Author Archives: skipper

Thoughts Beyond Nebraska

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The mariner saw the movie Nebraska recently. Bruce Dern provided an excellent performance portraying oldness, isolation and social conflict that often comes with old age. The mariner was pleased with Woody Grant’s (Dern’s character) ability to deal with these elderly issues. It was a good movie. The mariner recommends the movie particularly to those who have a lifetime behind them.

 

The simple plot and observation of Woody Grant opens the mind to refreshed empathy about senior citizens. The passing of time is a passage through many phases of life from infancy to the centenarian. There is a general assumption that there are four generations in a meaningful lifetime, the growing generation, the creative generation, the accomplishment generation and the retirement generation. Each of us is required by the order of our genetic code to move along through these generations as we age.

 

Living in the generations of creativity and accomplishment are self-rewarding and enable us to feel that we are important to society whether we are engineers and politicians, or factory workers or engaged in retail, whether we are engaged in social and health services. However, toward the end of the third generation, our bodies tell us that things are changing. Our attitudes begin to shift into a feeling that accomplishment becomes hollow and maybe our roles are a bit out of tune with the creative generation.

 

Finally, we are retired or at retirement age – it doesn’t matter, we are bound by our genetic instructions. Out of the creative and accomplishment phases of society, we begin to feel that we are not the first team anymore. A few of the elderly have either the money or the opportunity to continue to participate but the underlying genetic structure will not deny that we are passing beyond the dynamic moment in society when newness is created and enforced by productivity.

 

Because of medical advances, the fourth generation is living longer, on its way to creating a fifth generation: the very aged. What is the impact of old people living longer and longer? Medical research promises trouble free life until you literally wear out around 159-200 years of age.

 

Yet society’s idea of the work span is not respected beyond the age of 55. Older folk do not fit into the requirements of creativity or accomplishment. They are fit for lesser and lesser roles in the productive generation. Were it not for the few surviving pensions, Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid, the elderly would have no financial basis for continuing to survive – not considering the requirement to live to 150 years.

 

There are government roles in this situation. Some form of tax increase must be applied to the aging issue. The boomer retirement bulge does not make it easier. Let’s face the fact that we are an aging population. This is a disadvantage in international politics, where India, China, Argentina and Brazil have rapidly increasing populations in the creative and accomplishment range. Still, the United States has the creative edge and must find ways to integrate the wisdom of the fourth generation into the fabric of a productive role.

 

Ancient Mariner

 

Spring comes in May – then +100°

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There are a few who say spring is coming, then summer. The mariner is wary of these prognostications. Changing the time back to standard does not fool him. There is ice and snow all about and as he and his wife walked to the Post Office and back, the 2-knot wind had a sharp bite to it.

It was three years ago that summer came in February. It was 75 to 85 degrees for at least two weeks. Trees and bulbs began to bloom. The grass had to be mowed. Then March came. Coldest March in recent memory; killed many plants and all the buds and blooms. No apples, cherries or pears that year and no narcissus, either. Cost the mariner over a hundred dollars in ornamentals and landscape shrubs. Two years ago, the summer brought nine straight days of +100° weather – more plant kill-off. It is an old saying that owning a boat is like pouring money into a hole in the water. Try gardening in Iowa. Warning: you have to dig your own holes.

The mariner has always proclaimed that the Midwest, undisturbed for thousands of years, was a vast grassy plain because nothing but grass can tolerate the vagaries of the weather. In the southern plains, all the way to northern Texas, there wasn’t much of anything because of the frequent droughts. Visit Kansas, Nebraska, the Dakotas and Montana – and Iowa. Thomas Jefferson called the area The Great Western Desert alluding to the fact that nothing grew but grass.

Nevertheless, the mariner has hoisted his 17-foot Daysailer off the trailer for repair to a dozen spots. The poor thing has been in drydock for three years in an implement shed and is as dirty as a pig in _ _ _ _.

The first job is to put new lines on the centerboard so it can stay locked in the down position. Then it is a matter of giving the boat a bath in Ketone to remove streaks, stains and scum. Then its time to heal wounds and minor cracks with fiberglass work. Finally, the whole boat gets a 1000 grit sanding. Then the hull receives new paint trim and finally a complete waxing. That’s just the hull and deck. Working on masts, booms, deck hardware, new sails, and new sailing lines is another process.

This work will not be done by the spring equinox. There is hope, once the garden work diminishes, that the boat will be sail-ready for shakedown exercises at Lake Rathbun before it’s too late to sail in the Midwest.

