Every voice matters - the climate march in Knaresborough

It would have been lazy not to turn up, so checked the local options, to find that the nearest were at Newcastle or Knaresborough.

For those who don't know, Knaresborough is a small, pretty, historic town close to Ripon in North Yorkshire. It's a polite, quiet, well-mannered kind of town. Nice castle ruins, several nice pubs and coffee shops. Not exactly a hotbed of climate action passion, you would think.

But around 100 people turned up, including the local Green Party candidate for next year's election, Shan Oakes, who did most of the organising, by the look of things, and has posted some pictures here. The Canon of Ripon Cathedral, (didn't get your, name, sorry your reverence) was a prominent presence in his red garb, and gamely supported and joined in.

There were a couple of local church groups, a substantial anti-fracking group, and various others, including a number of ordinary Joes like you know who.

For a while it looked like the march was going to fizzle out before it started, when it was suggested that the numbers were too small to bother with the marching, but with a very little persuasion, it was clear that everyone very much wanted to march, so off we set from the castle green to the Town Hall, via the High Street, providing some small inconvenience for a few people in the traffic that built up behind us.

What was most impressive was the noise. These polite, terribly British (undemonstrative) marchers made a lot of noise, loud and proud, all the way back from the Town Hall to the Market Square, where after a few talks several folks headed of to the local parish for tea with the vicar - er -  canon.

It was a small gesture, as gestures go, but it was a part of a much bigger gesture, and clear that almost everywhere there are people who care enough about the future to give up their Sunday, stand up, and get counted.

Two police officers kept us company; thanks to them the march looked quite official, so gratitude for their forbearance.

Next up? back to the other bits of life for a day or two.

The Scottish Question

I was born in Scotland (Dundas Street in Edinburgh). My birth mother is a Scot. Both my adoptive parents were Scots, from Glasgow and Aberdeen - father claimed lineage from the MacKinnons of Skye. Grandparents, uncles, aunts, etc - all Scots. At one time, the family owned Glasgow's biggest butcher's business. I last visited Scotland in July, Inverness, to be precise. I live about an hour away from the border.

But I was not brought up in Scotland. I don't speak with a Scots accent and I don't live (nor ever have) in Scotland, so I have no say in Scotland's future. No vote for me, in spite of my Scottish name, ancestry and heritage. I am officially as Scottish as the average Canadian.

I can see and understand arguments both for and against independence. My heart encourages romanticism and autonomy, my head considers the history of Scotland prior to Union and I go into a cold sweat. But enough is enough. Here are some thoughts from a real thinker:

 19    Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
 20    Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
 21    To the last syllable of recorded time,
 22    And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
 23    The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
 24    Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
 25    That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
 26    And then is heard no more: it is a tale
 27    Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
 28    Signifying nothing.

that but this blow
  5   Might be the be-all and the end-all — here,
  6   But here, upon this bank and shoal of time,
  7   We'd jump the life to come

                                                        Nought's had, all's spent,
  5    Where our desire is got without content;
  6    'Tis safer to be that which we destroy
  7    Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy.

Hey Joe, where you goin’ with that Tesla in your hand?

Some notable environmentalists have been ‘against’ Hydrogen as a possible energy solution for a remarkably long time – Joe Romm’s ‘The Hype About Hydrogen’ goes back ten years now, to 2004. The RMI (Rocky Mountain Institute) isn’t keen. In the meantime, other energy solutions have made progress, in particular, as Romm points out in his recent series on ClimateProgress, in the field of personal transportation. But even on that site, Ryan Koronowski reports on developments at Toyota and Hyundai which look promising (here).

In 2006, Romm’s main criticism was summarised nicely in the Scientific American article ‘Hybrid Vehicles’, and usefully quoted by him in one of his articles;

For policymakers concerned about global warming, plug-in hybrids hold an edge over another highly touted green vehicle technology — hydrogen fuel cells. Plug-ins would be better at utilizing zero-carbon electricity because the overall hydrogen fueling process is inherently costly and inefficient. Any effective hydrogen economy would require an infrastructure that could use zero-carbon power to electrolyze water into hydrogen, convey this highly diffuse gas long distances, and pump it at high pressure into the car -– all for the purpose of converting the hydrogen back to electricity in a fuel cell to drive electric motor.

