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We now have a dedicated website for the Arizona State University, Interplanetary Initiative SIMOC project. There you will find a continuation of the “Postcard from Mars – SIMOC updates”. Please visit www.simoc.space for more!
At 8 pm this evening, the ASU Capstone team that has been developing the SIMOC game interface will have completed the first working prototype. This brings to fruition six months development of this unique agent model, and lays the foundation for its continued evolution.
As with all software projects, we begin with the blue sky as our goal, and a belief that we will reach that far. In October, November, and December of 2017 we engaged two calls each week, Saturday and Monday evenings. These 1-3 hour brainstorming sessions were a chance for the entire team to explore the possibilities of a scalable, mathematical model with a gaming interface.
We continually juggled the need to build a scientific foundation, a tool to be used for research with the goal to provide a gaming interface that engaged the non-scientific community (while yet producing scientific data, under the hood). While I have extensive experience in software development through my ten years as CEO of Terra Soft, and each of the ASU team came on-board with skills and experience ranging from Python to C, bash to CSS and SQL servers, none of us have built anything quite like this. None of us was truly the leader, nor anyone following. We all pitched in, challenged each other in the conversations, and slowly laid a design foundation that seemed to work.
ASU undergraduate astronomy student Tyler Cox came on-board in July 2017 to get the ball rolling. He built the first, working agent-based model (ABM) using Python and the Mesa library. He was able to quickly demonstrate a functional “astronaut in a can” model in which the initial parameters determined if the human crew of astronauts lived or died (they mostly died). Even our simple model with a light interaction between humans, a few species of plants, and a contained atmosphere proved tricky as even a minor imbalance in the system lead to catastrophic results.
In January the capstone team duplicated Tyler’s work on an Amazon web server, integrating SIMOC into an SQL database instead of the original JSON configuration files. Following a minor setback in which we realized Unity was overkill and a good ol’ web interface would suffice, we reset our expectations and started again. The end result goes lives tonight at 8 pm Arizona Mountain Time. It will be simple, and a little rough around the edges, but the Launch screen, Configuration Wizard, and Dashboard (game interface) will be complete (for now).
I have enjoyed the pleasure of working with the following ASU undergraduate students through the Computer Science Capstone team: Ben McCord, Greg Schoberth, Terry Turner, Thomas Curry, and Yves Koulidiati. In addition, we have this year welcomed the incredibly talented, widely published space artist and habitat designer Bryan Versteeg of Spacehabs.com as a backbone to our design process. And most recently, Kevin Hubbard comes to us with a strong foundation in the social sciences, his intent to introduce a means by which we can integrate human social behavior into a more advanced version of our model.
Just two weeks ago our work on SIMOC resumed. The holiday break was longer than anticipated (by me). I feel we lost some momentum from the pace we set last fall, but we are regaining now, shooting for a working prototype by the Interplanetary Initiative meeting March 5.
The team made a decision last week to abandon Unity as our game play engine, instead building a Javascript web interface. While we will have less total functionality, we are now more closely aligned with the current goals of this first version of our game play interface. And we will far more easily achieve the desired cross-platform support through a web interface. This decision cost us a week-long sprint of agile programming. Not a tremendous amount of time, but a loss that could have been avoided had I. A lesson learned, but no long-term damage done.
With the start of the new year we welcomed Bryan Versteeg, world renowned space artist onto the team. He is now leading the design of the game play interface and playing “pieces”, the icons that represent the growing, off-world community.
ECLSS
An Environmental Control and Life Support System (ECLSS) enables humans to survive in a semi-open (Fig 1) completely closed (BioSphere II, Lunar Palace) ecosystem. In a traditional model, all components vital to sustaining life are tracked by a network of system monitors. Careful estimations are made for the quantity of humans in the given environment for a particular period of time, against the resources provided. The amount of work they perform, the food they consume, and the number of hours they sleep all affect the duration and quality of the mission (see Wikipedia commons image, above).
In this linear tabulation of resource allocation and consumption each human actor or agent is treated as an IN and OUT box, a system which transforms one resource of a particular quantity into a bi-product which is either reused or discarded as waste.
