Tag: Life

Political Echo Chambers

Just heard the phrase on a clip on my X website on the Peston show from tonight in the UK where Martin Lewis talks about ‘people living within their own fiscal eco-chambers’.

To me this really struck a chord and is so insightful to so many political expressions, opinions and perspectives. An echo chamber is “an environment where a person only encounters information or opinions that reflect and reinforce their own.” The term is a metaphor based on an acoustic echo chamber, in which sounds reverberate in a hollow enclosure.

I often wonder why both in the UK and US why elections often appear to be so close and nobody really knows who is going to win or lose or even or by how much of a percentage and also why people seem to express certain strong held views or appear to disbelieve or not have an interest in or care about the views of others that can be considered to be an opposite to their own.

Well I still don’t understand why one would ever vote for Trump and over the next four years were going to see that political reality unfold. But as a businessman and salesman that made a pitch to multiple pockets of people with a wide spectrum of opinions and he was able to rally enough people in enough fiscal eco chambers to ultimately be able to now dominate the political landscape for the next four years in the US and beyond too.

Sadly in the UK the right have dominated our politics in terms of proportion of governments voted in over the years and an eco chamber of people that look inwards to what is in it for themselves when their lives are profitable or are sold a story or business model that looks inwards to making them wealthier and more prosperous, you can see the logic in why a majority would vote for this consistently on an election by election basis and then once elected our government and politicians fights for this ethos for our nations and fight to tell us that this is what they are doing for us and thus the cycle of inward looking self-serving politics continues.

Trumps political perspective might be an extreme perspective of such self serving interests and needs to be fulfilled and voted for but it is neither new nor in many ways an unexpected thing to vote for when given a choice to do so.

The main problem for me, which I mention from my warm, hobbit hole in the shire of Devon in what is after all considered to be a relatively affluent part of the planet and well looked after space and place is that the world aspires to be. A self serving place like many that looks after its own interest and needs but not everywhere in the world is relatively affluent part of the planet or a well looked after space and place on the planet. There are conflicting interest, desires and opinions and not everyone can have or should get their own way. There are not enough trees to be cut down, not enough rivers and seas to be polluted and robbed of life, not enough land to be bought and sold or mines to be dug out or shares to be bought and sold for everyone.

There are many in the wealthy areas of the world whose eco chamber of reality and political perspective often encourages them to ignore or turn a blind eye to the suffering of others, alien to themselves, to ignore and pretend that it does not matter to them because of who they are or what they have and where they live.

Foreign places to many that are experiencing great poverty or suffering in developing or underdeveloped or third world nations, due to lack of fiscal opportunities and jobs or due to wars (not caused by them) or climate change (not generated by them) or pollution (not produced by them), or political stagnation and corruption (also not their fault) are often seen as not our problems too.

Such people living under such circumstances will seek to possibly escape to a wealthy region of the world, safer from all of the above mentioned negatives, these people will be known as immigrants, both legal and illegal ones. Or if fortunate in the country they live in they might seek to work as best they can to provide their future generations with great chance of wealth and opportunities that they could never have had in their own lifetime, but this opportunity will not be there for all.

Imagine Dragons – Demons

Happ pre Birthday Bro

Friday 29th November 2024 would have been my brothers 52nd birthday. I really would not only love to still be able to speak to him but also see how old he would have looked now, I know I have shades of grey in my hair when it grows out I wonder what shades of grey he would have in his hair too now.

If all goes well I will be out catching up with friends this weekend and so would not be able to put this post on my site then. I am sure I could have timed it to come out on his birthday but I prefer to publish posts when I have written them.

When visiting my mum this year we have been discovering slides from the past of her parents and her growing up. There is also a lovely photo we found of her with a young Andy or Andrew as he was called back then.

Lindsay Edwards with her son Andrew Edwards

I just do still wonder what he would be doing know if he was still alive, I still think he would have thrived during the Covid-19 pandemic, he could be insightful, positive, optimistic and funny when you caught him on a good day, of which he had many. So to lose him to himself on a very bad moment is a sad and true tragedy to this day.

