If you are planning on flying in Canada, consider booking with WestJet - they're sort of like the JetBlue or Southwest Airlines of the Great White North. Flights are more affordable, flight attendants are funny, and I've had great experiences with connecting flights.
I don't know if every country has there own more or less domestic airline that rocks, but remember, if in Canada, fly WestJet.
These things really are frighteningly easy to make. I'm sure most of our readers aren't silly enough to buy a silk flower brooch from Nordstrom, but you never know!
Since this post was about "The Secret" and how my opinion was that it mainly encouraged materialistic gluttony based on metaphysical/quasi-mystical ideas, I'm going to only address your comment briefly:
I am aware that John Grey has remarried. He has also made a fortune giving out relationship advice. But measuring how much "good" he's done by his book sales or appearance in media doesn't, to me, seem like any sort of reliable barometer of success with other couples.
I felt that his inclusion in the film affirmed what I'd said at the conclusion of this article: it seems that there are some who have a talent for tapping into the zeitgeist of people who feel like there's just something missing, something wrong, can't put their finger on it... but wait! Someone just wrote a whole book about it, clearly instructing you on how to "fix" it. And now they have a DVD about the stuff in the book. And now they're going on TV to talk about why you need to buy the book and DVD to be truly happy.
Well, as happy as you can be until you start to feel empty again and a new book comes out.
I bought 4 airline tickets at Alaska Air from Seattle to Hawaii, for $236 each! Can't wait to go in October! Will be a much needed, highly anticipated vacay!
I finally made the jump from a 5x80mm (5 wheeled) inline speed skate frame to a 3x100mm+84mm (4 wheeled) frame. Translation: bigger wheels on my roadskates, i.e., faster rolling on downhills & easier to keep up with the faster guys! Bigger wheels also mean more shock-absorption on 'Gatorback' (bumpy) road surfaces. Joy! Cheaper than a gym membership and 100% more fun. $30!
seems to me that these things are a good idea all the way around, what happens in 10 to 30 years when climate change swings in high gear and we really NEED to be able to grow food in unhospitible areas? what about a nuclear catastrophe? Should we ignore the basic fact that if we dont activly pursue things like this wont have them when we need them? vertical farms like this will give humanity a leg-up the next time it shoots itself in the foot. call me doom and gloom, but I'm always suprised when people deride an idea that could very well save our collective butts at some point. All becuase its not the MOST healthy way to grow food? Becuase its not the MOST humane way to raise animals? well it sure nice to have the luxary to worry about whats the most in these situations, but it's likley that wont always be the case, and being prepared for that possibility is never a bad idea.
Julie, that reminds me of the time I was supposed to fly from Minneapolis to London with a friend. I was flying to Minneapolis from Denver and she was coming from Boise. My flight was on time, but hers was late. The wouldn't let me wait wait and take another flight without purchasing another ticket, and they wouldn't hold the plane for her. As it turned out, there were close to 10 people on her flight who were supposed to make ours and they got to the gate right after the doors closed, and they wouldn't get permission to reopen it for them as the airline "forgot" to tell them to hold our flight for that one. But we had to stay on the ground for another 45 minutes to get all these people's bags OFF our airplane.
I think his concepts are polarizing, and do a good job of getting the sexes to not talk to each other "because we're so different".
And his degree is a sham. He got his degree in 1997, a full year after CPU was denied approval to the Council for Private Postsecondary and Vocational Education (Council). Sure, the appeal process hadn't finished, but I trust this guy like I'd trust a bag of rocks to give me marriage advice.
Much like most of the people who teach this "thinking" garbage.
I once did see something like this that was actually useful. One year, California had a serious drought, and alfalfa for horses was hard to get. So one company sold a hydroponic grass factory. This was a shipping container with a stack of trays and grow lights. Each day you removed and "mowed" one tray, did some maintenance on it, and put it back in the stack to grow new grass. The grow cycle was about three weeks. Not very energy efficient, but needed little water, which was what mattered that year.
