Deer-Vehicle Collisions

The video shows how lightning fast a deer-vehicle collision can unfold. There is no time to react whatsoever, no guarantee of 100% safety on any road, especially during deer-hunting season when deer are spooked, or wounded, by hunters and flee across the road. The only way to minimize the risk is to 1. slow down, 2. be watchful for deer at all times, and 3, be prepared for more deer when you see one.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvCOiFcWNHE

The risk is further exacerbated by HUNTERS cultivating a high population of deer by means of food plots, where rich deer food elevates the birth rate from no fawn or single fawn to doublets or triplets - FOR HUNTING PURPOSES of course.

Each year, there are over 1 million DVAs (deer-vehicle accidents) on US roads, meaning over 1 million deer deaths, about 200 human deaths, and over $1 Billion in property damage. Over half of the DVAs occur October-December, coinciding with the hunting season. The hunters know that they are at least in part responsible for the human deaths (they don't care about deer deaths), and yet they persist with the practice, making the extra human fatality, due to them, premeditated.

Anthony Marr, founder
Heal Our Planet Earth (HOPE)
Global Anti-Hunting Coalition (GAHC)

Hatred in the movement

Most people in the AR movement honor Dr. Martin Luther King, many worship Jesus Christ, and a few laugh at western inventions of "Confucius says...". Here is something they all said that should give us pause.

"Let no man pull you low enough to hate him." - MLK
"Love your neighbor. Forgive your enemy." - Jesus
"The potential and power of forgiveness are infinite." - Confucius (loosely paraphrased).

I will be slammed by some for what I'm about to say, but I will say it. The AR movement, theoretically based on COMPASSION and indeed brimming with compassion, is, alas, also overflowing with HATRED, which many confuse with RIGHTEOUS ANGER.

Other than the omnipresent compassion, righteous anger is the starting point for most to join the movement. It serves as the CAUSE of and motivator for steel-like determination and cool-headed action. Hatred is not a cause, it is the COUNTER-PRODUCTIVE CONCLUSION.

Let's take the Anti-Hunting movement, starting with the very basic - personal safety, I mean mine, and general strategy. Most of those hurling hatred and death wishes upon hunters on the internet, even targeting CHILDREN, and at that often anonymously, have never confronted a hunter face-to-face, much less 100 at a time, in real life. I would not be alive today had I done the same back in 1996, when I undertook an 8-week, 50-stop, anti-hunting road tour in which I debate, in townhall settings, large groups of hostile hunters no less than 40 times, up to 130 hunters at a time, over 100 twice, over 50 at least 10 times, the average being about 40 hunters per confrontation. Did I ever raise my voice in these debates? Not once. Did I use hate speech? Never. I showed my DISAPPROVAL by means of LOGIC. For example, when a hunter defended himself as a "conservationist", I asked him, CALMLY, whether his motivation was pure conservation for the sake of the wildlife, or whether he "conserves" so that there would be more animals to hunt - for HIM. I also said, calmly, "Most of you have proven to be good shots, and claim to be anti-poaching. So, in the name of conservation, why don't you go and join an anti-poaching force to help conserve the rhino or the elephant? Rather than spending major bucks to hunt a rhino or elephant as a 'conservation' measure, which would be reaped by the hunting guide-outfitter, why don't you donated the same amount to the anti-poaching effort instead, which would have gone ten times farther?" This pretty much silenced them on the "conservation" issue for the rest of the debate.

http://homosapienssaveyourearth.blogspot.com/2011/09/on-my-war-path-007-hottest-anti-vs.html

There is also the crucial matter of STRATEGY. There were people present at the debates who were more or less non-committal. In such a confrontation, my main aim was not to convert the hunters present, but to win over those hitherto on the fence so that they will sooner or later come down on our side. Even more important was that there were usually media reporters present; my farther aim was to win over their readership, meaning thousands at a time. Had I used socially unacceptable hate speech against the opposition, what I would have achieved was to drive those on the fence to get off on to the other side, plus giving our side a black eye.

http://homosapienssaveyourearth.blogspot.com/2011/09/on-my-war-path-008-hottest-anti-vs.html

Resulting from the tour, hunting became the hottest topic of the year in British Columbia, with most fence-sitters getting off on to the Anti-Hunting side.