To use this model for a massively scalable system (4-40,000 people) will result in an arduous, ultimately failing bookkeeping effort of tracking values such as the quantity of molecules of oxygen, carbon dioxide, water, calories, Watts or Joules. Through this linear method, we will be less likely to discover causality. If instead we can build a model which considers the relationship between two or more systems, which are themselves maintained by a constant input of energy and mass flow against the natural progression toward system breakdown, then we will gain a better sense of what it means to scale a human colony in a totally foreign, inhospitable environment, from the first astronauts to arrive to a genetically viable human gene pool that can, of its own accord, carry the human species forward.
A rendezvous with Rama
In our imagination, humans in a distant future have gained the ability to travel vast distances in relatively short periods of time. An exploratory mission discovers a massive, abandoned space station in orbit about a planet which itself is not conducive to life as we know it. We attach a shuttle craft to the hull of the outpost, tens of kilometers in diameter, and let ourselves inside. There does not appear to be a single living creature inside. Nothing moves, not even automated repair and management systems.
Immediately, we ask, For how long has this outpost been abandoned?
To answer that question, we determine if the atmosphere is breathable for humans, and we remove our helmets. The air is dry, cold, and devoid of the smell of decay. There is an odor of machine oil and mechanical systems.
While completely sealed, and safely parked in a non-decaying orbit far above the drag of the atmosphere, this habitat is decaying. It is slowly degrading. No matter how well crafted, no matter how perfectly every nut, bolt, and weld is applied, eventually this artificial world will fall to pieces.
You can point to the systems which are no longer being maintained: water delivery, sewage removal, atmosphere recycling systems. The ship’s hull is continuously bombarded with radiation from the binary star system 1.5 AU from the orbit of the host planet. Each of these is breaking down due to a lack of maintenance.
As we explore the inner halls and chambers of this orbiting world we take note of the integrity of the structure. Are seals in tact? Are lubricants leaking? Do the doorways to passages open and close securely? Do motors yet spin and pistons yet pump? Or have all moving parts seized and become immobile?
While we tend to measure breakdown over time, we can also measure the disorganization of the structure, at the macroscopic and microscopic levels. Physical breakdown of a mechanical system can be described as a degree of current functionality in comparison to its original design parameters. In this alien outpost, despite the incredible technology employed, we do recognize the failure of some systems (once rebooted and encouraged to operate again), such that we are able to estimate their original function and design specification. The difference between full capacity and the current state is a ratio which can be described as a normalized function, from zero through one [0 … 1] where 1 is complete, working order and 0 is a seized, non-functioning machine, no longer providing the intended service, and thereby no longer supporting this habitat nor the inhabitants who once occupied it.
This breakdown, the unavoidable decline of all bounded systems can be described by the single variable entropy, or the measure of organization.
So let’s take a few steps back, to a time when the alien station was yet inhabited. We can safely assume that at that time there was a maintenance schedule, a system by which the entire structure was maintained through routine inspection, repair, and replacement. This could have been done by the macroscopic hands of the aliens (who appear to be of a similar stature to that of the human explorers), an automated array of robotic assistants, or by microscopic nanobots whose function is to maintain the integrity of all functional systems, at all times, such that no weaknesses ever develop, and no systems ever suffer from catastrophic failure.
Either way, there is a cost to this maintenance, the work (w), or energy expenditure and mass flow to maintain the function (f) of the habitat. Organization (o) of this work requires management of information (i). As such, we have defined a means by which we can measure the status of a closed ecosystem:
Function, then, is a relationship between the Organization, Information, and Work attributed to the sustained management of the habitat, or its total functionality. While each of these could be measured in any of number methods, we will place each in a tightly bound relationship to entropy, such that entropy is the counterpart, the undoing of organization, information, work, and ultimately the function.
Now, we have a new means of monitoring the health of the physical parameters of an isolated habitat, as:
Where the ratio is a measure of the effort or energy required to ultimately maintain a self-contained ecosystem without ever having had to count the molecules of oxygen, water, or complex carbohydrates. In a newly built habitat, the entropy is low, therefore the maintenance is low as well. But as the habitat ages, or if catastrophe strikes, the entropy will be large, thereby requiring greater organization, information, and work to bring it back into compliance with sustaining human life.
We are relating the current state of the system to its design specification over the inevitable force of entropy.
Back to Mars
If we employ a normalized set of values, as discussed above, then the maths is quite simple, even as we scale this colony from 4 to 400 to 40,000 individual habitants. This is not to say we will not count molecules nor worry ourselves with the atmospheric pressure in the greenhouse, for our model is in fact based on data accumulated from close-ecosystem and bioregenerative experiments on Earth. But to find those non-linear functions of scalability, we must remove ourselves from the line-item bookkeeping which would otherwise overlook the economies of scale which will surely affect a growing colony.
