<<October 6, 2007>>
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Cynthia Beal
Natural Burial Company
PO Box 11191
Portland, Oregon 97211-0191
Telephone: 503-442-1430
cabeal@naturalburialcompany.com
http://www.beatree.com
http://www.naturalburialcompany.com
Yaman Barlas, Ph.D.
Professor, Industrial Engineering Dept.
Bogazici University
34342 Bebek, Istanbul, TURKEY
Tel. +90-212-359 7073
Fax. +90-212-265 1800
ybarlas@boun.edu.tr
http://www.ie.boun.edu.tr/~barlas
SESDYN Group: http://www.ie.boun.edu.tr/labs/sesdyn/
Dear Cynthia:
(1) Many thanks for your very interesting msg (ATTACHMENT I).
I am taking the liberty of admitting you into our list and
distributing this msg to its members (about 2,500).
I first of all sincerely thank you for your reading the following paper
thoroughly;
Takeshi Utsumi, GLOSAS/USA
"Globally Collaborative Environmental Peace Gaming (GCEPG)"
http://tinyurl.com/k2c7a
BTW, this is the closing chapter of our following book;
Global Peace Through The Global University System
Tapio Varis -
Takeshi Utsumi - William Klemm (Eds.)
University of Tampere, Finland 2003
ISBN 951-44-5695-5
The entire contents of this book can be retrieved at;
http://tinyurl.com/kofpf
In the bottom line of this page, you can find the
following;
ÒInterview with Takeshi UtsumiÓ by Parker Rossman
http://tinyurl.com/fnxxt
You may also be interested in the following paper which is the opening chapter
of its Part II;
Takeshi Utsumi, P. Tapio Varis, and W. R. Klemm
"Creating Global University System"
http://tinyurl.com/sfgm7
(2) The variation of and initiation of the above GCEPG project is;
Quantitative Policy Analysis of Global Socio-Economic-Energy-Environment
Development (GSEEED) Project
http://preview.tinyurl.com/337nrn
(3) It is said that all human come out of soil, and hence have to go back to
soil.
Your idea of making our dead buried body to fertilize tree so that it would
absorb carbon dioxide to remedy global warming and produce oxygen which our
next generation would breeze is very intriguing, indeed. This is, in a
sense, to let us enabling to contribute to fauna and flora forever in global
scale!!
I browse through your
two web sites with great interest.
This idea reminded me the work by the 2004 Nobel Peace
Laureate, Dr. Wangari
Maathai of Kenya.
(3) It would be very interesting to make quantitative analysis of your idea
with a simulation modeling, though some of factors might be rather difficult
for such quantification — some of which you have already aptly identified
as;
ÒThe equation is very difficult to model, as
there is the issue of the proper TPA (trees per acre), the rates of birth and
death, both natural and artificially foreshortened, the rates of cultural (and
economic) adaptation to the idea or practice of natural burial, the rate that
religions might either embrace or prohibit it, the rate of divestiture of
corporations from current technologies like cremation or production economies
such as the conventional non-biodegradable casket burial, the species of tree,
the likelihood of available landmass given other resource pressures, the
lifetime of the tree, the rainfall, the condition of the soil web, the need of
some populations to use the trees for food or shelter or heat, etc.Ó
ÒGiven my total lack of training, I still like to think about
how, at a 1.2% death rate, with replacement trees being planted at a density of
approximately 50 TPA average overall, and with 2/3 of the species being short
lived - (under 50 years, dense TPA) and in some form of productive agricultural
rotation, and 1/3 of the species living a natural life of 100-300 years
(chaordic TPA), that there would be some sort of fluid equation that
could suggest a sort of carbon storage cycle that might help us better grasp
the time scale of re-terraforming the environment to mitigate the atmospheric
destabilization our lifestyles seem to be amplifying.Ó
ÒI would love to be able to tell people that if _____ numbers of
us converted to natural burial at the end of our statistically probable
lifetimes, we'd achieve a particular tree-replanting rate that would balance
____ amount of our carbon load. If it proved to be half as much as we needed in
a 50 years or so, we could start planting a tree for every birth, as well. If
the equation showed we needed 10 trees to be planted at every birth for 25
years in order to jumpstart the process, why then perhaps we'd see that happen,
too. And if it became very important to plant a tree for every person who has
died but was NOT buried with a tree, because your numbers showed how quickly
our forests might return under that program, then I would hope that people who
have died in war and disease will not have died completely in vain, especially
if they are each remembered in some forest somewhere with a tree (or 100 of
them).Ó
(4) You may then start constructing the following cause-and-effect diagram out
of the inter-relations of factors you mentioned above <http://preview.tinyurl.com/yp2eg7>;
This was drawn by Prof. Barlas, who is a world renowned
expert on System Dynamic simulation modeling.