I have just tried to add a frame to one of my favourite photos of him and I hope it does him justice. It’s just nice to see him in a very slightly different way. It’s one of my favourite photos of him with the flower painted on him and a happy content look.

Andy Edwards

I also thought it time to take a photo of me too and put a border frame around that too.

Huw Edwards

God bless you Andy I hope you are doing alright where you are and able to look in on us from time to time. Assisting us as best you can with any scrapes we might get into from time to time.

Neil Edwards – Father, Andy Edwards – brother, Lindsay Edwards -Mother

Above photo of when my brother graduated at HMS Raleigh in Cornwall

Keeping warm during power cuts in storms

Devon has been battered by the elements this week. My mum lives in a new house in a village in Devon. With new build properties, there has been a move to make sure that the buildings are energy efficient and heating supplies are sustainable, homes well insulated, which are all a good things and help the planet and also should help bring mums energy costs down in the long run.

Devon also got hit by snow this week on Thursday and although there was enough snow to stop the buses running for a few hours where I live in Exeter, where mum lives the storm took out the electricity supply too.

She has an air pump at the garden which is run  by electricity where air pumps heats up hot water, that then go to under floor heating pipes under the floors downstairs and takes hot water upstairs to radiators and a water storage unit. Well the village that she lives in had this power cut and on Thursday her electric was off from 09:30am to 4pm and during this time the temperature dropped too and snow fell.

I was worried about her and unfortunately the mobile phone network also went down in the area at about the same time, for all I know also due to having no electricity supply too. When I managed to get hold of her just after 4pm she was ok but cold and the heating was able to come on as soon as the electricity came back on, but she was so cold that she had to spend much of the day in bed just to keep warm and comfortable.

So over the weekend I have been trying to research possible ways of providing electricity or other support for her during a power cut. On the weekend we also had our second name storm of the season, I was staying with my mum and at around 6 am this morning the wind was blowing and the rain was pouring down there was another brief power cut although this time the power came straight back on fortunately. It is likely there will be more storms and power cuts on the way this season too.

So I started to do some research into possibly energy or devises that could assist mum during a power cut and the first thing I started looking into was the possibly of what they call a power station its a kind of rechargeable large battery, that people take on holiday when they go camping. I though wouldn’t it be great if maybe it could power a kettle and a heater, while the electric is off in the house that would be an awesome comfort to my mum and the only worry then would be where to plug it in and how many cups of tea she could make and how long it could heat a room for.

But from what little research I have done so far it take a huge amount of electricity to heat up a kettle let alone an electric heater, which would use a huge amount of electricity that a simply battery powered station simply could not provide. If lucky you might be able to heat up a small camping kettle a few times a battery charge, whilst spending something like £500 or more on a battery power station powerful enough to be able to heat the kettle and not much else. I don’t think the technology of kettles heating up water has changed much in over 50 or more as there has not been seen to be a need for that kind of invention we just switch them on at the mains and they work.

My Dad also sensible suggested a thermos flask for her to keep hot water in, for what every hot drink she might want to make use of it for. You can get ones that are 500ml or 1000ml in size made by thermos that will keep water heated for potentially up to 24 hours. There are minor problems with doing this though. To provide hot water during a power cut firstly, you don’t know when the power cut is going to happen so you would need to fill it with hot water before any big storm is forecast, just in case. Secondly if you accidently forget to fill it up or don’t fill it up before the electric goes off its no use to you whatsoever.

Price wise though it’s much more realistic to by a thermos flask for £25 and make good use of it rather than spend £500 or more on a battery power station that is not powerful enough to heat up your home kettle. So it looks like Santa will be getting mum a thermos flask for Christmas and as for the electric battery power station although it sounds like a great idea sadly it’s just not practical or powerful enough for the budget that we have.

It feels like better minds than mine will need to tackle these issues head on as if we are planning to have properties more dependant on just electric for there power needs no more gas central heating systems or wood burners or oil heating systems in home then homes in communities which are vulnerable to the elements and power cuts when storms take place will also have to have some sort of back up system that can continue to supply electricity while the main power is off during winter months.

