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Public health in a post-petroleum world
By G. Daniel Bednarz, PhD
It is better to be healthy than ill or dead. That is the beginning and end of the only real argument for [public health].
- Geoffrey Rose, The Strategy of Preventive Medicine.
The world is near the point where half of all its readily usable petroleum has been consumed. Beyond this plateau looms a bellcurve-shaped decline into the middle decades of this century to the end of the petroleum era. Some of you may recognize this phenomenon by the idiom "Peak Oil." However, as far as I know, the profound implications of Peak Oil remain unaddressed by public health, as they are throughout most of our society.
At this point you might be thinking, "Oil is the concern of geologists, economists, and industrialists -- and maybe politicians. What does it have to do with public health?"
Public health textbooks –- excellent indicators of how the discipline thinks of itself and conceives of its mission -- devote modest space to energy, let alone to the uniqueness of oil as a resource. Most have a paragraph or two on the importance of energy and note that oil will be available for at least another fifty years. Given this perilous misunderstanding by the discipline let me reply, "fair enough" to your question and set as my main goal today making the relationship between Peak Oil and public health an "interesting" call to reflection, as opposed to "absurd" and none of your concern (Strauss, 1971).
The Ubiquity of Oil
Petroleum –- and natural gas -- plays a crucial role in industrial society. It provides fuel for transportation and machines, as well as in pesticides and fertilizers for food production, heat in the winter and air conditioning in the summer, pharmaceuticals and medicines, and an extensive array of manufactured goods -- from toothbrushes to DVDs to the elastic in our underwear.
In sum, oil is the indispensable multipurpose resource of industrial society, both in terms of the energy it provides and the products we manufacture from it. Accordingly, absent alternatives to oil public health will face a situation that will eventually become worse than the one many thought was eliminated once and for all one hundred years ago when the profession incorporated itself around the germ theory of disease prevention and intervention. Because of its impending scarcity, we face the possibility of "Overshoot." I say more on overshoot in the final section of this report.
Alternatives to Petroleum and Natural Gas
A review of where we are regarding alternative sources of energy is needed because I speculate that most of you are wary of my premise that the world is running out of cheap oil or replacements for it. Therefore, what follows is a cautious review. My wish is to sober you by distinguishing between what is widely acknowledged: oil recovery will peak and then decline and at present there are no scalable or equally versatile alternatives to it; and what is speculation: from the dystopian vision of being catapulted back to the Stone Age after an intermezzo of several billions souls dying from war, famine and disease; to the utopian where there's absolutely nothing to worry about because the Market and technology will save us, perhaps –- far-fetched as it seems -- by integrating human existence with computers and thereby revolutionizing our relationship to the bio-physical environment (Kurzweil, 2005).
While there are a few maverick geologists who claim that the earth produces petroleum a-biotically in its core, making it in essence a renewable resource, the evidence seems incontrovertible that oil has a primordial biotic origin. This means oil –- and also natural gas -- is finite, a one-shot affair for civilization –- in any scope of human time -- that must be replaced by alternative energy sources if our level of technological and material existence is to continue, let alone be universalized through what we call "Globalization."
Jimmy Carter made tentative efforts to talk to the nation about fossil fuel alternatives –remember he was trained in physics—and was ridiculed as a wimpy defeatist for his efforts. That was three decades ago and, given the enormous amount of energy required to run industrial society, especially America, it is now late in the alternatives game. There is little dispute that we have not developed genuine, scalable energy substitutes since the 1970s and even if we had them in development it would be years, probably decades, before they could be incorporated fully into the infrastructure of the nation. The economic --in dollars -- and social costs --in hardships of various kinds -- of the conversion will be stupendous.
At this point, some may question my insinuation that the free market and technology will not produce a relatively painless fix, a Star Trek "Dilithium Crystals" solution, to our nascent energy problems. While space constraints prevent elaboration, I offer the following comments. The "Hydrogen Economy" sounds catchy but at present is unworkable due to a number of unresolved technological issues, plus the fact that hydrogen is no more a fuel than is electricity –you need to spend energy to produce the hydrogen that carries energy . Some advocate synthetic (liquefying) coal while pooh-poohing the cost to the consumer ($5.00 a gallon gas), the additional pollution and climate change ("global warming") it will generate, and the ecological destructiveness of massive coal extraction; furthermore, there is no guarantee we have more than several decades of relatively low-energy coal left in the earth.
Similarly, wind, solar, biomass, nuclear, and hydroelectric at present can provide only a small fraction of the energy we now get from oil and natural gas; moreover, they are reliant, either in construction or maintenance, on oil and gas. Finally they are not, repeat, not wholly "clean" technologies that avoid worsening the already perilous situation of climate change underway. As things stand, nothing rivals oil and natural gas for their convertibility, energy density and other features, such as their role in increasing agricultural yield to phenomenal levels ("The Green Revolution") –levels that cannot be maintained without them, and --according to recent figures -- per capita agricultural yield probably went into decline in the late 1980s.
The questions to put to those who are now coming along with "too good to be true" energy solutions stem from the laws of thermodynamics; these laws are immutable, they do not respond to wishes, fantasies, rhetoric, public relations or propaganda. When appreciated, these physical laws temper us to the real task of finding scalable and ecologically safe energy alternatives. To reiterate, the challenges of such an energy source conversion are manifold and currently are barely being addressed, relative to the enormity of the tasks of discovery, development, and subsequent conversion.
Peak Oil and the Limits to Growth
Twenty years ago some spoke of the limits to growth. But today we now know that growth is the engine of change. Growth is the friend of the environment.
- President George H. W. Bush, 1992.
As a transition into discussing public health in a post-petroleum world, I want to review an important assessment by Matthew Simmons, an oil industry consultant and investment analyst. As some of you may know Simmons claims to have explained Peak Oil to the G. W. Bush administration , which itself has several former oil executives as members. Simmons' (2000) analysis in "Revisiting the Limits to Growth Could the Club of Rome Have Been Correct, After All?" runs counter to his vested interests. He is, after all, in the business of making money with money, for which you need a constantly growing –- that is, limitless -- economy. Also keep in mind that the financial and oil industries tip toe around Peak Oil, referring to "interruptions" in supply but rarely, if ever, to the fact that oil and natural gas are finite resources .
He notes that in the mid 1990s when he began to discuss Peak Oil he would receive criticism –- from his community of economists, financiers and oil industry executives -- that he was a "Malthusian" or a "Club of Rome" doomsdayer. Simmons began to wonder why The Limits to Growth, published in 1972, could still years later draw such acrimonious criticism. He decided to read the book and then realized the disparagement he'd been hearing about Limits was either distorted or wholly untrue. He writes, "Nowhere in the book was there any mention about running out of anything [emphasis in origina;] by 2000…the book was focused on how the world might look" in 2070. "There was not one sentence or even a single word ...about an oil shortage...by the year 2000." (Simmons, 2000: 4). To his surprise, he learned that the book was an academic exercise in computer simulation –quite cutting edge for its time -- of the overshoot consequences of population and economic growth. A main conclusion was that –- surprise -- there are ecological limits to population and economic growth and therefore to the "Carrying Capacity" of the earth, that is, how many people it can support at a sustainable level. Limits to Growth projected that the earth's ultimate carrying capacity was not sustainable under virtually any continual growth scenario beyond the year 2070.
Simmons offers this observation, which is relevant to public health and, overall, to those concerned with eliminating poverty and promoting economic development in the world:
The world is now 30 years into this 100-year view. It did grow as fast as the book warned. The gap between the rich and the poor never narrowed. Instead, the gap between the "haves" and the "have-nots" grew by a significant measure [from 35/65 in 1970 to 20/80 in 2000] …The current strain on many of our precious resources … would have been far worse by 2000 … had these [poor] people also begun to significantly improve their standard of living at the same time. An accidental safety valve for many potential scarce resources turned out to be the widening of the rich/poor gap." (2000: 5).
Simmons stresses that the Soviet Union's collapse triggered sharp declines in public health and concomitant resource consumption in Russia; in essence he argues that the collapse delayed Peak Oil. He stresses that if the gap between rich and poor had narrowed and the Soviet Union not ended, "…the world could have easily reached an energy consumption rate of between 220 and 240 million BOE [barrels of equivalent oil energy] per day by 2000, assuming such vast energy additions could have been supplied" [emphasis added] (2000: 9).
If we concede that as a rule as poverty declines public health improves we must also acknowledge that energy consumption increases as living standards improve. Simmons observes, "A casual reading of the possible future limits to water, arable land, fish stocks, etc. causes one to question how the world could even cope with continued population growth and a narrowing of the rich/poor gap" (2000: 13). He also lists the infrequently mentioned fact that economic growth translates into increases in pollution. Then he observes with irony, "These are the issues that should now [in 2000] be dominating ... discussions of the world's public policy planners" (2000: 13).
Finally, Simmons discusses the status of OPEC to counter the widespread notion that they are both prosperous and floating on a sea of virtually limitless oil. For example, he informs us that Saudi Arabia, a nation we think of as being composed entirely of rich jet-setters, had 6 million citizens in 1970 and 22 million by 2000; by 2030, at the current fertility rate, the population will be 45 to 50 million people . "Most people still think Saudi Arabia is a very rich country. To the contrary, its economy is now in shambles as a result of the population explosion which has … occurred" (Simmons, 2005: 14). Simmons calculates that if all OPEC, most of whom have poverty rates between 25% to 50% and burgeoning populations, were to attempt to narrow the rich/poor gap they would likely be unable to remain oil exporting nations --they would consume all their oil domestically.
Furthermore, as Peak Oil passes world-wide and OPEC too descend down the bell curve, they face a grim future because most of them have no other viable economic exports and their populations are growing exponentially.
Although time prevents us from delving into this, the little known conditions of OPEC are startling, especially in light of our massive military presence in the region to "protect our vital strategic interests."
Peak Oil and Public Health
So what is the future of public health in a post-petroleum world? Let's go through several wide-ranging scenarios organized around the concept of overshoot to get a feel for how they would affect public health.
I say "get a feel" advisedly. It is my opinion that the distress of this topic has opened the door to all manner of prophets and prognosticators. From left to right, from anti-modernist survivalists to computer science utopians, to permaculturalists to Marxists to fascists, and so on, many are foretelling the future. But we all know that experts are typically wrong about the future; they too suffer from confirmation bias, overlooking or misconstruing their past mistakes, and from misunderstanding statistics and misapplying probability theory. And some will dissemble for a bit of fame and fortune. Also, bright and gifted people are wont to ignore a great deal of disagreeable information, thinking their intelligence is sufficient.
Further, we are not rational creatures; we possess rationality, but we are –especially when under collective social stress—subject to the spell of mythic "quick fixes" and explanations (Morrison, 2002). Relatedly, I mention Isaiah Berlin's famous Hedgehog/Fox dichotomy, where the hedgehog knows a great –"optimal" -- deal about one area and the fox knows a sufficient –"satisfycing" -- amount about many things. Since peak oil cuts across so many fields and is of such potential magnitude, there will be many highly intelligent hedgehogs who think what they know (in depth) is most important to peak oil. I'm a fox, myself.
Given what we know about ourselves I believe that we should, on the one hand, look skeptically at those who have totalizing analyses, answers, and predictions. On the other hand, we should not mistake motive debunking –"you make this argument because you're misanthropic"—as refutation. To inject some sixties pop culture triteness, "Something's happenin' here…"
So I begin with this question: what do we know with some degrees of empirical and logical certainty?
1. Oil is a resource modern society relies upon to operate.
2. Populations and economies are growing as oil production is about to plateau and then decline.
3. We presently have no scalable substitutes for oil (and don't forget that it has multiple uses beyond transportation).
4. When critical resources, or one critical resource, become scarce, if no substitute is available, something will have to change in the population-economic activity-ecology equation.
5. If society does not make changes, nature will do it, typically through the biological mechanism of a population Die-Off that reestablishes the balance.
This is, I suggest, a bare-bones a scientific grounding from which to assess Peak Oil.
The following scenarios are minimalist; the more detail given the less credible the scenario because things virtually never work out just as predicted. And, most important, human actions can, if taken in time, alter the future –this is my primary reason for engaging in this project.
• No Overshoot
Most classically trained, or "free market", economists argue that Peak Oil is a temporary setback or literally of no consequence –it's a meretricious concoction of tree huggers who cannot admit that the Market solves all problems. "Yes, we're running out of oil, but so what?" they retort. All that's needed is a substitute(s) for fossil fuels. Once our intellectual talent is focused on the task, we'll find scalable and suitable energy alternatives and we'll carry on with progress and growth for a long time, even into outer space and to other planets. We are, after all, an exceptional species capable of great ingenuity and, as we realized from the fall of communism, we have reached "The End of History" (Fukuyama, 1992), meaning that all human social problems are resolvable in the capitalist framework. As well-known free-market enthusiast Julian Simon said, "The material conditions of life will continue to get better for most people, in most countries, most of the time, indefinitely." Accordingly, all environmental issues in addition to or associated with Peak Oil will be solved in due time. There will be no overshoot -- it is an impossibility.
This definition of the situation assumes 1) that the Market and technology are receiving signals from the earth that are timely and decipherable; 2) that the economy does not rest on the foundation of the earth's ecology; and 3) that humans are detached from and managers of nature, not a part of it. Moreover, it assumes 4) that technological fixes carry no serious unintended negative side-effects, that they are relatively costless to society, and that they can be implemented "just in time."
I find this formulation na�ve and myth-inspired in extremis. But if I am wrong and it is correct the challenge to public health is nil, therefore, I have spent the last few minutes building a spurious argument.
As for public health under this no overshoot scenario, it will continue on as it is: under funded relative to its preventive mandate, which is broad and hard to define, and relative to the resources allocated to treatment medicine. No one in this audience needs to be reminded of the vast funding disparities between treatment-style medicine and public health. It is no exaggeration to say that in America one hundred pounds of cure at whatever cost is preferable to an ounce of prevention. Indeed, public health funding is reminiscent of Solzhenitsyn's description of his years in the Soviet Gulag: just enough nourishment is provided to keep you alive and working as more tasks are tacked onto your work routine.
In this era of extreme emphasis on individualism –the "Ownership Society"—we have off in the corner the embarrassing spectacle of public health emphasizing collective, community-wide solutions for the common good. Accordingly, government views public health with ambivalence. On the one hand, public health works; even the Pat Robertsons of this world have no argument with germ theory and the fact that life-threatening microbes evolve and need to be interdicted, the truism that commercially served food must be inspected, and so on. In addition, citizens trust public health to protect all of us –rich to poor. It is too risky for any politician to attack public health head on to dismantle it, but public health is so misunderstood by the public and by many in government that it is not important enough to properly fund. So it limps along.
• Short-Term Overshoot
As previously noted, my view is that at the least we are in for a period of transition to new energy source(s). Accordingly, systems such as transportation, food production and distribution, government services, health and medical care, living arrangements, and so on, will have to either adjust to a temporary condition of scarce and expensive energy, or they will stop functioning. In this picture there will be a recession, the overshoot will be corrected, followed by a recovery.
Obviously, the longer the transition lasts the more serious harm it will bring to society. As with the previous scenario, there is no assumption here that there are limits to growth, or that the overshoot is anything more than a temporary phenomenon that the market will correct; we just have to solve the energy problem, and this may require massive government investments and policy adaptations and "interference" in market forces to complete the transition successfully. This is reminiscent of the traditional "Keynesian" role of government in the market. Nonetheless, this slight overshoot may impel many citizens and public health professionals, practitioners and academics, to question pure free market capitalism and give serious consideration to limits to growth ideas, lest another overshoot come along. (I say more on this in the next two scenarios.)
Under this scenario the public health system will be distressed even more than it is now, but it will survive and whatever damage is done to the economy and other social institutions will be repaired.
Ironically, from a utilitarian public policy perspective, we could expect support for public health to increase as the most cost-effective, democratic, national security oriented, and humane approach to protecting the health of the nation. This is both ethical and logical. However, we must keep in mind that the United States is the only Western nation that still officially denies climate change and, along with Australia, treats evolution as a "theory" alongside Creationism. Also, the great hopes raised for building the public health infrastructure after September 11 are now largely dashed as, overall, public health systems continue to decline throughout much of the nation.
There is a great chance here for a "false dawn" subplot. Using coal or other bio-fuels aggravates climate change, and after decades of governmental denial I think we can agree that even if there were no impending petroleum scarcity crisis, climate change in itself could set off the same chain of events discussed here.
Finally, if the overshoot continues and no viable long-term solution is in sight, then the natural progression is to the next scenario, an economic depression.
• Long-Term Overshoot
If Peak Oil passes with no viable energy alternatives in place or in development the outlook for industrial society is dire overshoot on the downside of the curve to the end of the petroleum era . The increasing shortages and then widespread scarcity will create waves of economic, political and social crises, including widespread violence created by resource scarcity (Homer-Dixon, 1999).
Some of you may have read the book, The Long Emergency (Kunstler, 2004), a title that connotes an extended period of hardship and in all probability a society-wide realization that there are limits to growth . This means that standards of living in Western countries, especially the United States, will decline permanently as industrial society tries to reorganize and find a new balance –at a lower level of material comfort and consumption -- with the natural environment, one that ends the overshoot and avoids future ones. Kunstler seems fond of mid-nineteenth century rural life and sees this as a stabilization point for the overshoot. I have no way of assessing if this return to past ways of the mid-nineteenth century is viable, or if this is simply where his heart has led him.
As the crisis continues, it is likely that academic public health will lose its support from government, as will much of the government funded research now conducted in universities. Simply put, academic public health may go out of existence along with many other "Big Science" academic fields that rely on state and federal government support because it is, as much as those in the audience are distressed to hear it, a luxury of the petroleum era.
Public health in the community is another matter, as is the knowledge base the field has produced over the past century; these will survive in some form and perhaps even "prosper". Since public health is a local matter, the support for public health departments should vary from state to sate, and even locale to locale, being strongly supported in some areas and eliminated in others, probably depending on the strength of communitarian versus individualistic values.
The major questions then become, When --how long will it take? -- and at what economic levels and social sacrifices will society stabilize? Put differently, will industrial society be able to find an alternative energy source that will allow it to survive in any semblance of its pre-peak oil activity and organization?
The amount of widespread suffering within this scenario will be enormous and distressing. People will search for a source of hope –to persevere -- as society's collective mental health –the threat of massive depression seems obvious -- is placed at extreme risk. Although religion can help to fill this need, still we live in a secular society and a scientifically based explanation –that has as a subtext a narrative of optimism—will be needed, not as competition to religion but as a complement to faith-based exegesis.
This narrative will in all likelihood be based upon the insights and knowledge generated by various scientific fields: evolutionary biology, human ecology, demography, geography, human genetics and evolution, anthropology, among others. The core messages:
* There are ecological and geological limits to growth.
* Perpetual technological progress cannot be sustained by the planet.
* The earth is LIKE a living system, and humans have a place in it, but are not masters of this system that is the earth.
Not incidentally, public health is likely to transform itself to conceive of the earth as its central concern because this is the next logical step for it to take. And just what does this mean? One tiny example: public health would encourage citizens to do an "ecological footprint" inventory in the same way it now advocates body mass indexes. In more familiar terms, one can hear "Systems Theory" every day in the hallways of schools of public health. Unfortunately, it is social systems, not ecological systems of the earth that public health academics discuss at great length; but the idea is the same: things are interconnected –everybody in public health acknowledges this simple insight.
Indeed, the Institute of Medicine's Future of Public Health (2002) gives slight attention to the ecology either for the future of public health or for academic public health education. For example, the Institute's Power Point diagrammatic slide on "Assuring Conditions for Population Health" makes no reference to the earth's ecology. The factors listed are socio-cultural:
* The Community
* Health Care Delivery System
* Government & Public Health Infrastructure
* Academia
* The Media
* Employers & Business
The gorilla in the parlor is not acknowledged. By the way, I like gorillas; like all primates, they are social and have significant empathy, but you do have to be aware of their presence.
If the overshoot cannot be resolved by humans, nature will enforce its solution, at which point human actions will be stochastic and irrelevant to the collective outcome.
• Unrecoverable Overshoot
Die-off is a natural conservation process that is actuated when rising demand for the earth's resources intersects the declining availability of those resources. As Tainter, (1988) notes, collapse is nature's way of economizing, and the one thing we know about all civilizations, which are above all else economically complex, is that every one that has ever existed has collapsed. Greer (2005: 1) writes that the 1992 update of the Limit to Growth concluded that to avoid industrial collapse and a subsequent die-off "would have required the citizens of the United States to accept Third World living standards." In other words, we would have to engage in voluntary de-consumption, which the vast majority of Americans would find an absurd violation of all that they believe about their national identity.
Even if this is the long-term consequence of Peak Oil, it will not arrive according to a Hollywood action script; most likely it will take decades to unfold as a series of rolling and interconnected crises, each one more difficult to cope with than the previous one because resources become scarcer and scarcer as more and more systems break and infrastructure decays as population rises as a demographic certainty for at least the next several decades. However, new forms of socio-cultural organization emerge as it becomes clear to the members of the collapsing society that the old ways no longer work and new ways begin to "make sense." But let us be clear: overshoot created by a lack of energy means the human population of the earth will shrink to a sustainable number.
Although anthropologists tell us that humans are capable of appraising their circumstances and acting prudently to save their society, the signs that such foresight is occurring on anywhere near the scale it needs to occur are not apparent. On the other hand, evolutionary biologists (Morrison, 2002) appear certain that our genes have led us into plague species status, which means that we are overrunning the planet with people and pollution. This genetic explanation implies that there is little we can do to save ourselves as a species.
Abiding by the criteria I laid out at the beginning of this section of overshoot, I think a die-off of human life --as well as great destruction to the earth's biosphere -- possible within this century . Oil is the initial resource to become critically scarce. But as most of you know we face a plethora of interrelated environmental crises, what E.O. Wilson terms the "Bottleneck" humanity must pass through to survive what it has wrought.
What should we in public health do? At the least, acknowledge what petroleum means to contemporary society and, especially, to the foundation and future of public health. And then talk but not fall into the trap or "mortis-through-rigor". From there, we begin the processes of genuine strategic planning. Much is written and said about bridging the gap between practitioners and academics; this is the pressing issue to do so.
Catton, Wm. R. Overshoot. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. 1982.
Davis, Murray S. "That's Interesting!" Towards a Phenomenology of Sociology and Sociology of Phenomenology. Phil. Social Science 1 (1971), 309-344.
Diamond, Jared. Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. New York: Viking Press, 2005.
Douglas, Mary. How Institutions Think. Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press.
Francis Fuykuyama. The End of History and the Last Man. New York: Free Press, 1992.
Gever, John, et al. Beyond Oil: The Threat to Food and Fuel in the Coming Decades. Niwot, Colo: University Press of Colorado, 1991.
Greer, John Michael, "How Civilizations Fall: A Theory of Catabolic Collapse." 2005. www.xs4all.nl/~wtv/powerdown/greer.htm
Greer, John Michael. "Facing the New Dark age: A Grassroots Approach." 2005. www.survivingpeakoil.com/preview.php?id=facing_dark_age
Georgescu-Roegen, Nicholas, The Entropy Law and the Economic Problem. 1971. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Georgescu-Roegen, Nicholas, "Energy and Economic Myths." Southern Economic Journal 41 (1975).
Godesky, Jason. "Theses Series." The Anthorpik Network @ anthropik.com, 2005.
Homer-Dixon, Thomas F.. Environment, Scarcity, and Violence. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1999.
The Institute of Medicine. The Future of Public Health. Washington. D.C.: National Academy Press. 2002
Kurzweil, Ray. Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology. New York: Viking Press. 2005.
Kunstler, James. The Long Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of the 21st Century. New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 2005.
Levitt, Steven D. and Stephen J. Dubner. Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything. New York: William Morrow, 2005.
Meadows, Donella, Jorgen Randers, Dennis Meadows. The Limits to Growth: The 30 Year Update. White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green Publishing, 2004.
Morrison, Reg. The Spirit in the Gene: Humanity's Proud Illusion and the Laws of Nature. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1999.
Rose, Geoffrey. The Strategy of Preventive Medicine. New York : Oxford University Press, 1992.
Simmons, Matthew. Revisiting the Limits to Growth: Could the Club of Rome Have Been Correct, After All? 2000. Part 1: www.energybulletin.net/1512.html. Part 2: www.energybulletin.net/1516.html.
Tainter, Joseph, The Collapse of Complex Societies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1988.
Wilson, E. O... The Bottleneck. Scientific American Feb 2002.
Wilson, E. O. The Future of Life. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 2002
The World Bank. Saudi Arabia at a Glance, 2004. www.worldbank.org/data/countrydata/aag/sau_aag.pdf.


