1007: "Sustainable"

[OBloodyHell]

Though 100 years is longer than a lot of our resources

And yet, somehow, we manage to survive "resource exhaustion" over and over and over.

Julian Simon figured it out. Now if only teachers would learn enough to teach him.

[Kisama]

Really, the only notation that makes any sense is the ISO 8601 way: 1615-03-14 01:59:26.5358979... Big-endian all the way, baby. Screw you Lilliputians and your tyrannical little-endian edicts!

I fully agree that this is the best way to format dates/times, not least because it makes sorting by date/time much easier, but I cringe when people apply endian terms to text formatting. Endianness from my point of view as an engineer refers to the storage order vs significance of bytes in fields larger than a single byte. When this concept is conflated with order of display of characters, it tends to confuse people and makes it difficult to explain to them why their communication protocol has inconsistent endianness, which makes a head-shaped imprint in my desk.

[radon-nikodyn]

An somewhat good (Counter)example demonstrating why one should in applied Contexts not hurry to extrapolate.
(As a side Note: it looks, at any Rate, like it may plateau. But one cannot upon merely on a series of Values without
providing a phenomenological Explanation predict --- that is, purely empirical Explanations are effete.)

[n079614]

Malkovich? Malkovich Malkovich Malkovich

[Zamite]

This sustainable thread dramatically increases the unsustainability of the possibly sustainable use of the sustainable word: sustainable.

[Third]

_{i am disappoint that no one uttered the fallowing sentence..}


Buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo..

With some modifications this might actually work with variants of 'sustainable':

Sustainable sustainability sustainably sustained sustainability sustains sustains sustained sustainability sustainably.

I imagine this sentence is being used in boardrooms around the world at this very moment...

[SirMustapha]

Sustainable sustainability sustainably sustained sustainability sustains sustains sustained sustainability sustainably.

I imagine this sentence is being used in boardrooms around the world at this very moment...

Yes, because people who don't work with computers are ASSHOLES. [/irony]

[RyanfaeScotland]

Our only hope is running out of sustainable:s...

Anyone know any other buzz words and do study based on them so we can find some comfort in data...

If someone has some time and is also interested in other words I wouldn't mind seeing a similar approach taken to the word 'random.'*

I'm pretty certain in recent history is has flipped meaning to mean "completely predicatable in every sense." considering the amount of times I hear people saying 'Gee Willikers you're so random!'

*EDIT - I'd do it myself but I've got other things on that sadly take priority.

[Kisama]

If someone has some time and is also interested in other words I wouldn't mind seeing a similar approach taken to the word 'random.'

It doesn't take much time - here you go:

Spoiler:

Also:

Spoiler:

Now we know what causes it!

[vltava]

So it's heterological, then?

[cjmcjmcjmcjm]

So it's heterological, then?

I thought it was a lack of Hi-C's piracy.

[Technocratic]

Once the 100% barrier is reached, I'm hoping we all start using multiple voices to say "sustainable" at the same time. Then when things return to normal we'll all be able to be one-man barbershop quartets.

[BobTheElder]

I lol'd

[thc]

Plot your own ngrams. Here's mine:

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?co ... moothing=5

"Some things come and go, but a few are forever."

[Venetian Road]

Code: Select all

            S
           SU
          SUS
         SUST
        SUSTA
       SUSTAI
      SUSTAIN
     SUSTAINA
    SUSTAINAB
   SUSTAINABL
  SUSTAINABLE
  USTAINABLE
  STAINABLE
  TAINABLE
  AINABLE
  INABLE
  NABLE
  ABLE
  BLE
  LE
  E


I count twelve "sustainable"s in only four words (in each line, only lines 7, 11, 13, and 18 have actual words. That is, sustain, sustainable, stainable, and able.)

300% !!!!

[Venetian Road]

Plot your own ngrams. Here's mine:

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?co ... moothing=5

"Some things come and go, but a few are forever."

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?co ... moothing=0

heh

[Red Hal]

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?co ... moothing=5

[RyanfaeScotland]

It doesn't take much time - here you go:

Thank you

[serbalfanhui]

You know pokemon can share a lot of information by just repeating over and over the same word, so by the year 2109 we can only expect two posibilities:

a) the whole humanity will turn into pokemon, or...

b) pokemon will rule the world and sustainable-type pokemon will be the ones who are able to write.

[forbiddenSpell]

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?co ... moothing=5

[Kick]

Sustainable, sustainable sustainable sustainable.

Sustainable sustainable sustainable sustainable-sustainable sustainable, sustainable.

Sustainable! Sustainable, sustainable, sustainable sustainable. Sustainable sustainable sustainable sustainable sustainable sustainable.

After a while, sustainable starts to look like a really weird word.

[Colin Fiat]

Since the word 'sustainable' is not sustainable, there will be an eventual down curve to the graph. At
this time, will the use of the word 'redundant' begin to increase? Analysis of a graph representing the
frequency of 'sustainable' and 'redundant' could be used to conclude that 'redundant' was the downfall of
'sustainable'.