If there’s time in October when the mariner visits the Annapolis Boat Show, the boat will be free to run on the Chesapeake Bay.

Screw the weather. Reef the mainsail and cast the mooring lines. He has a heated workshop.

Ancient Mariner

It’s not Whether, It’s Weather

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It’s been very, very cold for a long time. It is not the mariner’s season with its incessant snow, bitter winds and short days. He, too, has a cold that has lingered for weeks. Where are the palm trees, green grass and colorful flowers? He’s asked that before but repeats it for emphasis.

The mariner has conjured a theory that the big brain in Homo sapiens, perceived to be a benefit, is actually a time bomb to manage the population of our species. Butterflies, for Pete’s sake, are smarter than arrogant super-thinkers like Homo sapiens. They know to migrate south when the weather shifts.

The human physiology, a hairless ape adapted to the subtropics, is not very far removed from its fellow creatures on the Serengeti. Other creatures driven north for whatever reason have had an eon or two to adapt to colder zones and in reduced numbers for obvious reasons. Think how long it must have taken the whale to return to the sea. We are young punks who do not know our true limitations. Hence, the time bomb.

That we overcame cold weather that is not our natural habitat is nothing to be proud of. Nature is patient. What goes around comes around. Now Homo sapiens is called the Sixth Extinction. Indeed, there is no question about that as we squeeze more and more creatures out of existence. There are soon to be twelve billion hairless apes roaming over every inch of space on the planet, consuming every resource that can be squeezed from Planet Earth – and having little regard for the trash and global instability left behind, all the while wearing longjohns and snowsuits. However, only with the aid of artificial hides, artificial heat and unnatural methods of transportation have we accomplished this unnatural act.

Nature is patient.

In the grand scheme of things, we are beginning to suffer social breakdown similar to crowded rat experiments performed decades ago. Did we not learn? As the rat culture broke down there was needless greed, theft, rape and deliberate denial of normal rat behavior. Today, it has become more and more necessary for not-so-smart humans to carry a weapon – not only as a deterrent for family and neighborhood violence but just in case the social fabric does indeed collapse. Ask any number of people living in the northwest for fear of their lives.

Did you know our African relatives had fake wars, not real ones?

Nature is a grim reaper. We little smart-assed ants are no match. Even real ants know their place and will survive human Armageddon. Even a world overrun with dinosaurs cannot avoid Nature’s little trick called a meteorite. We should have remained in the subtropics and allow Nature to mind our reality for us. Think how nice it would be to sit under a palm tree, smell the ocean breeze and see the tropical flowers in colorful abundance, with a cocoanut in hand instead of a Mounds bar.

It is a race to the death as humans try to turn themselves into humanoids before their abuses catch up with them.

As for the mariner, he’s going back some day, come what may, to blue bayou…

Ancient Mariner

 

Part IV – Part III revisited

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Before we evaluate Escapist behavior, the mariner must address Part III.

More than a few made it clear that the mariner was lost wading in the cattail patch. The most common difficulty expressed was identifying a greater reality. Perhaps we should stop using the word reality altogether. Instead, we will use “situation.” There are smaller situations and larger situations. The act of enabling harmony is finding the most harmonious solution between the two situations. The rain forest is a larger situation than clearing trees. It still can be said that clearing trees seems not to be in harmony with the larger situation that the forest is part of a global ecology.

A person is always the smallest situation. Any interaction involving another person or anything outside the self is a larger situation.

For example, you are listening to someone who likes to talk too much and has a way of never giving you a chance to talk. This is a larger situation. Focusing on the larger situation, you will make a better decision about how to act to resolve the dissonance between your lesser situation and the larger situation. You will act in a way that more likely enables harmony. In this example, harmony is enabled by politeness and concern that you do not hurt or embarrass the talker. Depending on your personality, several solutions can be imagined. The most common solution is to interrupt in a polite way and excuse yourself from the larger situation with some polite word about having to move on.

Can the reader sense that using a solution in the best interest of the larger situation prevents you from making an internal judgment that likely would be self-serving and may cause dissonance rather than harmony between your smaller situation and the larger situation? Just silently walking away from the talker, which may be the judgment you prefer in your mind, would be rude.

To answer the question about jaywalking, the larger situation is respect for moving vehicles and one’s own safety.  Jaywalking is a common judgment that does not consider the larger situation of someone in a vehicle who doesn’t expect a person to be in the street in the middle of the block. That is dissonance; crossing at the corner is more harmonious.