text:
Pamela Pike needed a new web page design and created a contest on 99designs.
A winner was selected from 6 designs submitted by 5 freelance designers.
vLinx (http://www.vlinx.com)
vLinx is a web-based global software company. We have created a technology that supports retailers and their global supply base. Improves communication, negotiations and brings savings to their organizations. We are strongly focused on the niche of Global Sourcing.
We believe in simplicity and straightforward communication. We compete against large companies (Oracle, SAP) and smaller ones as well (Tradestone Software). We need to stand out, clearly communicate what we do and why we are good at the service we provide.
Our company has rich knowledge on the technology side (I personally don't think our website conveys this now) as well as expertise in sourcing and retailing. We are customer focused (and this just isn't blowing smoke). We are global in nature.
Executive level, global retailers and suppliers.
CIO's; CFO's; Vice Presidents of Marketing, Sourcing & Supply Chain
Informational site that our sales targets and companies can come to find out more about us. We do not currently impress on our website after a sales call.
As well, this is also the main login site for customers (lower level employees - would like to keep them excited). Markets: North American & European Retailers; Asian manufacturers & suppliers.
Logo (as currently designed) must be used
Must have a Login box for customers
Should convey professionalism to a broad audience.
Graphics can and probably need to be updated. No gears as any graphic component.
Structure / site tree is flexible.
Increase the size / resolution / footprint of the site pages
Site needs more life! Site also needs to better convey what we do. Make people believe!

