get universal public health insurance for Americans, more than a century ago. It took more than a century. We don't quite have it yet, but we're a lot closer than we were 7 years ago. There are lost causes worth continuing to fight for. There are others that need to go to the ash heap of history.
I hope that someone does come up with a symbol that represents the good parts of southern values and heritage, without the burden of slavery and oppression. It's even possible it might be one of the other confederate battle flags, one that was not used by the Ku Klux Klan to incite repression of blacks.
As for the flag itself, I think we need to treat it as free speech and not be banned, but deprecated as offensive. I think we have a good prototype in religious speech: representatives of government must not display it, including public school teachers, elected officials and other public employees, and it should be kept off of state or federal property, except for museums. But several stores and flagmakers have announced that they will no longer make or sell it. I think this is a violation of free speech. I want it to go away because nobody wants to express what it says, not because the expression itself has been banned.
25 June 2015
11 June 2015
Gerrymandering and Undrerrepresentation
A lot of people have come to recognize that Gerrymandering (the chopping up of political districts such that a favored party has a dominant majority) is a big problem in a lot of states. A few states have tried to address this with nonpartisan or bipartisan districting commissions, with rules about irregular border and a few other things, but nothing really works.
A separate but related problem is that the present two party system strongly protects those two parties and does not allow third parties. The libertarian and green party both have several percent of the voters, but do not hold a single seat of the 435 in congress.
My idea is that the delegation that each state sends to the congress must contain a partisan mix corresponding to the actual party vote in that state's US congress elections. So, for example, a state has 10 districts, and the statewide vote is 40% Democrat, 40% Republican, 10% Libertarian, 10% Green, the states delegation must be 4Ds, 4Rs, 1L, 1G. How the state chooses to implement this is up to the state. Fixing Gerrymandering would be a start, but it does nothing for the parties that have significant votership, but no clear plurality anywhere. My thinking would be to reduce the number of districts to 8 and have two "at large" candidates for the two smaller parties.
Perhaps a better option would be to have even fewer districts--say, 5--and have the other 5 selected at large based on getting fair representation. If some of those districts are severely gerrymandered, one of the two majorities may be getting severely underrepresented, and at-large representatives could be used to fix the balance.
The way voting would work would be you'd have your district elections as always, and there would also be an at-large election. Candidates for the districts would also be allowed to run in the at large. You specify (vote for) your party, and then you vote for a district candidate, and some number of at-large candidates according to the number at large seats available. If a party needs at-large representatives, the at-large votes from voters matching that party would be tallied to select the candidate--the top vote getter from voters of that party would get the seat. This would allow voters to cross party lines.
A separate but related problem is that the present two party system strongly protects those two parties and does not allow third parties. The libertarian and green party both have several percent of the voters, but do not hold a single seat of the 435 in congress.
My idea is that the delegation that each state sends to the congress must contain a partisan mix corresponding to the actual party vote in that state's US congress elections. So, for example, a state has 10 districts, and the statewide vote is 40% Democrat, 40% Republican, 10% Libertarian, 10% Green, the states delegation must be 4Ds, 4Rs, 1L, 1G. How the state chooses to implement this is up to the state. Fixing Gerrymandering would be a start, but it does nothing for the parties that have significant votership, but no clear plurality anywhere. My thinking would be to reduce the number of districts to 8 and have two "at large" candidates for the two smaller parties.
Perhaps a better option would be to have even fewer districts--say, 5--and have the other 5 selected at large based on getting fair representation. If some of those districts are severely gerrymandered, one of the two majorities may be getting severely underrepresented, and at-large representatives could be used to fix the balance.
The way voting would work would be you'd have your district elections as always, and there would also be an at-large election. Candidates for the districts would also be allowed to run in the at large. You specify (vote for) your party, and then you vote for a district candidate, and some number of at-large candidates according to the number at large seats available. If a party needs at-large representatives, the at-large votes from voters matching that party would be tallied to select the candidate--the top vote getter from voters of that party would get the seat. This would allow voters to cross party lines.
08 June 2015
What's Next for Tesla?
Tesla has 3 cars in the product pipe, a new battery for home use and a gigafactory under construction. They plan to be a BIG car company and do some other things too.
The three cars that are already in production:
The roadster: two seater, two door, convertable Wheelbase = 93", Length = 155", Width = 73", Track = 59", Curb Weight 2723 lbs. No longer manufactured.
