September 08, 2010

• Empiricism: World/order imposed on subject
• Nativism: subject/order imposed on world, development = physical maturation
• Constructivism: subject acts, boundary in between, world reacts. Interaction = source of order, development = change in subject as function of interaction with world
• Human vs. cebus in sensory motor development, casual functions, logical operations, logical classifications – humans are delayed, but monkeys find out immediately (but are terrorized about it)
• Out of sight, out of mind: cannot see, no longer interested
• value-laden observer – defined system behavior – value-free, undefined material system not directly accessible. Science of necessity makes decisions; we must not mistake accuracy for objectivity.
• Child with no immune system unable to understand that building size is correlated with distance; no way to experiment
• Prediction: explain your future in terms of constraints
• To predict, look back into the past as far as how far into the future you wish to predict. Easier to predict if no other extraneous forces act.

September 10, 2010

• Bulbs: modified leaf bases, store carbohydrates (ie. onion)
• Tendrils: leaflets for climbing and holding
• Leaves modified for food storage (ie. cabbage, spinach, lettuce)
• Petioles modified for storage (ie. rhubarb, celery)
• Leaves attract pollinators instead of petals (ie. poinsettia)
• Stolon (runner): grows horizontally along ground
• Rhizomes: stems that grow horizontally underground, rich in stored food. Stays alive during the winter (perennials).
• Succulents: thick and fleshy leaves/stems for hot/dry environments.
• Cactus: thorns are modified leaves.
• Euphorbia: thorns are modified stipules.
• Garlic: used as medicine for 5000+ years, was a god in Egypt. Raw garlic has maximum medicinal effect.
• Corms: vertical, underground stems with papery leaf bases (ie. water chestnuts)
• Tubers: enlarged, underground stems, food stored as starch (ie. potato)
• Potato: low-calorie, high-protein (deeply-set eyes). Nutritional value declines with economic demand.
• Root modified to store food, reserves used to produce flowers and fruit (ie. carrot, turnip, beets)
• Homologous: actually the same thing. Analogous: looks like some other plant part.

September 10, 2010

• Simple system: everyone agrees what is structure vs. behavior
• Complex system: everyone needs to decide structure/behavior, meaning/dynamics, rate independence/dependence, discrete/continuous.
• Level of hierarchy – process to make it simple
• Become dexterous: novice. A craftsmen: apprentice. Creative: master.
• Classical: Because I said so! Modern: Because it is real. Post-modern: Because of high quality.
• Classical: master has apprentices do most of painting. Modern: there is the original and then there is the copyist. Post-modern: the privilege of the original disappears.
• Picasso: took the full face, side face, profile, etc. and put it all together.
• Post-modern: everyone is watching others do their thing. (ie. Who’s watching the person that’s watching me?)
• Post-normal science applies when time is short, uncertainty is great, stakes are high. (ie. epidemics, sea level rise, global warming)
• Naming something freezes time (ie. student not always a student)
• Narratives collapse a chronology so only certain events are deemed important. A full account is impossible and not a narrative. Facts are based on the perspective and info in the narrative.

September 13, 2010

• Complications of feedback: local events and processes are attached to upscale consideration

September 15, 2010

• Darwin exploring South America, finds horses and mastodons.
• Finches with different characteristics on Galapagos (varieties)
• Capacity to reproduce in excess, restraint competition for resources
• Evolution does not occur in the individual, but in the population
• Evolution is modification (new things) of descent
• Emergent structures are self-organized (ie. whirlpool)
• Survival of the fittest must fit into the environment

September 17, 2010

• Homology indicates similarities from ancestral origins.
• Anology indicates similarities based on common function.
• Darwin saw gradations; determine that species weren’t static
• Coevolution: helping each other live, ie. ants and spines, plants and animals (to carry sex cells)
• Convergent evolution: different species adapting to the same environments.
• Positive vs. negative feedback: determine type by multiplying + and –
• Initial disturbance, relationships between containers, loops as whole, value of loops (good or bad)
• Games of different cultures: spatial orientation, chess vs. African ayo.
• Mimicry, ie. flies copying stingers of wasps, IBM copying machines but selling them for lower prices

September 17, 2010

• Cylinders are more powerful because stretching and contracting is more abundant.
• Cable: cylinders that can bend and not be destroyed
• Add strengthening material to edges, not center; center has no change when bent.
• Trees are more than 32 feet, but water can only be pushed up to 32 feet, then vacuum occurs. Trees use pressure to pull water up; tree could shrink from pressure.
• Create a spherical shape to minimize surface area and keep heat. ie. Dogs curling up into a ball.