subset: commoncrawl


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Mark Cuban Reportedly Kicked Out Of Club On The Night Of Alleged Assault
Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban was accused of sexually assaulting a woman at a nightclub in Oregon in 2011. He denied the claims, and police never pressed charges, but a new report from the New York Post says Cuban was kicked out of the club for being too drunk on the same night he was accused of sexual assault.
Christopher White was working at the Barrel Room in Portland and saw Cuban get "kind of gropey" with a woman while the two took a photograph together.
"He was, like, really kind of gropey toward them," White told the newspaper. "It just wasn't how you'd normally pose in a picture with someone."
He told The Oregonian that "she jumped away like she was not happy with him" after he put his arm around her. White said Cuban was drinking heavily that night, and the club had to cut him off, and a manager escorted the billionaire to his car around two in the morning.
White said he was not interviewed by the police, though four other employees at the Barrel Room did speak with authorities.
An attorney for Cuban said that White's recollection of the events prove that Cuban did not sexually assault the unidentified woman.
This former employee of the bar who is coming forward today, seven years later, says he was watching Mr. Cuban at the critical moment when the photographs were being taken and Mr. Cuban did not put his hand in the complainant's pants," said Jacob Houze, an attorney for Cuban, in a statement.
The NBA said it is reviewing the incident, and investigating the claims in a recent report from Sports Illustrated about the "corrosive culture" in the front office of the Mavericks.
Photo: Getty Images