The habitat itself is designed to sustain human life in an otherwise inhospitable environment. As such, we can model the human lives of the astronauts by making certain the habitat itself is functional. We have established a potential framework built upon four parameters which enable us, at any point in the run-time of our SIMOC model, determine the relatively “health” of the physical structure of the habitat.
Now, let’s turn our attention to the health of the human habitants for which the habitat was designed and built Like a structure which is built from concrete, steel, glass, and soil, humans are composed of building blocks. Water, oxygen, calories, protein, vitamins and minerals make up the fluid and solid systems of our bodies.
How do we bring such discreet elements into the SIMOC model without managing each and every molecule that supports the lives of the human inhabitants of the isolated colony? In much the same way as we did with the habitat, we can look at the construct of the human body, and what breaks down over time.
One can see the human body as an assembly of points of failure, critical systems which must be satisfied. Oxygen intake, carbon dioxide exhalation, water, calories, nutrition, and waste management are as mission critical to the human body as is a sealed, pressurized shell to a habitat.
If we see humans as the caretakers of the habitat, that is, the principal labor force responsible for its anti-entropic upkeep, and the habitat as the physical construct which enables the humans to survive in outer space, or on a remote planet, then we have created a positive feedback loop in which each unit supports the other.
What happens when automated or directed robot labor replaces the human maintenance engineer? The labor is shifted from one entity to another, but the total work required to maintain the habitat is sustained, and the total quantity of humans supported, given the immediate infrastructure is not changed. Rather, the caloric expenditure of each human in the habitat is shifted to other functions, and the economy of scale is realized.
“Some stories only make sense in retrospect, the looking back giving foundation to where we now stand. This is the first of what will hopefully be a series of essays to describe the path from a Good Sam’s campground in 2011 to in some way, helping develop the first community on Mars.” –kai
It starts long ago, beneath a stair case in the basement of our family home in Columbus, Nebraska. Friend Jason Zach and I covered the underside of the stairs with plywood, cardboard, a dead monochrome CRT, and myriad electronic components, wires that stimulated Radio Shack switches, piezoelectric sirens, and LEDs and wires that went nowhere. In that spacecraft, we journeyed across the galaxy, venturing to the shores of distant planets whose inhabitants had never before seen humans. Jason was an expert marksman, never afraid to attack. I was keenly interested in obtaining samples, studying the cultures, and welcomed Jason to cover my back.
Many years later, while camped at a Good Sam’s, in Seabrook, New Hampshire on August 2011, I returned to that child-like sense of belonging to a distant place and time. As described, I believed I gained some insight as to how isolated communities might evolve on space stations, Mars and asteroid outposts, even among the stars.
Later that same year, I returned to Holden Village, an isolated village in the Cascades of Washington State. In those months late in the year, the retreat of summer saw the last of the guests depart down the sixteen miles to Lake Chelan. Those of us who remained, counted by dozens, shifted our daily routine from that of a more finite task to general support of the village. Files had to be stoked in order to heat the buildings, snow shoveled, and the water driving the hydro-electric generator kept from freezing, else the electricity would fail.
In those crisp, cold, mostly dark winter days that followed, Holden was a true Village. While a hierarchy of command remained, we became more egalitarian, sharing in the responsibilities of maintenance, even survival should a heavy snow storm bury the pathways and building exits or make impossible a medical evacuation. It was then that my interest in village (communal) living was again stimulated, and the journey to Mars re-ignited.
For five months in 2012 I worked as a photo journalist and documentary filmmaker in Palestine, where a sense of isolation from the world was applied not a mountain village, but the confines of geopolitical boundary that has the power to contain people from birth to death. I witnessed first-hand how the skilled craftsmen and capable artisans were the backbone of an economy of trade and negotiation in place of the familiar currencies of exchange. I learned how much individuals depend upon each other, especially in the challenging times.
I was building a sense of what it meant to live with the challenge of an isolated environment.
On an isolated ranch in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado in 2013, I lived for six months—up to six weeks without face-to-face contact with another human being. In those months I gained from the challenge and ultimate reward of true isolation; a chance to discover who I am without the influence of others, without opportunity to attribute my success nor place blame on the actions of others.
