Just random thoughts

INDEPENDENT STATE OF PAPUA NEW GUINEA - The Oil and Gas Act

2008-08-13T08:17:00.000-07:00

The Oil and Gas Act has the Petroleum Act as its precursor and basis. It extends the role and purpose of the legislation in key areas. The Oil and Gas Act makes provision for the grant of benefits to traditional landowners, Local Level Governments and Provincials Governments arising from projects for the production of petroleum, and the processing and transportation of petroleum and petroleum products in Papua New Guinea.
The Petroleum Act was passed by the Papua New Guinea Parliament in 1977. It was fundamentally based on several earlier laws, particularly the Petroleum (Prospecting and Mining) Act and the Petroleum (Submerged Lands) Act. The Petroleum Act was included as Chapter 198 of the revised Laws of Papua New Guinea as published 1st January 1980. Minor and consequential amendments were made respectively in 1987 and 1989.

Should anyone be interested to obtain a reprint of the Oil and Gas Act, feel at will to inform me. Otherwise, a legitimate copy can be obtained for the Department of Petroleum and Energy.
WARNING: A Reprint is NOT an Authorised Copy

Marcello Kamane AGEN

“Thank you, PNG Chamber of Mines & Petroleum”

2008-08-04T22:00:00.000-07:00

My recent paper set for publication “Geological interpretation of structural styles
of Iagifu-Hedinia oil field, Papua New Guina, using JERS-1 SAR (Japanese Earth Resource Satellite-1 Synthetic Aperture Radar) imagery” would not have been prompt had it not been with the provision of the full set volume of the petroleum convention proceedings. Hence, I wish to convey my sincere thanks to Ms. Melissa Obediah (Secretary) and Mr. Greg Anderson (Executive Director) of the Papua New Guinea Chamber of Mines & Petroleum. Their prompt facilitation on my request for the consignment of the petroleum convention proceedings sent to my end is well appreciated. The proceedings had provided the cognitive contents of my paper. Several years ago, a minor data breach may not have been considered a significant event in the life of an academic - so, I will not take their help for granted. Unlike my other papers, this one took a while and also endured certain constraints considering the material referrals. Anyways, to merely reiterate David Henton's remarks, we are all conditioned to see the world through our mindset – our preconceptions derived from the past experiences and prior knowledge. Different environments and experiences produce different mindsets, and different mindsets produce expectations of the way others will behave. Fraustrated expectations can and often do lead to animosity, and animosity is inimical to a successful project.

Marcello Kamane Agen

No one is perfect!

2008-07-31T03:31:00.000-07:00

No one is perfect!
No! I am not speaking of biological imperfection caused by mutation – neither computer programs that were written to study the dynamic interaction in humans between environmental mutagenesis, the genomic load of deleterious mutations and the probability of zygote survival. Nothing of that sort!
During our conversation, Wang Li, the teenage son of a personal friend of mine, told me that inspite of the relentless many hours he had spent on his studies, he never made the top marks with his various subjects in class. "I have no self-esteem, and I am just incredibly horrid at having confidence in self-image.", was the least of un acclaimed self assessments he made of him self. I promptly refuted that, and told him that he should not be harsh on him self – that he had the potential, and had given the best within his intellectual capacity to ascertain just that. There is no such thing as perfection, I affirmed him.

Then I told him, Albert Einstein had dyslexia and that it was harder for him to process information, yet he turned out to be one of the greatest geniuses that ever lived. No body is perfect, so do not be afraid to admit you have a problem. Even though Einstein had a disability, he was one of the greatest geniuses who ever lived....

Importantly, a human being is measured by the quality of his or her character, the condition of his or her humanity towards others, and the contribution he or she makes to their fellow – that! peharps is something you should consider a thought I told him. Anyways, he is a brilliant kid and I know he will achieve his aspirations in the years to come.

Review & correct your english language, they said!

