I’ve uploaded (assuming that everything has gone well) some audio files. There’s a couple of calls to prayer and what I believe is the first sura in the Q’uran. Let me tell you, this is how a religious text should be, it can be downright beautiful. Unfortunetly, I’ve never heard anyone quite as good as this here. I think this guy is from Egypt and I think he’s pretty good. Anyway, let me know if there are any problems…
My housemate came back from the internet cafe in a rotten mood. He had been reading the news and it made him really upset. The cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are swelling to over 2 trillion dollars, and some people estimate that we reached “peak oil” reserves 3 years ago… OK, the wars are a disaster, and I don’t know what else to do but get mad about that, but peak oil? What a crock.
The idea behind peak oil is “OMG, there’s less oil available, we’re screwed!” That’s a summary of the stance, and I think it’s pretty accurate. It’s ridiculous on a couple different levels. We’ll never run out of oil. That’s right we will never run out of oil. There’s a couple of reasons for that. The concept of peak oil was first brought up in the early 1900s. It was observed that there was not enough oil for the then current needs to be met in 10 years time. Well, guess what, more reserves were found. In more recent times, peak oil was again a worry. There wasn’t enough oil to go around in the decades to come! Well then the shale sand up in Canada added another source of oil, and when the price of oil rose above $50 a barrel, Venezuela’s reserves went online. They went from a minor player in the petroleum market to having the largest reserves in the world within the space of 10 years.
So, as prices rise, more and more oil is found. That’s one reason not to worry too much about running out of oil. Another reason is that when “Peak oil” theories are thrown around, they are talking about the “light sweet crude” grade of oil. That is the stuff that has the least amount of junk in it and is the easiest to refine into various useful products. There is an enormous amount of “sour” reserves. That’s oil with more impurities in it. Last I heard, the reserves of these sour grades is almost unimaginable. At some point, it will be economical to use these grades with more refining instead of the light sweet crude.
OK, so reserves keep growing as prices go up. That’ll be fine for the foreseeable future. If additional refining is needed, and nothing interferes, the cost of that refining will be minimized through compitition. There is a finite amount of oil in the ground, and we do use it at a much faster rate than it is created, there’s no getting around that. That part of the peak oil theory is basicly correct, although I think that it’s blown way out of proportion. The part of peak oil that drives me crazy is the tacit belief that we’ll just stand around and watch the oil be used up until it’s all gone. The idea is that we’ll run out of oil and the entire world will grind to a halt. The people that worry about this really don’t understand how markets work. As the price gets higher and higher, new ways will be found to find oil, new ways to conserve oil will be found (thus conserving the existing supply), and substitutes will be found. There are already substitutes available in the form of electricity and alternative fuels. This is why we’ll never run out of oil. At some point it will be so expensive that no one will want to use it. There will be a transition to some other type or types of fuel and oil, like whale oil, will be a historical curiosity.
All of the peak oil gnashing of teeth is really fear of change and a general distrust of people and their ability to adapt and thrive. It’s a really unnecessary and, IMO, obnoxious abject pessimism. Things will change, people will figure out how to use something else. Environmentalists the world over should be cheering the rise in oil prices, it’s the quickest way to have alternative fuels become viable. Where’s Julian Simon when you need him?
tags technorati : economics peak oil julian simon alternative energy
The annual book fair is going on at the Yemen Expo Center. It’s an interesting affair. Vendors have come in from all over the gulf area. Saudi, Kuwaiti, and Emeratian, plus maybe some from other places as well. The book selection was noticeably different than what I’ve seen in the west. Most of the place was filled with textbooks and religious writings. There were a fair number of children’s vendors as well. There was a heavy concentration on learning English in many booths, and there were even some English titles available. Oddly enough, I saw at least 3 booths filled with medical models, various types of internal anatomy and what looked like CPR dummies. I have no idea what they were doing there.
I had to buy some stuff of course. I can’t be around that many books and not buy anything. I got a couple Qran recitation cds, I got my requisite Qran (I can’t be in a Yemeni book fair and not get a Qran) and a few English titles. My Qran is pretty nice, although I did see some nicer ones. They have running commentaries alongside the suras. I decided not to get one of those since I don’t know my commentators at all.