September 20, 2010

• Ferns reproduce through spores; new generation grows parasitically from the mother.
• Spores – seeds – flowering (chronology)
• Double wrapping beneficial
• Berry: seeds buried in fleshy material (homologous)
• The pit is not the seed; the pit contains the seeds
• Achene vs. grain: dry fruits with seeds that either pull away from the wall or are fused to the wall
• Apples and pears are false fruits; the actual fruit is the fleshy part on the inside surrounding the seed
• Raspberries: grouplets
• Strawberry: ovaries expand after petals fall off. Small hard parts are individual dry achene fruits.
• Durian fruit

September 22, 2010

• Durian fruit: large, spiny, custardy substance around seed. Have a fleshy aril.
• Prey vs. predator coevolution: one attracts the prey while the other eats it.
• Hard-wired to react to particular things (ie. chicken mother reacts to sound but not to sight).
• You can be powerful or flexible but not both. Humans are flexible, taking into account a variety of different things in a variety of different settings.
• Humans like and create savannas. Buildings and constructions emulate savannas.
• Stereo vision helps determine depth
• Trees use red to communicate, ie. flower petals and berries. As a result, other animals use red to communicate.

September 24, 2010

• Open vs. Closed Living Systems. Open (tree): flow rates change drastically depending on the environment, size unlimited, externally driven by water pressure. Closed (human): flow rates are relatively constant; size limited by their ability to exchange water, nutrients, cases, heat; internally driven by an organism’s muscle contractions.
• Introvert kingdom: complexity is on the inside. Interior cells supported by a bag – the actual animal. Must get food from elsewhere: must be mobile and cannot have cell walls. Turn themselves outside-in.
• Extrovert kingdom: make food from molecules common in air and soil. Carbon dioxide + water = sugar to store, sugar = carbon dioxide + water to release energy. Cell wall provides support, allows necessary substances to pass through.
• Large surface area increases places where nutrients can enter, but also increases the bass it must carry.
• “Why is sex fun?” : (ex. tigers) males leave after giving sperm, but females must take care of child; encourages more reproduction. Investment of sperm less than egg. Birds’ investments are more equal; shared responsibilities. Parental investment: increasing probability of offspring reproducing. Commitment makes animals want to spread their genes. Female cannot while pregnant, so male does. Male wolf wants his genes to survive as well as spread. External fertilization: male takes care of eggs so they’re not fertilized by someone else. Sex-role-reversal, female competes for the male. Biological inheritance: impossible to care for infant without two parents. Confidence: male cares for offspring, but must be sure it is his. Otherwise, male has wasted time. Advertising ovulation visually, or concealed ovulation by humans. Daddy-at-home keeps male guessing when she can become pregnant. Many-fathers prevents infanticide, muddles paternity.
• Pollination: (1) finding a mate, (2) dispersing seeds later. Flowers are adapted `to attract the animals that pollinate them, ie. large petals for bees, red for birds.
• Flowers attract with colors (different animals see different shades), scents (either generic or fit for a specific animal), shape (determines what animals can enter), nectar (food)
• Dispersal: fruits are useful mechanisms to use animals.
• Accessory/false fruits: some/all of fleshy part not derived from ovary. Pomes: derive from ovary and other flora parts. Aggregate: several carpels infused, carpels turn into fruit. Multiple: come from many flowers and many fruits, but turns into one large mass after maturation.
• Achenes: seed loose within the shell. Nuts: achenes with hard thickened walls to protect seed. Grain: fruits of grasses. Follicles: primitive dry fruit. Samara: fruit of trees. Capsules: split open at maturity.
• Drupes: develop from simple superior (peaches, coconuts, walnuts, almonds, plums, dates)
• Durian type: (pineapple, cacao, bananas, durians)
• Legumes: carpel modified into leaves, fused together (pea pods, green beans, peanuts).
• Berry: fleshy with seeds on the inside. Ovary wall becomes enlarged. Derived from single ovary. (Tomato, pepper, grape)

September 27, 2010

• New World monkeys have longer tails, used as a fifth limb.
• Gorillas are vegetarians, get most water from the vegetation. Because of their food choice, their feces isn’t toxic.
• Birds with long tail feathers: advantage to reproducing and being attractive. Disadvantage when predator grabs the tail.
• Birds use objects (ie. shiny sardine can) to be attractive.
• House flies have a second set of wings used as gyroscopes for stability. When danger approaches, gyroscopes stop flapping and fly becomes unstable to move quicker.
• Brains produce a lot of heat because of the spherical shape having low surface area.

September 29, 2010

• An early mutation is far more harmful than a mutation that occurs later on during development.
• Bulging foreheads
• The chimpanzee’s grimace is the origin of the human smile.
• Facial hair hides facial expression showing weakness.