The Model S: 5 seat 4 door sports sedan, Wheelbase 116.5", Length 196", Width 86", Track 67", Curb Weight 4647 lbs.
The Model X: 7 seat 5 door station wagon/sports utility vehicle. First delivery in 2016. It looks like a taller version of the model S. I bet it uses the same chassis. the BMW X5 that it will compete with has slightly smaller chassis dimensions than the model S.
The Model 3: Smaller and half the price of the model S, but it's promised to have similar range and will be "less adventurous". My guess it will closer to the market niche of the Camry or Leaf. No real announcements will be made until at least 2016 but tesla employees seem to be very excited.
Tesla has also suggested that there may be a revival of the roadster. My guess is that this will use the same chassis as the model 3 with body styling reminiscent of the roadster. there's lots of precedent for this sort of thing: think Honda Civic and CRX.
So what else can be built on these two chassis?
A van: ford's E series van is 217x80" with a 138x70" wheelbase. less than 2 feet longer, and about the same width than the model S. There's no engine in a tesla so the cab could be quite a bit farther forward. This would be very practical as a delivery van, a work van for an electrician or plumber, etc, a family hauler, a class B motorhome
A truck: The ford ranger is 189-206 inches long by 70 inches wide: narrower and about the same length as a model S. the ford 150 is about as wide and 2-4 feet longer, so I'm thinking somewhere between. The major changes required would be an elevated, long travel suspension for rougher terrain, and towing. they already have the beginnings of the truck suspension with the air suspension, although it needs to be higher than that.
A family sedan/taxicab: the model X still has a very "fastback" roofline. by extending the high roofline even farther back, this would make it more suitable for carrying grownups in the back.
The three cars that are already in production:
The roadster: two seater, two door, convertable Wheelbase = 93", Length = 155", Width = 73", Track = 59", Curb Weight 2723 lbs. No longer manufactured.
The Model S: 5 seat 4 door sports sedan, Wheelbase 116.5", Length 196", Width 86", Track 67", Curb Weight 4647 lbs.
The Model X: 7 seat 5 door station wagon/sports utility vehicle. First delivery in 2016. It looks like a taller version of the model S. I bet it uses the same chassis. the BMW X5 that it will compete with has slightly smaller chassis dimensions than the model S.
The Model 3: Smaller and half the price of the model S, but it's promised to have similar range and will be "less adventurous". My guess it will closer to the market niche of the Camry or Leaf. No real announcements will be made until at least 2016 but tesla employees seem to be very excited.
Tesla has also suggested that there may be a revival of the roadster. My guess is that this will use the same chassis as the model 3 with body styling reminiscent of the roadster. there's lots of precedent for this sort of thing: think Honda Civic and CRX.
So what else can be built on these two chassis?
A van: ford's E series van is 217x80" with a 138x70" wheelbase. less than 2 feet longer, and about the same width than the model S. There's no engine in a tesla so the cab could be quite a bit farther forward. This would be very practical as a delivery van, a work van for an electrician or plumber, etc, a family hauler, a class B motorhome
A truck: The ford ranger is 189-206 inches long by 70 inches wide: narrower and about the same length as a model S. the ford 150 is about as wide and 2-4 feet longer, so I'm thinking somewhere between. The major changes required would be an elevated, long travel suspension for rougher terrain, and towing. they already have the beginnings of the truck suspension with the air suspension, although it needs to be higher than that.
A family sedan/taxicab: the model X still has a very "fastback" roofline. by extending the high roofline even farther back, this would make it more suitable for carrying grownups in the back.
31 May 2015
Insane Discoveries
I usually enjoy the website www.iflscience.com, but this time they've blown it. On a post labeled Top 10 Insane Unexplained Discoveries, I can find only 3 real mysteries of the 11 things listed. 5 of the others are worth pursuing but are not really mysterious and I don't think anybody deserves to be a considered a crank for the other three, just wasting time on something unlikely to be fruitful. The video is pointlessly long and conveys its largely incorrect message painfully slowly, exacerbated by especially irritating music.
Here they are:
10: Hastatic Order: There seems to be a mysterious force that occurs in certain Uranium compounds while cooled to superconductivity. This is a real mystery, worth pursuing.