More difficult to monitor is the spoken word unless recorded and transcribed. Television - the home of
buzz words - is one source. The word 'exclusive' has become more prevalent over the past 5 years;
especially in news and current affair programs.

However, a new word has begun to encroach on the dominance of 'exclusive' as the level of
exclusiveness was neither sustainable nor maintainable. These days, news reports can "reveal
exclusively..." This revelation of hitherto unknown facts (usually in list format regarding shopping
habits) seems to sustain the exclusiveness.

It saddens me to create a mental graph of the word 'like' from casual conversation. A trio of high school
girls on public transport can reach an amazing 25% usage of 'like'.

During a brief conversation, an acquaintance said, "Like, my girlfriend like spent like $50 on groceries
like confectionery."

So, you know in horror movies when the girl's like,
"Oh, my god. There's something in the basement."
"Let me just run down there in my underwear
and see what's going on in the dark."
And you're like, "What is your problem?
Call the police." And she's like, "Okay,"
but it's too late, because she's already getting murdered?
Well, uh, my story's kind of like that.

[muntoo]

It saddens me to create a mental graph of the word 'like' from casual conversation. A trio of high school
girls on public transport can reach an amazing 25% usage of 'like'.

When I was in Grade 7, I was afflicted by the constant usage of 'like'. (Like, um... If that sentence makes sense, like, um, tell me. Like... yeah.)

And I am a guy... AFAIK. I caught it from some other guy. (Who is also male, AFAIK.) Add that to incompetence at speaking (my writing, however, is a hell lot better), and you get the following:

Me: [Jumps up to answer Trivial Pursuit question.] "Like... err... you know, um, like... Like. Like. Like. Uh..."
(Awesome) Teacher: "Like?"
*Class laughs good-naturedly.*
Me: *smiles* "Like, err... I mean. [Fights off urge to use 'like'.] The square root of 1764 is... like... 42. Like. Um. Yeah."

[Kick]

It saddens me to create a mental graph of the word 'like' from casual conversation. A trio of high school
girls on public transport can reach an amazing 25% usage of 'like'.

When I was in Grade 7, I was afflicted by the constant usage of 'like'. (Like, um... If that sentence makes sense, like, um, tell me. Like... yeah.)

And I am a guy... AFAIK. I caught it from some other guy. (Who is also male, AFAIK.) Add that to incompetence at speaking (my writing, however, is a hell lot better), and you get the following:

Me: [Jumps up to answer Trivial Pursuit question.] "Like... err... you know, um, like... Like. Like. Like. Uh..."
(Awesome) Teacher: "Like?"
*Class laughs good-naturedly.*
Me: *smiles* "Like, err... I mean. [Fights off urge to use 'like'.] The square root of 1764 is... like... 42. Like. Um. Yeah."

My teacher got so fed up with our class' usage of "like" so as to spend a week (if not the entire year), enforcing the correct uses of "like" and correcting anyone who used it incorrectly. I am now miffed whenever I hear it used incorrectly, but even more so when I see it written incorrectly.

Edit: this happened in second or third grade.

[gimmespamnow]

Speaking of "dense" population areas, you can't really build too much more, a wider concept would be to build "hay" and "stick" houses in the more open area to avoid such dense areas in the first place.

This may be close to true in New York, London, Paris, Tokyo, etc, (and probably more so in large third world cities with extensive slums,) but it isn't true anywhere else in the US. If you look at aerial photos of downtowns in the US before WWII and today, and do the same thing to Germany before WWII and just after, you won't notice much difference: There are some buildings standing, but a lot of the city is the same height as the street. In Germany we did it with bombers, in the US we do it with parking lots. We've literally been ripping our cities down to build more parking, or as I like to call it, "socialized automobile housing", (since most of it is subsidized or worse yet mandated by city code.) Here is my favorite: the building wasn't torn down, just converted into a parking garage and so it makes for a great picture: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_Theatre_(Detroit,_Michigan) Density in our cities has been falling for 60 years because we are tearing down more than we build, so it is incorrect to say we couldn't build more now.

The big reason this is important: as you decrease density you increase transportation costs. If you compare the carbon footprint of someone that worked in the World Trade Center, including the cost of building the building, (even accounting for its actual vs projected life,) but that people could get to via a subway stop in the basement, to the greenest of the green suburban office park, that you have to drive to, the World Trade Center was far better. Don't get me wrong, if you have to live in the country, hay bails are a great way to go, but nobody should move there for that reason alone. If you really want to decrease your carbon footprint/energy consumption you should move downtown, sell the car, and walk or take the bus. Also: don't have babies.

[keldor]

Isn't it obvious what's going on here? Google whateveritis tracks word usage from all sources, including advertisements and generic spam. The real trend is that there's no actual change in conversation word usage, whereas ads and spam with "sustainable" in them are on the rise. Thus, by 2107, actual conversation will be an outlier, while "SUSTAINABLE SUSTAINABLE SUSTAINABLE SUSTAINABLE... Ford Heavy Duty Ram '08... SUSTAINABLE SUSTAINABLE....." and similar will dominate all channels of "conversation".