Paul George, then the head of the Western Canada Wilderness Committee (WCWC) of which I was a campaigner, wrote: "... his calm and unflappable style infuriated the opposition." I believe that many in the opposition hated my guts, but because I did not vent and rant, neither did they. Speaking of the "black eye", I was ambushed in 1998 by a hateful hunter who gave me not one but two black eyes (exactly, 3 facial bone-fractures including a buckled eye socket). You know what? The incident was widely reported and discussed, even in hunting circles. The black eye, again, was on them.

http://homosapienssaveyourearth.blogspot.com/1998/01/anthony-marr-physically-assaulted.html

I don't hate them, but I do use their own hatred against them. Conversely, kindly do not give them any of our hatred for them to use against us.

I leave the higher reasons against hatred to the Great Masters.

If you see merit in this post, especially for the benefit of the movement, please like and comment, and share it out far and wide. Thank you.

Anthony Marr, founder
Heal Our Planet Earth (HOPE)
Global Anti-Hunting Coalition (GAHC)

Methane plumes in the South China Sea?

This piece is pure speculation on my part, so please read accordingly. 

There is an article today titled [... How a Captain Stopped His Submarine from Falling Into a 3,000-Meter Trench] in which is reported:

"... Wang Hongli, captain of the submarine number 372,... calmly reversing the disaster during a routine patrol in deep waters... the submarine encountered a sudden fall in water density... The sub started to plunge straight into a deep trench in the ocean. / Wang, of the South Sea Fleet, calmly gave out orders and within three minutes, steered them out of danger (Subs usually operate down to 500 meters only; 3000 meters would be absolutely fatal.).... / Its submersible system went back to normal three hours later and 372 continued its patrol, which lasted for 20 days... The South Sea Fleet's area of responsibilities are northern regions of the Taiwan strait and southern areas from James Shoal including the Paracel Islands...]

http://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1584450/pla-reveals-how-captain-stopped-submarine-falling-3000-metre-trench

My question is: What caused this "sudden fall in water density"? As far as I can reason, there could be only 3 possible causes:

1. The sub moving from a body of water with a high salinity (salt water) into a body of water with a low salinity (e.g. fresh water). If so, where does the fresh water come from? The melting of the Himalayan glaciers (2000 of them, all melting) would be a good guess. Or

2. The sub moving from colder water into warmer water. However, the temperature gradient is usually vertical, i.e., water at shallow depths being usually warmer than water at greater depths. Presumably, the sub is moving more or less horizontally. Or

3. The sub entering a body of water containing a lots of gas bubbles, which would have a lower density. This is the point I will speculate on.

The first question to ask is: What kind of gas is it? My best bet would be METHANE.

The map shows the concentrations of methane hydrate in today's oceans. The orange/yellow patch on the extreme right mid-way down is in the South China Sea, where the Paracel Islands are located. It is one of just 3 major methane hydrate deposits in the tropical/subtropical regions (the other two being just east of India and at the mouth of the Persian Gulf. Ocean warming could melt some of the deposit in this region and release large volumes of methane gas into the water.

The average depth of the South China Sea is 1,500 meters (5,000 feet), whereas the trenches in that region reach depths of over 5,000 meters (16,500 ft). The general direction of the ocean current in that region is from SW to NE, that is, from the equator, and that is, warm. During the previous cooler period, whatever methane hydrate that could be melted, i.e. those at shallower depths where the temperature is higher and the pressure is lower. With ocean warming, the methane hydrate deposits at greater depths could begin to melt, and this might include those in the trenches.

In general, the closer to the equator, the deeper a deposit has to be to stay solid and intact. Conversely, the deposit currently out-gassing in the Arctic Ocean is at a much shallower depth than that in the South China Sea, if the latter is out-gassing at all.

Let's imagine a scenario where methane is out-gassing from a trench. When a submarine passes over the trench, it would indeed encounter a body of water with a lower density. So, the sub, as trimmed for the surrounding higher-density water, i.e. water without bubbles, would tend to sink. Further, if the bubbles are absorbed by the water on their way up, the upper layer of the sea would have a higher density than the lower layer, and the two layers would tend to invert, with the descending denser water carrying the sub down with it.

This, as I said in the beginning, is by and large speculation. But if the methane hydrate in the South China Sea is out-gassing at a depth, but the gas won't make it to the surface, indeed only submarines would know about it.

Some would argue that since the methane doesn't make it to the surface, it wouldn't contribute to atmospheric warming. But when dissolved by the sea water, the methane would turn to CO2, which would increase OCEAN ACIDIFICATION.

Anthony Marr, founder
Heal Our Planet Earth (HOPE)