9: Variable Constants: The speed light in a vacuum is a constant. Under poorly understood circumstances, the speed of light in certain far away galaxies can be observed to be changing. There are several completely plausible explanations: gravitational lensing, for one. What's not known is which it is. Definitely worthy of scientific pursuit.
8: Disappearing Europeans. They found a substantially colony of dark skinned, blue eyed paleolithic europeans that have died out. Lots of colonies have died out. Not really a mystery at all.
7: Tetra Neutrons. Irreproducible.
6: Ultra energetic cosmic rays. There are several mechanisms that might cause it. The leading candidate, a supernova, was incorrect. But there are others. Certainly a phenomenon worth pursuing. But it's unlikely to generate a new principle of physics or biology or something.
5: Placebo Effect: many people have shown substantial cures when given placebos. Clearly the mind can make you sick, and clearly it can quit doing it. No mystery at all. It's worth study--maybe it can be used in presently unanticipated ways.
4: Kuiper Cliff. There's a region of the Kuiper belt which has apparently been swept clear of the usual asteroids, etc. This would take a substantial planet, but no such thing is evident. This is not a mystery at all. Something happened to make the planet go away too recently for the asteroids to fill the space, but not recently enough to still be apparent. It might be another large object bulls-eying the planet such that the fragments spread far (probably from outside the solar system) or more likely, it might have been captured by another planet on the way through. Maybe it'll be discovered, probably not.
3: c-value enigma. the complexity of organisms was thought to be related to the complexity of the DNA that produced them. But it turns out that there's a lot of "junk" DNA in a lot of organisms and complexity of DNA doesn't correlate well with the complexity of the organism. If you understand what junk DNA is, this is not a mystery at all. There's a small mystery in why some simple organisms have simple DNA. My guess is that larger organisms (and their immune systems) tend to protect junk DNA, while single celled ones are much more susceptible to the junk causing problems and evolutionary pressure eliminates them. There might be a new understanding of DNA in there, so it's worth figuring it out.
2: Cold Fusion. This is an engineering problem, not really a scientific mystery. Some people think that nuclear fusion can be done in a context contained enough that we can get useful energy out and there have been suggestive experiments that it might be, although so far they've all been a bust or worse. But it remains an unsolved engineering problem, and it may for a long time. It sure would be great if somebody figured it out though.
1a: Dark Matter: Galaxies hold together in a way that suggests they have at least 20 times the mass that can be observed. Something that is presently unobservable is in there. It might be black holes, or it may be something else. Definitely a big mystery, but not as big a mystery as dark energy, which is unrelated, apart from having also been discovered by astronomers and given the term "dark"
1b: Dark Energy: The universe can be seen to be expanding in a way which contradicts inertia. Something is pushing. What it is is the biggest mystery of physics. There are several attempted explanations, none of which fit the "standard" model, which would require a substantial rewriting to fit it. (the last time we had such a rewriting of the laws of physics (by Einstein and others), the atomic bomb, the transistor and a lot more came out of it. the time before (by Faraday and Maxwell), most of what we know about electricity came out of it, including electric motors, radio, and more.)
Here they are:
10: Hastatic Order: There seems to be a mysterious force that occurs in certain Uranium compounds while cooled to superconductivity. This is a real mystery, worth pursuing.
9: Variable Constants: The speed light in a vacuum is a constant. Under poorly understood circumstances, the speed of light in certain far away galaxies can be observed to be changing. There are several completely plausible explanations: gravitational lensing, for one. What's not known is which it is. Definitely worthy of scientific pursuit.
8: Disappearing Europeans. They found a substantially colony of dark skinned, blue eyed paleolithic europeans that have died out. Lots of colonies have died out. Not really a mystery at all.
7: Tetra Neutrons. Irreproducible.
6: Ultra energetic cosmic rays. There are several mechanisms that might cause it. The leading candidate, a supernova, was incorrect. But there are others. Certainly a phenomenon worth pursuing. But it's unlikely to generate a new principle of physics or biology or something.
5: Placebo Effect: many people have shown substantial cures when given placebos. Clearly the mind can make you sick, and clearly it can quit doing it. No mystery at all. It's worth study--maybe it can be used in presently unanticipated ways.
