"...attributed to human activities."
Washington, Jan 20: A new research by scientists has shown that the temperatures in the state of California in US have risen by more than 2.1 degrees Fahrenheit between 1915 and 2000, largely because of human activities.
The research, which was conducted at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, the University of California, Merced and the National Center for Atmospheric Research, used data from up to eight different observational records to come up with the findings.
According to the findings, the warming of the state, which has been fastest in late winter and early spring, is largely attributed to human activities.
"The trends in daily minimum and maximum temperatures over the last 50 and 85 years are inconsistent with current model-based estimates of natural internal climate variability," said lead researcher Céline Bonfils from Lawrence Livermore.
"It's pretty clear that natural causes alone just can't cut it and external factors such as greenhouse gases and urbanization come into play," he added.
"Our study represents a credible first step toward the identification of the effects of human activities on California climate," said Benjamin Santer, also part of the Livermore team...
"If human-induced climate change is occurring, societal impacts - such as impacts on our water supply - cannot be far behind," said Duffy.
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Monday, January 14, 2008
"Solar-Powered MP3/Video Player"
From YahooTech:
The eMotion EM-SOL1GIG is pretty chunky as media players go: at five inches across, an inch thick, and a hefty 10 ounces, you won't be putting this sucker in your jeans pocket anytime soon. Open it up, however, and you'll find a pair of solar panels that'll charge the player's lithium-ion battery in about three or four hours (good for 17 hours of music playback). Even better, the player comes with a set of six connectors for charging laptops, cell phones, and other portable devices.
Specs-wise, the EM-SOL1GIG holds its own quite nicely. It can handle MP3, WMA, and WAV audio files, along with AVI and MPEG-4 video; the 3.5-inch, 320-by-240-pixel display was decent enough, if a little short of eye-popping. The player also has a photo viewer and a TXT file reader, along with a game emulator that'll run NES, GameBoy, and Sega game ROMs. Oh, and if you get lost in the woods, the built-in LED flashlight can help you find your way back to the tent.
Pretty nice, although the eMotion media player ($149, available now) falls down a bit in the storage department—it has only 1GB of internal flash memory (a 4GB version is also on tap in the $185 range), although the SD memory card slot can expand that total by another 2GB.
_____________________
It will be nice to see more of these things.
The eMotion EM-SOL1GIG is pretty chunky as media players go: at five inches across, an inch thick, and a hefty 10 ounces, you won't be putting this sucker in your jeans pocket anytime soon. Open it up, however, and you'll find a pair of solar panels that'll charge the player's lithium-ion battery in about three or four hours (good for 17 hours of music playback). Even better, the player comes with a set of six connectors for charging laptops, cell phones, and other portable devices.
Specs-wise, the EM-SOL1GIG holds its own quite nicely. It can handle MP3, WMA, and WAV audio files, along with AVI and MPEG-4 video; the 3.5-inch, 320-by-240-pixel display was decent enough, if a little short of eye-popping. The player also has a photo viewer and a TXT file reader, along with a game emulator that'll run NES, GameBoy, and Sega game ROMs. Oh, and if you get lost in the woods, the built-in LED flashlight can help you find your way back to the tent.
Pretty nice, although the eMotion media player ($149, available now) falls down a bit in the storage department—it has only 1GB of internal flash memory (a 4GB version is also on tap in the $185 range), although the SD memory card slot can expand that total by another 2GB.
_____________________
It will be nice to see more of these things.
"Antarctica ice loss accelerating....."
Global warming has caused annual ice loss from the Antarctic ice sheet to surge by 75 percent in a decade, according to the most detailed survey ever made of the white continent's coastal glaciers.
In 2006, accelerating glaciers spewed an estimated 192 billion tonnes of Antarctic ice into the sea, scientists calculate.
The West Antarctica ice sheet lost some 132 billion tonnes, while the Antarctic Peninsula, the tongue of land that juts up towards South America, lost around 60 million tonnes.
But there was a "near-zero" loss in East Antarctica, the world's biggest icesheet, the paper says.
Investigators from five countries, led by Eric Rignot of NASA's fabled Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), used interferometry radar from four satellites to build a picture of the periphery of Antarctica.
They sought to measure the velocities of glaciers that shift ice to the coast from the massive sheets that cover Antarctica's bedrock.
They built up a picture of around 85 percent of Antarctica's coastline thanks to the data supplied by the European Space Agency's two Earth Remoting Sensing (ERS) satellites, the Canadian Radarsat-1 and Japan's Advanced Land Observing satellites.
"Over the time period of our survey, the ice sheet as a whole was certainly losing mass, and the mass loss increased by 75 percent in 10 years," according to the study, published online by the specialist journal Nature Geoscience .
"Most of the mass loss is from the Pine Island Bay sector of West Antarctica and the northern tip of the Peninsula, where it is driven by ongoing, pronounced glacier acceleration.
"In East Antarctica, the loss is near zero, but the thinning of its potentially unstable, but the thinning of its potentially unstable marine sectors calls for attention."
The loss of 192 billion tonnes is more than twice the annual flow of the River Nile when it reaches the sea, according to a calculation.
Seen by another yardstick, it is equivalent to an annual rise in global sea levels of about 0.5 mm (0.02 of an inch), if factors such as evaporation and effects on precipitation are not factored in.
By comparison, sea levels rose by between 10-20 centimetres (four to eight inches) from 1900 to 2006, the Nobel-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported last year.
It forecast a rise of at least 18 cms (17.2 inches) by 2100, mainly as a result of thermal expansion, for water expands when it warms. The IPCC declined to set an upper figure to this estimate specifically because of uncertainty about ice-melt from Antarctica and Greenland.
In 2006, accelerating glaciers spewed an estimated 192 billion tonnes of Antarctic ice into the sea, scientists calculate.
The West Antarctica ice sheet lost some 132 billion tonnes, while the Antarctic Peninsula, the tongue of land that juts up towards South America, lost around 60 million tonnes.
But there was a "near-zero" loss in East Antarctica, the world's biggest icesheet, the paper says.
Investigators from five countries, led by Eric Rignot of NASA's fabled Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), used interferometry radar from four satellites to build a picture of the periphery of Antarctica.
They sought to measure the velocities of glaciers that shift ice to the coast from the massive sheets that cover Antarctica's bedrock.
They built up a picture of around 85 percent of Antarctica's coastline thanks to the data supplied by the European Space Agency's two Earth Remoting Sensing (ERS) satellites, the Canadian Radarsat-1 and Japan's Advanced Land Observing satellites.
"Over the time period of our survey, the ice sheet as a whole was certainly losing mass, and the mass loss increased by 75 percent in 10 years," according to the study, published online by the specialist journal Nature Geoscience .
"Most of the mass loss is from the Pine Island Bay sector of West Antarctica and the northern tip of the Peninsula, where it is driven by ongoing, pronounced glacier acceleration.
"In East Antarctica, the loss is near zero, but the thinning of its potentially unstable, but the thinning of its potentially unstable marine sectors calls for attention."
The loss of 192 billion tonnes is more than twice the annual flow of the River Nile when it reaches the sea, according to a calculation.
Seen by another yardstick, it is equivalent to an annual rise in global sea levels of about 0.5 mm (0.02 of an inch), if factors such as evaporation and effects on precipitation are not factored in.
By comparison, sea levels rose by between 10-20 centimetres (four to eight inches) from 1900 to 2006, the Nobel-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported last year.
It forecast a rise of at least 18 cms (17.2 inches) by 2100, mainly as a result of thermal expansion, for water expands when it warms. The IPCC declined to set an upper figure to this estimate specifically because of uncertainty about ice-melt from Antarctica and Greenland.
"Europe Takes Africa’s Fish; Migrants Follow"
Ale Nodye, the son and grandson of fishermen in this northern Senegalese village, said that for the past six years he netted barely enough fish to buy fuel for his boat. So he jumped at the chance for a new beginning. He volunteered to captain a wooden canoe full of 87 Africans to the Canary Islands in the hopes of making their way illegally to Europe.
The 2006 voyage ended badly. He and his passengers were arrested and deported. His cousin died on a similar mission not long afterward.
Nonetheless, Mr. Nodye, 27, said he intended to try again.
“I could be a fisherman there,” he said. “Life is better there. There are no fish in the sea here anymore.”
Many scientists agree. A vast flotilla of industrial trawlers from the European Union, China, Russia and elsewhere, together with an abundance of local boats, have so thoroughly scoured northwest Africa’s ocean floor that major fish populations are collapsing.
That has crippled coastal economies and added to the surge of illegal migrants who brave the high seas in wooden pirogues hoping to reach Europe. While reasons for immigration are as varied as fish species, Europe’s lure has clearly intensified as northwest Africa’s fish population has dwindled.
Last year roughly 31,000 Africans tried to reach the Canary Islands, a prime transit point to Europe, in more than 900 boats. About 6,000 died or disappeared, according to one estimate cited by the United Nations.
The region’s governments bear much of the blame for their fisheries’ decline. Many have allowed a desire for money from foreign fleets to override concern about the long-term health of their fisheries. Illegal fishermen are notoriously common; efforts to control fishing, rare.
But in the view of West African fishermen, Europe is having its fish and eating them, too. Their own waters largely fished out, European nations have steered their heavily subsidized fleets to Africa.
“As Europe has sought to manage its fisheries and to limit its fishing, what we’ve done is to export the overfishing problem elsewhere, particularly to Africa,” said Steve Trent, executive director of the Environmental Justice Foundation, a London-based research group...
