km (20% average) 45% at steepest .the bit at 2min 6 secs is unbelievable. this guy has done it all with one dab/fall and taking 1 1/2 hrs from top to bottom.

I think I could safely beat the time of 1.5 hours from top to bottom 😀 However it is a moot point as I would not even get 10% up there!

We may need to really shake off any Euclidian conceptual hangovers of time and space before we really get to grips with the “illusion” that is the physical universe 😀

There is a setting on itunes that allows you to record a CD in high quality (obviously you can therefore fit in fewer tunes). I am no teccie, and it was my mate who told me so don’t remember what the setting is. I never did this the first time around but wish I had as although this is modern technology, ipods have set sound quality back by maybe 30 years!

And yeah, get some decent headphones.

Oh, and I have one of these which is still going strong after lots of travels:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/XMI-X-mini-II-Mini-Speaker/dp/B001UEBN42/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1296259382&sr=8-1

Amazingly good sound for the cost of £13.

Unovolo – that thing looks like it would be more at home on the bottom of a sea bed scooping up plankton in a David Attenborough documentary 🙂

Bagsey the inside lane!

Ah right, I understood that the carbon cycle was now generally accepted as one of life’s major systems.

And yeah, you are right to pick me up using emotive language. To paraphrase myself, I do not think that scientists should be using emotive language designed to invoke images of holocaust deniers. They should stick to science.

As for “meaning” well you may have made your mind up but I would say the jury is still out and we would be wise to keep an open mind. 😀

I’ve had some time to think about my previous remarks and I think emotions probably got the better of me. Having had a think, I think I get more wound up about the presentation of what is still an inexact science.

If you look at comments from 2000:

the warming is so far manifesting itself more in winters which are less cold than in much hotter summers. According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia,within a few years winter snowfall will become “a very rare and exciting event”.

“Children just aren’t going to know what snow is,” he said.

This leads the lay person to expect no snow. However, as well as this year, 2009 had much snow too. One winter maybe but two winters in a row makes comments like this seem like scaremongering.

It is not enough for the scientists such as Viner to admit that their models were wrong. They then say that snow is in fact a sing of global warming, or alternatively, that weather should not be confused with climate, and yet berate laypeople for suggesting that maybe the last few years have not shown overall warming. They are extremely inconsistent.

This hideous near-religious like propaganda is now doing humanity no favours, as yes, I do believe that we are experiencing a new era of unstable climates, and we are living through changes.

Another bugbear of mine is this total focus on the carbon cycle, and no mention of any other system that contributes to the overall stability of the earth’s atmospheric temperature. This to me reeks of financial racket, led by politicians and business people who see it purely as a money making scheme, and another way to induce fear in order to control the population. Look at their actions as opposed to their words and I see no sign of any personal changes in their lives which suggest that they really believe in this, for example, reducing their own personal consumption of consumable products.

As for consensus science, and the peer process of reviewing, well just look at what happened to James Lovelock and Lynn Margulis, who developed the Gaia theory, and then the Gaia hypothesis in the 1970s. This suggests that life on earth, and the constant atmospheric temperature, is the result of positive and feedback loops consisting of interactions between living plants, animals and micro-organisms, and non-living systems such as the oceans, rocks and air. Lovelock initially could not get any of his papers published in any scientific journals, and he was accused of developing a teleological theory, since how could such a non-living system be self-regulating.

However, today Gaia theory forms a fundamental part of our understanding of the climate, and is now widely accepted. So much for the consensus. Science always seems be full of people who assume that they know everything, from Aristotle, to Newton, to Young, to science today. It could be said that the peer review process rewards conservative submissions which support the status quo – but that is another discussion all together.

And finally, with so much emphasis on global warming, we are ignoring other weather systems at our peril. As this article in The Telegraph suggests, those who preach global warming could have contributed to the lack of flood preparation in Australia:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/8262064/What-was-the-role-of-warmists-in-the-Queensland-flood-disaster.html

What am I doing? I have been involved in the transition town movement, which emerged to help cities become more resilient to both climate change and peak oil. However, what I want personally is the right to ask questions without being labelled in such derogatory terms, and the right to be wrong is important too.

