It's my great pleasure to introduce our speaker for today, Arthur Lee, who's an old friend and not too old, a seasoned veteran of the international climate negotiations. And so Arthur is a Chevron Fellow and Senior Strategy Advisor in the Corporate Strategy and Sustainability Group at Chevron. But more relevant to this talk, he is one of the few industry people in my experience who actually goes to almost all the climate negotiation meetings and, in addition, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. I actually tried doing both for about five years and I was totally worn out and he's been doing the same since 1998, which is great. So he is a respected industry spokesman in that group and there are probably only six or eight of you guys from less than that. Remaining in that realm. So he's well equipped to talk to us today about what the heck happened at Charme Alchique in COP 27 and how the process got to that point and a little bit about where he thinks things will go in the next couple of cops. I guess we just confirmed that this year's, what's it, November? In November 30th to December 12th. Is in Dubai. So Arthur, take it away and give us an overview of all the work you've done. People think these are kind of great places to go and you get to vacation and then shop around in Sitesi. But my experience is once you go there, actually a friend of mine described the negotiating sessions as 90% boredom and about 2% of totally incredible, outrageous, or shattering things, either good or bad. So with that introduction, take it away, Arthur. Thank you so much, John, for that intro. I know that I've been living my life by cop numbers and I know that sounds very pathetic. I've lived my life since COP 5 in 1999, my very first cop. And it was indeed a life-altering event for me. If you read my bio, you know I'm a chemical engineer. I came from MIT and then Caltech for my masters. And I thought I'd just work in industry as a chemical process engineer designing chemical processes, refineries and as well as even power plant and also molten carbon, a few cells and things like that that was early in my repertoire in my wheelhouse, straight ahead chemical engineer. But then through my career there's been some twists and turns. And then when I ended up at Texaco, which later became Chevron, Texaco and now Chevron, and it's been almost 30 years now. By this April I would have worked 30 years at Chevron or from Texaco onward. And I'm a chemical engineer as I said. I still think of myself as one, even though I haven't practiced chemical engineering in probably over 25 years. But when I walked into Hotel Maritime in Bonn, COP 5 in 1999, and where I left I was a totally changed person. It really is a life altering kind of experience. Because, you know, being a chemical engineer and then seeing how the United Nations actually works was really, wow, anybody, I can't use any more superlatives. But it's just changed my whole outlook on world events and on how some things actually work in real life. So anyway, without too much more, let me just say something about the COP. And we'll set you all on the same page and it will be on this slide. They'll just more or less stay on this slide. It really is a UN convention. It's called the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. So I'll use those words first, UNFCCC. Okay, so just remember that. And then the COP is actually a conference of parties, parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. So a conference of parties, when you hear the word conference, it actually is not the same as going to a chemistry conference or chemical engineering or electrical engineering conference. You're not there to do business in the traditional sense. You're there to actually negotiate. Nations actually go there as negotiators. They're not there to fool around. They're there to actually negotiate. And so the UN Framework Convention was agreed to in Rio de Janeiro back in 1992 before my time. I started, like I said, in 1999. So it was before my time. I could see how it was when they went through the UNFCCC became ratified in 1994, when I think 55 countries exceeded or ratified the Framework Convention. And the United States was actually one of the countries that first ratified it. So it is actually law of the land for the United States. When you accede to or you ratify something, in the U.S. cases by the Senate, you actually make a commitment to the international community that you will pass laws and regulation, whatever your system of governance is, to actually implement the UN Framework Convention. And so that's what actually the U.S. EPA did. And in some way, the U.S. Energy Information Administration actually did from 1994 onwards. And other countries have done the same. But the UNFCCC was a voluntary instrument. So three years later, in COP 3, well, COP 1 was 1995. Let me just set the record straight. COP 1 was Berlin. And so like any new process, new meeting, they tried to come up with a set of procedures and how to make decisions. So let me hold off on that. But the decision-making process itself was a huge debate in Berlin and was never really finalized. You might find that incredible that this whole UN thing, we're actually operating under draft rules of procedures since 1995. There's nothing final in any of the procedures at the UNFCCC. Everything is draft rules. But people agreed to do it. And so the whole decision-making process is done in a somewhat ad hoc way. I wouldn't say it's completely ad hoc, but it's somewhat in a way that at least countries recognize that they're doing things under draft rules of procedures. And the chairman, who was usually the facilitator or the presidency of the COP, would actually hold up a gavel and actually gavel a decision and say, yes, that's been agreed, and that's it. So that is the process. When it comes down to it, it is up to the president or the chairman of the COP to gavel a decision and say, yes, that's it, no more discussion. And then it would be decided. That is the ultimate decision-making. But of course, everything is done by consensus before that. So let me give you a sense of COP, the evolution of COP. COP 5, as I said, when I went into the maritime, it changed my life. It was less than 10,000 people. And it was just enough attendees and negotiators and observers like me to fill out the rooms and the plenaries and all that at the hotel maritime. Now, you might wonder, wow, this hotel must be pretty huge. In fact, it was actually one of the largest hotels, and it's the largest hotel in Bonn that can hold these plenaries. It's actually designed almost for the United Nations. So there are these plenary rooms that could remind you of the United Nations General Assembly in New York. It is quite large. And also three German ministry buildings. I think John Smith is some of those. Three German ministry buildings that were also borrowed from the German government to be part of the negotiation process as well. So that was it, about 10,000 or maybe even less than 10,000 people. But at COP 27, the one I'm going to focus on today, I stopped counting at 35,000. So it's quite different, and the scale of the events are very different. So let me go on then. The presidency, this is important to understand, when a country decides to volunteer, really to volunteer to be the host country, so that country then automatically accepts the responsibility of also becoming the presidency. So in this case, of course, it was the foreign minister, His Excellency, Mr. Sameh Shukri, the foreign minister of Egypt. So when he became the president, what that means is literally, yes, they would announce a city, a host city to host the COP, but it is also his role, his role here, he has a very strong role here, to do one thing, and that's one thing only, is to facilitate all of the mediation, bilateral and smaller multilateral discussion, especially in the second week of the COP. The COP is a two-week process, and the first week is always the technical negotiators. People kind of more or less like me, a technical person, going there to negotiate. And these, of course, these people represent their governments. I'm just an observer. So all these negotiators from the government, they negotiate, but then the second week, that's when things get really interesting, and that's when the political level people, the ministers, and the assistants, and all of those people, then they wrap up all the technical issues that have been negotiated the first week. If they get any agreements at all, and if they don't, there'll be options and menu of options in those particular issues. And then the political level folks, then they're the ones who make decisions and further massage the package, if you will, and see if they can come to a political agreement of all the decisions that were either made or not quite made, and then they would further make an agreement on that. So his role as the president, he would fan out all his diplomats, the Egyptian diplomats. Their role is simply to mediate and make sure the negotiations are successful. So when you hear, like Dubai this year, when you hear something about the presidency of Dubai being perhaps biased and all that, well, maybe there is some of that, but you have to understand the role of the presidency. It's really very purely and simply to make sure the negotiations are successful. Why? Because to have a failure as a host government would actually be quite highly embarrassing for that country. So Egypt, whatever you might have thought of Egypt as a government and whatever it is, human rights and all that, Egypt had to look good and had to make sure the negotiations were successful. And so will the UAE. They will have to make sure the negotiations are successful, will be successful. So I just want people to understand that. The chairing role, the presidency role, is actually quite pivotal. It's not necessarily something to influence issues, but the way they want to influence issues is to influence a successful outcome. Otherwise, it doesn't look good. And I can, you know, offline, I can even tell you stories at COP, for example, at COP 15 in, that was 2009, first year President Obama's term presidency. Copenhagen, the Danish government volunteered to be the presidency and that was a spectacular failure, unfortunately. And it didn't look good for the Danish government for years after. So it's quite unfortunate, but it does not look good, it did not look good for the Danish government when that whole thing cratered. So let me set you on the same page as that. Now, there's something here too. Mr. Shukri, when he talked about the COP in the very first day of the two weeks, he called it the implementation COP. That COP 27 is time to really stop talking, you know, high-level stuff, but talk more about details of implementation. And that's what the COP turned out to be, lots of details and the hashtag that was given by the organizers and by the presidency was together for implementation. So at the end of it, after two weeks and overtime negotiation, he then called this agreement, set of agreement of decisions, he called it the Charm-El-Shake implementation plan. Now, this is a bit of a new tradition that I'll explain a little bit here. Last year at COP 26, the UK government was the presidency and Mr. Alok Sharma, his Excellency then, he had the role of minister and he was given the task from the UK government to be the president. And so after that was all agreed to and there was a whole set of decisions, the UK government very smartly gave it a name and the name they gave it was the Glasgow Climate Pack. So I said that with some gravitas, Glasgow Climate Pack sounds really important Now I'll tell you, it's no more important and certainly not as important as the Paris Agreement or the Kyoto Protocol or the original UN Framework Convention. Just because some government gave it a name doesn't mean that it was that important. So I want you to, when you read the news media in the future, to really understand what sometimes these words and names actually mean or don't mean. And so anyway, the UK government is very smart in their portrayal of their success and called it the Glasgow Climate Pack. Sounds really great. Now actually the Egyptians who are a little bit more down the earth, they just simply called it the Charmel Sheikh Implementation Plan which is what it is. There's a lot of implementation details. Just want to know the Brits are really good in naming things. And to tell you why the difference was the Paris Agreement is a legal instrument. The Kyoto Protocol that came a few years after the UN Framework Convention was also a legal instrument and of course the UNFCCC is also a legal instrument. So those three are the legal instruments that I'm talking