October 04, 2010

• When you die, your body slows down and others take advantage of your resources.
• Fire is useful for everyone, regardless of location.
• High-gain (production) – low-gain (cleverness)
• Evolving into a large brain took energy; now that we have it, we can use it and take advantage of it.
• Our size allows us to take advantage of fire.
• A small portion of what we eat gets turned into energy (ie. beetles get 17% for growth; humans 1.2/1000 calories)
• In cold-blooded chain, about 1/3 of energy goes through to the next stage. In warm-blooded chain, about 1/10 of the energy goes through to the next stage.
• Fire allows humans to move to lower stages of the food chain and eat much more abundant foods (vegetables).
• Protection on vegetables overcome by boiling.
• Peppers are red to attract. Spicy to mammals because the mammals cannot disperse seeds, so pepper keeps away. Birds cannot taste spiciness and are good at dispersion.
• Dandelions: (1) Bitter, (2) Foaming agent create bubbles in stomach
• Enzymes maintains proper balance, biochemistry works in loops.
• Some enzymes (ie. uncooked beans) use protein-digesting properties as defensive method.
• Uncooked yams has sexual hormone/chemical mimics that confuse the eater’s thyroid.
• Caffeine, morphine, ephedrine are alkaloids with a circular shape
• Neurotransmitters don’t make the body happy, causes person to feel bad when people want to stop drinking

October 06, 2010

• Cooking created plants that specialize in getting us to eat them.
• Dopamine remains released and eventually gets lost. Drugs then become needed to maintain normality.
• Sex is fun because it acts as a social lubricant.
• The use of cocaine relieves and satisfies all desires, so addicts must check wrinkles on their hand to check for thirst.
• Digitalis can be used medically to regulate heart beat, but when taken in plant form, will make a heart slow to a stop.
• Coco leaves are healthy, but using its crystallized product (cocaine) is bad.
• Gout is caused by uric acid in the joints which causes pain.
• Different types of tea have different requirements when making, ie. water temperature. Only loose tea leaves, no bags.

October 08, 2010

• Wind pollination: pollen is light, produced in excess to increase the chances of reaching the stigma, stigmas are long and feathery to increase chances of catching pollen.
• Wind dispersal of seeds: spikelets are fragile and break off easily.
• Grasses lack color/nectar/odor to attract animals.
• Wild wheat/barley: rachis shatter when grains are ripe for wind dispersal.
• Wild oats: lemma has long spike called awn. Twists and allows wild oat grain to drive into the ground.
• Barley: self-pollinating, diploid. Wild and cultivated hybrids common where they co-exist.
• Priorities for breeding barley: more grain per plant, responsiveness to fertilizer, photosynthetic efficiency.
• Wheat structure has group of 3 grains in each spikelet, barley has 3 separate spikelets in 1 cluster.
• Wild barley has 3 spikelets, center for producing grain and two for wings to aid dispersal.
• Spikelet: shoot in which florets occur in the axils of specialized leaves (lemmas). Glumes never have florets and define the spikelet.
• Base chromosomes = 7. Diploid = 14 (most wild and primitive wheats). Tetraploid = 28 (hybrids of wild and domesticated). Durum = commercial, good for pasta. Hexaploid = 42 (only in domestication, hybrids of diploids and tetraploids).
• Hard wheat: high protein, used for chewy bread. Soft wheat: low protein, pastry and French bread. Hulled: glumes tight around grain. Free threshing: glumes more open. Winter wheat: growing season in spring. Spring wheat: plant in spring, summer harvest.
• Cultivated oats: livestock feed. Non-glutenin protein (not useful for bread making).
• Domestication can cause resuscitation of formerly sterile parts. Six rows of fertile grain in barley produces three times as many seeds.
• Buckwheat: not grass but seeds (achenes) are grain-like. High-quality protein; used in porridge, pancakes, animal food.
• Sorghum: sweet used for syrup, forage crop. Grown in dry conditions. Uses cyanide as self-defense.
• Triticale is a hybrid of wheat and rye. Good and vigorous.
• Millet: feed crop cereal in U.S. Human diet in tropical countries. High protein (16-22%). Require little water, tolerate poor soil.
• Rice husk = good source of vitamin B. Machine processing reduces vitamins.
• Steam-rolled barley: crushed and heated by steam to soften material and destroy enzymes.
• Race horse oats are larger and lighter. More expensive.

October 08, 2010

• Opiates come from the poppy and is addictive. Morphine was created to help overcome opium, but was also addictive; heroine was created to overcome morphine.
• Opium is an analgesic, eliminating pain.
• Coca cola contains cacao after cocaine is extracted.
• If all illegal drugs were made legal and the government take control of all sales, all profit would go toward discouraging people from using the drug.
• Spiders spinning webs on drugs: caffeine and speed are negative, but LSD makes the spider spin perfect webs.
• Humans move to vegetarian diets due to the ability to cook and the abundance of vegetables leading to agriculture.
• Sun directly overhead near the equator induces high photosynthetic activity. Away from equator, sun sets slanting at an angle.
• Humidity: relative is the amount of water compared to how much there can be, absolute is the amount of water dissolved.
• Global warming will melt the ice in Greenland, releasing enough cold water to drive the Gulf Stream south, sending Britain into an ice age in 4 years.
• Agriculture is on the tail end of coins.
• All areas experience 50% light and 50% darkness depending on sun’s perspective.