The entire process of electrolysis, transportation, pumping and fuel-cell conversion would leave only about 20 to 25 percent of the original zero-carbon electricity to drive the motor. In a plug-in hybrid, the process of electricity transmission, charging an onboard battery and discharging the battery would leave 75 to 80 percent of the original electricity to drive the motor. Thus, a plug-in should be able to travel three to four times farther on a kilowatt-hour of renewable electricity than a hydrogen fuel-cell vehicle could.

Summarising the problems that all AFVs have, Joe usefully produces a list:

1. High first cost for vehicle

2. On-board fuel storage issues (i.e. limited range)

3. Safety and liability concerns

4. High fueling cost (compared to gasoline)

5. Limited fuel stations: chicken and egg problem

6. Improvements in the competition (better, cleaner gasoline vehicles).

7. Problems delivering cost-effective emissions reductions

Some recent research, though, has led me to question some of the assumptions which lead away from Hydrogen as a viable energy ‘solution’, and to reach the conclusion that, done in the right way, hydrogen has the potential to help move our society much closer to the ideal ‘zero carbon world’. Here is some of that evidence.

Before the detail, though, I should point out that there is no real disagreement with Romm’s arguments – he knows what he’s talking about – especially in respect to FCVs and FCEVs. And some of his criticisms may need to be fleshed out in more detail later, otherwise this piece could be endless. On the other side of the coin, as with electric hybrid technology, things have moved on a pace, and at least some of the problems are already close to resolution. Hyundai has the new ix35 FCEV, with a range of 360 miles. Nissan has new fuel cell stack technology, as do Hitachi, who are working on CHES storage (Carbon Hydride) amongst other things. There’s a new Honda on the way, too.

The biggest obstruction to generic hydrogen use is the problem of distribution. So let’s get rid of it. Instead of hydrolysing at a distance, follow the Toshiba model (below), and produce locally. As well as being a by-product of some existing factory processes, hydrogen can be produced direct at the site of a wind-farm (which also means the maximal use of the energy generated, in the sense that there is no distribution loss from the transformer to the end-use). A small (but commercially viable) local wind farm will be practicable in plenty of places (though not all – for example in Africa, where the long-term mean annual wind speeds in the centre of the continent just won’t do the job), where anything from 1-50MW capacity local farms will produce electricity almost as cost-effectively as on the really big ‘Texas-scale’ farms. For the majority of the time, the energy from these goes direct to a local ‘island’ or national grid infrastructure for direct use. But there are always times when supply exceeds demand. What to do with the excess? Store it as hydrogen.

Using a suitable piece of engineering, it is simple enough to then transfer the gas, suitably pressurised, into rail tenders purpose built for this. The tenders can then be towed down the line to a rail head or terminal where they can be simply linked up to the rolling stock. This means the expense and consumption implied in Romm’s model is reduced to a sufficiently low level that the relative inefficiencies are compensated for.

This is one area where I think hydrogen has real potential for solving some of the problems Joe and others bring up, in the rail network. Though it is underfunded and still not fully realised, some good work has been going on for years, and several projects are running around the world. Hydrail has a useful links page and some summaries of what is happening here. Or, you could look at this article from Future Rail magazine.

In Japan (where else?), several companies have been working on Hydrogen for a variety of purposes. Toshiba have an ongoing demonstration project in Kitakyushu, in which hydrogen as a by-product of steel production in a nearby factory services homes, fuel stations and local businesses. There’s a promotional demo here, which includes a grumpy kid and a cute puppy, so don’t switch it on if you’re easily nauseated. There’s a lot missing from the demo video, so let’s not pretend that all the answers are there now. But there’s more…

Here’s a pdf of a presentation on the work done recently at Ulsan and Insheon in Korea, with heavy involvement from Hyundai. It’s useful for some real numbers, demonstrations of distribution plans, and the absence of kids and puppies. In upstate New York, GE has a new domestic energy hydrogen research facility working to roll out products by 2017.

Which leads me to the ‘obvious’ link up. If it is possible and effective to generate at a wind farm, store in tenders, and link to the transport (rail) system, could we do the same for personal transportation? I see no reason why not. This is how it might work.

