Month: April 2014

Time and Puzzles

Time and Puzzles

I wish I understood all that I know about time.

Like the mysteries of the Quark, I would really like to understand that too.

What I do know about time is that we never seem to have enough of it. When things slow down I like to ponder what I know about “things.” One of those things is time.

As a creator of a science fiction book I had to do some messing with time. Not unlike the “flux capacitor” I had to “invent” a device that would move my beleaguered crew through time and space. This required a lot of research because I really don’t want to be laughed at.. Well I guess if they must laugh I would hope it is with the same jocularity that we laughed at the garbage consuming flux capacitor.

Having said that and on a little more serious note I was wondering. Things like this keep me up at night as I “wonder” a lot. Ever notice how the storms on the sun seem to last forever?

I am thinking that they only seem to last forever as the sun has its own version of time which is a lot slower than ours due to its mass and gravity.

Knowing “something” about Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity it just seems to make sense.

How to prove this is another story. Here is another question. Does the time that mercury experiences correlate with ours? Another words, if we were to land on mercury and call home via radio, other than the 8 minutes that it would take to get the signal to earth would their atomic clock read the same as the one on earth?

If there is a difference in time from the light source from the sun to us would this change our perception of the speed of light? How about the age of the sun?

How about in reverse? Are the clocks on Voyager or some satellite that is far out in our solar system the same as the clocks here on earth? Do they have them?

Things like this really do keep me up at night. What say you folks that understand the complicated math that surely accompanies this “stuff?”

-Best to you and those that you care about!

NO!

“No” is a word that too many CEO’s need to hear. The problem is that too many hire people that will agree with them or say “yes” or “great idea” or some other such yes-man technique as they either fear that their boss does not want to really hear the truth or they are cowards or simply not well informed.

It is not only CEO’s that need to hear the word “no” but a lot of politicians need to hear it as well.

For instance, did Truman really need to drop not one but two atomic bombs on Japan to end the war? I would argue that one would have been enough and I would also argue that it could have been dropped on a small island that we were loosing so many marines on or perhaps an unpopulated island. Leveling that island would have been enough to demonstrate our resolve and abilities.

The simple truth is that Japan was already war weary and the people of Japan did not want this war. We could speculate who and why things transpired the way that they did but the end results of those decision have still not fully played out.

Yes, Japan surrendered. But now any dictator or want-to-be dictator in the world set their sites on getting an atomic bomb too. If the US had them than of course Russia needed them hence so many years of the cold war. Of course China would need them and of course any country with a dictator would need them as well!

Like Gunpowder, this is something that Einstein should have kept under his hat. Any time anyone makes any sort of advancement in technology, the dictators of the world wonder how to use it as a weapon. If one country has it, than they need it as well.

We have enough weapons of mass destruction to kill every living thing on earth many times over and yet we still keep trying to make something just a little more lethal.

No, that is not a good idea. Wasting so much money and resources on finding better ways to kill is just so juvenile. Now you put these weapons of mass destruction in the hands of irrational dictators and you place the entire earth and all of its inhabitants in grave danger. Brinksmanship is not lost on today’s “leaders” who seem to be nothing more than your classic neighborhood bully who will gladly get someone else to do his fighting for him.

If a race of beings from another planet were to visit and watch some of our news or other “entertainment” they would most certainly put some sort of beacon around our solar system warning anyone else to stay the hell away! We have entire countries to this day that are xenophobic in nature and bent on destroying anyone that does not agree with or cow down to them. This is 2014 and this is going on today!

Imagine if you will the difference between you and the Chimpanzee. Where DNA is concerned there is exactly one percent difference between human DNA and that of the Chimpanzee. That is 1%, that is it! Now let’s talk about intelligence of humans compared to that of the Chimpanzee. We think that we are intelligent because we have a space station, physics, music, weapons of mass destruction and of course we have E=MC2. The Chimpanzee can make and use tools, stack boxes to get to a banana and even use tree branches to escape their confinement in a zoo.

If this race of Aliens were watching us they may very well compare us to their progeny when they are in kindergarten.
Their 1rst grade kids may come home from school with something that looks like your masters thesis while ours come home with macaroni art or clay ash trays. To think that we are intelligent and that we could have anything to offer to a race of aliens that can traverse interstellar space borders on hubris.

One of our most beloved “inventors” was Thomas Edison. What history does not tell you is that this man was anything but nice. When Tesla came up with the concept of AC vs. DC as a way to power the city, Edison was furious. Instead of being an open minded person, he tried his best to discredit the idea. One of the ways that he did this was to electrocute an Elephant in public trying to turn public opinion on AC.

While both men were “out of the box” thinkers, one needed some morals; the other needed some business acumen.

Some CEO’s of auto manufacturers really needed someone to say “no” to them.