October 11, 2010

• Rachilla/rachis: long stem-like portion
• Oats imitate to be harvested
• In oats, it is the rachilla that shatters, not rachis.
• Dispersal units. Wheat: spikelets + rachis. Barley: 3 spikelets + rachi. Oat: 1 floret + rachilla.
• Discovery of agriculture was likely a mistake, ie. drop grain on accident but see that a new plant with grain has grown; store grain but notice that new plants are growing.

October 13, 2010

• Adenine and thymine, cytosine and guanine with hydrogen bonds, the sugar is facing the opposite direction.
• DNA replication, splits DNA apart and attaches correlating
• Aligning amino acids properly and removing water creates a peptide bond in a dipeptide.
• mRNA is the secondary blueprint copy (opposed to original)
• Combinations of ACGT 3 at a time creates 64 possibilities, but only 20 amino acids exist.
• Mitosis: four duplicated chromosomes; spindles pull them apart and make two sets of four single chromosomes.
• Haploid: one set of chromosomes, Diploid: two sets.
• Meiosis: start with single-stranded chromosomes, pair up, mix/combine and pull apart. Double-stranded chromosomes afterwards, mitosis occurs with mixed up chromosomes.
• Genes get turned on and off according to the environment, but are passed on regardless.
• If chromosomes don’t match up, child becomes sterile (zorse = zebra + horse, zonkey = zebra + donkey).

October 15, 2010

• Chromosomes duplicate forming 2 sister chromatids, mechanisms for moving chromosome appears, chromosomes align in the middle, chromatids are separated, new nuclei form and cells divide.
• Mitosis: replication of genetic material and passing copies. Proper distribution of genetic material.
• Meiosis: replication of chromosome, chromosomes pair up to form 4 chromatids. Homologous chromosomes line up in middle, chromosomes move apart, chromosomes lined up and separated into different cells, results in 4 daughter cells.
• Produces 1N gametes from 2N cells. Chromosome number halved, new generation has same number of chromosomes.
• Purpose. Mitosis: replicate cell. Meiosis: create gametes containing genetic material.
• Levels of 2: DNA has double helix structure, segments of DNA and chromosomes are double-stranded, nucleus is diploid (two sets of chromosomes).
• Mitosis retains levels of 2. Meiosis halves diploid levels. Differences at metaphase and anaphase.
• Root and stem tips: fastest growing tissues on most plants.
• Independent assortment: homologous pairs line up in middle, the side of midline is random. Mix up maternal/paternal genes.
• Crossing over: chromosomes broken between genes and reattached. Occurs frequently during meiosis.
• Dominant: first generation, recessive: successive generations.
• Unit characters: factors control inheritance of characters. Dominance: one gene may mask another. Segregation: only one gene per pair goes into gamete/spore.
• Genotype: actual genetic constitution (ie. RR, Rr, rr). Phenotype: actual observable/measurable characteristic (ie. RR = red, Rr = pink, rr = white).
• Cross between two pink results in red and pink and white.
• Hybrid desirable if it combines desirable traits of both parents. Could end up better adapted than parents.
• Hybrids sterile – chromosomes won’t pair successfully in meiosis. If mitosis fails to separate the copies of chromosomes, meiosis can work.
• If hybrid goes through chromosome doubling to become a fertile tetraploid (2N -> 4N), it is an instant new species.
• Inversion: chromosome breaks, fuses backwards, simple pairing cannot occur, chromosome twists to pair.
• Translocation: both chromosomes break, fuse backwards, backwards pair with normal by aligning proper numbers.
• What has group of 3 grains in each spikelet, barley has 3 separate spikelets in 1 cluster.
• Polyploid: usually occurs in domesticated crops.
• Mitosis fails, failed products fuse and form cell with double DNA. When reattempting mitosis, results in 2 daughter cells with twice the genetic material.

October 15, 2010

• Double occurs in a shock in the mitosis cycle or a cell turns into a sperm/egg prematurely.
• Seven characters, statistical ratios come out about 3:1.
• Heterozygote, homozygous
• A female carrying a bad gene can pass it on to her children and the disease can show up in grandchildren.
• Breeding sometimes only takes place locally, as other neighborhoods are miles away and separated by mountains.
• Treat ethnobotanists well.

October 18, 2010

• Mediterranean: lots of precipitation during winter but less in sumer, water flows down from the mountains.
• Centers of origins all in the right place at the right time.
• Agriculture is more work and all potential origins state that agriculture is not a good idea.
• They don’t continue agriculture because it’s a good idea; they don’t know what they’re up to. They only continue because agriculture increases population, so they must continue.
• During a radical change (domesticated vs. wild), there are periods of delayed negative feedback oscillation.
• Civilization and cities first, agriculture later.
• If you have a steep gradient, structures will emerge.
• The more items the system contains, the more problems could potentially arise.