The question about the animal trap demonstrates that an individual could identify a larger situation and have multiple ways to enable harmony. In fact, every person will identify a larger situation in their own way and enabling harmony may be different from yours.

The answer to the question about payroll is the owner should not make an internal judgment to determine the solution. She should look outside herself to identify a larger situation, that is, what is the most harmonious thing to do for the twenty employees. There are many solutions.

The most harmonious solution may be to have everyone in on the problem solving and essentially let the employees determine a solution that resolves the financial circumstance. This is a good place to point out that enabling harmony is not mediation or arbitration, used to divide the pie or establish a different definition of dissonance. Fairness is an important element when enabling harmony. Sadly, many managers determine a solution without looking outside to identify a larger situation. The common response is, “I will make this decision because I have authority and it will be made in my best interest.” Internalized solutions are prone to creating dissonance.

A misconception that crept into readers’ ideas about harmony is that enabling harmony is the same as enabling bliss and happiness. This response may appear in one-to-one solutions but harmony is not tied to bliss. D-Day in the Second World War was in pursuit of harmony regarding the larger situation of human abuse and disregard for due process on a grand scale by the Third Reich in Germany.

Enabling harmony means, quite simply, going outside the self to identify a larger situation and then act in a way that minimizes dissonance and enhances harmony between the lesser situation and the larger situation. Sometimes, as in the example of the Brazilian rain forest, the lesser situation is the state of Brazil’s economy, not a person. What can be done that enables harmony between the needs of Brazil and the world’s need of many effects attributed to the rain forest?

Stepping back into the reality word, there are political realities, financial realities, international realities, etc. This discourse about harmony is just another reality: harmonious reality – the reconciliation of two situations using harmony as the measuring stick.

Perhaps it is wise to leave escapist behavior for the next part.

Ancient Mariner

Part III

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Part III

Taking both Part I and Part II combined, we learned that humans have vices and by definition in Part II, vices are dissonance in a relationship between a lesser reality (the person) and a greater reality. Further, we learned that oneness is the pursuit of harmony between realities. Finally, we learned that oneness does not judge anything as right or wrong. The goal is harmony among many realities, indeed among all realities. If the reader needs to refresh the meaning of greater and lesser realities, read Part II again. The dynamic of oneness hinges on relationships between realities.

The mariner resists adding further trappings to an interpretation or to the behavior of oneness. He knows that readers will recognize ideas and virtues that are part of their own religion, especially moralistic ideas and rules of behavior. This is because ethics and morality are by nature universal. However, the mariner makes a special effort not to be drawn into judgmental elements of religion or its specialized practices.

Part I took issue with many human behaviors. Quoting Part I:

“Any, ANY activity pursued for the sake of personal gain or stature – whether mental, spiritual, physical, pursuit of success or pursuit of empirical reward. This statement eliminates thousands of pseudo-virtuous activities.”

Humans have active minds. In addition, genealogically humans are not far removed from apes. In fact, humans are classified as part of the family tree. This evolutionary mix produces an ethical behavior prone to empirical gratification and self-guided pragmatism.

Yet humans feel a need to organize, to overcome obstacles, and to achieve consciously some definition of superiority. The trouble is that the simplistic urges passed to us by our ancestors move more easily to greed and chest thumping than to the finer elements of oneness.

Following the spirit of oneness, an individual must not consider themselves a completed product; one must assure there is harmony between themselves and the greater reality of their neighborhood, town and neighbors. As an afterthought, harmony in the family might be nice. Further, a sense of absolute oneness is required as a tool to evaluate lesser realities.

The moral act of oneness is enabling harmony. Therefore, an individual must identify a greater reality that will provide requirements for harmony. It can be civic, as mentioned a moment ago; it can be an organization; it can be any institution from a religious one to a special activities club. There is virtually no limit to greater realities. Greater realities can be as simple as rules for crossing a street, as complex as one’s national ethic and culture, or awareness of nature and planet centric realities.

The mariner will not examine the unending list of pseudo-virtuous activities. It is easier to restate the principle of oneness:

In this moment, doing what you’re doing, saying what you’re saying, thinking what you’re thinking, what greater reality will guide you to harmonious behavior? In other words, do not approach life from within yourself. That process leads to judgmental, pseudo-virtuous behavior. Instead, approach life from the outside, consciously knowing you are enabling harmony within a greater reality.

Pretend you need a map to go from your home to some distant, unknown place. The rational person would acquire a map and follow the path to the destination. The process of knowing that you did not have an answer within yourself but looked for guidance outside yourself is precisely how oneness works. You are always the lesser reality. Enabling harmony comes from outside and is a greater reality that shows you the way to the most harmonious behavior.

