Overpopulation is our biggest threat

The world contains over 6 billion people. Obviously there is a limit to the carrying capacity of the earth - some say that this is about 12 billion as a maximum (could be uncomfortable though). Sounds like we are OK then? NO!!!!!

At current rates of population growth, the worlds population is doubling every 40 years or so. This is within our own lifetimes and unless we address this critical issue we are in trouble. It is a far greater threat to our lives and lifestyles than our "carbon footprint", but it is not seen as being an issue although the maths is quite simple really... Is anyone listening?

Aquamarinegreen

I think the colour I'm imagining when I think of the most vivid aquamarine green is a "fundamental primary" - it would be the colour you might see if you could stimulate only the "green" receptor(cone) in your eye - (It should be emphasized that the colours you actually perceive are coloured by processing in the brain as light itself has no inherent colour, the colours we see are determined by the wavelengths of the light rays). Of course you can't just stimulate one cone, the other cones would also be stimulated to a lesser degree.

Professor Andrew Hamilton of the University of Colorado talks about psychedelic aquamarine -

"The colour of the green fundamental, at (l, m) = (0, 1), is quite another trip. I call it psychedelic aquamarine because it lies well outside the range of physically realizable colours, at least for people with normal three colour vision. The nearest monochromatic colour, obtained by adding white to psychedelic aquamarine, is around 497 nm, about the colour of the water around the reefs of Heron Island in the Great Barrier Reef of Australia, which I had the privelege of visiting in 1995. You should mentally subtract white to imagine psychedelic aquamarine in its vivid primal hue. "

http://casa.colorado.edu/~ajsh/colour/primary.html

Enjoy this summer - next glaciation is overdue

We live in a glacial age and have done for the last 2.5 million years. Right now we are in an interglacial period which has lasted longer than usual. The periodic cycles of the glaciations within this era correlate with known orbital variations of the earth, which affect the intensity of sunlight reaching the earth. These are known as Milankovitch cycles, after the Serbian engineer who proposed the theory in 1912 - (he was well ahead of his time.)

The cycles are -

1. Rotation of the elliptical orbit of the earth and variations in eccentricity, affecting the distance of earth from the sun 2. Variation of Tilt of the earths axis which affects the angle with which the suns rays hit the earth 3. Precession of the axis of rotation of the earth affecting the angle of the rays for a particular season

The various cycles combine together such that the ice advances and retreats according to their combined effect on intensity of sunlight and therefore temperature of the earth. It is possible we have contributed to the unusually long interglacial period we are in but the ice will come - enjoy this summer....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Vostok_420ky_4curves_insolation.jpg