I want to be able to ask questions about the very fabric of reality, about how explorations into quantum physics is teaching us about how “particles” are in fact more like units of meaning, or consciousness. I want to be able to ask questions about deeper levels of reality, that physicists are now developing models of, and I want to be able to do this without fear of persecution.

I hope this clarifies my thinking, and I do regret maybe writing at speed without deeper though for my words.

Peace all

Just a few bits and pieces

http://poorrichards-blog.blogspot.com/2010/12/new-scientist-plants-false-story-that.html

http://newsbusters.org/node/11879

Strange locations for temperature monitoring devices

http://www.surfacestations.org/odd_sites.htm

http://theintelhub.com/2011/01/24/it’s-all-just-coincidental-vaccines-continue-to-damage-children/

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/8223165/The-green-hijack-of-the-Met-Office-is-crippling-Britain.html

Just for the record, and I apologise for the ambiguity, I was not lumping all scientists together. I want to be able to be free to question any study that I may come across, as some scientists, for example those who are sponsored by commercial interests, could well be under pressure to mis-represent their findings. I want to be able to question things without having a cynical label applied to me. The greater proportion of scientists may well be upright and above board, I was trying to make the point that I want to be able to be a sceptic and feel that to be able to question things is a right, and not be labelled as such.

If the science is beyond suspicion then it should be able to speak for itself without having to resort to such cheap and nasty tactics.

It’s not how much oil is left, it is how much it costs to extract. We are nearing the end of cheap oil. The theory about peak oil is that our world economy depends on cheap oil, and so we will soon start to see the problems begin, as opposed to having to wait until the oil runs out.

After saying that, Brazil has recently made some more discoveries which has increased the totals, but hey, I guess that means we can soon expect to see Al Qaeda in action here and the US invade 🙁

And Peter Sissons has written a good account of his time at the BBC and their attitude to Climate Change:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1350206/BBC-propaganda-machine-climate-change-says-Peter-Sissons.html

For me, I want to be able to consider the possibility that we are entering a period of climate instability, and that this may have a number of causes, e.g. sun spots etc as well as man made causes, but I resent the fact that I am cynically being branded a “denier”, a deliberately emotive word, just for wanting to question the science and not be duped by scientists faking results because of the money involved.

I’m the opposite right now in that my girlfriend is working in Sao Paulo and I am staying at home, working on some project proposals, in another city that is the equivalent of London – Edinburgh.

This for us is a short term solution, and for you, you should really try and think how long you could cope. Short term there are no major issues, and now that you have Skype, it is much better when talking mid-week. Also, you need to try and make good use of your mid-week free time too, such as going to the gym etc.

I for one could not do it long term, but obviously for you it means income and also potential work experience which will help when job hunting back in your home area.

“If you’re doing that sober there is something wrong with you!”

Here’s a review:

Be warned – this book is very heavy going. It is clearly well researched, but you have to read it slowly. More like an academic thesis than light reading.

In fact, as I think a previous reviewer has said, it isn’t your typical self help book. In fact, if you are looking for a book which will give you practical tips on how to improve your life, or your outlook on life, I doubt that this is the book for you.

The book really has only one central message – participation in “flow” activities tends to make you happy. These are activities that are goal orientated and challenging enough to absorb all your attention such that, when engaged in them, you cease to notice the passage of time. For me, it is playing the violin. For others it may, for example, be art or a challenging sport. They tend to be active rather than passive activities – i.e. producing a painting as opposed to visiting a gallery, making music as opposed to listening to it.

So I guess you can read the book and take away this one nugget of information, or you could take my word for it and spend the time you would have spent reading the book engaging in your favourite “flow” activity instead!