The Chevy Vega with that crappy engine comes to mind along with the Pinto’s exploding gas tank. GM using plastic parts in transmission was another not so bright spot in trying to make things cheaper. Liquid filled motor mounts was another costly invention that failed and let’s not forget “air bag suspension!” “Not a better idea!”

Bringing German engineering to Texas was really not too smart in the early days, as air cooled engines in 100 plus degree weather did not work so well. The VW Microbus while a really cool looking van was not really very well suited for Texas or any place that was not flat. They were so lacking in power that if one had to go up hill, they may very well not make it. On top of that if the engine got a little oil and or grease on the housing and one did not take great care to keep it clean, it might very well catch on fire as was the fate of many of those vehicles. It would be an interesting statistic to see what percentage of microbuses did not burn up compared to those that did.

Aluminum wiring for houses was another area where someone should have said “no.” While aluminum wire conducts electricity better than copper and while it is cheaper than copper; that is where it stops. When you connect aluminum wire to electrical outlets, switches and so forth that are not specifically designed for this, you increase the chance of fire.

Dissimilar metals have different coefficients of thermal expansion due to differing resistances of the metals. I have actually tracked down problems like this in a house that was made in 1957. Using an old transistor radio tuned off of any station, I tracked the source of interference down to an electrical socket in one of the rooms of the house. Removing the cover of the socket revealed a blackened terminal that was arcing right in front of me when a load was present. This arcing causes heat to be generated. The heat can be sufficient enough to cause a fire to start. Houses made in the late 50’s 60’s and 70’s in the US should be checked for such wire and if it exist, should be brought up to code.

Even though it would have cost the builder a few more dollars, they elected to save a few dollars on each house and use aluminum. Someone should have said “no.” How many people have died in house fires caused by aluminum wire?

Ralph Nader, love him or hate him is such a person who is an activist for humanitarianism among other things. Back in the day, I was not a fan because it was his activism which did away with the Corvair.

The 61 Corvair was probably one of the coolest cars to drive but also very dangerous. Rear engine cars create an environment that would allow a car to spin out more easily as the weight was behind the axle. Along with cars like this, his activism did away with the metal dash.

I restored an old Victrola not too long ago. While the genius of the device “again thanks Edison” is impressive, looking under the hood so to speak is what impressed me more.

Under the deck is a large spring and a governor consisting of weights that move out the faster the turntable spins. This governor is quite an impressive piece of mechanical engineering. The weights resemble steel balls that when expanded, slow the rotation down. Much like a ballerina bringing her arms in, speed up; so too the governor of the Victrola. This is where the phrase “balls to the walls” came from. The idea was of course to go fast enough to cause the balls of the governor to expand far enough to hit the casing “walls” around them.

Anyone in power of anything needs a governor. Even Bill Gates needs such a thing, although I suspect it is his better half. We all need someone to challenge our decisions from time to time. Some would argue that religion serves in such a capacity, others would argue, that is why we have laws.

So if we had neither; what would we be like as a people today?

One only has to study history to learn the answer to this. The problems are that we are too busy doing other things to look back. If I were to tell you that early man hunted, killed and ate each other as matter of day to day life, some of you would not believe me. Some of you would say that you had heard of it in the deepest darkest parts of Africa a long time ago. It amazes me that we have survived our animalistic instincts and tendencies.

If I were to tell you that there was a group of people that considered torture an art form, you might shake your head. Certainly not you decry.. [1]

If reading about the Assyrians does not give you nightmares, read about some of the 25 most brutal torture techniques. [2]

[3] Vlad the Impaler was someone history should learn from. Real nice guy!

History is full of this stuff. When we hear on the news that someone was murdered in some drive by shooting or some crime of passion, by histories standards, that isn’t nothing! I don’t mean to diminish their acts but by yesterday’s standards, that is child’s play.

There is a culture that is into bondage and such and one has to wonder if it is a leftover from earlier times when nothing was off limits.

The very cross that people wear around their necks is a miniature copy of a device that was made for torture. The traditional way to punish a criminal in those days was to nail them to that cross. This made it very difficult for them to breath so they would let them suffer for several hours before they would come along and break their legs so they could no longer support themselves, thus suffocate.

When they execute someone by lethal injection they are executing them on a device that looks like that very cross, just a little wider place to place the body, soon to be corpse, arms stretched and tied and feet held in place while the paralytics enter into the body and stop the bodies ability to breath. Some say that this is too kind and that they should be killed in some horrific manner. Really, does that sound familiar?

These documents are hard to read. This is important stuff as this is where the human race came from. This is where you and I came from. This is where Stalin and Hitler and many other modern day killers, came from.

We are capable of horrific acts! We can choose. We also come from the likes of Brahms, Ptolemy, Aristotle, Plato, Chopin, Pythagoras, Newton, and Voltaire to name just a scant few.

I often wonder about these violent video games that some play. They are very much simulators for war, violence and the conditioning of the brain to accept such things. We come from a very violent past and much like the alcoholic, steering clear of such things is probably a good idea.

