Friends are Electric

A carelessly quick survey of a random assortment of websites would make it seem that, in order to be happy, we have to try and become something else, to change ourselves in some way.  Most obviously in the form of body enhancement advertisements, but these are some of the less dangerous and least concerning sources.  Certainly they are irritating and stupid, but most of us recognize them as such.

The dangerous types are those which attempt to offer the author’s wisdom.  As though any happiness, material success or whatever other desirable they are selling is not a product of all of their experiences and was instead caused by a few choices, be they insignificant or not.   The author is sincere in his offering and probably believes that the reader can become just like them by following these few steps…

That is not what I shall do.  My experiences (and here I go, ignoring what I said above) tell me that universals are false.   What works for me, what challanges me, what makes me actually happy with myself will not be the same things that work for you.  I spent years studying a topic I did not enjoy, it was hardly challanging.  Nor was it easy, but the mundainity of it all made it impossible to derive joy from.  Thats the case for me, many of my good friends find the topic to be quite the opposite.  Nietzsche was wrong about a whole lot of things, but he spoke true on the need to overcome universals and find what works for you, to see how the other lives.

So here is the challenge.  It is simple to state and impossible to implement.  Life is the struggle to do so, to me at least.

Live as you want, study and do what makes you happy.  Don’t let your pursuit of these things prevent another single person from doing the same.  Compromise, sometimes when you do not need to.  It makes both your lives better.

Do not be smug or judge other people for taking a different path than your own.  Their happiness is not a thing to be ridiculed.

That is it.  That is all.  As a first step I’d recommend reading a book, a real book.  On paper.  The medium is the message and the message of the screen is constant interaction and more information than you can ever hope to digest, the book is more calm and suitable for such baby steps.

While, at least in Ontario, the history curriculum is incredibly weak, I am fairly certain most of us are familiar with the Battle of the Plains of Abraham.  A truly important point in the development of the Canadian nation.

While this was not the only important event in the Seven Years War, it can be seen as a pivotal one, the turning point in the Canadian theater of the conflict.  The battle itself predicted the outcome of the war and shall be considered one in the same for the sake of argument.

In broad terms, a global perspective, the battle itself and the war by extension was a defeat of the French Empire by the British Empire on a generally worldwide scale.   The French colony of New France was merely a pawn in negotiations at the end of the war.  It is well known that had the British seen more prestige or a larger profit to be made in sugar plantations than they had in the fur trade of what would become Canada, then perhaps France would have regained their colony.  However, the French Empire ceded New France, the colony of Quebec, to the British.

From a French nationalist perspective, the battle and the war were a humiliating loss.  The English were an oppressive, occupying power, not liberators.  While little attempt was made to assimilate the French Canadians, this perspective is not unreasonable.

From a British nationalist perspective, it was a victory.  The allowances made for the French Canadian people were seen as unreasonable, especially in the 13 American colonies.

Neither of these perspectives, however, represents what is needed from a Canadian perspective.  The forbearers of one segment of Canadians were defeated by the forbearers of another part of the population.  Since Canada is a multicultural experiment this poses some difficulties.  How, for example, does someone celebrate our shared history while some see it as a triumph and others as a defeat?

I am myself largely of British ancestry, while possessing some French as well.  I grew up in a French Canadian town outside of Quebec.  The battle and the war were treated as a victory.  I do not think this is the way to deal with the event.  It is too simplistic and I feel as though it places too much emphasis on our historical inclusion in the British Empire.  Certainly, we are members of the British commonwealth and have much shared history and culture, but we are an independent nation with our own complex and interesting history and culture separate from our partners in the commonwealth and it is time we embraced this.

The question is how do we interpret this battle, this war.  Canada was founded largely through an alliance between both French and English Canadians.  Their work together lead to confederation.  Without the other party, neither the French nor the English could have been successful.  Certainly other word events, such as the British actions towards the Confederate States of America, helped found the nation of Canada.  Without the work of the Canadian Fathers of Confederation, however, Canada as we know it would not have worked out.

There were a great many years between the 1763 end of the war and the formation of the provinces of Upper and Lower Canada in  1791, their unification in 1841 and the final creation of the Dominion of Canada in 1867.  One cannot discount the numerous important events that took place in these intervening years.  However, these years, as well as all the years since 1867,  do lend something to our shared understanding of the battle and thus the war.

Since 1791, perhaps earlier, Canada and that which preceded it has had two European cultural groups living to a large degree peacefully side by side in the same place, and since 1841 under the same government.  For no less than 169 years this has gone on.  Aside from a brief American incursion during their War of Independence and during the War of 1812 and a few scattered and minor rebellions, Canada has been largely peaceful since the Seven Years War.

