Mother Earth, the pedosphere

Soil is a complex and dynamic substance.  Not only a support for vegetation, soils lie at the interface of numerous interactions between Earth's atmosphere, biosphere, hydrosphere and lithosphere.  What's more, soils lie at the interface of the living and non-living, biotic and abiotic, organic and inorganic, casting doubt upon the duality implied by these domains.  In healthy soil, absorbancy, storing (largest terrestrial pool of carbon), recycling and processing is high in relation to the limits set by climate.  Soil is the foundation of our home, a host to our activities, and a witness to our comings and goings.  It is ancient (but fertile), easy to destroy, and all too easy to overlook.  A thorough understanding of soils requires knowledge of many earth sciences and natural sciences.  (The two main branches of soil science are pedology and edaphology.  Pedology deals with pedogenesis, soil morphology, and soil classification, while edaphology studies the way soils influence plants, fungi, and other living things.)  E.O. Wilson's interest in microbial ecology is clearly a subject with close ties to soil science. 

Now a word on the romanticisation of agriculture and pastoral life.  Humans never wanted it, we only entered into that enterprise through necessity (source: The Wild Life of Our Bodies, by Rob Dunn, as read in here).  Do I love the farm life?  It can be very good, but it will never compare to the beauty of raw wilderness.  The over emphasis on fertility and growth that farmers tend to have is due to their need for productive farmland and crops.  Soil doesn't need to be maximally productive, like a weight-lifter on steroids, to be healthy, it just needs to be at its natural balancing point.  Organic farmers have recognized that this balance point is higher than we tend to give it credit for.  A whole slew of back to the land, natural farming philosophies developed in the 20th century to address and repair our dysfunctional relationship with the Earth.  I would be content with a field of raspberries to pick.  The sobering reality is that soil conservation must be built into society.  It is harder to gain back once it is lost.  Aside from the use of earth moving equipment, most of our interaction with the soil is indirect.  How do we affect water runoff and drainage?  Leaf litter accumulation?  Plant diversity and growth?  Sun and shade patterns?  Soil structure and compaction?  What animals do we allow on our soil?  Questions like these are central for the soil conservationist. 

Any meditation on the transience of life would do well to include variations on the following Christian passages that identify a symbiotic relationship between man and soil:

“The Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.”  Genesis 2:7
“For dust you are, and to dust you will return.” Genesis 3:19
“All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return.” Ecclesiastes 3:20

There are many who literally want to do, and have done this, among them Malcolm Beck (alive), and W.D. Hamilton (dead).  In a pedocentric world, perhaps the purpose of death is to return to mother earth, enrich the soil with our bodies, and allow our matter to find reanimation in another form of life.  [Update: Helen Knight's article in New Scientist explores this in more depth.]

Sauna: The Finnish Bath by H.J. Viherjuuri

This is a short and pleasant little book.  What I like most about it is the way in which the author relates the experience of taking a sauna and it's positive effects.  “The feeling of well-being which follows the cold dip is undoubtedly one of the most delightful sensations which the human body can experience.” (41)  “the most delicious moment of all... when the bath is over and one can lie naked in the fresh air outside the sauna...” (44)  “The sauna banishes psychological troubles and ill humors.  In its heat, the mind is relieved of all pressure, and recovers its true balance.  A man bowed down by worries may come out of its doors in a philosophical and even humorous frame of mind.”  (45) 

Viherjuuri recommends a distance of at least 42 inches between the top platform and the ceiling, a 20 inch minimum width of the upper tier (78) and using bands of cloth hung from the ceiling as leg supports when lying down.  He also states that aspen (poplar) makes good material for benches. (55)  A nice full page “Rules of Thumb for Bathing” is included. (68)  “Regardless of where the stove may be placed, it should have a wooden guard rail around it.” (79)  Fiberglass bats should be stapled, not glued as the adhesive could melt. (80)  Regarding the sauna stones, he recommends igneous or basalt. (83)  I have struggled with ideas for a simple and effective floor drain, Viherjuuri recommends a “floor which slopes gently down to a drain in the corner of the hot room; the floor can be scrubbed and rinsed with a minimum of trouble, and the water brushed toward the drain.” (82)  I encountered a lot of advice in this book that I recall reading from later sauna books that recycled Viherjuuri's wisdom.  He is clearly viewed as an authority in his field.