Overfishing is hardly limited to African waters. Worldwide, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that 75 percent of fish stocks are overfished or fished to their maximum. But in a poor region like northwest Africa, the consequences are particularly stark.
Fish are the main source of protein for much of the region, but some species are now so scarce that the poor can no longer afford them, said Pierre Failler, senior research fellow for the British Center for Economics and Management of Aquatic Resources...
“The sea is being emptied,” said Moctar Ba, a consultant who once led scientific research programs for Mauritania and West Africa...
Fishermen like Mr. Diouf argue that Africans should have first priority in their own waters — an idea enshrined in a 1994 United Nations treaty on the seas that acknowledges the right of local governments to sell foreigners fishing rights only to their surplus stocks.
But that rule has been repeatedly violated along northwest Africa’s nearly 2,000-mile coast.
The 2006 voyage ended badly. He and his passengers were arrested and deported. His cousin died on a similar mission not long afterward.
Nonetheless, Mr. Nodye, 27, said he intended to try again.
“I could be a fisherman there,” he said. “Life is better there. There are no fish in the sea here anymore.”
Many scientists agree. A vast flotilla of industrial trawlers from the European Union, China, Russia and elsewhere, together with an abundance of local boats, have so thoroughly scoured northwest Africa’s ocean floor that major fish populations are collapsing.
That has crippled coastal economies and added to the surge of illegal migrants who brave the high seas in wooden pirogues hoping to reach Europe. While reasons for immigration are as varied as fish species, Europe’s lure has clearly intensified as northwest Africa’s fish population has dwindled.
Last year roughly 31,000 Africans tried to reach the Canary Islands, a prime transit point to Europe, in more than 900 boats. About 6,000 died or disappeared, according to one estimate cited by the United Nations.
The region’s governments bear much of the blame for their fisheries’ decline. Many have allowed a desire for money from foreign fleets to override concern about the long-term health of their fisheries. Illegal fishermen are notoriously common; efforts to control fishing, rare.
But in the view of West African fishermen, Europe is having its fish and eating them, too. Their own waters largely fished out, European nations have steered their heavily subsidized fleets to Africa.
“As Europe has sought to manage its fisheries and to limit its fishing, what we’ve done is to export the overfishing problem elsewhere, particularly to Africa,” said Steve Trent, executive director of the Environmental Justice Foundation, a London-based research group...
Overfishing is hardly limited to African waters. Worldwide, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that 75 percent of fish stocks are overfished or fished to their maximum. But in a poor region like northwest Africa, the consequences are particularly stark.
Fish are the main source of protein for much of the region, but some species are now so scarce that the poor can no longer afford them, said Pierre Failler, senior research fellow for the British Center for Economics and Management of Aquatic Resources...
“The sea is being emptied,” said Moctar Ba, a consultant who once led scientific research programs for Mauritania and West Africa...
Fishermen like Mr. Diouf argue that Africans should have first priority in their own waters — an idea enshrined in a 1994 United Nations treaty on the seas that acknowledges the right of local governments to sell foreigners fishing rights only to their surplus stocks.
But that rule has been repeatedly violated along northwest Africa’s nearly 2,000-mile coast.
Friday, January 11, 2008
"A first! Snow falls in Baghdad"
After weathering nearly five years of war, Baghdad residents thought they'd pretty much seen it all. But Friday morning, as muezzins were calling the faithful to prayer, the people here awoke to something certifiably new. For the first time in memory, snow fell across Baghdad.
Although the white flakes quickly dissolved into gray puddles, they brought an emotion rarely expressed in this desert capital snarled by army checkpoints, divided by concrete walls and ravaged by sectarian killings — delight.
"For the first time in my life I saw a snow-rain like this falling in Baghdad," said Mohammed Abdul-Hussein, a 63-year-old retiree from the New Baghdad area.
"When I was young, I heard from my father that such rain had fallen in the early '40s on the outskirts of northern Baghdad," Abdul-Hussein said, referring to snow as a type of rain. "But snow falling in Baghdad in such a magnificent scene was beyond my imagination."
Morning temperatures uncharacteristically hovered around freezing, and the Baghdad airport was closed because of poor visibility. Snow is common in the mountainous Kurdish areas of northern Iraq, but residents of the capital and surrounding areas could remember just hail.
"I asked my mother, who is 80, whether she'd ever seen snow in Iraq before, and her answer was no," said Fawzi Karim, a 40-year-old father of five who runs a small restaurant in Hawr Rajab, a village six miles southeast of Baghdad.
"This is so unusual, and I don't know whether or not it's a lesson from God," Karim said.
Some said they'd seen snow only in movies...
Although the white flakes quickly dissolved into gray puddles, they brought an emotion rarely expressed in this desert capital snarled by army checkpoints, divided by concrete walls and ravaged by sectarian killings — delight.
"For the first time in my life I saw a snow-rain like this falling in Baghdad," said Mohammed Abdul-Hussein, a 63-year-old retiree from the New Baghdad area.
"When I was young, I heard from my father that such rain had fallen in the early '40s on the outskirts of northern Baghdad," Abdul-Hussein said, referring to snow as a type of rain. "But snow falling in Baghdad in such a magnificent scene was beyond my imagination."
Morning temperatures uncharacteristically hovered around freezing, and the Baghdad airport was closed because of poor visibility. Snow is common in the mountainous Kurdish areas of northern Iraq, but residents of the capital and surrounding areas could remember just hail.
"I asked my mother, who is 80, whether she'd ever seen snow in Iraq before, and her answer was no," said Fawzi Karim, a 40-year-old father of five who runs a small restaurant in Hawr Rajab, a village six miles southeast of Baghdad.
"This is so unusual, and I don't know whether or not it's a lesson from God," Karim said.
Some said they'd seen snow only in movies...
Thursday, January 10, 2008
"Warm-winter cycles accelerating loss of Great Lakes water"
Lake Huron is in a fog, part of a gloomy cycle that's pushing water levels to record lows, scientists say.
Last week, a winter storm dropped more than a foot of snow over the Great Lakes. Over the weekend, warmer temperatures melted that snow, which evaporated into the air.
The cycle has been playing out for the last 30 years in the Great Lakes, said Cynthia Sellinger, co-author of a paper to be published Saturday in Environmental Science & Technology, a scientific journal.
Winters have been warmer. Snow doesn't build up, then seep into the ground and recharge the lakes in the spring.
Instead, warmer winter temperatures melt the snow after it falls, leaving the ground frozen and allowing the snow to evaporate.
"Since 1978, there's been a long-term decline in precipitation and a long-term increase in evaporation," said Sellinger, a hydrologist at the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory in Ann Arbor, an arm of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
"It's very subtle, extremely subtle, but it's there."
Lakes Huron and Michigan, which are connected by the Straits of Mackinac, are experiencing the lowest water levels in the Great Lakes this month.
Lake Huron is within 2 inches of its all-time low for January, according to data from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The lake is 14 inches lower than it was at this time last year.
It's projected to dip another inch during the next month, as part of its seasonal decline.
Sellinger said it's possible that Lake Huron will break its record low for January, set in 1965, later this month...
Temperatures in the Bay City area were expected to reach 53 degrees Fahrenheit on Monday, topping a record of 50 degrees from 1989, according to the National Weather Service.
Since 1980, when NOAA temperature buoys were installed, the surface water temperature of Lakes Michigan and Huron has increased by about 4 degrees Fahrenheit, according to Jay Austin, a researcher at the Large Lakes Observatory, part of the University of Minnesota in Duluth.
"It's larger compared to what we've seen in the atmosphere," or about twice the rise in global air temperatures attributed to global warming, Austin said.
Lake Superior is only Great Lake seeing higher levels this January. It's 6 inches higher than at this time last year. The rest of the lakes are 11-16 lower than a year ago.
Part of the reason for Lake Superior's rise is about 10.5 inches of rainfall the basin saw in September and October, right at the lake's low point, said Keith Kompoltowicz, a meteorologist for the Army Corps in Detroit.
Last week, a winter storm dropped more than a foot of snow over the Great Lakes. Over the weekend, warmer temperatures melted that snow, which evaporated into the air.
The cycle has been playing out for the last 30 years in the Great Lakes, said Cynthia Sellinger, co-author of a paper to be published Saturday in Environmental Science & Technology, a scientific journal.
Winters have been warmer. Snow doesn't build up, then seep into the ground and recharge the lakes in the spring.
Instead, warmer winter temperatures melt the snow after it falls, leaving the ground frozen and allowing the snow to evaporate.
"Since 1978, there's been a long-term decline in precipitation and a long-term increase in evaporation," said Sellinger, a hydrologist at the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory in Ann Arbor, an arm of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
"It's very subtle, extremely subtle, but it's there."
Lakes Huron and Michigan, which are connected by the Straits of Mackinac, are experiencing the lowest water levels in the Great Lakes this month.
Lake Huron is within 2 inches of its all-time low for January, according to data from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The lake is 14 inches lower than it was at this time last year.
It's projected to dip another inch during the next month, as part of its seasonal decline.
Sellinger said it's possible that Lake Huron will break its record low for January, set in 1965, later this month...
Temperatures in the Bay City area were expected to reach 53 degrees Fahrenheit on Monday, topping a record of 50 degrees from 1989, according to the National Weather Service.
Since 1980, when NOAA temperature buoys were installed, the surface water temperature of Lakes Michigan and Huron has increased by about 4 degrees Fahrenheit, according to Jay Austin, a researcher at the Large Lakes Observatory, part of the University of Minnesota in Duluth.