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Shiva (Final Fantasy 10) – Cosplay of the Day
Shiva is one icy lady, but her recurring appearance throughout all of Final Fantasy's illustrious history has made her a fan favorite. And it seems that with every iteration of this frosty summon, she only gets more attractive, making her perfect as a Cosplay of the Day.
Even though she's come in all shapes and sizes, there's always something familiar about the ice summon, Shiva. Whether it's her seemingly anti-gravity hair, her glacial skin, or the way she floats about and delivers a Diamond Dust attack, Shiva's been a staple of the Final Fantasy series as much as other beloved summons like Ifrit or Bahamut. The only difference is that, among the roster of summons, Shiva is easily the most attractive.
This is Yurai Cosplay, all suited up in Shiva's signature blues and rocking the summon's look from Final Fantasy 10.We're not sure how heavy that wig is, especially with all of those rings at the ends, but this is one cosplay that truly impresses.
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Want your Cosplay to be seen? Send your info to firstname.lastname@example.com and we may feature you in our Cosplay of the Day!


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Uggla, starter are Wren's priorities for Braves
ATLANTA -- Much of the early offseason speculation surrounding the Braves has focused on where Brian McCann and Tim Hudson might be playing next year. But this scope will widen as the Hot Stove season takes shape over the next few weeks.
With a stable core of talented young players in place, general manager Frank Wren can approach the annual roster reconstruction process comforted by the fact that he does not necessarily have any glaring needs.
ATLANTA -- Much of the early offseason speculation surrounding the Braves has focused on where Brian McCann and Tim Hudson might be playing next year. But this scope will widen as the Hot Stove season takes shape over the next few weeks.
With a stable core of talented young players in place, general manager Frank Wren can approach the annual roster reconstruction process comforted by the fact that he does not necessarily have any glaring needs.
Sure, Wren will be among the many clubs who survey the trade market in search of the rare ace that this year's free-agent market lacks. At the same time, he will attempt to find a team that is willing to trade for Dan Uggla and a portion of the $26 million the veteran second baseman is owed over the final two years of his contract.
It will not be easy for the Braves to land one of the few available aces or find a potential suitor for Uggla. But Wren will gain a better sense of how realistic these two possibilities are when he and his top aides spend next week (Monday-Wednesday) talking shop with their peers at the annual General Managers Meetings in Orlando, Fla.
History has shown the GM Meetings unearth possibilities that had not previously been explored by some clubs. During the first day of the 2010 Meetings, which were held in Orlando, Wren received an unexpected offer from former Marlins exec Larry Beinfest, who used a napkin to scribble the parameters of the deal that brought Uggla to Atlanta.
Three years later, the challenge of moving Uggla will prove to be much more taxing.
After struggling through his first three months with the Braves, Uggla hit .291 with 34 homers and a .938 OPS in the 130 games he played from July 5, 2011-June 5, 2012. But while hitting .181 with 31 homers and a .659 OPS in the 235 games that have followed, the 33-year-old second baseman has distanced himself from those glory days when he compiled five consecutive 30-homer seasons.
The two most attractive second basemen on this year's free-agent market are Robinson Cano and Omar Infante, who coincidently was traded by Atlanta in exchange for Uggla. There are seemingly just a few clubs that will be willing to pay the significant cost it will take to sign Cano.
But the supply of second basemen could also be increased if the Rangers' Ian Kinsler or the Angels' Howie Kendrick are made available on the trade market. Kinsler has a limited no-trade clause and is owed at least $62 million over the next four seasons. Kendrick has a less-limited no-trade clause and is owed $18.85 million over the final two years of his contract.
If the Braves move Uggla, they might have to eat at least 70 percent of his remaining salary. But this could leave Wren with an additional $6 million to $8 million to spend as he attempts to strengthen his roster this winter.
Atlanta will be among the teams linked to left-hander David Price and right-hander Max Scherzer, if Detroit truly is willing to deal the American League's Cy Young Award favorite. But the cost of getting either of these two aces might prove to be too steep, especially when the free-agent market is thin when it comes to frontline starting pitchers.
Hudson has already received a one-year offer from the Braves. But if this offer is not enhanced, the 38-year-old veteran will likely be pitching elsewhere next year. The Royals, Indians and Red Sox are among the clubs that have thus far shown the greatest interest.
If Hudson does indeed exit Atlanta, the Braves will still have a solid rotation that would include Kris Medlen, Mike Minor, Julio Teheran and Brandon Beachy. Alex Wood stands as the early favorite to win the rotation's fifth spot.
While this rotation would be potentially solid, it would also lack a member who has made more than 85 career starts. When Wren talked about bringing Hudson back, he mentioned the desire to have an experienced presence in his rotation.
Wren might also be looking to add a veteran to his bullpen. One attractive option could be LaTroy Hawkins, who compiled a 2.93 ERA in 73 appearances for the Mets this past season. Along with aiding the young relievers, Hawkins could also serve as a good influence on B.J. Upton.
When Upton was in the midst of his struggles last year, he reached out to Hawkins for advice. The two players are both represented by Larry Reynolds.
Mark Bowman is a reporter for MLB.com.


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Knowing how important NEC issues are to our readers, we're introducing a new online Code Q&A column. Updated weekly, visit this link for answers to your latest Code questions and concerns.
Q. I represent a large multifamily management company. Many of our residents want to install small satellite dishes in their apartments. Our policy is the dish must be installed per the manufacturer's installation procedures, which references the NEC. Additionally, our policy states that all wiring must stay within the tenants "rented" space, in this case the patio or balcony. Given these parameters, how can a small satellite dish be grounded properly per the NEC and still be installed in accordance with our management policy?
A. There is no way to comply with the requirements set forth in the 2002 NEC and meet your management's policy. In fact, your management policy is in violation of the Satellite Consumer Bill of Rights, a regulation released by the FCC on August 6, 1996. This regulation supercedes area zoning ordinances and Homeowner Association covenants and restrictions on DBS dish antennas. For more specific information, please contact the Satellite Broadcasting & Communications Association at (703) 549-6990, and/or the Federal Communications Commission at (202) 418-0163.
Q. I'm installing a Satellite TV system (18" DSS) near the electrical service. Is it okay to ground the dish mast and the coax grounding blocks to the same rod used for the electrical service, or do I have to install a new 8-ft grounding rod for the dish mast, as per the manufacturer's instructions?
A. DO NOT add an independent ground rod in accordance with the installation instructions, they are wrong. You can use the same ground rod as the service ground rod as you suggested [810.21(F)(1)(a)].
Q. Many apartments and condominiums have a 15A or 20A, 125V receptacle on the balcony/patio. Could a connection be made to the ground in this receptacle, which is continuous back to the electrical circuit panel, to ground a satellite dish and its cable?
A. No. [see 810.21(F)(1)]
How to Ground a Satellite Dish and the Lead-In Cables In Accordance with the NEC
The lead-in cable from an "outdoor antenna" must be equipped with a listed antenna discharge unit (grounding block) located as near as practicable to the entrance of the conductors to the building (810.20). The cable discharge unit (810.21) and the mast (Dish) [810.15] must be grounded in accordance with 810.21(F)(1)(a) through (f) with a 10 AWG copper conductor that is run in as straight a line as practicable [810.21(E)].
If the grounding conductor to the electrode is run in a metal raceway, both ends of the metal raceway must be bonded to the grounding conductor [810.21(D)]. When an electrode, such as a ground rod, is installed to ground the mast or lead-in cable, it must be bonded with a 6 AWG copper conductor to the grounding electrode system at the building or structure served [810.21(J)].
If the lead-in from an outdoor antenna is not properly earth grounded, the receiver can be destroyed by voltage surges caused by nearby lightning strikes. If the mast is not properly grounded, the Low Noise Block (LNB) and the DC rotor motors that control the positioning of larger satellite dishes can also be destroyed.
Q. I want to install a 2-way satellite system on the patio of my third-floor apartment, which is enclosed on three sides. The installer wants to ground the dish and the coaxial cable to a ground rod at ground level. Can I use the metal water pipe in my apartment instead?
A. You are not permitted to use a metal rod driven into the earth to ground the dish and lead-in cable unless the rod is bonded to the building grounding electrode system with a 6 AWG conductor in accordance with 810.21(J). In addition, the 2002 NEC doesn't allow you to use the local water pipe [810.21(F)(1)(b)] because it isn't located within 5 ft of the point of entrance into the building.
Q. How far from the entrance to a bedroom can the light switch be after entering the room?
A. The NEC doesn't specify a distance, but it would be nice if they were installed near the door entrance.
Q. How far from a shower or tub must a switch or receptacle be located?
A. The NEC doesn't specify a distance—just don't put them inside the shower or bathtub space [404.4 and 406-8(C)].
Q. Is there a minimum mounting height for a 277V or 480V metal-halide floodlight fixture outdoors if the system voltage is 480/277V, 4-wire, three-phase.
A. No, but outdoor lighting fixtures on circuits exceeding 120V nominal (between conductors) and not exceeding 277V nominal (to ground) must be located no less than 3 ft from windows, platforms, fire escapes, and the like [225.7(C)].


