An Autonomous Agent

exploring the noosphere

Category: video (Page 2 of 24)

New Theories on the Origin of Life with Dr. Eric Smith

Dr. Eric Smith’s lecture on the origin of life really challenged everything I thought I understood regarding how life functions and possibly originated on Earth. Make sure to watch the question and answer at the end for some good points regarding panspermia and Miller’s experiments.

NOVA – Life’s Rocky Start

Life’s Rocky Start gives a decent educational account of the importance of minerals to both the formation (assuming life originated on Earth) and the progressive development of life. It is one of the few documentaries I have seen that properly shines light on the importance of meteorites to the understanding of planetary formation. The documentary starts by visiting Marrakesh, Morocco to show how meteorites are obtained in the infamous Northwest Africa region. I only wished it developed more on this meteorite theme.

Diets, Animals, and the Environment

Consider, in 2008 Americans killed an estimated 8,130,000,000 chickens and 40,800,000 cows. Those are the statistics for a single year! The total estimated global stock of chickens and cows in 2011 was 19 and 1.4 billion, respectively. Might the environmental crisis be due in part to sustaining livestock for consumption. The documentary Cowspiracy suggests this to be the case. There is not much one can do to convince someone who was raised eating meat to switch from an omnivore to an herbivore diet. If you don’t believe me, try it! Or, tell that person to watch a documentary like Forks Over Knives. The benefits of a whole-food plant-based diet are incredible. Making the transition will not only improve your health but also save the life of the planet. Note, make sure you know about the necessity of Vitamin B12 supplements for vegetarian diets.

It is impossible for livestock consumption to continue growing at this pace indefinitely into the future. The pressure on the environment from livestock grows daily. At some point either the human population will change their behavior to alleviate this pressure or the Biosphere will take matters into its own hands. My own pessimistic opinion is that it will inevitably be nature who reprimands her children. The punishment, or gift — depending on your perspective — might be a virus, plague, prion, drought, or famine which wipes out a species of livestock.

A Journey into the Mind of Pynchon

It has been a long time since I read a fictional book. For various uncertain reasons I have only read non-fiction for the past several years; I am tired of non-fiction and for the past few weeks I have been on a quest for a book that grabs me and says: “Read THIS!”

I have been enjoying Gore Vidal’s Burr; although a wonderful book of historical fiction, my desire is for a more mind expanding literary challenge. Perhaps Thomas Pynchon’s work? I am going to start with V.

A fascinating video about Pynchon is linked below; it is amusing to watch how, near the end, the narrators analyze video footage as they search (in vain?) for an image of Pynchon — it reminded me of the old videos of the ever-elusive big-foot roaming in the woods, too funny.

The Coming War on China – John Pilger

John Pilger’s upcoming film The Coming War on China (Consider supporting via the link on his Indiegogo page)

The link on YouTube keeps getting removed. Once an official version is posted I’ll update this post with a fresh link. Until then…

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