When did you last hear that said? We were reminded of that this morning. In these days of quarantine what do you do?
The Lord Jesus told his disciples that they too should go into quarantine. Those of you who have no interest in tax or law please skip the next paragraph. Those of you who do, please correct me. It does have a remote significance to the point I have to make, but skipping it will not harm.
Coco came across some notes of a discussion on charitable status which contained the following reference; for the purposes of obtaining tax relief, you would expect that a religious group would not find any difficulty in obtaining such a status. However the RC Carmelite Priory which housed a contemplative order, devoted to prayer, and therefore quarantined was found not to be charitable as the public benefit provided was not susceptible to legal proof, which the court required in order to act. Lord Greene did not argue that there was no public benefit but that the benefit could not be proven and without proof of benefit you cannot move from the position of being non-beneficial. That there is public benefit in private prayer is, as we shall see, without contradiction.
In the sermon on the mount, which you will know starts with the beatitudes: Blessed are the poor in spirit, etc the Lord goes on to say, just after the section dealing with charitable giving and good works where he says: Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing: when you pray, you shall not be like the hypocrites. For they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward. But you, when you pray, go into your room [quarantine yourself], and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place (Matthew’s gospel chapter 6).
When we are going to pray we are enjoined by the Lord to hide away in our own room away from others. It is there that we make our requests known to our heavenly Father, who hears us. Are we in our enforced quarantine making use of this opportunity to hide away and make our requests known? In times past our leaders have exhorted us in times of national distress to pray. We live in a day of international distress, do we hear that call today, or have some of our leaders lost their way?
The Lord went on in the sermon to say: your Father who sees in secret will himself reward you openly. Openly, in plain sight, in public that the benefit of your praying might be felt by all. Paul wrote to the Philippians (my paraphrase): For I know that through your prayer taken on by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, this will turn out for my deliverance.
Coco wrote this before the Queen’s speech this evening. It was good to hear her words about people who pray. Coco asked, should he change any of this? Perhaps, perhaps not….you may judge.
But we, let us pray and seek the Lord that he may have mercy upon us and upon our land. It will be costly. If you will approach him you must have clean hands and a pure heart, and who of us can say to that I do? But he in Jesus Christ will provide that so we may come to him in Jesus’s name and he shall hear us.
Did you read the recent article about the black light?
You have probably heard about them before, perhaps in the context of a disco or the sun tan parlour. Black lights were given that name because they produced ultra violet light which of course we cannot see, but which when absorbed by other materials produces photosynthesis, suntan, strange glows, which were considered to add atmosphere, or ambience, to the venue, otherwise known as fluorescence, sunburn and cancers. But the article was not talking about that sort of black light, but something quite different. It was felt for a long time that the search for the black light was rather akin to the long running race to breed the first truly black tulip. Many very dark tulips have been bred of course, but rather like the familiar black lights used in discos they are actually simply a very dark shade of violet¹.
The actual engineering of a black light showed itself as a possibility with the advent of the wave particle duality coupled with its quantum mechanical aspects. In theory a black light light could be produced simply by reference to wave mechanics, and an appropriate use of laser technology. Interference is a well understood phenomena, even if it is generally unwelcome when used in actual communications (aka TV signals), and the existence of nodes, essentially a point in space in which the wave dynamic amplitude is reduced to nil. In sonic applications, in particular sound damping applications in industry, interference is often used to silence what would otherwise be an intolerable sound. This works well where the sounds are regular and predictable. Often however the complexity of the wave formations in the real world, and we are thinking now of the electromagnetic waves which we experience as light, make the use only of wave mechanics an impossible mountain to climb, and even if it were possible to climb it the computing power required to control the laser output is simply beyond anything that we have yet been able to build. Quantum computing may overcome this of course, but that is still in its infancy.
The alternative approach which relies upon the quantum effects of the wave particle duality however help us to overcome the computing difficulty. What we are doing, in layman’s terms, is moving the computing power required out of the machines that we build and into the real world and utilising its own quantum effects. This is analogous to the industrial sound damping problem where a digital solution fails, but an analogue solution prevails. You will all be aware of the difficulties of quantum mechanics in the real world; this is the Schrödinger’s cat problem. The Schrödinger’s cat problem however relates to a single quantum event. In the real world we are dealing with billiards of events and across these we can predict with certainty the outcome of the events taken as a whole. This has been understood clearly throughout most of the twentieth century, but the problem then became how can this understanding be applied to the black light problem? The breakthrough came in the early years of the twenty first century. One year before beforehand the year 2000 problem hit many of our computers. Of course adequate preparations had been, by all who knew that moving from dates with years commencing 19 to years commencing 20 would be an issue, made and most of the popular operating systems had addressed the matter many years earlier. A few machines were however ill-prepared for the change.