In 2014 I joined MarsCrew134 at the Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS) as the seventh member of an isolated, Mars analog crew. We lived for two weeks in the confines of a simulated Mars lander, a two-story vehicle just large enough to contain individual sleeping quarters, two airlocks, kitchen and crew commons, toilet and shower, lab, and minimal storage. We departed the structure only while wearing a spacesuit, the visor scratched and needing replacement; the radios dodgy at best. The crew came from six countries, representing seven nationalities and more than a dozen languages spoken. It was not always easy, and at times far from fun, but we made the best of those two weeks, focused on our research, data collection, and surviving the simulation. We came away friends for a life-time, even now traveling far to see each other again.
It was then that I became invested in a study of village life. In part because I realized that is where I felt most at home; in part because at least for the first generation, that is how humans will once again live when we finally place boots on Mars.
This week I submitted a proposal to the Interplanetary Initiative at Arizona State University’s School of Earth and Space Exploration (SESE) for the research and development of a mathematical model of a scalable, isolated model of an off-world community (SIMOC).
Now we wait …
I have considered my sources of joy: backpacking, rock climbing, surfing, and cross country running with my partner Colleen; wood working, cooking, reading, watching movies, inventing, and listening to music. I realized that not a single one of these involves the internet.
When I further delved into this investigation, I realized that I could not think of a single function of the internet that directly brings me joy. I appreciate being able to order books and movies from Amazon (but prefer book stores); and the weekly engagement of my SIMOC development team, but would prefer an in-person gathering were we not spread across three countries and as many States.
That says something. For me, the internet is not a source of joy. It is instead a source of anxiety for I know that I must engage, nearly every day, to maintain my income, to pay bills, to engage my employer (University of Arizona) in an ever growing mound of documents to prove my very existence within the layers of bureaucracy.
I already consider myself a minimal user, yet a reduced engagement is desired.
Four-person crew released from sealed habitat after week long journey, May 3, 2023
by Paola Rodriguez for Arizona Public Media
“A new adventure is beginning at Biosphere 2 north of Tucson. A four-person crew sealed themselves into an air-tight, pressurized habitat Thursday morning to learn more about what life might be like on another planet.” Read the full article.
Four-person crew sealed into pressurized habitat to learn about space living, April 28, 2023
by Paola Rodriguez for Arizona Public Media
“As the pressurized air from the Space Analog for the Moon and Mars was released into the Earth’s atmosphere, cheers of happiness and deep breaths of fresh air were taken in. Four researchers emerged from their sealed, pressurized habitat at Biosphere 2 after being locked in for almost a week in the name of space exploration. Their task: to learn more about what work and life would be like on another planet.” Read the full article.
Ad Astra, Q3, 2022
In Return to Mars, National Space Society’s Ad Astra magazine, author Melissa Silva describes a Space Analog for the Moon and Mars, a habitat analog built around the 1987 Biosphere 2 Test Module prototype and how a University of Arizona team is helping our species prepare to become interplanetary.
Scientific American, October 4, 2021
In Biosphere 2: The Once Infamous Live-In Terrarium Is Transforming Climate Research reporter Keridwen Cornelius writes, “The Space Analog for the Moon and Mars (SAM) ‘is very much, at a scientific level and even a philosophical level, similar to the original Biosphere,’ says SAM director Kai Staats. Unlike other space analogues around the world, SAM will be a hermetically sealed habitat. Its primary purpose will be to discover how to transition from mechanical methods of generating breathable air to a self-sustaining system where plants, fungi and people produce a precise balance of oxygen and carbon dioxide.” Read the full story.
Science, August 19, 2021
In Researchers revive the dream of a martian habitat in Arizona—in miniature reporter Michael Price writes “SAM is a welcome addition, says ecologist Shannon Rupert, director of another Mars analog, the Utah-based Mars Desert Research Station. ‘SAM has two distinct blessings,’ she says. ‘First, it’s already connected to a known destination, Biosphere 2, so it can have a huge public impact.’ Second, its airtight and pressurized facility ‘is the first of its kind.'” Read the full story.
ASU NOW, June 1, 2020
In Interactive model simulates keeping house on Mars reporter Scott Seckel writes, “A research-grade computer model and web interface for citizen scientists of all ages to design and operate a human habitat on the red planet, SIMOC is anything but a game. It was built on published data for mechanical life support systems (like those used on the International Space Station) and bioregeneration (sustaining human life with plants) with guidance from experts at NASA, Paragon Space Development, ASU and the University of Arizona. Read the full story.