You see smaller trays like that full of alfalfa sprouts at Jamba Juice outlets. Same concept, smaller scale.
There are some huge indoor farms in Saudi Arabia, where they have sun, space, energy, and money, but limited water and poor soil.
There's some grumbling in the "eco" community about the "3000 mile salad", and how much energy is used shipping produce around. But in fact, the biggest transportation fuel cost is the SUV trip to the grocery store. If the customer drives further, to the farmer's market, it's even worse. What's actually happening in transportation is that railroads are making a comeback, simply because their energy costs are lower.
Perhaps you could get your facts straight before you trash someone in your review? Yes, John Gray was divorced after 2 years of marriage, but he then remarried and has remained so for well over 20 years.
I'm not someone who's drank the kool-aid or thinks the Secret is the key to anything, but it does benefit your readers if you complete the truth in your review instead of trashing someone's credibility in the area he's done so much good in. I don't think it matters a hill of beans if he's been divorced given the good that his books have done for people in conflicted marriages.
My 160GB external hard drive. I purchased it on a whim and because it was on sale. I thought I might put shows and music on there just for fun. Instead, I backed up my laptops and all of my work.
Best investment and purchase I have ever made.
My laptop died the next day, and I had to send it in to get repaired and re-imaged, and I lost *EVERYTHING*... but not quite. I had all of of my documents and my life went on without a hitch by using my other spare laptop, and my trusty external drive.
I didn't miss a beat in any meetings or things I had to get done, even without my laptop.
Dave P. has a good point re: having practice producing food in enclosed, artificial environments and long term thinking.
In regards to Smithsone's post, I find the point that "food can be grown outdoors, enough for all--without a single bit of the technology described. it's PROVEN." to be morally idealistic but simplistic. The world population is at 6.6 billion and exponentially growing by the minute. Land is at a premium and, guess what, not controlled by the majority of the 6.6 billion people on earth. Eventually we were going to have to innovate when it comes to producing our food by dint of neccessity. The aggregation of land in the hands of the rich and corporations worldwide means that land isn't being parceled out to each and every human being equally to raise his/her own livestock and produce. And land sure isn't being held so that food can be grown on it in a conscienable way for the masses. Gee, who needs that when we can pull up high rises, condos and resorts there instead?? And call me a cynic but how are we going to wrest back power over our food supply, short of a bloody revolution to reclaim the land? Anyway, don't hate on the messenger. If you don't like the idea of high-rise industrial farms, do something to empower small and organic farmers.
It is a huge step forward, socially, that we all are even discussing the condition of how our livestock is raised and whether or not our veggies are GMO. A hundred years ago, Upton Sinclair wrote "The Jungle" to raise mainstream America's awareness about the immigrant struggle .. . .and instead people got incensed over severed hands and rats in the meatpacking factories. These days, we're still pissed about the severed hands/rats (I'm still sure they're there!) and some of us are angry about the GMOs.
Btw, this is pretty bourgeois that we're having this discussion about how our food is raised when much of the world goes their daily life without a decent amount of food. Isn't fighting about bland carrots and terrorized chicken so much more soothing to our conscience (woo hoo! we get to be on our moral high gorund then!) than really facing the fact that much of the world doesn't even have access to our bland carrots and chicken?
When I bought my laptop a year ago, I didn't have the extra couple of hundred for the 1GB laptop, so I bought the 512, thinking it wouldn't be that big of a difference. Well, as a graphic designer who in the last 6 months has decided to strike out on my own, it really hampered my productivity. Using the Adobe programs takes up a ridiculous amount of memory. Ever try waiting over 4 minutes for a program to open? I couldn't even have two programs open at the same time without one of them unexpectedly quitting on me! And don't get me started on trying to color correct a large Photoshop image. Grrrr.