Finnish Sauna by Allan Konya

I recently finished reading “Finnish Sauna” by Allan Konya.  He pointed out:  “The sauna is the only form of bath in which both dry and damp air are present, and in which the dampness can be controlled by the bathers themselves.” (5)   “Some people consider that the pile of stones on top of the sauna stove is a relic of an altar used in pagan times and that the throwing of water over the stones was a form of sacrificial ceremony to supernatural beings.” (7)  I think this is more than a bit of a stretch, but a fun piece of lore all the same.  “On entering the hot room, bathers are enveloped at once by a delightful heat, not stifling, in no way oppressive, but rather like the protective, nurturing warmth of an incubator.” (13)  I like the analogy of a sauna to an incubator.  “It is advisable to start off with a lower temperature and increase it gradually to the required level.  This allows one's blood vessels to expand slowly and the circulation to improve.” (14)  Especially for the novice!  “Sauna and an after-sauna supper (saunapala) is a fairly common form of entertaining.” (16)

“Too low a humidity can result in the following problems: an unpleasant 'dry room' smell; the drying out of the mucous membranes of nose and throat; perspiration evaporating too quickly from the skin surface, allowing it to become too dry.” (18)  “Fresh air should ideally be drawn directly from outside and certainly not from an adjoining room where odors may be present... The correct (and traditional) position for the [venting] outlet is in the wall opposite the inlet and at least slightly above it.” (19)  An outlet area of five square inches per person is recommended.  Later on page 74 he begins describing how a flue above this outlet can improve the suction and form the updraft needed to counteract any effects of back pressure.  An illustration of a venting outlet flue inside the sauna is shown, although I might consider putting this flue outside the wall, where it won't take up any interior space.  Konya describes something called the “piston effect”:  “When water is poured on the stones, the superheated vapor expands greatly, rising quickly to the ceiling and forming a thickening blanket of loyly which pushes the air downward, forcing the heavier stale air through the outlet.  This phenomenon is sometimes referred to as the 'piston effect', a term which describes the action rather well.” (19) 

On construction:  “The roof usually projected over the gable end which contained the low door – not much above chin level and with a high threshold.” (9)  Konya recommends siting the sauna such that the windows face west “as the time for to sauna is generally the evening, very often at sunset, the rays of the setting sun will stream into these rooms, helping the bathers to relax.” (31)  “Once the [sauna] room approaches a square on plan, arrangements with L-shaped benches are usually more economical, up to a size of about [7x7 feet] internally.” (33)  Regarding floor construction “Materials like linoleum, which have a characteristic smell, must be avoided at all costs.” (48)  “Benches supported only from the walls... it is better to avoid timber supports at floor level, where fungal attack is most likely to occur.  [But] wherever the benches are supported on the floor [and stabilized with connection to the walls], rubber doorstops should be screwed to the undersides of the supports with non-ferrous screws, to prevent contact between the floor and the end grain of the  timber.” (52)  “Cellular plastics... some types cannot withstand the high temperatures encountered in a sauna.” (61)  I should call the manufacturer to see if foil faced R-max foam board insulation will work in this application.  “The door... can consist of a standard solid core flush panel door, with insulating material, vapor barrier and paneling added to the inside face.  A heavy ball or roller catch keeps the door closed.  If it must be locked... a hasp and staple with padlock offers the best solution.” (73)  “To ensure sufficient draught for effective operation, the flue should, if at all possible, be not less than about 13 feet in total length.” (88) A gable roof, rather than a flat roof, would support a ceiling peak of greatest height for a tall chimney flue.  “The [chimney pipe] joints must be airtight and should be fitted with female end upward otherwise there can be difficulty with tar and condensation leaking to the outside of the pipes...”  (89)

I also enjoyed looking at "Finnish Villas and Saunas", which is a feast for the eyes. 

