Thursday, January 30, 2020

WHAT IS AFRICA?

- The terms "Africa" and "African" refer to the African continent. 

- But there is no African nation.

- There is no official agreement as to what Africa is, so there is room to negotiate what Africa is. 

- Since Jamaican and some other Caribbean black people (often called Africans, since they descend from slaves from the continent) are as numerous proportionally as the black population in many African nations, we need to consider them as provisional citizens of a provisional African state.

- Potential Effects: Tends to remove disunity (Caribbean vs  US; Black vs White, one Caribbean nation vs. another, etc.) 

- Possible First Step: Jamaica having observer status in the emerging African free trade area

- Other immediate possibilities: use social media to share ideas, including ideas for curriculum development in and beyond the African continent. 

- This particular approach to African unity comes out of Jamaica in the context of Garveyism. Jamaica does not need to change to please anybody but itself. Jamaicans have no particular need to leave Jamaica and move to the continent. Africa is the ground beneath their feet. Jamaica can dictate the conditions of an African unity in which it is included. Whatever one thinks of it, there is a case to be made for Garveyites to develop and evolve the role of their leader--self declared and widely agreed upon--President of Africa. The presidency of Africa (which has not been refuted, to my knowledge) has a responsibility to consider and help resolve the above-stated issues. 

 

OTHER NOTE: (Africa Community Tourism Network,. SAID TO HAVE BEEN FORMED By Jmaican Diana McIntyre-pike
www.facebook.com/CommunityTourismNetwork

Tuesday, January 14, 2020

WOODEN BUILDINGS

I don't think sprinklers in each wooden house is excessively complex. No doubt, a governance system that orders sprinklers at scale could afford to have ubiquitous wooden house sprinklers. That doesn't happen now. Wooden houses don't keep in the summer heat like concrete. It's easier to forego AC in a wooden house. Concrete uses tons of energy to create, and wipes out mountain ranges. Wooden houses have important aesthetic qualities for a species that doesn't live by bread alone. Charring wood prior to building with it keeps it from burning. Wooden houses are important to promote and value. Putting wooden houses down is unnecessary, and makes about as much sense as putting down fossil fuels and advocating for a switch to renewables.

Friday, January 10, 2020

Cuba chosen as #1

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/business-report/alternative-index-ranks-jamaica-23rd-most-sustainably-developed-country-cuba-ranked-first-trinidad-40th-singapore-last_183214?profile=1606&fbclid=IwAR25iPBFUbuIzRVGv88DSQ9Z6Aj2-Hi2Mb8r4yRsXxpvOASB9WfbvCgK8P0
FINITE GROWTH

Curt Kurschus says:
One problem is the belief and core assumption that growth can go on forever, another is the belief and core assumption that pensions (and, depending upon where one is in the world, social welfare benefits) are a fundamental right. Personal experience and observation tell me that if an economist or politician offers a future of sustainable growth, then he is she is right and clearly knows what he or she is talking about. If someone like myself points out that a finite world equates to finite limits to growth and it looks like we either have reached or are getting very close to reaching that point, then the response is “you can’t tell the future” and “we must have growth”.
That very strong core assumption is a positive in the short term due to keeping the populace content in the belief that things will be better in the future, but a negative in the medium to long term as it means that nobody is motivated to do anything to plan and prepare (including psychologically) for what lies ahead.
People continue to take on mortgages, pay for vacations with credit cards (including credit cards linked to mortgages), because of such assumptions about never-ending growth. I get emails from Greenpeace (due to my having supported them in the past) making it clear that they (being supposedly environmentally aware) assume that we can keep our civilization and lifestyles intact without fossil fuels thanks to wind turbines and solar panels.
Nobody wants to hear or to know that we aren’t going to have the desired wind turbines and solar panels without abundant supplies of cheap and easy fossil fuels.
We live in a world where looking beyond the immediate surface and thinking would seem to be very much out of fashion and unwelcome.