A few insightful questions are provided. Trying to invent exceptions to the obvious answers is not helpful.

You are walking on a sidewalk on a street that has moderate vehicle traffic with gaps every so often. You want to cross the street. Do you time your crossing to jaywalk between vehicles or do you walk to the corner? Jaywalking is dissonance to what greater value?

You are walking through the woods. You come upon an animal trap of the kind that is illegal. The trap is set. What do you do? This is a trick question. Any number of greater values can be applied. Maybe the animal is food for a destitute person. Maybe it was set by an uncaring, pseudo-virtuous person with no empathy. Maybe you should report the trap to the authorities. Maybe you should take the trap with you. Maybe……

Each of these actions enables harmony from slightly different greater values. No one said life was easy! The correct behavior is not to be judgmental about the illegal trap. Oneness does not judge right or wrong; only determine what the most harmonious behavior should be.

A business is having financial difficulty. The situation has come to a point that labor costs are too high to pay the twenty people who work for the owner. What greater reality provides her with the most harmonious solution?

Part IV will address escapist behavior.

Ancient Mariner

 

Part II

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To refresh our minds about Part I, it begins a discourse on oneness.  The mariner chose the word oneness to represent absolute holism.  Holism is the belief that all things are connected in an orderly fashion. It is common to mention holistic medicine, which goes beyond the mechanistic treatments of common medical practice. It is also said of holistic belief that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Using a term like oneness allows the mind to deduce lesser realities in context.

An example of greater and lesser reality would be the issue of leveling the Brazilian rain forest. The greater reality is that the forest is part of a global ecology; the lesser reality is the economic imperative to cut down the forest.

Oneness, like any philosophy or religion, has rules for interpretation and rules for behavior. For example, oneness interprets reality as the sum of all human knowledge – both proven and perceived. This interpretation is not as broad as it could be because it is limited to human knowledge; there is no limit to knowledge in general.

Oneness measures behavior in the context of harmony. For example, the intentional abuse of fossil fuels is not in harmony with the natural environment required by living creatures all over the planet – a greater reality. Similarly, cutting the Brazilian rain forest is not in harmony with a greater reality.

One easily can be drawn into a maze of judgments about behavior. Oneness does not denounce any object or circumstance in reality. The example of abusing fossil fuel is not judged as wrong; rather, it seems not to be in harmony with a greater reality.

One cannot role back history or foretell the future. However, one can deduce harmony and dissonance between greater and lesser realities. The moral foundation of oneness is pursuit of harmony.

Often, it is difficult to determine which may be the greater or lesser reality. In the United States today there is dissonance. What is the source of the dissonance? What is the greater reality? One cannot pursue harmony without identifying the greater reality.

Often, there is confusion between similar realities. For example, consider the following: computers, motorcycles, milk jugs, credit cards, electricity, Justin Bieber CDs. What is common to these objects is they are made of plastic, which consumes fossil fuel or they burn fossil fuel directly. How does one accept one object but denounce another? The example given earlier that abuse of fossil fuel is not harmonious with a greater reality seems untidy when very small realities seem to be in harmony with human enterprise and possibly may be measured against another greater reality before arriving at the dissonance found in abusing fossil fuel.

This conundrum is similar to the old question about how many angels can stand on the head of a pin. This arbitrariness is behind the creation of different religions, sects, denominations, countries, provinces all the way down to the dissonance between the Hatfields and McCoys.

Oneness avoids these judgments by not judging right or wrong. If one gives some thought to this issue, one realizes that “right” and “wrong” are never absolute. There are dozens of sayings about right and wrong: “There’s always two sides to the story;” “Everyone does the best they can;” “Time heals all wounds,” etc.

The mariner knows Part II is heavy reading. Philosophical reasoning is difficult at best. Part III, however, investigates the list of human behaviors in Part I. It will be an easier read.

Ancient Mariner

 

Part I

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Part I

The mariner is an old guy. Too old to run and play. Too old to have any motivation for work or for that matter any inconvenience. Too old. Having nothing else to do but be old, he is liberated from ambition, competitiveness, rampant emotion, and has a great desire to allay accountability to any purpose. This leaves him with an amazing amount of physical and mental freedom.

Being similar in age to wizened elders of several religions that pursue unification with a world beyond four dimensions, he understands now that a different worldview comes to mind when one is not obligated to four-dimensional success. Others may call this mindset escapist, lazy, demented or delusional but there is an order of comprehension beyond the mundane.