consciousness, a model

According to Charlie Stross, “Consciousness seems to be a mechanism for recursively modeling internal states within a body.”  Animals, such as humans, use their senses, their nervous system, to construct a model that allows them to optimize their living conditions.  Most of what the brain does is unconscious, so why isn't all of it?  Perhaps there is a survival advantage conferred by creating the artificial “recursive model” that allows a dualistic mind/body sensation of consciousness, whereby the model (the mind, conscious awareness) can have an active conversation with the machine of the body, second guessing its impulses and suggesting alternatives.  Any creature exhibiting complex behavior appears to be capable of emotions and a rich inner life, according to Jonathan Balcombe.  And the inference seems justified to me. 

By happy accident, I have had the pleasure of seeing three distinct species of salticid spiders here in Fairbanks (including Sitticus finschi and Phiddipus borealis).  These small creatures have two large eyes for binocular vision that they use to stalk their prey, a trait we share with them.  I wish I had a macro lens on my digital camera, but even without one, just a few days ago I captured the image of a spider staring back at me as I focused on him.  There is more evidence than not to suggest that he was aware of me, in some sense, just as I was aware of him.  For me, that is one of those experiences of “seeing the world in a grain of sand.” 

Philosophy is, in one sense, an attempt to “model the model”, and technology is providing us with a more direct route to do this via better sense data - by watching the degree of activity in regions of the brain with real-time brain scanning.  This brings the larger, unconscious activity that the brain engages in into the realm of conscious awareness.  And it is speculated that this could conceivably allow one to control all of one's impulses, specifically the less desirable ones.  Could this be the much sought after cure for procrastination?  Still a long way off. 

One last observation: “The Chinese room” thought experiment supposes that the man in the room exchanging symbols for symbols under the door need not have a recursive model (in Stross' sense) to do so.  But we know that such a model has evolved and, so far as we have means to detect it, we have not failed to observe it.  Call it salience, even the insects beneath our feet display it (recent studies of animals like bees and even jellyfish suggest our understanding of their behavior is far from complete).  Who is to say their model is any less vivid to them than ours is to us?  We do not know the basic unit of thought or emotion, but in a materialistic world, surely it must exist in some sense.

Albert Camus

I browsed through "100 ideas that changed the world" and at number 90 was “Existentialism Defines an Absurd Existence”.  Here's the paragraph I read on page 118: 

… But the most popular of the group [of French and German existentialists] was the saturnine Algerian-born writer Albert Camus (1913-60).  In his essay "The Myth of Sisyphus," a meditation on the predicament of humans attempting to make sense of a senseless universe, he memorably expressed a central existentialist tenet: the absurd. Reflecting on the Greek figure of Sisyphus, who is condemned eternally to roll a rock up a hill only to have it roll down again, Camus tells us that by recognizing the absurdity of his situation, Sisyphus gains at least the dignity of forthright clarity. "We must imagine Sisyphus happy," Camus famously concludes, for "being aware of one's life, and to the maximum, is living, and to the maximum." Camus died in the most absurd way of all - a car crash. 

We value our lives and think them important, but we also know that we will die and that time will erase all our work.  Though we long for it, we cannot create meaning or hope in a world that contains neither.  Our awareness of the paradox between our desire on the one hand and our disappointment on the other are the terms of an absurd life.  Camus states:  “Knowing whether or not one can live without appeal is all that interests me.”  And later concludes: “Happiness and the absurd are two sons of the same earth.  They are inseparable.”  The image of a happy man devoid of hope is the mark of absurdity.  (This reminds me of the story of the monk hanging on the end of a rope above a chasm.  Above him a black mouse and a white mouse gnaw at the rope, slowly reducing its width to that of a single strand.  The monk sees a strawberry near the cliff by which he hangs, so he picks it, and eats it.)  "The present and the succession of presents before a constantly conscious soul is the ideal of the absurd man." "The absurd man can only drain everything to the bitter end, and deplete himself."

Albert Camus was 46 when he died in 1960.  Three years before his death he was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature for his writings against capital punishment (Reflections on the Guillotine, 1957).  In 1942 he published The Myth of Sisyphus, and in 1951 The Rebel, which builds upon the ideas of the earlier work.