I finally made the investment for 1GB extra RAM, (freelancer? Yeah, I have no money except for required bills) had the Mac guys install it for me, and presto! All of a sudden, I'm doing my work in half the time and as a result, getting more business overall accomplished.
I'm confused. When is raising animals indoors ever a good thing for the animals?
One of the posters hit the nail on the head: your post lacks much in the way of empathy or understanding of the original prolblem. More technology has not solved a single meaningful problem in agriculture, but has instead created most of the current problems *and* empowered monolithic factory farming.
The technology you're describing serves to make monolithic factory farming even more pervasive, driving down crop diversity, crop resistance, and the worst part--making it nearly impossible for small farms and organic crops to exist (if you don't understand what that means, or why it's true, you should learn more about your subject.)
In other words: the issue isn't just a problem of "how to grow more food more consistently." In fact, that is not a genuine problem at all--it is one propogated by large corporate machines like Monsanto. And Monsanto, by the way, is one of the corporations funding this research.
Standing at arm's length and calling it fascinating is disingenuous, and possibly dishonest. Take a stand. It really *is* sad to see you try to both defend the idea and simultaneously absolve yourself of any committment to what you wrote (you in fact said clearly you hoped it would happen in your lifetime.)
I'm also reminded of that scene in "Forrest Gump", when he's criss-crossing the country on foot. He attracts quite a following who are doing it because I guess they think there's some kind of Zen state they'll attain by following him, or maybe they just want to be included in the non-event of simply running.
When he just stops, they all wonder, "What are we supposed to do now?
Likewise, without owning and following the ideas in 'The Secret', how could anyone make a better life for themselves? At least, that's the suggestion.
Sometimes, I think, you just do what you do and the rest falls into place. I'm not negating other people's beliefs in the metaphysical claims of 'The Secret'; I'm just saying that it feels like a cleverly-marketed 'snake-oil' packaging of (relatively) common sense: postive perpetuates positive, and vice versa.
One other thing to think about, as far as the implications: if a person is responsible for "attracting" all these creature comforts through their own thoughts, wouldn't the converse be true: that any calamity, disease, personal tragedy, etc. would be the result of negative thinking and not simply the way life goes, sometimes?
Besides sounding like a Tony Robbins seminar, I hated the movie because it included that all-encompassing disclaimer: if it doesn't work, you're not trying hard enough. Constantly thinking of someone calling you (for example) just makes it stick out in your mind when/if they call. It's coincidence, but our brains register "hits" more than "misses." And this theory includes a get-out-of-jail-free card even if the coincidence doesn't hit.
the most important aspect to this is only breifly mentioned above. to produce food on the moon/mars/elsewhere we will have to have practical experiance producing food in enclosed, artificial enviroments. These buildings would be a good starting point/proof of concept for that activity.
Its good to see important technology like this being worked on at a civilian (non-NASA) level.
I spent $262.45 on a digital picture frame for my grandmother. My grandfather, who passed away ten years ago, was an amazing amateur photographer. When he passed he left behind thousands of photographic slides. Due to the cost of processing film, he rarely developed the pictures he took. I painstakingly began to scan and catalog the images. With so many to scan I have only made a dent in the piles. Many of the images brought me to tears. Moments captured of my mom and dad at their first Christmas, images of my brother coming home from the hospital, and pictures of my mother and I that exude the love we hold for one another.
Realizing that my grandmother doesn’t have access or knowledge of a computer, I decided to buy her a digital picture frame to view the pictures. When I look at the pictures my grandfather took, I can only imagine the range of emotions he felt behind that lens. Within each picture I try to imagine the pride, joy, compassion, elation, and frustration he felt. My grandmother says it's the nicest gift anyone has ever given her.
If you are planning on flying in Canada, consider booking with WestJet - they're sort of like the JetBlue or Southwest Airlines of the Great White North. Flights are more affordable, flight attendants are funny, and I've had great experiences with connecting flights.
I don't know if every country has there own more or less domestic airline that rocks, but remember, if in Canada, fly WestJet.