So how then do we interpret the Seven Years War and the pivotal Battle of the Plains of Abraham?  As a victory or a defeat?  As a victory and a defeat?

We interpret it as the event which put together, in the same place, two different but similar cultural groups and allowed them to act constructively together in the future to build the nation we now call Canada.   The result of the battle may have been a defeat for the French Empire, but French Canadians have been able to practice their culture and speak their language ever since.  The result may have been a victory for the British Empire, but that empire is no more.

The result for Canada was that the right people were able to work together to found a truly interesting experiment.   Not a perfect entity.  Not a static entity.  Not anything that had been tried yet.  An experiment.  The Canadian Experiment.  And while not all aspects of this grand experiment have been successful, overall the experiment has been successful and warrants further study.

I have never made direct mention of them before, yet I constantly have been discussing the foolishness of their ideology.  And of the many undesirable direct consequences of their ideology. And now a direct attack by those who seek to destroy what for hundreds of years, perhaps thousands, citizens of the world have fought for.

The right to self determination.

This is sparked by an exceptionally ignorant editorial in this week’s issue of Imprint, the University of Waterloo student newspaper.   The editorial was titled No government is good.

What, exactly, is so wrong headed about this argument?  The first and most important problem is the argument that a non-functioning government is the best form of government, as though the people we elected to govern our nation are not up to the task  of it.

This idea has its source in a couple of deeply flawed ideas.

The first is the confusion between self interest and disinterest.   The former being what modern economics demands we operate solely by.  The later which democracy functions by.  Certainly economics is an interesting field of the social sciences, as important as any other, but it alone does not have the rights and responsibilities to run government, or any type of government policy.  Human beings are not solely self-interested beings, they are an irreconcilable combination of self-interest and group-interest.

Irreconcilable.  Combination.  Digest what that means for a moment.

Both factors are important for a functional human being.  Leave self interest for where it is best, and leave government to disinterest.  Society functions not based on the wild swings of the market but rather on the interactions of the human beings that make it up.  Interactions which do involve the buyer-seller relations described by economics but also the family, friends, neighbour, etc. relations.   When determining government policy, we must not enter with the thought “How can I get the best deal for myself,” but rather “What policies and practices are going to benefit society as a whole most.”

Ethics.  Operating for the greater good rather than the personal good or the private good.  When I am done school, self interest says that I should no longer care about education (unless I have children).  Group interest tells me this is the highest level of foolishness.  For social reasons as well as economic.  Certianly the old adage that the youth are the future does hold true and influences this, as employees and future employers as an economic argument but, more importantly for the fabric of society, education is the process by whch we train the next generation of citizens to act in the ethical fashion.

The second source of this ignorant argument is the corporatist.  The cult of the professional.

The ideology, which I am unsure if the writer even knows he subscribes to, is the principle that any task should be left to professionals and that the untrained cannot have an opinion, or an opinion which has an effect on the final outcome, about any topic which they themselves have no professional training or knowledge in.  Corporatism has its place, having an MBA decide the direction of pure scientific research would be foolish, since the MBA has no skills to help them.  Where corporatism is most dangerous is in government.

In government, corporatism has two important outcomes.  The first is that government must be run by professionals.  The environment ministry must be run by environmental scientists, since science is unbiased and impartial.  But are the scientists themselves biased?  And since they are scientists, they have no right to discuss policy with the natural resource departments, since environmental science is not the same as earth science.  And neither are the same as human resources, or finance or transportation.  Never mind the fact that all of these departments can be horribly interrelated to such a degree that any single specialist would never be able to see the big picture, the possible outcomes for other departments.  No, if you are not a professional in the field then your opinion has no validity.

Of course, the parliament itself is dominated by nonprofessionals.  The people elect it, and the people are not professionals in the art of government.   This is either solved by having professionals select government or by having the people select from a list of certified professionals.

Either case, our right to self determination goes out the window.   Which is the second important outcome.  We lose our right to govern ourselves.

Which is what the article is all about.  We have no right to determine how we want our society to be governed.  We are to be reduced to a passive role where the only vote of any consequence is which brand of toothpaste we purchase and from which store.   A mere mockery of democracy where societies interest is confused with the interest of large companies.

Or, how students really buggered up with Radio Waterloo

No one would pretend that the ethical life was the easy life, nor the productive or efficient life.  The ethical life is simply the good life.  It puts unimportant things like economics in their proper place, subservient to the needs of society as a whole.  The ethical life serves the greater good.

