I often sit and wonder why the world is the way that is. Why we have so many problems that have seemingly simple solutions. Just fix it! It’s easy, right? Unfortunately, at least for me in my corner of the world, we have it too easy. Everything is too cheap. Why would we push for mass transit, cleaner air, high density housing, socialized medicine or good schools when all of those things that we know need major improvements are just good enough to make us accept them as is.

For example, the way to fix the traffic and air pollution problems is to create a viable mass transit system. In order to do this, we need to increase the cost of not having a mass transit system. Fuel for an automobile needs to be $5.00 per gallon, all highways need to be toll roads, the CAFE standards need to be considerably higher and the standards for vehicle emissions need to be more stringent. Doing this would make mass-transit a cheaper alternative to driving, thereby causing people to want it.

The problem with the above scenario is that we, the collective we, will never impose these higher costs upon ourselves. We will wait for external influences to drive these costs higher (oil shortages, elevated smog levels, etc…). Of course, during the course of waiting for these costs to rise on their own, we will have destroyed a number of natural resources and increased costs for associated things, not to mention the unintended consequences that we can’t forsee.

I am completely disgusted with the content of the major nation-wide news outlets. Over the past few days I have seen nothing but sensationalized and over dramatized stories about people that I could care less about. There must be some real “news” out there somewhere that they could be reporting on. I know it isn’t necessarily the news outlet’s fault, they are simply providing a service to the public and this is probably what the public wants, but come on now… Just because some redneck in a trailer park wants to hear about a lady that has lost her mind over a failed relationship, doesn’t mean that he should see it on TV. Why can’t the news outlets take the onus of providing worthwhile, intellectually stimulating content to the masses? I know it is all driven by advertising dollars, but it seems to me that there should be at least a couple of stations that could provide real news. I am sure they could make money from advertising, albeit not from McDonald’s or WalMart. Maybe this is the wave of the future… The target audience will be fragmented, instead of trying to be all things to all people we will see a news station that appeals to the white-collar, luxury car driving crowd as opposed to the blue/gray collar, big-ol-dumb-ass truck driving crowd.

I hate traffic! I hate it, it literally sucks the life force from me with every creeping mile. I think I would not be very happy with my life if I ended spending a major portion of it in traffic. I can’t imagine spending 3-4 hours every work day stuck on a freeway creeping along with every other zombie, for years upon endless years.

That being said, here are my solutions to the traffic problem!

• Large trucks must stay in the right lane! I can’t tell you how many times I have been on a freeway and some a-hole truck driver thinks that he will just get into lane #3 to pass some other a-hole truck driver who thinks he will just get into lane #2 to pass some other a-hole truck driver that is going 53mph. Imagine this, a four lane expressway that could handle loads of car traffic jammed up because there are large semi-trucks inn 3 of the 4 lanes! Can you imagine it? If not, just go drive on the freeways in SoCal for a few minutes and I am sure a group of a-hole truck drivers will accomdate your lack of imagination. I honestly think that if trucks were relegated to the slow lane only, and I mean ONLY, that traffic would flow considerably better. I am willing to make certain considerations for them though. If there is a steep grade, I think there should be two slow lanes, one for trucks only, and one regular one so they can pass each other. I also think that it would be acceptable for them to move out of the rightmost lane prior to an interchange so that they can navigate their way onto the correct freeway.
• Section off the carpool lanes with concrete dividers and seriously limit the ingress and egress points for them. This would help to eliminate the near gridlock that happens every 2-3 miles because some a-hole wasn’t paying attention to the signs and failed has to jump out of the carpool lane, zip across four lanes of traffic and exit the freeway. If you don’t give stupid people too many options, they can’t make as many bad choices
• Once the carpool lane is sectioned off, make the minimum speed limit 90mph and set a maximum of 120mph. Why not? If you don’t have to worry about lane changes and whatnot why not? Most people drive close to 90mph in the fast lane anyways, so what is the harm?
• Limit the number of on-ramps and off-ramps. Again, people are stupid, limiting their choices limits their mistakes. Most people get on the freeway, head directly for the fast-lane and cruise along at 75-80mph until about 1,000ft before their exit where they dash across all the other lanes with wild abandon because they don’t want to miss their stop. With our current configuration, this happens every mile or so, if we only had a exit every 5 miles or so, the a-holes cutting everyone off to make their exit would be condensed to a smaller area
• Now for my favourite solution: Mass Transit!!!! I am all for ripping out freeway lanes in favor of commuter and high speed rail lines. 10 lane freeways running across our landscape chock full of single occupancy vehicles burning Middle Eastern oil is a piss poor solution. We need an effective mass transit system of buses and trains that actually work together in concert to get people where they need to go in a convenient manner. If we stop pooring money into our parent’s idea of utopia (where everyone owns a car and drives for hours to work), we can start making some smart decisions. This would of course require us to completely change our retarded, suburban sprawl method of housing ourselves, but that is just one more upside to my idea.

