Are Natural Systems Smart

[Mortie31]

I couldn't have said it better - I agree. Side note - beautiful tank you have. I just went through your build thread. I had the pleasure of visiting the UK over Easter. Not vacation, but work, but still was able to get out and about. I was bouncing between Reading and Newbury.

Thankyou, thankfully my tank is nearly through its fallow period and I’m starting to get ready to restock, glad you saw some of our country apart from work.. I’m a little further north from Reading

 

[Subsea]

But who controls the world bank?? Isn’t it all one and the same?

Follow the money and form your own opinion. Confessions of An Economic Hitman should give you a road map.

PS: So that you understand some of my points on conspiracy theory, my four combat tours in Cambodia was a CIA mission. I may use differrent glasses to see the hidden conspiracy.

 

[Mortie31]

Follow the money and form your own opinion. Confessions of An Economic Hitman should give you a road map.

PS: So that you understand some of my points on conspiracy theory, my four combat tours in Cambodia was a CIA mission. I may use differrent glasses to see the hidden conspiracy.

Didn’t he exaggerate throughout this book? Or is that a conspiracy as well..

 

[Subsea]

Didn’t he exaggerate throughout this book? Or is that a conspiracy as well..

From what I have seen, I personally don’t thnk that he exaggerated. I don’t know the author. Envirometal friends of mine know him as an environmentalist protector of Amazon Rain forest. Go figure.

 

[Mortie31]

From what I have seen, I personally don’t thnk that he exaggerated. I don’t know the author. Envirometal friends of mine know him as an environmentalist protector of Amazon Rain forest. Go figure.

Interesting, as it’s the G8 countries that seem to have written off debt etc and no mention of the world banks, but maybe they own the G8... maybe exposure etc led to this I dont know, but this author sounds to have a political agenda himself so probably no different to any of the other lobbyists etc that seek to further themselves or change the rules of a game they no longer win at...

 

[Mortie31]

What’s really interesting about debt and third world countries and this book/ novel American economic hitman, is that it seems to have back fired massively as American is so much in debt now, I’d be surprised if the banks / foreign governments didn’t own it... circle of life I guess..

 

[Subsea]

Interesting, as it’s the G8 countries that seem to have written off debt etc and no mention of the world banks, but maybe they own the G8... maybe exposure etc led to this I dont know, but this author sounds to have a political agenda himself so probably no different to any of the other lobbyists etc that seek to further themselves or change the rules of a game they no longer win at...

I can’t make that projection with the information that I have seen. Last I heard, he retired to the Amazon Rain Forest.

https://www.pachamama.org/john-perkins

Between 1968 and 1971, John Perkins served as a Peace Corps volunteer with the Shuar people of the Amazon rainforest and the Kichwa of the Andes. These were deeply transformational years during which he established strong indigenous friendships and planted the seeds of his path towards awakening.

During the next decade, John Perkins served as Chief Economist at a major international consulting firm. His job was to identify resource-rich countries for corporations and arrange enormous loans. The loans were then used to hire U.S. companies to build infrastructure projects that benefited the companies and a minority of wealthy elite. This tactic left the ordinary citizens of the targeted countries in deep debt. Inevitably, when the loans defaulted, John and others would go back and “asset strip” the country. He became an “economic hit man.”

 

[Subsea]

What’s really interesting about debt and third world countries and this book/ novel American economic hitman, is that it seems to have back fired massively as American is so much in debt now, I’d be surprised if the banks / foreign governments didn’t own it... circle of life I guess..

The interest on the national debt is larger than the military budget and will soon reach 50% of our total federal income. When the credit rating of the United States was lowered during Obama’s first term, be certain that interest rates will increase and the interest on the national debt will soon consume > 50% of taxes collected. In this scenario, people will pay higher taxes and holders of the national debt make increasing revenue. Sounds to me like tax payers are making big big banks bigger.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

I can’t make that projection with the information that I have seen. Last I heard, he retired to the Amazon Rain Forest.

https://www.pachamama.org/john-perkins

Between 1968 and 1971, John Perkins served as a Peace Corps volunteer with the Shuar people of the Amazon rainforest and the Kichwa of the Andes. These were deeply transformational years during which he established strong indigenous friendships and planted the seeds of his path towards awakening.