about today and the UNFCCC is really the legal instrument under which all of these negotiations is the Mother Treaty. The Mother Treaty of everything. And then you have the Kyoto Protocol that came in 1997 and then 18 years later in 2015 we got the Paris Agreement. In between we had all these decisions but they're nowhere as high level or as important as these legal agreements, okay? All right, so there's a little bit of drama. I just want to explain these photos. Most of these photos I took, okay? So there's no copyright issues if you want to use them. I grant you that copyright. You could use them, just attribute it back to me. And I think these slides will be shared with you. So the only one I didn't take is of course this one. This one came from the UN. It's based on the webcast. It's a SNIP of the webcast. But I think almost every other photo in here I've taken. So it was a long process, long negotiations. It lasted almost 70 hours beyond the deadline which would have been Friday night but it just went right through that. It blasted right through that and just had all days negotiations and all night. Okay, when you think about as engineers, some of you, I know I did some all-nighters myself at MIT in Caltech. So you know all-nighters, what that means? Well, these people did all-nighters. Okay, these people did all-nighters for almost three straight days a night. Now, I don't know how they slept or whether they took turns going to bed or something, but I'm sure some of them did. And I'm sure some of them didn't. So it was three straight days of round-the-clock negotiation. And finally, at 3 a.m., Mr. Shukri decided, okay, it's time to close the meeting. So he started gaveling all the decisions that happened made up to that time and going through the ones that are made and the ones that are not quite made yet, he would do that a little bit later in the morning. And finally, at 6 a.m., it was done. Okay, so from 3 a.m. to 6 a.m., they just went through one by one and there were probably more than 50 issues that they had to gavel, that he had to gavel down. And he called it the implementation cop. Now, this is what one issue looks like in terms of negotiation, and this is actually one of the smaller rooms. It's not one of the bigger rooms. This is one of the smaller rooms. And in this room, probably there were 25 countries, maybe, or a little bit more. Now, some countries, some representatives in this room will actually block negotiators, okay? And let me explain the process of that. Okay, I mean, imagine you are from Vanuatu. You're just one of maybe two delegates from Vanuatu. And how would you be able to negotiate 50 issues, 50 decisions? What do you think? Anyone? How would you negotiate 50 issues when there are only two of you? I think I gave you the answer already. You negotiate as a block. You go to a block, in this case, well, in the case of Vanuatu, they probably go to two blocks. One is called the G77 plus China. It's a big negotiating block. A group of 77 countries plus China. And or maybe you also go to the small island developing state, IDS, the SIDS. So that's another block. So you could go to either one or maybe both. And you kind of delegate your issues to these block negotiators and let them negotiate whatever it is for you in those 50 issues.  So a lot of times, these smaller countries, that's what they do. So they go through blocks. So I just want you to understand that process as well. That's how smaller countries delegate their part of their sovereignty in a sense to other countries. And that's how they leverage power. So some of the themes that will come through in my presentation is all about power. It's all about power of negotiations and influence on the world stage. The other thing I didn't quite explain, but I'll explain now, is in this UN process. Now, you've always heard of UN General Assembly and all that, right? And certainly I grew up in New York City.  So the UN General Assembly and also the UN, when it comes to war and peace process, you have sort of an executive council. And that's called the UN Security Council. You have five permanent powers, permanent nuclear powers, and one rotating state from the General Assembly. And so the five nuclear weapons states are basically your executive committee for the world when it comes to war and peace, right?  But the UN process is like that at that level for those kind of issues, for war and peace. But in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, it's very different. It's entirely different. Every country has a voice. Every single country has a voice, okay? I want to let that sink into you in your thinking, okay? You may not have known this, or maybe you were aware of this, but couldn't quite believe it. But every single country has a voice. Now, it doesn't mean that every country has a vote, okay? So there is no voting mechanism in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. No voting. When that was first proposed back in Berlin, maybe John even knows this and can tell me the process. In Berlin, when they try to propose something like that, a voting procedure for making decisions, guess which country voted against that? Guess which country spoke up against that? Anyone? U.S. U.S., okay? Okay, who else? Anyone else? Okay, I won't take too long. European Union, United States, all the big countries, of course vehemently oppose that, right? Why would they give up their right to be a big, powerful country, to a little country that also would have a vote? G77 plus China will overwhelm any issue, okay, in a decision-making process like that. Okay, so the U.S., EU, all the big countries definitely oppose such a voting mechanism. And when that was proposed, that basically created a whole decision-making process, governance process in the first COP. And from then on, 20-plus years later, we're still operating under these draft rules of procedures. We're still under that. And the reason why, you would ask, why would they still be draft? Everyone is still operating under them. But of course, that means, okay, if they're draft, and anytime anyone doesn't really like it, if it doesn't happen, they can always say, well, that's just a draft, that's just a draft rule. So anyone can actually renege on following those rules, which is why you need a strong presidency to gavel the decision and say, okay, that's been made. So we're operating in this UN framework convention, which I didn't know until a few years into the COP myself. I really didn't understand this. But a few years into the COP, I finally realized, the power structure, the power influence. And again, I'm a chemical engineer. I know political science. But this was amazing to me, okay, how all this works. So anyway, so as an engineer, a scientist, I found this fascinating, just observing all this. It's been life altering. Okay, so I'll just give you five key takeaways from the Charm El Sheikh implementation plan from what was agreed to COP 27. And with these five, I can tell you a little story with each, because I hope you will find it interesting and it will illustrate some of the realities of what actually happens at these negotiations. Number one, the Paris Agreement goals, although the Paris Agreement goals are clearly restated and reinforced at this COP, but there is some statement. There is some emphasis shifting more towards the goal of one and a half degrees. Now, of course, the Paris Agreement, if you recall, is all about well below two degrees. And with actions, steps taken towards no more than one and a half degrees. So that's the, well, I didn't quote it verbatim, but that's essentially the decision made at the Paris Agreement at COP 21. So again, note down that number at COP 21. That's the Paris Agreement. Okay, so at COP 27 now, there's that restatement of purpose, a restatement of a goal. But there definitely is now more of an emphasis towards one and a half degrees, because the scientific community really thinks that even getting to one and a half degrees, there would still be a lot of impact, a significant adverse impact on us, on human beings. Okay, so one and a half degrees, definitely there's that switch on emphasis. But one of the parties, and I'm not making any of this up, you can watch the plenary at the end of the final hours and here in California, whatever it was, and then 3 a.m. in the morning over there. You can hear Switzerland, the Swiss representative, talking on behalf of Hisbock. Hisbock was called the Environmental Integrity Group, which consists of about five or six countries. So the Swiss representative spoke up and said, well, you know, I just found, he said something really, not too outrageous, but he said he was very disappointed that some countries, some parties, which shall remain unnamed, and that's what he said, and he didn't name them, tried to roll back what was already agreed to at Glasgow, and he said six, okay. So I'll connect the dots for you, and I'm not saying necessarily that's what happened, because I wasn't there, I wasn't there in the closed rooms when they were negotiating this. But in COP26, there were two of the most controversial statements were made, was about phasing out of coal, okay, and phasing out of fossil fuels subsidies. Now, just to be fully transparent, you know, of course, I come from Chevron, I work for an oil and gas company. So those two were the first proposed as words in the decision that COP26 phased out, okay, phased out of coal and phased out of fossil fuels subsidies. But what happened was they were at the very end, at COP26, the president, that was Alec Sharmer, a British minister, he basically, when he saw, he was about to gavel the decision, when he saw China raises placard and pressed the button to say that they want to speak, and he had to recognize them. He wasn't fast enough to gavel, and they spoke up, and they said that we oppose, we oppose this use of the words phased out of coal, okay, and then, and also the other countries, like India also spoke up, and several other as well spoke up, opposed the words phased out of coal. So the counter proposal was, we prefer phased down of coal. Now, of course, you know the difference between English words phased down and phased out, right? I mean, is it clear to you what the difference is? Phased down, which is what China now got, first phased out, right? Phased out of course means zero. Phased out means decline, but it never said it could be zero, right? So India supported that as well. Now, the compromise then, now I'm talking about to have 26 now. So Alex Sharma was very pained. You could see the UN camera was focused on him, and I was able to watch this.  He could see the whole thing unraveling, and he was very pain-looking. So he suspended the plenary meeting at that point, suspended it, and started walking around and started getting people together. And it was John Kerry, our special envoy. Now, John Kerry has a role of special envoy, so on the climate change issue, he has the same role, same level of protocol as Anthony Blinken, our Secretary of State. Okay, just want to give you a little bit of that diplomatic nicety. I would report to the President in the Cabinet with that role equal to Anthony Blinken. Anyway, so John Kerry started walking around because he was, of course, very concerned about this, too. And so he talked to the Chinese lead negotiator, his counterpart, and he went around. Now, it's funny that he didn't stop at the EU delegation. He did not stop. The EU said we buy into the compromise, but we are disappointed that we were not consulted. So you could see exactly why the EU person said that, because the U.S. person, John Kerry, never consulted them. So it was funny how all human beings, and you know, she wasn't consulted, so she really let John Kerry have it. It's funny when I see these things. Yeah, so the final compromise, as I said, was phased down of coal, of use, but phased out of fossil fuel subsidies. So India didn't get everything it wanted, and needed the China. But anyway, so that particular agreement was almost rolled back at this COP, at COP 27. So that I'm connecting dots for you. Of course, I'm not saying that China and India said those things in the closed-door session, but I have a very strong feeling that that's what happened. Okay, so number two, the mitigation work program to enhance nationally-determined contribution by some parties still needs to be completely fleshed out in 23 and 24. 