Can You Spare a Light?
flip me a bird
Light and dark. What a silly topic. My favorite thing about writing has been that it leads to learning something new, undermining something I thought before, or reinforcing something I thought I already knew.
For me, light brings me back to my youth. My Dad, if he observed us doing a task without what he concluded was sufficient light, would say “put some light on the subject”. That expression which I began hearing perhaps when I was five or six has stuck with me for the subsequent fifty-five years. Thanks, Dad. I’m guessing Dad would have liked modern LED lights. While we revere Thomas Edison, the truth is about 90% of one of his ‘magical incandescents’ is light we can’t see. By comparison, something as complex as an internal combustion engine manages to convert about 20% of the energy in the gas to useful work. A Prius approaches 40%. A modern electric motor is about 80% efficient. An LED light bulb is about 90% efficient. Next time someone wants to argue (without the burden of evidence) remember those basic numbers. Old lightbulbs real bad, car engines pretty bad, hybrid car not bad, electric motors pretty good, LED bulbs really good. That is why those old bulbs were so darn hot and such a MONUMENTAL WASTE of energy. In that context, it is clear to me we shouldn’t treat Edison as some sort of shaman but rather as the first in a string of many who start turning mysticism and unreason into understanding. Thanks, Tom.
Of course, with my rearing, one cannot avoid the earliest reference to light. Let there be light…and it was good. I would imagine that even 3000+ years ago, an average Joe recognized that light was a good thing. Of course, we’ve managed to conquer this in our modern world with artificial light.
So what is worth talking about today? Several years ago, long before I seriously considered this writing thing, I heard a long-form story on the radio. Hint, I didn’t hear it on ‘talk radio’ where someone seemed to be going through the airing of grievances ala Frank Constanza on Seinfeld. When I located the story I heard, through the magic of a search engine, I realized I heard the story perhaps in 2014. Of course, I cannot go any further without treating us all to Festivus since I mentioned the airing of grievances. It is this wonderful snippet I think of when someone I know shares some inane thing on the internet to be outraged about. Almost always it seems to be something they heard or read on Facebook or talk radio it seems. I call it faux outrage and it seems a new component of everyday life. Better to enjoy a comedic foil that captures the foolishness. Enjoy a bit of Frank Costanza, a man who long ago went down the rabbit hole of conspiracy and madness. Be thankful that Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David made it appealing and funny and never dwelled on the madness:
I have always been fascinated by people who become enamored with ‘one thing’ as an explanation of everything. Absolutists, to me, are a surefire source of entertainment for those who enjoy people-watching. I have been participating in my History Book Club for many years. There is one class of book that I am reminded of by tonight’s topic. Those are books that take one VERY NARROW-angle and attempt to explain a whole lot of something through that narrow lens. Examples were a book called “Salt: A World History” which explained the role of salt through history. Sure, McDonald’s fries might have been an afterthought without it but come on. Another was “A History of the World in Six Glasses” which went from water through Coca-Cola to explain the evolution of mankind. Both books were entertaining and that speaks to their storytelling skill. However, I have found these sorts of books do not leave a mark with time. What is fascinating is before the most recent centuries of rapid change, such considerations as salt and beer did matter.
The long-form story I heard was about the history of light. It happened to be on a show called Planet Money which is a lot of fun to listen to, at least for me. It is about 20 minutes long. Perfect for runners, walkers, bikers, and treadmillers. Being stuck on this planet with one Sun and only half the day is light sounds like a genuinely important challenge we have wrestled with from the start. What we know is that until humankind, every creature before us just accepted the light and dark bargain although I suppose animals with night vision or nocturnals sort of flipped the script. Anyone who has stubbed their toe on the end of the bed on the way to the bathroom in the middle of the night knows how important conquering the light is. For the `one thing explains it all` crowd, light seems more compelling than salt or prevailing beverage choices.
So the setup for the audio/podcast from Planet Money is about how for the last 400 years or so we have battled to conquer the night and reduce the cost of an extra hour of light for all of us. I find that a cool way to think about it. I would imagine that many people who enjoy reading like it when they get introduced to something they never heard before and might even enjoy, as do I when I hear a new word. As a teaser to get you to listen, the link will help you know what this bird at the top is called and how it helped us conquer the night. The story about the bird is just crazy!
If you don’t bother to listen, I challenge the birding community to identify the subject at the top of the post in a comment! I am not sure how many birders read my Newsletter.
As a conservationist, I am happy that we discovered kerosene just in time. Nearly all whales would likely have been driven to extinction if that were not the case. It is estimated that the largest of all species, the blue whale, now numbers perhaps 10,000 to 25,000 remaining animals. Many of the other species did go extinct during the purge of whales, largely for their oil in the 1700s through part of the 1800s. While a handful of countries still commercially whale, the populations seem to have stabilized.
We’ve come a long way when it comes to light and like most things, the progress is quite recent. While perhaps a bit of a broken record, anthropologists figure the development of the torch emerged about 6500 years ago. Before that, stationary fires I guess. As always millions of years of an upright ape, perhaps 200,000 years in our current form, and we didn’t get around to lighting of some sort until recently. For all of our hallowed worship of the Founders of the nation, the gas lamp had not even been invented until 1790! I guess that means mostly candles. Their accomplishments were significant but it would seem they would not wish us to deify their actions at a moment in time. I will always consider it a fools’ errand to deify activities of only 500 years ago and perhaps even 250 years. What is the purpose of such outsized worship of men from another era? I believe when we do this unnecessarily, we sell short all that has happened since and has shaped a modern world such men would not recognize. The humor site TheOnion.com shared this bit of satire if you enjoy a good laugh on the topic.
If you listen to the audio of Planet Money, please share a comment about our mystery bird. It is quite a story!
The Poll & Music
For those of you up for something completely different, I listened to this on the treadmill one morning. Eventually, my dog started barking. If it were not for him, this is pretty amazing and calming. For a more traditional song which is my habit, this is what I came up with for tonight. Thanks for visiting my corner of the world and being willing to give my writing a chance.
What’s Next
I’m back in the groove of this writing thing and that allows me to know what is coming next time. I would have never been able to make it in a newsroom as the deadline thing is not my favorite. I write a lot of these posts in advance and tweak the order if something interesting tickles my fancy. Anyhow, I generally have some future posts in the can. My next post is titled “Cool Living Stuff”. It is about amazing living things on this planet including us and a bit about how we treat them. While the link won’t work till the item publishes, in the future, a new subscriber should be able to read an old post and from here go to the next one pretty easily. My writing will need to get a bit more compelling to command that level of interest.
Your poll made me laugh and laugh. I chose 2, but only bc it made me laugh the most. Is that a good reason?
Still hoping someone will share a digital smile upon learning the name of this poor bird. I wonder if it got its name for an unusual reason?