(5) You may insert/add your factors around the population sector, which may be
included in the population sector of the following (or similar one later) <http://preview.tinyurl.com/ysreo3>,
which was constructed by Prof. Forrester of M.I.T.;
(6) You may then start reading some
of introductory materials about how to construct a simulation model;
"System Dynamics and K-12 Teachers" (D-4665-4.SD&K-12
teachers.pdf) (1 MBytes),
http://web.mit.edu/sdg/www/D-4665-5.SD&K-12%20teach2-s.pdf
This was written by Prof. Jay W. Forrester, the originator of the System
Dynamics methodology, at the M.I.T., who was once my professor in late 1960s
— you can access other materials written by him at;
Articles on System Dynamics by Prof. Jay W. Forrester
http://preview.tinyurl.com/2svgts
According to him, K-12 school teachers are vigorously using System Dynamic
simulation models as making such models even out of ShakespeareÕs stories.
(7) We are now about to initiate GSEEED project mentioned in the Item (2)
above.
I will ask our colleagues of various countries to include your idea in their
national simulation model. Although our first attention would be on the
energy security, its usage is certainly related to the population growth,
which, in turn, would be closely related to the death rate. At that
point, we may consult with you. We may then be able to produce forecasting
curves of the number of trees and the amount of their producing oxygen.
(8) I greatly appreciate knowing your idea, and letÕs keep in touch.
Best, Tak
ATTACHMENT
I
From: Cynthia
Beal <cabeal@naturalburialcompany.com>
Reply-To: <cabeal@naturalburialcompany.com>
Date: Fri, 05 Oct 2007 20:51:46 -0700
To: <utsumi@columbia.edu>
Subject: Peace Game with trees and people - an equation to write and solve
Dear Dr.
Utsumi,
I just read your paper "Globally Collaborative Environmental Peace
Gaming" posted online. Although I can't begin to claim I understood it
all, parts of it I appreciated it very much.
One concept that struck me as relevant to my work was in your
"Anticipated Difficulties" section, wherein you discussed the
importance
of the forest. You wrote:
"Oxygen is extremely vital to sustain most of the life forms on earth.
Global warming due to greenhouse effect is caused by carbon dioxide gas
emitted by human activities. Carbon dioxide is converted back to oxygen
by plants. Amazon rain forest is said to cover, by acreage, 20 % of
world total forest. If the Amazon forest will be denuded by thrash and
burn cultivation technique, all human will be choked to death with the
lack of sufficient oxygen. Namely, Amazon rain forest is the vital
treasure for our human's survival in the future. This is one of our
major reasons why we are forging ahead to create a GUS/Amazon/Brazil
which will be centered at the University of Amazonia as mentioned above,
so that they can host a Beowulf mini supercomputer with their region's
socio-economic-environmental simulation model (Utsumi, T., et al, 2003)."
In my daily life, I am currently working to promote natural burial -
what this means to me is that when I (or anyone else wanting this) dies,
we are buried in the earth naturally and a tree is planted over us,
using our bodies for food so that it can get a head start in its carbon
sequestration/oxygen replacement task in the biosphere.
This is relevant to your work because I have a modeling problem and it
is hindering my ability to share what I think are important features of
the idea of "being a tree" in a memorial forest (that supplies the
same
amount of biospheric-support as a non-memorial forest does).
I would like to know how to figure out how beneficial it would be to
humankind if some portion of us were returned to the earth, at our
natural death rate, and established as some particular species of tree.
It seems like your global computer system of people and machines could
do that, and there might be some service to humanity in solving for this
problem.
The equation is very difficult to model, as there is the issue of the
proper TPA (trees per acre), the rates of birth and death, both natural
and artificially foreshortened, the rates of cultural (and economic)
adaptation to the idea or practice of natural burial, the rate that
religions might either embrace or prohibit it, the rate of divestiture
of corporations from current technologies like cremation or production
economies such as the conventional non-biodegradable casket burial, the
species of tree, the likelihood of available landmass given other
resource pressures, the lifetime of the tree, the rainfall, the
condition of the soil web, the need of some populations to use the trees
for food or shelter or heat, etc.