The specific issues that these machines faced is not the subject of the article, of course. They were not machines that had any public impact, but were used in many academic laboratories. The anomalous results produced in that final year of the twentieth century led to an investigation into the nullification (actual nihilifaction, but that is quite a difficult technical term to describe in this bus passengers’ summary of the scientific article. I also read of kenotic interactions in the main article, a term which inspired more dread even than the first) of photons in free space, and it was discovered that this was a process that had taken place quite naturally and we had not even noticed. Quantum interactions took place in parallel with the interference observed in wave mechanics to produce nodes in the space-time continuum which were free of, in simple terms, light. In other words those nodes were in complete darkness.
This discovery led the academic teams to consider three general areas:
whether the size of these nodes could be controlled
whether it was possible to generate these nodes – in whatever way
whether it was possible to stabilise the nodes in the fourth (time) dimension
This is a huge simplification of course, and others may take exception to the way I have presented the issues in these three areas. It will do for me today, if you can think of a better simplification, and I have no doubt that text books will soon be published which provide a different but nevertheless isodocic, or at least not incongruent, with mine, presentation; please, let me know.
The first step was to demonstrate the possibility of supporting negative energy fields. Other so-called forbidden energy states, and in particular transitions to and from them, are well understood, in the matter for example of phosphorescence. The ideas underlying this concept had been present in quantum theory since at least the days of Paul Dirac’s quantum sea proposal: Don’t worry that is the only equation you will see in this article. It is perfectly well explained in other publications, but in any event it has been superseded by a better understanding of these things. The results of the new work were presented at the Icarus Project. At that stage the end game of the studies was kept well under wraps.
Further work however was required to answer the questions that had been posed. Progress was slow, but the theory answered yes to each of these matters. Having shown in theory that it may be possible to control the nodes, various aspects of the theory were put to the test, primarily through post graduate doctoral theses, as these were relatively cheap, and being quite narrow in their scope would not give away the big idea too soon. Each thesis had to design, run and prove experiments to test some aspect of the theory. After several years the original team had dispersed across several universities, but continued to work together on this project utilising the time of whatever PhD student was willing to work on it. As the individual parts of the theory were proven, where they could, testing began on multiple aspects. All of the abstracts to these doctoral theses are available online in the usual places, if you have access to the appropriate libraries. For the full script you must approach the authors or visit the university libraries.
Eventually it was possible to involve the engineers, who were to build prototype engines which were intended to control the size, shape, intensity and stability of the nodes. One engineer of German descent hit upon a relatively simple model engine, which his colleagues wished to name Awesome, but he insisted in honour of his much loved Oma that it be named Aweful which was a play on her name and his family name, though it required significant power input. At a power input of 40kw it was able to produce a stable intensity of -300lumens/s/cu.m in a volume of 2.5l for a period just under 10ms. The earlier attempts were able to produce nodes for durations measured only in nanometres and µs.
This was a great achievement, in scientific and academic terms, but a wholly impracticable solution for the real world. Further developments were made. Input to output ratios were lowered by a factor of ten thousand, but stability proved to be a greater problem. Advances in other forms of lighting engineering however were adopted which produced significant improvements. The original machine design was retained, but the components were upgraded to use the newer materials which had become available. There was then an unexpected shift in both the I/O ratio and the stability of the luminous intensity. For the academics, this required further work on the theory, as they were reluctant to proceed without a proper understanding of what had changed. The engineers however were delighted with the result and pressed ahead building into their designs and machines control mechanisms to prevent overloading of the output. At the same time they looked at the possibility of controlling the output through processes similar to the optical amplification and stimulation techniques which were used for lasers. In their view this would provide a much safer source than the original idea of a random source.
The engineers raced ahead with the material they had, though not understanding why things were working until the academic team had caught up with them and were able to confirm an understanding of the results that had been seen in the real world.
They were then ready to go public on the matter. By now the engineers had been able to produce a machine that was little larger than a lectern and would run, though admittedly not for very long, on batteries. They packed the batteries into the lectern stand, controls on the face of the reading desks and the source into a rather bulbous expansion box at the top of the reading desk. The academics sought the lecturer who had given the negative enegry field presentation at the Icarus Project and arranged for the first public presentation to take place from a viewing platform high above the city.