The English titles they had available were impressive. They were for people studying English, the English speaking population isn’t big enough to support a dedicated market. A local asked me, in broken English, if I could make a suggestion for him. He explained that he was studying English and was midway through his course. He showed me a book called “The great cave” or something like that. It was sealed so I couldn’t get a feel for the content, but it looked like a “young adult” book. I would guess the target age was 11-13 years old in the states. Then he showed me the other book he was thinking about getting, “A Tale of Two Cities.” Hmmm, I like to encourage people to read the classics, but he was having trouble asking me which book I thought he should get. As diplomatically as possible, I told him that Dickens uses an older style of English and that it might be a little difficult for him.
They didn’t just have Dickens there either. They had a slew of Shakespeare, the Bronte sisters, Austen, and a few more. I picked up a copy of “Dubliners,” a book that I would be astounded if any Yemeni could understand. My favorite purchase had to be D.H. Lawrence’s “Women in Love.” I have never read any of his stuff before, and I have no idea if I’ll like it. I bought the book because of the delicious irony of finding what must be an incredibly haraam work at the Yemen book fair. Maybe this is a book about innocent love, but the title and the author’s reputation makes me think that’s unlikely. Anyway, I’ve got some new things to read, things that I would never have thought of finding here…
My teacher started today with a discussion about William Shakespeare. I can’t remember how we got on the topic, he might have brought it up. Anyway, after I talked for a while about how we studied him in high school and which plays I had seen and/or read, he told me about a popular theory here. There are some that believe that Bill’s ancestors came from Yemen! The evidence? C’mon, Sheik-spear? Seriously, some people believe that before Islam showed up, people dispersed from Yemen all over the world, including William’s ancestors. I asked to make sure I was understanding this right, that his family members would hold on to the name “Sheik-something” for a 1000 years. “Right!” Right….
One other thing that came up with Adel yesterday is how he viewed Jesus. Moslems consider Jesus (Issa, PBUH in Arabic) to be the 2nd most important prophet behind Mohammed (PBUH). Adel believes that Jesus was sent to correct the followers of Moses and that Mohammed (PBUH) was sent to correct the mistakes of the followers of Jesus. I have a slightly different take. If I assume that Mohammed (PBUH) really was a prophet, I think that there might have been something else going on than “correcting” the Christians. After all, it’s my understanding that most Arabs were not Christians when Mohammed (PBUH) started to preach, they were polytheists. It took some time before there was contact with a Christian nation, so when did the “correction” start? I think that God may have sent another prophet because the Arabs were not (and are not) able to respect, let alone worship, anyone they perceive as weak.
Even the Bible mentions the stereotypical Arab mentality when it describes the descendants of Ishmael. In Genesis 16:12 it says (referring to Ishmael), “This son of yours will be a wild man, as untamed as a wild donkey! He will raise his fist against everyone, and everyone will be against him. Yes, he will live in open hostility against all his relatives.” To be fair, the bedouin life was pretty tough, and lead to some tough people. By all accounts, the people that Mohammed had to deal with were a little rough and tumble, and there’s still a lot of that kind of attitude around today. The stereotypical Arab (and there’s always a grain of truth in stereotypes) is quick to anger, prone to vengeful thoughts, and doesn’t hesitate to judge. It shouldn’t be any surprise that the concepts of self sacrifice, pacifism, forgiveness, and subjecting oneself to persecution does not sit too well with a lot of people over here. The culture that has been developed over millennia has systematically disparaged the the core teachings of Christianity.
Instead of “correcting” Christians, I believe that Mohammed (PBUH) was sent to the Arabs so that they could channel their culture into useful and good purposes. That hasn’t always worked out of course (name one religion that has) but I believe that the overall impact on the Arab culture has been a positive one. There are many Christians that would like nothing more than the entire middle east to be converted to Christianity. That thought has some appeal, but aside from the obvious problems, I just don’t think that it’s realistic to expect Christianity to be persuasive in this culture.