"It's larger compared to what we've seen in the atmosphere," or about twice the rise in global air temperatures attributed to global warming, Austin said.
Lake Superior is only Great Lake seeing higher levels this January. It's 6 inches higher than at this time last year. The rest of the lakes are 11-16 lower than a year ago.
Part of the reason for Lake Superior's rise is about 10.5 inches of rainfall the basin saw in September and October, right at the lake's low point, said Keith Kompoltowicz, a meteorologist for the Army Corps in Detroit.
Medicine
I went to my doctor the other day - it had been 2 weeks since I originally got a cold and I still had it. Or at that point it was sinusitis - a bacterial infection. The cold had the sore throat - but both shared the symptoms of low-grade fever, fatigue, and congestion along with the resulting headaches.
Outwardly I looked pretty normal - but inside I felt (and still feel) fairly lousy - sometimes more than other times.
So I get to the office (it was a new office) with my 1pm appointment. And here are 4 pharmaceutical reps all waiting to get in. I listened to their banter as I waited.
I asked the nurse what was up and she said that 4 reps are allowed in in the morning and 4 are allowed in in afternoon. They tend to get there as soon as they are allowed (for some reason). There are rules like they aren't allowed to approach the doctors - I guess the doctors have to approach them. They have a certain place for them to be.
It seems like a pretty stupid way for doctors to get info on new products.
As I'm in the exam room - I can hear the doctor talking to one of the reps. Then she comes in and I tell her about my symptoms.
She orders an anti-biotic and decongestants. She doesn't suggest anything else.
So later on I'm home and at first I'm just thinking that these medicines are going to do it.
And then I decide that I really needed to look into this - and I find that my condition could go on for weeks or even months. So it was time to get serious.
I looked up herbal remedies in my herb book - and it recommended eating leeks and garlic and taking a foot bath with dry mustard (soaked in water).
I recalled what my mother would have suggested - gargling salt water - and drinking lots of fluids.
It seemed that I drank pretty many fluids - but I got more serious and after reading various recommendations online - I dropped the coffee and wine and turned to teas exclusively (for the most part). And I try to keep them hot - warm when I drink them. Usually my hot drinks get pretty cold by the time I'm done with them - but no more. I developed a system where my teapot is resting over a candle - and it stays plenty warm that way.
Other recommendations including putting a warm, wet washcloth on ones face. But it doesn't stay warm very long - so I used one of my snakes (material sewn with rice inside) - heating it up in the microwave and it stays warm for quite a while.
I made leek soup for lunch and I'm making fairly hot chile for dinner - in case capsicum is helpful.
I've been inhaling lots of steam, and gargling, and I've also been trying to clean out my sinuses with a warm saline solution. I got pretty much gook out - but I still feel plenty congested.
This afternoon, I read online about Essential oils 'combat superbug'. I figure if they can help with the "superbug" - maybe they can help with whatever I've got. (I think it's rather ridiculous that they have a video entitled "Machine may kill MRSA microbes" - when it's really the essential oils dispersed by the machine that does it.) The authors of the articles are reluctant to reveal much (I don't see what it would harm) - but tea tree oil seems to be one. Others oils that people mention are Grapefruit seed extract, Eucalyptus, and Lavender. I'll have to look into it more - but I'm willing to try some of those. It can't hurt.
One thing that occurred to me that might be a contributing factor to my sinusitis is that the anti-depressant that I take seems to dry things up a bit. I think that part of the problem with my recovery was all of this stuff was too stuck in there. So the problem may have started with a pharmaceutical to begin with. I've had a suspicion that there would be complications from those pills that would not have been anticipated.
Meanwhile - all of the old time tested remedies need to be revived. Chinese Medicine is looking better all the time. The idea of low-tech practitioners who spend time with patients - with low-tech charges that regular people can afford (or at least that's supposed to be how it's worked in China).
Outwardly I looked pretty normal - but inside I felt (and still feel) fairly lousy - sometimes more than other times.
So I get to the office (it was a new office) with my 1pm appointment. And here are 4 pharmaceutical reps all waiting to get in. I listened to their banter as I waited.
I asked the nurse what was up and she said that 4 reps are allowed in in the morning and 4 are allowed in in afternoon. They tend to get there as soon as they are allowed (for some reason). There are rules like they aren't allowed to approach the doctors - I guess the doctors have to approach them. They have a certain place for them to be.
It seems like a pretty stupid way for doctors to get info on new products.
As I'm in the exam room - I can hear the doctor talking to one of the reps. Then she comes in and I tell her about my symptoms.
She orders an anti-biotic and decongestants. She doesn't suggest anything else.
So later on I'm home and at first I'm just thinking that these medicines are going to do it.
And then I decide that I really needed to look into this - and I find that my condition could go on for weeks or even months. So it was time to get serious.
I looked up herbal remedies in my herb book - and it recommended eating leeks and garlic and taking a foot bath with dry mustard (soaked in water).
I recalled what my mother would have suggested - gargling salt water - and drinking lots of fluids.
It seemed that I drank pretty many fluids - but I got more serious and after reading various recommendations online - I dropped the coffee and wine and turned to teas exclusively (for the most part). And I try to keep them hot - warm when I drink them. Usually my hot drinks get pretty cold by the time I'm done with them - but no more. I developed a system where my teapot is resting over a candle - and it stays plenty warm that way.
Other recommendations including putting a warm, wet washcloth on ones face. But it doesn't stay warm very long - so I used one of my snakes (material sewn with rice inside) - heating it up in the microwave and it stays warm for quite a while.
I made leek soup for lunch and I'm making fairly hot chile for dinner - in case capsicum is helpful.
I've been inhaling lots of steam, and gargling, and I've also been trying to clean out my sinuses with a warm saline solution. I got pretty much gook out - but I still feel plenty congested.
This afternoon, I read online about Essential oils 'combat superbug'. I figure if they can help with the "superbug" - maybe they can help with whatever I've got. (I think it's rather ridiculous that they have a video entitled "Machine may kill MRSA microbes" - when it's really the essential oils dispersed by the machine that does it.) The authors of the articles are reluctant to reveal much (I don't see what it would harm) - but tea tree oil seems to be one. Others oils that people mention are Grapefruit seed extract, Eucalyptus, and Lavender. I'll have to look into it more - but I'm willing to try some of those. It can't hurt.
One thing that occurred to me that might be a contributing factor to my sinusitis is that the anti-depressant that I take seems to dry things up a bit. I think that part of the problem with my recovery was all of this stuff was too stuck in there. So the problem may have started with a pharmaceutical to begin with. I've had a suspicion that there would be complications from those pills that would not have been anticipated.
Meanwhile - all of the old time tested remedies need to be revived. Chinese Medicine is looking better all the time. The idea of low-tech practitioners who spend time with patients - with low-tech charges that regular people can afford (or at least that's supposed to be how it's worked in China).
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
Record Highs in Indiana, 2Ft. Snow in Iran
Here in Indiana the past couple of days we've had temps in the 60's, almost 70. At the primaries today in New Hampshire it was in the high 50's, at least - instead of the average high of 31 (for Concord). If it got to 60 today - it would be a record. (Update) - Concord didn't set a record - but Nashua did - they had a 67 degree day yesterday - the previous record was 53 degrees).
There had been some great snow out east - I had been looking forward to cross-country skiing. The current system is supposed to blow through (there were intense tornadoes from Mississippi to Wisconsin) and the snow will return.
Meanwhile, Iran's heaviest snowstorm in decade kills 21
TEHRAN - The heaviest snowfall in more than a decade has left at least 21 people dead in Iran — some buried under avalanches, some frozen to death and others killed in traffic accidents, state media reported Monday.
As much as 22 inches of snow has fallen in areas of northern and central Iran since Saturday, said meteorologist Ali Abedini. The storm has forced schools and government offices to close, blocking major roads and leading to the cancellation of all domestic and international flights.
"At least 21 people have been killed and 88 others injured ... as a result of heavy snow," state-run radio reported. "Some died of the severe cold, some were buried under avalanches and others died after their cars overturned on snow-covered roads."
There had been some great snow out east - I had been looking forward to cross-country skiing. The current system is supposed to blow through (there were intense tornadoes from Mississippi to Wisconsin) and the snow will return.
Meanwhile, Iran's heaviest snowstorm in decade kills 21
TEHRAN - The heaviest snowfall in more than a decade has left at least 21 people dead in Iran — some buried under avalanches, some frozen to death and others killed in traffic accidents, state media reported Monday.
As much as 22 inches of snow has fallen in areas of northern and central Iran since Saturday, said meteorologist Ali Abedini. The storm has forced schools and government offices to close, blocking major roads and leading to the cancellation of all domestic and international flights.
"At least 21 people have been killed and 88 others injured ... as a result of heavy snow," state-run radio reported. "Some died of the severe cold, some were buried under avalanches and others died after their cars overturned on snow-covered roads."
"400-Plus Coastal Zones Are Dying"
From thedailygreen.com
The world is getting familiar with the carbon cycle and how pumping carbon that's been buried for millions of years into the atmosphere causes some global problems. Well, get ready to learn about nitrogen.
Like carbon, the nitrogen cycle is all out of whack. In this case, the origins are similar. Instead of burning petroleum or coal, nitrogen comes from natural gas transformed into ammonia fertilizer and used to grow crops; what doesn't absorb into the soil runs off into streams, which flow into rivers, which flow to the ocean, where the nitrogen fuels "dead zones" – areas where nitrogen (and phosphorus) fertilizes so much algae growth that it absorbs enough oxygen to make the water inhospitable to fish and other marine life. Jellyfish are about the only thing that thrives in these conditions; corals certainly do not.