Finnish Sauna: Design and Construction

Finnish Sauna: Design and Construction (6th revised edition, 2007), published by Rakennustieto and compiled with the assistance of 15 Finnish authors, is probably the best book about sauna construction I have read.  Unintentionally I also checked out the 2nd edition from 1995, which is oddly longer (mostly due to the later removal of several illustrations, reorganization of sections, removal of in-text advertisements, and omission of the cleaning chapter).  As all construction books should be, this one is heavily illustrated.  One spends as much time pouring over the drawings as reading the text.  The final section of the book is a photo montage of “Contemporary Finnish Saunas” that are peerless in their beauty, but largely beyond my ability or means.  I will include below passages from the text I found helpful.  As time allows I might work these into a proper blog entry, or not: 

In a good sauna, heat is conveyed symmetrically, which means that the bather feels heeat evenly from all directions and there is a balance between convecteed and radiated heat (26). 
The traditional manner is to place the window at a low elevation, whereby most of the light falls on the floor in front of the stove (42). 
In placing the light fittings and directing the light, the upper part of the sauna and the seat level of the platforms should remain in darkness, but the steps and route of access should be lit... Normal lighting is required for cleaning the sauna (87). 
Darkness is usually felt to be a pleasant aspect of the mood of the sauna (97). 
If the stove is next to the door, it should be hinged on the stove side (43). 
[The cooling area] if possible should face the setting sun and a scenic view (44).  (Yes!  Mine will.)
[Vapor insulation] overlaps must be at least 15cm wide, affixed with heat-resistant tape, and pressed against each other betwween two wood surfaces (48). 
(Pages 49 through 52 contain wall, floor and roof sections for saunas of different types.  Using their labeling scheme, I have a US2 wall, AP2 floor, and YP1 roof)
[Year round sauna] windows are usually triple glazed, three paned insulating glass with a ventilation shutter that can be opened (54). 
Spruce [Picea abies] with few knots is well suited for all surfaces in a sauna... To minimize cracks caused by drying, the boards must be sufficiently thick in relation to their width... Countersunk nails are recommended for the lining... Horizontal cladding (as opposed to vertical) is a better solution, since there will be a gap admitting air between the upright bottom battens [the boards to which the cladding is nailed] and the parts behind the lining boards [the cladding] will be ventilated... The wooden wall lining is not extended down to the floor (56).  [Red or yellow cedar is never mentioned!  The cover image appears to exemplify these recommendations.]
A waterproof surfacing material [for floors] is a plastic mat with welded seams (57).  [what does “welded seams” mean?]
(Pages 62 through 63 have diagrams of removable bench construction.)
A sturdy railing is built around the stove to prevent the bathers from falling onto it and also to serve as a footrest.  It should include a lower rail element for children.  The railing can be made of wood or steel and faced with wood (65).  [Can this be made removable for access to the stove?]
Rubber stops are nailed or screwed to the lower surface [of wooden duckboards] to facilitate drying (66). 
One of the most common problems is the presence of ferric sulphides (pyrites) which release sulphuric oxide and sulphuric acid into the ambient atmosphere when the stones become worn (78). 
The intake air of the stove room is located... to prevent draughts or cold downward draughts onto the floor (84).  [Preheating the air in the dressing room is best.]
Palsi's law: the bather must be seated with his or her whole body (including the feet) above the stove stones [in smoke saunas] (95). 

The description by Nestor of Kiev in his chronicle from 1112 supports my earlier argument that saunas are cathartic.  From page 5:  Nestor tells of hot wooden saunas, in which naked bathers beat themselves with branches and finally pour cold water over themselves.  “Without any coercion they torture themselves and in this way gain pain instead of cleanliness”, tells the chronicle. 

The Moral Landscape

In a world without God, where does morality come from?  Is morality a matter of opinion or a matter of fact? The rallying cry of atheists has long been “no absolutes”, which has left some people wonder:  Where does their strength of conviction to make a stand on matters of right and wrong in the world come from?  A reticency to convict others for trespassing moral law is a strength, but also a major weakness. This book is answers these questions.  According to Harris, true moral knowledge is possible, and science can illuminate an entire moral landscape. 