A hydrogen management system is installed (much as an oil tank or gas tank is put in already) outside the home. Solar panels (where wind is not practical) on the garage roof, or the house roof, generate electricity which can be switched on demand to the household system, battery backup systems, the hydrolysis ‘machine’, and, if relevant, the grid. The hydrogen ‘terminal’ contains loadable fuel cell units which can be transferred to a car/auto, a stove, or whatever. Plastic gas pipes can feed into the house, where a combined heating and ventilation system can be operated. There may even be a hose point to feed a car’s storage, so when you get home in the evening, you can fill it up in three minutes. All of the technology to deliver this (with some modification) already exists – nothing new has to be invented. Safety levels are now very high – probably better than domestic propane systems, at a guess – and the renewable energy generated is used where it is needed, when it is needed, without so much wastage or loss.

The novelty here, such as it is, lies in three elements – one, the synthesis of energy needs for the average person – home, heat, transport – two, the transferability of the energy storage medium between uses, and three, the removal or reduction of pretty much all of that list of reasons why it didn’t used to work, in particular the problems of distribution and infrastructure. And so the average Jo or Joe can maintain a modern lifestyle (whilst being energy efficient, of course), independence, and achieve some payback on energy saved, gas saved, utility and domestic costs.

Which leaves three unanswerable issues from the list. The initial cost, which is determined by the cost of technology and demand volume. Improvements in other technologies, which are happening all the time, but can be seen as complementary or alternative solutions which will work better in some cases. And, finally, the achievable cost-effectiveness of the whole package. Which I can’t answer. Because it depends on comparative energy costs, ratio of energy usage, which will vary depending on lifestyles, and other factors which as things stand are incommensurable.

It may not be the final word, but it really is starting to look, to me, like the day of Hydrogen is on the way, if not as the ‘magic bullet’, then at least as another in the mix of energy solutions which will help get us out of this mess.

This is not a review of 'The Bone Clocks' by David Mitchell

Because other writers, experienced reviewers and interested parties, like Ursula K Le Guin in the Guardian (here), will do a decent job of it; though I found the New Yorker's extended piece somewhat over the top, with too much in the way of spoiler, and possibly missing the point, though that's probably just me.

This is a blog about climate change, philosophy, and whatever I say it is about, so why the sudden urge to discuss literature? Like my previous discussion of the writing of James Morrow, the urge is because I think it is pertinent and useful to read David Mitchell (the author, not the comedian, though the comedian is my kind of amusing, too).

If you are reading this because you share my interest in the near future of humanity, read the book, with a focus on the last seventy or so pages, which paints a picture which is both credible and frightening; it contains what is for me the best description to date of what we might expect (included the fascinating but flawed vision offered by Kim Stanley Robinson in the recent '2312' (also worth a read).

The Bone Clocks is connected in a casual but conscious manner to some of Mitchell's previous writings, most notably for me, Cloud Atlas, but also Black Swan Green and The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet. In both novels he plays with time and narrative, and incorporates two themes dear to my heart - the Future in a world changed by a changing climate, social order and politics, and Human Nature, in particular, the struggle to do good in a difficult world.

A part of Mitchell's appeal is that he is covering these subjects in ways which match mine to a large degree, so that, on these matters we share a vision of the future and our role in leading to it. There are times during reading when I stop and find myself thinking 'I could have written this' (which is not a presumption of talent on my part, but a recognition of material). The last time I had similar, regular experience of this was in the 1980's and early 90's, when I read a considerable amount of Michael Moorcock's work, and kept finding myself uncovering a narrative which I had just finished writing in my head a few weeks before - so frequent was this occurrence that it was almost spooky. When I told Moorcock about this, I think it freaked him out slightly, too.

It is interesting to note that the two authors share other features, most particularly, the persistence across time and narrative of certain core characters - metacharacters, consciously so, like Moorcock's Eternal Champion or Jerry Cornelius, or Mitchell's Dr Marinus - and the idea of the persistence of narrative patterns (in this, both are post-modern, post-deconstructionist writers).