4: Kuiper Cliff. There's a region of the Kuiper belt which has apparently been swept clear of the usual asteroids, etc. This would take a substantial planet, but no such thing is evident. This is not a mystery at all. Something happened to make the planet go away too recently for the asteroids to fill the space, but not recently enough to still be apparent. It might be another large object bulls-eying the planet such that the fragments spread far (probably from outside the solar system) or more likely, it might have been captured by another planet on the way through. Maybe it'll be discovered, probably not.
3: c-value enigma. the complexity of organisms was thought to be related to the complexity of the DNA that produced them. But it turns out that there's a lot of "junk" DNA in a lot of organisms and complexity of DNA doesn't correlate well with the complexity of the organism. If you understand what junk DNA is, this is not a mystery at all. There's a small mystery in why some simple organisms have simple DNA. My guess is that larger organisms (and their immune systems) tend to protect junk DNA, while single celled ones are much more susceptible to the junk causing problems and evolutionary pressure eliminates them. There might be a new understanding of DNA in there, so it's worth figuring it out.
2: Cold Fusion. This is an engineering problem, not really a scientific mystery. Some people think that nuclear fusion can be done in a context contained enough that we can get useful energy out and there have been suggestive experiments that it might be, although so far they've all been a bust or worse. But it remains an unsolved engineering problem, and it may for a long time. It sure would be great if somebody figured it out though.
1a: Dark Matter: Galaxies hold together in a way that suggests they have at least 20 times the mass that can be observed. Something that is presently unobservable is in there. It might be black holes, or it may be something else. Definitely a big mystery, but not as big a mystery as dark energy, which is unrelated, apart from having also been discovered by astronomers and given the term "dark"
1b: Dark Energy: The universe can be seen to be expanding in a way which contradicts inertia. Something is pushing. What it is is the biggest mystery of physics. There are several attempted explanations, none of which fit the "standard" model, which would require a substantial rewriting to fit it. (the last time we had such a rewriting of the laws of physics (by Einstein and others), the atomic bomb, the transistor and a lot more came out of it. the time before (by Faraday and Maxwell), most of what we know about electricity came out of it, including electric motors, radio, and more.)
27 May 2015
Death Penalty
Nebraska has voted to ban the death penalty. This makes a lot of sense. The death penalty is cruel and unusual, it is irreversible, it is much more expensive than life in prison, and there is no particular evidence it deters crime.
Blackstone suggested that it is better that 10 guilty go free than one innocent be punished, and several of the founders expressed the same opinion. It turns out that that's pretty close to the rate of erroneous convictions. The Illinois Innocence Project exonerated 11% of death row inmates when DNA evidence became available. Other similar studies have found different numbers--few lower than 6%. Through incompetent defense, irresponsible prosecution, misuse and misinterpretation of evidence, and more, the criminal justice system is imperfect. It's the best we've figured out, but it makes enough mistakes that we should not resort to irreversible punishments.
Justice Blackman, when he was retiring, stated that he was opposed to the death penalty as a violation of the 8th amendment. It cannot, he said, be applied fairly in this society with various forms of discrimination.
Over the years, the method used has changed. During my lifetime, it switched from the electric chair, then to the gas chamber, and then finally lethal injection. Before that, hanging, decapitation and firing squads were used, among others. Each switch was made because previous methods were deemed to be cruel and painful. Lethal injection uses a sequence of drugs--one to render the subject unconscious, and then further drugs to kill them. The doctors of the world have decided that they are firmly against the death penalty and have banned doctors from administering lethal injections...and have pressed the pharmaceutical companies of the world to stop providing the required drugs to anyone who might use them this way. The botched lethal injections we've seen recently have been the result of medical amateurs using drugs that were not designed for the purpose they were being used.
Many people argue that capital punishment is more economical than life in prison. Not True! Because of all the necessary legal processing, capital punishment is as much as ten times as expensive as life in prison.
There is no particular evidence that the death penalty deters crimes. The deterrence effect only works if you're thinking rationally and suspect you might be caught. Killers either aren't thinking rationally or they are being very careful and don't think they will be caught--think of a mob hit man.
The one real thing that the ultimate penalty does is give some finality and retribution to the victim and their families. That's small consolation for the thousands who have been wrongly executed. The urge to vengeance is very destructive. Jesus himself spoke to this subject. Vengeance is mine, sayeth the lord. Not you or me and not the courts. Only god.