We have thousands calling for stricter gun control. Do they think that laws regarding guns will affect criminals? It is a knee jerk reaction to violence, nothing more, and would serve nothing other than emboldening the criminal element among us.

Japan would never invade the mainland and it was never their plan. Why? They knew even back then that most Americans had guns.

If you think that I am full of shit, ask yourself “why these video games are developed in the first place, who thinks up this stuff.” Than ask yourself, “why do they sell so many of them, why are they so popular.”

Pornography fills something inside us that is basic and part of the programming. Violence does the same thing both in movie and of course video game and I would argue that some people who practice it for real have the need for the adrenalin etc that it releases.

It would be an interesting experiment for someone to develop video games where one can capture and torture their victim in ways mentioned below. Complete with screaming and gnashing of teeth and so forth. As sad as it is, I would bet that they would sell. The interesting part would be to see what demographic buys them, how many hours they “play the game” and how does it affect them. I would argue that it would condition them to be “monsters in the making.” The world needs less of this stuff, not more of it. That is my humble opinion.

Science makes arguments against the existence of God. A belief in God humbles one and I think assist us with being moral. Some will claim that they are a good person and don’t need such a belief to “be good.”

If you use God as an excuse to stop asking questions than that is a problem. Where there is mystery, a question to be answered, than search for that answer. Science and God must necessarily co-exist.

The links below are to some sites that speak of evil people and or techniques used to torture people. These are a scant few that history is full of.

All through the history of man, violence prevails. Some of the violence is mystical in nature and some is downright evil. The American Indian tortured white man by some horrific means as did the [6] Chinese torture people as did the Japanese. [5]

When you read about some of this stuff, it really makes you wonder why God would allow this?

[1] http://faculty.uml.edu/ethan_Spanier/Teaching/documents/CP6.0AssyrianTorture.pdf

[2] http://list25.com/25-most-brutal-torture-techniques-ever-devised/

[3] http://www.vladtheimpaler.info/the_impalement.html

[4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captives_in_American_Indian_Wars

[5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanking_Massacre

[6] http://www.ishr.org/Methods-of-torture-in-the-People-s-Republic-of-China.1047.0.html

These links are a drop in the bucket. That is the sad part.

No, no advanced race or being would come here looking for anything from us. They might come here to enslave us, eat us, kill us and take our resources much like we exterminate insects before we build a house on the land they occupied.

Unless they like music, or poetry or our understanding of math and science and physics I would not hold much hope for a friendly meeting.

As always I welcome your thoughts, input, and of course enlightened conversation regarding this or any other blog that interest you.

-Best to you and those that you care about.

Cliven Bundy or Holy Cow!

Have any of you followed this Cliven Bundy thing?

This just has distraction written all over it. Why do I say this?

This guy has been letting his cattle graze where ever for over twenty years. They go on land that is not his and eat whatever is eatable. The land is covered in cactus and scrub brush and if it has grass, I didn’t see it.

The point here is that he admittedly broke the law and has been doing so for a long time.

The Sheriff is a friend of his and my guess is that he looks the other way as nothing is being hurt. As the matter of fact the cattle are eating material that could be combustible so in fact they are doing the feds a favor!

Now out the blue the feds come in with attack dogs, snipers and the freaking military to do what, to fine this trespasser? Give me a break.

This is a way to get Fox news, which admittedly is no fan of the liberals to turn their attention to this, rather than keeping their eye on the ball. Not only does this distract the news outlets but the American people as well.

This stand off had the makings of Ruby Ridge[1] or Waco [2] until the militia showed up and said “cool it.” This really could have ended badly. Brinksmanship is a dangerous game where hot heads and guns are involved. It ended very badly for Ruby Ridge and Waco and this is the same mentality at work here.

Even though the snipers and attack dogs have left, we still have good old Harry and his son stirring the pot. Harry, why does the Fed own so much of your state? That land belongs to the people and you should make an effort to get it back into their hands. Do you not represent your people?

On Hannity tonight he interviewed the family. Brianna, a daughter in law made the statement that “we are a family of faith and have god on our side.” Brianna, I am certain that it is biblically correct not to break the law, read Romans..

This administration seems to have taken its cues from Houdini, watch the other hand if you want to see what is really going on. As for the Bundy’s, get your cattle on your own land and respect fences. Make nice with the feds, because as we have seen with past experiences, they usually don’t end well.

This is a stretch but if the feds had any sense they would make this go away. Fine the guy a $100 and tell him not to do it again. Next time don’t go after a gnat with a cannon!

Neither of you want this to go to court. There was never a need for deadly force, and this really makes the feds look bad, again…

Just my 2 cents worth and it really is worth about that…

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_Ridge

[2] http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/atf-raids-branch-davidian-compound

-Best to you and those that you care about!

Meteors Asteroids and other heavenly bodies

February of 2013 a meteor crashed into Russia.

