Is smiling a sign of submission?

I read somewhere recently that smiling is a sign of submission among primates. Now, I haven't verified this. However, it seems to me that smiling among some humans may have the same effect. My problem is that I like to smile, but I am not trying to be submissive.

Do our human leaders smile a lot? Most managers I know carry a serious look with them, but can and do smile. How about presidents? Well, Pres. Reagan smiled often, but he could also be serious (e.g. "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!"). Pres. Obama can smile, but most of his campaign pictures portrait him with a serious expression.

Maybe it is a matter of maturity. That is, mature people understand that being friendly is not a sign of weakness. The less mature a person is, the more they see smiling as a sign of weakness?

Just a thought. As they say in the US Congress, I reserve the right to extend and revise my remarks on this matter.

Environmental Question of the day....

The oil spill disaster in the Gulf brings up a question: how will the ripple effect of this oil spill affect humans? Political interests put their spin on this disaster for ideological purposes, and that is something I am not addressing by asking this question. This is not an anti- or pro-oil question.

Fossil fuels are a fact of life. Oil is global power (notice I did not say "Oil companies are global power"). Right now we are at Level 0 as far as civilizations go regarding energy consumption (see: http://mkaku.org/home/?page_id=246 ). That means we will rely on fossil fuels for a long time no matter who controls the oil companies.

However, the ecological system must be taking a huge hit from this spill. In turn, this will affect other ecological systems. In short, how will humans be affected in the short run and in the long run?

Political spin is no help.

From the left: oil companies are evil.

From the right: oil companies are victims.

Political spin does not answer my question (yes, I realize I am over simplifying things). So, I suppose my real question is this: how will humans be actually affected, removing the politically motivated spin from evaluations of this event?

In reality, I don't know that the public has access to this honest type of information. Still, we will feel the effects of this spill, whatever those effects turn out to be in the future.

Plugging A Good Musical Group.

Welcome! For my first post, I want to plug a musical group I stumbled upon. The group is Kieran Kane, Kevin Welch, and Fats Kaplin. I've seen them classified as Country in the Americana or Alternative Country sub-genres. I downloaded their album, Lost John Dean, last week from iTunes and have been playing it everyday. There isn't a bad song on the album, but I especially like "Heaven Now." "Postcard from Mexico" is also good, and "Lost John Dean" is a good bluegrass song along with "Mellow Down Easy." This last song is good to play when, as the song says, "when you really want to blow your top."

Some of their music is more country, others more bluegrass. What really impresses me about their music is the instrumentation. These guys are artists at heart. It is great! Check it out.