The goals of our penal system should be: #1: to get dangerous people out of society. #2: to deter crime. #3: to rehabilitate those who can be. Life in prison does this without the irreversibility of the death penalty.
I think there's one situation in which capital punishment is acceptable: When the criminal themselves want it. This is uncommon, but not at all unheard of. Gary Gilmore, Ted Bundy, and several others have concluded that their lives were not worth living. I am opposed to suicide for someone who is simply depressed, but if a person is objectively in a situation where their life is irretrievably no longer worth living, euthanasia is the most humane solution. This is appropriate for people with terminal diseases that kill slowly and painfully. And this is appropriate where the convict agrees that they did the deed and there is no possibility of them living a life outside of prison. Of course we should do it in the most humane way practical--unless the convict, as did Gary Gilmore, wants something more dramatic.
addenda 10 June 2015
Scalia's perfect capital punishment case-falls apart
Blackstone suggested that it is better that 10 guilty go free than one innocent be punished, and several of the founders expressed the same opinion. It turns out that that's pretty close to the rate of erroneous convictions. The Illinois Innocence Project exonerated 11% of death row inmates when DNA evidence became available. Other similar studies have found different numbers--few lower than 6%. Through incompetent defense, irresponsible prosecution, misuse and misinterpretation of evidence, and more, the criminal justice system is imperfect. It's the best we've figured out, but it makes enough mistakes that we should not resort to irreversible punishments.
Justice Blackman, when he was retiring, stated that he was opposed to the death penalty as a violation of the 8th amendment. It cannot, he said, be applied fairly in this society with various forms of discrimination.
Over the years, the method used has changed. During my lifetime, it switched from the electric chair, then to the gas chamber, and then finally lethal injection. Before that, hanging, decapitation and firing squads were used, among others. Each switch was made because previous methods were deemed to be cruel and painful. Lethal injection uses a sequence of drugs--one to render the subject unconscious, and then further drugs to kill them. The doctors of the world have decided that they are firmly against the death penalty and have banned doctors from administering lethal injections...and have pressed the pharmaceutical companies of the world to stop providing the required drugs to anyone who might use them this way. The botched lethal injections we've seen recently have been the result of medical amateurs using drugs that were not designed for the purpose they were being used.
Many people argue that capital punishment is more economical than life in prison. Not True! Because of all the necessary legal processing, capital punishment is as much as ten times as expensive as life in prison.
There is no particular evidence that the death penalty deters crimes. The deterrence effect only works if you're thinking rationally and suspect you might be caught. Killers either aren't thinking rationally or they are being very careful and don't think they will be caught--think of a mob hit man.
The one real thing that the ultimate penalty does is give some finality and retribution to the victim and their families. That's small consolation for the thousands who have been wrongly executed. The urge to vengeance is very destructive. Jesus himself spoke to this subject. Vengeance is mine, sayeth the lord. Not you or me and not the courts. Only god.
The goals of our penal system should be: #1: to get dangerous people out of society. #2: to deter crime. #3: to rehabilitate those who can be. Life in prison does this without the irreversibility of the death penalty.
I think there's one situation in which capital punishment is acceptable: When the criminal themselves want it. This is uncommon, but not at all unheard of. Gary Gilmore, Ted Bundy, and several others have concluded that their lives were not worth living. I am opposed to suicide for someone who is simply depressed, but if a person is objectively in a situation where their life is irretrievably no longer worth living, euthanasia is the most humane solution. This is appropriate for people with terminal diseases that kill slowly and painfully. And this is appropriate where the convict agrees that they did the deed and there is no possibility of them living a life outside of prison. Of course we should do it in the most humane way practical--unless the convict, as did Gary Gilmore, wants something more dramatic.
addenda 10 June 2015
Scalia's perfect capital punishment case-falls apart
26 May 2015
The Problem Isn't Immigration, It's Carrying Capacity
There are immigration crises happening in North Africa with people trying to get away from the catastrophe that Libya has become, from West Asia, trying to escape the civil wars in Syria and Iraq, from South East Asia with people trying to get away from Myanmar and more. There's an imaginary crisis of people coming from Latin America into the US and the very real one of cruel deportations back. These all reflect real problems in the regions these people are trying to escape. No one nation can hope to accommodate all the refugees, nor should they. Much of the hostility toward immigrants, in both our country and in others, is racist or xenophobic.
in the 19th and early 20th centuries, there were massive immigrations to the United States from nearly every part of the world. In hindsight, nearly all of these groups have been widely accepted, although there was certainly a large amount of intolerance when they were first coming over. Small amounts of this remains, especially towards groups who can't pass for Anglo-Saxon. These groups enthusiastically embraced American culture and added their distinctiveness.
