Time and Energy

Its the mean season again, and with the US Presidential race come 2 different approaches to the escalating energy crisis. As both have serious problems – one philosophical, the other in execution – here’s some fresh thought regarding energy options:

Vitally important yet never heard are the time factors underlying the realities of energy sources. To understand the time factor, it is important to understand that, except for  geothermal and nuclear, energy sources are essentially different forms of solar energy: direct photovoltaic conversion; solar driven hydro- and atmospherics tapped into by wind generators and dams; solar built life; and last but unfortunately not least – the stored solar energy of fossil fuels (oil, gas, and coal.)

Regarding time, imagine the planet completely covered with photovoltaic solar panels, converting incoming sunlight into electricity which is stored in massive subterranean batteries. As time goes by, the batteries charge and as such they can be likened to coal deposits formed by hundreds of millions of years of sunlight collected by photosynthetic plant life, nature’s solar cells. Again, thats hundreds of millions of years. 

In such a vast time period much plant life was eaten by animal life which defecated, died, and decayed into pools of oil. Gases were also formed and trapped and the potency of all 3 fossil fuel states are essentially the result of pressure-cooking in geologic crucibles over hundreds of millions of years.

Very near the end of this time period, humans learned to use fire and came to consume vast quantities of wood. As the supply dwindled in the last hundred years or so, numerous localized supplies of much more potent fossil fuels were discovered to be a good match for powering technologically advanced machines, and so it is today.

One could reasonably state that civilization is in the midst of a fossil fuel binge. In essence, humankind is raiding the solar storehouse collected and condensed over hundreds of millions years and burning it in what is likely to be mere hundreds of years. Even as the limits of this storehouse are increasingly felt, these energy sources are taken for granted as lifestyles depend on its consumption almost universally.

When people claim that renewables should be taking the place of fossil fuels they are basically right. However, it should be abundantly clear by now that forays into “solar” and wind energy are coming up short relative to accustomed energy consumption levels. Renewables simply cannot compete with fossil fuels because they manifest solar energy only as it comes in – in real time.

Because energy’s critical time factors have thus far been excluded from debate, policies and practices have been misguided. On the one hand, there is the notion of letting energy sources succeed by “their own merits,” when such merits disregard the raiding of time inherent with fossil fuel consumption. On the other side, manic belief that renewables can replace fossil fuels at accustomed usage levels has begun a raiding of space – the space of earth’s surface - with a big solar projects approach that can not satisfy such energy demand even if the nightmare scenario of 100% coverage were to come to pass.

The solution is to learn to live with less. Leadership needs to tell that truth. Learn to live with what can be generated from the space already allotted for rooftops, tapping into real time energy as it comes in – directly. Toward that end, government might lead by example, harnessing the sun from the roofs of its own buildings, starting with the White House.

Beyond Topography

This slide show (uploaded to SlideShare in February) comprises the final part of a massive overhaul of the code’s original structure published to the internet in 2004. Since then there have been many small improvements of clarity in code reasoning, and in filling gaps with application details, e.g., rocket engines. The first half deals with topographic design, and it should be stated that it is not my intention to imply that the entire planet be thus shaped. Far from it, even the approximate 10% caricatured on slide 2 would be exaggeration.

The only really major development since 2004 has to do with how the cuboda models electrodynamism. The model is so rife with parallels that (if I ever find the time) I would be much encouraged to dig deeper in search of some actual predictive power – both in regard to what is known (e.g. the speed of light) as well as outstanding mysteries. Aside from that, not being an electrical engineer, it is not yet clear how the model might be applied, beyond the geometry of wave-contoured EM Wave transmitting towers.

Universal Positioning

Because this post might seem a bit abstract and unconnected to anything on this 2012th Christmas, I have included a link to a most deeply touching story at the end for balance.

The match between the real world Planet Earth and the central sphere of the cubodal form’s ideality presented a sublime metaphor: In an infinite center-less universe, it is still one universe, and because it is one with a distinct beginning, an act of creation is suggested with its Creator at the center of it all.

A more physical connection between our planet and the cuboda is this: earth - like most all celestial bodies – is a spinning sphere with an axis of rotation. So the next step toward a conceptual model is to determine how the cuboda is oriented relative to earth’s poles.

Toward this end, 4 different sets of opposing geometric features characterizing the cuboda’s outer shell present themselves as candidates. That is, opposing pairs of edges, squares, triangles, or vertices. Vertices represent the end points of 12 lines radiating from the cuboda’s natural center, and because these oppose each other exactly in relation to the center, the 12 lines are actually 6, each of which transfixes the central sphere. In the first useful interplay between cubodal expressions, any one line may be selected to coincide with earth’s axis.

Thus designated, the cubodal shell (or spherical anti-entropic thunderhead) is viewed as spinning relative to the earth sphere, such that any of the cuboda’s prime geometric features situated directly out from the equator can be positioned above any longitude, at any time. This maneuver is referred to as primary rotation; and only by orienting opposing vertices to coincide with the earth’s axis can all cubodal features be so positioned.

