In our supercomputer simulations, we represent sub/cultures and countries as molecules.

In one recent simulation, we asked the supercomputer network to calculate how many helium-filled balloons it would take to carry a payload into outer space.

The computer stopped immediately and asked exactly how we planned to fill the balloons with helium.

In other words, if one balloon is “full” of helium, it will burst at a lower elevation than a balloon only partially “full,” but the partially-filled balloon will not carry as large a payload.

A latex rubber knapsack problem intersecting a few gas laws.

You, the reader, are fully aware, aren’t you, what this means.

An enclosed space that we pretend contains largely a uniform distribution of a “pure” substance — gas or subcultural beliefs, for example — tends to behave according to simple mathematical formulae.

Telegraph a public message that contains little in the way of subtext and you can expect a ready answer in return.

On the other hand, atmospheric conditions are not uniform.  Pressure is related to density of gas molecules and gas ratio distribution, is it not?  Atmospheric disturbances, including solar heat related phenomena and patterns we give labels such as “Arctic Oscillation” also play into the picture.

People, are, for the most part predictable.  A person raised in a remote Pakistani village will probably not suddenly start dancing a perfect Argentinian tango from out of nowhere.

Which means we can tell the supercomputer to add layered parameters to the simulation, with every layer’s data passed into the simulation and the simulation rerun when the previous layer’s data has been crunched into output that is available to add to the next layer’s data crunching.

Inside every layer are matrices of changes, some predictable and some random, that we build from hypotheses and hallway discussions rather than tried-and-true scientific formulae broken down into simple subroutines.

Often, we save a set of output data, vary a layer’s matrix and rerun the simulation for one specific layer over and over with large numbers of matrix variations.

What’s the point of having a good hypothesis if you can’t subject it to rigorous testing and verification?

So, if I want a payload of a known mass that is not changed by atmospheric pressure changes to reach outer space, I give the supercomputer network the number of balloons I wish to attach to the payload and ask it to tell me at which elevations the balloon(s) burst until the last one carries the payload into outer space.

The same goes for the 3D chess game that is the constant interaction of sub/cultures.  A person is a molecule is a subculture is a balloon is a culture is a generalised personality archetype.

Bottom line: two issues hog some of the international news spotlight — the massacres in Syria and the nearly uncontrollable bankrupt behaviour of Greece.

It’s like telling Hernandez’ agent that the NY Giants will find a way to secretly reward him for his behaviour toward the end of the 2012 NFL Super Bowl.  Some things should be too obvious to mention.

But they aren’t.

So, we have to proceed with what’s next.

The Committee wants to box me into a corner and force me into making a decision that sways the next U.S. Presidential election.

Some want me to reveal what the supercomputer network says is a religious forecast that predicts the balance of faith-based belief for the next century or so.

Others want to ensure their families are well provided for, as usual.

For me, it’s always the hardest task to give the supercomputer network a touch of irony and sarcasm in its output.

I don’t care whether a CPU is multicore and has interlaced optical memory or if some portions of the network still operate with relay-based and bubble memory.

I sit here, after the end of a grueling session with the Committee, with seven billion of us to manage, as individuals, multiplexed into subcultures or a combination of the two that I vary by degrees in simulation scenarios that either I see fit to estimate or is input by the hacker network I depend on to throw me an unexpected curve every now and then.

Change is constant.

If India completely rejects monetary aid from the UK, who will follow by example?  Will this influence future Saudi military contracts with the U.S.?  Will Greece break up into city-states once again?  Will Syria divide into Assad-controlled and international consortium-controlled sectors, leading to the creation of the next “Berlin Wall” and a lukewarm Cold War?

And, looking back 1000 years from now, will we say this next millennium was the era of extremophiles, our only encounter with “alien” or extraterrestrial lifeforms being a set of states of energy we were unable to see or comprehend with current technology in 2012 but wholly integrated into our way of life by 3011?

Questions, questions, questions.

The saga continues unabated.

Is any one life more important than maintenance of the status quo to preserve a subculture’s place in the jigsaw puzzle of global belief sets?

Yes and no.

At least according to one simulation after the next.

Every life is important.

Every life is canceled out at one level or another of scenario stacking.

One relationship disappears and another takes its place.

Interdependencies described in the world’s longest SQL statement.

All just to say what is the smallest number of balloons to take an indescribable payload into outer space.

Outer space is infinitely bigger than the sphere from which we calculate its intersection with us.

A finite sphere full of everyday drama begging for attention 24/7.

Time’s a-wastin’!