Were nowhere near investing in a solar panel roof for to be covered in snow or for the sky to be covered in clouds and she doesn’t have the land to place a working wind powered generator onto. If the batteries for home power stations could improve or if home electrical products became less power hungry then that is certainly an investment for the future. But for now I think we will stick to a thermos flask.

Sting – Soul Cake

Crossing the digital divides

Reading a few posts on WordPress and Facebook this week about people wanting to leave what was Twitter and now X, but not quite sure where to go or what to do or who to follow or who can then follow you?!

I have been really happy here on WordPress though my spelling and writing style is not great at times and my punctuation is even worse. But I find this page such a cool place to offload ideas, shape perspectives and develop thoughts, express opinions and unwind in a way that would otherwise have just risked thoughts being trapped and stuck in my head.

The thing is I’m a good thinker well at least I think I am. But thoughts can often turn to fears or at least an expression of a fear and so writing them down and offloading them is a good way to let go too. Let’s be honest we live in dangerous times now, with no real light at the end of the tunnel, just yet and unfortunately things might get a lot worse before or even if they are then able to get better.

After some friends in the non-digital word expressed a view to sign up to bluesky I also decided to sign up to it when I heard you could share your WordPress posts on it. So I am now posting their too at @huwspace.bsky.social and my tag line introduction is that ‘I enjoy blogging on WordPress at huwspace.com and do not enjoy adverts on Facebook and get lost in what was twitter or should I say my X. Here to share views and discuss the world going to hell in a handcart.’

Another thing about writing on WordPress is that I could have swore that I used to have a sense of humour (I know, who knew!), but I am not sure if I express it that well it kind of might get lost in my fears and political thoughts these days. But it’s a case of swings and roundabouts I am sure I still have a funny bone it just needs to be tickled in the right way, that’s all.

I’m a little disappointed but not that surprised that I don’t seem to have found more people that share similar interest to me on WordPress, Facebook or Twitter err I mean my X. Alas it is like life I suppose. I keep on hoping to find kindred spirits anywhere and everywhere only to realise that I am unique and alone and that there are a surprisingly large amount of people that probably are not that interested in what I have to say.

Though I must admit I am a shy soul and seem to do my best work when no one is watching me. I do wish WordPress could find a way to promote itself to new people more, I guess it’s classed as a form of social media and competing for people in what is already a busy marketplace, where people expect to get a high quality product for free with adverts rather than pay for something which they must then generate the content themselves.

Snow Patrol – Chasing Cars

What does the future hold for Mother Earth?

Sometimes to understand the present we must learn from the past. When we learn from the past we stand a better chance of not repeating past mistakes and those mistakes that are not learned from then look more likely to be repeated again and again.

The most successful cultures, nations and empires have not been kind to those that they have conquered. As an invader would say “This land is now my land even if you were on it before I arrived”, that kind of thing, “Your old gods are not my gods, but I have some far more successful gods to introduce you to whom you must now believe in too, if you wish to continue to live and should you refuse you will die or be my slaves”, as the wheels of the world continue to turn and the world continues to carry on with or without you as the new occupier build there temples on what was once your land.

Of course this was all in the olden days before we were born, we live in a modern cultured, educated world now where people no longer go to war for land, culture wars, or for gods or power don’t we? We now fight just wars for freedom not unjust wars for money and power don’t we?

Well we are on the brink of a potential of circumstances to be able to escalate into world war three so we are sure to find out what will happen next. Sadly justice does not always win out in wars, but is written into the script and end credits by the victors.

 I have often wondered at what the world would look like if the druids were still preaching today? I love pagan and druidic mythology or interpretations of what they stood for in history. Sadly we do not have any direct written knowledge or guidance from those pagan times because those that wrote down their interpretations of them were their enemy, who wanted no less than to defeat their gods and make them worship their gods and adopt their own culture and gods as their own instead in order to survive and as people continue to thrive.  

A love the concept of an earth mother or mother earth and gaia – a planet of life.