Well put, Ed. Besides, no one is "trashing" anyone else by pointing out things like that.
No one is going to sustain a boycott against Chinese goods. It just ain't gonna happen.
Thanks a bunch! I'm happy to be included.
These things really are frighteningly easy to make. I'm sure most of our readers aren't silly enough to buy a silk flower brooch from Nordstrom, but you never know!
Since this post was about "The Secret" and how my opinion was that it mainly encouraged materialistic gluttony based on metaphysical/quasi-mystical ideas, I'm going to only address your comment briefly:
I am aware that John Grey has remarried. He has also made a fortune giving out relationship advice. But measuring how much "good" he's done by his book sales or appearance in media doesn't, to me, seem like any sort of reliable barometer of success with other couples.
I felt that his inclusion in the film affirmed what I'd said at the conclusion of this article: it seems that there are some who have a talent for tapping into the zeitgeist of people who feel like there's just something missing, something wrong, can't put their finger on it... but wait! Someone just wrote a whole book about it, clearly instructing you on how to "fix" it. And now they have a DVD about the stuff in the book. And now they're going on TV to talk about why you need to buy the book and DVD to be truly happy.
Well, as happy as you can be until you start to feel empty again and a new book comes out.
I bought 4 airline tickets at Alaska Air from Seattle to Hawaii, for $236 each! Can't wait to go in October! Will be a much needed, highly anticipated vacay!
I finally made the jump from a 5x80mm (5 wheeled) inline speed skate frame to a 3x100mm+84mm (4 wheeled) frame. Translation: bigger wheels on my roadskates, i.e., faster rolling on downhills & easier to keep up with the faster guys! Bigger wheels also mean more shock-absorption on 'Gatorback' (bumpy) road surfaces. Joy! Cheaper than a gym membership and 100% more fun. $30!
seems to me that these things are a good idea all the way around, what happens in 10 to 30 years when climate change swings in high gear and we really NEED to be able to grow food in unhospitible areas? what about a nuclear catastrophe? Should we ignore the basic fact that if we dont activly pursue things like this wont have them when we need them? vertical farms like this will give humanity a leg-up the next time it shoots itself in the foot. call me doom and gloom, but I'm always suprised when people deride an idea that could very well save our collective butts at some point. All becuase its not the MOST healthy way to grow food? Becuase its not the MOST humane way to raise animals? well it sure nice to have the luxary to worry about whats the most in these situations, but it's likley that wont always be the case, and being prepared for that possibility is never a bad idea.
-Dave P.
Julie, that reminds me of the time I was supposed to fly from Minneapolis to London with a friend. I was flying to Minneapolis from Denver and she was coming from Boise. My flight was on time, but hers was late. The wouldn't let me wait wait and take another flight without purchasing another ticket, and they wouldn't hold the plane for her. As it turned out, there were close to 10 people on her flight who were supposed to make ours and they got to the gate right after the doors closed, and they wouldn't get permission to reopen it for them as the airline "forgot" to tell them to hold our flight for that one. But we had to stay on the ground for another 45 minutes to get all these people's bags OFF our airplane.
I think his concepts are polarizing, and do a good job of getting the sexes to not talk to each other "because we're so different".
And his degree is a sham. He got his degree in 1997, a full year after CPU was denied approval to the Council for Private Postsecondary and Vocational Education (Council). Sure, the appeal process hadn't finished, but I trust this guy like I'd trust a bag of rocks to give me marriage advice.
Much like most of the people who teach this "thinking" garbage.
I once did see something like this that was actually useful. One year, California had a serious drought, and alfalfa for horses was hard to get. So one company sold a hydroponic grass factory. This was a shipping container with a stack of trays and grow lights. Each day you removed and "mowed" one tray, did some maintenance on it, and put it back in the stack to grow new grass. The grow cycle was about three weeks. Not very energy efficient, but needed little water, which was what mattered that year.
