Petropolis

[A tailings pond is a toxic lake so dangerous that air cannon and scarecrows are used to deter wildlife. ?? Greenpeace / Eamon Mac Mahon]

One of my favorite films from this year???s TIFF has to be Peter Mettler???s Petrolis.  Mettler, who was the cinematographer for Edward Burtynsky???s Manufactured Landscapes, takes on a directorial role on Petropolis, which visually documents the Alberta Tar Sands.  Given the massive scale of the project, the infrastructures, and the process, Mettler had few choices but to document the project from an aerial perspective.

[A giant earth mover transports earth mined at an open pit for processing to separate the bitumen. ?? Greenpeace / Eamon Mac Mahon]

The Canadian Tar Sands are the largest supplier of oil to the United States and the largest GHG emitters in Canada.  Located in northern Alberta, the Tar Sands consume over 140,000 square kilometers (or an area the size of England).  While the scale and sheer devastation to the landscape is incomprehensible, currently only three percent of the project (or 420 sq. km) has been carried out.  Increasing oil prices is attracting more investors to the Tar Sands.  Currently there are close to 100 projects planned, which total approximately $100 billion.

via infranetlab.org

simultaneously beautiful and horrifying

Evil People

???If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart???? Alexander Solzhenitsyn (who knew about evil)

via fascinated.fm

it's not that we don't really earnestly try the old sift-and-gas approach, over and over and over. it's just that it don't ever work.

Finally! Coming To Theaters Oct. 23

Astro Boy is a boy robot who has to use his super-strength, x-ray vision, speed and flying ability to save the things and people he cares about. The new CGI (computer-generated images) Astro Boy movie will be coming to theaters this fall on October 23. Astro Boy will be voiced by Freddie Hightower and Nicholas Cage also lends his voice to the movie. The film is directed by David Bowers. Script by Timothy Harris. Astro Boy is produced by Summit Entertainment and is based on the Japanese anime cartoon character (below) created by Dr. Osamu Tezuka.

via robojapan.blogspot.com

Been waiting hundreds of years for this.

A Jazzin' the Schools How-To

This is a question I have asked myself and wondered why, only I was wondering why years and years ago when Electric Miles was tantamount to heresy; today it is the standard soundtrack of most TV:

instead of thinking the kids will thrill to some Count Basie, how about appealing to them through the jazz they’ve already been exposed to? Where’s something like the Alice Coltrane program? Where’s the weeklong Electric Miles events? Why aren’t we taking advantage of the bridges that already exist? There’s obviously nothing wrong with Basie but you’ve got reach people where they’re at, not where you want them to be. They’ll get to Basie in their own time, provided you win them over in the first place. As Teachout wrote, “Any symphony orchestra that thinks it can appeal to under-30 listeners by suggesting that they should like Schubert and Stravinsky has already lost the battle.”

via The Kids Are Alright

There is an old joke in mathematics that defines a 'recursive' procedure as follows:

1. If you know the answer, say it
2. if you don't, give these instructions to the nearest person who is one step closer to Douglas Hofstadter

We all learn and change incrementally. This method is standard procedure in the branches of psychology we call 'change work': you cannot jump from here to the finish without looking at where you are and taking a first step toward where it is you want to go. Even if you're not precisely sure where it is you are going until you get closer to it.