October 20, 2010

• Emergent structures will never be the same, only similar.
• Agriculture is a collapse to a higher level.
• A higher level of organization results in the less important and lower levels to be forgotten. (ie. Information -> Industrialization -> Agriculture)
• Functional complicatedness: A computer is more advanced than an abacus, but a computer is easier to use.
• Laws vs. Rules. Laws: inexorable, general, rate dependent, structure independent, dynamical. Rules: local, arbitrary, rate independent, structure dependent, linguistic.
• If you don’t have the technology, you don’t care about it. Once you get and use a technology, you can’t live without it.
• Things invented in cities can move to rural areas (ie. feeding cows grain in Chicago, bras in New York).

October 22, 2010

• Homeostasis: everything in balance. Equilibrium: a dynamic balance of input and out put processes.
• Emergent structures: qualitatively different.
• When a system is far from equilibrium, new structures emerge. Flow of energy is great, pathways are restructured.
• Tornado in a bottle: new dissipative structure with disturbance.
• Gradient: more potential power to be accessed. Build structures to diffuse gradient more rapidly.
• Gyroscope: spinning causes structure to hold orientation.
• Complexity: elaboration of organization, behavior gets simpler, hierarchy gets deeper. Complicatedness: elaboration of structure, behavior gets complicated, hierarchy gets flatter, more degrees of freedom. Behavior becomes more elaborate.
• Creation of pattern without intent: enter a system and cannot escape. ie. agriculture, growing grains can both feed and trade, once you start, you cannot leave.
• Most food production occurs away from equator. Longer days allow longer periods of photosynthate accumulation.
• Fertile crescent: SW Asia, earliest center of food production, mild wet winters and hot dry summers. Constant and flat land.
• Near east: topographically diverse. Mediterranean climate of hot summers and cool winters with winter rain, large alluvial valleys.
• Cultivated crops adapted to seasonal climate. Dormant through dry season. Predictable supply of seeds.
• Origins of Domestication. Darwin’s light bulb: someone’s good idea. Childe’s oasis: response to drought, moved to oasis. Braidwood’s natural habitat: oases/springs not habitat of wheat/barley, but foot of mountains were. Cohen’s population pressure: humans forced into agriculture. Binford’s marginal zone: forced to move to marginal zone and do agriculture for survival. Smith’s regional: various factors including population, environment, social structure.
• Barriers to Domestication. Diet: animal only converts 10% of food mass to own mass. Growth rate: animals must grow quickly. Problems of captive breeding: only want private breeding. Nasty disposition: tendency to kill humans. Tendency to panic: panic and flight to danger. Social structure: dominance hierarchy and herds.
• Barriers of Domestication Based on Availability of Receptive Animals. Rapid acceptance of Eurasian domesticates by non-Eurasian people. Keeping of pets by virtually every human society. No significant additions to list of domesticated animals since 2500 BC. Same few wild species attracted attention of many different human societies. Nobody succeeded in useful domestication outside Ancient 14.
• Characteristics of domesticated animals: tameness, behavioral change, breeding control.
• Changes due to domestication: growth rates, coat color, skull and skeleton, hair, physiology.
• Firemaking devices: fire drill, fire piston, fire plow.

October 25, 2010

• Alcohol is both fat and water soluble, so it gets everywhere.
• Head rotary sense gets recalibrated.
• Fat globules scar soft tissue in liver, positive feedback.
• Alcohol decreases heart attack, increases cancer.
• Fetal alcohol syndrome: facial cells die wrong place/time.
• Americans wash grapes for wine, must add yeast.

October 27, 2010

• Wheat has lots of protein, causing bread to rise.
• Run through rollers to grind it.
• Gluten (protein in bread): bubbles stretch and persist.
• Unleavened bread without leavening agent: thin, crispy, brick.
• Leavened bread: agent that produces gas. (ex. quick bread, angel food, yeast bread, sourdough)
• Quick bread: releases carbon dioxide when cooked (ex. US pancakes)
• Yeast bread: create alcohol and carbon dioxide. Take time to rise, alcohol evaporates. Rises, pushed down, rises again.
• Kneading is mostly a stretching process.
• Overkneading: water attaches to protein. Dough becomes inelastic, bread becomes weak.
• Bread cooking temperature: start high, then lower (ex. 400 degrees to 350 degrees)
• French bread is one of the best baguettes in the world, doesn’t last long so French are always baking bread.
• Croissants made on marble/stone tables at low temperatures. Stretch, add unmelted butter, fold, stretch, fold.
• Sourdough: bacteria put in starter. Converts alcohol of fermentation into acetic acid (vinegar).
• Angel food: air is the leavening agent, whipped into the egg mixture.
• Bread and wheat has lots of symbolism.