You see smaller trays like that full of alfalfa sprouts at Jamba Juice outlets. Same concept, smaller scale.
There are some huge indoor farms in Saudi Arabia, where they have sun, space, energy, and money, but limited water and poor soil.
There's some grumbling in the "eco" community about the "3000 mile salad", and how much energy is used shipping produce around. But in fact, the biggest transportation fuel cost is the SUV trip to the grocery store. If the customer drives further, to the farmer's market, it's even worse. What's actually happening in transportation is that railroads are making a comeback, simply because their energy costs are lower.
good post, but pageant "beauty" is always scary!
Perhaps you could get your facts straight before you trash someone in your review? Yes, John Gray was divorced after 2 years of marriage, but he then remarried and has remained so for well over 20 years.
I'm not someone who's drank the kool-aid or thinks the Secret is the key to anything, but it does benefit your readers if you complete the truth in your review instead of trashing someone's credibility in the area he's done so much good in. I don't think it matters a hill of beans if he's been divorced given the good that his books have done for people in conflicted marriages.
-One reader's opinion
And here I was thinking it was Photoshop...
My 160GB external hard drive. I purchased it on a whim and because it was on sale. I thought I might put shows and music on there just for fun. Instead, I backed up my laptops and all of my work.
Best investment and purchase I have ever made.
My laptop died the next day, and I had to send it in to get repaired and re-imaged, and I lost *EVERYTHING*... but not quite. I had all of of my documents and my life went on without a hitch by using my other spare laptop, and my trusty external drive.
I didn't miss a beat in any meetings or things I had to get done, even without my laptop.
For all of your readers who understand the Reality of
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Dave P. has a good point re: having practice producing food in enclosed, artificial environments and long term thinking.
In regards to Smithsone's post, I find the point that "food can be grown outdoors, enough for all--without a single bit of the technology described. it's PROVEN." to be morally idealistic but simplistic. The world population is at 6.6 billion and exponentially growing by the minute. Land is at a premium and, guess what, not controlled by the majority of the 6.6 billion people on earth. Eventually we were going to have to innovate when it comes to producing our food by dint of neccessity. The aggregation of land in the hands of the rich and corporations worldwide means that land isn't being parceled out to each and every human being equally to raise his/her own livestock and produce. And land sure isn't being held so that food can be grown on it in a conscienable way for the masses. Gee, who needs that when we can pull up high rises, condos and resorts there instead?? And call me a cynic but how are we going to wrest back power over our food supply, short of a bloody revolution to reclaim the land? Anyway, don't hate on the messenger. If you don't like the idea of high-rise industrial farms, do something to empower small and organic farmers.
It is a huge step forward, socially, that we all are even discussing the condition of how our livestock is raised and whether or not our veggies are GMO. A hundred years ago, Upton Sinclair wrote "The Jungle" to raise mainstream America's awareness about the immigrant struggle .. . .and instead people got incensed over severed hands and rats in the meatpacking factories. These days, we're still pissed about the severed hands/rats (I'm still sure they're there!) and some of us are angry about the GMOs.
Btw, this is pretty bourgeois that we're having this discussion about how our food is raised when much of the world goes their daily life without a decent amount of food. Isn't fighting about bland carrots and terrorized chicken so much more soothing to our conscience (woo hoo! we get to be on our moral high gorund then!) than really facing the fact that much of the world doesn't even have access to our bland carrots and chicken?
I appreciate all of your input. Tthank you for being involved in a valuable service that is 100% genuine.
When I bought my laptop a year ago, I didn't have the extra couple of hundred for the 1GB laptop, so I bought the 512, thinking it wouldn't be that big of a difference. Well, as a graphic designer who in the last 6 months has decided to strike out on my own, it really hampered my productivity. Using the Adobe programs takes up a ridiculous amount of memory. Ever try waiting over 4 minutes for a program to open? I couldn't even have two programs open at the same time without one of them unexpectedly quitting on me! And don't get me started on trying to color correct a large Photoshop image. Grrrr.