One of the things that has stuck with me from my Buddhist studies is the concept of “skillful means.” In that context, a Buddha can teach in a way that makes sense to that person in order to lead them to enlightenment. They were adamant that there wasn’t one way of doing that, there were an infinite number of ways. I don’t think that it’s unreasonable to think that God does the same thing. Or maybe actually is the same thing… Anyway, I’m willing to believe that some messages will be accepted by some people and not by others. And I’m also willing to believe that none of us have the complete picture, none of us is capable of it. So different people get different glimpses and do the best they can with things that make sense for them…
Adel (my teacher) and I were talking about various things between Christianity and Islam today. One thing that came up was how the Bible was constructed. He had actually heard of the Apocrypha but didn’t really understand what they were. Ooog, I gave up trying to explain in Arabic and did the best I could. I’ve found that teaching is the best way to learn how much you really know. I have had several instances when a question was asked and my first reaction was, “I don’t know that..” but with a little reflection it turned out that I did, I just hadn’t thought of it before.
His question about the Apocrypha brought a lot of loose ends together in my head… I explained that for a long time, there wasn’t a single text that Christians based their faith on, there were many texts that purported to tell some of the story. What has become known as the Catholic (and guess the Orthodox) church had ecunenical councils in 692 (the so called Quinisext council) and the more famous council of Trent in 1545 to determine what books were orthodox and which were not. They based this decision on the practices of the church which supposedly had been passed down from Peter and the rest of the Apostles down to the present day. They already had an idea of what was orthodox, the church had its practices down and the Bible was going to reflect those practices. When the Bible was put together, it was corroborating the church’s practices. I’m sure that the people involved at the time would never have thought to try to understand the Bible separate from the church’s beliefs and practices.
Of course when the Reformation came along, the attempt was made to strip the Bible from the church that created it. Nowadays, a basic article of faith in most Protestant churches is that the Bible is the word of God and infallible. But I’ve never heard of any serious attempt to reexamine what books make up the Bible despite the fact that the newer churches don’t look or practice anything like the Catholics.
Here’s where my issues come into play. I really don’t think that the Bible is complete without the background that the church brings to the table (as the Orthodox and Catholics believe from the teachings of the Apostles). This is totally missing from the Protestant churches, and I can’t really take them seriously. On the other hand, I have issues with the Catholic and Orthodox churches. So Adel asked me, “So which is it? The book or the church?” Of course it’s neither for me. I gotta believe that there’s some truth in both, but that neither by themselves pass “The smell test” and that in combination they (IMO) reek of humanity and have very little holiness in them. Adel was of the opinion that I was going to have to choose a church, I don’t think that’s true. Things have been going just fine without having to rely on a book or an organization completely, and until that changes, I don’t see why I should have to subjugate myself to something that I can’t believe…
My teacher was telling me about some of his experiences when he went on Haj. That is the pilgrimage that all muslims should take to Mecca if they can. He, his wife, and his mother all went together by bus. When they got to the Saudi border, the men and the women were separated into different busses. From that point onwards, the only time he could actually be in the presence of his wife and mother was in the main mosque in Mecca, everywhere else it was forbidden for the sexes to mingle. There were even separate hotels for the men and the women, even though he was married to one of them. The idea was that he needed to be protected from seeing any other man’s wife, it might incite lust in him…
It gets better than that, he learned of some real bizarre practices by some Whabis. There are apparently hadiths (Islamic writings used by the faithful to guide their practice) against men hugging or kissing their sisters or daughters because of the fear of arousing sexual feelings. Also, if a husband and wife have sex, it must be in total darkness. To be fair, I think that the orthodox Jews have similar restrictions, or at least the ultra orthodox Hasidim do… Here’s my favorite one, some people believe that it is dangerous for women to chop cucumbers or carrots. Yes, it’s for the reason that you think. How twisted is that? Actually, it wouldn’t surprise me if they don’t want women to cut those vegetables due to fear of them getting vengeful ideas in their heads…
At some point you have to wonder if all of these restrictions have the opposite effect. Instead of avoiding lustful thoughts, people will get the idea that every single thing can, and does relate to sex and sexual feelings. By keeping it in the forefront all the time, they may be twisting people more than protecting them.
