Resumen El activismo de izquierdas de las últimas décadas muestra un giro anarquista evidente en indicadores cuantitativos como las menciones de anarquistas en las noticias y en los activistas que adoptan modos de organización, tácticas y objetivos sociales anarquistas, independientemente de que reivindiquen o no esa etiqueta. Los autores de este Elemento sostienen que las […]
As the soundscape of the natural world began to disappear over 30 years, one man was listening and recording it all The tale starts 30 years ago, when Bernie Krause made his first audio clip in Sugarloaf Ridge state park, 20 minutes’ drive from his house near San Francisco.
He chose a spot near an old bigleaf maple. Many people loved this place: there was a creek and a scattering of picnic benches nearby.
As a soundscape recordist, Krause had travelled around the world listening to the planet. But in 1993 he turned his attention to what was happening on his doorstep. In his first recording, a stream of chortles, peeps and squeaks erupt from the animals that lived in the rich, scrubby habitat. His sensitive microphones captured the sounds of the creek, creatures rustling through undergrowth, and the songs of the spotted towhee, orange-crowned warbler, house wren and mourning dove.
Back then, Krause never thought of this as a form of data-gathering. He began recording ecosystem sounds simply because he found them beautiful and relaxing. Krause has ADHD and found no medication would work: “The only thing that relieved the anxiety was being out there and just listening to the soundscapes,” he says.
Bernie Krause ‘out there and listening to the soundscapes’ in Sugarloaf Ridge state park. Photograph: Cayce Clifford/The Guardian
Inadvertently, he had begun to gather a rich trove of data. Over the next three decades he would return each April to the spot at the bigleaf maple, set his recorder down and wait to hear what it would reveal.
But in April last year, Krause played back his recording and was greeted with something he had not heard before: total silence. The recorder had run for its usual hour, but picked up no birdsong, no rush of water over stones, no beating wings. “I’ve got an hour of material with nothing, at the high point of spring,” says Krause. “What’s happening here is just a small indication of what’s happening almost everywhere on an even larger scale.”
A rich weave of sound fades
Video Player
00:00
00:52How Sugarloaf Park fell silent 2000 – 2023. Credit: Bernie Krause at Wild Sanctuary 2024
Animals produce a vast array of sounds: to find mates, protect territories, identify offspring or simply by moving about. But traditionally, ecologists have measured environmental health by looking at habitats rather than listening to them.
Desirae Harp, an educator at the park and member of the local Mishewal Wappo tribe.
Krause developed the idea that the sound of healthy ecosystems contained not only the calls of individual animals, but a dense, structured weave of sounds that he called the “biophony”……..
….Life swept away by fire…..A silent message to the world…..Comparison of 2003 and 2023:…..
Its hard to imagine our arrogant rulers would sabotage the world economy to
dispossess us and make us digital slaves. Yet something must break- As US hegemony declines it cannot get the exponentially ballooning debts it needs.- Webb’s analysis of the WEF Mega Scam is convincing, but billionaires and offshore transnationals would also lose out initially, as he admits, and might block the Great Reset Plan. Also, like most analysis, it often assumes the USA /UK/West is the universe, ignoring the active resistance of the rest of us.
In Part 1, I explained that the next financial crisis will be bailed out not with central bank money creation but with our stocks, bonds and bank balances.
In Part 2, I explained the multi-year quiet regulatory changes that dispossessed us of our property.
In Part 3, I explain David Rogers Webb’s conclusion that a massive financial crisis is pending in which our financial assets are the collateral underwriting the derivative and financial bubble and will result in the loss of our assets but leave us with our debts as happened to those whose banks failed in the 1930s.
******
Webb begins with the economic formula that the velocity of circulation of money times the money supply equals nominal Gross Domestic Product. V x MS = GDP.
The velocity of circulation is a measure of how many times a dollar is spent during a given period of time, e.g., quarterly, annually. A high velocity means people quickly spend the money that comes into their hands. A low velocity means people tend to hold on to money.
Velocity impacts the Federal Reserve’s ability to manage economic growth with money supply changes. If the velocity of money is falling, an expansionist monetary policy will not result in rising GDP. In such a situation, the Federal Reserve is said to be “pushing on a string.” Instead of pushing up GDP, money supply increases push up the values of financial assets and real estate resulting in financial and real estate bubbles.
Webb notes that falls in velocity are precursors of financial crises. A multi-year sharp fall in velocity preceded the stock market crash in 1929 and the Great Depression that gave birth to regulatory agencies. The 21st century is characterized by a long-term fall in velocity that has reached the lowest level on record, while stocks and real estate have been driven to unprecedented levels by years of zero interest rates. When this bubble pops, we will be dispossessed.
Will the bubble pop?
Yes. The Fed suddenly and rapidly moved from zero to 5% interest rates, a reversal of the policy that drove up prices of stocks and bonds. The Fed raises rates by reducing money supply growth, thus removing the factor supporting high stock prices and collapsing the value of bonds. This results in a lowering of the value of stocks and bonds serving as collateral for loans, which, of course, means the loans and the financial institution behind them are in trouble.
Bonds have already taken a hit. The stock market is holding because participants believe the Fed is about to reverse its interest rate policy and lower rates.
Russian turtle tank – yes, the type everyone laughed about – transporting Russian invasion forces to central Western Krasnohorivka under intense Ukrainian artillery fire – unharmed – and returning to base. 1. Not funny at all. 2. Where are Ukrainian defenders? pic.twitter.com/gMwkKOrlEw
By Clare Pastore / The Conversation On April 22, 2024, the Supreme Court will hear a case that could radically change how cities respond to the growing problem of homelessness. It also could significantly worsen the nation’s racial justice gap. City of Grants Pass v. Johnson began when a small city in Oregon with just one homeless shelter began […]
The Free 