The quality of the picture is not good, but the engineering did not fail. The source was able to produce a black out flux at approximately -10000 lumens/s/cu. m for thirty seconds. This black out flux was able to control the whole of the pyramidical space delineated in the image, a volume of roughly 1 cu. m. You will note from the shadows that the source was pointing directly at the sun, thus demonstrating the efficacy of the flux. An appendix to the paper provides technical details explaining the marginal effects of tinting in the windows.
The academic team are now looking for industrial partners to develop the Aweful engine further. There are many commercial, industrial and military uses for Aweful, providing it can be scaled up.
It is seen as an effective and non-lethal weapon. A sufficiently powerful source would be able to provide a black out flux across a wide area, such as a battlefield, ensuring that no fighting could take place. Infrared and night vision goggles would be rendered ineffective. Radio and wireless communication of all sorts would also be impossible as the flux operates on all electromagnetic waves through their quantum interactions. With further work it is thought that frequency specific holes could be left in the black out to allow defenders to communicate. Laser technology would allow the source to be placed high in the sky, perhaps even ultimately on a satellite, and the black out applied with precision and considerable accuracy. Presently the technical challenges of providing a sufficiently powerful energy supply would militate against the use of a satellite.
It is also seen as a security device. A black out device could be used in any place which requires high security, even in homes, to protect against intruders. But perhaps the most likely use will be in the field of entertainment. There are many places which would benefit from such a device. A lower powered device, which would be able say to continuously provide -5000 l/s/cu. m, would be sufficient to provide a sufficiently dark ‘room’ even in the open air as it operates by bathing the area in negative luminous energy, the flux. In a completely blacked out zone, any light from sources in, or shining into, the zone is nihilifactored (neutralised to you and me) by the kenotic quantum interactions with the flux from the source, but if the black out is not complete then it is rather like being in a room with very low level lighting. This would provide some very interesting possibilities if the frequency specific holes problem can be solved.
Thus there are many exciting commercial prospects and already the engineers have prepared to lodge a planning application to the Sydney City council for the provision of a day time open air discothèque on Bondi beach, concluding that the black out lighting would have not only value as an entertainment venue, but also have collateral health benefits, in that day time exercise could be obtained in the open air without the issues of overdoses of UV. It would also reduce the number of shark attacks as the day time occupants of the beach would be likely more attracted to the disco than to the sea.
Shark attack
In the assured prospect that the appropriate planning consents will be provided, the dear lady after whom the Aweful flux engine has been named, Frau Awril Fuhldü, has agreed to be present for the opening of the venue, and she has said, to be the first to dance the floor.
1 The claim may be disputed by some. The date of that article, unlike this, is undisclosed. 2 Apologies to anyone whose copyrights Coco may have inadvertently infringed.
If you don’t want the name, give the money back – isn’t it as easy as that?
Charities are minded to understand that if the source of the funds offered to them is questionable, they should refuse the offer.
And, as a tax professional, Coco would welcome the opportunity to refresh his estate duty knowledge as it is tracked how the Codrington Library building and contents would have passed through all of the generations of his family, and calculate the amount of estate duty due on each death, and he would also assume IHT, would now become payable – a very welcome windfall to be sure.
AT and Coco worked together for twenty years or so apart from a brief period when he escaped to a competitor firm, so you might think that I have a few tall tales to tell about him. Well, perhaps sadly I must say no. AT is so well behaved that it would be impossible to find even a single strange hair on his shoulder. That said however, when he was the custodian of some very fine white cats, you did have to be careful if you happened to use his chair in the office.
So then, just so that you know where I am going there are three things that Coco has to say about AT: His coding His language His demeanour.
Coding
Like all young men who walked into AA’s workplace in Surrey’s fields AT was required to do many things. He proved adept at writing code. Unlike some, he would fill his code with comments explaining why he had done something, what was expected to happen and what the necessary preconditions for success were.
We all had to admit that his code worked. It would never fail, indeed it could never fail, providing you had precisely the correct starting conditions and sometimes, but not always, precisely the correct data. If there were anything unexpected in the data…..
…. you then discover that you had been relying on whether or not AT had set a particular flag in a random piece of code, which may or may not have run. Or perhaps he had defined a variable, which is so beloved of programmers, which happened to have the same name as the range that you were addressing, or perhaps he had moved your favourite cursor from the A sheet to another random location. If it were a good day you might have seen an error message which suggested what you needed to look for, on a bad day you watch the edifice come down into a mysterious heap of electronic dust.
