"Our greatest responsibility is to be good ancestors."

-Jonas Salk

Monday, April 21, 2008

Questions, Questions

Too many questions, not enough answers.

Andrew Revkin asks: what is the energy demand of vat-grown meat?

It's an example of a good question that ties into the future that is hard to answer. Who knows? How can we get such information? How much can we rely on such information if we get it?

The "collaboratorium" group at MIT proposes a mechanism for collaborative thinking. I see some flaws. It seems pretty labor-intensive and not very fun and not very scalable. For some things it it might work if enough people get in the right spirit. I have a feeling they are taking on too much too soon with, you know, the everything (a.k.a. climate) question. Of course, everything is intertwingled ultimately...

(By the way, weren't people talking about collaboratories in a somewhat different sense quite some time ago? I guess science doesn't get to register trademarks.)

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