Universe Today, January 27, 2021
In Space and Sustainability: How the Lessons of Biosphere 2 Inspired SAM reporter Matt Williams writes, “… it was a tremendous learning experience, the results of which continue to inform human spaceflight and ecosystem research today. In an era of renewed interplanetary exploration, those lessons are more vital than ever. This is the purpose behind the Space Analog for the Moon and Mars (SAM), a new analog experiment led by Kai Staats and John Adams. Along with an international team of specialists, experts from the University of Arizona, and support provided by NASA, the National Geographic Society, and commercial partners, SAM will validate the systems and technology that will one-day allow for colonies on the Moon, Mars, and beyond.” Read the full article.
SpaceTalk, The Next Generation, February 2019
The magazine for the all International Space University Alumni. In this issue, SIMOC (www.simoc.space) is featured with a 7-page spread, telling the story of how SIMOC got started through the first two phases of development. Read the full publication at Calameo.com
Exoplanets will become a reality, December 2017
Article for WIRED magazine’s “The Wired World in 2018”, British Edition, pages 41-42.
LIGO Magazine, March 2017
To catch a Wave: A detection story in LIGO Magazine, Issue 10, pages 18-21
Audio Network, February 28, 2017
In How music helps us learn Kai Staats shares how the musical score is an integral part of horror, drama, fantasy and sci-fi. We anticipate that the instruments will amplify our emotions, carry our mood from scene to scene. Yet, documentaries are often devoid of the careful application of score. If we apply the same techniques, the same instrumentation, we not only keep the audience engaged but help the viewer retain the information given.
Space.com, August 2015
“Detecting Ripples in Space-Time, with a Little Help from Einstein”, co-authored with astrophysicist Marco Cavaglia, University of Mississippi.
Space.com, January 2015
An article “Swamps, Simulations and Mad Drone Skills” to accompany the film LIGO Generations
Space.com, August 2014
“When Black Holes Cross Paths” by Kai Staats and Gaurav Khanna, Ph.D. at U Mass Dartmouth
LIGO Magazine, August 2014
A Passion for Understanding in LIGO Magazine, Issue 5, pages 24-26
Space.com, April 2014
An article “The Minds Behind the Film” to accompany the film LIGO, A Passion for Understanding
OMNI Reboot, 24 September 2013
“Seeing Stars: Sex in Space” by anthropologist Cameron Smith, Ph.D., Portland State University; first edit by Kai Staats
Committee on Human Spaceflight, 9 July 2013
The Committee on Human Spaceflight (NASA Authorization Act of 2010) requires that the National Academies perform a human spaceflight study [to] review “the goals, core capabilities, and direction of human space flight” … this language reflects concerns that—without an accepted and independent basis for the establishment of long term goals—political cycles and other factors would continue to drive instability in the human spaceflight program. Download “Real Heroes: A Case for Continued U.S. Involvement in Human Space Exploration” by Kai Staats and Gaurav Khanna, Ph.D.
Humanity & Technology, 2004, 2010-12
Humanity & Technology is a column I wrote for MacNewsWorld (’04) and Northern Colorado Business Report (’10-12). Not a comparison of the speed of the latest wifi networks, but an introspective look at the effect of deeper integration of technology into the human experience, bringing to focus how our interaction with technology affects our relationship with each other, how it shapes the social evolution of our species.
The Stars’ Embrace, 2009
In The Stars’ Embrace, Kai Staats offers nineteen stories written over twenty years. His science fiction takes the reader from the ruthless rule of a near-future government, whose citizens are held captive by mind altering medication, to a distant planet where the remaining astronauts of a failed mission have lost all hope.
Getting Started with Yellow Dog Linux, 2002-06
First published in 2002 by OpenDocs Publishing, Getting Started with Yellow Dog Linux was written for anyone interested in running Yellow Dog Linux on a PowerPC computer, with emphasis on Apple computers. This book introduced the reader to Yellow Dog Linux, regardless of previous familiarity with Linux, enabling comfort and familiarity with the daily use of Linux, both in the graphical interface, and if desired, at the command line. “Getting Started” went into 2nd, 3rd, and 4th publications, each edition updated for the latest advancements of the Linux Desktop.
After two and a half years in research and development, networking and team building, chasing dollars and fund raising, this is the day we can officially say, “SAM IS BEING BUILT!”