Most significant, for this blog, is Mitchell's fairly consistent imagining, glimpsed in the background in Song Mi's story in Cloud Atlas, more fully rounded here in the Bone Clocks, in the later two chapters, set in 2025 and 2042 respectively. It is clear to me that I share something with David Mitchell here - our research, understanding, interpretation of the near future is very closely paralleled. We both imagine a future of bleaker weather, vastly divided social groups, and a strong distinction between life in the remnants of 'civilisation' (drawn out in Mitchell's more distant Shanghai, more proximate Iceland), and the residue of the 'uncontrolled' world, a place of violence and lawlessness. Much of the detail is inferred, hinted at, slightly nebulous - this isn't the epic prose of a vast sci-fi style future vision, but a more subtle, more open-ended imagining.

The other area of interest, and what lift's Mitchell's work into the traditional concept of the literary, is his concern with human nature, and the nature of good and evil. There are touches of this in his earlier work, but in The Thousand Autumns and here, the Bone Clocks, this is a pretty transparent theme. We know this from the presence of the narratives of the Horologists and the Anchorites. We can see it in the moral choices made by all of the characters, to whom (without presuming the author's intention) we can attribute certain internal dynamics which shape our empathy and their moral compass. Holly could said to stand for love, in particular, the love of the family, Hugo for the Ego - he could so easily have stepped out of 'Atlas Shrugg'd' - Crispin as the somewhat detached, ivory-tower self-isolator; they all have moral ambiguities, but there is no question about who the good guys and the bad guys are.

Reviewers (apart from Le Guin) seem to have struggled with the 'fantasy' element of the novel, but few have observed that this is a core metaphor - and Mitchell's decision to spell it out as narrative rather than leave it embedded in the text for the reader to puzzle out, is also a very post-modern approach to the concept of meaning in Narrative, something also featuring in Moorcock's writing. The reader is presented with at least three (I'll be honest, I can't really fathom out Ed's moral position, yet) different human ways of being - the loving, the distant, the selfish - seen in the context of a battle between the non-authoritarian, laissez-faire little acts of salvation undertaken by the Horologists, and the Murderous, self-perpetuating selfishness of the vampiric Anchorites.

There are other interesting sub-metaphors in play here, too ; science/reason vs mysticism, the other vs the self, lives lived conscious of meaning and its absence, engaged in the being lived. There is anough content and suggestion in the story, as there is in Mitchell's other work, to justify (and more or less, in my case, guarantee) a second or third reading.

So, if you want to know where much of my posting is directing itself towards over the past several years, read the book, and get a better, more engaging description than I could ever manage for myself. Just don't expect a happy ending.

Why has Hansen become an 'Advocate'?

One of the reasons its been quiet here is because yours truly has been busy mixing it at the Guardian. Occasionally, the odd little gem has poppped out of the cabbage patch and been reasonably well received.

Just now, someone else left a post on a John Abrahams article (here) which I felt the need to respond to. I'm quite pleased with the result, so here are the two comments:

Smith1867

05 September 2014 5:23pm

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In truth, I prefer the harder science, but frankly these do not get as many page views as the debunking posts.

Is how many page views your blog posts receive what you are interested in? Is that the primary reason for your participation in this blog? If so, then by all means follow more closely to your colleauge's approach. But beware that that is not a scientific blogging approach so much as it is a publicity approach in a sciency genre. Not really science communication in even a loose sense of the term.

A problem for all science communicators and the public who are their target, is that their scientific credentials are often projected onto their activist writings. Take Dr. Hansen for instance, a brilliant and well qualified atmospheric physicist he may well be, however his advocacy for, or protest against any given solution to the technical problem which is high atmosheric CO2 concentrations is no more qualified than any other intelligent layman. He is not a politician or an economist and solutions for the CO2 problem all require considerable expertise in these arenas. However, more often than not he is awarded the respect he has earned as a scientist for his socio-economic/political solutions. We are told we are not listening to "science" if we do not agree with his proposed solutions. Yet when discussing his solutions his scientific credentials hold no more weight than anyone else who accepts the concensus scientific position on AGW.

So you have to ask yourself, is this blog about science communication, which you are well qualified to author? Or is this blog about advocacy for or protest against highly complex socio-economic/political solutions, which you are no more qualified to author than any other intelligent layman?

If you choose the later, just remember that you are not communicating science and cannot project your scientific expertise onto your opinions about other matters.

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  Fergus Brown Smith1867

  05 September 2014 6:01pm

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  First, I think it is important to point out that the blog is a part of John's journalistic work, into which his science work feeds. As a journalist, he needs to earn his crust by bringing an audience into the Medium that pays him, so hits matter.