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Tampa Bay's Favorite Scapegoat is Hot-lanta Bound
People in Tampa Bay are going to have to anoint a new scapegoat in the Trop. for 2013 because their old target, BJ Upton train is heading to Hotlanta. We already knew the odds of Upton returning to the Tampa Bay Rays were slimmer than his waist size, but now armed with a 5-year $75 million dollar lunch pail, Upton will be meandering along with his family up I-75 a tad to the N L east contender.
All that stands in the way of Upton securing his treasure is passing a Brave's physical exam, but we all know that is a formality as Upton was in the best shape of his career at the end of 2012, and possibly knowing his payday was on the horizon, might have tweaked himself a bit to excite just such a ample and multi-year deal.
It is kind of sad that some will be left with the image of Upton possibly not being a team player, someone who might actually understand the word "lolly gagging", and lastly that his concentration on game day has been mistaken for indifference. Ask anyone within the confines of the Rays clubhouse and they will tell you how much this guy has matured since the 2007 days when veteran Cliff Floyd mentored the oldest of the MLB Upton clan.
Even before he stepped foot again in the Trop. after his first venture into the majors at 17, people held Upton's past and associations with others against him, even as far back as his DUI in North Carolina and as a member of the Terrible trio from Durham along with ex-Rays malcontents Delmon Young and Elijah Dukes. I seriously think that he had a black mark against him that so many would not/could not shake off him that he was doomed to be either loved or hated during his Rays tenure.
I do not want this to seem like a conspiracy theory, but it was almost like Upton didn't have a chance with some fans in St. Pete even though he created "Upton's Bunch" to help local south side St. Peterburg kids, or that he held his charity events to help organizations. Even after his positive on-field and off-field affirmations, Upton still heard the murmurs and cackles from the fan base about his long stride looking like he was moving at half speed.
Some even had the audacity to mock his Center field play as mediocre when considering Upton was projected as a speedy, well-tooled infielder and offered to test the CF waters as a challenge to his talents, in my opinion Upton nailed the transition, possibly transforming into one of the best Center fielder to ever grace a Rays uniform.
Upton's game day demeanor also struck a chord with a segment of the Trop. crowd as he would become a bit quieter and sometimes over transfixed on game day that Upton made unthinkable mental errors both in the field and on the base paths with regularity erasing possible scoring opportunities because of him taking his eye off a slick pitcher or a catcher with a rocket arm. Suddenly he was badgered as being aloof on the field when in reality he was too concentrated on the small things and some major mistakes reared their ugly heads.
Upton even gave more fuel to the crowd's smoldering embers when he would give long glares and a bit of sass to the home Plate Umpires, possibly branding himself with the guys in blue as someone you can get rattled with a borderline call or be caught wide-eyed with his bat on his shoulder with a hard breaking slider. Upton didn't help himself with his batting swing mechanics and his prolific high strikeout totals every season.
Upton played in 966 Rays contests and leaves St. Petersburg with 8 seasons as a Rays that included 118 HR, 447 RBI, 232 stolen bases, a lifetime .255 average. But the stats so many will remember are his 69 times caught stealing, his 1,020 K's and a total of 58 errors. Missing from even those facts was the shoulder pains, nagging hamstring and ankle injuries he played through for the sake of his squad. People have loved to downplay his outfield skill level, but out of his 71 career fielding errors, only 24 came when he was stationed in the outfield. Over the past 2 MLB seasons Upton has had back-to-back 3 error seasons proving his skill set has not only improved, but he is a capable Center fielder.
One of the things that personally rattled me coming from the fan base was the fact they all thought Upton was not "in-tune" or a leader in the Rays clubhouse. I guess they all have somehow forgotten Carl Crawford's tussle with Pat Burrell in the Rays locker room when Burrell questioned Upton's team commitment. For another player to want to physically as well as verbally stand up for you even in the clubhouse setting shows he had his team's respect and confidence.
Personally I have known Upton since his first venture into the MLB a long time ago. He was a bit shorter, weighted maybe 160 pounds then soaking wet. Through his 8 seasons with the Rays I have seen him grow taller, confident and show the traits needed to not only be a leader, but also someone who can lead by example. I will miss Upton. Always made sure when I saw him to ask how his Dad and Mom were and he would cock a smile and a head nod.
It has been fun watching Upton mature on the field and off the field as a dad himself. I can sometimes shrug off a player leaving by using and analogy "it is all part of the game", but with Upton it is different. I think he was wise to refuse the Rays offer of $13.3 million to stay another year. Even though some will say his new vista is just an 8-hour drive up I-75 from his old Trop. home, Upton needed a change of scenery, to re-energize his career and himself. Upton needed to go away to finally be missed…… by all of us.


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Lemonade and iced tea are two of the most refreshing summer beverages.
Mixed together, they offer the best of both beverages.
This punch uses a base of black and mint teas combined with freshly squeezed citrus juices and a touch of sugar to create the perfect barbecue accompaniment.
ORANGE-LEMON-LIME TEA-ADE 8 bags black tea 4 bags mint tea 6 cups boiling water ��cup sugar Ice Juice of 4 oranges Juice of 2 lemons Juice of 2 limes
In a 1-gallon pitcher, combine the black tea bags, mint tea bags and boiling water. Let steep for 5 minutes. Use a slotted spoon to remove the tea bags, squeezing them over the pitcher to extract as much liquid as possible.
Add the sugar, stirring until it is dissolved. Stir in the orange, lemon and lime juices, then add enough ice to fill the pitcher.
Makes 16 servings.
Nutrition information per serving (values are rounded to the nearest whole number): 35 calories; 0 calories from fat (0 percent of total calories); 0 g fat (0 g saturated; 0 g trans fats); 0 mg cholesterol; 10 g carbohydrate; 0 g protein; 0 g fiber; 0 mg sodium.


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Peer-Reviewed Publications
Reducing crashes and injuries among young drivers: what kind of prevention should we be focusing on?" Inj. Prev.. 2006;12 Suppl 1:i15-8."
Childhood Traumatic Stress and the Emergency Department Visit." Clinical Pediatric Emergency Medicine. 2013;14(1):41-46."
Screening for Adolescents' Internalizing Symptoms in Primary Care: Item Response Theory Analysis of the Behavior Health Screen Depression, Anxiety, and Suicidal Risk Scales." J Dev Behav Pediatr. 2012;33(4):283-90."
Eye Tracking as a Biomarker for Concussion in Children." Clin J Sport Med. 2018."
Feasibility of an interactive voice response tool for adolescent assault victims." Acad Emerg Med. 2009;16(10):956-62."
Headache after pediatric traumatic brain injury: a cohort study." Pediatrics. 2012;129(1):e31-9."
Head injury causation scenarios for belted, rear-seated children in frontal impacts." Traffic Inj Prev. 2011;12(1):62-70."
Frontal and oblique crash tests of HIII 6-year-old child ATD using real-world, observed child passenger postures." Traffic Inj Prev. 2018;19(sup1):S125-S130."
[Determination of the risk of a 2d cancer in patients treated for a first cancer]." Rev Epidemiol Sante Publique. 1988;36(4-5):292-300."
The Child Stress Disorders Checklist-Short Form: a four-item scale of traumatic stress symptoms in children." Gen Hosp Psychiatry. 2010;32(3):321-7."
Investigating the link between gun possession and gun assault." Am J Public Health. 2009;99(11):2034-40."
A difference-in-differences analysis of health, safety, and greening vacant urban space." Am. J. Epidemiol.. 2011;174(11):1296-306."
Novel Linkage of Individual and Geographic Data to Study Firearm Violence." Homicide Stud. 2008;12(3):298-320."
Exploring e-Health usage and interest among cancer information service users: the need for personalized interactions and multiple channels remains." J Health Commun. 2005;10 Suppl 1:35-52."
Trauma Providers' Knowledge, Views, and Practice of Trauma-Informed Care." J Trauma Nurs. 2018;25(2):131-138."
Boosting Restraint Norms: A Community-Delivered Campaign to Promote Booster Seat Use." Traffic Injury Prevention. 2012."
Rear-facing car safety seats: getting the message right." Pediatrics. 2008;121(3):619-20."
Aggression, gender-typical childhood play, and a prenatal hormonal index." Social Behavior and Personality: an international journal. 2009;37:105-116."
Gender differences in relations of mental rotation, verbal fluency, and SAT scores to finger length ratios as hormonal indexes." Dev Neuropsychol. 2005;28(1):493-505."
Gender differences in relational and physical aggression. ." Social Behavior and Personality: an international journal. 2007;35(1):41-50."
Trip characteristics of vehicle crashes involving child passengers." Inj. Prev.. 2005;11(4):219-24."
Teen drivers and the risk of injury to child passengers in motor vehicle crashes." Inj. Prev.. 2005;11(1):12-7."
Adolescent decisional autonomy regarding participation in an emergency department youth violence interview." Am J Bioeth. 2005;5(5):70-4; discussion W14."
Use of the Vestibular and Oculomotor Examination for Concussion in a Pediatric Emergency Department." Am J Emerg Med. 2018."


