Antonine Scalia somehow managed to get a lifetime 'gig' on the U.S. Supreme Court. Before SCALIA came on board, SCOTUS might have been competent if not 'supreme'. All bets are off now. SCALIA has thrown in with a fringe group called "young earthers". They are called "young earthers" because they believe that the Universe and the Earth were created con-currently about 6,000 years ago. SCALIA has that in common with Sarah Palin who believes that human beings walked with the Dinosaurs.
There is NO EVIDENCE but religious dogma for this 'young universe' theory. The opposite is true of the scientific evidence that proves conclusively that the universe is much, much older. Most recently scientists discovered an "object" whose distance from Earth can be measured. That distance is about 13.7 billion light years from Earth. Put another way --it has taken light (the light we see) some 13.7 billion years to reach earth. That, of course, is inconsistent with Palin and who clams that the universe and everything in it is but 6,000 years old. SCALIA joins S. Palin by subscribing to it. Both Palin and Scalia are WRONG and embarassingly so! Recently --the most distant object in the universe was discovered and verified by REAL SCIENTISTS in the real world. The AGE of the universe is determined by the distance --in light years --to that recently discovered object. This figure, we are told, is derived by adding up the "begats" in the Old Testament.
The distance to this object is stated in light years as is the distance to almost every object beyond our moon. The distance to the most distant jobject yet discovered is 13.7 BILLION LIGHT YEARS. That means that merely observing this object is PROOF that the universe is AT LEAST 13.7 BILLION years old as it has taken light from the object 13.7 BILLION years to reach the Earth where we have observed it. SCALIA should stick to law (or, at least, his defective grasp of it) and leave science to intelligent people! Put another way --SCALIA should just SHUT UP about things of which he is ignorant. Uh....come to think of it, SCALIA is no better at law than he is at science. _________________________________________________________________
We have known about threats to planet earth for years if not decades! Possibly even longer! And NOTHING is ever done to restrain rapacious assaults on the only environment that we will ever have; nothing is done to slow the increases in the consumption of fossil fuels; nothing is ever done to preseve the integrity of habitats, estuaries et al; nothing or very, very little is done to improve air quality as a result of a rapacious consumption of fossiul fuels, the use of oil derivatives in motor vehicles or the alarming rate with which we destroy habitats on the land and throughout the world's oceans --the ONLY oceans that we will ever have.
Bottom line: we MUST enact and abide by 'Limits to Growth' --the topic of a conference that was held in the 'Woodlands' near Houston.
At this conference, scholars, environmentalists, economists as well as representatives from some of the world's major oil companies met and discussed nothing less than the future of planet earth.
I covered this early (if not their first such meeting) for a Washington D.C. based journal: "Energy Users Report". Following is an excerpt from one of the papers that had been submitted:
II. How the Unlimited Growth Ethic Exascerbates Organizational Unresponsiveness
Unrestrained production, assumed desirable and feasible in the belief system underlying unrestrained growth, depends on and encourages unlimited rising expectations. In turn these lead to increasing numbers of conflicting demands on organizations (a) to be responsive by producing more goods and se)-vices, and (b) to be responsive to the adverse consequences of that growth. (Production and product-produced pollution are obvious examples.) Particularly distressing and complex are the demands growing from life conditions in the third and fourth worlds since the gap between them and the first and second worlds is almost certain to continue to grow in the absence of an interpretive context premised on interdependence in a finite world. Such conflicting local and planetary demands generate more information, and require attention to more information,if organizations are to be responsive. This, of course, increases information and decision over-load and is likely to lead to comparatively less responsiveness because comparatively more information. needed for discriminating responses, would be screened out or ignored.
The myth that production can be indefinitely increased also encourages tendencies toward splintering and the establishment of autonomous groups and activities. That is, ifthere need be no limits on matter and energy each dissenting group will feel encouraged to go its own way. “do its own thing”, believing it can be self-sufficient and feeling little need for interdependence or to be concerned for the welfare of others. Others can “get theirs” bv also tapping into the gravy train via the time-tested means for flourishing in a capitalistic or socialistic economy.
Autonomy and differentiation, operating in and stimulated by the absence of a shared set 01‘ values and rules of conduct. will Icad to continuing challenges to legitimacy: each group will be devoted to its interpretive context and to the specification of factual importance justified by its values.
--On Growth and the Limits of Organizational Responsiveness, DONALD N. MICHAEL
This dates to the middle 70s! Essentially ---we knew then what we know now: Earth is finite and dying! As nothing seems to have been done to prolong our planet's life, the question remains: are we resigned to sitting back, pointing fingers and, in other ways, refusing to accept responsibility for the fate of the ONLY planet that we have ever known or inhabited, the ONLY planet that any of us will ever call 'home'?
A 'bail out' is simply not a part of the equation! We do not have that luxury! Where would a 'bail out' come from? Heaven? The only world of which we have intimate knowledge is Earth. And it is on Earth that we must make a heaven or create hell itself!
Sydney Poitier Reads Plato's "Allegory of the Cave"