2023 and 24. Now, here I will also share with you a little bit of a decoding kind of exercise how to read UN language. A mitigation work program, that sounds nice. It's actually when you have a work program in a UN decision, it actually means that the countries did not agree. They did not agree. But what they agreed to was to disagree, and so for the next two years they will work on it. So that is the work program. So whenever you see that in the UN Framework Convention decision, you know that the countries actually didn't agree, but they agreed to continue working. Which is nice, okay, which is still good. So they will continue to work. And they even have some further words in there to say what they will work on, and they will have some workshops, okay, some workshops to be negotiated in 23 and 24. So just note down those words in your future when you see work program in the UN context, you know exactly what that means, okay. Okay, number three was actually the biggest headline grabbing agreement out of the implementation plan, the Sharma-Sharkin implementation plan. Now I'll give you a bit of context here. This new loss and damage financial facility has been set, but there's no money in it. Okay, and I'll explain what that means. In the UN Framework Convention for the longest time since 1994, there's been money, there's two buckets of money historically. There's been the bucket of money for mitigation. That is the word for reducing emissions. So that is the first bucket of money and it's represented through the Global Environment Facility, or GEF, which is actually stewarded by the World Bank. So the World Bank actually has a lot of authority and a lot of influence over many of these funds of money. So it's for reducing emissions. And countries have to apply more or less to the World Bank as the dispenser of this money to get that money. So that's one bucket of money.  And that is more or less represented through the Adaptation Fund, which was established a little bit later in the history of the UNSCCC. So there's money for that. And some of that money comes directly from the, what's in the Kyoto Protocol, coming from what's called the Clean Development Mechanism. So there's like a 2%, almost like a tax, 2% tax on the proceeds of the Clean Development Mechanism, which I won't go into too much details. It's about doing projects in a developing country. And then you do, and those emission reduction can be turned into credits. And those credits, you take 2% of that, sell on the market, and you can put those funds into this Adaptation Fund. So there's that second bucket of money on climate change adaptation. Now the third bucket of money has never been talked about, but if you think of it this way, I always try to use very practical everyday examples. You try to reduce emissions, and you do a lot to adapt your country, your infrastructure to these future impacts. But if you still get extreme events and you get problems, what happens? So your country is damaged, right? So what happens? Where do you turn to help your country to recover? Of course I'm not equating what's happening in Turkey now, but imagine this third bucket of money. That's what this was for, is to think about loss and damage, because there's never been this third bucket of money beyond the mitigation and beyond the adaptation. So since, I'll give you another story, since 2013 at COP 19 in Warsaw. COP 19 in Warsaw was the first time actually in my memory when countries actually came up with something called the Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage. And there's no money in that either, but let me give you a story on that. A quick story on that is the first week of COP 19 to remember COP 21 was two years in the future. COP 19 is Warsaw, the lead negotiator, a technical negotiator. The lead negotiator is Mr. Sanorev... sorry, Danorev Sano, okay? That's his name. And when he stood up, or when he raised his flag in the first plenary, he said that, you know, the week before, Super Typhoon Haiyan, Super Typhoon Haiyan struck the Philippines, the East Coast Philippines, with a lot of this devastating force and basically destroyed half of the city of Sibu. Okay, the Cebu city was destroyed, half of it. And he's basically set in that first plenary, first intervention. And he said that he had family members who were injured and or killed. I remember there were deaths in his family. So the next few minutes later, he talked about he would go on hunger strike, which he did, for about five, six days. And because of that, there were a lot of people in the observers' community who were very sympathetic to what he was going through, and they too went on hunger strike with him for several days. So that, at COP 19, that set of negotiations was very emotional and very, I guess what he did was very impactful. And so at the end of it, finally, all the countries, after years of opposition, all the countries decided that, yes, they will have a Warsaw International Mechanism on loss and damage. Now, the countries that opposed this loss and damage were mainly, again, if you can make a guess which countries were opposed to this. Any good guess? Any guess? Same as last time. Same as last time, yeah, more or less, that's right. Because we, as a country, the United States and our European allies, argued that we should not be held accountable, liable, legal liabilities for any of this, for any hurricanes or anything. We're not liable because the science is not saying that we're liable. Okay, so the large countries basically have said, no, no way, we're not going to give any, first of all, we're not going to give any money. And most important, no legal liability so that no other country can take U.S. or E.U. to court, to the international court. So the legal liability question now is still there, but I think the only reason why the E.U. and the United States this time at COP26 agreed was because I think that legal liability question is still off the table, but countries now are willing to talk money, okay? They're willing to talk money but not because of liability, but because of the kind of a voluntary nature of that money to put money into a fund. So this fund, there's no fund yet. There is something called a transitional committee. It is being operationalized this year, and they will start thinking about all the criteria and processes of what this fund could do. Now, what do you think the things that they need the most in terms of setting up this fund? Well, I mean, I'll tell you. Just think of it like your insurance company. I mean, that's how I think about it. Think of it like your insurance company. You know, if there's been damage to your car or your house, whatever, you have to make a claim, right? So what is the claim process for all this? And what are the criteria for this claim process? And then, of course, if that claim is satisfied, then what would happen to dispense the money? How do you actually get the money, and how much and how frequent? All of that needs to be operationalized. So in the UN, you will see these kind of negotiations for the next two years, probably two years, to get that operationalized. So watch for this. There will be more to come on this money. Right now, there's no money. Like I said, it's just a box, empty box, no money. But all these procedures and criteria have to be operationalized, too. So it's not just simply getting the money. All right. Number four, it's also about money. A new collective quantified goal still needs to be negotiated in 2023, and these negotiations have to end in 2024. The reason for this is fairly straightforward. Again, at COP 21, which is 2015, that year the negotiations were also very fraught, very much fraught. Countries were pushing the wealthier countries to come up with money that will help the lesser developed countries to reduce emissions and or to adapt to climate change. So the Paris Agreement, if you have to understand the Paris Agreement at the heart of it, is really a voluntary agreement. We're back to the UNFCCC. I didn't even go through the Kyoto Protocol. The Kyoto Protocol is actually a mandatory agreement for some countries. So that didn't work. So the Paris Agreement years later became another voluntary agreement, and all countries can volunteer to do what they can. And these are called nationally determined contributions, or those of us in the community just call them NDCs. And these developing countries, almost all of them have NDC that's unconditional. That means they will, of course, do something without any conditions. And then there are NDCs where they will accept money. In fact, they need money to help them reduce emissions or adapt to climate change impact. Those are the conditional NDCs. So if you count up all the NDCs that are conditional and there's a certain amount of money that would be attached to it, you can actually arrive at a new goal for assistance, for financial assistance. So that's what some analysts have done. And that number could be anywhere in terms of... Well, I didn't even give you the old number. The old number was $100 billion a year. $100 billion a year for the period 2020 to 2025. Now, your next question would probably ask, okay, has that ever been done, has that ever been achieved? And my simple answer is no. No country has ever... There's been not enough money contributed at all to that $100 billion per year goal. The closest that they got to was like $90 billion in one year. And that's it. There was nothing cumulative about it. $90 billion in the last several years. So this goal has never been achieved, but the Paris Agreement actually stipulates that you must now negotiate for the period beyond 2025. You must have a new goal, and the stipulation is that that new goal, quantified goal, must be higher than the $100 billion a year. So this will be fraught. Negotiation will be fraught, starting this year in Dubai. Okay, whenever countries talk about money, they always drift very far apart and don't converge. And so the $300 billion is like the least amount that some analysts have found, but the high end is... It probably doesn't astonish me anymore, but the high end of it is about $5.5 trillion per year. Okay, not a cumulative number, but $5.5 trillion per year. Okay, so I'll let that sink in as well. So how do you think these negotiations go in Dubai? It's fraught. Okay, so that's my conclusion. So between countries, it's going to be... Whenever they talk about money, it's very hard to see them come together. Okay, Article 6 is more or less about cooperative approaches. It's about countries getting together and actually cooperate in terms of maybe emissions trading. So two or more countries could, under Article 6, paragraph 2, could decide that two or more countries could cap their total emissions at some level, and then they could actually trade emissions by reducing more than what the cap says. And so by doing that, they can then trade the excess emissions, credit or reduction as credit amongst each other, and that way they can look for the countries with the most cost-effective emission reduction and still be able to reduce emissions overall for a club or group of countries. So that's under Article 6, paragraph 2 of the Paris agreement. And Article 6, paragraph 2 procedures have been very well spelled out now. At COP 27, it received a lot more negotiation time and there was a lot of detailed agreement. 