It all went well, because America had wide open spaces. It had small cities wanting to become big ones. It had seemingly inexhaustible natural resources, including water, oil, coal, aluminum, iron and lots more. Perhaps most importantly, it had lots of places to dump the stuff you couldn't figure out what to do with. That included setting off atomic bombs in secret when you weren't quite sure what would happen and wanted to make sure nobody was watching.
Today, this is gone. There's basically nowhere that isn't feeling some pressure from overcrowding. Even the great barren places of the southwestern desert and the almost uninhabitable hinterlands of Alaska are seen to be somebody's back yard. There is really nowhere left, anywhere on the planet, if you truly want to be left alone.
I think this is all a symptom of an ecological phenomenon called Carrying Capacity. The carrying capacity of an ecosystem for any particular species is that which is stable, consuming only the resources that the rest of the ecosystem can produce. If it exceeds it, the population will crash, and won't recover until the resources are replenished. These crashes are very traumatic, and many ecosystems never recover.
There are ways to fool this: a small, well tended aquarium can support lots more fish than a much larger, poorly maintained one. The same is true for people. Sophisticated farming and transportation can provide food well beyond what a foraging culture could achieve. Well managed countries have much higher carrying capacities than corrupt or incompetently managed ones. If something bad is happening in your community, you will do what you can to get away from the problem.
I think the carrying capacity of the planet is somewhere between 1 and 2 billion people. We crossed 1 billion shortly after 1800, and 2 billion in 1929. Today we are over 7. Several countries have recognized that their excessive population is a problem and have acted with various levels of aggressiveness to deal with it. In many cases, this has left them open to the consequences of immigration from countries that have not done this. Immigrant populations always struggle to fit in, but if the whole society is struggling with the limits to the carrying capacity, the stress of this seems inordinately worse.
I think America's share of world carrying capacity should be about 10%: 100-200M people. (we arrived a little late, crossing 100M in 1915 and 200M in 1968). The infrastructure we have, which was mostly built in the 1940s through 60s, could handle this. Instead, we have about 320M, and we quit building and repairing infrastructure in the 1970s. We need to understand what we are doing to ourselves. I think we need to look at various incentives and barriers to get our population back to this sustainable level. And other countries must do the same. A lot of our problems--many of the civil wars, pollution, climate change, etc., can be greatly reduced if we do this.
in the 19th and early 20th centuries, there were massive immigrations to the United States from nearly every part of the world. In hindsight, nearly all of these groups have been widely accepted, although there was certainly a large amount of intolerance when they were first coming over. Small amounts of this remains, especially towards groups who can't pass for Anglo-Saxon. These groups enthusiastically embraced American culture and added their distinctiveness.
It all went well, because America had wide open spaces. It had small cities wanting to become big ones. It had seemingly inexhaustible natural resources, including water, oil, coal, aluminum, iron and lots more. Perhaps most importantly, it had lots of places to dump the stuff you couldn't figure out what to do with. That included setting off atomic bombs in secret when you weren't quite sure what would happen and wanted to make sure nobody was watching.
Today, this is gone. There's basically nowhere that isn't feeling some pressure from overcrowding. Even the great barren places of the southwestern desert and the almost uninhabitable hinterlands of Alaska are seen to be somebody's back yard. There is really nowhere left, anywhere on the planet, if you truly want to be left alone.
I think this is all a symptom of an ecological phenomenon called Carrying Capacity. The carrying capacity of an ecosystem for any particular species is that which is stable, consuming only the resources that the rest of the ecosystem can produce. If it exceeds it, the population will crash, and won't recover until the resources are replenished. These crashes are very traumatic, and many ecosystems never recover.
There are ways to fool this: a small, well tended aquarium can support lots more fish than a much larger, poorly maintained one. The same is true for people. Sophisticated farming and transportation can provide food well beyond what a foraging culture could achieve. Well managed countries have much higher carrying capacities than corrupt or incompetently managed ones. If something bad is happening in your community, you will do what you can to get away from the problem.
