Monday, 17 May 2010

Is This
The Most IMPORTANT Video You'll Ever See?

This video has been viewed by more than 1.4 million people 

You'll just have to watch to see what's so damn amazing about what he (Prof. Albert Bartlett) has to say. 

When I saw this lecture at a conference in 1995, I came out blasted, thinking "This needs to be required listening for every person on the planet. Nothing else will matter if we don't understand this." The presenter is Albert Bartlett, a retired Physics prof. at U of Colorado-Boulder.

The presentation is titled "Arithmetic, Population, and Energy," and I introduce it to my students as "The most boring video you'll ever see, and the most important." But then again, after viewing it most said that if you followed along with what Bartlett is saying, it's quite easy to pay attention, because the content is so damn compelling. 

If you forward this to everyone you know, we might actually stand a chance in staving off disaster in the global finance system, peak oil, climate change, and every other resource issue you can think of. Without a widespread understanding of what Bartlett's talking about, I think we won't be able to dodge ANY of those issues.

BE ABSOLUTELY SURE you catch the parts about "the bacteria in the bottle" (in Part 3) and the list comparing things that add to the problem and things that address the problem. If we don't choose from that right-hand column, nature will choose for us. I for one, would rather we be the ones making the choice.

Posted May 16, 2010 - Thanks to Raymound for bringing this to my attention.

Part 1

 

Part 2

 

Part 3

 

Part 4

 

Part 5

 

Part 6

 

Part 7

 

Part 8

 

Dr. Bartlett is a retired Professor of Physics. He joined the faculty of the University of Colorado in Boulder in September 1950. His B.A. degree in physics is from Colgate University and his M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in physics are from Harvard University. In 1978 he was national president of the American Association of Physics Teachers. He is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. In 1969 and 1970 he was the elected Chair of the four-campus Faculty Council of the University of Colorado.

See also written analysis below.

http://hawaii.gov/dbedt/ert/symposium/bartlett/bartlett.html