There are other causes of dead zones; human sewage, inadequately treated, is another, as is the fallout from burning fossil fuels and certain industrial processes. Dead zones, which start as "eutrophic" zones (that is, over-rich with fertilizers), and end up as "hypoxic" areas (that is, short of oxygen), often shrink and grow with the seasons.
___________________________________________________
The World Resources Institute recently mapped the world's dead zones and found a whopping 415 eutrophic zones, including 169 that are known to be hypoxic and another 169 that probably are. The researchers believe the number is much higher, since only the United States and the European Union do an adequate job of counting and reporting problem coastal areas. China and other fast-growing Asian economies are likely polluting their coasts, but the problem hasn't been documented, the researchers say.
As the map shows, a mere 13 eutrophic zones are in recovery – a particularly sorry tally considering scientists have long known the causes and have long since identified solutions to the problem. The Chesapeake Bay and Gulf of Mexico are two examples close to home of systems whose dead zones are well documented, but not greatly improved, even despite millions of taxpayer dollars being spent on the problem. (The Gulf of Mexico dead zone threatened to grow bigger than ever in 2007, as farmers buoyed by ethanol subsidies planted a near-record crop of corn, leading to a flood of fertilizer down the Mississippi.)
"Our findings highlight the dramatic growth of areas receiving the endflows of nitrogen and phosphorus created by agriculture, increasing industry, fossil fuel combustion, and population growth," Mindy Selman, one of the researchers, wrote. "More than 1,000 scientists estimated, in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, that, as a result of human activities over the past 50 years, the flux of nitrogen has doubled over natural values while the flux of phosphorus has tripled."
The world is getting familiar with the carbon cycle and how pumping carbon that's been buried for millions of years into the atmosphere causes some global problems. Well, get ready to learn about nitrogen.
Like carbon, the nitrogen cycle is all out of whack. In this case, the origins are similar. Instead of burning petroleum or coal, nitrogen comes from natural gas transformed into ammonia fertilizer and used to grow crops; what doesn't absorb into the soil runs off into streams, which flow into rivers, which flow to the ocean, where the nitrogen fuels "dead zones" – areas where nitrogen (and phosphorus) fertilizes so much algae growth that it absorbs enough oxygen to make the water inhospitable to fish and other marine life. Jellyfish are about the only thing that thrives in these conditions; corals certainly do not.
There are other causes of dead zones; human sewage, inadequately treated, is another, as is the fallout from burning fossil fuels and certain industrial processes. Dead zones, which start as "eutrophic" zones (that is, over-rich with fertilizers), and end up as "hypoxic" areas (that is, short of oxygen), often shrink and grow with the seasons.
___________________________________________________
The World Resources Institute recently mapped the world's dead zones and found a whopping 415 eutrophic zones, including 169 that are known to be hypoxic and another 169 that probably are. The researchers believe the number is much higher, since only the United States and the European Union do an adequate job of counting and reporting problem coastal areas. China and other fast-growing Asian economies are likely polluting their coasts, but the problem hasn't been documented, the researchers say.
As the map shows, a mere 13 eutrophic zones are in recovery – a particularly sorry tally considering scientists have long known the causes and have long since identified solutions to the problem. The Chesapeake Bay and Gulf of Mexico are two examples close to home of systems whose dead zones are well documented, but not greatly improved, even despite millions of taxpayer dollars being spent on the problem. (The Gulf of Mexico dead zone threatened to grow bigger than ever in 2007, as farmers buoyed by ethanol subsidies planted a near-record crop of corn, leading to a flood of fertilizer down the Mississippi.)
"Our findings highlight the dramatic growth of areas receiving the endflows of nitrogen and phosphorus created by agriculture, increasing industry, fossil fuel combustion, and population growth," Mindy Selman, one of the researchers, wrote. "More than 1,000 scientists estimated, in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, that, as a result of human activities over the past 50 years, the flux of nitrogen has doubled over natural values while the flux of phosphorus has tripled."
"Compressed Air Car Set for Take-Off in India"
What seemed like a pipe dream may soon become reality as Frenchman Guy Negre hopes versions of his compressed air car will be produced in India this year by Tata Motors Ltd after a 15 year quest for backers for his invention.
Negre believes the time is right for his design with oil prices at record highs and pressure on carmakers to improve the fuel efficiency of their vehicles.
"It is clear that with oil at US$100 a barrel this will force people to change their use of fuel and pollute less," Negre told Reuters in an interview at his firm Motor Development International (MDI), based near Nice in the south of France.
"My car is zero pollution in town and almost no pollution on the highways," he added, saying the vehicle could travel 100 kilometres at a cost of one euro in fuel.
The former Formula One motor racing engineer's invention depends on pressurised air to move the pistons, which in turn help to compress the air again in a reservoir. The engine also has an electric motor, which needs to be periodically recharged, to top up the air pressure.
The bottles of compressed air -- similar to those used by divers -- can be filled up at service stations in several minutes.
EXTENDED RANGE
The latest versions of the cars -- MDI made an entire series of prototypes of engines and vehicles -- also include a fuel engine option to extend the car's range when not in reach of a special power plug or service station.
Tata, India's largest carmaker with revenue of US$7.2 billion in its last financial year, concluded a deal in 2007, investing 20 million euros (US$29.4 million). Pre-production in India is set for 2008, Negre said.
The vehicle, protected by some 50 patents, will cost some 3,500 to 4,000 euros. Using composite materials, it will weigh not more than 330 kilos (727.5 lb) and its maximum speed is 150 kilometres (93.21 miles) per hour.
"The lighter the vehicle, the less it consumes and the less its pollutes and the cheaper it is; it's simple," Negre said...
Negre said he aimed to set up mini factories in regions where the car is used. "No transport, no parts suppliers. Everything will be made at the place of sale in production units that can make one car per half hour," said Negre.
"That is more profitable, more ecological than the big factories of the large carmakers."
Negre believes the time is right for his design with oil prices at record highs and pressure on carmakers to improve the fuel efficiency of their vehicles.
"It is clear that with oil at US$100 a barrel this will force people to change their use of fuel and pollute less," Negre told Reuters in an interview at his firm Motor Development International (MDI), based near Nice in the south of France.
"My car is zero pollution in town and almost no pollution on the highways," he added, saying the vehicle could travel 100 kilometres at a cost of one euro in fuel.
The former Formula One motor racing engineer's invention depends on pressurised air to move the pistons, which in turn help to compress the air again in a reservoir. The engine also has an electric motor, which needs to be periodically recharged, to top up the air pressure.
The bottles of compressed air -- similar to those used by divers -- can be filled up at service stations in several minutes.
EXTENDED RANGE
The latest versions of the cars -- MDI made an entire series of prototypes of engines and vehicles -- also include a fuel engine option to extend the car's range when not in reach of a special power plug or service station.
Tata, India's largest carmaker with revenue of US$7.2 billion in its last financial year, concluded a deal in 2007, investing 20 million euros (US$29.4 million). Pre-production in India is set for 2008, Negre said.
The vehicle, protected by some 50 patents, will cost some 3,500 to 4,000 euros. Using composite materials, it will weigh not more than 330 kilos (727.5 lb) and its maximum speed is 150 kilometres (93.21 miles) per hour.
"The lighter the vehicle, the less it consumes and the less its pollutes and the cheaper it is; it's simple," Negre said...
Negre said he aimed to set up mini factories in regions where the car is used. "No transport, no parts suppliers. Everything will be made at the place of sale in production units that can make one car per half hour," said Negre.
"That is more profitable, more ecological than the big factories of the large carmakers."
Monday, January 07, 2008
Foul Stench (and Giant Jellyfish)
By TETSU KOBAYASHI - From asahi.com
From mountaintops to the seabed, the effects of China's headlong rush into modernity via smoke-belching factories are being felt across Japan.
On cold winter mornings, when biting winds blow off the Asian land mass and over the Sea of Japan, trees atop Mount Unzen-Fugendake in Nagasaki Prefecture are covered in a fine icy coating.
Residents of the normally warm southern prefecture traditionally refer to the seasonal white frost as hana-boro, or flowery little clusters of ice that dot the tree branches.
But, something is happening to the enchanting ice blossoms.
Hiromitsu Watanabe, 63, Unzen resident and a former high school teacher, has been studying the icy fog deposits since 1999.
"Look how dirty it is. It's almost like slush. This is evidence of transboundary air pollution," he said. Watanabe was displaying a small bottle containing black water. The water was melted ice fog deposit from Mount Unzen-Fugendake. The sample was taken Dec. 9.
The water's pH index was 3.2, making the liquid almost on par with vinegar. According to Watanabe, vehicle exhaust and the burning of coal are causing the change.
Mount Unzen-Fugendake's highest summit is 1,359 meters, which means it is exposed to vast wind currents.
According to research by the Nagasaki Prefectural Institute for Environmental Research and Public Health, whatever is turning hana-boro into slush is originating in China. More precisely, it's coming from the vicinity of Beijing, 1,500 kilometers northwest of the mountain.
The cold weather that produces hana-boro tends to occur when a typical winter atmospheric pressure pattern sets in, with northwestern seasonal winds blowing...
About 20 km west of central Beijing, a forest of chimney stacks spew white smoke into an already smoggy sky. The Shoudu Iron and Steel Works plant produces about 8 million tons of steel annually. It is the largest steel production center in Beijing.