You could say that AT’s coding and his approach to coding taught us a great deal. It also prompted the system team to provide us with additional tools to clean up after ourselves.
But AT had imagination, which he used to good effect. He always had in interest in getting different things to talk together, so we had internet data collection tools in the days when the internet was little more than an expensive toy, which were crafter lovingly by the hand of the Grand Master of ‘I can write this code, and indeed any code, to do precisely one job’. Later when we had to make it do two, he became the knight in shining armour to show us how it could have been written to do that, but as it was not, it would now have to be re-written from scratch using a completely different set of tools. As we have seem recently with the upgrade from v5 to v6 of Data Import. V5 and v6 are a world apart, but without his vision for it and his determination to make v5 work, v6 would never have seen the light of day.
Language
Now the use of the English language by AT would put all but the most erudite of scholars to shame; that cannot have escaped your attention. How taught us how to put words together mostly in a meaningful way, so if you wish to attribute blame to anyone for the brevity of this eulogy, then it should not be to the orator, he is merely repeating, please do not misunderstand that, what he has been taught. We used to say of AT tat if something could be said in many different ways, then it is no waste of breath to use them all. At least if you take that approach you have more chance that you will get your message across, and you will have been understood at least in part, in not in the whole.
There was no sense with AT that he wasted his words. Words convey meaning; words are there to be used not to sit idly in a dictionary, so make use of them, and use as many of them as you possibly can as often as you can.
Now for some of us, that is an effort and requires generous preparation, hence an enormous bundle of paper is required to prepare for even the briefest of presentations, but the remarkable thing about AT was that he could do this without taking a breath, and as if he had been rehearsing what he was going to say for weeks even when he had just made it up on the spot.
And finally we turn to his
Demeanour
There is a certain humility about AT. Some people like to tell you about everything they are doing, how well it is going and what other people think about it. Some people can be full of themselves – Coco knows too well how much he suffers from this – but AT presented himself in a modest way. He is confident in his abilities, and he certainly has them. He is superbly competent! But he is more than competent. Perhaps Coco should say that if anything else is going on underneath it should be left for him to say not for others. He never speaks with a ‘look at me and what I have done’ attitude, but rather with a sense that conveys the idea that nothing at all would have been achieved if you had not also been involved. He would belittle himself in order to lift others up.
Finally, one cannot leave without remembering that it was chocolate and coffee that ensured that the wheels of his vivid, exact, far-sighted and innovative imagination ran with the utmost efficiency. In such a world, there were never any failures, only opportunities to learn, to improve and to overcome all the obstacles and hurdles that human generated data could, not to mention the detritus of only partially removed half-baked non-data, present to the unsuspecting coder.
It was Monday morning, the weekend had been longer and more tedious than usual, and Norbert was preparing to leave for the office, when there was a knock at the door. Norbert was surprised to find Jeremy the local bobby outside.
Good morning, Jerry. What brings you here today?
I am very sorry, sir, but I must take you away to a place of confinement where you will remain for an indefinite period.
I don’t understand, are you saying that you are taking me to gaol?
Yes, sir, that is what I must do. You were condemned by the Court yesterday, and I have been instructed to escort you to the lawful place of confinement.
I know you must do your work, Jerry, but perhaps you would enlighten me. For what have I been condemned?
I have not been told, sir. I am aware that your statement was presented to the court, one witness was called and then came the judgement, but I was not permitted to enter to courtroom.
May I have a few moments to pack a bag? Please come in and take a seat. I shall not be long.
As he packed, Norbert reflected upon the situation. He had been called into the station several weeks ago to give an account of his movements on a particular day in December. He thought carefully about what he had said in that document. He had been out of town all of that week on business, and could think of nothing in it that could give rise to what was now taking place. He mused thoughtfully, as the absurdity of the situation pressed home upon him. Here he was about to be committed to a place of confinement on the judgement of a court at a hearing of which he had no knowledge. He supposed that had he troubled himself to go to the court every day, he would have seen his name on the list of cases to be heard: Person or persons unknown v Norbert Smith Defendant 1230 Room B, he imagined to himself. What had been said about him? Why had he not received a call to attend the hearing and reply to his accusers?