But from what little we have learned or can be interpreted to be known today, the druids believed in equality between woman and men. Women could be gods, queens and governesses of people, owners of property in their own right and had the right to marry and divorce. These are something we think of as rights earned overtime and thought for through the 20th Century and rights still being hard thought for in many countries today.  To me this concept is not only about a transfer of power to women but an equality of rights amongst all. It is heart warming to know this is not a new concept but in fact an ancient one from cultures of a distant past.

How and when we treat others with compassion and fairness, whether we know them or not is not a sign of weakness but an insight into knowledge and understanding of others and we should always see ourselves from the eyes of others whenever we can find it possible to do so. We should aspire to be equals wherever we can and not enemies.

When we branch out from the tree of humanity, we are all at one time or another connected, what sustains the life of one can sustian the life of all. From the first seed to the most recently sown. Where one thrives, all can thrive but when we destroy others we risk destroying all including ourselves.

When we see all that are different or indifferent to us as potential enemies that must be battled against then one day we will all be beaten and lose. We must aim and aspire to be equals not enemies. The most powerful enemy who wins upon a battlefield is not necessarily going to be the most righteous or for want of a better word moral or stand for what is right verses what is wrong. Might is not always right.

Eva Cassidy – Fields of Gold

Discovering Ai Image generators

A work colleague of mine was talking last week about the creative power of using ai writing programs he used it to generate a template for a questionnaire for work and was really impressed with its ability to write out a template for him.

So with that in mind I have started to look at Ai art generating software and I am absolutely amazed by the results just from some basic prompts that I included to generate those images.

I do hope to continue to use such software to express myself in future too. One old image I have that I find really cool and inspirational is that of a polar bear swimming through ice cold waters it’s a fairly old image so I assume it is real as I have had the image since 2010.

I love the image and have in the past dreamed about polar bears too and love the fact of where they live, how dangerous and majestic they are as well as able to survive and thrive in such a hostile environment. I tried seeing could generate similar images with Ai photo generator and got the following results just in word press, its such a cool tool.

I also had a go on a Microsoft image generator and got the following results.

I also tried to generate an image of a polar bear being stared at by a wolf. The image below is using WordPress image generator.

I am just amazed by how cleaver these image generators are. Though they don’t always know what they are doing!

But mostly its impressive to view. The below image was using the Microsoft image generator this time.

Smoke City – Underwater Love

For what we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly thankful!

When your the chosen one put on this planet by your American Christian God and then voted into office on his second time round by about 51% of the voting US electorate. Is this a huge vote against the global consensus on what is needed for the environment?

The US now has Trump in charge of deciding what happens in the court of humanity on the future of the climate of this world, a supreme court judge for an issue he has no time for and frankly does not understand and who’s interest it serves, to not care or understand anything about protecting or preserving anything to do with it either.

In reality the policy is one of seeing the environment as a mere stock or commodity to be treated like everything else as something to be bought and sold on an alter of American capitalism and exploitation. Not engaging with the attempt to protect or preserve but to be bought or sold merely for profit.

What he does will be no accident or miscalculation. He can now act as judge and jury on the future fate of this planet, by making a conscious choice to destroy past international treaties with the environment being relegated to a mere commercial product and play thing for a few dollars more a capitalist’s wet dream on the alter of Christian capitalism, but at what cost to us all?

It’s just like playing a game and rolling dice with the globe, a game that can be lost as well as won. Trump will now pick up a set of dice and roll them to see what happens next at the expense of the planet and its populations. One roll could result in no serious irreversible climate damage over the next four years while pumping out black gold from the seas and ground just to reduce the price of gasoline for consumers and make him and his buddies a lot of money.

Whereas on an alternative landing of the roll of the dice it could result in destroying recognised globally established environmental treaties, designed to save this planet and stave of irreversible global climate catastrophise. It could lead to us reaching one of many global tipping points that would result in global climate collapse in ecological systems on the planet and then to the death of us all or a serious reduction in humans ability to survive in spaces on this planet or degrade considerable this planets ability to sustain life as we know it.