November 01, 2010

• Literacy: Greeks were literate but not alphabetic. Used a cryptographic pictorial language.
• Overfarming and lack of rain caused the ground to blow away. Dust bowl.
• Easier to smelt but not enough bronze.
• Earthquakes and natural disasters don’t damage communities that are not yet complex.
• At the rate of scientific development now, everybody will have to be a scientist in 100 years.
• Centaurs were seen as a man on horseback being one thing.
• Trees are important for holding dirt and recycling, burning them up
• Complex systems collapse abruptly, no warning until it is completely gone.

November 08, 2010

• By 145 BC, Rome is an important trading center.
• Every time there is a steep gradient, there will be an emergent structure to take advantage of it.
• Attacking and pillaging a village for gold can only be done once before the gold is gone.
• A method to get more gold after it’s gone is taxation.
• Roman attitudes = “Can do!”
• To reverse sins, do right vs. contemplate
• Romans were not interested in machines, which imposed limits.
• Machinery = animals pulling equipment.

November 10, 2010

• Romans liked sweeter wine, so they put acid in lead wine containers and drunk the lead acetate.
• Romans did not see themselves as aggressors, they saw the people they were overseeing as aggressors.
• Humans and animals defecate on their own land, creating a cycle.
• The amount of silver was reduced because people melted and reconstructed them, adding other substances and restamping them. Eventually, the silver ran out.
• The equation of the decline of silver is a cubic function that fits well, saying that Romans were doing the same wrong thing consistently.
• Society increases in complexity and solves problems, but new problems arise and eventually it cannot be solved.
• When marginal return goes flat, it is no longer worth it.

November 12, 2010

• Stonehenge (Salisbury Plain, England): heel stone indicates sunrise on summer solstice. 18+ astronomical observations can be made from various lines of sight.
• People of the era held fire ceremonies, worshipping sun gods and god of sky, which lead to astronomy.
• Avenue: outermost element, 1/3 mile long, runs in from NE, consists of twin mounds 4 feet high and 40 feet apart.
• Heel stone: indicates summer solstice sunrise, outside of circles.
• Aubrey holes: 56 pits (circular concrete spots) inside mound.
• Sarsen stones: 30 upright, about 25 tons each, smaller lintels about 6.75 tons. Only 16 sarsens and 5 lintels remain today.
• Built in 3 eras: 3100 BC aubrey holes, 2550 BC animal bones inside ditches and holes, 2100 BC all stones erected.
• Stones transported on rollers for 20 miles north and 180 miles west. Tipped stone into pit, wooden legs erected pillar, hole filled.
• Crossbar (lintel) added, earthen mound built on top of uprights, dragged up 22-foot ramp, arranged.
• Collapse of Complex Societies by Joseph Tainter. Relatively new as of 6000 years, 99.8% human history has been simple.
• Emerges as problem solving organization in response to changing circumstances.
• Collapse is rapid loss of established complexity. Result of increase in complexity resulting in diminishing marginal returns.
• Collapse based on (1) societies = problem-solving organizations, (2) sociopolitical systems require energy for maintenance, (3) increased complexity = increased cost per capita, (4) investment often reaches point of declining marginal returns.
• Fertility symbols: humans represented environmental abundance with female figure. Fertility of land = fertility of people. Penetration and insemination of land with plow.
• Slash-and-Burn Agriculture: farmers cut down and set fire to undergrowth of grass and trees. Ash from burning fertilizes land and gives crops nutrients. Mimics forest’s natural ecology.
• England, British Farming: (1) Communal farming, laying out of 2-3 large fields into numerous small plots. (2) Estates, enclosed farms held stock in winter. (3) Free trade, machinery introduced, farming became a business of investment, rise of scientific agriculture. (4) Planning, integration and planning at national level, larger financial sector over production.
• Ireland: large family for farm maintenance, life patterns and kinships formed on their land, not loyal to government and faithful to the land.
• Potato Famine (1841-1851): Potato crop wiped out by late blight disease, no alternate food cultivated, 30% population died, 2,000,000+ immigrated to U.S.
• Irish and Incan spades
• Scratch Plow: metal-tipped lightweight used in Mediterranean. Eight-Ox Moldboard Plow: heavy plow with colters and metal parts lift and turn over soil in the cohesive and wet North Europe.
• Fermentation. Glucose broken down to pyruvate, oxygen absent. Wine: yeast present on skin of grapes, yeast breaks down grape sugars into alcohol, long = dry and short = sweet. Beer: grain soaked to initiate sprouting, enzyme converts starch to sugar, yeast added after brewing with hops and grains. Bread: dough rises, yeast digests starches in grain, produces alcohol and carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide creates bubbles and pockets of air.
• Beer: Ales vs. Lagers. Ales brewed with top fermenting yeast at room temperature, broadest range of beer styles, fresh = flavorful and individualistic. Lagers brewed with bottom fermenting yeast at cooler temperature, clean and round flavor. Home brewing: mash, boil, ferment.
• Traditional English pub games: Quoits, Shove Ha’Penny, Aunt Sally, Skittles, and Table Skittles, Ringing the Bull, Darts
• Whiskey. Alcohol has lower boiling point than water. Vaporized alcohol captured for higher concentration (distillation). Also: vodka, rum, gin, tequila, brandy. Pasteurization: submersion, flash, spray methods.