He resigned himself to his fate. He remembered that the wise man said: the first to present his case seems right, till another comes forward and questions him. (Proverbs 18:17)
Coco wonders how many of us feel a little bit like Norbert. There are flaws in many processes which would not be permitted in the legal process in a liberal state. And if you wonder why Coco wrote this, it is quite simple, there are two reasons. Firstly, the document, which claims to be an assessment, appears to be empty. Nothing has been said, so there is nothing to which a reply can be given. And secondly, there has been no process meeting with the preparer of the document, but only an informal chat with the one who has been interposed between Coco and the Assessor. It is of course nothing less than is expected to happen or not happen however you may wish to look at it.
[Coco attempts to make some changes and add comments to the document, and then having second thoughts to remove them.]
“Ah, but how strange, it seems not to be possible to remove comments, even draft comments, after they have been saved….ah well I shall post the whole thing again with the correction…”
[It is for this reason that the first related tale finds its way into the document. Then there is a question to which an answer must be given, but the only answer available is not the answer which Coco either wished to give or would have been true if given]
“It would seem that there is only one possible answer to the question. HMRC require non trading partnerships who wish to file on-line and also to complete the additional information box, which is intended only for trade use, to pretend that they are trading partnerships (ie to lie) and to declare that the type of trade is NO TRADE. In the light of this and in the same spirit I have selected the only option available.“
[Coco is left as perplexed as Norbert was at the process which led to his gaoling, but without having to face the same consequences.]
If you are a taxologist, or even if you are not then this will appeal to your sense of injustice. Do not forget to do your research first…..read the story below.
Before Coco makes any, as perhaps some would interpret it, apositive comments, do not think that Coco is not unaware that languages change in their construction, grammar and syntax, and that words change their meaning, a phenomena to which many of the so-called false cousins of the European languages will be very willing to attest. So his comments may be understood to be quite miserable, but they are certainly, Coco says with not with unalloyed hope, but not hype, not intended to be misérable. For this reason it is very important that we have a proper understanding of words and their use, it is for this reason that every one of us carries within him a taxonomy by which we classify words so that we know which set of words are appropriate at any particular time. Parts of our taxonomic classification, if that is not a tautological repetition of the same conceptual idea, will indicate to us that certain classes of words are appropriate in one circumstance; for example, language may not be used in the discussions that take place in the nursery between a mother and her child, which would not be out of place in the context of seeking a negotiated settlement of certain difficulties which may have arisen as a consequence of a perceived, or perhaps even putative, breach of contract, even though the purpose of the use of the language in both cases is propitiatory, which is to say that in its intention it seeks to bring about the reconciliation of two estranged parties.
So to come to the point of my post, if it were not for its progeny Coco would not have believed it possible for this to have been suggested by R*****s. Now although Webster’s is not his favourite dictionary, it behoves Coco to avoid, or should that be evade, perhaps even eschew the use of a British dictionary in this context, and Coco does happen to have a copy of an authorised British printing of the 1924 edition, which rather helpfully warns him that should it be found in his possession after emigrating to Australia it will be liable to confiscation.
Turning to page 2118 in the second volume we find in the footnotes this entry
The main entry on the following page then provides a clear definition of the word under discussion.
Coco is not entirely sure how well the photographs will turn out here, so here is a transcription for the two root words:
tax-on´o-my ({tăk-sŏn´ṓ}-mĭ), n. [Gr. τάξις arrangement, order + νομος a law.] Classification; esp., classification of animals and plants according to their natural relationships; also, the laws and principles of such classification.
The meanings of the derived terms; taxonomist, taxonomic, taxonomical, taxonomically, and those derived from the synonym taxology, need no further explanation.
Coco will draw no conclusion, but rather leave the reader to draw his own.
By the way Coco too is a taxologist in the way that he thinks about and understands tax, but his taxological understanding and methods do not end there. The use of taxology is important in our approach to many different aspects of knowledge without which we would remain in extreme ignorance of the world around us. So, taxology is important to us in our understanding of who God is, the universe, life and everything. Of course, taxology is not itself a substitute for these things. It merely provides a framework for us within which we may build our understanding and hope to build up our understanding of these things.
The Story
{A} monumental discovery became evident after plenty of sleuthing. A senior director of marketing for the corporate business, and her team recruited countless players: leaders across the industry, numerous accounting firms, and even the IRS. Persona work cut through a jungle of questions. Suddenly the uncertainty dissipated. What remained was a clear gap in the market…and the team seized upon this opportunity to address the need for a personality.
We fill that gap as the industry’s trusted partner in tax technology. {The} team knew it was time to take ownership of our prestigious status and create a campaign with which the customers identified.
And the Taxologist was born.