While Trump might be banking on the unlikely outcome and too busy counting his profits in his bank accounts to think that the American nation is to big and powerful to be lost to a global issue and might not be affected. If he is wrong, we will all end up counting the cost and paying the price. Just when many US citizens shout out that their prayers have been answered and that their god is good capitalist Christian god and the heir to the thrown of power is Trump, who is now their president elect. I fear the god of this earth to whom I pray to on this planet has yet to give their answer back and will most likely have the last word on this matter of the climate.

We are all now left with no alternative at this moment in time, but to hope that climate scientists are wrong and have miscalculated with all the evidence presented to them that the climate is in peril and so to our ability to maintain life on this earth unless we change course and the fact that we are seeing 100 year likely storms on a yearly basis and are just about to brake another climate record for hottest global temperature on record this year is inconsequential.

We all have to hope, whether we like it or not that exploiting the climate, degrading the environment and the dismantling of globally agreed climate treaties has no irreversible consequences or a bare minimum negative effect to this world or just merely consequences that can be witnessed and then circumnavigated or reversed in some as yet unforeseen way to prevent climate collapse and irreversible habitat and species extinction. I would rather not leave the future of my home, species and plant to Trump and hope, but I was not at the ballot box when his name was put on the card.

Mr President-elect for what we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly thankful.

The Devil Went Down to Georgia by Charlie Daniels

Trumpism’s

Trump a successful misogynist who is now president-elect and leader of the free world in waiting, after beating two women at the ballot box.

We not only get the leaders that we vote for, we get the leaders that we deserve.

We live on a dysfunctional planet where you could ask 100 people what makes a perfect world and you would get 100 different answers. One man’s version of heaven is another’s living hell.

The Source Ft. Candi Station, You Got The Love – 1991

Oh Mr President-elect!

A world in flux, just when some thought (including me) that it had got its act together and we were acting, voting and engaging to save a planet, fight a good fight for democracy and do right by others, still with battles to be unveiled and won or lost.

A majority of a countries citizens ( I will let you guess who’s that is) shouted out and voted to say stop the world from spinning. It’s not spinning for me in the right direction now. My money in my pocket just does not go far enough, my petrol in my tank has prices going up and up and I fear for the future and the alien’s invading my country too who also want to take my job and steeling my cash from me while eating my cats and dogs for their tea.

We need a saviour right now one that can solve all these problems and things we fear and face, if that is you they will vote for you in an election race.

So now the voting is over, the stock markets roared with delight. Paying out to all stock-owners thanking them for their votes and giving up their rights.

It’s gone silent now and we wait to see what will happen next, some with hope that those votes cast will bring about a golden age. Others now fear for their lives and for what will happen ib the next phase.

The other 49% wipe the tears from their eyes, shedding sorrows and starting the count of four more years of potential dishonesty and aggressive lies. Now wondering what will happen and when will it come to an end and what on this beautiful earth will still remain.

A Top Trumped America!

The art of politics will always amaze and intrigue. It’s looking like the majority of the people of the US believed in and voted for Trump. The Republican party look to have taken control of the Senate, the house of Representatives and the backing of the supreme court. It’s a huge achivement and things will never be the same again.

We live in a dangerous times in this world, we will have to see if Trump adds fuel to the fire or not. I stayed up most of the night to watch the results of the election, nothing like watching history being made right before your eyes, even when you cant believe what is unravelling before your very eyes. You want to try to give everyone the benefit of the doubt when you can, even Trump.

I could never vote how you have voted if you voted for him. But respect your right to vote in the way that you choose to do. There will be those that are now afriad, bitter, scarred and scared. You can not stop Trump being Trump and doing Trumpisms.

One of the most intriging political comebacks in American history is underway. If it was bought and will be sold it is all to late now to change.

I don’t really remember Trumps election when he was voted in the first time around, it just kind of happened. I dont think we will forget though the second time he has become electeted.

I still think Trump is a bad man and that is probably the majority view by many people I know and respect. You hope in a democracy that your government and like minded governments have the power and abilty to solve your problems and not make matters worse.

Bruce Springsteen – Streets of Philadelphia