The greater good.  Not personal desires.  Not self-interested behaviour.  The ethical life has not to do with these.  Nietzsche called such people nihilists, those who desire only warmth.  Warmth in his words is the physical comforts of an easy life.  The meaning of nihilist has changed somewhat since Nietzsche first wrote of them, but his point stands.  To truly live the good life is to live the ethical life.

We as students of the University of Waterloo are guilty of such nihilism.  Twice we had the chance to do the right thing and twice we failed.

How can I call support for Radio Waterloo the right thing, you may ask?  Never is the silencing of an independent media outlet the greater good.  Only through plentiful voices does society function in a sustainable manner.  The silencing of any voice, no matter how  small, is not something to celebrate.  It requires mourning and a serious look at how it was allowed to happen.

We allowed it to happen twice.  We caused it to happen.  All are guilty.  Those who supported the station failed to demonstrate how important any media is to society’s proper function.  Those against are guilty of using largely false reason and common sense  through economic arguments of personal good to directly cause the destruction of an organ of society’s function.  The vast majority are guilty of indifference.  These are perhaps the most guilty.  Certainly, they did not fall for the arguments of self-interest.  They ignored the debate entirely.  They are guilty of sacrificing something akin to citizenship for the bliss of ignorance, indifferent to the arguments of both sides and unaware of what was at stake.

As students we failed to live the ethical life.   I as much as any other failed.  We all share in the guilt of conspiracy to destroy the functional organs of society.

The nihilists march forward.

I can think of three main reasons why someone would care passionatly about spelling, and none are flattering.

The first relates to bitterness.  I can imagine someone caring passionatly about spelling if they were forced to learn to spell perfectly from a very young age.  These people would be bitter about all this wasted time, and take out the angstiness they feel on the world at large by always taking the time to point out every spelling mistake they see.

The second is a serious lack in pattern matching ability.  If you are so handy capped, you may be unable to understand the meaning of a word if it is not exactly spelled out.  In some cases, this is a legitimate worry, for instance form and from.  The difference in stratigraphy and stratgiraphy, however, is slight.  Anyone being a stickler in the later case is probably just an asshole.

The third and final reason I can think of why anyone would care passionately about spelling is a superiority complex.  You correct spelling because it gives you something by which you feel you can legitimately place yourself above other people.  In this case you are an asshole.

Now, before anyone tells me that correcting spelling comes from a legitimate desire to protect the english language, or even from love of it, I’ll point out that if you truly cared you would cease preventing its natural progression.  I would also inquire about your slang usage, and whether you use the original spellings as layed out by the original dictionaries.   The dictionary spellings reflect common usage today, which has often changed over the years.  The original was written out before the majority were literate, and thus reflects closer how whoever wrote it down felt it should be spelled.  I understand that those who care will continue to care and force their ridiculous nitpick on the word as a whole, and feel as though any transgression is the greatest crime imaginable (except of course suggesting that they are misguided), but for all of us who don’t care or who feel hostile towards their tyrannical behaviour, I’m with you.  I’ve got your back.

I failed the challenge, reaching only 20000 words by the end of November.  As I edit and make the material readable it will be posted.

A discussion on development in Northern Ontario, strikes on a large number of items I feel strongly about.

In all of my time studying engineering and science, I have never come upon something as useful and nearly perfect as Bowen’s Reaction Series.

For those who have yet to be made aware of it, Bowen’s Reaction Series shows the relation between various minerals of igneous (molten rock) origin.  There are three parts to Bowen’s Reaction Series, the continuous reaction series, the discontinuous reaction series and the residual phase.  I’ll talk about each part in more detail and move on to a few interesting applications of Bowen’s Reaction Series in mineralogy.

The layout of Bowen’s Reaction Series is such that as you move up the series (towards olivine and calcium plagioclase), the melting temperature increases.  Calcium plagioclase and olivine do not have the same melting temperatures but are usually placed at the same height for aesthetic reasons.  This means that quartz, muscovite and potassium feldspar melt at the lowest temperatures.

Related to the melting temperature is thermodynamic stability.  Minerals which crystallize at a high temperature tend to be stable at such temperatures, and are less stable at atmospheric conditions.  Olivine, therefore, weathers very easily under standard conditions.  This helps to explain why quartz is the leftover in beach sand.  Quartz is resistant to chemical weathering and is commonly left behind.  The mechanical weathering of waves may wash away other materials, but quartz will remain behind.  Olivine and pyroxene, the two  mineral types on the discontinuous series with the highest melting points, weather extremely easily and are thus unlikely to form such deposits.

Anyone not interested in a more detailed discussion of the chemistry of Bowen’s Reaction Series should skip ahead to the final section on interesting applications of Bowen’s Reaction Series.

