Position : 45°26'•03 N 12°20'•16E 20.04.2012 Mood: EXUBERANT
DEAR READER This is the first ever edition of THE MUNCH REPORT.
First let me introduce myself. As a former member of the business community, I have, since retiring, dedicated my interest on those issues I felt I had missed out on over so many years : Sailing, Cosmology, Marine Biology, and other life mysteries.
As a result I left my PhD in economics behind, and for those who follow my lectures or my blogs, I have become Michele di Venezia or Mister or Master Mike, the Interpretor of OZ.
It took me quite some time to get going, to learn the technology behind this web page, and of course to define the content. I promise not to express so much of an opinion, but to report on what I see, hear, and learn, or have learnt, and as a result might rather ask questions than giving answers.
I hope you don't find that boring !
Please feel free to send me an email in case you want to say something positive, otherwise move on,read something else, relax, and have a nice day.
THE UNIVERSE AND ITS EPIC TIME
PICTURE WAS TAKEN IN THE ADRIATIC IN 2010 ON MY WAY TO MALTA I have taken this picture of the rising sun on one of my sailing trips 2 years ago and looking at it I realise again how much our life is linked to the sun. Our life is dominated by the count of 24h per day, the 29.5 days the moon needs to go around the earth, and the 365.25 days the earth travels around the SUN. How many sunrises do we actively watch in a lifetime ? How much happens in a lifetime ?
Now take this and compare it with the epic time of the universe. It is roughly 13.7 billion years old, the earth itself is relatively young, with only 4.6 billion years of age. We live in one solar system of which there are billions of others, and even millions in only our own galaxy. And in that galaxy we swirl around a centre that our scientists haven't yet fully understood. All we know is that it is 'a black hole', with tremendous gravitational force. Take only a small stone size of whatever type of mass it might be, and drop it on earth. It will slice through, exiting on the other side, as if you slice through butter.
Do you know how long it takes the galaxy for one circuit ? 200 million years, or in other words 0.1% of mankind !
So there is a long journey ahead of us, in an epic time span that we can only imagine but surely not comprehend. At the end there will be darkness, that we know, in a number of billion of years. Our sun , running out of fuel as all other suns in the universe, will have first expanded,burning everything in its reach, and then imploded , making life impossible on earth. So this is what I call the
Mother of all Climate Changes . Environmentalist, and Politicians, take note. If you want to see change, watch the universe. It is unstoppable, no matter how many wind-turbines you plant in our beautiful countryside and oceans. It is the path on which we are fixed, 'the Yellow Brick Road', and I guess not even the 'Wizzard of OZ" knows enough to say what will happen on its way. It is however a long way, and compared to our earthly time, the dimensions are ridiculously long.
But time is relative. Imagine the feeling before an event, say you are going to travel, or have an exam some months ahead, or a special presentation at work, and you wait for it, each day passing by, thinking: One day less. AND THEN THE DAY HAS SUDDENLY ARRIVED ! There is no difference between our time and the time of the universe ,except for its dimension. BUT THE PRINCIPLE STAYS THE SAME. Go out and watch the sunrise, guys, go ! AND BE HAPPY.
WHERE IS ALL THE FISH GONE ?
'THE BLACK FISH' ORGANISATION LAUNCHES CAMPAIGN AGAINST OVER-FISHING OF BLUEFIN-TUNA IN THE MEDITERRANEAN SEA.
"The Black Fish will be launching a new campaign this summer to protect the endangered bluefin tuna from illegal overfishing in the Mediterranean Sea. The bluefin tuna is so heavily overfished that its breeding population is expected to disappear from the Mediterranean within just a few years. The region has always been known to be rich in biodiversity, yet in the last 50 years, industrial fishing, in particular trawling and purse seine fishing for bluefin tuna, has decimated the populations of marine wildlife." (see www.....)
IT IS NOT ONLY THE BLUEFIN TUNA
I have been sailing in the MED now for 40 years. And every year I have been listening to fishermen, self-elected environmentalists, scientists,and locals about that fact that the sea changes, and its marine life with it . 40 years now! Whether it is overfishing due to industrialised fishing methods, some legal, some not, in the western med , or fertiliser pollution from the river Po delta and its resulting killing fields of slimy sea-algae in the northern adriatic , whatever it is , I have been able to watch it developing over the years , with the resulting question :
WHERE IS THE FISH GONE ?
Ok, all you smart people, the answer is: IN OUR STOMACH,STUPID ! ( or in your aquarium ) Here is a simple calculation : During my lifetime the world population has increased from 2.8 billion to 6.1 billion, by 2050 it is estimated to be 9 billion.
Does anybody believe that the fertility rate in oceanic fish has increased in the same period by as much as three times ?
Forget the bacteria infested fish farms,where life stock is fed to stimulate artificial growth and fast fattening processes. With prices increasing they only marginally help to satisfy the hunger of the poor - and the rich. We are depleting stock, that's it. Simple ! But just to say , let's fish no more, or less, or elsewhere, or only this size and that sort, will not help.
WHO AND WHAT WILL FEED THE WORLD ?
But then you can always eat your Goldfish !
Picture taken in the Aquarium of Syracuse, Sicily, in 2010