His art has been linked here always as a staple on the sites blog roll. In this video though, Chris Jordan, is in his own words able to bring new life to his work (from TED, Chris Jordan: Picturing excess).

Sometimes and especially in the shakiest markets, a portfolio’s best defense is dip buying. As with any investment, questions must be answered on both sides of the transaction. On the one side are questions about the stock being purchased. Today, everyone asks: does the company rely on a lot of credit or have a lot of debt? On the other side, are questions about purchasing power; questions about how putting this money out right now might alter your own bottom line. So, how ’bout it, do you rely on a lot of credit or have a lot of debt?

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This chart, released April 10th, 2008 by the American Geological Institute, shows oil by the barrel priced over the last seven years in the US dollar, the Euro dollar, and gold by the ounce. Oil on the commodities market is only ever priced in US dollars, so to get a clearer picture of how the price of oil trends, it is important to include and compare other units such as currencies and even other commodities as is done here. This is because, the dollar pricing itself could be having the most significant impact on the price of oil units. This seems to be the case today.

This data very clearly confirms this idea as it indicates that for about the last 7 years (at least) oil trend has been sideways. In other words, oil valued in gold hasn’t moved in 7 years. Yet, that same oil has become dramatically more expensive when priced in both of the currencies.

There are some reasons why this inflation is abnormal; for instance those same US dollars are backed by gold. As of March of 2008 priced in US dollars, the United States held 261.5 billion in gold. One of the reasons the US has this reserve is to prop up the value of US dollars. Given the value and nature of these gold reserves and the obvious relationship with the US currency, this chart seems to suggest other, very powerful inflationary influences are diminishing the US dollar. Contributing to this may be the 100s of billions of US dollars pumped into the banking system and the consistent downward spiral of the various Fed controlled rates.

But in what seems like a quietus of the dollar, one wonders how speculators will price-in the Fed’s new TAF auctions and new discount window for investment banking entities in the months and years to come.

This study was enlightening, while some of the results were predictable, others were disturbing and shocking.

I don’t know whats funnier, that there is a spike in common sense right after the “D” marked in 2007 on the chart at all, or the story for which “D” marked.

Heres the predictable part, the United States is mored interested in bullshit than common sense. But seriously what the f– is going on over in Canada and Australia?

Stranger still, Seattle is more interested in bullshit than Los Angeles, New York & Washington D.C. I’m almost speechless. Because this also says Washington D.C. searches for common sense more than bullshit. Note to self, contact Google — something is broken with Trends.

All over the world people are asking four magic words: Is this the bottom? The answer from analysts even going back to January 2007 say certainly not — back then predictions suggested 50-60% loss from around a 14,000 DIJA. We’re about half way there despite all the Fed’s recent efforts (with intra-day lows of 11,756.60). If you look closer and pick a giant like Google, there were analysts who predicted it would be at $850 at this time. GOOG trades instead at almost exactly a 50-60% markdown with lows of 412.11.

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They say don’t believe everything that you read. The most prominent target might be Wikipedia. Well, I think in this case, maybe they nailed it on the head. Say ‘Hello’ to President Businessman. He’s got such a wonderful view on finance and economics. Congressional Baseball investigation anyone?

This category, Unending Curiosity, is essentially for questions I can’t expect to answer but feel compelled to ask anyway. These questions seem like they’d go on for ever if you did try to answer them, and certainly just the asking could take a while.

So, one of these more interesting ideas is of course Technology, and I mean as a whole. However, it seems we rarely look at Technology from more than one, rather simple dimension. For most people, this dimension allows them to see a simple progression of tools or a linear release of innovations. But, technology has an interesting substance which I feel allows it to be better described as the evolution of human usage.

This, because without need there is no use, and vice versa. Moreover, there is little that can be innovated upon. Lacking these fundamental concerns, the idea of Technology slowly collapses , or at least, so does its underlying value.

What, and how we use it, is our Technology. And, Technology changes how existence, either in how skills or our uses are employed, improved and connected with each other and our existence, or through providing a platform for more innovative construction. Technology is an extension of our existence in this way.

None of this complexity dismisses the truth discovered though, in our single dimension view of things: as time changes, one might throw away tools for new one,s or replace tools with refined human skills.

This idea itself, specifically, is what I’m hung up on; this idea of the continuous refinement of human skills.

My question (read as Unending Curiosity) is: How does the mind integrate replacements for deprecated human skills and behaviors (as those mental tools are themselves Human Technologies)? Also, how, if at all, is the knowledge or wisdom accredited to obsolete or deprecated uses/behaviors/technologies retained or passed along (so as to ensure technologists are not working on the exactly same problem continuously, only being re-represented)?

( ref: http://www.tcf.ua.edu/AZ/ITHistoryOutline.htm )