Noted astrophysicist and of course NASA have said that the meteorite that exploded over Russia was not related to 2012 DA14.

While they may understand the complicated mathematical formulas that go along with their craft, I do not. I do however understand statistics.

What are the odds that at the same exact time-frame 2012DA14 is flying by earth we have three widely reported meteorites and other similar reports from all over the globe?

Their argument is that the trajectory of the meteor that exploded over Russia and 2012 DA14 are not the same and therefore it could not be related.

One thing to take note of is that the Chatyabinsk Meteor orbit shown in the photo below was calculated on the trajectory from when it hit the earth.

This first paragraph is from Wiki.

Preliminary calculations rapidly showed the object was not related to long predicted 15 February close approach of what was at the time known as asteroid 2012 DA14 (later named 367943 Duende) that passed the Earth 16 hours later at a distance of 27,700 km. The Sodankylä Geophysical Observatory, Russian sources,^[107] the European Space Agency, and the Royal Astronomical Society all indicated the two objects could not have been related because the two asteroids had widely different trajectories.

Credit for these next two paragraphs are from a fellow wordpress blogger [1]

February 16, 2013 – HAVANA — An object fell from the sky over central Cuba on Thursday night and turned into a fireball “bigger than the sun” before it exploded, a Cuban TV channel reported Friday, citing eyewitnesses. Some residents in the central province of Cienfuegos were quoted as saying that at around 8 p.m. local time Thursday (0100 GMT Friday) they saw a bright spot in the sky comparable to a bus in size. The object then turned into a fireball “bigger than the sun,” said the witnesses, adding that several minutes later they heard a loud explosion. One resident told the TV station that his house shook slightly in the blast. Cuban experts have been dispatched to the area to look for possible remains of the meteor-like object, said the report. It remains unknown whether the reported phenomenon in Cuba is related to Friday’s meteor strike in central Russia, which set off a shockwave that shattered windows and left some 1,000 people injured. –Xinhuanet

Fireball seen in Bay Area skies: It may not have been as spectacular as the space rock that streaked across the skies above Russia late Thursday, but the Bay Area’s close encounter with a meteor Friday night was drawing its own attention on social networks. Comments on Twitter indicated the object that flashed across the horizon around 7:45 p.m. was blue in color and visible throughout the Bay Area and large areas of the West Coast, with at least one reported sighting in Washington State. Amateur video footage broadcast on KTVU-2 showed a bright streak lasting approximately five seconds that appeared to head downward. Some viewers described it as a firework in the night sky. One commenter on Twitter, who said they saw the meteor while driving in a car in Cupertino, said the object appeared to be headed west. Scanner traffic at the Contra Costa County Sheriff’s Office indicated that they were aware of the event, but a dispatcher said they had not received any emergency calls related to it. Gerald McKeegan, an astronomer with the Chabot Space and Science Center in Oakland, was at the center Friday evening for its weekend stargazing sessions with free access to the center’s large telescopes, but he said they did not spot the meteor there. He said that the center received phone calls from people who reported seeing the meteor. Based on their reports, McKeegan said it may have been what astronomers call a “sporadic meteor,” an event that can happen several times a day but most of the time happens over the ocean, away from human eyes, and brings as much as 15,000 tons of space debris to Earth each year. Meteors, hunks of rock and metal from space that fall to Earth, burn up as they go through the atmosphere, which is what apparently caused Friday night’s bright flash of light, McKeegan said. It was likely smaller than another meteor that landed in the Bay Area in October, which caused a loud sonic boom as it fell, breaking apart and spreading rocks, called meteorites, in the North Bay, McKeegan said. –Mercury News

I think that they were related and I think a quick look at Newtonian physics will show why I think that they were. [3]

We must first look at; where do asteroids come from. For that matter where did the earth come from?

Assuming that the big bang theory is correct, the cosmos was full of dust. Even smaller than dust were most probably the elements that make up atoms.

Above is the first image of a Hydrogen Atom. Notice the orbits…

One of the most mysterious forces today is “gravity.” We think we understand how it works and this is where NASA and others I think are missing the boat. Follow the link for gravity if you really want to “geek out.” [2]

As the dust floated around in a “perfect vacuum” these particles began to stick together. The more “sticking” they did gave them differing amounts of mass, which gave them differing amounts of “gravity.” Wouldn’t it be fascinating to think that the different types of elements that we have today were the result of the way that different parts of the different atoms just randomly glued themselves together?

The earth, moon and all heavenly bodies are currently falling unless they are so far removed from any source of gravity that they are not affected. Since we have the Kuiper belt, we can assume that gravity extends quite a bit from the Sun. Indeed even Pluto is falling along with its neighbors, cousins and so forth, all falling.

If you think about how large a Galaxy is, it too is swirling around some force of gravity, most probably a large black hole.

Credit Wiki for the following 3 paragraphs.

