65 Million Year Eraser

I must not be the only idiot wondering whether humans really were the first species on the planet for whom culture and civilization became a natural outgrowth of evolution, though unfortunately I'm probably the most sober.

Background to my question:
We carry on with a certain arrogance and vanity, secure in our knowledge that we are the pinnacle of biological evolution; that nothing on this planet has ever approached our sophistication, and after we're gone nothing will again.

But consider:

• Endothermic terrestrial vertebrates rocked up at the end of the Triassic, and then partied for 135MY before the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event
• 135MY could contain 27 independent monkey-to-moon cycles given the rate of Hominini progress these last 5MY
• If a Chicxulub-sized event stuck April 24th, 1616 CE (the day after Shakespeare died), what traces of humankind would be available to our cockroach overlord archeologists 65MY hence?
• How advanced must any civilization become before imprinting itself permanently on the planet?

Now, clearly dinosaurs were never driving around in Teslas, and we won't find their footprints on the moon. BUT, 400 years ago you wouldn't have seen us doing that either. We did, however, have Calculus, Romeo & Juliet, and ice cream.

The question:
Is the fossil record granular enough to describe an "intelligent species", or could some small population with the following characteristics come and go, many times over, and be lost permanently over the intervening 65MY?

• Are self aware
• Possess conceptual thinking
• Practice agriculture / hedge against scarcity 
• Create expressions analogous to poetry / philosophy / allegory

If culture is fundamentally more advantageous than non-culture, why would it arise only now, after 200MY?

Adventures in Car Buying - Lexus CT200h

The first car I brought home for an overnight test drive was a 2012 Lexus CT200h. A compact hatchback based on the Toyota Prius, the CT200h does a couple things outrageously well, and one thing quite poorly.

But before I get into any of that, I feel compelled to discuss two topics that I myself have spent years trying to digest:

On badge engineering

In short, badge engineering is the ubiquitous practice of borrowing a model from another manufacturer and then slapping your name on the outside, often with little or no additional customization.

Examples of badge engineering

• Acura ILX = Honda Civic
• Lexus ES350 = Toyota Avalon
• Lincoln MKS = Ford Taurus
• ad nauseam

I approve of the concept on principal; if your blue-collar model is refined enough for your white-collar consumer, well done you. Everybody wins. But the smaller the difference between these two models, the more closely must the buyer examine his motivation behind choosing the more premium brand. Especially when a non-trivial cost difference is involved.

There are myriad ways to justify that cost difference without ever addressing egoism, but I think this is disingenuous at heart, so I won't list them here.

Which leads neatly into the next topic:

On premium brands

Premium brands exist entirely along the segment of the diminishing return curve where total return on investment as a proportion of the total investment decreases. Put another way, when you buy premium you're getting less for more, relative to a non-premium counterpart.

In reality the core value proposition of premium brands is that they are out of reach of a given percentage of the population, and so by extension are those who buy them.

So ultimately, would I buy one?
Yesssssssss.

Why?
Because we can afford to right now, and all the ugliness that implies.

On the intersection of premium brands and badge engineering

The CT200h, henceforth referred to as the Lexus Prius, really is a lovely little thing; but it is defined by the contradictions it holds within the whisper quiet cabin.

The Lexus Prius is chic but not sexy. Isolating but not numb. Exclusive but not unattainable. The Lexus Prius is Helen Hunt in As Good as it Gets.

Drive the Lexus Prius and ambient noise fades away, like the moment before a pressure induced yawn on an airplane. Front seats are perfectly sculpted with excellent mid-back lumbar support. You'll have to fight to get fewer than 40 highway MPGs because the car will always default to Eco mode.

This is the perfect car for two people on a cross-country adventure. This is not the perfect car for three people on a cross-county adventure. Back seat room is a bit confined, as per usual in this class.

So why didn't this one work? At the end of the day, this is still a Prius, and that means reigning in fun to boost fuel economy. And Nura wanted something a little bit hotter.

Adventures in Car Buying - Backstory

I am addicted to cars. And trucks. And motorcycles. And occasionally bicycles, modern and vintage wrist watches, tablet computers, cell phone cameras, running shoes, dog breeds, airline tickets, jackets (rain, winter, and leather), hi-fi stereos, or anything else I happen to desperately need in that moment.

My addiction is fed, but indeed never sated, through endless searching; stating and restating requirements describing vague and fleeting moods with the goal of either identifying the perfect thing, or determining at what cost that thing should be bought.

Stimulation and pleasure are found in the hunt, and then in the kill, rather than from hanging a trophy on my wrist or parking it in the garage.

But I now find myself in the position, and oddly uncomfortably so, of needing to finally commit and transact on a car for Nura.

I say uncomfortable because for me the perfect car changes not on a yearly or monthly basis, but on a daily and occasionally hourly cadence. On Monday morning at 9:00, the most perfect car in the world; the quick and quiet, capable and reliable, sexy and understated machine that will literally bring about world peace is a clear and unconscionable error in judgement well before noon.

Normally I would simply defer to Nura to pick out the car. It will be her daily driver after all. But few things in this world register as less appealing for Nura than car shopping.

List of things Nura would rather do than shop for cars:

• Hang out at Wal-Mart
• Volunteer customer service
• Putting down pound puppies
• Talk to vegans

And so the task falls to me: Identify a car befitting of her current and potential future needs, is exciting for her, and fits the budget.

I'll try to talk about the process and the findings here until we finally buy.


List of potential cars for Nura:

Pontiac Aztek

Trix Donk

Nissan Juke

Toyota Prius