"The smoke used to be reddish. Now it is pure white," Wu Jianxin, a Shoudu official, proudly proclaimed.
The Shoudu plant has been making capital equipment investments since the 1990s, installing desulphurization devices and other means to try and protect the environment.
Still, there is no getting around the fact that the plant remains a major pollution source that guzzles coal in huge volumes...
Underwater effects
Hiroshi Koshikawa, senior researcher at the National Institute for Environmental Studies in Tsukuba, Ibaraki Prefecture, said that when he was aboard a Fisheries Agency's research vessel in June 2007, he noticed the water had turned a dark tea color.
"We were far offshore but the sea had a fishy smell," Koshikawa said.
The boat was in the East China Sea, about 350 km from Shanghai.
Koshikawa expressed surprise to find the effects of the polluted Yangtze river, also known as the Chang Jiang, so far out.
At that time, Koshikawa also spotted a school of Echizen jellyfish, each measuring more than 20 centimeters, moving northward.
A few months later, Japan was once more inundated with huge Echizen jellyfish, which measured more than 1-meter across. The tentacled giants were first spotted in Japan's offshore waters in 2002.
Every winter, the high season for many fishing operations, the jellyfish cause extensive damage to nets and to hauls themselves.
The prevalent theory for the arrival of Echizen jellyfish along the Sea of Japan coastline is that Chinese waters, polluted by untreated effluent discharged by China's cities, are promoting the growth of microorganisms.
Overfishing, in turn, causes the number of fish that also feed on the microorganisms to plunge, thus providing a perfect environment for jellyfish to proliferate.
In November 2007, a three-nation scientific study council comprising researchers from Japan, China and South Korea met in Cheju, South Korea.
For the first time, a Chinese specialist revealed details of the jellyfish's emergence in China. Japanese researchers were shocked to hear that Echizen jellyfish have been showing up en masse in Jiangsu province, around the estuary of the Yangtze where it flows into the East China Sea, since 1997.
There was another surprise. Japanese scientists learned that hatchlings were also showing up in waters off Liaoning province in northeastern China.
Still, China does not want to admit that the troublesome jellyfish are indeed originating in its waters.
"There is no evidence that indicates any correlation between (the jellyfish) and China's economic growth. Maybe there are some that drift into the Sea of Japan, but they are limited in number," said Cheng Jiahua, of the East Sea Fisheries Research Institute...
From mountaintops to the seabed, the effects of China's headlong rush into modernity via smoke-belching factories are being felt across Japan.
On cold winter mornings, when biting winds blow off the Asian land mass and over the Sea of Japan, trees atop Mount Unzen-Fugendake in Nagasaki Prefecture are covered in a fine icy coating.
Residents of the normally warm southern prefecture traditionally refer to the seasonal white frost as hana-boro, or flowery little clusters of ice that dot the tree branches.
But, something is happening to the enchanting ice blossoms.
Hiromitsu Watanabe, 63, Unzen resident and a former high school teacher, has been studying the icy fog deposits since 1999.
"Look how dirty it is. It's almost like slush. This is evidence of transboundary air pollution," he said. Watanabe was displaying a small bottle containing black water. The water was melted ice fog deposit from Mount Unzen-Fugendake. The sample was taken Dec. 9.
The water's pH index was 3.2, making the liquid almost on par with vinegar. According to Watanabe, vehicle exhaust and the burning of coal are causing the change.
Mount Unzen-Fugendake's highest summit is 1,359 meters, which means it is exposed to vast wind currents.
According to research by the Nagasaki Prefectural Institute for Environmental Research and Public Health, whatever is turning hana-boro into slush is originating in China. More precisely, it's coming from the vicinity of Beijing, 1,500 kilometers northwest of the mountain.
The cold weather that produces hana-boro tends to occur when a typical winter atmospheric pressure pattern sets in, with northwestern seasonal winds blowing...
About 20 km west of central Beijing, a forest of chimney stacks spew white smoke into an already smoggy sky. The Shoudu Iron and Steel Works plant produces about 8 million tons of steel annually. It is the largest steel production center in Beijing.
"The smoke used to be reddish. Now it is pure white," Wu Jianxin, a Shoudu official, proudly proclaimed.
The Shoudu plant has been making capital equipment investments since the 1990s, installing desulphurization devices and other means to try and protect the environment.
Still, there is no getting around the fact that the plant remains a major pollution source that guzzles coal in huge volumes...
Underwater effects
Hiroshi Koshikawa, senior researcher at the National Institute for Environmental Studies in Tsukuba, Ibaraki Prefecture, said that when he was aboard a Fisheries Agency's research vessel in June 2007, he noticed the water had turned a dark tea color.
"We were far offshore but the sea had a fishy smell," Koshikawa said.
The boat was in the East China Sea, about 350 km from Shanghai.
Koshikawa expressed surprise to find the effects of the polluted Yangtze river, also known as the Chang Jiang, so far out.
At that time, Koshikawa also spotted a school of Echizen jellyfish, each measuring more than 20 centimeters, moving northward.
A few months later, Japan was once more inundated with huge Echizen jellyfish, which measured more than 1-meter across. The tentacled giants were first spotted in Japan's offshore waters in 2002.
Every winter, the high season for many fishing operations, the jellyfish cause extensive damage to nets and to hauls themselves.
The prevalent theory for the arrival of Echizen jellyfish along the Sea of Japan coastline is that Chinese waters, polluted by untreated effluent discharged by China's cities, are promoting the growth of microorganisms.
Overfishing, in turn, causes the number of fish that also feed on the microorganisms to plunge, thus providing a perfect environment for jellyfish to proliferate.
In November 2007, a three-nation scientific study council comprising researchers from Japan, China and South Korea met in Cheju, South Korea.
For the first time, a Chinese specialist revealed details of the jellyfish's emergence in China. Japanese researchers were shocked to hear that Echizen jellyfish have been showing up en masse in Jiangsu province, around the estuary of the Yangtze where it flows into the East China Sea, since 1997.
There was another surprise. Japanese scientists learned that hatchlings were also showing up in waters off Liaoning province in northeastern China.
Still, China does not want to admit that the troublesome jellyfish are indeed originating in its waters.
"There is no evidence that indicates any correlation between (the jellyfish) and China's economic growth. Maybe there are some that drift into the Sea of Japan, but they are limited in number," said Cheng Jiahua, of the East Sea Fisheries Research Institute...
Sunday, January 06, 2008
People Making a Difference
"50 people who could save the planet" ~ from The Guardian
and
"Americans Who Tell the Truth" ~ from Yes Magazine
Exs. from - "50 people who could save the planet":
Aubrey Meyer
Musician and activist
Can a 60-year-old South African violinist living in a flat in Willesden, north London, actually change the world? It's a serious question because the odds are increasing that over the next two years rich and poor countries will come round to Aubrey Meyer's way of thinking if they are to negotiate a half-decent global deal to reduce climate change emissions.
Nearly 20 years ago, Meyer devised what he believed was the only logical way through the political morass dividing rich and poor countries on climate change. After a letter from him was published in the Guardian, he gave up playing professional music to set up the tiny Global Commons Institute in his bedroom. There he developed the idea that not only did everyone on earth have an equal right to emit CO2, but that all countries should agree to an annual per capita ration or quota of greenhouse gases.
That was the easy bit. But then the musician, who had played with the LPO and had written for the Royal Ballet, went further. Meyer proposed that each country move progressively to the same allocation per inhabitant by an agreed date. This meant that rich countries would have steadily to cut back their emissions, while poor ones would be allowed steadily to grow theirs, with everyone eventually meeting in the middle at a point where science said the global maximum level of emissions should be set. He called it "contraction and convergence" (C&C).
Meyer is nothing if not determined. Since 1990, earning next to nothing and sometimes practically begging for money so he could lobby international meetings, he has pressed C&C at every level of global government. Early opposition came from British civil servants, who said it was akin to communism, and major environmental groups, which were ideologically opposed to any kind of trading emissions. For many years the US government had no interest in any such deal.
But the climate stakes have risen with every new scientific report, and the politicians and environment groups have moved on. As the urgency for a global agreement has grown, so C&C has emerged as one of the favourites to break the international impasse.
"Its advantage is that it is far simpler and fairer than the Kyoto agreement, which applied only to a few rich countries," Meyer says. It also allows science to set the optimum level of emissions; it gets round long-standing US objections that poor countries should be part of a global agreement; and it is inherently pro-business, because it encourages rich and poor countries to trade emissions between themselves.
The long years of single-minded lobbying mean that Meyer's idea now has some powerful backers, including, in Britain, the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution; 180 MPs have supported it in an early day motion, and the government, equivocal so far, is moving towards a version of it. It has become official policy in India, China and most African countries. Germany and India are expected to run with it in UN meetings. Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, has backed C&C publicly.
The long years of single-minded lobbying mean that Meyer's idea now has some powerful backers, including, in Britain, the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution; 180 MPs have supported it in an early day motion, and the government, equivocal so far, is moving towards a version of it. It has become official policy in India, China and most African countries. Germany and India are expected to run with it in UN meetings. Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, has backed C&C publicly.
Other proposals are emerging and it will take two more years to thrash out a system that will please everyone. But few have the elegance of C&C. "It's the least unfair of all the proposals that have been put forward," Meyer says. "It secures survival by correcting both fatal poverty and fatal climate change in the same arrangement."
Writing music and calculating emissions have a lot in common, he says. "Look at a sheet of music and you would not know what it was. But when you hear it played, then it's beautiful. Equally, when you read the calculations on countries' gases, they mean nothing. But when you work out how you can reduce them, it's clear that it's the best thing for humanity."