  On the main points you make: Let's say for arguments' sake that you, a scientist, along with a number of colleagues, spend several years working on a hypothesis and reach the conclusion that it really is likely to change the World as we know it, and furthermore, that the consequences could be devastating, and beyond this, that a certain course of action could reduce risks and harm considerably.
  So, of course, you publish. Then, for twenty years, nobody does anything about your findings apart from whinge and get abusive. The evidence mounts up, but the clock is ticking. Your original conclusions have been validated many times over, but still nobody seems to want to do anything to stop the harm or the potential devastation.
  So, what do you do?
  Firstly, as a scientist, you keep on proving your point, testing your work, and keeping up to date. You develop some kudos. Then, as a human being, you start advocating loudly and publically. Because talking about it scientifically and reasonably didn't work. But it still matters. It matters more than ever. So you shout, you protest, you publish, you lobby, and you do everything in your power to get the message across that this is serious, and it ain't gonna go away.
  No, bollocks. If it was me, I would have lost my patience years before Hansen did. Any normal, rational human being would do the same.
  Along with which, I'd get really pissed off with people who told me I had no right to meddle in politics or that my opinions had no validity.
  I think I've made my point...

Taking your mind for a walk on a Sunday Morning

Here is a logico-mathematical puzzle to entertain the idle on a Sunday morning:

A train leaves Moscow at 0800 on the 1^st of January, its destination Vladivostok; a distance of is 9289 km. For the first part of the journey, it travels at an average speed of 60km/hr for 18 hours in every 24. The rest of the time it is stationary. The bridge over the Amur River, 8515 km into the journey, has been swept away. Between Krasnoyarsk, 4098 km into the journey and Vladivostok, the train starts to accelerate at a rate of 0.1 m/s² for one hour in every three while it is moving, until it reaches its maximum velocity of 120kph, at which point it slows back down to 60 kph at the same rate; it then accelerates again.

1. When will the train arrive at its destination?
2. If the average speed for 18/24 hours is 70kph for the first part of the journey, when will it arrive?
3. If the rate of acceleration and deceleration is 0.07 m/s², how much longer will it take to arrive at its destination?
4. If the rate of acceleration and deceleration is 0.2 m/s², how much sooner would the train reach its destination?
5.  On the same train, 500 passengers start the journey at Moscow. The train picks up new passengers at a rate of 20 per hour. The passengers alight on average at a rate of 18 per hour until Chita, 6199km into the journey, after which time the numbers joining and leaving the train are equal. The rate of acceleration changes by 0.01 m/s² for every 100 extra/fewer passengers on board. What difference will this make to the total journey time?

Look forward to your answers.

On the impossibility of dialogue

In the busy thread below, this extended comment appeared. It contains some thinking which requires extended response, so I’ve done a lift and here it is up front.

The context is that the correspondent is a regular presence on the internet, commenting on climate change and global warming. His view and mine are different.

In the comment, he tries to explain why he thinks the way he does, to which I offer my efforts to understand.

Please note that his first language is not English, and make allowance that some of the expressions, which might sound abrasive, may be a function of linguistic difference, not necessarily aggression.

Here we go:

Let me suggest something: Pull back and consider that I am convinced you act in good faith and are honest, but you have been brainwashed.

I too have been brainwashed. The only difference is that I´m aware of the brainwashing and you seem to be oblivious (like 99 % of the population).

This is not a promising start. You set out by claiming your intellectual superiority to me, in that you have a privileged (and superior) epistemic status, because I am not aware that the world as I understand it is relative. I might be inclined to disagree with this.

The brainwashing isn´t the result of an overarching conspiracy. Some of it is genetic, some of it is deeply ingrained culture, some is early education, and some of it is impressed on you by the media, your friends, and your enemies.

Being brainwashed seems to be a positive survival trait in homo sapiens. Although many brainwashed populations were defeated and driven to extinction, others which practiced brainwashing as a higher art form, or got a bit luckier seem to have survived more often thanks to this brainwashing, which aligned most of society with the leadership, and moved them to perform as requested.

This is somewhat helpful. You are trying to describe your hypothesis, that our perception of reality is conditioned. In particular, you emphasise the social context of individual development (or call it the means by which I form my Weltanschauung (‘World-view’).

