"Opting Out" Of Optometrists

Sometime in early 2005 (January to March), I happened to stumble upon an extremely interesting technology: "adjustable prescription eyeglasses" -- with no eye appointment necessary!

At the time, I worked for a small medical sales, service, and supply company here in south Florida. I've since left that career path, but back then I was "up" on most of the new medical equipment, and tried to keep myself well informed. Medical advances still intrigue me, so I occasionally browse major technological advances in the field. Every once in awhile (like this past week) I still stumble on articles about the creator of these money-saving spectacles. His original site, www.adaptive-eyecare.com hasn't been operative since July of 2007, but you can still read through it at the Internet Archive.

The inventor, Professor Joshua D. Silver, runs the EBIT Group in the physics department at Oxford University.

The concept behind the glasses is fairly basic: the wearer can "tune" each lens (independently) to the exact prescription needed (+/-6 diopters max) and then "lock" that prescription into the glasses by tightening a screw to seal the lenses. With that, Presto! You have the correct prescription -- for your eyes! Of course, that is without the exam fee, the doctor's fee, the extra cost for designer frames (these are ugly, but effective), and without wasting time waiting for the production of new designer glasses.

The only drawback to these adjustable prescription glasses: they're still in "concept" phase, so they haven't become cheap enough (yet) to distribute widely. (Over 30,000 pair have already been donated to the poor.)

Professor Silver's goal for this year is to be able to produce a pair of glasses for around $1 -- and then he'd like to distribute one million of them throughout India.

His long term goal:
Distributing one billion glasses to the poor and needy of the entire world!

Comparison of 128 Years Of CO2 Emissions & Resulting Climate Change

This entry gets a little more detailed than I normally do, but in the last week I've been having extensive discussions with some individuals that are concerned with CO2 emissions causing the eminent demise of our planet. Seemed to me that replicating the work to my blog would make a good article... for those that aren't interested in "spin" -- but in the truth.

After you look at this small amount of evidence, and before you go explaining it to "lousy Larry" on the street, just remember what Terence said:
"Hoc tempore obsequium amicos, veritas odium parit":
(In these days friends are won through flattery, the truth gives birth to hate.)

I've done extensive work... learning formulas... comparing graphs... studying charts... crunching numbers... plugging along... and the sum total all of my research can be boiled down and expressed by a comparison of 2 simple graphs. (Both are pulled from 2008 data compiled by US govt organizations.)

The first is the CDIAC's estimate of CO2 emissions and the second is NASA's recorded climatological records.

I got this CDIAC graph from EarthPolicy.org. It shows the increase in total CO2 emissions from 1751 to the present (prior to 1825 the amounts were too small to graph):

This NASA graph shows the difference of the yearly US temperature averages (0 degrees C being the mean of the last 128 years) -- from when they were first recorded (in 1880) to the present:

Looking at the two graphs, I see several things:

1) Since the early 1880s, CO2 emissions have increased astronomically.

2) The largest difference in minimum and maximum yearly temperature means for any 5 year period falls between 1917 (low of -1.071) & 1921 (high of +1.119). (A total difference of 2.226 degrees C.)

3) The highest single yearly average mean is actually a tie between 2 years: 1934 & 1998 (+1.238).

4) 1934 had ~1.125 billion tons of CO2 emissions; 1998 had ~6.875 billion. (A difference of ~5.75 billion tons.)

5) The difference in the absolute lowest recorded yearly mean temperature (1917: -1.071 degrees C) and the highest recorded yearly mean (the 2 years listed in #3 & #4) is about 2 degrees C (2.309524).

6) The total change from the first 5 year mean ~(-0.24) to the most recent ~(+0.64) is a difference of almost 1 degree C ~(0.880952).

7) The very first recorded five year mean temperature (1882) is identical to the five year mean temperature recorded in 1977.

8) The last year on the temperature graph -- 2008 -- has an annual mean temperature identical to that recorded in 1890.

9) The estimated yearly output of CO2 emissions in 1890 was ~0.375 billion tons, in 2008 was ~8.375 billion tons. (A difference of ~8 billion tons.)

10) There is only one yearly mean that falls more than 1 degree lower than the 128 year average: 1917, but there are 5 yearly means that fall more than 1 degree above the 128 year average: 1921, 1931, 1934, 1998, & 2006.
(Incidentally, 3 of those 5 occur well before the beginning of the explosion of CO2 emissions that started in the 1950s and have continued since).