The asteroid belt is the region of the Solar System located roughly between the orbits of the planets Mars and Jupiter. It is occupied by numerous irregularly shaped bodies called asteroids or minor planets. The asteroid belt is also termed the main asteroid belt or main belt to distinguish its members from other asteroids in the Solar System such as near-Earth asteroids and trojan asteroids. About half the mass of the belt is contained in the four largest asteroids, Ceres, Vesta, Pallas, and Hygiea. Vesta, Pallas, and Hygiea have mean diameters of more than 400 km, whereas Ceres, the asteroid belt’s only dwarf planet, is about 950 km in diameter. The remaining bodies range down to the size of a dust particle. The asteroid material is so thinly distributed that numerous unmanned spacecraft have traversed it without incident. Nonetheless, collisions between large asteroids do occur, and these can form an asteroid family whose members have similar orbital characteristics and compositions. Individual asteroids within the asteroid belt are categorized by their spectra, with most falling into three basic groups: carbonaceous (C-type), silicate (S-type), and metal-rich (M-type).

The asteroid belt formed from the primordial solar nebula as a group of planetesimals, the smaller precursors of the planets, which in turn formed protoplanets. Between Mars and Jupiter, however, gravitational perturbations from Jupiter imbued the protoplanets with too much orbital energy for them to accrete into a planet. Collisions became too violent, and instead of fusing together, the planetesimals and most of the protoplanets shattered. As a result, 99.9% of the asteroid belt’s original mass was lost in the first 100 million years of the Solar System’s history. Some fragments can eventually find their way into the inner Solar System, leading to meteorite impacts with the inner planets. Asteroid orbits continue to be appreciably perturbed whenever their period of revolution about the Sun forms an orbital resonance with Jupiter. At these orbital distances, a Kirkwood gap occurs as they are swept into other orbits.

Classes of small Solar System bodies in other regions include the centaurs, Kuiper belt and scattered disk objects, and Oort cloud comets.

So if they are falling why are they all not part of the large fireball we see each day lighting our way? According to Newton, an object that is doing whatever it is doing will continue to do so unless acted upon by another force.

While the moon is falling, because it has a velocity to it, it continues to “orbit” the earth at a near perfect speed to keep its distance. I say near perfect because it is actually moving away from the earth at a very slow rate.

The thing to really pay attention to is the word perturbation.

As long as the moon is not messed with, it will continue to “fall” until it escapes earths gravity enough that its velocity will then carry it in whatever direction that it finally releases orbit from the earth.

While we need the moon for life to exists here on earth and the NASA folks should really be looking at their tractor ideas to slow the moon down a bit to keep it from flying away, that is a subject for yet another blog.

We orbit the sun using the same physics that the moon uses to orbit us.

If the earth were impacted head on with a large enough object to change our velocity or mass, our orbit would necessarily change. Would we move out further into the outer regions of the universe or would we “fall” into the sun? This is “perturbation” and this is what happens to other things in space. Our fate would depend upon if we gained or lost velocity and or mass. Whether life would still be here after such an event is another story.

The objects known as meteors and or asteroids were formed the same way that we were. As the matter of fact as time progresses on, some of those proto-planets could conceivably gain enough mass to draw other objects toward them to become larger and or become perturbed.

The idea here is that we “think” that everything is static. While there are those that declare there is no such thing as evolution, they are simply unable to comprehend the amount of time that has passed between the original creation of the earth and today. 4.2 billion years to our puny limited minds means nothing. We have no context for that kind of time, so we cannot grasp even the idea of evolution; or the idea that the earth and everything that we see in the heavens at night was once simply dust. That includes you and I. The simple facts are that things are very dynamic, we just have such short life spans we don’t get it.

If an object in the kuiper belt or the main asteroid belt is acted upon in such a way to slow it down it will loose the velocity necessary to stay in the orbit that it is in and “fall.” While it is technically falling currently its orbit will change. It will very slowly at first loose its orbit and start moving inward. All objects that are currently in orbit around this object will also move with it, thus moving towards the sun. Lets say that the asteroid is large enough that when it collided with another object pieces of it were knocked off of it, or possibly the colliding object was destroyed in the process. This is exactly how the planets were formed.

Since there is mass/gravity to the object, some of that debris may very well have started to orbit this rock as it began to change trajectory.

As these objects were created in the same manner that we were created we have to assume that they have objects in orbit with them, it just makes sense. The larger the object the more “cousins” it may carry along. Of course it goes without saying the greater the mass the greater amount of and size of these cousins.

2012 DA14 is such an object that was acted upon. It is large enough to have its building blocks or other debris orbiting it. As it begins to fall, those object stay in its orbit and as it’s velocity / trajectory change, so do the objects that orbit it. Since they are all traveling in a perfect vacuum, there is nothing to change those orbits, no friction so it really doesn’t matter how fast it is traveling.