I think the carrying capacity of the planet is somewhere between 1 and 2 billion people. We crossed 1 billion shortly after 1800, and 2 billion in 1929. Today we are over 7. Several countries have recognized that their excessive population is a problem and have acted with various levels of aggressiveness to deal with it. In many cases, this has left them open to the consequences of immigration from countries that have not done this. Immigrant populations always struggle to fit in, but if the whole society is struggling with the limits to the carrying capacity, the stress of this seems inordinately worse.
I think America's share of world carrying capacity should be about 10%: 100-200M people. (we arrived a little late, crossing 100M in 1915 and 200M in 1968). The infrastructure we have, which was mostly built in the 1940s through 60s, could handle this. Instead, we have about 320M, and we quit building and repairing infrastructure in the 1970s. We need to understand what we are doing to ourselves. I think we need to look at various incentives and barriers to get our population back to this sustainable level. And other countries must do the same. A lot of our problems--many of the civil wars, pollution, climate change, etc., can be greatly reduced if we do this.
23 April 2015
Recharging While Driving
Electric cars are here, and are already having a significant impact on the roads. But they still have a problem with range. The small ones: the Leaf, the BMW i3, etc., have a range which is fine for the typical daily commute, and even for a lot of delivery services. But recharging in most cases can only be done at 20 miles of range per hour. But for occasional longer trips, they remain a problem, and you have to spend several hours on the charger for every hour you drive. Not adequate if you're taking a trip that's substantially longer than the range of the battery. So far, Tesla has the most complete solution: 1) a much bigger battery than the others, giving 250+ miles of range. 2) faster "destination" charging, as much as 60 miles of range per hour, so you can put those 250 miles of range on in only 4 or so hours, allowing two or three cars to use the same charger over the course of a night, and finally, the Tesla "supercharger", which can put 150 miles of range on 20 minutes. Presently, these are located about 150 miles apart on most of the big cross country routes in the US, but there are still a lot of gaps. Tesla has promised to get around to them, but it'll be a while.
The second best solution is to make some sort of fuel-electric hybrid. there are a number of plug-in hybrids available, but all have a very short range. If your commute is very short and you're careful to plug in every night, it may work for you, but for long range travel, you're just a relatively efficient internal combustion engine car.
My idea is to put power rails along the roadway. Whether these have inductive pickup or are actual physical rollers that run on rails is an engineering decision. I'd put these on the interstates--the same routes where Tesla is putting its superchargers--and reserve a lane for them. The new Teslas come with the ability hold lane, speed and following distance on their own (although lane following is still in alpha), and this is all it would take to have the car drive itself on an accurately delineated charger lane. Many other carmakers have similar features available. There is no particular reason that following distances couldn't be short and speeds high, as long as the computer is doing the driving. The car will arrive at its destination city fully charged, and the driver rested.
The Tesla Model S charging at 19.2KW, charges at 60 miles of rated range per hour, so this is what it would need to maintain steady charge state at 60 mph at the rated characteristics. This is probably all that's necessary. The car draws less than that while going straight and level, but more accelerating or going uphill. The battery can handle surges--the power rail is just for topping up. It needs to be arranged so that all the cars needing to be charged can have their own charger. Simplest would be for each car to tap into the same (say) 600VDC rail pair simultaneously and regulate itself so it never draws enough power to cause the voltage to drop more than a small amount. If more power is needed, it reduces its charge rate and draws from its own battery.
Issues:
The power rails would probably need their own substation few miles or so. Highly loaded, this would be 50 cars per mile or so. 19.2*50=960... a megawatt. Those big, 200+ foot wind turbines put out 1.5 to 3 MW at their peak, so having one every mile or so would work nicely when the wind is blowing. A strip of solar panels along the road 6 meters wide (20 ft) would do the same thing when the sun is shining. (there's a company that's trying to sell solar panels that work AS road surface...I think you could make this work by paving the special lane with such things)
If the power available is exceeded, the cars can run on their batteries, but they should probably be aware of what's happening. If it's a traffic jam, they'd probably need to slow down and this will automatically reduce the power drawn.