2008-07-29T07:02:00.000-07:00

Early this month, Associate Professor Li ShaoHu, submitted his recent paper to the Journal of Sedimentary Geology. That paper had taken him months of prolonged and laborious effort of research work. Briefly, his paper researched on time-matter compositions of sequence boundary - checks the harmonization of time isochronous virtual areas in time sequence framework. Based on outcrops observation of the Jijihu modern subaqueous aggradational fan (SAF) in Eastern Junggar Basin, Western China, his paper established “The rules: diagramming, and isochronous emendation for three-divided model of classical sequence stratigraphy and new LHT (LST-HST-TST) model” ….
Anyways, working under his supervision, and from a country where the English language is the official language of medium, I felt honored when the three times awardee of the distinguished Science Prize from the Ministry of Geology and Mineral Resources (China) asked me to initially review his paper prior submission. A few days ago, he received a response from the editors of the Journal that he must re-edit the paper, specfically, the “english language structures”….While we respect the rights of the editors of the Journal to adjust style to certain standards of uniformity – however, I thought we did well. Anyways, we are reviewing it now.

Having spoken of this, it just occurred to me that scientific institutions and journals often claim that they are international. However, Pasterkamp et al., (2007) demonstrated that most scientists have a nation-oriented citation bias; in a study of 1200 publications on the cardiovascular system, citations to publications from the same country were more than 30% greater than expected by chance. In absolute numbers, this was most pronounced in the USA, but in relative terms nation-oriented bias was more common in other countries. The language barrier between English and other languages is another factor that increases what we call institutional provincialism within science, by which we mean polices and practices within entities such as journals which imply that they have a de facto local or limited perspective.

What are your thoughts?

What you make of YOUR LIFE is up to you.

2008-07-27T21:34:00.000-07:00

Working tirelessly in my research laboratory, 6 days a week is truely having a toll on me. Not that I wish to complain. This is a small price to pay to gain access to intellectual capital as some would say...

I was drinking herbal tea the other night with my chinese research collegue and also best friend. While enjoying our tea, we conversed on many trival issues, (work and in life). Until he began to confide in me about his many misgivings and regrets - and that he wished he had done better, or if he been given a wish by the "Genie in the bottle", he would alter certain events in the course of his past life lived. I also shared my sentiments, though reserved some thoughts to myself.

Anyways, I remember what my mother used to say to me during my childhood time, "sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken." and she would assert that my life is a gift, how I appreciated it and used it was entirely up to me. ...to create my life by the conscious choices I make during my life's journey.

It is very true. Every person creates his or her own reality. Authorship of your life is one of your absolute rights; yet so often people deny that they have the ability to script the life they desire. They look past the fundamental truth that it is not our external resources that determine our success or faliure, but rather our own belief in ourselves and our willingness to create a life according to our highest aspirations.

We're Raising Children, Not Flowers !

2008-07-27T04:29:00.000-07:00

Jack Canfield originally told this story and published it too in an "English" Magazine, which I can not remember the precise volume and date of its publication...but here it is - it indeed made me ponder over it for a while.

David, his next-door neighbour, has two young kids aged five and seven. One day he was teaching his seven-year old son Kelly how to push the lawn mower around the yard. As he was teaching him how to turn the mower around at the end of the lawn, his wife, Jan, called to him to ask a question. As David turned to answer the question, Kelly pushed the lawn mower right through the flower bed at the edge of the lawn -- leaving a two-foot wide path leveled to the ground!

When David turned back around and saw what had happened, he began to lose control. David had put a lot of time and effort into making those beds the envy of the neighborhood. As he began to raise his voice to his son, Jan walked quickly over to him, put her hand on his shoulder and said, "David, please remember..... we're raising children, not flowers!"

Jan reminded me how important it is as a parent to remember our priorities. Kids and their self-esteem are more important than any physical object they might break or destroy. The window pane shattered by a baseball, a lamp knocked over by a careless child, or a plate dropped in the kitchen are already broken. The flowers are already dead. We must remember not to add to the destruction by breaking a child's spirit and deadening his sense of liveliness.