Taxologist noun [taks-ol-uh-jist]: a tax professional that excels in the use of technology to maximize tax function effectiveness.
How does one identify this breed of professional? It’s simple, really: they are typically tax managers or directors, engineers of change that operate as a driving force for new tax technology. By challenging the status quo of the tax department, they have moved away from Excel and toward total management of their professional skillsets using the utmost technological efficiency.
The big word in the Taxologist campaign is {Taxological}. {Taxology} transforms today’s tax professionals into Taxologists. It empowers them – which, as eye-opening persona work reveals, is important for this customer.
“[The campaign] has a personal feel to it. [The customers] are unique characters,” A said.
Her team’s extensive persona work greatly shaped the Taxologist campaign. By analyzing the buyers’ behavio[u]rs(sic!) and psychology, they gained eye-opening results that helped them better anticipate the content they desire to see and better understand their current situation. The team learned that these customers sometimes don’t hear enough accolades though they’re essential operators of tax processes. They often work as behind-the-scenes players in the company, but their work is crucial to their business. The Taxologist campaign is a personal way to reward them and make them feel special. Now we’re speaking their language.
{Taxology} noun [wuhn-sohrs]: the art, science, and skill of combining tax with technology to gain efficiency across the tax lifecycle. It transforms today’s tax professionals into Taxologists.
Taxology is the tool that fills the gap in the industry for a tax technology leader. The Taxologist campaign is what we’ve crafted to get the customers excited about the technology they utilize and their pivotal roles in the industry. With this identity, they can feel confident about the change they’re enacting. It is okay to embrace technology and we are their partner in that.
The Taxologist campaign will invade and conquer using a broad range of materials. Currently….
Advertising campaign by {name redacted} media group
Names have been redacted both to protect the innocent and to not promote the advertising further.
By Coco · France Vegetables, especially green vegetables provide excellent nourishment, vitamins and micronutrients
By Xocolatl · Mexico Whilst potatoes have a very pretty flower, they contain significant amounts of starch so should be avoided unless a high calorie intake is required.
By Schokolade · Deutschland Fruits are considered to be an excellent food source containing many vitamins and importantly necessary sugars.
By θεοβραμα · ΄Ελλας We must however remember that, as with the potato, whilst the lemon tree very pretty and lemon flower is sweet the fruit of the poor lemon is impossible to eat despite the obvious benefits that, as a fruit, it brings to the body.
首被 平原的管家 · 中华人民共和国 不要忘了榴莲 – 花色淡黄，果实大小如足球，果皮坚实，密生三角形刺，果肉是由假种皮的肉包组成，肉色淡黄，粘性多汁，酥软味甜，吃起来有冰淇淋的口感。 有一等臭果，若臭牛肉之臭，内有粟子大酥白肉十四五块，甚甜美好吃，中有子可炒吃，其味如栗。 [Don’t forget the durian – colour yellow, as big as a football, thick prickly peel, rich flesh-coloured yellow, sticky, juicy, sweet like eating warm melted ice cream. It is a first-class smelly fruit, like the foul smell of beef. There are big white pieces of meaty flesh in each pod – five to fourteen – which is said very sweet and delicious, even the child may have it fried. Its flavour is such as Li (untranslatable).]
Truffles as the currency of the new economy By Chocolat · Français It is well known that truffles provide absolutely have no nutritional value, nevertheless they command such a high premium both for the ability to absorb flavours in some varieties and in others provide sweet and pungent aromas and tastes of their own in a wide range of culinary dishes. Indeed the esteem which they command has led to the consideration that in the new economy gripping southern Europe, the varieties grown in Greece being especially favoured, they could become the currency of choice to replace the euro.
Chocoholicism and the Federation By Choco · USoA Enough! Everyone knows that addiction to chocolate is no bar to enjoying good food and life. Why I spend an inordinate amount of time, though probably far less than they do in actual preparation, thinking about the wonderful array of victuals one could produce using the items mentioned by, should I say by my colleagues, above but then I reconsider. Should I spend time doing that, or simply enjoy what helps you work, rest and play? The conclusion is obvious.
Truffles By PureChocolate · NR Truffles may be being cited as the new global currency, but if there is one reason why one should not eat chocolate, and there is only one, it is that truffles are available. Of course these are not that variety of fungus found by pigs in the roots of trees, but those that have been carefully and lovingly prepared from the roasted, cured and fermented beans of the cacao plant. These beans are the very θεοβραμα as my Greek friend should know, which are full of the most nutritious (Cocoa solids contain alkaloids such as theobromine, phenethylamine and caffeine. These have physiological effects on the body and are linked to serotonin levels in the brain. Some research found that chocolate, eaten in moderation, can lower blood pressure and eaten in therapeutic doses will reduce stress and enhance pleasure) content that ever the world knew.