6.4, paragraph 4, is a lot slower, and that is a kind of agreement like the old clean development mechanism. It's a much more UN-focused, a UN-centered agreement where the United Nations would actually set up a supervisory body to actually approve projects to be done in certain countries and the emission credits would then flow from those actions. So those procedures, even though there are more details now at COP 27, there's still more details that need to be done, and so many of us expect 6.4 to be a lot slower coming out of the gate. 6.2 is ready, and there are lots of countries now doing bilateral agreements already. They haven't traded yet, but the countries like Singapore, Switzerland, together with seven and eight other development countries are starting to write bilateral agreements. But 6.4 is a lot slower. Okay, and I'll say one quick thing. Article 6 had the title of cooperative approaches in the run-up to the Paris agreement, and yet it failed to complete negotiations at COP 24, 25, and then the pandemic year when everything was skipped, and then 26 finally achieved agreement. So the one provision in the Paris agreement that was supposed to be enhanced cooperation actually had the least cooperation between countries, so it was kind of disappointing. Okay, I won't go into any more of this, but this is the Charme-El-Shake implementation plan actually there are 17 chapters, and I only cover those that are highlighted, and I didn't even do justice to any single one of them, except for a few examples. Okay, so I just want to show you, I spoke in the IPCC pavilion, the science pavilion, talking about carbon capture and geologic storage for industry, I talked about that. Now I want to focus on this one because this is, I'm at Stanford now, I'm with students and many people who could be in the youth NGO community, the youth movement. Now another part of the UN process you might find very interesting is I'm with a business community, so my constituency is called BINGO, Business Industry NGO, so a lot of people call me a BINGO. BINGO, okay. Environmental NGOs are ENGOs. Gender NGO for women and other gender issues would be just ENGO, and of course youth movement is YUMGOs. Okay, so I know I make that sound a little funny, but that's how the UN look at us, okay, by the way. UN look at us as not companies, but as constituencies. UN does not look at Sierra Club as one entity. UN look at the whole NGO as one big constituency. So I'm in one big constituency. The YUMGOs, this is the YUMGOs, okay. For the first time, obtained funding and it was on a part of the UN and several countries, donor countries decided that that we must allow the youth movement to have a strong voice. And so a pavilion was set up so that the youth movement could invite people to talk and actually think about and give input to the negotiation process. Now the reason for this, I'll give you a very practical reason. In COP24 and COP25, the youth movement's messaging to the UN, both at the official level and also in terms of demonstration and protest, became louder and louder and angrier and angrier in both circumstances, okay. At COP25 in Madrid, in fact there were like over 300 people who staged a very disruptive demonstration at one of the negotiating track, one of the negotiating rooms and disrupted that whole negotiation for hours, okay. So now that didn't do anyone any good because that simply delayed the process. And so those 300 YUMGO members were ejected from the, arrested by the UN police. And these are real police, by the way. The UN in the blue zone, the UN actually, they have police powers and they actually carry weapons. So they are real police and they ejected 300 youth movement people and debatched them as well, took away their badges so that they could not come back. Now whether they were permanently debatched, I don't know, but it's possible because they were very disruptive. But anyway, so having a YUMGO, for the first time a YUMGO pavilion doing very systematic and lots of side events I think was very helpful, much more helpful than before when there was no voice given to the youth, children and youth voice, okay. All right, so let me just show you some more pictures. Now these are the actual words from a decision package on the right hand side. So, and I'm just quoting just a few paragraphs and each of these decisions are pages long, four, five, six pages long. So there are lots of these decisions that were made and I just show you the actual negotiation itself is like this, okay. This is a little bit bigger room than what I showed you earlier. This one was probably not on technology, but on the new collective quantified goal, the money issue, which of course attracted a lot of the negotiators. So this was a big negotiation. And this too was a technical negotiation but it was held in the first week as a plenary held by the chair of the Mopanu Mopanu of one of the West African countries, sorry, forgotten, but Mopanu Mopanu was a chair, okay. And so this was a technology negotiation and you can see that that's what people actually do. They actually negotiate for hours over words and you can see the upper left corner there, the words there. And you know, in this particular case it's very close to final, okay. So there were no brackets. So when there are still this agreement the text itself would be bracketed and there could be options, sometimes option in the text. And that's exactly what happened in the, let me show you in this particular slide, okay, on this slide this is about technology, about technology transfer and development, okay. And on this particular slide, the U.S. negotiator, Mr. Erwin Rose, he was looking very, he was looking very intently, intently on the screen, and so is his counterpart in the EU, that woman there in the EU, from the EU. There are allies on this issue. And so when Argentina off-screen, when Argentina spoke up and inserted a few words on what they had proposed for this decision, they were intently looking at it and seeing whether it could impact how it could be handled in the future. So I think eventually this was at the end of the final hour of the final session, they had to make a choice. And they could either delete the whole paragraph or they could go with a compromise. So I think for this particular issue they went with a compromise. But if it's a bracket of text and they're all these brackets and you can't take away the brackets, that's bad news. That means very likely that you need to remove the whole paragraph. That's why sometimes these decisions, they don't read very well. They read very choppy. But this was the chair. She's from Austria and she basically threatened people saying if you don't come to some compromise, I'm going to invoke Draft Rule 16. And again, I told you what Draft Rule is mean. But Draft Rule 16 would have deleted everything that went on that whole session. The whole two weeks. Delete everything and the whole year before. So you would come back to this decision again next time, literally with a white sheet of paper. So I'll just end there. I know I took a long time but I hope you found it interesting because that's what really happens at these meetings. It's not pretty, but it is necessary. And I'll say that again. It's not pretty, but it's necessary. Everyone has a voice. Every single country has a voice. No voting, but every single country has a voice. There's no executive committee to make decisions for you or for the world. It's not a pretty council for climate change. Every single country has a voice. And that's why these cops are like this. And it's done every year so that this progress is slow but it's made. So I hope I've convinced you it's not a pretty process, but it's necessary. Thank you.


The ritual, I guess, of getting ready for a show, day of, most of the time it involves like anyone who doesn't have work comes to the house here where we practice and packs up everything which can be range from four or five guitars, drum set, all the amps like an entire van full of stuff too if we're playing a smaller show maybe just a couple guitars and a couple amps, smaller drum set, load up the van and then make sure the van starts and then drive to wherever the show is. Really nice to play a show in Boston because all our friends are there but it's also a little more nerve-wracking to play in Boston because all our friends are there so sometimes I get especially like when we're you know when we're on stage just seeing people seeing my roommates in the crowd is kind of a different experience than seeing just general faces. There was one time we played at Rockwood Music Hall in New York and we parked kind of far away and we were just loading on stage and I was like where's my guitar and I couldn't find it anywhere I was like sure it had been stolen because we weren't watching the stuff or like we were trying to watch it but there's so many people in and out so I'm running around the venue we're supposed to be on stage setting up running around the venue trying to find the guitar don't find it I run to the van it's like a five-minute run it's not in the van so I'm now like convinced it's been stolen I'm like in this really terrible mood and I run back to the venue I'm just like okay I guess I'll just borrow one and eventually but I'm like in this awful mood and I'm supposed to be on stage and I finally I see it behind a curtain it has been moved like literally behind a curtain next to the stage so it's like oh my gosh thank gosh but my like stress level was so high at this point that we got on stage and I was just it was like the complete wrong headspace to be in before a show it's just very stressed and angry and not good freaking out yeah freaking out basically and so that's something that we've learned is like the the headspace that you are in right before you play and you know when you're getting to the venue is often the same one as when you get on stage so making sure that that can be as stress free and you know just the right the red you know the right mood is important before because you bring it with you on stage well you can prepare as well as you can for it but it's you're always going to have new things happening on stage that you didn't expect it's yeah usually a technical malfunction or sometimes the monitor level isn't right so you're just like I hope that I'm singing a tune but all you can do is just prepare you know as much as you can and hope for the best because once you're on there you're on there you know you can't you can't be like wait a minute I mean sometimes you have to but ideally not


What's up guys and welcome to Trendy Update Tapa, SPM Boz. Now on to the trending news today is Bonfire Adventures CEO Simon Kabu, wu has met Mugivi Singa Samido and Wife Derito, but separately and it looks like he is trying to help them solve their marito issues. Now we all know Karen Nyamu, the nominated senator is also Samido's baby mama and this is a situation that doesn't seem to sit well with the first wife of Samido, Edin Derito. And of course this is evident because she has been posting a post on social media that looks like she is really hurting over this incident that are happening in public. Samido and Karen Nyamu have been seen attending publicly events and have posted even pictures of them together and just the other day they were celebrating their daughter's bati. We all know Samido has fathered the two children of Karen Nyamu and is also has had children with Edin Derito as well. And we all know Edin Derito and Samido have been in marriage for quite some time and dated over for 15 years, but now he rather Edin Derito says that Samido has put her to shame and has drained and took to the drain the marriage that they have shared for so many years. And of our post that she put up just a few weeks ago, she was saying to say that she is not going to raise her kids in a polygamas family. And of course this is something that had led people to speculate that Edin Derito is leaving this marriage with Samido and probably this is why Kabul Simon has met the two of them separately just to have talks with them. And on this picture that Kabul Simon put up on social media, alieza pu caption with my buddies Penye Mabazu. And we can see these pictures have been taken separately in different times in different locations. So it looks like Kabul Simon is hinting that he met this couple just to try and make sure they are still together and solve their marito issues. Of course with a hint Edin Derito put up that she is not willing to raise her family in a polygamas family. It led of course people to think that they have separated with Samido. And of course Ranyamu has continued to post Samido any time they are attending a public event so that means they are still together. Now this leaves a question that is Edin Derito ready to go on with this or not? And probably this is what Kabul Simon is just about to answer when he met this couple separately. So I'm going to be reading the comments on this picture that Simon Kabul has posted. Esi International says bila karenyamu hapo hi nikazi yabure. Okay esi one boy says good job you are doing Simon. But usi sahau the other side kuna innocent kids who also need their father. Hashtag peace. Then Eunice Nje is definitely noting that these are different locations that Simon Kabul has met the couple. Alafu mama Eliana tu waifu wa nasema achana na patanisho. Wale wangi na ulua patanisha wakaleo atu na waka JVsha. I'm sure of course this is something that mama Eliana is talking about kwa Simon Kabul meeting Erika Mondi and Jackie Maribeth, the TV presenter. When he met them just a few years ago just to try and make sure they are together. But of course the ton of events weren't so good. Now benilas naana mwambi. Thank you Simon. Family first we all make mistakes in life but that should not destroy any family. Alei naepi anasema ni me kumbuka ya Erika Mondi na Maribeth. Let people be. Nani kimalizia pale Rosu Beth mwangi says ati we all make mistakes. Kwa ni utarudia hi mistake marangapi uiu amezuea. Wacha ni kubali first wife ni kujua kuna second wife. Hizi ho punapia first wife then utaji pata kwa pale pale. Sita ampia heart attack. All right I don't know what are your thoughts about this conversation that Simon Kabul has gone to meet a singer Samido and a wife heading the rito separately just to seek and how just to help them in their marito issues. Let us know down on the comments section but in the meantime keep it trendy updates. Hapa SPM buzz.