The Discontinuous Series

The discontinuous series is the most interesting part of Bowen’s Reaction Series.  It is here where the most interesting chemistry takes place.  As mentioned already, olivine is the first mineral to crystallize out of a melt.  Olivines have the general formula (Ca,Mg,Fe)(Mg,Fe)SiO4.  Calcic olivines are metamorphic minerals and will not be discussed further.  Magnesium rich olivine is known as Forsterite, and melts at a temperature much higher than the iron-rich end member, Fayalite.

If an olivine, (Ca,Mg,Fe)(Mg,Fe)SiO4, reacts with quartz, SiO2, it will form a pyroxene, (Ca,Mg,Fe)(Mg,Fe)Si2O3.  Unlike olivine, calcium pyroxene (known as clinopyroxene) are found in igneous formations.  Orthopyroxenes do not contain calcium.  Ortho and clinopyroxenes have different crystallographic structures since calcium ions are enough larger than iron and magnesium to force a change in the structure.

Adding another SiO2 and water to a pyroxene will produce an amphibole, (Ca,Mg,Fe)2(Mg,Fe)5Si8O22(OH)2.  Amphiboles are minerals that we begin to see more regularly in light coloured volcanic rocks, such as granites.  Amphiboles show a lot more chemical variability than either pyroxenes or olivines.  Sodium ions are capable of substituting for any of the (Ca,Mg,Fe) ions and minerals with up to three sodium ions exist.  To maintain charge balance, however, if a sodium is substituted for one of these atoms, an aluminum (3+) must substitute for a silicon (4+).  Al-O bonds are slightly weaker than Si-O bonds and thus only up to half of the silicon in a structure is available for substitution.

As all of the above minerals crystallize from the melt, thee melt becomes rich in potassium and silica (SiO2).  The last mineral in the  discontinuous series has plenty of silica in its structure and contains potassium, a very large ion.  Biotite’s chemical formula is K(Mg, Fe)3AlSi3O10(OH)2.  Like all other mineral classes on the discontinuous series, it has a high temperature magnesium and a low temperature iron end member.

Each mineral class in the discontinuous series has an increasing degree of polymerization than the last.  Olivine is a nesosilicate, meaning that the silicon-oxygen tetrahedra (which comes from the relative size of the two ions) are physically isolated from each other and no polymerization has taken place. Pyroxenes are single chained inosilicates, meaning that they have a linear chain of tetrahedrea linked together.  Amphiboles are also inosilicates, only two of these chains have joined to form a wider sheet.  Lastly, biotite is a phylosilicate, meaning that many such chains have joined such that the resulting polymer structure is infinite (compared to the size of the atoms) in two directions, forming a sheet.

The Continuous Series

Unlike the discontinuous series, where earlier minerals react with the melt to form  later minerals, once a mineral is formed it remains unless remelted.  The continuous series features only one mineral, plageoclase feldspars, varying from calcium-rich (anorthite) to sodium-rich (albite) end-members.  All feldspars are tectosilicates, meaning they are polymerized in all three directions forming a complex network of interconnected silica tetrahedra.  The way these minerals form tend to produce a zoning effect, where within a crystal calcium content decreases as you move from the centre to the edge.

As you move from albite to anorthite, an increasing number of silicon atoms must be replaced with aluminum atoms to ensure charge balance.

The Residual Phase

The residual phase is whatever is left over after both reaction series have run to completion.  As it cools, orthoclase (potassium) feldspar forms, as well as muscovite mica and quartz.  Quartz and orthoclase are both tectosilicates (3D network), while muscovite is a phylosilicate (sheet).

Interesting Uses

Now that I’ve walked you through the basic chemistry, its time to examine a few reasons why Bowen’s Reaction Series is such an amazing tool, aside from chemical and temperature relationships and weathering.

The first is something I’ve already referenced, as you move down the series, crystal structures generally become more complex.  From olivine with no polymerization to quartz with perfect three dimensional polymerization, all in one easy to see chart.  I say generally since it is common to group all of the feldspars together (as above), which separates biotite and muscovite mica.

Crystal structure determines many physical properties.  For example, micas break off into thin, flexible sheets because all of the silica tetrahedrons point in the same direction, all of the upward facing oxygen are coordinated (bonded) to potassium, which is so large that it needs 12 oxygen to bond to.  This means that the potassium-oxygen bond is extremely weak (1/12 of the silicon-oxygen bond).  Since the structure forces these to form linear sheets, its no wonder micas cleave the way they do.

The third thing is incompatibility.  You will never find an olivine and a quartz in the same rock.  Why?  If there was silica in the melt, it would have reacted with the olivine to form pyroxene, leaving either less olivine and no silica or no olivine and less silica.