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Well, due to the help, Ive got my hands on the box, thanks to some friends in the east who'll go unnamed, and sadly I was just provided - so far with the full artwork and packaging of the 2 disc regular box. Anywas- damn! Hot damn!
Let's begin with the Zoom Club first show - first impression is: I can hear Jamie much better now although these are sonic differences that'll go unnoticed to the untrained. I'm enjoying 'Zoom' right now, and man, they got it funky right from the beginning, eh? The band grooves and gels as if this wasn't their first, but rather, as if they've been playing for YEARS, BUT - they've decided to play it safe. The level of telepathy is amazing- and as uncontrollable Jamie seems to be, he just fills the sonic landscape with sheer delight. (note - many have complained that he's mostly only heard in the quiet parts; I've actually noticed he spends most of the time just playing drums. Hint: that china cymbal and snare drum sonic differences - out of a million other things, of course) Peachy. You can even play it in your car. Fripp hits the notes slowly , or in between, or lightning speed- jedi fast. At points it sounds like he's tapping, but we all know he doesn't do that, hm? 'Book of Saturday' with drums and extra lyrics, fragments of 'Lament' and the 'Fallen Angel' improv... You DO get the impression that, as long as 'Zoom Zoom' is, that they're playing it safe in this concert. Hints of the Earthbound band abound - rhyme not intended - as many things sound mostly like jams rather than the classic Crimso blows; in its 44 minutes, if I may mention it again, I get the impression it's just an old river prog band jamming (no offense, but...) HOWEVER, when things get to the calm, paranoid Z'Zoom preceding Exiles, you do realize there's much wasted potential there. I've got a theory: Jamie's gear didn't fit entirely in this venue, and Fripp decided to make of this hot date just a calling card, and I may be wrong one either one or both accounts since by the the grand finale 'Talking drum -> LTIA Pt. II' is somewhat of an earth shattering experience, and Jamie CAN be heard on his percussion. Other shades of the Islands era are obvious in the brief, to quote an ET member, 'pastoral' 'Easy Money', which (gasp) reminds me of 'Ladies Of The Road'. Ok I'll stop.
A conundrum. A meek band performance when they have togetherness in spades. Can't blame Jamie. Hear the last two songs! Plus, as sonically 'very slightly improved' it is, I've never found this concert to be bad sounding. Not for an audience recording. But I can't help it and will give this one **1/2.
More to come, and your reviews would be appreciated too!


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|International Space Station Imagery
high res (0.4 M) low res (44 K)
|JSC2006-E-54697 (December 2006) --- Computer-generated artist's rendering of the International Space Station following scheduled activities of the STS-116/12A.1 mission. Space Shuttle Discovery departed from the station on Dec. 19, 2006. This angle shows the starboard side of the orbiting complex. The P5 Integrated Truss Segment is added and the P6 port solar array wing is retracted. Progress 23 resupply vehicle is docked to the Zvezda Service Module aft port. Soyuz 13 (TMA-9) is connected to the Zarya Module nadir port and Progress 22 resupply vehicle remains linked to the Pirs Docking Compartment.
Curator: JSC PAO Web Team | Responsible NASA Official: Amiko Kauderer | Updated: 11/19/2012


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Find hotels & motels in Stone Park using the list below. Explore our guide for inexpensive and discount hotel/motel rates in or near Stone Park, IL for your corporate or personal leisure travel. Explore the most favored Stone Park, Illinois hotel and motel rooms. Browse the Stone Park area hotels to find the perfect lodging! Please use the provided map of the Stone Park hotels.
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- Illustrations by Mr Angelo Trofa
When it comes to whiskey sampling and appreciation, everyone does it in their own way. Above and below are some of my favourite pointers and recommendations I've always stood by. This process is best broken down based on the human senses. That aside, in my opinion, the best part of whiskey tastings is to tell the attendees about the history of the product and where it originated. I founded the Bulleit Distilling Company in 1987. The art of making bourbon runs deep in my family and I'm proud to share my great-great grandfather's recipe with people around the world. bulleitbourbon.com


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Mail-order brides, either as scheming minxes or as doormat housewives, are a stock joke, but our heroine in this engaging, gentle, small story - romantic in every sense - is not. Playwright Vanessa Rhodes asks: what if the immigrants turn out to be human? What if internet Russians turn out to have families, dilemmas and - gasp - jokes of their own?
And what if Godzone is not (just) seen as a green landscape - a place to escape physical hardship - but also a cultural wasteland? Yulia (Elena Stejko) loves the champagne and caviar served at the theatre; Waikato Bob (David Aston) has never been to the theatre. "Good," comments Yulia's mother Ludmilla (Elizabeth Hawthorne) emphatically, when she learns that her daughter has sent Bob a postcard of their local cathedral. "He can see how beautiful Russia was."
John Verryt's low-key set is placed between two banks of audience, and across the stage we see the courtship unfold in profile via letters and telephone calls (in some pre-Skype past). Stejko shines brilliantly in the most fully-written role - her emotional authenticity is vital - and Aston and Hawthorne are excellent supports. Those with far-flung family might secretly identify with Ludmilla's laments that her grown daughter is a "selfish girl" for wanting to settle on the other side of the world.
The plot holds no particular surprises nor broader commentary; instead, the focus is the "how" not the "what". Cameron Rhodes' direction pulls the play up from straight conventionality by emphasising the piece's lyrical lines ("branches lift you higher than the concrete world, even higher than the concrete sky") and other poetic, dream-like elements, with poignant violins, dance, and sudden, intriguing mood shifts.
A fairytale - The Snow Child - is mentioned at one point; it could have been a framing device. The first contacts are believably awkward, but if anything can make a fairytale romance also seem possible, it is the portrayal of the couple as having will and bravery.
Theatre review
What: Where Are You My Only One?
Where: Basement Theatre, to December 8.