I posit an island, in which three people live: a farmer, a merchant and a banker.
I had been introduced to Take five some time ago.
On that former occassion the gentleman concerned wished to know the sum of two digits of two. During his enquiries he called upon a banker but was left somewhat perplexed by the banker’s response.
Take six shows us the consequences of what the banker tried to explain.
The island was located in the warmer temperate regions of the ocean and favoured by typically warm summers and mild winters. The farmer owned fields in the western end of the island which looking towards the favourable prevailing winds brought vibrant and diverse life to that arable and arboreal part of the island. Year on year he diligently sowed his fields, which produced an abundant harvest, which the merchant would take across the mountains to the eastern side of the island which lying as it was in the lee of the winds was much drier than the western side. The banker lived on the western side of the island in a house on a hillside overlooking the sea.
The economy of the island was dominated by this annual cycle, which easily supported the modest lifestyles enjoyed by the island’s community. Both the farmer and the merchant used the facilities offered by the banker.
These three men showed their appreciation to all around by holding annual festivities. The farmer held a festival in the autumn after the first fruits of the harvest had been brought home. The merchant held a ball in the spring to celebrate the end of a trading year, and the start of a new. The banker held a midwinter festival, as he was the only one who could afford both to light and heat a hall sufficiently large at that time of the year.
Over the years the islanders noticed changes in the community. Firstly, the banker moved house, then had his new home rebuilt. Now he was living in a large house with extensive private grounds, including in the western part of the island fenced off areas, which were being converted into a golf course.
None of this was really surprising, the economy was well run; harvests and the profits derived from the trade of the farmer’s produce generated surplus funds with which the farmer and the merchant sought to deal with prudently. Noone however discussed how they did business nor how they managed their own businesses.
The disparity that arose between the banker, the farmer and the merchant however did lead to some serious examination of the mechanisms by which this had come about. Academic reports, and enquiries suggested that far from using money he actually had to support the building of a larger home and the other works being undertaken, the banker had in fact mortgaged his own future earnings thus releasing sufficient funds to pay for all of these things. There was no suggestion that the banker had ever acted without the utmost propriety in this matter however. He had not taken any one else’s money for this and for everything the farmer and the merchant had ever deposited with him he could account in full and all was still available to them.
The farmer and the merchant were not then unhappy with the situation, but as a consequence of the production of the academic papers, and the translation (for that is what really was required) of them into the language of everyday people, they began to wonder whether they really needed to keep such deposits as they had with the banker. If the banker reckoned, and he surely of all people would know whether this was a safe thing to do, that to mortgage his future earnings was good in order to enhance his present lifestyle, then as the saying has it, what is good for the goose is good for the gander.
The merchant was the first to move in this matter and managed to obtain from the banker a significant loan, which enabled him to expand his commercial interests, building a marina on the south coast of the island which would provide easy access to the area near to where the banker was building his golf course, and also to move out of town to what was perhaps inauspiciously described as a lodge near the national park.
The farmer was rather more cautious. He looked at the economics of his situation and concluded that what was safe for him to do would be to no longer finance the annual seeding himself but to seek a loan from the banker to cover that. He used the proceeds to convert several acres of land near to the marina into a golf course. It had become apparent that the banker’s would remain a private affair rather than available to tourists.
All appeared to be well. The world did not end after all of this activity, and indeed everyone appeared to be better off. The construction work had given others skills that they would not otherwise have acquired and provided much needed diversification in the economy. The island acquired the appearance of wellbeing, and the people of the island became quite comfortable with the situation.
Very occasionally the prevailing winds failed to bring the rains on which the farmer depended. Sometimes the dominant winds came from the east. The farmer was aware of this and it was the prospect of this that had held him back from joining the others. But he reasoned that he had survived such years in the past, and having done his sums considered he would be able to do so again.
One such year came upon the island shortly after the completion of the marina. The farmer’s harvest fell short of what was expected. He was only able to repay the banker his loan for planting, by selling all of his seed to the merchant. He knew that this would mean that in the spring he would not only have to borrow to pay for the planting but also to purchase seed to plant. He reasoned with himself that he could afford to do that.