SAM is a hi-fidelity, hermetically sealed analog and research center composed of a crew quarters, airlock and hub, and greenhouse with temperature, humidity, and carbon dioxide level controls. When complete, SAM will include a half-acre Mars yard for pressure suit, tool use, and rover tests. Located at the world renowned Biosphere 2 outside of Oracle, Arizona SAM is built around the original Test Module, a 480 cubic meter sealed greenhouse with automated, gravity-fed pressure regulation system designed and built by Taber MacCallum, William Dempster, and fellow Biospherians in 1987.
This week I have moved from my residence in Cascabel, Arizona to the Biosphere 2 where I fully anticipate long, back-to-back days of physical labor and further development of this exciting program. It is likely that my own blog entries will be few and far between for the coming year, but I will be posting regular updates about our progress at samb2.space/blog/.
I hope to see you there!
A Space Analog for the Moon and Mars (SAM), UA Biosphere 2, 2019-current
SAM is a platform for research and science education. As with many analogs before, SAM helps us prepare for the challenges of living and working in hostile environments. By isolating human research crews in an hermetically sealed and pressurized vessel SAM provides a unique, powerful environment in which to conduct a multitude of studies in mechanical and plant-based life support, plant biology, food studies, haptics and tool use while encumbered by a pressure suit; EVA, rover, and drone field exploration; the challenges of isolation and interpersonal engagement and music, writing, photography and film.
SIMOC – an isolated, off-world human community, 2017-current
SIMOC [see-mok] is a Scalable, Interactive Model of an Off-world Community. The model is given foundation on published data derived from Environmental Control and Life Support Systems (ECLSS) and closed ecosystem research at NASA and universities world-wide. With SIMOC you design a habitat that sustains human life with a combination of mechanical and bioregenerative (plant-based) life support systems. Set the model in motion, and learn how your design performs for the duration of the mission!
I haven’t had much to say lately. Neither here nor on social media (which I seldom use, anyway). My words are no longer at home outside of my head. Where do they go? What value to they carry? To whom do they intend?
I’ve been hyper-focused on my research project and team at ASU, building a mathematical model of an off-world habitat and community. My work at LIGO has slowed, but remains in motion. Mostly guiding, in a supporting role. With the help of my high school physics prof Dan Heim, we are preparing the Cave-Cassegrain telescope to ship to Tanzania, the one I drove from Wisconsin back to Arizona a few weeks ago.
I am settling into some semblance of a routine, now that Colleen and I share a house in Flagstaff. Runs every-other-morning from here around Buffalo Park and back. Home made fruit smoothies, fresh eggs from Nikki’s chickens on the east side of town, then work from my shed-office, a tiny tin-roofed structure built from lumber recycled from two generations earlier. Interior sideboard are covered with newspapers from the 1800s. When I need a break, I walk around the space (4 paces long, 2 paces wide) and journey back in time.
I am experimenting with crabapple pies. Colleen continues to cook incredible meals, breakfast, lunch, and dinner. She is a natural with food. We eat incredibly healthy, yet both crave garden-fresh food knowing we have succumb to store-bought produce that always fails in comparison.
This was my summer to begin construction of a home on my land outside of Moab. But recent alterations to the C&Rs have raised confusion and tension. My ideal, modest mountain cabin may not be accepted, for it does not uphold the neighborhood that is leaning toward half million dollar homes. Legal language has been employed instead of neighborly consideration, despite my best attempts at personal communication. While the land remains astounding, I question if this is where I want to live, to raise a family. I should not have to seek legal approval to build a greenhouse or children’s playground when the nearest neighbor is a quarter mile away. I cannot help but see parallels between our small microcosm of the larger, over-developed world. Houses are sized not according to personal need nor their impact on the environment, but by the need to increase the value of the investment. This establishes a contest between frequently opposing forces. Development almost always wins.
The issues on the border are crushing to me. I fight back tears as I listen to the news. Having worked on the border with No More Deaths (https://www.kaistaats.com/blog/2010/06/no-more-deaths) I feel the pain of the situation deep inside. I contemplate forgoing a vacation and instead learning if my organizational and computer skills could somehow be applied, a database and image recognition algorithms to help reunite children with their parents.
Today, I must remain focused. Three calls with ASU research team members (ignoring that it is a Sunday), editing a film proposal, and the final submission of my book proposal for MIT Press.