On Becoming an Evolutionary Biologist has an entry discussing the debate between creationism and evolution. While his point of view is clearly expressed, I would like to chime in with my own 2¢.

I do not wish to argue the merits of Evolution vs. Creationism, rather the utter lack of respect either side of the argument has for the other. Obviously people are extremely passionate about the topic, but perhaps we have lost site of a fundamental principle of our society. What is this principle you ask? Well, the ability to intelligently debate a topic while respectfully disagreeing with your opponent. On the side of Creationism, the religious fundamentalists are arguing that evolution has no basis in scientific fact, despite an enormous amount of evidence to the contrary. On the side of Evolution stands well educated academics who believe that they “know” what is true and right and are unwilling to accept or even tolerate a differing, non-scientific point of view.

Both sides are guilty of using extremist tactics to debase the other. Both use exaggeration and omission to confuse the un-decided. The religious fundamentalists point to omissions in the historical record of fossils as proof that evolution is a hoax. They point to organisms who haven’t evolved in eons as proof that evolution does not exist. They prey on the ignorance of the masses regarding evolution to bolster their ranks. Now, this is clearly wrong. Not just wrong in that they are incorrect, but wrong in a deeper sense. They are purposely misleading and distorting the facts to their followers. But the scientific community is not free from blame either. The scientific community is guilty of basely dismissing a religious point of view without even acknowledging that it is a legitimate point of view. Not necessarily legitimate in fact or proof, but legitimate in that it is held. The scientific community is also guilty of not properly educating the masses. They fail to admit that there are enormous gaps in the data. That while we may have a good idea of what is going on, very little of what we know can be stated as scientific fact. They also fail to admit that we don’t definitively know anything. Very little can be stated as an absolute fact with absolute certainty.

While I personally agree that evolution is a fact, I do not know what role (if any) a deity or higher power played in the creation or maintenance of our universe. I do, however, believe that the Christian Fundamentalists are not correct. In fact, they are, in my opinion, absolutely incorrect. I obviously side with the scientific community, but I wish they would do a better job of explaining what evolution is, how it works and that they may be wrong, if only partially.

Cave Thinkers
How evolutionary psychology gets evolution wrong.
By Amanda Schaffer

I don’t think people get evolution, or biology at all. This article points to flaws in some jack-hole New York Times columnists articlethat claims that Evolutionary Psychology (EP) is the driving force behind human behavior. That men must be more competitive than women because they, the men, win more Scrabble competitions? WTF? My main
concern with this is that other people will read the New York Times
article and accept it. The fact that more men win Scrabble championships than women has nothing to do with competition. I do find the fact odd though. I understand that women are usually more adept at language based skills than men. Perhaps Scrabble is more memory based than language based, but I digress.

I, for one, am of the belief that our biology is the primary driving force behind what we do. I tend to look to a biological reason for societal and individual behavior. That doesn’t mean that I am totally nature vs. nurture though. I also believe that the human mind is an incredibly flexible and adaptable machine. That what we are taught has enormous ramifications in regards to our future behavior.