Today, we're going to be looking at the home colorway of the Nike Air Penny 1. There's so much nostalgia behind this sneaker and I'm excited to give you guys a review of this shoe as well. And if you didn't know by now, my name is DJ and this is the DNA Show. On this channel, I love talking about sneakers and especially giving you guys dope reviews like this. So if you haven't already, consider subscribing and joining the fam. We're on the road to a million subscribers and you could be the next one to get us there. Now let's go ahead and crack this box open and see what they're talking about. Starting with the outside of the box right here, we got nothing special, just your classic Nike box all red with the Nike branding on the top and the sides with the swoosh. And then on the size tag, it reads Nike Air Penny White Varsity Royal Black, size 13. Just for me, retail is 170 bucks.  Oh, you got the shoe. All right. First impression of this sneaker, might I say perfection. I don't normally do all white sneakers because I'm a size 13 and they just look extremely huge. But these ones, I had to make an exception. These go crazy. So before we start breaking down the styles, cuts and materials and all the details of the shoe, we got to talk about the history first. Penny Hardaway was an iconic basketball player known heavily for playing in the NBA during the 90s. And back in 1995-96 season, we saw this sneaker debut with the Penny One. And I'm telling you right now, still in current time, this is a legendary sneaker. Even though Penny Hardaway may have been overshadowed by Michael Jordan, during that same time with him winning all those championships, I can guarantee you, Penny Hardaway was a legendary basketball player and has played a huge role in the sneaker community and our culture at the same time. We haven't seen this colorway hit the street since 1996. So I think from a sneaker head perspective, we could say these were definitely overdue. But with all that being said, let's go ahead and break down the sneaker, starting from the bottom and working our way up. Looking at the outsole right here, you got an all white outsole with a huge Nike swoosh right here in blue with that wavy traction vibe on the bottom of the foot. And then one thing that I had always loved, I remember this when I was a little kid, super dope. You've kind of got this see-through element right here in the center of the heel. And this actually looks at the air unit right here. So super dope to be able to see that and see that they brought that steel back to life in current time because I remember back in my childhood days, looking at this type of element or like the hologram on the Jordan 13, different stuff like that was a super iconic to me growing up. So it's always nice seeing this little touch as well. Now going up to the midsole right here, you got your foam wrapping up halfway through the middle of the foot, which are drooled Nike swoosh and the black lines through it. And then on the back end, you got your exposed air unit like I was talking about earlier. And then on here, it looks like it has a blue line on the inside of that as well. Now going up to the upper, you have a smooth leather. It doesn't feel like it's the best. It doesn't feel like it's the worst. At the end of the day, I don't think they were coming for crazy quality. I think it was just more of like bringing back nostalgia so I can understand why they didn't put some crazy premium leather unless it were to be like a collab like we've recently seen. Now looking at the toe of the foot right here, you got your piping that goes around both sides from the center of the foot.   Super dope, super soft right here. These come equipped with a pair of rope white laces. And then on the top of the tongue, you have a leather patch with the embroidered blue swoosh with the silver lining around that.  Now going to the heel of the foot, you have a very iconic hit right here and it's the penny one cent logo. Honestly, this logo is always super dope and it's easy to identify as soon as you see a penny hardaway sneaker, typically you're going to look for this and you'll be like, oh, okay, that's a pair of penny. I know these might look like some moon boots from the 90s, but at the end of the day, these are definitely very iconic and nostalgic and it's dope to see them coming back to life like I said earlier, 20 plus years later. So for all my new sneaker heads out there, trust me, these hit home for a lot of the OGs out there. Now going to the sock liner right here, you got a blue material and then a black behind the tongue. And then on the end, so you got a royal blue with a white Nike air on the center of that. So as you guys can tell, I clearly love this sneaker and I'm so excited to be able to add these to my collection. Now I'm interested to see what everybody else's thinks because I know there's going to be a big disconnect between the modern day sneaker head. All the OG has the nostalgia, the gap between. This was 1996. If you're a sneaker head and you're under 21 years old, no disrespect, but you weren't even born at that time, which means you may not know or understand the nostalgia behind it, which could cause you not to like it because you don't have any sentimental memories to it. Completely understand. So that's why I'm always interested to see the polls on sneakers like this that aren't as hot, that aren't trending as much. And I'm sure it might not be what we expect to see. So anyways, at the end of the day, if you haven't followed me on IG, make sure you do so you can participate in the polls and see all the results here on the channel. I ask the people a simple question.  This is what they say. 38% of the people said fire and 62% of the people said trash. Now, I didn't think it was going to be that bad. I was thinking like, you know, like in 60, 40 saying fire, but maybe I'm tripping. I don't know. Like let me know what y'all think down below. Again, we can all like what we want to like and there's no harm or no love lost to any other body. Like I'm happy to see everybody's opinions, but I thought that was kind of crazy. And I understand there haven't been a bunch of penny ones coming out to raise awareness behind the sneaker to cause the consumer to understand the nostalgia behind it and the storytelling and all that different stuff. So I get that as well. So let me know what you guys think down below in the comment section when it comes to the sneaker. Is this your first time hearing about the shoe? Do you now like it? Do you still not like it? Let me know. I would love to hear all of your opinions again. I didn't design it. I didn't create the nostalgia.  At the end of the day, I love these. I think they're fire. I'm glad to have them in my collection. And for you to be able to purchase these for retail, I think that's a good thing too. And it's kind of interesting cause I looked at the resell market. I was able to get these at my local store for 170 bucks and people are already selling them for like 225 and the black pair, the black pair is going for like 350 or 400 bucks or something like that. Those sold out. So everybody wanted those. At least I think everybody did. I don't know. Either way, let me know you guys' opinion. I would love to hear it down below in the comment section. Yo, if you enjoyed this video and want to grow your collection or make extra money on the side, I built a VIP mastermind that will teach you everything that I've learned about growing my sneaker collection over the past 15 years. This will also give you access to the DNA fam in my VIP community where we talk about investing outside of sneakers. And don't worry. If you don't plan on joining the VIP community, it's okay. I also set up a private DNA fam community that gives you access to all the behind the scenes looks from the studio and multiple chances to win free sneakers and gear from weekly and monthly challenges. So all you need to do is click on the link down below in the description or the first link pinned in the comment section. That will get you set up and into the community. I'm excited to see you guys on the inside. I hope to see you guys in another video. All right, y'all, I'm out.