Now as DA14 cruises past earth, its cousins are moving along with it at the “speed of heat” all the while in orbit with DA14. I emphasis ORBIT as that is how the trajectories of different meteorites that hit the earth can appear not to be related to DA14 when if fact they are.

DA14 now orbits around the sun as its orbit was acted upon by the planets that it passed by. Will its orbit change in the future?

[1] http://theextinctionprotocol.wordpress.com/2013/02/16/meteorite-fireballs-streak-across-skies-over-cuba-and-san-francisco/

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravity

[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton’s_laws_of_motion

Instead of writing yet another blog on this subject I will add this addendum here.

Celestial mechanics is an interesting subject worth noting. One would think that the astrophysicist that get paid for this kind of work would have figured some of this out and not been so quick to rule out the relationship between the other meteorites that were associated with this event.

As the planets orbit the sun, our solar system is also in motion. not only in the direction of the X axis but the Y axis as well. Think about this for a second. Our solar system is located in one of the arms of the milky way which is doing what? It too is in motion , a spiral motion so it is dragging our solar system along in the X axis.

Since we know from previous scientific data that the universe is expanding; we must therefor assume that we are not in the center of it which means the the Milky Way is also moving in a Y axis or vertical as well as the X axis. Again we are also being dragged along for the ride as “gravity works.”

So, the sun is our gravitational focus which drags this solar system with it. The Milky way is the suns gravitation focus which drags it with it, as it spirals and as it also moves as a collective entity, along the Y axis. Is Andromeda heading for us, or we to it, or are we both headed to each other?

As with any of my blogs, I welcome enlightened conversation, questions, and of course well thought out arguments.

-Best to you and those that you care about!

Life, Wealth and Happiness

I chose the title carefully as the three can me mutually exclusive.

Stuff and Reality

Most of us grow up seeing a pattern of “wealth = happy.” In fact some of the poorest people that I know are some of the happiest. How is that possible?

The world today tells us that we “need” an expensive car, or the largest flat screen TV or whatever the newest gadget is. Apple is doing their part by providing a new version of their products about every 18 months or so.

A few years ago a “car phone” was for the most exclusive and wealthiest of us. Today, kids in grade school have a much more sophisticated version than I would have dreamed possible just a few years ago.

A simple automobile that cost a few thousand not too many years ago now cost upwards or $40K. Of course you can spend $24K for the same basic car but it does not have the “logo” that the $40K car has. Will the less expensive car do the same as the expensive car, probably; but it will not have the social status of the $40k car? I cannot envision spending $150K on a car but there are many on the roads.

If you are a churched person you no-doubt know that “God will provide.” Does that mean that if you pray really hard and give money to the church that you will get the $40K or $150K car? No. It means that you will have the necessities of life. The trick of course is realizing what the “necessities are.”

This is where the poorest among us have the rest of us beat. They are happy with what they have. One of my favorite song writers penned the phrase, “it’s not about having what you want, it’s about wanting what you got.” If you think about that, it is so true.

“Failure to plan is planning to fail!”

Am I telling you to settle for less than what you have or want? No, I am telling you to set your expectations accordingly, set your goals a little higher than your expectations, and take the actions necessary to achieve those goals.

Much like project management, your goals need to be fully planned. What do you want, what does the end goal look like, and what does it take to achieve it? What milestones must you achieve to get to where you want to go or be? Goals should be on some sort of timed deadline. If you set dates to accomplish certain milestones you are more apt to succeed at the end goal. Start with prayer for wisdom. Praying to win the lottery is probably not going to get you anywhere. If it does; please keep me in mind.. J Realistic goals are part of the prayer process. Few grow up with the goal of being a garbage man. If you did, “bless your heart.” Many end up there because they failed to plan.

Do I look down on those folks, not on your life! It takes all kinds of folks to make the world go round. If more folks planned better, I think that finding a ditch digger or garbage man might cost more money. I make a point to know my garbage collection folks. If I can, I go out and tell them good morning etc. The same is true of the mail person and even the janitor at the office. They are all people and disserve the respect that you yourself would want. If you think that you are better than them you are in dangerous territory.

Wealth or the lack thereof.

I would seriously recommend taking the Dave Ramsey course for you who are just starting out. After listening to his radio show for several months, I am convinced that he should be a required course in high school. Credit card companies would lobby against that but, that would be just too bad. Our progeny need to understand the fundamentals of his wisdom, and the sooner the better.

The good news is that if you are a parent you can go through the course with your kids. It does not need to be mandated from the Ivory towers of DC. Many churches around the country offer this course. Why? A tenant of the course is to be generous, think there could be a connection? Too Cynical? Only they and God know their motives.

His mantra goes against current trends in advertising and indeed the way that we spend money! His philosophy and wisdom really came from making mistakes and learning from them. These are mistakes he made many years ago. So, why make the mistake if you can learn from those that have already done it? Like history, if you don’t know it, you will repeat it.