Finally, Bowen’s Reaction Series allows us to explain what we see in rocks.  We know that a granite, rich in quartz, feldspar and biotite, is the result of a relatively iron-magnesium free magma which crystallized at lower temperatures.  A dunite, on the other hand, is mostly olivine and so had to crystallize at high temperatures and become physically separated from the rest of the melt and its silica.  Combine this information with the size of crystals observed in the rock, which determine the rate of cooling, and even an amateur like myself can tell a rock’s story with ease and accuracy.

That is why I find Bowen’s Reaction Series to be so fascinating, with only two other pieces of information (bonding rules and crystal size in relation to cooling rate) you can explain most common minerals and the rocks they make up.  It is a very powerful tool in earth history and mineralogy.

I’ve written previously about my distaste for Toronto.  I’ve also claimed that this is not a mentality unique to myself, for truly it is not.  I explained one theory which I think provides the why to the action.

Now I shall refine that thought further.

I find Toronto as a physical place to be greatly unpleasant.  This is, however, just an opinion.  Many of us who grew up outside of the world’s largest cities would share such feelings owing to the total lack of anything natural within the city.  Certianly trees are planted all about, but never do they appear natural.  Even when a forested area is left, it is ruined by the excessive noise pollution of the roads which inevitably follow along near it.

This is not to say that the physical city lacks any attraction, since the ample opportunity for one to exercise boundless consumerism would be a desirable quality to many.  Any with an interest in urban architecture would also find their interests addressed within the city.  My argument is that these aspects of the physical city are insufficient to derive any enjoyment from, at least in my case.

There is the cultural city of Toronto as well.  One would be hard pressed to negatively write about this, and I shall not.  Pure cultural diversity is not the only thing that matters by a long shot, however, it can be a very positive thing.  I would say that Toronto as a cultural entity is somewhat positive in nature, if not wholly positive in nature.

The problem is neither the physical city nor the people who live in it.  The city itself is rather ugly and oppressive to me.  The people are friendly enough so long as you never utter the greatest blasphemy known to them, that Toronto is not the greatest place to live.  No, neither of these are the true nature of my distaste for this city.

The real problem is the idea of Toronto.  That, by virtue of living in Ontario at least, and perhaps Canada as a whole, one should be familiar with the street geography of Toronto enough to recognize a caricature of a map is the centre of the issue.  Toronto expects and demands awareness and seems unable or unwilling to cope with the idea that perhaps it is not the ideal form of life, eve for one person.  That, by living in the same province as the city, we should be informed of who the mayor is and what his daily actions are is an example of this.  (This last point is weakened by the fact that recent mayors of Toronto are eccentric enough to often warrant such coverage regardless of their city’s relative importance.)

I understand that Toronto is an important location and a very populous one.  I just find it impossible to care about where street x crosses street y and what shops can be found in such a local.  So please, a little understanding.

I will not comment on whether or not inflation is beneficial or otherwise.  I know not the answer.  I will not comment on the magnitude of inflation which is healthy.  I do not know the answer.   I will comment on a few causes since I do know the answer.  Not all causes will be addressed since, again, I am not familiar with all causes.

To determine whether or not you are personally an agent of inflation you need only ask yourself one question and one question alone: by doing my job, do I produce wealth.

This is a much more complex question than it first might appear.  Money is not itself wealth.  Money is only wealth if it is backed up by material or intellectual goods.  If you are not producing such goods directly then you are a personification of inflation.  You personify inflation because you make money without producing wealth, which is the working definition of inflation we are using here.

This is necessarily a simplification, but for the sake of argument it is appropriate.

This is not to say that if you personify inflation that something is fundamentally wrong.   Many of the jobs which fall under this catagory are vital to life, such as doctors and nurses, make the rest of our lives easier, such as sanitation workers, or make the actually productive people function better, such as managers.

I feel as though it is unnecessary to discus doctors, nurses and sanitation workers as I feel as though their value is self-evident.   I intend to discus managers in some detail, however.

Some management is important to the functioning of society.  Someone needs to make sure that many functions, such as agreements between the company the government, actually take place.  Other examples of useful management would be people who do not directly add wealth to society but increase the value of final products in other ways, such as people who write manuals and those who test prototypes and those who repair damaged goods.

In modern times, however, management structures have become too large and organizations are routinely supersaturated with managers.   I wonder what a healthy ratio of managers to productive people is.  I wonder how many layers of managers is needed to run an organization.  I wonder why some of our most apparently successful institutions are comprised solely of managers.  I wonder why, when we already have far too many managers already, schools are still eager to produce as many managers as possible.