Is this the kind of thing you are trying to describe Mr Nutt?

Maslow also wrote a lot about peak experiences too.

Absolutely love this vid – excellent.

A couple of articles which may or may not be of help. The Planetary Boundaries article was also published in Nature. My blog has a better graphic you can download:

http://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/researchnews/tippingtowardstheunknown/thenineplanetaryboundaries.4.1fe8f33123572b59ab80007039.html

http://www.stockholmresilience.org/download/18.8615c78125078c8d3380002197/ES-2009-3180.pdf

EDIT – wrong url!

http://www.eea.europa.eu/soer/synthesis/synthesis

I think people have already come up with your idea. It’s called The Houses of Parliament 🙁

I’m selling my dark blue 1.4 Vauxhall Meriva in March, c. 30,000, ’06 and c. £3K. The back seats fold flat, making it big enough for me to have my bike in the back with both wheels on. Boring but very practical car.

If I may offer an opinion, given your background your blog has the potential to be one I would consider subscribing to, as I would be really interested to hear about your adventures. But right now all I really saw were product reviews. I have all the outdoor kit I need, and am not too sure a blog is a good format for kit reviews. So for now I wont be subscribing as I do not feel a personal need to read about kit, but as I said, I am sure you will potentially have some interesting blog entries in the future about actual adventures.

Also, with wordpress you can add a few more permanent pages. These may help you organise the content into easier to find categories, as I have done with my own wordpress blog[/url].

Quite a few people, including myself, have printed off photo books and these are amazing momentos of what are often very memorable years! Some days you may have quiet or uninspirational pics, but when you see the flow of your life like that it really is interesting (for you anyway).

Brakes – no – you can start it whenever you like. We also have One Photo Every Week for people who want to either enter their best photo, or have a photo blog of their year, or who may not be up for the challenge of one photo every day..

I myself did one photo every day in 2009 and 2010, but am just doing One Photo Every Week this year.

(You have to be a member of the One Photo Every Week to see the photos I have submitted as they are set to private).

Philsequencer?

Boo Ragleys

The Dawes

SantanaCruz

etc (can’t think of any more bike/music puns)

Heh – well you will want to be my friend even more when I tell you another project I am working on is a proposal to help the Brazilian government prepare for the world cup 🙂

But yeah – we digress from the Channel 4 stuff.

I said ‘average’ STWers, Simon.

Well just to complete the circle I could be potentially working on a documentary about Brazil and the UK (and maybe narrating too) which could well be shown back in the UK so you can all critique that one!

I spose you could do a fly on the wall doc about the lives of yer average STWers

Speak for yourself – I feel there could be an element of projection here 🙂

I am in Brazil – the state where we live is in a state of emergency in some parts, but not our city. It is terrible watching the news as there are still many many people searching for their relatives, so from what I can see the death toll could be much higher.

Sao Paulo is also in a state of chaos in the poor areas. There has been severe flooding there too, but in a city of 20 million, there is so much concrete that the rain has nowhere to go, and many parts of the city are just one big sewer.

The Brazilian people are all helping out. Many people have no food, water, electricity or electricity, and many places are still cut off. The Brazilian army are helping out, but it is still pretty dire. I know there are terrible things happening in Australia, but it is really heart breaking over in Brazil – and the news is showing nothing else.

I am not too sure how much outside help is needed – it is more a case of getting water and food to the isolated areas that are cut off.

The other thing about Brazil is that many politicians are still in power from the military dictatorship period, and the rich don’t care about the poor. There is still an insane amount of corruption here so you could not be confident that any donations would actually go to the people who need help. But many regular Brazilians are helping out with clothes donations etc.

Some real jungle music

And an absolutely classic Brazilian tune. Check the table with booze!

A review of the book says one of the trials was having his knob pushed back inside his body. I think even I would stop short of volunteering for that one! 😯

I use wordpress and really like the functionality. Although it is really for blogging, you can chose from many templates, and have permanent pages too, with photos.