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Documentation and support:
New facilities in PIPS 3.3.1, aggregation of regional indices and use of COICOP.docx (March 2013)
Commentary on PIPS Upgrade.docx (February 2011)
CPISystemConversionToSQLServerDataBase-rev.docx (May 2010)
Final Price Index Processor Instructions for Imputing Data and Uploading.doc (March 2010)
PIPS_MultiuserEnviroment.doc (October 2009)
Notes on Nuances in PIPS.doc (October 2009)
How to use PIPS Access to/from SQL Database Utility Program. By PIPSUS Support Team (September 2013)
This link will take you to the download page: Download CPI/PPI compilation system here
28 Comments
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I'm Makame from Zanzibar, Tanzania. Working at Zanzibar Institute of Financial Administration,and I'm helping The Office of chief Government Statistician, Zanzibar to use CPI compiler since 2005. the office now intend to use the system fully after rebasing the weight.
Currently the office is using the system developed inhouse ie excel and visual basic for application running paralal with CPI compiler. The results are very significant equal. however by CPI compiler have alot of tools, such as imputation.
I'm very happy to get the source code, which are very simple to understand and to follow the logic.
The forum is very useful for improvement of compiler.
Just a visit... good job with the site Carsten.
Finally got the time to sign up. I look forward to test the systems soon myself. Well done Carsten and Paul for making the PIPS finally available.
- Kari
I ran a workshop on using PIPS in October 2009. During that workshop, there were a number of nuances that we discovered when using PIPS. I have added an attachment to this site (click on attachments) with notes on these nuances. You should take note that PIPS is best run in an Office 2003 environment. Special steps must be taken to use the spreadsheet templates when using EXCEL 2007. These are discussed in the notes.
I spoke with one of the developers of the software about using SQL Server for running PIPS. He advised that you cannot convert your ACCESS DB to a SQL DB adequately for PIPS to be able to use it. They use different architecture and indexing. You should create your SQL DB from PIPS. You first need to make sure there is direct communication between the PC and the SQL Server. Once this is established, you need to enter the correct information on the System config screen. After clicking the SQL button and making sure you are connected, you must enter the following information in the SQL Server location box: SERVERNAME\Instance,port# . You then name the DB to be created and click the "create DB" box. This will create a SQL DB that is only populated with the fixed tables such as classifications tables and country tables. This is the DB you can begin to enter outlet, product, and price data. If you already have an ACCESS DB that you have been using, you need to populate the variable tables in the SQL DB by copying the ACCESS tables such as the establishment table (tblEst), the product table (tblProd) and the price data (tblPrice). If you have created a lot of varieties, you may also need to copy this table (tblCountryVCode) too.
Hi All
I understand that the PIPS uses ISIC Rev3.1 but I would rather use ISIC Rev4.0 as we have moved our indices to NaceRev2. Do you know if this is possible or can PIPS only function using ISIC Rev3.1?
Niall, I believe you can download the ISIC excel template, then paste in the NACE to overlay the ISIC, and upload the results to store in the DB.Try it to see if that works.
Paul, Thanks that worked perfectly.
Hi All
We are setting up some test indices using the PIPS but we having some problems entering weights and also making changes to products and adding new products and/or transactions to an existing establishment which already has saved products and transactions against it. I have included relevant detail, in the form of comments from my colleague who i sworking on the setup, below. Any advice on these issues would be greatly appreciated.
I went into the establishment from the Create Establishment screen
then clicked on PRODUCT
then entered the establishment weight into the ESTABLISHMENT ASSIGNED WEIGHT line
I then clicked on ADD PRODUCT
then clicked on the radio button and selected my product code from the list
the share is displayed as 100% so I tried to enter my weight here but I got the error message "You can only define weight by entering a share"
when I gave the share a different value and then tried to enter my weight I got the same error message
I clicked on ADD TRANS to add transactions to the product group
then added these to the product group
then entered the % share breakdown given by the establishment. (There were no updates to the weights)
I saved my changes
Once the product/transaction details were saved I went out of the screen and tried to add new transactions to the product group for that establishment or tried to change the transaction details I had saved as follows:
1. I went back to the Create Establishment screen and clicked on product on bottom right corner and got the error: "error type mismatch 13"2. I went to the screen which lists the Establishments and I clicked on my establishment. I then right clicked with the mouse and selected Edit Product and got the same error: "error type mismatch 13"
Regarding the shares, they must be entered as a decimal, e.g., 0.2 is 20 percent.
When going back to the establishment screen after saving in the product screen, try using the "refresh" button before visiting the same establishment again. This updates the screen so that you have the information you just saved. Otherwise, it is going back to a screen generated before you made the updates.
Hi, this is Ricky Ho from Statistics New Zealand. We're currently assisting Tokelau in setting up a CPI and have been investigating the PIPS as a possible tool for Tokelau to compile the index on an ongoing basis.
Thank you Carsten for pointing me to this forum and also to Gangti for answering my initial question.
The Tokelau CPI is going to be a quarterly release. It appears the software is designed for a monthly CPI by default. I have not been able to find any options to select the frequency. Gangti pointed out that although the software defaults to monthly indexes, it is able to handle different frequencies by simply entering quarterly data values.
However, I am not sure how this works in practice, as the software requires the user to select a compilation date before an index can be compiled.
There may also be an issue during the pre-compilation data check stage, where current period data values are compared with the previous period (and the periods as I understand are monthly frequency by default).
Any help will be greatly appreciated.
One country testing PIPS is compiling their CPI quarterly. They collect the data around the 15th of Feb., May, Aug., and Nov. During the off-cycle months, they simply repeat the previous price so there is now index change off cycle. PIPS does not have a publication module, so the stats office simply outputs the time series report to Excel and picks up the on-cycle indexes for publication. I hope this helps you.
Please note that Zanzibar (Mr. Iddi Makame) and the East Africa Regional Technical Assistance Center (East AFRITAC, Dr. Shelly Winston) have provide a Field Manual that many will find useful for using with PIPS. I posted this Manual at the request of East AFRITAC because I seem to have faster upload speeds than those in Eastern Africa. It appears as attachment 3. Just click on "attachments" at the top of this discusssion page.
Thanks for your quick response Paul. Could I ask a couple of other
- The PIPS uses the Jevons formula at the elementary aggregate level and it
appears Dutot is not option that can be selected (it is greyed out in the
system config screen).
The ILO recommends that Jevons be adopted where possible. It also states
that in some instances Dutot is the preferred formula - where there is
little possibility for substitution (eg local authority rates), or where
individual prices may become zero or near zero through subsidies for
example (since the geometric mean becomes zero).
Is there any way to enable the Dutot option?
- After the outlets and products have been set up, I was attempting to
enter prices for the base period and the current period. However, at the
Price Input screen, all the data fields are greyed out so I am prevented
from entering any prices. I made sure that the varieties are set to Active
in the Edit Product step. I have also tried using the Excel method for
loading prices but still no luck.
- The PIPS uses the Jevons formula at the elementary aggregate level and it
Ricky, if there is perfect homogeneity then the Jevons and Dutot give the same answer. IMF decided to drop the Dutot option because some users may ignore the issue. So you do not have the option to use Dutot.
For data entry, you need the outlet, prices, varieties and then prices. It sounds like you have not set up the varieties within the products. Also, make sure the compilation date is set correctly for the time period you are using.
I found another wrinkle with the PIPS variety coding. The codes should only contain letters and not numbers. I have found that when numbers are used in the variety code, the uitility that sets the global item weight redistribution will not distribute a weight to observations with number in the variety code. A number of people have noted that the weights do not get totally distributed and I believe it is due to this situaiton.
I found a problem in the CPI aggregations for compiling indexes. In the aggregation structure, Food is coded at a level 4 and Non-alcoholic beverages is coded as level 5. Because of this the Food aggregate is the same as Food and Non-alcoholic beverages. One needs to make several changes to Access DB tables as follows:
- In tblItemWeight change ItemCode 11.01.20 to 11.01.2
- In tblICPSPD change fields as noted: in line ID 4: Ccode 01.1, CTitle Food
- In tblICPSPD change fields as noted: in line 189: Ocode 11.01.2, Digit 4, and Ccode 01.2
- In tblIPC change fields as noted: in line ID 189: Ocode 11.01.2, Digit 4, and Ccode 01.2
This should resolve the problem, so that when you compile the index you get a separtate, correct aggregation for Food.
I tried to download the PIPS software, but I couldnot. Perhaps the problem is related to my computer setting by the administration her in Khartoum. Any way it would be a good software. Iwill into possibilties of downloading it.
Dear Marial Bawuor. As far as I can see there is no problem in downloading the software here, so it is probably something with your setup - for example you firewall, if you are not allowed to download program (.exe) files or there may be a limit on the size of the files you can download. My first advice would be to talk with your IT persons. If there is still a problem we could perhaps send the files to you on a CD.
I have added attachment 4 which shows Edwin St. Catherine's attempts (St. Lucia) to create the PIPS DB in SQL Express. SQL Express is available as a free download and runs much faster than ACCESS. The DB creation in the attachment was not 100% and if any IT folks out there have an interest, we would really appreciate you having a look at this to see if you can provide additional guidance.
My name is amour H. bakari from Zanzibar. we had piloted the system for about one year ago. And we plan to fully utilize soon when we constructing the new CPI weights.
Last week we had a minor problem on compilation, however we identify the problem. Mr. Iddi, he is working on the issue
CARTAC is using PIPS widely in the Caribbean. We have a contract with a software developer to prepare a transfer facility from an Access DB to a SQL DB. We will also make PIPS compatible with Office 2007 and Windows 7. We hope to have these improvements available by the end of October 2010. We are currently testing an upgraded version (3.1.2) of PIPS and a beta version of the transfer facility.
Dear all, Soon zanzibar we will start using the system, therefore, please let we know those changes and we are happy to receive the new version
Upgraded version of PIPS (version 3.1.1) is available. Please document 4 of attachments for commentary on this new version.
Upgraded versions of PIPs are available. See the documentation on Downloading the CPI PIPS. It also contains some information on areas for future PIPS development if reasources for software updates can be secured.