In this video, we're going to look at the mythologies coming out of what's just kind of broadly called the Middle East. Now, just using the term the Middle East to refer to this group of mythologies is like saying, we're going to look at the cultures of North America, kind of pretty wide spectrum there. Now, we're going to start with Mesopotamia. Mesopotamia is an area between the Tigris and the Euphrates River. For the south, Mesopotamia is Sumeria. For the north of Sumeria is a city called Babylon. The peoples of Babylon conquered Sumeria, and then that region collectively with Babylon and Sumeria was collectively referred to as Babylonia. And for the north, he had the Assyrians, and the Assyrians conquered Babylonia. Now what we're going to find, so we're going to start with, and then all this is referred to as Mesopotamia. So Mesopotamia have Assyria, Babylonia, Babylon, and then Sumeria. Now these, like I said, these, this is referred to as Mesopotamia, and the mythologies coming out of Mesopotamia really influenced the areas around Mesopotamia, and we're going to see this when we take a look at Persia mythology. Now Persia is not a part of Babylonian mythology, but I think at one time it was conquered by Persia. You know, about Mesopotamia was conquered by Persia. So what happens when you have this conquering is, believe it or not, the, yeah, you might think that when one region conquers another, the culture of the second region, the conquered region, is just wiped out, but that doesn't look like what, that's what happens. Instead the mythology, the cultures are absorbed by the conquering nation. Now even though there's absorption, there's still going to be some tension, some changes, and we're going to see this probably most notably with Sumeria and Babylon. Sumerian mythology is a little different to Babylon, the Babylon mythology, the mythology out of Babylon, and then this in turn makes Babylonian mythology different. So with that in mind, let's take a look at this, you know, at least some of the things that happened in this chapter just broadly called the Middle East. So this difference between Sumerian mythology and Babylonian mythology might be most easily seen with their creation myths. So let's start with Sumerian mythology. So for Sumerian mythology, everything comes from this primordial sea, primordial sea, Namu, and the primordial sea. And from the primordial sea come the earth and the sky, the gods An and the goddess Ki. Now the earth and the sky give earth to Unleil, he's the creator god, he's the god of order, god of the universe, and Unleil, that only creates all things, but he also gives agriculture, he also creates tools, the arts of civilization, vegetation, cattle. You might look at this and say, well, yeah, this guy's responsible for our existence, and that's true. Our Unleil, that only creates all these things, he creates humankind, and humankind is here to serve the gods. So Namu, An, Ki, and Unleil. It's similar to Unleil, and I'm not sure if he's necessarily supposed to be different than Unleil, but here we have this description of another god called Anki. Anki is, he lives in the underground sea, you know, whether they're supposed to be different from the primordial sea, I don't know. Anki lives in the underground sea, and he possesses the me, these laws or imutable divine decrees on how to do everything. And there's lots of these, I think there's something about 100 of these laws, these defined decrees, and they range from anywhere, the text doesn't go too much into the description, they range from defining what it means to be a law, defining what it means to be a god, defining what worship should look like, the different roles that people should take, what it means to be a king, and how to run economies, even down to, you know, rules and description, how to create certain musical instruments. And the me, these immutable divine decrees, tell you how to live and order your life. So this is, this is the Sumerian mythology. Out of the primordial sea comes order, and order organizes, and creates, and gives life to everything. So on the one hand we've got the Sumerian mythology, the Sumerian creation myth, on the other hand we have the Babylonian creation myth, and the Babylonian creation myth is a little bit different. Instead of one sea, one primordial sea, Namu, we've got two Apsu and Tiamat. Apsu is the sweet water ocean, we might maybe also interpret this to be freshwater ocean, I don't know exactly what it's supposed to be, but it's a sweet water ocean. And on the other hand we have the salt water, that's Tiamat. Now Tiamat and Apsu come together to, you know, they come together and through their union they create two more gods, Anu and Ia. And these are very, very powerful gods, Anu and Ia. Anu and Ia give birth to Marduk. Marduk is the king of Babylon. So we've got Apsu, Tiamat, Anu, Ia, and Marduk. Alright, there's a lot of names here. So the book doesn't really go into detail, we may not know, but a conflict arises. And in the midst of this conflict Ia kills Apsu, so child kills a parent. And because Ia kills Apsu, Tiamat, Tiamat, the salt water ocean, the salt water, swears revenge. Now to carry out her revenge, Tiamat creates monsters. And at the head of this army of monsters is her son, Kingu. So Kingu is the kind of head of the monsters, leading the monsters and fighting the other gods. Now this fight is going nowhere. Nobody is apparently winning, and there's just more and more destruction. So to settle the fight, Marduk says that he can kill Tiamat. He can defeat Tiamat, but if he's going to defeat Tiamat, he wants something to return. And namely, he wants to be king of the gods. So the other gods agree, and Marduk goes off and kills Tiamat. And when he kills her, he savors her body in two. And one part of the body makes the sky, and the other part of the body makes the earth. Then he confronts Kingu and takes away from Kingu the tablets of destiny. And the tablets of destiny are pretty much like the me. They are these divine decrees. Everybody wants these divine decrees, because they can now control everything else, or they have absolute power if they have the divine decrees. So Marduk defeats Kingu, or takes away the tablets of destiny for Kingu, and then on top of that he kills Kingu. Now with Kingu's death, Kingu's blood mixes with earth and creates humankind. And once again, we're here to serve the gods. So it's a pretty different version for the Sumerians. So let's compare these two mythologies here briefly. They teach two very different lessons. For the Sumerians, the universe is order. The universe was brought about through order. Creation was brought about through order. The gods are ordered. Your place in the universe.   And you were brought about as you were created as an extension of that order. For the Babylonians, creation comes about through conflict. The conflict in the beginning with the gods, and through that conflict, that death, and destruction, we exist. And you were brought into existence by one who ascended to the throne by defeating an enemy. And for the Sumerians, life is mysterious. Sure, there's mysterious forces out there, but at least it's orderly for the Babylonians. Life is mysterious because whatever happens happens because of some whatever whim of the gods, whatever whim of the one who conquers. And for the Sumerians, you were here as part of the order of the universe. For the Babylonians, you were here because you brought into existence by the one who conquers and made you assert. And Sumerian mythology, what do we have? We have this idea that the universe is ordered. We have some notion that the immutable divine decrees, even though they can be captured by one god or the other, still determine what the universe is supposed to be like. For the Babylonians, the universe is kind of a capricious place. It's own wild whims because the gods that are controlled us are a little bit on the wild side. And one epic, one legend kind of exemplifies this, and that's alleged in Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh is an important epic in Babylonian mythology, true. But Gilgamesh is also kind of a mess. You might just call him Gilgamesh. If Gilgamesh were to run today, he'd be at once a WWMA star. He's a wrestling sensation, but at the same time he also leads a rock and roll band. And president of the country. That's what Gilgamesh would be. So he's grandiose. He's larger than life. He's two-thirds god and one-third man. Not even half and half, but two-thirds god and one-third man. Presumably the one-third man part is his own mortality. He could be killed. So he's this huge, large-in-life person. He's a king and he's pretty much, we would say he's oppressing the people. He'd probably say, I'm just being a king! He's doing what he wants and he's living life and he's being large and in charge. So to kind of put Gilgamesh in his place, the gods sent a kidnu. A kidnu is kind of this wild, savage man. And a kidnu is supposed to go and defeat and kill Gilgamesh. So what happens is the two fight and then they become friends. Gilgamesh makes him his buddy. And then they start going off and have all kinds of wild adventures together. They offend the gods even more, including at one point, right? This goddess wants to have Gilgamesh as her consort. And he says, no, thank you. I don't need you. He spurns this goddess. How large a person can he be? The love of a goddess. What is that? So Gilgamesh and a kidnu are even having these larger, even more grand adventures than Gilgamesh all by himself. So now since Gilgamesh spurned the love of a goddess, the result is that a kidnu dies. A kidnu is killed by the goddess. And this sends Gilgamesh into kind of a depression. He misses his friend. So he tries very hard to get immortality for his friend a kidnu. And in a way, he kind of succeeds. He finally acquires the secret to this immortal life, or at least to bring back his friend a kidnu. And then he loses it. And in the midst of all this, the lesson we're supposed to learn in all this is that it doesn't matter how larger than life a person you are, it doesn't matter how powerful you are, or how big you are, or to the extent that what you have and can spurn the gods, because this is what Gilgamesh does. He never suffers death, what his friend does. No matter how grand and outrageous your life is, even if immortality is in vain, you're never going to see it.  Death is inevitable. That's kind of sad, right? You can rise to the top.  Your life is not in your control. So we looked at the Sumerian mythology and Babylonian mythology that's drift on over to Persian mythology. And the Persians are even somewhat different than the Sumerians and the Babylonians. They might even say it's kind of a synthesis of the two. So you have Sumerians on the one hand to think the universe isn't in order, right? There's a reason for existence. There's something important and a meaning to your life. It's from this defined decree, the immutable me. That's Sumerian. On the other hand, you have Babylonian mythology that says, look, there ain't a whole lot that's in your control. What happens in life is up to the whims of the gods. And it's not like they're really nice guys. They're killing each other and having all kinds of fights of their own. And then you have Persian mythology. Persian mythology abuse creation. At least we don't have a creation story here. They just borrow from the previous ones. But there's two supreme gods involved. One is Hurra Mazda. And this is the wise lord. This is the supreme god. And Hurra Mazda, yeah, he's basically a good person. He's responsible for life. He brings about life in the universe. He brings about order again to the universe. That sounds a little bit, you know, like in Leo or Anki. And kind of in opposition to Hurra Mazda is Angra Manu. Angra Manu. And this means the lord of darkness and sterility. Darkness and sterility. That's awful, right? Not only you're in the dark, you're sterile. And Angra Manu is continually fighting against a Hurra Mazda. And it's pretty much an even match. It's not as if a Hurra Mazda could just snap its fingers and get rid of Angra Manu. There always seems like Angra Manu has some resources to call upon to continue this fight. But this is what existence is. It's this battle between good and evil. And while good will win, right? So the perjury mythology says good will win. It's not going to be an easy fight. It's not going to be an easy fight. So one way to think about this, what the Persians might be doing here, is that they're saying, look, yes, there's order and wonder and beauty and life to the universe. But there's also this horrible disorder. There's also this daft and sterility going on. And these two are fighting each other. We're kind of caught in the middle. We're kind of caught in the middle. So you can kind of see how Sumerian mythology influenced Babylonian mythology and those two in turn influenced Persian mythology.