I finally made the investment for 1GB extra RAM, (freelancer? Yeah, I have no money except for required bills) had the Mac guys install it for me, and presto! All of a sudden, I'm doing my work in half the time and as a result, getting more business overall accomplished.
I'm confused. When is raising animals indoors ever a good thing for the animals?
One of the posters hit the nail on the head: your post lacks much in the way of empathy or understanding of the original prolblem. More technology has not solved a single meaningful problem in agriculture, but has instead created most of the current problems *and* empowered monolithic factory farming.
The technology you're describing serves to make monolithic factory farming even more pervasive, driving down crop diversity, crop resistance, and the worst part--making it nearly impossible for small farms and organic crops to exist (if you don't understand what that means, or why it's true, you should learn more about your subject.)
In other words: the issue isn't just a problem of "how to grow more food more consistently." In fact, that is not a genuine problem at all--it is one propogated by large corporate machines like Monsanto. And Monsanto, by the way, is one of the corporations funding this research.
Standing at arm's length and calling it fascinating is disingenuous, and possibly dishonest. Take a stand. It really *is* sad to see you try to both defend the idea and simultaneously absolve yourself of any committment to what you wrote (you in fact said clearly you hoped it would happen in your lifetime.)
I'm also reminded of that scene in "Forrest Gump", when he's criss-crossing the country on foot. He attracts quite a following who are doing it because I guess they think there's some kind of Zen state they'll attain by following him, or maybe they just want to be included in the non-event of simply running.
When he just stops, they all wonder, "What are we supposed to do now?
Likewise, without owning and following the ideas in 'The Secret', how could anyone make a better life for themselves? At least, that's the suggestion.
Sometimes, I think, you just do what you do and the rest falls into place. I'm not negating other people's beliefs in the metaphysical claims of 'The Secret'; I'm just saying that it feels like a cleverly-marketed 'snake-oil' packaging of (relatively) common sense: postive perpetuates positive, and vice versa.
One other thing to think about, as far as the implications: if a person is responsible for "attracting" all these creature comforts through their own thoughts, wouldn't the converse be true: that any calamity, disease, personal tragedy, etc. would be the result of negative thinking and not simply the way life goes, sometimes?
Besides sounding like a Tony Robbins seminar, I hated the movie because it included that all-encompassing disclaimer: if it doesn't work, you're not trying hard enough. Constantly thinking of someone calling you (for example) just makes it stick out in your mind when/if they call. It's coincidence, but our brains register "hits" more than "misses." And this theory includes a get-out-of-jail-free card even if the coincidence doesn't hit.
A mattress =) I was camping out on a pile of blankets for nearly 3 months before I realized I was being insanely cheap and sacrifing my health for it.
the most important aspect to this is only breifly mentioned above. to produce food on the moon/mars/elsewhere we will have to have practical experiance producing food in enclosed, artificial enviroments. These buildings would be a good starting point/proof of concept for that activity.
Its good to see important technology like this being worked on at a civilian (non-NASA) level.
I spent $262.45 on a digital picture frame for my grandmother. My grandfather, who passed away ten years ago, was an amazing amateur photographer. When he passed he left behind thousands of photographic slides. Due to the cost of processing film, he rarely developed the pictures he took. I painstakingly began to scan and catalog the images. With so many to scan I have only made a dent in the piles. Many of the images brought me to tears. Moments captured of my mom and dad at their first Christmas, images of my brother coming home from the hospital, and pictures of my mother and I that exude the love we hold for one another.
Realizing that my grandmother doesn’t have access or knowledge of a computer, I decided to buy her a digital picture frame to view the pictures. When I look at the pictures my grandfather took, I can only imagine the range of emotions he felt behind that lens. Within each picture I try to imagine the pride, joy, compassion, elation, and frustration he felt. My grandmother says it's the nicest gift anyone has ever given her.