Meyer still plays the violin every day, but seldom with an orchestra. "I just did not realise that it would take quite so long to change the world," he says.
____
Ma Jun
Writer and activist
Ma Jun, 39, became an environmentalist in 1997 after hearing Chinese engineers boast that the Yellow River was a model of water management, even though he knew it was so over-dammed and exploited that it failed to reach the sea on more than 200 days each year. Now he is one of a growing number of people challenging the Chinese culture of official secrecy and saving face. His website names and shames companies and local governments that violate environmental standards, and the former journalist has called to account corporate executives and Communist party cadres with pollution maps. Ma Jun set up the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs, which cooperates with the central government in a non-confrontational - but highly pragmatic - campaign strategy. Despite the tight controls imposed on independent organisations by the Communist party, there are now 3,000 registered green NGOs, up from fewer than 50 five years ago.
____
Peter Garrett
Politician
Peter Garrett, 54, is the former punk lead singer of the disbanded Australian rock group Midnight Oil, who continued his weird journey from radical muso to establishment politician when he was appointed Australia's environment minister in November. He began with gigs outside Exxon offices and protests at the Sydney Olympics about Aboriginal rights, and found himself labelled a turncoat by some at the election. However, he was nominated here by Jonathon Porritt, for being "instrumental in shaping the Australian Labour party's climate change and environment policies". Within days of his taking office, Australia signed up to the Kyoto climate change treaty, and has broken with the obstructivist policies of President Bush.
____________________________________________
Exs. from "Americans Who Tell the Truth":
Medea Benjamin
Human Rights Advocate, Anti-War Activist, Author (1952 –)
Medea Benjamin was born Susan Benjamin but in college changed her name to that of the Greek mythological woman. She has a Master’s Degree in both Public Health and Economics, and has spent over twenty years advocating for human rights all over the world. Benjamin spent ten years in Latin America and Africa as an economist and nutritionist for such organizations as the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Health Organization, and lived for five years in Cuba. She is the author of eight books, including Bridging the Global Gap: A Handbook to Linking Citizens of the First and Third Worlds (1989), and Greening of the Revolution: Cuba’s Experiment with Organic Agriculture (1995).
Benjamin and her husband Kevin Danaher co-founded Global Exchange, an organization dedicated to promoting “fair trade” practices, where environmental concerns and fair wages for the production of goods take precedence over corporate profits. She has fought against sweatshops, particularly in the garment and shoe industries, and with Global Exchange persuaded corporate giant Nike to investigate and monitor its overseas factories to ensure safe working environments and living wages. Global Exchange was also a prominent, key factor in organizing the protests against the World Trade Organization in Seattle in December 1999.
It was after the attacks on September 11, 2001, however, that Medea Benjamin’s activism took on a different tone and color – pink. She co-founded CODEPINK: Women for Peace in 2002. It’s a “women-run, women-led peace organization”, whose activities range from personal meetings with members of Congress to dressing in pink surgical scrubs handing out “prescriptions for peace.” Their approach is inventive, often playful, and always in pink, but their goal for peace is serious. Their acts of civil disobedience can be confrontational and often involve members being arrested, but this merely strengthens their resolve. Code Pink’s Members include prominent figures such as Ann Wright and Diane Wilson, but also “regular” women from all over the country, participating in at least 250 chapters. In 2006, Benjamin and Code Pink brought six Iraqi women (Sunni, Shiite, and Kurd) to the US for International Women’s Day to travel and lobby to end the war. She is co-editor of Code Pink’s 2006 book, Stop the Next War Now: Effective Responses to Violence and Terrorism. It’s a collection of essays from people such as Barbara Ehrenreich, Alice Walker, Helen Thomas, and Arianna Huffington.
Medea Benjamin has involved herself in the peace and justice process in a myriad of ways besides Global Exchange and Code Pink. In 2000, she ran for US Senate (for California) on the Green Party ticket. She helped to bring groups together to form the coalition United for Peace and Justice. She’s traveled to Iraq several times and assisted in establishing an occupation and watch center in Baghdad. In 2005, Benjamin was nominated to receive the Nobel Peace Prize as part of the project, “1000 Women for the Nobel Peace Prize 2005”, a collective nomination representing women who work for peace and human rights everywhere.
____
Amy Goodman
Journalist, host of Democracy Now, 1957—
Amy Goodman has the perfect answer when asked who she represents: “Democracy Now.” As host of the only national radio/TV news show free of all corporate underwriting, she is able to present a range of independent voices not often heard on the airwaves. “Dissent,” she explains, “is what makes this country healthy.”
Goodman grew up on Long Island, the descendant of Hasidic rabbis and the daughter of radical parents. After graduating from Harvard in 1984 with a degree in anthropology, she spent 10 years as producer of the evening news show at WBAI, Pacifica Radio’s station in New York City. Democracy Now, which began in 1996, now airs on more than 225 stations across North America.
Goodman believes that media should be, in the title of the 2004 book she wrote with her brother David, The Exception to the Rulers. “The role of reporters,” she says, “is to go to where the silence is and say something.” For going to places like East Timor, Nigeria, Peru, and Haiti to report on stories ignored by the mainstream media, often as considerable risk, she has won many honors including the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism, George Polk, and Overseas Press Club awards.
“She begins broadcasting at 7 a.m., and works until near midnight,” a reporter wrote in the Washington Post. Her fellow journalist Danny Schechter has said, about her, “She works hard and when she's not working, she works harder. She is earnest to a fault, with little patience for folks who may have a more nuanced stance on certain issues than she does. But she is informed, committed, passionate, thorough and very uncompromising.” Goodman is, Schechter says, “in a class of her own.”
____
Frances Moore Lappé
Writer, Activist 1944-
Frances Moore Lappe was born in Pendleton Oregon. A graduate of Earlham College in Indiana, she was a “26-year-old trusting her common sense” when she began the research that led to the publication of Diet for a Small Planet (1971), a book which sold over three million copies and changed forever the way people think about food. Her little book showed that human practices, not natural disasters, cause worldwide hunger. Food scarcity results when grain, rich in nutrients and capable of supporting vast populations, is fed to livestock to produce meat which yields only a fraction of those nutrients.
In Food First; Beyond the Myth of Scarcity (written with Joseph Collins, 1977) she went on to identify other causes of starvation: centralized control of farmland and economic pressures to produce “cash” crops rather than basic food products. The authors argued that western colonization of underdeveloped countries create the conditions for waste and poor distribution of food resources that allow whole populations to go hungry. Their vision for feeding the world is one of “food self-reliance,” in which communities produce the food they consume and manufacture the tools and fertilizers that they need.
A passion for the democratic process infuses her work as a co-founder of two national organizations: the Institute for Food and Development Policy based in California and the Center for Living Democracy, a ten-year initiative which encourages “regular citizens to contribute to problem-solving in all dimensions of public life.” In 1987 Lappe became the fourth American to receive the Right Livelihood Award, sometimes called the “Alternative Nobel,” for her “vision and work healing our planet and uplifting humanity.”
In 2002 Lappe and her daughter, Anna, published Hope’s Edge; The Next Diet for a Small Planet. Like other visionary leaders, Lappe sees hope as something to be lived not sought after: “A lot of people think we find hope by marshaling evidence and proving there is grounds for it. But hope isn’t what we find in evidence; it’s what we become in action.” It is not surprising, then, that her next book is called Choosing Courage in a Culture of Fear.
____
Bill McKibben
Author, Environmental Activist, 1960-
Bill McKibben is a writer and avid environmentalist. Currently a scholar-in-residence at Middlebury College in Vermont, he has written several books, and contributes regularly to publications such as The New York Times, The Atlantic Monthly, Orion, and Mother Jones. He is on the board of Grist Magazine, for which he also writes articles.
McKibben’s books vary in nature; however, it was his first book that established him as an environmental writer. The End of Nature, published in 1989, spoke to the issue of climate change. Originally serialized in The New Yorker, it was considered the first public-oriented alarm about climate change. With tragedies like Hurricane Katrina finally bringing global warming into sharper focus for everyone (not only scientists and environmentalists), his writings have grown even more important. An active participant in the Methodist Church, he sees religion playing a vital role in protecting the future of Earth. A recent document called the Evangelical Climate Initiative led McKibben to write an article asserting that “even in the evangelical community, “right wing” and “Christian” are not synonyms…given that 85 percent of Americans identify themselves as Christians, and that we manage to emit 25 percent of the world’s carbon dioxide – well, the future of Christian environmentalism may have something significant to do with the future of the planet.”
Today, he examines the economy, the environment, and the overall happiness of the US. McKibben writes that formerly, it was accepted that growing the economy would make people wealthier, and therefore happier. Now, he says, “Growth is bumping up against physical limits so profound – like climate change and peak oil – that trying to keep expanding the economy may be not just impossible but also dangerous. And perhaps most surprisingly, growth no longer makes us happier.” McKibben’s latest book, Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future, states the need “to move beyond growth…begin pursuing prosperity in a more local direction, with cities, suburbs, and regions producing more of their own food, generating more of their own energy…”. This idea builds on his 2003 book, Enough, which imagines genetic engineering, progress, and growth taken too far, and wonders whether it is not better to be fully human than unnaturally perfect.