Hey everybody welcome back to magic orthodoxy my name is David and this is a magic review. Hey today we're going to look at the search engine pen from Jeff Price. What is it? Basically it's a hot rod. It's a new take it's a new look at the old hot rod. You probably got one when you were just starting out in magic and then you kind of like discarded it because it looked too much like a magic prop. Jeff Price has kind of addressed that issue and turned it into a pen a big pen and so if you want to see what it looks like this is it. So here at the magic shop we sell a ton of different types of hot rods but the problem is that they all look like this a magic prop. The search engine pen is the first one that looks totally organic. In performance the spectator thinks of one of the colors and with the shake the entire logo changes to that color. The set includes an additional pen that can be handed out for complete examination at the end. The search engine pen combines the world's most iconic search engine logo with the hot rod methodology to create the most natural looking hot rod ever and it's now available at magic stores near you. All right so that was Jeff Price you might remember he did in your wallet. I reviewed that a while back. This what I liked about it it put the hot rod back in my routine. I am glad you have picked it up. I used to have a hot rod a long time ago when I was a wee magician and I kind of threw it by the wayside because it looked too much like a prop that wasn't recognizable and nobody would trust and so what this does is it kind of puts that effect back in your hands with something that's more believable and a little bit more organic. All right so a couple questions we always ask about all of our magic reviews. The first of which is what's in the box. What's in the box the first thing you're going to get is you're going to get written instructions okay these are written instructions there's no video at all included.  All right so is it what I thought it's absolutely what I thought it's a hot rod device I've seen one before they said it was a hot rod pen and that's what I got. And how are the angles the angles for the hot rod are pretty much standard you probably know what they are if you already have one. If you know how to do the paddle move the angles are virtually unseen. Can it be inspected the examinable one can be inspected if you figure out how to do an easy switch between one pen and the other you can hand the examinable pen out at the end and yes it really writes. Is it well made it's a standard big pen it even says Vic right there on the cap and so it couldn't be any more realistic looking or believable than this. All right so how much practice does it require the only practice required is knowing the paddle move the paddle move is given in the written instructions however I find written instructions somewhat archaic in this form when you're trying to learn something like this I mean there aren't even photographs or pictures of this and so what I would recommend is you go out and find some instructions on the paddle move maybe on YouTube or perhaps another magician I think once you figure that part out you're good to go. How much setup and reset is there there's none what I do is I take the gimmick pen and stick it in one front pocket stick the examinable pen in another front pocket and then after the effect I take the gimmick pen stick it in the same pocket with the examinable pen and then when the spectator asks to see it I switch pens and pull the examinable one back out they think it's the same pen and they're none the wiser. All right so what's the positives to this. The positives to this this is a much more organic realistic looking hot rod people are gonna believe this they're gonna believe your story and I think it's a much more realistic crop and I think this is a much better crop to have. All right so what are some of the negatives these are just the negatives that I see with this they don't have to be the negatives that you see the first negative is when dealing with the pen itself there's a little pocket holder on the disposable pen so when you're doing the paddle move you're going to notice that this little bar flips from one side to the next and so I would suggest that when you do the paddle move you actually remove this cap before you do the change that way it'll be consistent when you show both sides of the pen. Second a negative to this in the advertisements they keep saying that this is the recognizable search engine logo it is not. Of course due to copyright there's no way Jeff Price would have gotten Google's permission to do this and so this actually says Kugel with a C and what Jeff's suggestions are is first you could just get a felt pen and fill in the C and make a G. I think that would be difficult since you got to do it for all four sides of both pens and to make it look consistent in your own writing it's probably not going to work. His second suggestion would be to take your fingernail and scratch the logo away to make it look worn that's certainly a possibility that might work if you could figure that out. The third recommendation he has and this is what he does in the video is when he holds the pen he either covers the C completely or he just covers the lower part of the C like that so you're giving the illusion that it says Google and so that's going to be up to you. Personally I would have rather seen them make just any logo I mean it could have said you know ink pen could have said any fake company it doesn't have to say Google. I think he chose Google because of the colors that are in the logo for sure but again I always kind of get a little leery when magicians try to replicate a brand name that people recognize with something that they won't recognize because that in and of itself also makes the object look like a magical device and not a real device and so in trying to make it look more realistic it still ends up looking a little fake but like Jeff says there's ways around it if you're dedicated to it and I think for the most part no one will ever even catch it. Alright so is it worth your money it's 10 bucks 10 bucks and you get two pens both the gimmick and the examinable I think that's well worth your money to put the hot rod back into your magic routine 10 bucks is nothing I think everybody should go out and get this right now. Alright so who would like this I think anybody that likes to stick regular recognizable objects in their pockets so they can walk around and do you know walk around uh people that do street magic people that just want to you know show something quick to a group of kids or party magic or whatever like that anybody who's used the hot rod before and it's been looking to put it back into the routine I think would certainly like the search engine pen from Jeff Price. Alright so that is my review for the search engine pen this was provided for us by the great people down at Murphy's Magic Supplies and if you'd like to purchase your own you can find it in one of your favorite in Murphy's Magic Suppliers. Thanks bye.


Welcome to yet another session of Oral Medicine and Radiology series. Today we will be dealing with Aptis ulcers. Before we go to an Aptis ulcer, let's see what's an ulcer? By definition, an ulcer is a breach in the continuity of the epithelium of the skin or the mucus membrane to involve the underlying connective tissue as a result of micro-molecular cell death of the surface epithelium or its traumatic framework. These are the various parts of an ulcer. This is the margin or the junction between the surface and the ulcer proper. This part is called as the edge and this is the floor which is visible and this is the non-visible part and it's called as the base. The ulcer actually rests on the base. This what you see here is the epithelium and this part is the connective tissue. So you can see that the connective tissue is involved here. So if the connective tissue was not involved, it was just a superficial area. This could have been called as an erosion. So only since this connective tissue is also involved, it is called as an ulcer. So let's go to the classification of ulcers. So according to the 11th edition of Birkitz, we can classify ulcers into four. The patient with acute multiple lesions. The patient with recurring oral ulcers. The patient with chronic multiple lesions and the patient with single ulcers. Under the patient with acute multiple lesions, we have herpes, simplex virus infections, varicella-softer infections, cytomegalo infections, coxacivirus infections, acute necrotizing ulcerative gingivitis and periodontitis, erythema-multiforme and severe forms of that. That is Steven Johnson syndrome and toxic epidermal necrolysis. Oral hypersensitivity reactions. All these come under patient with acute multiple lesions. And under patient with recurring oral ulcers, we have recurrent apistomatitis So this is what we will be dealing with today. Under patient with chronic multiple lesions, we have a list of vesiculobullous lesions actually. There is pancreas vulgaris, pyroneoplastic pancreas, pancreas vegetans, subepithelial bulus dermatosis, bulus panfegoid, mucosmineran panfegoid, linear IgD disease, epidermolysis, bulosa equisitia. Chronic bulus disease of the childhood. And under patient with single ulcers, we have traumatic injuries causing solitary ulcerations. That is your traumatic ulcers. And traumatic ulcerative granuloma. That is your esnophilic granuloma of the tongue. And then you have three other deep fundal infections. Where the histoplasmosis, gastromycosis and picomycosis. Which also called as mucomycosis. And this is another classification. Just added to make it a little bit simple to understand. This is based on etiology. You can actually divide ulcers or group ulcers based on the etiology part. It is traumatic, infectious, drug induced, ulcers associated with blood discresias, immune mediated, oral ulcers associated with dermatological disorders, oral ulcers associated with GI disorder with gastro-understandal disorders, new plastic oral ulcers and ulcers of uncertain etiology. So the ulcers of the ulcers come under ulcers of uncertain etiology. Coming to recurrent aptis stomatitis or recurrent aptis ulcer. So in short, you can call it as RAS. Short for recurrent aptis stomatitis. So recurrent aptis stomatitis is the most common oral mucosal disease. It is found in men and women of all ages, faces and geographic regions. So it doesn't actually have a particular gender predilection. Because it can be equally seen in men as well as women. It's a disorder characterized by recurring ulcers confined to the oral mucosal in patients with no other signs of disease. So this is why it's called as a recurrent aptis ulcer. The exact etiology is still unknown. Suggested causes of recurrent aptis stomatitis are local factors which include trauma, smoking, salivary gland dysfunction, microbial factors like bacterial and virus diseases, exposure to certain drugs like say, sinusitis, systemic factors like allergic reactions, stress, HIV, besieged disease or syndrome, hormonal influences, celiac disease, counts disease, intravenous ulcers, PFA-PA syndrome, magic syndrome, sweet syndrome. These are actually syndromes associated with oral ulcer formation, apis ulcer formation. Besieged disease. Here you have oral apis ulcer formation along with thing ulcers in your eyes, conjunctiva region, especially you can have also genital ulcers. Okay, that's vicious disease. It's an immediate disease. And then you have PFA-PA syndrome, which is periodic fever apistomatitis, perotitis, sorry, currentitis and agonitis. You can have apis ulcers along with all these other diseases, the conditions. In magic syndrome you have oral ulcers, genital ulcers as well as inflammation