One must eliminate false interpretations. Obviously, this means eliminate every faux religious or self-righteous activity. The list is immense but a few examples are provided:

  • Any, ANY activity pursued for the sake of personal gain or stature – whether mental, spiritual, physical, pursuit of success or pursuit of empirical reward. This statement eliminates thousands of pseudo-virtuous activities.
  • Escapist behavior pursued for benefit of the self. Eliminate any attempt to elevate self-importance for positive or deranged reasons.
  • Compassion as an act in the moment. Compassion will be evaluated in further detail later. Examples at this point are compassion for kittens and puppies, I’m-better-than-these-people compassion, He/she-is-ugly compassion, I-feel-better-now compassion, He/she-is-like-Kennedy/Reagan compassion, they-are-a-teammate compassion, etc. It is compassion derived from any external perspective.
  • Allegiance to anything. Allegiance constricts the mind more completely than any other behavior. The art of advertising is the art of shaping one’s belief that a certain product, concept, or behavior is the best choice. Surely you have met someone who buys only Ford vehicles. The supreme example in the twentieth century is Nazi allegiance. Other countries, though less brutal, are quite the same in allegiance by their citizens. Some countries may be too broken for citizens to have allegiance typically because of war or tyranny.
  • Homocentric gluttony is the practice of consuming beyond normal necessity – taking into account that the Earth is a finite source with a lot of people. The wealthy are especially prone to gluttony. Homocentric gluttony is the act of consuming earthly materials, earthly fresh water, earthly energy, and earthly space for no other purpose than to consume. A few of the most egregious are corporate farming, construction, real estate, travel and home consumption of all forms of energy. In the United Kingdom, basically made up of islands, there are homes that were built four hundred years ago or older – not because the Brits are virtuous, it’s the limitation imposed by limited real estate.

Oneness is chosen as the word to describe an understanding of the universe, life on Earth and one’s lack of need for the mundane world beyond the constraints of one’s need to survive. By its nature, oneness invites exceptions. However, to claim exceptions implies a misunderstanding of oneness. Perceived exceptions will be reviewed later.

Using oneness avoids talking about six dharsanas, four yogas, five virtues, salvation, miracles, naturalism, humanism, six pillars of faith, two parts of the human soul, and being impervious to snake bites and other superiorities. Oneness accepts belief however it is ordained by any human being. To believe is an unavoidable human characteristic – even if it’s a momentary belief that one will win the lottery.

As an aside, the supreme contribution of the Internet is that one can major in any subject in one day instead of taking fifteen college credits over three years – meaning if you want to learn more about religions of the world or any topic you may have in mind, visit the Internet. It saves the mariner from writing a thick book and saves you a lot of money needed for college tuition.

Ancient Mariner

 

 

Chaos Grows Among Financial Analysts

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The following chart by Tom DeMark from the McClelland Market Report shown in a right-of-center financial magazine, Money Morning during an interview with Peter Schiff. Schiff feels the US fiscal policy is heading toward a financial collapse similar to the crash in 1929. The following chart was shown during the interview. It compares the behavior of the stock market leading up to the 1929 crash (blue) with current stock behavior red) from September 2007 to today. The parallel lines are eerily similar.

parallel

In an earlier post, the mariner alluded to a great shift in wealth that must occur before the US culture can move on. Apparently Schiff feels the chaotic moment will occur very soon.

The issue in 1929 was public debt far beyond what the public has today. Investors had as much as 90 percent margin (unpaid purchases). The effect was very much like the housing collapse in 2008 when there were tens of thousands of mortgages being sold on the stock market (remember derivatives) that had no cash to back them. Eventually, the banks faced a grim future if the US Treasury didn’t step in.

This time, however, conservatives like Peter Schiff and Donald Trump are attacking the Federal Government for having too much debt. Sooner or later, someone must pay the bill. Will the wealthy take a hit on their investments? Yes, says Schiff.

Scare tactics are thrown everywhere. The mariner believes there has been an imbalance for a long time. Two circumstances reflect the entire situation: the Federal Government indeed is in debt because tax laws have not changed and the wealthy are getting wealthier. Beyond that, the current economy hasn’t responded as well as it should. This is blamed by the right on Obama not allowing jobs to be created, and by the left that businesses are sitting on their profits and not investing in new jobs.