In 2006, McKibben led a five-day walk across Vermont, demanding legislation to slow US carbon emissions. In early 2007, he founded stepitup2007.org. This unique idea called on people and local groups (including not-so-local groups such as the Sierra Club and the NWF), to organize their own rallies on April 14, 2007. The rallies ranged from a large group of people dressed in blue in Manhattan’s Battery Park, lining up approximately where the sea level would rise with continued glacial melting, to small groups viewing Al Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth. All called for Congress to pass strict laws to cut carbon emissions by 80 percent by the year 2050.
and
"Americans Who Tell the Truth" ~ from Yes Magazine
Exs. from - "50 people who could save the planet":
Aubrey Meyer
Musician and activist
Can a 60-year-old South African violinist living in a flat in Willesden, north London, actually change the world? It's a serious question because the odds are increasing that over the next two years rich and poor countries will come round to Aubrey Meyer's way of thinking if they are to negotiate a half-decent global deal to reduce climate change emissions.
Nearly 20 years ago, Meyer devised what he believed was the only logical way through the political morass dividing rich and poor countries on climate change. After a letter from him was published in the Guardian, he gave up playing professional music to set up the tiny Global Commons Institute in his bedroom. There he developed the idea that not only did everyone on earth have an equal right to emit CO2, but that all countries should agree to an annual per capita ration or quota of greenhouse gases.
That was the easy bit. But then the musician, who had played with the LPO and had written for the Royal Ballet, went further. Meyer proposed that each country move progressively to the same allocation per inhabitant by an agreed date. This meant that rich countries would have steadily to cut back their emissions, while poor ones would be allowed steadily to grow theirs, with everyone eventually meeting in the middle at a point where science said the global maximum level of emissions should be set. He called it "contraction and convergence" (C&C).
Meyer is nothing if not determined. Since 1990, earning next to nothing and sometimes practically begging for money so he could lobby international meetings, he has pressed C&C at every level of global government. Early opposition came from British civil servants, who said it was akin to communism, and major environmental groups, which were ideologically opposed to any kind of trading emissions. For many years the US government had no interest in any such deal.
But the climate stakes have risen with every new scientific report, and the politicians and environment groups have moved on. As the urgency for a global agreement has grown, so C&C has emerged as one of the favourites to break the international impasse.
"Its advantage is that it is far simpler and fairer than the Kyoto agreement, which applied only to a few rich countries," Meyer says. It also allows science to set the optimum level of emissions; it gets round long-standing US objections that poor countries should be part of a global agreement; and it is inherently pro-business, because it encourages rich and poor countries to trade emissions between themselves.
The long years of single-minded lobbying mean that Meyer's idea now has some powerful backers, including, in Britain, the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution; 180 MPs have supported it in an early day motion, and the government, equivocal so far, is moving towards a version of it. It has become official policy in India, China and most African countries. Germany and India are expected to run with it in UN meetings. Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, has backed C&C publicly.
The long years of single-minded lobbying mean that Meyer's idea now has some powerful backers, including, in Britain, the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution; 180 MPs have supported it in an early day motion, and the government, equivocal so far, is moving towards a version of it. It has become official policy in India, China and most African countries. Germany and India are expected to run with it in UN meetings. Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, has backed C&C publicly.
Other proposals are emerging and it will take two more years to thrash out a system that will please everyone. But few have the elegance of C&C. "It's the least unfair of all the proposals that have been put forward," Meyer says. "It secures survival by correcting both fatal poverty and fatal climate change in the same arrangement."
Writing music and calculating emissions have a lot in common, he says. "Look at a sheet of music and you would not know what it was. But when you hear it played, then it's beautiful. Equally, when you read the calculations on countries' gases, they mean nothing. But when you work out how you can reduce them, it's clear that it's the best thing for humanity."
Meyer still plays the violin every day, but seldom with an orchestra. "I just did not realise that it would take quite so long to change the world," he says.
____
Ma Jun
Writer and activist
Ma Jun, 39, became an environmentalist in 1997 after hearing Chinese engineers boast that the Yellow River was a model of water management, even though he knew it was so over-dammed and exploited that it failed to reach the sea on more than 200 days each year. Now he is one of a growing number of people challenging the Chinese culture of official secrecy and saving face. His website names and shames companies and local governments that violate environmental standards, and the former journalist has called to account corporate executives and Communist party cadres with pollution maps. Ma Jun set up the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs, which cooperates with the central government in a non-confrontational - but highly pragmatic - campaign strategy. Despite the tight controls imposed on independent organisations by the Communist party, there are now 3,000 registered green NGOs, up from fewer than 50 five years ago.
____
Peter Garrett
Politician
Peter Garrett, 54, is the former punk lead singer of the disbanded Australian rock group Midnight Oil, who continued his weird journey from radical muso to establishment politician when he was appointed Australia's environment minister in November. He began with gigs outside Exxon offices and protests at the Sydney Olympics about Aboriginal rights, and found himself labelled a turncoat by some at the election. However, he was nominated here by Jonathon Porritt, for being "instrumental in shaping the Australian Labour party's climate change and environment policies". Within days of his taking office, Australia signed up to the Kyoto climate change treaty, and has broken with the obstructivist policies of President Bush.
____________________________________________
Exs. from "Americans Who Tell the Truth":
Medea Benjamin
Human Rights Advocate, Anti-War Activist, Author (1952 –)
Medea Benjamin was born Susan Benjamin but in college changed her name to that of the Greek mythological woman. She has a Master’s Degree in both Public Health and Economics, and has spent over twenty years advocating for human rights all over the world. Benjamin spent ten years in Latin America and Africa as an economist and nutritionist for such organizations as the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Health Organization, and lived for five years in Cuba. She is the author of eight books, including Bridging the Global Gap: A Handbook to Linking Citizens of the First and Third Worlds (1989), and Greening of the Revolution: Cuba’s Experiment with Organic Agriculture (1995).
Benjamin and her husband Kevin Danaher co-founded Global Exchange, an organization dedicated to promoting “fair trade” practices, where environmental concerns and fair wages for the production of goods take precedence over corporate profits. She has fought against sweatshops, particularly in the garment and shoe industries, and with Global Exchange persuaded corporate giant Nike to investigate and monitor its overseas factories to ensure safe working environments and living wages. Global Exchange was also a prominent, key factor in organizing the protests against the World Trade Organization in Seattle in December 1999.
It was after the attacks on September 11, 2001, however, that Medea Benjamin’s activism took on a different tone and color – pink. She co-founded CODEPINK: Women for Peace in 2002. It’s a “women-run, women-led peace organization”, whose activities range from personal meetings with members of Congress to dressing in pink surgical scrubs handing out “prescriptions for peace.” Their approach is inventive, often playful, and always in pink, but their goal for peace is serious. Their acts of civil disobedience can be confrontational and often involve members being arrested, but this merely strengthens their resolve. Code Pink’s Members include prominent figures such as Ann Wright and Diane Wilson, but also “regular” women from all over the country, participating in at least 250 chapters. In 2006, Benjamin and Code Pink brought six Iraqi women (Sunni, Shiite, and Kurd) to the US for International Women’s Day to travel and lobby to end the war. She is co-editor of Code Pink’s 2006 book, Stop the Next War Now: Effective Responses to Violence and Terrorism. It’s a collection of essays from people such as Barbara Ehrenreich, Alice Walker, Helen Thomas, and Arianna Huffington.
Medea Benjamin has involved herself in the peace and justice process in a myriad of ways besides Global Exchange and Code Pink. In 2000, she ran for US Senate (for California) on the Green Party ticket. She helped to bring groups together to form the coalition United for Peace and Justice. She’s traveled to Iraq several times and assisted in establishing an occupation and watch center in Baghdad. In 2005, Benjamin was nominated to receive the Nobel Peace Prize as part of the project, “1000 Women for the Nobel Peace Prize 2005”, a collective nomination representing women who work for peace and human rights everywhere.
____
Amy Goodman
Journalist, host of Democracy Now, 1957—
Amy Goodman has the perfect answer when asked who she represents: “Democracy Now.” As host of the only national radio/TV news show free of all corporate underwriting, she is able to present a range of independent voices not often heard on the airwaves. “Dissent,” she explains, “is what makes this country healthy.”
Goodman grew up on Long Island, the descendant of Hasidic rabbis and the daughter of radical parents. After graduating from Harvard in 1984 with a degree in anthropology, she spent 10 years as producer of the evening news show at WBAI, Pacifica Radio’s station in New York City. Democracy Now, which began in 1996, now airs on more than 225 stations across North America.
Goodman believes that media should be, in the title of the 2004 book she wrote with her brother David, The Exception to the Rulers. “The role of reporters,” she says, “is to go to where the silence is and say something.” For going to places like East Timor, Nigeria, Peru, and Haiti to report on stories ignored by the mainstream media, often as considerable risk, she has won many honors including the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism, George Polk, and Overseas Press Club awards.
“She begins broadcasting at 7 a.m., and works until near midnight,” a reporter wrote in the Washington Post. Her fellow journalist Danny Schechter has said, about her, “She works hard and when she's not working, she works harder. She is earnest to a fault, with little patience for folks who may have a more nuanced stance on certain issues than she does. But she is informed, committed, passionate, thorough and very uncompromising.” Goodman is, Schechter says, “in a class of her own.”
____
Frances Moore Lappé
Writer, Activist 1944-
Frances Moore Lappe was born in Pendleton Oregon. A graduate of Earlham College in Indiana, she was a “26-year-old trusting her common sense” when she began the research that led to the publication of Diet for a Small Planet (1971), a book which sold over three million copies and changed forever the way people think about food. Her little book showed that human practices, not natural disasters, cause worldwide hunger. Food scarcity results when grain, rich in nutrients and capable of supporting vast populations, is fed to livestock to produce meat which yields only a fraction of those nutrients.