of cartilage. In sweet syndrome you have apis ulcers or oral ulcerations along with rashes in various parts of the body like your trunk or arms, etc. Then coming to nutritional and hematological deficiencies. This can also be included in the treatment of the cough. The completion of iron is in folic acid, as in V1, V2, V6, V12, etc. And there are kinetics factors, immunological factors also. Coming to the various clinical features of rheumatoid apistomatitis, mostly it is seen in the second decade of life, that is around 10 to 20 years. The problem of localized burning or stinging or pain can be felt 24 to 48 hours before proper ulcer formation. Localized area of erythema first develops within hours a small white bacterial forms with ulcerates and gradually enlarges over the next 48 to 72 hours. The individual lesions are round, symmetric, shallow, but no tissue tags are present. Multiple lesions are seen, but the number, size and frequency of these varies. So according to these, actually you can subdivide apis ulcers into three, that is minor, major and property form ulcers. It is usually seen in the freely movable oral ulcers, that is your non-characterinal mucus. The ulcers are mostly seen involving the leading and the muscle mucosa, but also occur on the tongue, the mucobacal fold, the little mouth and the soft palate. The characterized part of the lip mucosa, the hard palate and the vinge are fairly involved. So as I told you, these are the various features of apis ulcers. This here can be considered to be a minor apis ulcer, moving to its size, which seems to be less than one centimeter. This could be considered as a major apis ulcer, because it looks like it's more than one centimeter, or almost one centimeter in size. So this can be considered as a major apis ulcer. These here look like herpetiform ulcers. So here you can see small ulcers, but a lot of ulcers. So these can range from around 50 to 100 ulcers. So such a presentation of apis ulcer is called as herpetiform ulcer. As time proceeds, you can actually see that these minor ulcers or maybe small small ulcers, they can squarely form larger ulcers. Coming to the three subtypes of apis ulcers in detail. So when you check for the numbers, you can see that minor apis ulcers can range from 1 to 10. It's usually multiple. Major, it's usually one or two. You can go up to five. In herpetiform, you always have a huge range, that is from five to 100. You can have almost 50 or 100 regions in one particular area. You can have colonies or crops of ulcers. Coming to the size, you can see that it's around five to 10 millimetres. That's less than one centimetre. Major is always more than one centimetre, or it can be one centimetre. Herpetiform ulcer is always less than 0.5 centimetres. Coming to the pain sensation, the major apis ulcer, since it occupies a large area, there's a lot of nerve-indexing water, and the pain attributed can be severe. Whereas in your minor and herpetiform ulcers, it can range from 1 to 100. Coming to the duration, you can see that the major apis ulcer takes a little bit more to heal. It takes more than two weeks to heal. Whereas your minor and herpetiform ulcers, take less than two weeks. Regarding scarring, the major apis ulcer heals with scarring, whereas the other two variants don't form scars. The location is almost similar. It's usually the clay bale, or the soft palate region, or the non-catanus, the ulcer, which is in the water. Coming to the incidence, you can see that the minor apis ulcer forms the major scar, or the minor apis ulcer, which is always usually seen when compared to the major apetiform radians. The diagnosis doesn't actually require a particular lab procedure to form a definitive diagnosis. It is kind of a diagnosis of exclusion. That is, you rule out all the other conditions, including zero in on apis ulcers. You can also always see the clinical presentation and a bit of history and then you can go for this particular diagnosis. There's no particular requirement for a biopsy to provide a definitive diagnosis. You may rule out malabsorption and eliminate nutritional causes. That is, you know, replacement of iron or correlate with vitamin B-tel or keratin stores. And again, you can go for biologically mitigations if you suspect herpetic involvement. Herpetic involvement. But again, this is not really required. You can just go for the clinical presentation and exclude all the other conditions. You can just exclude nutritional states and the viral states or the viral species, you think. So this is not a definitive diagnosis, but a diagnosis of exclusion. Coming to the various differential diagnosis, a proper detailed history and a proper examination of the requisites for diagnosis of oral apis ulcers. All these can be considered to be differential diagnosis for apis ulcers. Traumatic ulcers.  So you always have a traumatic agent. In coming to oral apis infection, you could have fever or the ulcer could be preceded by a small vasectomy or a blister. So that's how you can roll out herpes infection. In cyclic neutropenia, you have ulcers forming every 21 days. So if you go for a little bit of history, you can find out this. And then you can go in for certain flap procedures where you can check the neutrophil count during this particular day as well as the other days. So you can compare both those states and then zero in on cyclic neutropenia. In ertyma multiformae, as the name suggests, multiformae, we have various types of license. Ulcer is also one of the forms that we could find ertyma multiformae present in the oral character. So you could have blisters, or you could have ulcers, you could have vesicles, bullies, apioles, erosions, all those forms can be seen. But in ertyma multiformae, you could also have skin lesions. You could see that we have the relations of bulls-eye lesions. So that could easily help you to roll out this form of the ulcers. Coming to tubercular ulcers, usually it's seen as a salt reels. It's painless. It's seen in the tongue or the heart palate. And you will have history of a cough or something which actually brought in the infection from the lungs to the oral palate. Then again you can go for your lymph nodes and check. And then coming to sephilitic ulcer, the secondary stage, that is not the Shangri or the Gamma, but the mucocutinous lesions. They kind of resemble the apis ulcer, but again you can roll out the proper history. Coming to the treatment aspect, so as we discussed the probable causes or the etiology for the apis ulcers, this is not a very specific treatment vision. You can see that it's a more generalized kind of a treatment offer for apis ulcers. First of all, you would try to eliminate all the local factors. Try to reduce the stress, avoid acidic or salty or spicy food, abstain from alcohol or carbonated beverages or any other possible causes which can cause apis ulcerations. Then the next step is topical therapy. So we can go for analgesics or anti-inflammatory drugs, anti-microbials or cortical steroids. Under analgesics and anti-inflammatory drugs, we have lidocaine or bignocaine, diphenhydramine, benzythymine, hydrochloride, milk of magnesium, etc. So usually a lidocaine or lidocaine gel or ointment is given. It's applied topically. You can also use benzythymine mouthwash. This is a particular drug which is best given as a mouthwash. So in areas where you cannot place your finger or the applicator, there may be extreme parts like the oral cavities, peripheral part or areas where your finger cannot reach or penetrate or can cause nausea. You can use this particular formula. Gargle form or mouthwash form. You can actually gargle and apply the medication into a particular area. Then you have anti-microbials like chloroxidin gluconate, which is available under the commercial list. Or tetracycline or all these can be used. This again can prevent secondary infection. You can see that it is not a specific treatment. It just prevents secondary infection thereby reducing the feeling of the particular ulcer. Then when you have severe lesions which doesn't actually heal very fast include for corticosteroids, topical corticosteroids. Usually triamcinolone, epitaminosuronic, clobitazole, propionate are usually given. The most commonly used corticosteroids in the topical form is triamcinolone, etc. It is available by the name canocortortes. 0.1% is usually given. Clobitazole propionate can also be given which is actually more long-standing. But usually it is given in the dermatological lesions rather than oral lesions. But along with the norobase it can be used for oral lesions also. Then long-acting steroids like that some of this one can also be given in the form of elixes. Then in case where these ulcers do not respond to normal topical application you can go for installation injections. This is mostly given for the calcitrine cases which doesn't respond to normal medications. These again are corticosteroids given in injection form. Then there are others like amyloxenox, acentralophen, cyclosporine which are immunomodulatives or drugs which are used for cancer therapy. Cyclosporine, cyclosporine, etc. Amyloxenox is another drug which is a recent drug not very recent but considerably recent and it has given very promising results and used as a 5% paste of ointment gives very promising results in oral cavity. It has been earlier used as a dermatological medication but now along with oral base it has been very successful in treating oral ulcers especially it helps in reducing the pain increasing the time when the next ulcer appears and the frequency is also reduced. Then you have ulcer protectants like sukhalphic which actually coats the ulcer this can also be used and then you have other natural products like aloe vera which helps in soothing in soothing sensation this can also be used on top of ulcers as topical therapy. In where topical therapy doesn't really work very well you go in for systemic therapy you see that immunomodulators are given they include levomazole, thaliumide, colchicin, petoxyfilin, papstone, santerpin, etc. you also have antioxidants, vitamin V12, folic acid so here it's actually a mixed bunch it's not actually a proper immunomodulator the levomazole is not a proper drug which can be included in an immunomodulator it is actually an anti-helmet but when used in a particular formulation in a particular dosage it can act as an immunomodulator again here, pentoxyfilin it is a vasodilator, colchicin again used for treatment of gout but when used in a particular dosage it can act as an immunomodulator and reduce the formation of apricus ulcers then again here anti-oxidants can be given to reduce oxidative stress calving and pre-radicals and then detoxify prevent ulcer formation vitamin V12 and folic acid again nutrient supply apricin faster healer then again others like trednisalone, pramsinone, decimicosone decimicosone can be given as systemic drugs where it does not actually respond to topical therapy and then you have rebomopied which is recently successfully used for treating both gastric as well as oral ulcers this has been recently used nowadays in clinics but you have to understand as well as oral ulceration together you have also other therapies like ultrasounds and laces of tissue laces where T's have been proven to reduce the healing time so the healing time is very fast and again the pain has also been reduced so all these modalities have been tried after ulcers increasing successfully so there is no exact magic wand or proper treatment we actually have to tailor make each treatment for a particular patient depending on how it presents how the frequency of each ulcer or each other claims of ulceration that is how you create apricots so with that we will end this session today thank you stay safe and stay enlightened