During the next decade, John Perkins served as Chief Economist at a major international consulting firm. His job was to identify resource-rich countries for corporations and arrange enormous loans. The loans were then used to hire U.S. companies to build infrastructure projects that benefited the companies and a minority of wealthy elite. This tactic left the ordinary citizens of the targeted countries in deep debt. Inevitably, when the loans defaulted, John and others would go back and “asset strip” the country. He became an “economic hit man.”

Kind of reminds me of the banana company set up by the US government in Honduras, eventually company used to bring down that government ,if I remember right. Or was that a different government in Latin America?

Known as banana Wars.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

The interest on the national debt is larger than the military budget and will soon reach 50% of our total federal income. When the credit rating of the United States was lowered during Obama’s first term, be certain that interest rates will increase and the interest on the national debt will soon consume > 50% of taxes collected. In this scenario, people will pay higher taxes and holders of the national debt make increasing revenue. Sounds to me like tax payers are making big big banks bigger.

Don't forget US government printing more money than what's being shown out there. All these numbers we see on debt, Etc... it's all relative.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

One one, an Israeli group was printing US money for 10 years. Only reason they got caught is trying to move their printing presses to the US. If not for that, they would have continued printing. This happened about 5 years ago

 

[Subsea]

I watch my Tangs line up to graze on biofilms attached to Gracilaria Hayi surfaces. The macro fell off eggcrate platform on top of deep water gorgonians. Somewhere in there is a green mandarin searching for pods and grazing on same biofilms as tangs.

PS: I just noticed where I posted to the wrong thread. Considering divergence of this thread I see that as funny.

 

[Subsea]

The interest on the national debt is larger than the military budget and will soon reach 50% of our total federal income. When the credit rating of the United States was lowered during Obama’s first term, be certain that interest rates will increase and the interest on the national debt will soon consume > 50% of taxes collected. In this scenario, people will pay higher taxes and holders of the national debt make increasing revenue. Sounds to me like tax payers are making big big banks bigger.

Since I started the economy conversation, I will finish developing the conspiracy, but it is not a theory, it is a world economy system. Like I said, follow the money.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crony_capitalism

“Crony capitalism is an economy in which businesses thrive not as a result of risk, but rather as a return on money amassed through a nexus between a business class and the political class. This is done using state power to crush genuine competition in handing out permits, government grants, special tax breaks, or other forms of state intervention[1][2] over resources where the state exercises monopolist control over public goods, for example, mining concessions for primary commodities or contracts for public works. Money is then made not merely by making a profit in the market, but through profiteering by "rent seeking" using this monopoly or oligopoly. Entrepreneurship and innovative practices, which seek to reward risk are stifled, since the value-added is little by crony businesses as hardly anything of significant value is created by them, with transactions taking the form of "trading". Crony capitalism spills over into the government, the politics and the media,[3] when this nexus distorts the economy and affects society to an extent it corrupts public-serving economic, political and social ideals.”

Because conspiracy is not new and because I like Shakespeare, I will exit this sub topic with this quote,

“What a web we weave, when we first seek to deceive.”

 

[Subsea]

To use natural filtration best, it is necessary to understand the dynamics between differrent tropic levels. To say food chain is an injustice to the complexity of differrent food webs that process inorganic & organic nutrients into differrent size live food to feed differrent size hungry mouths.

https://www.sciencelearn.org.nz/resources/143-marine-food-webs

Organisms in food webs are commonly divided into trophic levels. These levels can be illustrated in a trophic pyramid where organisms are grouped by the role they play in the food web. For example, the 1st level forms the base of the pyramid and is made up of producers. The 2nd level is made up of herbivorous consumers and so on. On average, only 10% of the energy from an organism is transferred to its consumer. The rest is lost as waste, movement energy, heat energy and so on. As a result, each trophic level supports a smaller number of organisms – in other words, it has less biomass. This means that a top-level consumer, such as a shark, is supported by millions of primary producers from the base of the food web or trophic pyramid.


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Marine trophic pyramid

Food webs throughout the world all have the same basic trophic levels. However, the number and type of species that make up each level varies greatly between different areas and different ecosystems.