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Collegium Pharmaceutical Inc. Announces Notice of Allowance for U.S. Patent Covering Oxycodone DETERx®, a Tamper-Resistant, Extended-Release Opioid Product
Feb 12, 2013, 07:00 ET
CANTON, Mass., Feb. 12, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Collegium Pharmaceutical, Inc., a specialty pharmaceutical company, today announced that it has received Notice of Allowance from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) for its patent application "Abuse-Deterrent Drug Formulation" US Patent Application Number 12/823,628. The Notice of Allowance is the USPTO's official communication that the Company's application has successfully completed examination and that a patent will be issued. This will be the third issued patent related to the DETERx® drug delivery technology.
The allowed patent claims cover the Company's lead development program Oxycodone DETERx® (COL-003), a tamper-resistant, extended-release oxycodone product utilizing its proprietary DETERx® technology. The Oxycodone DETERx® formulation was specifically designed to provide and preserve extended release of the active ingredient following the most common methods of product tampering employed by drug abusers (e.g., crushing, chewing, heating for IV injection, etc.). The product is currently in the final stage of clinical development and has been designated Fast Track Status by the FDA due to its potential to address the problem of prescription drug abuse, a major public health issue in the U.S.
"These newly allowed, product specific claims strengthen and expand our overall patent coverage for COL-003. We are continuing to focus on filing new patent applications that support COL-003 and the DETERx® technology in both the U.S. and internationally," states Michael Heffernan, CEO of Collegium.
About DETERx® Technology
The DETERx® drug delivery platform consists of a multi-particulate matrix formulation in a capsule. While developed primarily to provide tamper-resistant properties to protect against common methods of tampering such as chewing, crushing, insufflation and extraction for IV injection, the multi-particulate design is expected to enable patients with difficulty swallowing to open the capsule and administer the contents on food or via a gastronomy tube, while maintaining the extended release properties of the product. DETERx® technology can be used with drugs that are commonly abused such as opioids and amphetamines, as well as drugs that have narrow therapeutic windows that would benefit from protection against misuse such as breaking, crushing, grinding or dissolving the product. The formulation platform is covered by U.S. and international patents and patent applications. COL-003 is the first of a number of product candidates using the DETERx® platform.
About Collegium Pharmaceutical, Inc.
Collegium Pharmaceutical, Inc. is a specialty pharmaceutical company focused on developing a portfolio of products that incorporate its patent-protected DETERx® formulation platform for the treatment of chronic pain. The DETERx® oral drug delivery technology provides extended release delivery, unique tamper-resistant properties, and flexible dose administration options. For more information, visit the Company's website at www.collegiumpharma.com.
Michael Heffernan, President
Collegium Pharmaceutical, Inc.
SOURCE Collegium Pharmaceutical, Inc.


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Jennifer Lawrence wows in white at Dior Haute Couture show
See Gallery
America's favorite funny girl, (and the face of Dior!), was no joke in a sophisticated pencil skirt and backless silk top. She glowed in white on her way to the Haute Couture show, and we think this could be one of her best looks yet!
Jennifer Lawrence could not have looked chicer as she attended the Christian Dior fashion show on July 7 during Paris Fashion Week as she took in the Haute Couture Fall/Winter 2014-2015 collection. The 23-year-old was a vision in white and we can't get enough of her look! Can you? The Hunger Games actress watched as the latest looks from the fashion house came down the runway - but it was Jennifer's dress that had us do a double take!
Her Dior silk top and off-white suede pencil skirt combination was such a classy choice. The sleeveless top allowed Jennifer to show off her bronzed arms and shoulders and the boatneck style brought attention to her beautiful face! The skirt hit just above the knee, exposing her toned calves, (not to mention her killer heels) - but our favorite part of the get-up was the backless top! The strappy, printed top flashed J-Law's back, adding a sexy element to this refined look. Her white outfit with black details was fabulously coordinated with matching Dior accessories including strappy pointy shoes, a clutch, and tribal earrings.
Jennifer's attendance at the fashion show came as no surprise considering the actress just launched her third ad campaign with Dior earlier this year! She rarely passes up a chance to represent Dior on the red carpet, (a choice that always pays off). We're glad to see that Jennifer is taking time for herself after wrapping up filming scenes for Mockingjay, and we can't wait to see the movie when it's released in November!
Click on the slideshow above to see Jennifer Lawrence looking stunning in Dior!
More from Hollywood Life:
Jennifer Lawrence Flaunts Her Curves In Two Sexy Low-Cut Cannes Dresses
Jennifer Lawrence: Miley Cyrus Told Me 'Get It Together' After Post Oscars Puke


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MYSTERY SOLVED! 'SYTYCD' Judge Adam Shankman Is Directing The 'Rocky Horror Picture Show' Episode Of 'Glee'!
Although it was believed that Adam would be directing Glee's Michael Jackson episode, he'll still be thrilling us by paying homage to this cult '70s film!
Adam Shankman dismissed rumors that he would be directing the hotly anticipated Michael Jackson episode of Glee, but he's still going to be helming one awesome upcoming episode – one that pays tribute to the crazy, zany 1975 cult film, The Rocky Horror Picture Show!
"Which episode am I directing??? I'll never tell!" the 45-year-old So You Think You Can Dance judge joked on his Twitter account Sept. 19. He posted the above photograph of himself with stars Cory Monteith and Lea Michele before adding, "I seriously can't wait to get back to my new favorite people: the cast and crew of #glee tomorrow. Musical #s all week!"
We can't even begin to think of the possible shenanigans that will ensue when Cory, Lea and the crew take on Dr. Frank-N-Furter, the bisexual scientist from Transsexual, Transylvania and his henchman Riff Raff, a straggly-haired henchman with murderous intent. We can't wait!


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FONTANA >>> There may be as many issues and questions as miles as the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series embarks on its fifth race of the season this afternoon, the Auto Club 400 on the two-mile Auto Club Speedway.
Among the primary questions is whether the race, set for a noon start (KTTV/Ch. 11), will replicate the 2013 affair, won by Kyle Busch, considered by many to be the best of the year. The race will forever be remembered for late racing beatin' and bangin'; Joey Logano and Denny Hamlin colliding within sight of the finish line and an angry Tony Stewart mixing it up with Logano afterward on pit road.
So much for the talk of boring races at the Fontana track.
Matt Kenseth will start on the pole for the 200-lap event, with Brad Keselowski alongside. Kenseth is a three-time winner of the event, but that was while he was racing Fords for Roush Fenway Racing. Now he's in a Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing, seeking its second straight Cup win at the track.
When Busch took the checkered flag, it was Toyota's first win at what essentially is its home track with its racing headquarters in Costa Mesa. Toyota hopes for today's race will be also be carried by Clint Bowyer of Michael Waltrip Racing, who will start fifth. Hamlin of JGR, Bowyer teammate Brian Vickers and Busch, who had trouble finding speed during qualifying any will start 14th.
So what are the questions/issues fans can look forward to in today's race, the 25th Cup race at Fontana:
— Why is the race a sellout? The first eight races were sellouts, but then the recession hit. For this event, the track removed seats and dropped its seating capacity to 68,000 (down from 81,000). Attendance has increased the last two years so a sellout was well within reach.
"Southern California fans fans have proven ACS is the place to be," said track president Gillian Zucker of her first sellout.
— Will another driver get his Chase ticket punch. After four races, four drivers — Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kevin Harvick, Keselowski and Carl Edwards — have almost assuredly have clinched a spot in the post-season Chase, providing there are fewer than 15 winners.
"Everybody is assuming that you win and you're in, and that's definitely not the case. We have 12 more races and all of a sudden it turns in to there are already 16 winners, but the first step is you have to win," said Edwards after his Bristol win. "You're going to have to have a win, I believe, to be in the Chase, so now that we've checked that box, we need to go get another win and then I think we'll be guaranteed to be in that."
— What about tire wear? Both Logano and Martin Truex Jr. had tire issues on Saturday, hit the wall and will have to race a backup entry. However, Goodyear said it was more a team issue than any fault of the tires. The same right-left combination has been used since 2012.
"Low pressure is the common denominator," said Greg Stucker, director of race tire sales for Goodyear. "It's below what we recommend. It's not a lack of grip, it's a loading situation."
According to Stucker, some of the teams were pushing the envelope between grip and tire wear.
"They're trying to get as much grip as possible by taking the air pressure down. We're just trying to work with them."
The ACS asphalt is 17-years-old and, as qualifying and practice proved, times and speeds fall off after a few runs. Plus, seams in the corner and bumps in the backstretch area are also a concern.
"ACS is a fun track. I so much enjoy going to the kind of race track where the asphalt is old and worn out," said Aric Almirola, during a Richard Petty Motorsports Ford. " I wish there was a way to repave these race tracks with old asphalt. It would allow Goodyear to bring a tire that is softer and makes a bigger difference.
"The difference from the first lap on the race track to lap 20 is often times two seconds slower. When the caution comes out, you want to get four fresh tires. It seems like the track is getting rougher each year we come, and that makes it a challenge."
The wide Fontana track is the reason drivers are all over.
"It's nice knowing that as a driver you can help yourself out and you're not relying so much on the car. Regardless of what everyone else is doing, you can find a way to help yourself out," said Tony Stewart, a two-time winner at Fontana. "It makes you feel good knowing that because the place is so wide, you can move around, and basically, earn your money."
His Stewart-Hass Racing teammate, Danica Patrick, knows it'll be a challenge.
"Fontana's pavement has not aged gracefully," she said with a laugh., "so it makes for a challenging race. It's a challenge to set up the car – the seams move the car around a lot. It's very fast. It's one of the tougher places to get the balance right."