Columnists

We're in the middle of a slow-motion catastrophe. The consequence of disease, depression, and Donald. Here are a few thoughts about what we can do about this dire situation.

The Pandemic: The best summation of our current situation was written on April 18 by New York Times science and health reporter Donald G. McNeil Jr, "The Coronavirus in America: The Year Ahead." (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/18/health/coronavirus-america-future.html) "In truth, it is not clear to anyone where this crisis is leading us... Exactly how the pandemic will end depends in part on medical advances still to come. It will also depend on how individual Americans behave in the interim. If we scrupulously protect ourselves and our loved ones, more of us will live. If we underestimate the virus it will find us."

"Resolve to Save Lives, a public health advocacy group run by Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, the former director of the C.D.C., has published detailed and strict criteria for when the economy can reopen... Reopening requires declining cases for 14 days, the tracing of 90 percent of contacts, an end to health care worker infections, recuperation places for mild cases and many other hard-to-reach goals." Donald Trump is not willing to apply these criteria and is pushing states to reopen early. Some Republican governors are obliging.

Donald McNeil noted: "[Recently, a science writer] analyzed Medicare and census data on age and obesity in states that recently resisted shutdowns and counties that voted Republican in 2016. He calculated that those voters could be 30 percent more likely to die of the virus." -more-

A person's brain has some level of similarity to a computer. Physically, the two are quite different, yet they have parallels. Humans know everything about the workings of human-made computers, yet there is a lot we don't know about the human brain, despite advances in science. The manner in which information is processed by the brain, versus by a computer, is vastly different. Yet, if you look at how human beings have short-term memory, long term memory, and mechanisms for processing data, this is parallel to the design of a computer. And, in this piece, I will make some analogies so that the readers can understand more easily. -more-

In March 2020, the most detailed study yet on how sea level rise could alter the San Francisco Bay Area, titled Adapting to Rising Tides, was published. The study speculated that the 48-inch increase in the bay’s water level in coming decades could cause more 100,000 Bay Area jobs to be relocated, 30,000 lower-income residents might be displaced, and 68,000 acres of ecologically valuable shoreline habitat could be lost. We can also expect the waters to rise not only along our coast and bayshore, but in local creeks and groundwater too. -more-

Happy post-Earth Day to all. Who knew we'd be honoring the 50th anniversary by hunkering in our suites instead of marching in the streets? To my mind, a viral pandemic is nature's way of fighting back against humankind's planet-killing misbehavior. Mother Nature's giving us a good global spanking and she's sent us to our rooms. Now let's consider what Michael Moore has to say on the matter.

Planet of the Humans: Moore Than We Can Handle? -more-