Monday, March 18, 2019

The cheapo multi-disciplinarian naturalist (3/18/2019)

I often explain in my workshops that biologists would make the great economists. Or, maybe better that economy and biology are actually very closely related fields. On the first hand, you may think I am crazy, but that will be one of the arguments I will try to make in today’s post. Today’s post is also about the beauty of being multidisciplinary. I do not strictly believe that we all belong in our silos, but that our professions and specializations can benefit a lot from cross fertilization and interaction. For example, in my sermon last year, I argued that biology, or my observations of nature, reveal order, mathematics and rhythm. Nature or biology, I argued also has parsimony, she really has so much more to offer or to teach us than just biology.

Nature offers us:

  • Food
  • Shelter
  • Fiber
  • Peace of mind (or sanity)
  • Health
  • Art
  • Wonder
  • Spirituality
  • And many more benefits

We are part of nature. We come from it and have evolved from it, whether we want to acknowledge it or not. Some may think we have outgrown it, but we all still have that animalistic (or natural) instinct in us, from birth, until we we die. We are created true the animalistic (instinctive or some call it loving) behavior of our parents and when we die, we again become part of nature; we even refer to it in our ceremonies: “ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

But there is so much more. The natural world has offered us some magnificent art; it started in the old cave paintings, and then just think of the greats like the photographer Ansel Adams, writers like Thoreau, painters likes Monet, and I am just scratching the surface. Nature offers sanity to the forest bathers, the meditators, those folks who retreat to nature. They all offer nature something in return, their admiration, love and desire to preserve and protect it.

About once a month or so I see that picture on Facebook that offers you $3,000,000 or some crazy price to go live somewhere in nature without a phone and internet for 3 months or some period. I wish it was a true offer, I would jump at it, and disappear for 3 months, or even longer, a half year?


Creek in coastal plain woods of Virginia
This photograph captures the beauty of nature.  We went for a walk in the woods behind our home and after some bushwhacking we found this little creek meandering through the woods.  Who could not just live here for 3 months (were it not for the bugs, but I think I would even be able to survive them with the proper protection).
Back to what I want to write about today! In my classes I talk about parsimony and how parsimonious nature is. Let’s look at the word parsimonious. It has become one of my favorite words and it means: “the quality of being careful in spending.” You may also call it stingy, miserly, cheap, frugal, tight, or penny-pinching. You get the idea. Not that I live that way, but nature does not waste a thing (unlike most of us humans). If you don’t live as efficiently in nature as possible you have less reserves as your neighbor, something or somebody will outsmart you, out-compete you, hunt you down and have you for dinner. It is a dog-eat-dog world out there and if you don’t do it as efficient as possible you are literally toast or at least the stuff they put on toast!

Nature is very supply and demand oriented as part of this parsimony. If you can do the same thing as your neighbor and use less of the resources available to you, you can literally do more with what is available and out-compete those guys. It is survival of the fittest, of the most efficient, or the strongest. This is the most classic Darwinian concept, but also classic economic model you can find: Supply and Demand.

The German scientist/chemist Justus von Liebig (1803-1873), also known as the father of the chemical fertilizer, developed the “Law of the Minimum.” He figured out that plants (and in his case crops) always had one limiting factor. Once you alleviate that limiting factor, say through fertilization, something else will become limiting (another element or chemical in the soil or something else like water or light). By the way, von Liebig also invented the bouillon block that we use in soup. He was supposed to be a great chemist, philosopher and teacher.

It was around that time that biology really took off, we had Darwin who really figured out this thing called evolution; then we had Mendel who figured out genetics. It must have been an exciting time to live and learn. But both Darwin and Mendel illustrated that there are other forces in play than just biology, or maybe that biology involves economics, mathematics and statistics, just to name a few. Von Liebig had showed it involved chemistry. I always tell folks that I probably came the closest to a religious experience when I studied cell biology and learned what all goes on at the cellular level, or maybe what can go wrong on a cellular level. To think we have all these people and other living organisms running around on this earth, each of which have million of cells, some of which have hundreds of processes going on inside those minute cells, was a religious experience to me. It was absolutely amazing and kind of scary to think that if one of those processes does not work that cell could potentially become a cancer cell. But then I learned we have little organs in the cell that can repair these mishaps and that we even have suicide organelles (or capsules) in our cells and if it really goes wrong, the cells can commit suicide (an interesting concept in itself). This works most of the time, but if not, we grow older and those cells may mutate and could eventually develop cancer. It is all amazingly complicated and it all works; most of the time. But no, I never became overly religious, but I did gain a heck of a lot of respect and love for biology and I retained my spirituality.