Whatever the cause, that chart is a bit scary. Perhaps we should do what was recommended in another post: ”…. get rid of credit card debt fast. Use as much cash for daily expenses as you can; pay cash for gasoline; pay cash for groceries; pay cash at supermarkets, Walmart, Target, and Farm and Home. In other words, live well within your means and do not use the Wall Street banks in lieu of any other option. And save, save, save. The taxes to pay for change are coming….” and you know who will be taxed.

Ancient Mariner

Sailing Through Life

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The mariner frequently writes of doom and gloom. He writes because he cares about the reader’s exposure to those issues that may hurt the reader and all people for that matter, reader or not. He writes to make sure the reader knows of troublesome things that the reader may prepare for them or take steps to address them. The mariner is a weather service for ships at sea.

Yet, it is not the clarion call of the mariner that is important. It is the reader’s satisfaction with his or her own spot in life. Can the reader, in that warped, beaten, abused soul that defines you, feel accomplished? That you have done the best you can. Are you able to find pleasantness on a daily basis? Importantly, have you done something quite frequently that brings you joy? Joy is such a curative that it is required to be an intentioned purpose in life.

Every stage of life, from an infant to a centenarian, must deal with the rainbow of happiness, sadness, laughter, tears, fear, pride, satisfaction, grief, and the sense of self that is our consciousness. Each decade, each generation, makes different demands on these emotions.

When one is trained in sailing, one is taught that all reality is seen from the boat as the center of that reality. That is why wind is expressed not in terms of its absolute direction but the direction from which it approaches the boat. Listen to the TV weather announcer; the wind is described as coming from someplace to the viewer, not the direction it is moving to. The relationship to other boats underway has 37 different rules for right of way. How one’s boat relates to these rules always is seen from one’s perspective: their own boat. There are no traffic lights or stop signs at sea.

This analogy applies to life in general. The world is always seen from the reader’s position. If your life is moving in a certain direction, you will feel reality pushing into you while another person may feel the same reality pushing them forward. It is a telling thing if one wishes to be on the other boat and its reality. You have let your boat drift without direction and it has lost its position relative to reality. You will have no joy, no satisfaction, no accomplishment in your life. Indeed, the reader may have difficulty living according to the numerous rules of right of way for living a good life.

Stay at your own helm, whether it is a dingy or a 100-foot schooner. Set your sails, that is use your attitude and smartness, to catch as favorable a wind as you can. You may have to tack against a headwind but at least you have confidence that you are making progress.

Fair winds, mate.

Ancient Mariner

Snow

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The mariner has windows in his home. Outside every window is snow. He is a distinct minority among his family, friends and acquaintances. He holds great disdain for snow, sees no use for it and considers it quite a monochrome. Indeed, one must shovel it out of the way, slide uncontrollably on it with an automobile, and he finds snow too cold to be of any comfort. Snow causes heating bills, heart attacks, broken bones and one can die from exposure. Deep enough, it brings functional life to a standstill. In this winter, the mariner has sympathy for those in the south who seldom see snow and find it alien to normal life.

Where are the greens of summer? Where are the reds of flowers and a warm breeze with a blue sky and the hopefulness of a multicolored sunrise? Where are the palm trees and lush bromeliads? Where is that moment when one cannot feel the temperature at all because it is just right as it touches the skin?

The mariner believes that if the human species were limited to a natural state of existence, that is, no clothes, no heated homes, and restricted as other creatures are to a specific habitat, Homo sapiens would exist only between parallel N25° and S25°. For landlubbers, roughly speaking that is a line between Mexico City, Daytona Beach, the Bahamas, the Canary Islands, Saudi Arabia, Bangladesh, and Hong Kong in the northern hemisphere and in the southern hemisphere Asuncion, Paraguay, Rio de Janeiro, Pretoria, South Africa, Shark Bay on the western coast of Australia and Brisbane on the Eastern Coast.

Granted, weather patterns would allow Homo sapiens to be migratory but like the Monarch butterfly, who by atmospheric standards may be smarter than Homo sapiens, returns to warmer climes. How many creatures can you name that are migratory – including life in the oceans? They need not kill other animals for protective clothing; they need not consume great resources to keep warm; they need not invade alien habitats in search of large quantities of food. Homo sapiens is not so wise in its ability to conjure unnatural means of survival that are necessary because the species has moved out of its natural habitat.

All the population issues would have been solved long ago. We may have died as a species, or, more likely, we would have adapted to less abundant procreativity. Other species would have their space on this planet.

Oh well, the mariner dreams of better days. Meanwhile, his wife is out shoveling the walk.

Ancient Mariner