November 15, 2010

• Corn growing on ground that has been slashed and burned. Not completely organized, but organized enough.
• Deforestation at the current rate will result in about 50% of the tropical forests being gone in about 50 years.
• Low temperatures: slow growth, very slow decomposition, build up lots of organic material, salts washed away.
• High temperatures: fast growth, very fast decomposition, low organic build-up, plants capture nutrients.
• There are a variety of different spades of different sizes that serve different purposes and meet different criteria.
• Cultural integration of spades: sadness, his face is as long as a spade. Digging with the wrong foot.

November 17, 2010

• England: moderate moisture -> moderate plant growth -> moderate decomposition -> humid, nutrient-rich soil.
• Ireland: very cool, wet -> slow plant growth -> very slow decomposition -> peaty, low-nutrient soil.
• Ireland has a rich language with 80 sounds.
• Infield: measured every year and sown with grain, distributed among individuals in strips. Outfield: five years of fallow, five years of oats, repeat.
• Religion provides conservatism.
• In peasant families, the mother runs the family.

November 19, 2010

• Essential oils that serve as defenses have been long exploited by humans for medicinal, nutritional, culinary, and dyeing purposes.
• Herbs; plants whose leaves are used. Grown in temperate climates, tend to have less potent concentrations of essential oils. Drying further concentrates oils.
• Spices: tropical origin. Tend to be the root, stem, seed. Higher concentration of essential oils, more potent. Served antibacterial purposes in food preparation.
• Plant parts used as herbs/spices. Seed: mustard, cardamon, anise. Bark: cinnamon. Leaf: rosemary, thyme, bay, sage, basil, cilantro. Seed: nutmeg, mace, coriander. Style: saffron. Flower: chamomile, calendula. Fruit: peppers, peppercorns, vanilla beans.
• Traded spices valued like gold and jewels. Monsoon winds used to trade by sea. Pepper had the highest demand.
• Plant defenses: poisons (caffeine), tough materials and protective cover (popcorn), foaming agents (latex and rubber), bitter taste (tannins, found in tea).
• Tea is made by steeping the top leaves and buds of tea plants. Coffee made by brewing roasted and ground seeds of tropical evergreen coffee plant. Coca-cola made from sources of cocaine and caffeine.
• Chinese tea practices still require skilled laborers. Devices only help in roasting and withering.
• Evolution of tea: cake -> powdered -> leaf.
• Opium: China’s dream drug. Used for medicine and pleasure. In U.S. 19th century, no laws banned opium, morphine, codeine, heroine. Chinese seen negatively -> opium smoking is foreign, opium used to seduce white women, completely banned 1914.
• Caffeine: stimulant that occurs in many widely-distributed plants. Chemically an alkaloid. Comes from Coffea arabica seeds, Theobroma cacao.
• Caffeine health: cycle, increased caffeine intake -> decreased sleep quality -> increased caffeine intake -> decreased sleep quality -> disease and fatigue -> increased caffeine intake.

November 29, 2010

• Agricultural technology improvements improve productivity drastically (ie. windmills)
• Britain got an industrial revolution with sweatshops.
• Corn: domesticated grass but fundamentally structurally different.
• Corn was used as fertility symbols for Aztecs and Pueblo Indians.
• Different varieties of corn, including poppable popcorn.
• As of 1913, corn production went up massively. We are now up to about 200 bushels per acre.
• Breeding for high/low oil/protein can be done in less than 50 generations.
• Each in-breeding generation cuts the heterozygosity in half. About 8 generations, the plant becomes nearly fully homozygous.
• Breeding A and B or C and D creates an entirely predictable plant. Combining the AB and CD plants makes (B X A) X (C X D) seed for commercial planting, but is less predictable.
• Double crossing loses genetic control but increases productivity.
• The corn begins as a 1-2-1-2 pattern but becomes much more massive.
• In corn, there’s two spikelets at each node. This causes an even number of rows.
• Corn is terminal on a lateral shoot.
• The cob twisting creates 8- and 16-row cobs.