Although you will end up with a web address along the lines of mountainbiking.wordpress.com, you can then buy your own web url.

I used http://www.fasthosts.co.uk, and they have a very easy interface for redirecting domains, but there are many other companies too.

So for example, if you click on http://www.transitionconsciousness.org it will take you to my wordpress blog which is http://transitionconsciousness.wordpress.com.

Easy really.

I’d definitely go to one of his talks.

I have heard good things about his book Tribe which was him talking and describing all the things about the documentary that were sometimes deemed not suitable for television. A friend read it and said he provides some really interesting commentaries on various episodes. I missed much of the series, maybe as I was in Gibraltar or something, so may well get the DVD and book some time.

I’m still here but not posting much as I am not biking right now. iPlayer does not work in Brazil so I can’t watch this which is a shame as I would have liked to.

I have a friend Lucy who is an accomplished jews harpist, as are her father and two uncles. One of her uncles arranges school exchanges between students in a part of Siberia called Yakultia which is one of the main regions for the jews harp.

I was lucky enough to have met Spiridon, one of the world’s most accomplished players, and who is also a Siberian shaman when he was invited to the UK by Lucy’s family a few years ago. Shamanism there is alive and well, but as is always the case, is often not well represented on television.

I am a fan of Bruce Parry but obviously the television series are highly edited affairs designed for mass viewing, and not necessarily able to really offer anything other than a superficial treatment of shamanic use of natural plant hallucinogens.

My dissertation for my masters degree was on ayahuasca, of which Parry took in Peru, but again this episode was only covered in one part of one of the Amazon episodes.

Obviously I know that most of you have no experience of these, in terms of gong through the shamanic initiations that apprentice shaman have to go through when they are learning the mysteries of these medicines, but what I was trying to do with my dissertation, and also the book I have written but is yet to find a publisher, is to really start to document the progression of experiences in an academically acceptable manner, and also to really ground the phenomenology in deeper quantum theory, which for me involves noting just how “shamanic” the quantum physics and framework of wholeness of the late David Bohm is.

I am also hoping to present at an up and coming conference at Kent University on psychedelics, but until then we only really have Bruce Parry who is trying to offer an honest picture of tribes and indigenous cultures around the world, and I for one, despite the limitations, feel he is doing a pretty good job of it 🙂

Just been watching Arsenal v Man City with my girlfriend in a very wet Brazil but still here occasionally! 😀

On the whole they are not that good, but there is a tourist map that is not too bad, but of course local knowledge will help 🙂

Bikefax Southern Spain has some good local routes including Mijas.

Here is a route a few km south of Rhonda:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/simonralli/sets/72157616582300985/

There is another route that goes from there down to Marbella, also described in the Bikefax book.

The good thing about Rhonda is that when you get there you will be able to buy an Ordnance Survey style map of the region and this also has a large number of bike routes on it. As well as rocky singletrack there will also be plenty of big rides with brilliant views type riding.

Well the only reason I am in possession of the magazine is that my flight to Brazil got cancelled in the snow chaos so yesterday my Mum went and bought some last minute small pressies, of which the magazine was one, to make up for the fact that I was not on a beach with my girlfriend sipping Caiprinhas 😥

Is that Ton on the back cover on the orange? (Serious question – it looks a bit like him?)

Yeah but you will have to buy it off people straight out of A Clockwork Orange!

I do. But then I also love reading a lot about both the history of all Christian ceremonies, and how they are derived/plaigarised/have hijacked the older pagan ceremonies, and also how many Biblical stories are adaptations of much older Sumarian stories. Oh, and it is also interesting to look at all the saviour/resurection myths and see just how much commonality there is, for example between Christ/Quezatcoatl/Mithrais/Dionysus/Krishna/Pythagoras/Zoroaster you name it.

I am more a winter solstice kind of person really.

Oh I haven’t forgotten that I am meant to be organising something – stay tuned for an update some time in March 😀