To further locate features at any latitude (of any longitude), imaginary axes are placed through the center of those opposing features situated directly out from the equator – wherefrom features situated 90˚ from them are rotated via secondary rotations. If this seems highly irregular, a parallel is found in the real and imaginary numbers necessary to grapple with the math of wave dynamics in the realm of physics.

Imaginary axes may be centered through any pair of equatorially opposing features. But another reason for choosing opposing vertices to align with earth’s real poles is that this uniquely orients one (and only one) of the remaining pairs of opposing vertices at the equator, a circumstance that enables equatorial squares to be latitudinally located. Alternatively, the remaining 8 vertices have no distinction from each other and are positioned via secondary rotations about equatorial axes passing through opposing equatorial triangles to guide design of “tree” mounds.)

Thus by real and imaginary axes, primary and secondary rotations may locate features universally. The ability to position features in this manner is important in practice because each feature represents a pattern orientation with its own special applicabilities.

A more sublime aspect of this universality is that it essentially holds all space/time positions on earth to be equal and thus mirrors the notion that as any such perspective represented by an individual soul is unique and part of an incredible variety over the domain of earth, each also holds equal (potential) value to the ultimate Creator of the one universe.

So much for abstraction. If you click on the graphic, you will be taken to a story I heard during a Christmas years ago on NPR. Remembering it days ago, I got so choked up I could hardly describe it to a loved one.

Earth to Space to . . .

What might be done with the cuboda – a most ideal form exuding potential for real application by virtue of unique attributes that in one light poses utter simplicity, while in another kaleidoscopic complexity?

Backing up a bit, the whole cuboda was derived from a careful consideration of space in its conceptual sense. This differed from the traditional analysis of space called geometry in that a rational accretion proceeded from a more experiential base (of spheres).

Spheres were chosen to be the elemental building units by reason of their common presence in the world experienced, as much as for their most simple geometry. In contemplating the cuboda’s 3 basic expressions, its spherical manifestation is first apprehended, or more specifically its clustered aspect in which center(points) are ignored to focus on 13 spherical bubbles, 12 nested in a clear pattern around one central sphere.

Thus a real world match for the cuboda’s spheres is sought. Models of atoms and molecules come to mind, being near one end of the spectrum of the material world. But models are models, and as such are conceptualizations not observed directly. Within the normal scope of our experience, entities in the space posed by the cosmos offer other possibilities, these toward the other end of the spectrum, and having innumerable choices.

Looking there, which celestial body is to be ascribed to the cuboda’s central sphere?

When humans first conceptualized order to the cosmos, earth was placed at the center. This view held until the bitterly fought idea of the earth revolving around the sun eventually came to be accepted. Then the sun was found to orbit the center of our Milky Way Galaxy, along with hundreds of billions of other stars. Galaxies conglomerate in clusters, and these in super clusters, yet somehow the sense of progressing to one ultimate center vanishes. That the universe had a beginning but no (material) center poses another kind of uncertainty principle, one at the macrocosmic level.

The Big Bang theory of creation, overwhelmingly accepted by science and much of religion (one of its earliest theorizers was a Catholic Priest), is securely attached to the cosmic background radiation field. Because its dim 14 billion year old light is relatively even in all directions, a 12 trillion-mile diameter sphere is suggested, one in which earth again seems to be at the center of the mighty explosion whereby time began. The mind boggling paradox of it all is that as much as the Big Bang does evoke a center, the same sense of being at the center of the biggest sphere imaginable could hypothetically be made from any star, no matter how distant, and thus our perspective of the Big Bang is nothing special or privileged.

But if ascribing earth to the central sphere of the ideal form seems arrogant or vane in the face of scientific relativism, it would be equally absurd to choose any other celestial body.

It has always been natural for humankind to use earth as a reference point, or the origin of a (navigational) coordinate system, out of sheer convenience. For humankind, earth also represents a kind of middle ground or nexus between macrocosmic and microcosmic worlds: a minuscule sphere in cosmic terms, but stupendously large in atomic terms – yet not so large that one of its bigger chunks of terra firma can’t be biked in a season.

Beyond these considerations, one could also say that of all material spheres earth is the only sphere common to all life at all times, as far as we now know.

The import of this lies in the notion that life is at least as improbably miraculous as the conditions for life posed by its habitat in space. In the grand scheme of things, if earth also be the sphere common to all self-conscious beings – those capable of discerning and abstracting and exercising free will toward the one true unseen center yearned for in realms beyond an uncertain physical universe – earth may, after all, be ground central to what is ultimately the most important consideration of all.

If earth is chosen to correspond to the cuboda’s center sphere, the outer 12 spheres – by virtue of their simple, compelling, and universal pattern – can be viewed as a kind of anti-entropic thunderhead imparting bolts of enlightened order to the planet. How this pattern is oriented relative to the earth sphere’s fundamentals will be the subject of the next post.