As you can see, biology can involve a lot of disciplines, ranging from spirituality to mathematics, to economics to actually life science. I do think multidisciplinary thinking is extremely important. We lose sight of the whole picture by being overly specialized. While writing this post I was going through my old posts knowing that I wrote about using old experiences in development of my classes. It was amazing when I reread some of my posts. There are a lot of reoccurring themes here, and I have always wondered if I label too much. However, this shows my multidisciplinary interests, my scattered brain and my love for knowledge (or the unknown). For example, I am currently studying about the construction of embankments and how to compact soil. This is something fairly new to me, I have learned a little bit about it when thinking about the rooting of plants, but never really about building dams. It is fun, and it will be something new to think about and to teach. Life is never boring this way, and all I can say is: go out there yourself, put yourself out there and don’t be afraid to learn something new, something you had absolutely no idea about; become an multidisciplinarian, we need more of them.

Tuesday, March 12, 2019

You are what you eat (3/12/2019)

Recently, our minister Andrew reminded us in one of his sermons of the four main elements of this world:
  1. Air (Wind)
  2. Water
  3. Earth
  4. Fire
I am not sure what the correct order is, but who cares? The fascinating thing was that I realized that at least every molecule of air and water has probably passed through every person in history, the good ones like mother Theresa and the bad ones like Hitler, Mussolini and my (not so) all-time favorite Idi Amin. I acutely became aware that I was connected to everyone in our sanctuary at that moment, and that I probably had shared at least one or two air molecules with each one of them that morning already.

Water, as Reverend Andrew reminded us, may actually (partially?) originate from comets and connects us to rest of the universe. I remind my students of its unique properties as a solvent, but in particular of the fact that it is the only chemical compound (that I am aware of) that expands when it gets colder. Since a lot of my guys work for the Department of Transportation, this is a fact that is not lost on them. Expanding or freezing water is the origin of potholes in our roads and the source of their job security.

There is not much I can share with you about earth and fire, except that they are the origin and we cannot live without them. I have witnessed the virtual lack of life on the core of the earth in an area of Newfoundland. The Tablelands Areas of Gros Morne National Park is amazing; this area had no (top)soil or earth, and visible life was scarce. It looked like Mars; and word has it, NASA seems to has tested there Mars rovers there.


Gros Morne National Park
This picture was taken by my wife during our trip (2017).  To the right is a wetland pocket where some low vegetation is possible but the majority of the Table Lands look like what is in the foreground.
In my workshops I often tell the attendees that “you are what you eat.” No, as most of you know I do not teach nutrition courses, nor do I give motivational talks hoping they lose some weight or get healthier. I sometimes do get a standing ovation after taking for six hours straight, which I find terribly embarrassing to tell you the truth. Most of you know I am somewhat of a dilatant: a sailor; bread baker; cyclist; naturalist; biologist; photographer; a shin kicker; and amateur philosopher; and a teacher. In other words, I can talk about a variety of subjects for hours. So yes, I could probably give a health talk and yes some of my students could stand to get in shape (but so could I) or stop smoking. But when I mention “you are what you eat” I do this in context of my workshops on soil, plant nutrition and establishment.

Sourdough bread
The latest bread I baked.  It is a banana sourdough and was an interesting bread to make.  No artificial ingredients: bananas, flour, water, salt and natural yeast, that's it.  Honest ingredients, you are what you eat! 
What I tell my students is that when you give your plants a good, healthy, nutritious soil you get healthy plants, or a good vegetative stand, like a lawn. But is you give them a crappy soil you get a crappy vegetative stand or sickly plants. Makes sense doesn’t it? One way of achieving this is by adding organic matter to the soil. Organic matter or compost kick starts the soil microorganisms that are so sorely needed for a healthy soil. This is why I got so angry in this blog at my neighbors for bagging their leaves.

One way of ensuring a healthy soil is by taking soil samples and getting them analyzed by an accredited lab. They should be able to let you know what nutrients are missing in the soil and what you need to add to make it better. I am no enemy of synthetic fertilizer, except for the fact that it takes a lot of energy to produce or transport some of them. But in fact, I really do not think there is a heck of a lot of difference where the nitrogen or phosphorus comes from. However, I am in favor of sustainability. Moreover, a lot of the organic fertilizers bring in micro-nutrients and organic matter which are good for the soil and thus for the plants.

I am no friend of pesticides or chemicals that control weeds and bugs. For one many of these chemicals break down and seem to transform to estrogen type compounds. Honestly, estrogen is not something I want to have a lot of in my body. In addition, I strongly believe that we are all connected in this world and that we depend on each other. Many of these chemicals will travel far and impact and harm more folks and species than we ever intended.

So, where am I going with this post? Talking to my students in workshops, I tell them you are what you eat. The plants they eat represent what they are being offered in the soil. Water, nutrients, organic matter, contaminants and agricultural chemicals including pesticides. We are what we eat: those plants, or animals who eat those plants, the (contaminated) water that we drink. We are the top of the food chain, unless you get mauled by a mountain lion or a grizzly. But in the case of those mountain lions or grizzlies, don’t you want to offer them the cleanest, least contaminated food possible? But in any case, those contaminants are not good for your health neither for for those creatures below in the food chain or potentially above you. Let’s just try to keep our environment clear, our air, water, earth … and fire!