Reading his book was a delight, and I felt he was following in the same tradition of La Mettrie, a vanguard stating aloud what others had hitherto only mentioned in passing.  Harris' thesis that meaning, morality, and values can be reduced to facts, and thereby be objectively determined, denies moral error theory, and does not specifically endorse hedonism or utilitarianism (subjects I had recently read that primed me for his book).  Harris believes that “well-being” is a deeper notion than pleasure.  He forms his argument from many sources in science and philosophy, asserting that science is natural philosophy, or “philosophy in practice” (180).

Harris disagrees with E.O. Wilson that “morality is merely an adaptation put in place to further our reproductive ends.”  While morality was very likely adaptive in some sense at one point, and perhaps sexually selected for, that does not imply that it continues to fulfill this narrow function.  I was disappointed to see that while Harris mentioned Geoffrey Miller, he did not give due credit to Amotz Zahavi.  All the more a shame since Zahavi and Harris share the same concern for altruism.  (Zahavi saw altruism as a reliable fitness indicator that confers status upon and improves the reproductive chances of the individual.  Harris seems to see morality as a kind of codified version of objective altruism.)  It was interesting to learn that out group hostility and in group altruism are two sides of the same coin (101).  After reading the first few pages of Harris' latest book I felt it was a reaction to Europe's growing unease with its immigrant Muslim population.  I was reminded of French president's recent decision to make wearing burqas in public illegal.

There was considerable references made to other researchers.  I would like to read about Robert Edgerton's book Sick Societies.  And I found Adam Smith's quote about our reaction to distant tragedies very telling (58).  The description of the Dobu Islanders was of such a horribly organized society that I instantly suspected it was a “Poe”, but there is no reason to doubt that it could very well be a real society.  I instantly identified with the reasoning of a four year old about the difficulty of acting on moral decisions (71).  In the second half of the book Harris seemed to stray from his subject (only to bring the overall scope of the topic into clearer resolution no doubt).  I learned that parenting strategies that increase empathy in children are very important (99), but having children generally decreases happiness (188)!  I also learned that Harris' dislike of Francis Collins runs very deep!  I particularly liked the following quote, in which he rails against Collins while identifying the human-like qualities of animals (170):

And just how widespread must "glimmerings" of morality be among other animals before Collins - who, after all, knows a thing or two about genes - begins to wonder whether our moral sense has evolutionary precursors?  What if mice show greater distress at the suffering of familiar mice than unfamiliar ones? (They do.)  What if monkeys will starve themselves to prevent their cage mates from receiving painful shocks? (They will.)  What if chimps have a demonstrable sense of fairness when receiving food rewards?  (They have.)  What if dogs do too?  (Ditto.)  Wouldn't these be precisely the sorts of findings one would expect if our morality were the product of evolution?  

I wondered at one point, that if morality is a system of thinking about and maximizing the well-being of conscious creatures (who stand in relation to specific environmental states) then does it not also follow that science can determine aesthetic values as well?  One of the criticisms of a science of morality is Hume's assertion that it is impossible to deduce “oughts” from what “is”, but I wonder what the distiction between these two really consists of, or for that matter the difference between truth and goodness.  Have we answered the question of why a science of morality is important?  Our intuitions of right and wrong are fallible (87).  Population ethics govern some of the most important decisions societies ever make (68).  What of the ethics of nuclear power?  Or of particulate air pollution?  Some of these questions bear on matters closer to home than others.  Harris identifies a few more advantages (188):

We would all be better off in a world where we devoted fewer of our resources to preparing to kill one another.  Finding clean sources of energy, cures for desease, improvements in agriculture, and new ways to facilitate human coop0eration are general goals that are obviously worth striving for.  

Now I am ready to enjoy reading Anthony Grayling's book, which is also about ethics and morality, though I gather without as much speculation on science's role in determining it.

Update: The best review I have read of this book is here and his response to critics.