Syntropy blog: A Big Picture, Conceptual Introduction to Biology: EEB 122

I wrote a detailed review of OpenYaleCourses's EEB 122: Principles of Evolution, Ecology, and Behavior.

Here are some highlights:

• Startling: "survival of the fittest" is wrong!


• The wonderful metaphor of the theater in evolution (due to Evelyn Hutchinson)


• A remarkable description of El Niño


• Evolutionary Medicine may be one of the most significant benefits of the theory of evolution


• I was inspired to research the frequency of major geological events (earthquakes, volcanos, etc)


• A poignant discussion on biodiversity


• Biogeochemistry is one of my biggest "discoveries" of the course: it may be one of the most important interdisciplinary fields for Human survival


• I reference the Buckminster Fuller Challenge


• The importance of geography


• A survey of other freely available introductory biology courses

Sugar is a chronic toxin

I wrote a summary of my research into the chronic toxicity of fructose and sugar.

Syntropy blog now on-line

I finally got a real Wordpress blog going at blog.CJFearnley.com. My first substantial post is on Buckminster Fuller and the Open Educational Resources Movement. I was pleased that several people found it and started commenting right away.

Managing FOSS for Business Results

For a few months I've been posting to a new blog Managing FOSS for Business Results. It is focused on FOSS or Free and Open Source Software and the problems involved with managing or administering systems built on FOSS. Check it out at blog.RemoteResponder.net.

Interesting post on Virtualization on new blog about Managing FOSS

There is a new blog about Managing FOSS (Free and Open Source Software). The most recent post is on Xen Virtualization.

Comprehensive Anticipatory Systems Administration

LinuxForce announced some exciting new news this morning about our Expanded Partnership with The Franklin Institute.

Several people have asked me about LinuxForce's signature approach to the maintenance and monitoring of computer systems as mentioned in the news release which we call Comprehensive Anticipatory Systems Administration.

To put it simply: the world is continually changing. Best practices are continually changing. Software is continually changing. As Buckminster Fuller said "change is normal". Change frequently comes from unexpected directions. So to be proactive (the old buzzword for managed services which is just a glorified name for systems administration of software systems) one must comprehensively anticipate the changes and develop software infrastructures that are maintainable, secure, and effective on an on-going basis.

To put it another way: omitting any relevant detail in security, configuration, boundary case catching, etc., can result in system failure. The way to avoid system failures is to anticipate everything. That inherently requires a comprehensive approach to identify all salient factors and administering to them in support of the design requirements for the system.

A complex, ecological approach is required. That's what my talk on Comprehensive Anticipatory Systems Administration at the September 2008 PLUG meeting was about. My slides on systems administration from that talk are available on-line.

Let me know of ways in which you see that software administration can become both more comprehensively anticipatory in its attentiveness to change.

My Foldable Great Circles Presentation

I gave a presentation on "Explorations to Define a Theory of Foldable Great Circle Origami" to the AMS Special Session on Buckminster Fuller's Synergetics and Mathematics at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences at New York University (NYU).

Some important elements of this mathematics research are

1. The subject is at least partially accessible to young people (I have built these models with young children and undergraduates should be able to understand the work "completely")
2. The models can be built with paper, fasteners (bobby pins), and a protractor. So the material is concrete and tangible.
3. The statement of the problem is easy enough that one would think, at first, that the problem is "easy"
4. The problem is still unsolved
5. My research supports the view that there are still easy to state, easy to explore, exciting unsolved mathematics problems

I am looking for collaborators to finish the research. I would be willing to give a simplified version of my presentation to educational and/or research audiences.