We talked a little about the treatment of women in Saudi, you know its repressive if a Yemeni thinks they are crazy. It wasn’t too long ago that the law in Saudi allowed women to go to school and work unescorted, but many people do not approve of these laws. My teacher is constantly pained by the idea that people world wide associate wahabism with muslims in general. As a matter of fact, I have yet to meet a single muslim that didn’t think that the wahabis are crazy. Unfortunately, I think that many people do think of wahabis when they think of muslims, especially in the US. It’s too bad… My teacher believes that the reason that the Arab world is in such bad shape is because God is punishing them for the actions of the Wahabis. Now there’s something to think about….
I don’t know what my problem is, no matter what time I go to bed, I can only rouse myself at noon. I’m blaming ramadan for this, I’m still sleeping on a ramadan schedule. It took me a couple of weeks to get into it, and I guess it’ll take a couple of weeks to get out of it as well… Luckily, my class isn’t until 4, so there hasn’t been too many problems. Of course the diretor of the school leaves at around noonish, so I’ll have to drag my carcass out of bed at the crack of 10 O’clock one morning so I can pay him.
So I was still having trouble with my ATM card. I had verified the transactions that I had made, but the next time I used it, I was refused again. I called up the bank and they explained that I was OK by them, but that VISA had put the card into the fraud investigation category. My bank put me in touch with VISA, I answered their questions and was told that I was now clear to use the card. OK, so that night I go to the ATM and… it was refused again. Grrrr… So I called again today, was told that VISA had put a hold on the card for the fraud investigation. I mentioned that I had already jumped through VISA’s hoops, the lady on the other end did some clicking away at her keyboard and confirmed that I had done it, but the guy that had been helping me neglected to pass the info along to the necessary person to clear the card. So I answered a few more questions successfully and the lady said that the card would be ready to use in 5 or six minutes and there was nothing else for me to do. I thanked her and then told her that I would stay on the line until she told me that the card was ready. That did the trick. A couple of minutes later, she informed me that the entire process was completed. Tonight I went back to the ATM and… Success!! Whew! Now I can proceed to spend all of my money…
My teacher and I had another interesting chat today. The concept of interest came up for some reason and I asked him how Islamic banks get around the prohibition on usury. Turns out that is a sore subject with him. The way he explained it, if you give the bank money and you earn a certain percent interest on it, that is harram (forbidden). But if you give the money to the bank and they agree to give you a certain amount more back after they complete a transaction, that is OK by Islamic bank standards because it is directly tied to another transaction. My teacher feels (quite correctly I think) that it doesn’t matter, the bank customer is earning interest in both cases and so it should be harram in both cases.
We then started talking about banks in the US. He was blown away by the idea that I rarely handled actual cash back home. I had direct deposit and I used an ATM card for most transactions. “But it’s just numbers, how do you know that you have the money?” That sounds like a strange question, but coming from someone in a cash economy, it’s a logical one. “If you wanted a million dollars in cash, could you get it from your bank?” Needless to say, the concept of fractional reserve banking was incomprehensible to him. To be fair, a lot of Americans have never heard of this and get a little nervous when they find out that the bank doesn’t actually have all of it’s money in cash. It was a challenge trying to differentiate between M1 and M2 in Arabic, I’m not sure if I suceeded… The concept of bank runs came up and so I tried to explain the great depression, bank runs, the FDIC, etc. All in all, it was quite a work out for my Arabic, and I was told a fair number of new words.
The upshot of all of this is that not so many people keep their money, or at least a large part of their money in a bank here. Either they worry about religious obligations, or they just do not trust the banks. There is no insurance here, and without earning interest, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to put their money in a bank. People that have a lot of money and are worried about the prohibition on earning interest simply invest their money in land and businesses. I get the feeling that a lot of the people with money aren’t so worried about religious problems with earning interest, maybe that’s why they are rich, and the rest of the country is pretty poor. If there isn’t a good reason to save your money (i.e. making money off of it) then there is a powerful incentive to simply spend it all. It’s almost impossible to create any wealth at all if there isn’t much saving going on. The straightforward prohibition helps explain a lot of the poverty in this part of the world. Money should be able to work for you without you having to monitor every single aspect of your investments. But what can they do? It’s a very explicit command, there isn’t any wiggle room. It sucks that they have to choose between adhering to their religion and following a sound method of wealth creation.