600VDC with the availability to deliver 1600 amps would cause major badness to occur to any conductor that happened to fall across it, including a person or animal. the conductors either need to be protected somehow, or buried with inductive pickup.
there should probably be some mechanism to keep non-robodriven cars out of the special lane. I think the double white lines and reflective bumps as used on toll lanes, are not quite enough. There is no real safety problem with illegal use of a toll lane. There is with power rails and high-speed robocars,
billing should be straightforward. the car would have a tamper-resistant meter which monitors the number, location and timing of watt/hr picked up and communicate it with substation, which would bill appropriately, and prevent incorrectly equipped cars from driving on the road. If it becomes a problem, substation can monitor load and correlate it with the traffic data to detect tampering. I suspect it won't be...once the roadside infrastructure is built, it'll last for decades and cost very little to maintain. It'll pay itself off in a few years.
heavy trucks should be able to use this. they'll obviously draw more power. the road design can handle this straightforwardly. more megawatts per mile.
because all the cars are robodriven, including the heavy trucks, all the vehicles will run down exactly the same part of the road, and rutting will be a worse problem than it will be on roads with human drivers. Since there's a parallel road and all the vehicles have batteries, repairing it will be pretty much the same as with present roads.
The second best solution is to make some sort of fuel-electric hybrid. there are a number of plug-in hybrids available, but all have a very short range. If your commute is very short and you're careful to plug in every night, it may work for you, but for long range travel, you're just a relatively efficient internal combustion engine car.
My idea is to put power rails along the roadway. Whether these have inductive pickup or are actual physical rollers that run on rails is an engineering decision. I'd put these on the interstates--the same routes where Tesla is putting its superchargers--and reserve a lane for them. The new Teslas come with the ability hold lane, speed and following distance on their own (although lane following is still in alpha), and this is all it would take to have the car drive itself on an accurately delineated charger lane. Many other carmakers have similar features available. There is no particular reason that following distances couldn't be short and speeds high, as long as the computer is doing the driving. The car will arrive at its destination city fully charged, and the driver rested.
The Tesla Model S charging at 19.2KW, charges at 60 miles of rated range per hour, so this is what it would need to maintain steady charge state at 60 mph at the rated characteristics. This is probably all that's necessary. The car draws less than that while going straight and level, but more accelerating or going uphill. The battery can handle surges--the power rail is just for topping up. It needs to be arranged so that all the cars needing to be charged can have their own charger. Simplest would be for each car to tap into the same (say) 600VDC rail pair simultaneously and regulate itself so it never draws enough power to cause the voltage to drop more than a small amount. If more power is needed, it reduces its charge rate and draws from its own battery.
Issues:
The power rails would probably need their own substation few miles or so. Highly loaded, this would be 50 cars per mile or so. 19.2*50=960... a megawatt. Those big, 200+ foot wind turbines put out 1.5 to 3 MW at their peak, so having one every mile or so would work nicely when the wind is blowing. A strip of solar panels along the road 6 meters wide (20 ft) would do the same thing when the sun is shining. (there's a company that's trying to sell solar panels that work AS road surface...I think you could make this work by paving the special lane with such things)
If the power available is exceeded, the cars can run on their batteries, but they should probably be aware of what's happening. If it's a traffic jam, they'd probably need to slow down and this will automatically reduce the power drawn.
600VDC with the availability to deliver 1600 amps would cause major badness to occur to any conductor that happened to fall across it, including a person or animal. the conductors either need to be protected somehow, or buried with inductive pickup.
there should probably be some mechanism to keep non-robodriven cars out of the special lane. I think the double white lines and reflective bumps as used on toll lanes, are not quite enough. There is no real safety problem with illegal use of a toll lane. There is with power rails and high-speed robocars,
billing should be straightforward. the car would have a tamper-resistant meter which monitors the number, location and timing of watt/hr picked up and communicate it with substation, which would bill appropriately, and prevent incorrectly equipped cars from driving on the road. If it becomes a problem, substation can monitor load and correlate it with the traffic data to detect tampering. I suspect it won't be...once the roadside infrastructure is built, it'll last for decades and cost very little to maintain. It'll pay itself off in a few years.
heavy trucks should be able to use this. they'll obviously draw more power. the road design can handle this straightforwardly. more megawatts per mile.
because all the cars are robodriven, including the heavy trucks, all the vehicles will run down exactly the same part of the road, and rutting will be a worse problem than it will be on roads with human drivers. Since there's a parallel road and all the vehicles have batteries, repairing it will be pretty much the same as with present roads.
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