The jobs that you take should reflect some part of the path that you are on in order to achieve your goals. Jobs can be milestones. Let’s say I want to be a geologist. I would start out learning everything I could about the subject from books to social groups that are like minded. I might take an internship at a company that studies core samples. Even if I have to wash beakers or crush rocks, I would be part of the process and undoubtedly something I learned would stick that I could apply later.

The society we are in today has kids out of college with no practical experience looking for the big paycheck and the corner office. Bless their heart!

Many out there just take anything to get some sort of income. Folks, this is ludicrous. Letting fate decide your future is a formula for a life filled with dead end jobs being someone’s slave. If you can’t afford to leave the bedroom that you grew up in, you are on the wrong path! If you are forced to return to the bedroom that you grew up in because you are not making enough money to live on your own and be investing money in your future, you are certainly on the wrong path, or making bad decisions.

Briefly, fast food jobs are for kids in school. Those jobs will allow them to earn some spending money, gasoline and insurance money and if they are strict with themselves, some savings for college. They teach the fundamentals of the working world and truthfully make one appreciate a real job when they get one. I am a firm believer that everyone should have a fast food job as a child.

Retail jobs in general are the same type of job. Most retail jobs are not a career choice that should be anywhere in your decision making process. If those jobs are part time they are for kids living at home. Unless your end goal is to manage some high end retail establishment, you have no business working there unless of course, you are a teenager.

There is definitely a difference between adult jobs and “youth” jobs. “Youth jobs are training wheels for life.”

One job does not fit all.

I see way too many older folks taking retail jobs in places where there should be kids. I think this is a direct reflection of the times that we live in. The sad fact is that these older folks in these jobs allow their attitude towards that job to come through while dealing with the customer. It is not hard to tell that they are not happy and feel that the job is beneath them. Guess what; it most definitely is! Staying in that job is mistake of monumental proportions. Stay in it long enough to retrain and re-invent yourself if necessary, and then leave it for the teenagers that it was originally designed for.

Some older folks are taking these jobs to get out of the house. If you need the money, at least shoot for management. Leave the kid jobs for kids. Of course if you had planned correctly you would not need the money and could be spending your time out of the house, volunteering somewhere.

The last few years, entitlement spending is at an all time high. We are paying people to stay home and live on the government tit. That money that the government gives away comes from those of us who are working, not living on the ignorance of a government run amuck. If the politicians that think that what they are doing is correct they need to revisit it.

Anyone taking money from the government that should be working should be “reinventing” themselves. Currently if you are attending school you are not eligible for unemployment. What kind of foolishness is this? If you don’t find suitable employment in X months you should be required to take some classes and I would argue that those classes should be subsidized by the government. If you get an “A” 100% re-imbursement and so forth. It is almost as if we don’t want you to ever work again, we want you to live on some small amount of money taken from those that are working. Folks this is crazy!

If you know a politician or someone that you can talk some sense into by all means lets push this initiative. People need a hand up, not a handout!

Business is not ignorant of this fact. To get skilled workers to work for peanuts on a part time basis vs. dealing with kids who often have not developed a good work ethic is a bargain. If they get college graduates to slave away at minimum wage jobs, that too is a bargain for them! Keeping them at part time so they don’t have to screw with benefits, another win!

We see the argument to raise the minimum wage so people can make a living at these part time jobs that school kids should be doing. The pay is not the issue, the issue is that adults should not be doing these jobs!

Slavery is not Dead!

The problem is that these kids need those jobs as that is the next part of their training to become good workers. A part time retail or fast food job is not for anyone that is serious about making a living. Managing these occupations is another story however; it is slavery at best as you are most undoubtedly salaried and will work 50 or 60 hours a week and “it will be expected.”

Raising the retirement age was another mistake on so many levels. Companies are shoving you out the door when you are 50 and looking for the college kids fresh out of school to bring in and abuse.

This guy still votes too. That is another blog for another time.

Very few companies see the value in bringing in older Americans as they would have to pay them a decent wage. On top of that, these folks have experience and to some degree that experience might be askance of the job requirements and or environment of that company. The phrase “you can’t teach an old dog new tricks” certainly may play through their mind. Mature workers are excellent employees most always as they are skilled professionals and are not the party animals that they once may have been. Their children are most probably out of the house, so little will pull them away from their task.

Mature workers indeed need a vocation as we were designed to work. Those of us who linger in the couch or in front of the TV or video games all day are most probably going to expire way before our time. “A body in motion stays in motion!” Keeping a regular schedule, going to bed at a decent hour, getting up at a decent hour, greeting the morning sun for fifteen minutes in the morning will keep you healthy. There is of course more to it but these fundamentals are all too often overlooked!

If you take a look at the richest people in the world (which is out there on the internet) you will notice Bill Gates is number 1. The Wallmart and Sam’s ilk are close to that and there are so many others. What I would like to call to your attention is that none of these made it there because they are “nice people.” They are shrewd business people. One has to wonder if they are “happy!”