Thus my position is that a lot of what we believe is real isn´t really there. As my grandchildren would say, it´s all bogus.

Though your expression is a little clumsy, what is coming out seems to be a much simplified version of the ideas of Paul Feyerabend, for example, in ‘Against Method’. Feyerabend’s views are well summarised in Wkipedia (here).

So how does this impact the way I absorb information about global warming? First, I know there are actors trying to manipulate me to behave in a certain way. Why? Because whenever an issue arises which involves government decisions, subsidies, taxes, putting a drilling rig on the public library grounds, and moves like that I have to be manipulated to accept such decisions.

The position gets a bit more complicated here. This is because you introduce the Political realm. What you seem to be saying is that the information which is available about global warming has the same epistemological status as the information which we get from politicians or their employees. I think some people might object to this.

Do you see why you really can´t change my mind? As far as you are concerned I´m a ghost. I live in a different universe. You are trying to debate global warming, and I debate the way "they" manipulate us.

A part of the complexity is that you seem to have thoroughly mixed your resistance to political manipulation and your view of the nature of scientific endeavour. To you, these are manifestations of the same phenomenon – the untrustworthiness of given knowledge – and therefore they are the same thing. You reject Science as a whole, wholesale.

And why do you think you avoided the subject when I tried to use Kosovo and Iraq as talkng points? Because your comfort zone is in global warming and the associated science. You want to feel comfortable surrounded by your friends, sitting in a tall stone tower from which you can fling arrows and stones at the enemy trying to scale your walls.

Here, you are making presumptions about me which are not justified. I avoid discussing Kosovo or Iraq because I do not believe I have sufficient knowledge or understanding to comment on these subjects; I have no expertise or opinion which I trust.

And your characterisation of me in the second sentence is laughable. I have spent considerable time addressing your point of view and defending your right to express yourself, even when you have been illogical and inconsistent, yet you accuse me of attacking you. If you still see me as your enemy I would suggest that the problem lies not in my attitude but in yours. You have already decided that we must be enemies, so I cannot have any understanding of you or any human compassion. This means I cannot win. Your mind is closed to my humanity and identity; to you, I am just ‘one of them’. So who is acting in bad faith, you, or me?

On the other hand, I see this behavior as normal, quite human, and also misguided.

How very patronising and wise of you.

Almost everybody is the same. And this is why in the 21st century we see children being slaughtered with laser guided bombs in Palestine, and we look the other way. We have been brainwashed to accept this, and we can´t even bring ourselves to discuss it. And the odds are this post may even be censored, isn´t it?

Since I have both permitted every statement you have made on this blog, and defended your right of comment, even when it pushed libellous status, you have no grounds whatsoever to imply I might censor you, so this is just a personal insult.

To sum things up as best I can. You claim to be my intellectual superior. You set out a view of how the world (of understanding, or knowledge) is constructed. In this, you explicitly reject Science wholesale; to you, it is just as much in error as political propaganda. You frequently draw parallels between political events and scientific knowledge. You then remind me of why I am ignorant and accuse me first of being your enemy, then of repressing you, in spite of the visible contradiction of these in this blog.

Where does this leave me? If, as you say, all science is deception, then we cannot talk about science – not at all – by your terms there is nothing meaningful to say about it. But neither can we talk about anything which we might think of as being a shared human experience. So we cannot have any dialogue. Besides this, you have demonstrated that you do not respect me as an individual or as a human being; in particular, to you I am an inferior being. So you deny me any motivation to continue the effort to engage with you. Finally, you have established that, whatever I say and however I say it, you have determined that I am your enemy. I don’t need enemies, I want friends.

In conclusion, by your terms and rules, since there is nothing ‘true’ to say about science, every comment you make on science is a piece of hypocrisy. Furthermore, on your terms, nobody understands how things really are better than you, so you will never consider the possibility that you might be wrong, or the possibility that anyone else might have anything valid to say. This, too, given your views on propaganda, is hypocrisy. You deny the subject, the means, and the motivation to engage in dialogue. You have determined that discourse is impossible, so, unless you give me some reason to believe otherwise, I can do nothing better than remain silent.

For now, that is all I have to say on the subject.