The following spring he approached the banker as usual for the necessary loan. The banker was as ever accomodating, but required a mortgage over the golf course as security for the additional amount. The farmer agreed to the conditions imposed and proceeded with the planned planting programme.
It was a good year, but not quite as good as could have been hoped. The winds had been mixed, and as a consequence of the mixed winds the rainfall in the west was inadequate, but flooding caused much damage in the east. The farmer sold his harvest to the merchant, and repaid most of his loan to the banker. The banker did not require full repayment as he still had security over the golf course, which in any event had a value in excess of the amount of the loan. At this the farmer reflected upon the fact that had he not taken the golf course out of use, his harvest would have been that much greater and he would have been able to repay the debt in full. But he had done so, that was the way it was. The flood damage in the east caused quite some distress, and even the merchant had had to approach the banker for further loans to put repairs into effect. For others it put pressure on goods, some of which fell into short supply and prices started to rise. The price of the farmer’s produce also rose as it too was not as abundant as it had been for many years before. The rising prices however encouraged the banker who only saw increased security therein for the loans he had advanced.
By the time spring had come the price of seed had risen from 130 conche/bushel to 250 conche, such was the shortage of seed. There was also other competition for the seed. It was thought by many that the price would continue to rise for some time to come and seed was seen to be an investment.
The farmer approached the banker for the necessary loan to buy seed from the merchant and to finance the planting. Meanwhile the merchant was was also in discussions with the banker. The merchant and the banker eventually agreed to a mortgage over seed. The merchant would retain sufficient seed to cover twice the amount of his debt to the banker at the prevailing price. If the price rose he would be free to sell off the surplus, providing he also applied some of the proceeds in reducing the debt. If the price fell, he would only need to take action if the cover afforded fell to one and a half times the amount of debt. This did not seem to be an unreasonable solution to the merchant.
It would be a hard year. Food prices continued to rise. The rains were poor in the west, but the farmer had modified his agricultural practice in order to mitigate the effects of lower rainfall and as a consequence obtained a good harvest. The loan on the golf course had to be rolled over again. There was no autumn festival and the winter festival was not as grand as in former years. The people longed for the coming of spring.
The farmer enquired of the banker what he could borrow. The amount available would enable him to buy sufficient seed only if the price were less than 300c/b. The market price was over 350c/b. He approached the merchant, who in a different age may have been willing to help, but the banker’s mortgage over the seed meant that he could not sell for less than the market price, and to have left the difference in price outstanding would have broken his borrowing convenants leading to the immediate recall of all his loans.
In the meantime the banker’s chief steward having noticed the continual steep rise in the price of seed, which he needed in order to feed the household discussed with his master the possibility of entering into forward contracts for the purchase of seed in order to mitigate the adverse risk of fluctuating and increasng prices. He was authorised to enter into contracts up to a maximum price of 450c/b. He put these contracts before the merchant for delivery over the summer.
What now was the merchant to do? He knew that if he gave the farmer what he needed the price would rise over the summer far in excess of 450c/b and he would not in any event have sufficient seed to satisfy the bankers’ order, so he would not be able to accept it. On the other hand, if he accepted the banker’s order the price would likely not rise above 450c/b and he would only have sufficient seed to meet it if he did not accept the farmer’s order. He could sell to the farmer at 300c/b and face ruin, or sell to the banker at 450c/b.
That summer the winds had been just right. No-one could remember a better year than that. The west was properly warm and watered. The east recovered from the previous two wet summers.
The following spring the banker was puzzled. The farmer did not come to him for a new loan. Then it came to him: though the previous year the farmer had approached him for a loan, he had not drawn any of it down. There had been no planting. There had been no harvest. The farmer had instead taken a job stacking shelves in an supranational store, which had been attracted to the island by its recent prosperity.
The merchant had also sold out to the store. The price of seed had risen to peak at nearly 1000c/b, but the wharehouse was now empty.
When the shelves in the store are empty, what then?
In 1894 the importance of conserving natural resources was recognized and expressed in a report by the State Fish and Game Commissioner of North Dakota. The report cautioned that short-term thinking and narrow monetary motivations might lead to the destruction of the last tree and the last fish. The following passage shows thematic similarities to the quotation under investigation: Present needs and present gains was the rule of action – which seems to be a sort of transmitted quality which we in our now enlightened time have not wholly outgrown, for even now a few men can be found who seem willing to destroy the last tree, the last fish and the last game bird and animal, and leave nothing for posterity, if thereby some money can be made.
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Shark attack