 

[Subsea]

I could not set up a natural reef tank without a sandbed to feed the tank.. Thirty years ago, we used 6” dsb to provide low oxygen conditions to promote denitrification bacteria as complete nitrogen export requiring no equipment and happened automatically because of Dynamic Equilibrium. Only good gas exchange is required to complete nutrient export by denitrification.

The most important part of captive reef management happens automatically at water air surfaces.

Carbon dioxide as a free gas is easily soluble in salt water and combines with carbonate alkalinity to form bicarbonate alkalinity. When photosynthesis combines with bicarbonate alkalinity, glucose is formed which is the carbon source that grows coral. Danna Riddle published articles at Andvanced Aquaria discribe how carbon dioxide grows coral and organic carbon dosing feeds bacteria. The great balance in the Dynamic Equilibrium of carbon dioxide into the ocean is offset by solubility of limestone to buffer carbonate alkalinity.

Oxygen

Nitrogen gas is why we are a green planet. N is also a free gas with a partial pressure that moves it back & forth from water to air in Dynamic Equilibrium. Cynobacteria process nitrogen as a free gas saturated in the water into ammonia to feed itself inorganic nitrogen to grow organic biomass. The process is called
“Nitrogen Fixation”.

Micro Ablgae will combine carbon/nitrogen/phosphorus in the ratio of 116:16:1 and is called the
Redfield Ratio.

Macro Algae will generally combine carbon/nitrogen/phosphorus in ratio of 560:30:1 with large variance of nitrogen. Randy Holmes Farley told me that enough carbon comes with fish food. Dana Riddle says carbon comes in with carbon dioxide gas. Both of those work for me.

PS: I am hosting a field trip of ninth grade aquatic science students after Christmas brake. It was my intention to introduce them to chemical oceanography. I am using differrent parts of this thread to advance understanding of the complexity & beauty in Nature.

 

[Jase4224]

Nice tank. What is that material the mandarin is on top of?

 

[Subsea]

Nice tank. What is that material the mandarin is on top of?

Eggcrate with fiberglass screen. This was the Plenum established 25 years ago and covered by 6” of aroggonite until 12 months ago when I gravel vacuum out several hundred pounds of mixed substrate with 25 years of organics built up.

Two years ago, with the introduction of an efficient wrasse as a predator of snails and most other small things, I lost a detrivore crew that managed sandbed and feed the tank. I have become the big janitor instead of letting the little people do their thing.

With help from a friend, I will rip clean my 25 year old sandbed and pipe in a reverse flow up thru eggcrate Plenum using 2” of mixed substrate. To accomplish this, I will use a 40G Rubbermade tub with some 5G buckets. Once I get live rock out, I will remove all fish. Wrasse will be removed to LFS. I will wash out substrate with well water but I will not sterilize it. Substrate will be returned to tank, as well as live rock. Circulation upflow thru substrate will provide oxygen for detrivores (micro fauna & fana) to process inorganic & organic nutrients into complex food webs.

 

[Subsea]

This section of Plenum was uncovered by Blue Devil Damsel. He is very bold and bites often. When Yellow Tangs were introduced into this tank, the Damsels were very mean and head butted & body slammed which begin the Tang Stand-Off Era.

The eggcrate is lifted off of the bottom glass using 1/2” pvc scrapes. When I modify to reverse flow sand-bed, I will use a 1/2” pvc manifold with drilled holes to provide void under the eggcrate.

 

[ca1ore]

.

Assuming the top two levels are excluded from our tanks for practical reasons, I’ve often wondered how many fish a tank could support if this kind of natural food web were the goal? 100 gallon tank ..... one fish, maybe two lol.

 

[Subsea]

Assuming the top two levels are excluded from our tanks for practical reasons, I’ve often wondered how many fish a tank could support if this kind of natural food web were the goal? 100 gallon tank ..... one fish, maybe two lol.

More fish are best as a source of nutrients. In my 120G at 1 year old, I have four tangs, four drawf angels, eight pajama cardinals, purple dottyback, royal gramma, sailfin blennie and green mandarin. I could 10 fold the bioload with no biological problem but fish aggression would be a nightmare.

I would not lift biodiversity up as the goal. I consider it as the method to achieving my goal: a minimalist reef tank that I can enjoy.