Some of you may try to extol the virtues of Mr. Gates as he gives money to different charities, “what a nice guy!” When Bill was buying the first operating system from a guy for $4k and licensing it to IBM for millions, I was involved with computers. When Mr. Jobs was a criminal, phone phreaking, making his first large sum of money, I knew about it and how he did it. When Bill got the windows idea from Xerox who happily showed him their ideas and products and told him about it being open source he happily took it and ran with it.

I have kept up with Bill, not because I am angry with him, he is a shrewd business man. One has to wonder if they “the richest folks in the world” are “happy” and how much money is enough? How do people get so rich? I wish I could say it was by treating people right and practicing good “ethical” business practices…

Retail stores hire folks are minimum wage and then give them just enough hours so they don’t have to pay for benefits. Some reward their slaves with a few more hours for extra effort while only giving a few to the people who are not really motivated to be there. Folks, it is hard to be motivated for $8 and hour, especially when it takes more than that to get a hamburger. If you are working for someone, even as a slave, do your best as you are gaining experience not just in folding clothing but in dealing with people, managers and situations out of your control. This also should teach you the value of an education and setting goals!

What is your goal? Money is not a goal, but a tool. Like a hammer or saw, it is nothing more or less than a tool. Money is a common tool that everyone can use to pay for or gain enough of to obtain food, shelter and the other basics for life. In some cases it can buy you an island or maybe a small country.. It is still a tool and a means to an end.

Your goal should be to be happy, that I would wish for you. Deciding on what is (happy) is another story. Some find happiness in stuff, and others find it in family and friends. Some of the happiest people that I know find happiness in serving others and or taking care of the other creatures that live amongst us.

I think that happiness is nothing more than a state of mind and those that have little to worry about seem the happiest. I guess if you’re rich enough to hire people to worry about things for you, so you can focus on being “happy” that might be one example of being one of the world’s richest folks might work for you.

Personal growth, understanding the person in the mirror, makes me happy. Each and every time I learn something about me, I am a little happier. There are few things that are in “your control.” Getting a good education, understanding that knowledge is power is a great foundation for being happy. Using that knowledge in a way that is consistent with “enlightened people” to me is a mark of wisdom. Serving others, in some way that is consistent with who you are is another way to become happy. I find that helping others takes my mind off of “self.” Looking at the bigger picture, one can appreciate the complexities of life and sort out the small stuff that should be in the noise, and not artificially elevated to demand your full attention.

This is a lot to chew on. Questions and thoughts are always welcome.

-Best to you and those that you care about!

Yesterday, A simpler time.. #radio #vintage

Nostalgia is not lost on me. To that end I truly enjoy bringing things back to life of the electronic type, that should have otherwise gone in the dumper.

Currently there are countless transistor radio’s that were dead and now work once again at least as good as they did new, and some of them probably better as materials are now better. While the challenge of transistor radio’s is finding the parts; tube radio’s magnify that issue as no one is making new tubes for radio’s that I know of.

My latest project is this Tube Radio that I have had well over 30 years. I bought this for next to nothing and of course it did not work. If the case is in good shape and the parts are all there, that is about all I require.

The Radio is an Emerson 744B that was made in 1954. It sold for $34.95 which, back then was a heap of money.

Sadly there are many that will read this blog and not know what a tube is. With that in mind I have taken pictures of my latest project and will “splain” a few things as we go. The glass objects are tubes. These either are dead in the case of the rectifier tube or weak or leaky as with the rest.

The tubes house a filament, some metal structures that emit and collect electrons as well as things that control the flow of the electrons. Some house a thing called a “getter.” The Getters sole job is to collect and burn off any o2 that should get in by way of the pins. The getter is coated with a chemical that accomplishes this.

The British refer to these “tubes” as “valves” and in actuality that is a much more accurate description as that is in essence how they work.

This is the audio output tube in action. Notice the filament is glowing.

Here is a top view of the radio in operation.

Here is a bottom view of the radio showing the point to point electronic components. If you know anything about electronics you will notice the modern parts that I have installed, replacing the parts that failed.

Back in the day, capacitors were expensive to manufacture so they would use just what they needed and nothing more in terms of capacitance. Today that is not the case and with technology I was able to offer much more capacitance and higher working voltages to the circuit for around $6.

One old .05 MFD capacitor is still in the radio and functioning so I left it. The white square capacitors replaced two of the three .05 which are now .047.

The two modern electrolytics replaced the huge combination capacitor that some “purists” will actually disassemble and install the newer capacitors inside of it. I know very few who are going to take the metal bottom off of the radio and look underneath to see the parts. This radio sounds like a new one.

Here in North Texas we have a station that plays music from the era that this radio came from. http://www.kaamradio.com/

Big Band music I just never get tired of…. Anyway, this radio sounds great playing that station.

-Best to you and those that you care about..