There is no observable correlation in the data between the graph of CO2 emissions and the graph of yearly temperature means.

This is only ONE comparative example of MUCH data that I've sifted through. After extensive digging, I have yet to find even one piece of recorded scientific evidence that reflects a direct tie-in to CO2 emissions and climate.

Therefore, it's apparent to me (based on the last 128 years of recorded global temperature change) that the urgency of reducing CO2 emissions to "save the planet" from catastrophic climate change is an unmitigated hoax.

Poll Comments: Blog Reading

I finally updated the code behind the blog and found all the cool stuff; it's still pretty easy to update. Adding new widget-type stuff is easier, and I like the ease of spatial-editing too.

One of the cool things is the polling capability. I'm sure there isn't any danger of me rivaling Zogby, but I wasn't particularly sure just how I wanted to start it. I gave it some time and came up with this one:

"What do you look for in an "interesting" blog?
---------------------------------------------
Blogs about the lives of my friends or family.
Opinions with which I generally agree.
Opinions about which I can debate.
Finding "pointers," shortcuts, tips, and ideas that educate, or make my life easier.
Cutting edge technical information.
The latest fashion info, trends, and celebrity gossip.
Hobby- and craft-specific info.
I just love to surf from blog to blog reading about other people's lives.
Other: (comment here -- on this post)

The only two problems I have with the ability to poll readers are the inability to add comments to each poll, and the inability to put in a poll as a blog posting (that could be accessible for vote-casting indefinitely). Other than that, I like it.

The Crash -- and Other Happenings

Just found this post (October 16) was still in unpublished draft form... publishing now, and updating (again) in the next post.

I thought I'd take a few minutes and catch up for the month. First of all, I've been assisting with a martial arts class once a week (Tuesday nights from 6.30-8.00pm EST). If I were young, dumb, and single (no offense intended if you fit into any of those categories) I'd prefer to go 3 to 5 times a week, but I do have a wife, children, a life, and an aging body that doesn't recover in 12 hours anymore... so... once a week is "enough."

On the last Tuesday of August, while I was teaching our self defense class (around 7pm), my parents were told of a live webcast. (I'd known of it, but after looking at the ominous clouds in the sky and watching lightning strike nearby several times, I'd forgone telling anyone else in the house about the webcast.) Unbeknownst to me, my neighbor (helpful soul that he is) came over and spread the word (just after I'd left).

We lost our power several times in a row that night; only for a few minutes each time, but the last was a brown-out -- which "affected my computer negatively" -- it fried an important chip ("southbridge") on the motherboard. On my system, the southbridge runs all of the things that plug into the computer -- which means, everything I plugged in did not work properly (the monitor and floppy disk drive), or did not work at all (everything else). Found it rather difficult to use a system that didn't work properly, and that couldn't have information added to it except in 1.4M pieces.

The computer was built around 2001, so the motherboard is old, but it's been upgraded pretty-well and is sufficient for my needs. I tried, but couldn't replace the motherboard with a new one (my wife wanted to buy a whole new system, until I explained we'd have to repurchase several thousand dollars worth of software to make "new computer" = "old computer").

I was able to locate some used motherboards in a Canadian computer shop and purchased two of them via eBay (1 for backup). That was wonderful, but I didn't have them yet. On a side note: I despise Canadian shipping; it is unimaginably slow (if I ever produce an illustrated Canadian/USA dictionary, the Canada Post logo will be the only thing listed under the word "slow").

After 15 days, I finally got my new motherboards and installed one. No problems with the motherboard, however, when I updated the operating system, the system glitched (of course). Something with Windows XP service pack 2 doesn't like my system -- so now I'm slowly working thru the re-update problems. Hopefully this won't take long...

Lost in cyberspace!

I have discovered (by skimming back over old blog entries) that I need to re-read my posts after hitting publish. This is because I've found several gaps in a number of past posts. Gaps that I know weren't there when I posted them originally. I hadn't considered the possibility of losing bytes in the submission process, but it's (obviously) not only possible, but a fact of blogger-life.

I'm pretty sure all of the blanks have been found and "filled in"... or at least been made somewhat more understandable to "normal" people. I'm also fairly certain that someone will be there to point out those gaps I've missed. Several of the partially-empty-posts were so old that even I couldn't figure out on which tangential tracks my train of thought was attempting to run.

For now I'm going to go park my rusty train of thoughts in bed. One good thing about getting older: I sleep harder and fall asleep faster... oh, wait... that's two things.