December 01, 2010

• Adding extra features adds more things that can break. Underconnection makes the system fall apart. Overconnection makes the system tear itself apart.
• Iowa corn in the fall is stable, winter wipes it out and disconnects it.
• Increasing diversity will increase stability. Bug: “I eat corn but not beans, but they’re all mixed up in the same field.”
• Potatoes must have low protein levels to be French fried well. High-protein potatoes are used by people dependent on protein (ie. Andes).
• Potatoes are still moist and active, internal timer tells them when spring is here so they can sprout.
• Turning potatoes into potato flour is a way to keep the crop available year-round.
• Potatoes and a dairy product give a good, robust diet.
• Potato blight rots both fresh and stored potatoes, rotting potatoes smell horrible.
• Putting salt on eggplant, leaving it for 5-10 minutes, and squeezing takes the bitterness out.
• Papaya skin has papayan enzymes, which is the basis of meat tenderizer. Scraping pulp close to the skin to eat is bad.
• The less effect you have, the less side effects you experience.
• 75% of humanity in the new world was centralized around the Aztec and Incan empires.
• The Aztecs lived in Tenochtitlan, which was a lake and is now Mexico City. The Aztecs have an odd approach to religion – human sacrifice because girl was too beautiful and was thought to be long to the gods.
• The sugars of artichokes break off easily, including a delightful sweetness.
• Artichokes leave sugars undigested and send it down to the intestines, creating flatulence.
• The limiting factor in an intense system is space.
• Aztecs and Sumerians did not have iron. Soft metal was useful for organizing society.
• Highly disciplined society with strict punishments. Getting drunk or being adulterous was a capitol offense.

December 03, 2010

• Catastrophic Sexual Transmutation Theory
  • Teosinte: Female zone located inside the male zone, terminal male tassels, male and female zones controlled by hormones.
  • Environmental and genetic change: tassels on the laterals/branches are lowered into the female zone through shortening of the branches. The terminal male tassels were transformed into female spikes. Tassels outside the female zone were not transformed. Suppression of the laterals by apical dominance of the female terminal on the branch.
  • Modern Corn: through time, the continued apical dominance of the terminal females suppressed the lateral females. This leads to the gigantic corn cob. Human selection for easily harvestable packets = positive feedback loop for larger ears of corn. The structure of the cob retains the twisting and yolking proposed by Beadle.
  • Evidence of the Theory. (1) Differences in the locations of the sexes. Teosinte: males = terminals, females = laterals. Modern corn: female = terminals on branches. (2) Archaeological evidence. Teosinte: female = hard glumes. Corn: tassels = soft glumes. (3) Male tails, along with other environmentally linked sexual changes have occurred.
• John Doebley found small number of genes that achieve most of the bits of the changes from teosinte to corn.
• Mexican use of corn. Husks wrap tortillas, corn leaves are cattle fodder, stems are human food (sugar).
• Aztec and Incan Agriculture
  • Aztec diet well-balanced with variety of vegetables, herbs/plants, wild animals, and fish. Main staple was corn.
  • Aztec major agricultural trademark was chinampas, floating gardens. Mats made of reeds layered on mud. Nutrient-rich top soil and grasses layered on top of reeds.
  • Seed nurseries and transplanting maximized crop production.
  • Incans very dependent on agriculture. Developed irrigation systems and canal networks.
  • Incan diets similar to Aztecs, center around maize.
  • Terraces are broad, step-like formations cut into mountainside. Done by hand.
• Aztec Medicine
  • Aztecs cultivated 100-1200 species of plants to cure ailments. Valuable info lost when conquistadors burned Aztec library.
  • Used opposites – hot vs. cold, wet vs. dry.
  • Classified diuretics, sedatives, and purges according to properties.
• Terracing of Andean valleys was a systematic method of soil preservation and soil creation. Fit together rocks to form slopes filled area behind walls with top soil.
• Inca Culture
  • Quipus (strings with knots arranged similar to decimal system) used for record keeping.
  • Agricultural basis was cultivation on irrigated terraces. Horizontal surfaces even on steep mountains.
  • Built stone structures without mortar and round arch. Stone cut so carefully that mortar was not needed.
  • Ritual, worshipped major deities and performed ceremonies.
• Incan social structure: pyramid hierarchically, 10 citizens -> administrator, 10 administrators -> higher-level admin. Highest tier = Inca. Stable, little chance to organize/rebel.
• Protein complementarity. 22 amino acids, 8 cannot be produced by body. All 8 must be present simultaneously in correct proportions.
• Meat and dairy have abundant protein but are inefficient.
• Native American leaders: Sitting Bull, Chief Joseph, Geronimo, Chief Standing Bear, Quanah Parker.
• Petroglyph (rock carving). 20 varieties of plants (mostly corn), bears (strength), birds, coyotes (tricks/humor), deer (gentleness), deities, eagles (spirit), flute players, hands (presences of spirits), lizards/geckos (sun/pregnancy), turtles, spiral/star patterns.