However, it strikes me that if a case for natural burial with tree
replacement could be made, and it could be demonstrated that the our
atmospheric carbon could eventually be balanced in part against the
human deathrate/lifespan, then a certain working equilibrium could be
suggested, a structure around which other stabilizing forces in our
environment could also gather, and that might provide some sort of
constant around which other more random balancers could grow to help us
get a 'planetary thermostat' if you will, pegging the carbon formula to
something more tangible that we can all see. It could become like a
"gold standard" - a non-falsifiable physical constant against which
other more intangible and less predictable 'carbon mitigators' could
also be measured.
I do some public education on natural burial, but I can only speak from
an intuitive grasp of the likelihood of its eventual practicality. I
have no formal training in any of the disciplines this sort of
speculation would require. This equation is too hard for me to figure
out. I can only describe it and if I make the mistake of doing so,
everyone's eyes roll. That doesn't stop me from wanting to have some
concrete numbers to back my intuitions, however.
"Another Chinese proverb says, "Acquiring knowledge is a joy, and
sharing knowledge is an ultimate joy.""
Given my total lack of training, I still like to think about how, at a
1.2% death rate, with replacement trees being planted at a density of
approximately 50 TPA average overall, and with 2/3 of the species being
short lived - (under 50 years, dense TPA) and in some form of productive
agricultural rotation, and 1/3 of the species living a natural life of
100-300 years (chaordic TPA), that there would be some sort of fluid
equation that could suggest a sort of carbon storage cycle that might
help us better grasp the time scale of re-terraforming the environment
to mitigate the atmospheric destabilization our lifestyles seem to be
amplifying.
I would love to be able to tell people that if _____ numbers of us
converted to natural burial at the end of our statistically probable
lifetimes, we'd achieve a particular tree-replanting rate that would
balance ____ amount of our carbon load. If it proved to be half as much
as we needed in a 50 years or so, we could start planting a tree for
every birth, as well. If the equation showed we needed 10 trees to be
planted at every birth for 25 years in order to jumpstart the process,
why then perhaps we'd see that happen, too. And if it became very
important to plant a tree for every person who has died but was NOT
buried with a tree, because your numbers showed how quickly our forests
might return under that program, then I would hope that people who have
died in war and disease will not have died completely in vain,
especially if they are each remembered in some forest somewhere with a
tree (or 100 of them).
But I won't let myself get anymore carried away. I'm sure you get the
picture.
Your words again:
"The next phase of the Internet development with global neural (or grid)
computer network should be the globally collaborative experiential
learning and constructive creation of wisdom with interactive actions on
virtual reality simulation models of joint global research and
development projects on various subjects mentioned above. "
Thank you for reading this. Feel free to forward the suggestion (or
simply convey it) to anyone you think might like such a project. I don't
know if such a project would even interest you, or if you know of
someone who might find it compelling, but if it does I'd look forward to
hearing the results of such a calculation someday. I believe there are
enormous benefits to knowing this set of numbers (or at least the
approach to them) and helping humanity grasp it as a concept.
It would certainly make my presentations easier.
Thanks again for your time and attention.
Sincerely,
Cynthia Beal
http://www.beatree.com
"Be a Tree, the Manual for Turning Yourself into a Forest"
Natural Burial Company
http://www.naturalburialcompany.com
Portland, Oregon USA
*******************************************************************************
* Takeshi Utsumi, Ph.D., P.E., Chairman, GLOSAS/USA
*
* (GLObal Systems Analysis and Simulation Association in the U.S.A.)
*
* Laureate of Lord Perry Award for Excellence in Distance Education
*
* Founder and V.P. for Technology and Coordination of
*
* Global University System (GUS)
*
* 43-23 Colden Street, Flushing, NY 11355-5913, U.S.A.
*
* Tel: 718-939-0928; Email: utsumi@columbia.edu
*
* http://www.itu.int/wsis/goldenbook/search/display.asp?Quest=8032562&lang=en
*
* http://www.friends-partners.org/GLOSAS/
*
* Tax Exempt ID: 11-2999676
*
*******************************************************************************