[Uzh]

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=PS3%2CXbox%2CWii&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=0&smoothing=5

The green line makes me wonder...

Georg

[Eternal Density]

We don't have to worry about 2109 though.

In AD 2101, war was beginning...

[shokoshu]

I could make some serious comments about naive extrapolation, or ignoring the growth of competing words...but what comes immediately to mind is "Malkovitch Malkovitch. Malkovitch? Malkovitch. Malkovitch Malkovitch. Malkovitch!"

Ha. Malkovitch minds think malkovitch...

[jpk]

Though 100 years is longer than a lot of our resources

And yet, somehow, we manage to survive "resource exhaustion" over and over and over.

That's right! Just because it hasn't happened yet it will never happen. And as we all know, the earth is an infinite volume, so why shouldn't it hold infinite resources?

[orthogon]

I could make some serious comments about naive extrapolation, or ignoring the growth of competing words...but what comes immediately to mind is "Malkovitch Malkovitch. Malkovitch? Malkovitch. Malkovitch Malkovitch. Malkovitch!"

Ha. Malkovitch minds think malkovitch...

"Stop saying Hawaii!"

[rmsgrey]

Though 100 years is longer than a lot of our resources

And yet, somehow, we manage to survive "resource exhaustion" over and over and over.

That's right! Just because it hasn't happened yet it will never happen. And as we all know, the earth is an infinite volume, so why shouldn't it hold infinite resources?

Hey, who says we'll remain limited to the Earth's resources? In an infinite universe, infinite resources are "out there"...

Empirically, every time our society has run into "resource exhaustion" we've managed to find a work-around - a replacement resource, a new supply, or a way to recover expended resources...

Of course, there's no reason why you can't have an infinite universe with only finite (useful) contents...

And, while our society has managed to dodge famine, drought and rare-earth shortages, that's purely anthropic - only societies that stave off resource starvation last to have a history of facing resource starvation - any society which faces impending resource starvation must have a history of having survived every prior resource starvation - it's just as possible that we've survived this far because we got lucky, and our chances at the next crisis are no better than any other society at any other similar crisis.

[Kit.]

Hey, who says we'll remain limited to the Earth's resources? In an infinite universe, infinite resources are "out there"...

Empirically, every time our society has run into "resource exhaustion" we've managed to find a work-around - a replacement resource, a new supply, or a way to recover expended resources...

...or to have enough luck to kill a competitor.

[jpk]

Though 100 years is longer than a lot of our resources

Hey, who says we'll remain limited to the Earth's resources? In an infinite universe, infinite resources are "out there"...

And, on average, infinitely far away.

In any case, if "we" manage to get off the earth, it will be a very few of us. This is not a solution to resource issues on earth, unless you can come up with some viable way of continuing to get people off the earth, or else to get them all of the earth, once. Or perhaps you were going to suggest trying to return resources to the earth? So whether or not humanity establishes a presence outside of the Earth's atmosphere, this has no effect on the question of finite resources, expanding population, and expending expectation of quality of life on earth.

[Coyne]

Hey, who says we'll remain limited to the Earth's resources? In an infinite universe, infinite resources are "out there"...

Empirically, every time our society has run into "resource exhaustion" we've managed to find a work-around - a replacement resource, a new supply, or a way to recover expended resources...

Of course, there's no reason why you can't have an infinite universe with only finite (useful) contents...

And, in fact, that is the case as far as we understand. Best estimates by astronomers put an upper limit on matter in the universe. If we could maintain our current population growth, humanity will outweigh the universe in around 9000 years...and since the speed of light is absolute as far as we can tell, we'll only have the matter within 9,000 light years (max.) to use.

We will hit the wall sooner, rather than later.

[philip1201]

Hey, who says we'll remain limited to the Earth's resources? In an infinite universe, infinite resources are "out there"...

Empirically, every time our society has run into "resource exhaustion" we've managed to find a work-around - a replacement resource, a new supply, or a way to recover expended resources...

Of course, there's no reason why you can't have an infinite universe with only finite (useful) contents...

And, in fact, that is the case as far as we understand. Best estimates by astronomers put an upper limit on matter in the universe. If we could maintain our current population growth, humanity will outweigh the universe in around 9000 years...and since the speed of light is absolute as far as we can tell, we'll only have the matter within 9,000 light years (max.) to use.

We will hit the wall sooner, rather than later.

This doesn't take relativity into account. Our entire future lightcone is accessible for spacecraft with an eigentime of less than 9000 years, if they go sufficiently close to the speed of light. If, within 1000 years, we invent a spacecraft which accelerates at 1g, you would get around 60 million lightyears away within 9000 human population-years.

Assuming our goal is to allow humans to reproduce without limit and without altering human physiology, then the finite size and acceleration of spaceships puts an upper limit on travel distance far closer than 64 million years, unless we manage to make spaceships capable of duplicating themselves in transit using nothing but interstellar hydrogen moving at hyperrelativistic speeds.