Robbie Tulip Blog

Geostorm
In watching an action fantasy world apocalypse movie like Geostorm, a temptation for the cynical can be to just see the surface appearance. First a village mysteriously freezes solid in an instant in Afghanistan, then the streets of Hong Kong erupt in flaming explosions sending skyscrapers collapsing like dominoes while a driver miraculously escapes through the rippling volcanic chasms opening around him. And next the bikini babes on Copacabana turn to blocks of ice as a super cold front somehow pushes a tsunami onto the Rio beachfront.
The cause of the disasters is problems with geoengineering satellites deployed in 2019. But is this just a programming malfunction? If not, who are the baddies who have sabotaged the world weather management system run by the USA? Why and how did they do it, and how can they be stopped? Who is the rogue on board the geoengineering space station? Will the clock that he started tick down to zero, causing a geostorm, a fiery end to life on earth? Will the US President die in the robot car chase through massive lightning bolts hitting every second? Will the hero return from exile, and will he survive on the space station? Will his brother get the girl? Which city is next?
Such plot details are classic Hollywood formula. This movie combines amazing disaster scenes, excellent visuals and production, a strong simple plot, a vivid range of characters and great acting into a gripping thriller. Geostorm is full of tension and drama and surprise and new ideas down to the wire. It is a worthy popular successor to Independence Day and Godzilla, which were both also produced by the Geostorm producer/director Dean Devlin.
Geostorm deserves to be a smash hit for a serious reason though. This movie makes an important and well considered contribution to advancing policy debate on response to climate change. The question raised at the start is how to address the threat that global warming could destroy the world economy. This explicitly raises the need for urgent concerted technological response to avert catastrophe, since previous methods focused on emission reduction have failed.
The movie deliberately chooses an impossible geoengineering technology, aiming to blend the topical ideas of weather management and space travel to create a science fiction fantasy. But the parable is equally applicable to realistic geoengineering proposals, ranging from solar radiation management to large scale ocean based algae production for carbon mining. Any large scale climate intervention needs proper risk management if it is to help forestall the impending climate impacts.
In a nod to human corruption, the plot raises the risk of weaponizing a peaceful technology, evoking the failed military Star Wars Initiative idea of death from the skies. And recognising human fallibility, Geostorm asks if this magical system installed by technological geniuses at the last minute will become like Goethe

The Case Against Sugar by Gary Taubes
https://www.amazon.com/Case-Against-Sugar-Gary-Taubes/dp/0307701646

Here is my review, posted at Amazon. (link)

This book tells the tale of the scientific paradigm shift from blaming fat to blaming sugar as the main cause of disease. The noncommunicable lifestyle illnesses of modern sedentary society include diabetes, cancer, heart attack, hypertension, tooth decay, obesity, gout and senility. Sugar is the main culprit for the epidemic explosion of these conditions in recent years. The science behind this discovery, and the social failure to see and address it, is laid out by Gary Taubes in forensic detail. It is a story of grand corruption and stupidity, both moral and political. The sugar industry, hand in glove with its close partner the tobacco industry, has systematically deceived and suborned public health in its pursuit of filthy lucre, at massive avoidable cost in health expenditure and quality of life.

Starting with the key role of sugar in slavery, Taubes explains how the depravity continued with the key role of sugar in making cigarettes so pleasant and addictive by enabling easy inhalation of their smoke. Gross conflict of interest was then allowed by government, allowing so-called scientists paid by the sugar industry to systematically deny and conceal the ghastly and obvious criminal role of sugar in driving avoidable suffering. Like drug pushers, the sugar industry has tried to hook its addicts when young, for example with the lying portrayal of breakfast cereals as health foods, while concealing the scale and effect and coordination of its assault on our health.

The toxic cocktail of Coca-Cola and cigarettes given to American servicemen in World War Two was one example of Big Sugar

Link to text R Tulip Lecture to the Canberra Jung Society on the book Aion by Carl Jung 5 May 2017

Opening Paragraphs

Aion