In Food First; Beyond the Myth of Scarcity (written with Joseph Collins, 1977) she went on to identify other causes of starvation: centralized control of farmland and economic pressures to produce “cash” crops rather than basic food products. The authors argued that western colonization of underdeveloped countries create the conditions for waste and poor distribution of food resources that allow whole populations to go hungry. Their vision for feeding the world is one of “food self-reliance,” in which communities produce the food they consume and manufacture the tools and fertilizers that they need.
A passion for the democratic process infuses her work as a co-founder of two national organizations: the Institute for Food and Development Policy based in California and the Center for Living Democracy, a ten-year initiative which encourages “regular citizens to contribute to problem-solving in all dimensions of public life.” In 1987 Lappe became the fourth American to receive the Right Livelihood Award, sometimes called the “Alternative Nobel,” for her “vision and work healing our planet and uplifting humanity.”
In 2002 Lappe and her daughter, Anna, published Hope’s Edge; The Next Diet for a Small Planet. Like other visionary leaders, Lappe sees hope as something to be lived not sought after: “A lot of people think we find hope by marshaling evidence and proving there is grounds for it. But hope isn’t what we find in evidence; it’s what we become in action.” It is not surprising, then, that her next book is called Choosing Courage in a Culture of Fear.
____
Bill McKibben
Author, Environmental Activist, 1960-
Bill McKibben is a writer and avid environmentalist. Currently a scholar-in-residence at Middlebury College in Vermont, he has written several books, and contributes regularly to publications such as The New York Times, The Atlantic Monthly, Orion, and Mother Jones. He is on the board of Grist Magazine, for which he also writes articles.
McKibben’s books vary in nature; however, it was his first book that established him as an environmental writer. The End of Nature, published in 1989, spoke to the issue of climate change. Originally serialized in The New Yorker, it was considered the first public-oriented alarm about climate change. With tragedies like Hurricane Katrina finally bringing global warming into sharper focus for everyone (not only scientists and environmentalists), his writings have grown even more important. An active participant in the Methodist Church, he sees religion playing a vital role in protecting the future of Earth. A recent document called the Evangelical Climate Initiative led McKibben to write an article asserting that “even in the evangelical community, “right wing” and “Christian” are not synonyms…given that 85 percent of Americans identify themselves as Christians, and that we manage to emit 25 percent of the world’s carbon dioxide – well, the future of Christian environmentalism may have something significant to do with the future of the planet.”
Today, he examines the economy, the environment, and the overall happiness of the US. McKibben writes that formerly, it was accepted that growing the economy would make people wealthier, and therefore happier. Now, he says, “Growth is bumping up against physical limits so profound – like climate change and peak oil – that trying to keep expanding the economy may be not just impossible but also dangerous. And perhaps most surprisingly, growth no longer makes us happier.” McKibben’s latest book, Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future, states the need “to move beyond growth…begin pursuing prosperity in a more local direction, with cities, suburbs, and regions producing more of their own food, generating more of their own energy…”. This idea builds on his 2003 book, Enough, which imagines genetic engineering, progress, and growth taken too far, and wonders whether it is not better to be fully human than unnaturally perfect.
In 2006, McKibben led a five-day walk across Vermont, demanding legislation to slow US carbon emissions. In early 2007, he founded stepitup2007.org. This unique idea called on people and local groups (including not-so-local groups such as the Sierra Club and the NWF), to organize their own rallies on April 14, 2007. The rallies ranged from a large group of people dressed in blue in Manhattan’s Battery Park, lining up approximately where the sea level would rise with continued glacial melting, to small groups viewing Al Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth. All called for Congress to pass strict laws to cut carbon emissions by 80 percent by the year 2050.
Saturday, January 05, 2008
"...Stricter Rules on Navy to Protect Marine Life"
A federal judge has ordered the Navy to adopt stringent new safeguards intended to improve protection of whales and dolphins during its sonar training exercises off Southern California.
The ruling, issued Thursday by Judge Florence-Marie Cooper of the United States District Court for the Central District of California, orders the Navy to limit its use of medium-range sonar to an area beyond 12 nautical miles from shore. Closer to the shore, marine mammals have exhibited frenzied and disoriented behavior during the emissions of sonar blasts as part of the Navy’s practice missions.
Judge Cooper’s order also outlined safeguards, which include a monitoring session one hour before a military exercise to detect the presence of marine mammals, the use of trained aerial lookouts throughout exercises and a mandatory sonar shutdown when mammals are spotted within 2,200 yards of training maneuvers.
The ruling stems from a long-running legal battle between environmental groups, led by the Natural Resources Defense Council, and the Navy, which has argued that mid-frequency sonar is vital to the training of submarine seamen and other crews who now face a new generation of quiet submarines that cannot be detected by traditional passive sonar waves.
A spokesman at the Pentagon said Friday that the Navy was reviewing the judge’s ruling to determine its next move, which could include an appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
“Despite the care the court took in crafting its order,” said the spokesman, Cmdr. Jeff Davis of the Navy, “we do not believe it struck the right balance between national security and environmental concerns.”...
The ruling, issued Thursday by Judge Florence-Marie Cooper of the United States District Court for the Central District of California, orders the Navy to limit its use of medium-range sonar to an area beyond 12 nautical miles from shore. Closer to the shore, marine mammals have exhibited frenzied and disoriented behavior during the emissions of sonar blasts as part of the Navy’s practice missions.
Judge Cooper’s order also outlined safeguards, which include a monitoring session one hour before a military exercise to detect the presence of marine mammals, the use of trained aerial lookouts throughout exercises and a mandatory sonar shutdown when mammals are spotted within 2,200 yards of training maneuvers.
The ruling stems from a long-running legal battle between environmental groups, led by the Natural Resources Defense Council, and the Navy, which has argued that mid-frequency sonar is vital to the training of submarine seamen and other crews who now face a new generation of quiet submarines that cannot be detected by traditional passive sonar waves.
A spokesman at the Pentagon said Friday that the Navy was reviewing the judge’s ruling to determine its next move, which could include an appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
“Despite the care the court took in crafting its order,” said the spokesman, Cmdr. Jeff Davis of the Navy, “we do not believe it struck the right balance between national security and environmental concerns.”...
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
"What’s Your Consumption Factor?"
By JARED DIAMOND From New York Times
TO mathematicians, 32 is an interesting number: it’s 2 raised to the fifth power, 2 times 2 times 2 times 2 times 2. To economists, 32 is even more special, because it measures the difference in lifestyles between the first world and the developing world. The average rates at which people consume resources like oil and metals, and produce wastes like plastics and greenhouse gases, are about 32 times higher in North America, Western Europe, Japan and Australia than they are in the developing world. That factor of 32 has big consequences.
To understand them, consider our concern with world population. Today, there are more than 6.5 billion people, and that number may grow to around 9 billion within this half-century. Several decades ago, many people considered rising population to be the main challenge facing humanity. Now we realize that it matters only insofar as people consume and produce.
If most of the world’s 6.5 billion people were in cold storage and not metabolizing or consuming, they would create no resource problem. What really matters is total world consumption, the sum of all local consumptions, which is the product of local population times the local per capita consumption rate.
The estimated one billion people who live in developed countries have a relative per capita consumption rate of 32. Most of the world’s other 5.5 billion people constitute the developing world, with relative per capita consumption rates below 32, mostly down toward 1.
The population especially of the developing world is growing, and some people remain fixated on this. They note that populations of countries like Kenya are growing rapidly, and they say that’s a big problem. Yes, it is a problem for Kenya’s more than 30 million people, but it’s not a burden on the whole world, because Kenyans consume so little. (Their relative per capita rate is 1.) A real problem for the world is that each of us 300 million Americans consumes as much as 32 Kenyans. With 10 times the population, the United States consumes 320 times more resources than Kenya does.
People in the third world are aware of this difference in per capita consumption...
If India as well as China were to catch up, world consumption rates would triple. If the whole developing world were suddenly to catch up, world rates would increase elevenfold. It would be as if the world population ballooned to 72 billion people (retaining present consumption rates).
Some optimists claim that we could support a world with nine billion people. But I haven’t met anyone crazy enough to claim that we could support 72 billion. Yet we often promise developing countries that if they will only adopt good policies — for example, institute honest government and a free-market economy — they, too, will be able to enjoy a first-world lifestyle. This promise is impossible, a cruel hoax: we are having difficulty supporting a first-world lifestyle even now for only one billion people.
We Americans may think of China’s growing consumption as a problem. But the Chinese are only reaching for the consumption rate we already have. To tell them not to try would be futile...
No, we could have a stable outcome in which all countries converge on consumption rates considerably below the current highest levels. Americans might object: there is no way we would sacrifice our living standards for the benefit of people in the rest of the world. Nevertheless, whether we get there willingly or not, we shall soon have lower consumption rates, because our present rates are unsustainable.
Real sacrifice wouldn’t be required, however, because living standards are not tightly coupled to consumption rates. Much American consumption is wasteful and contributes little or nothing to quality of life. For example, per capita oil consumption in Western Europe is about half of ours, yet Western Europe’s standard of living is higher by any reasonable criterion, including life expectancy, health, infant mortality, access to medical care, financial security after retirement, vacation time, quality of public schools and support for the arts. Ask yourself whether Americans’ wasteful use of gasoline contributes positively to any of those measures.
Other aspects of our consumption are wasteful, too. Most of the world’s fisheries are still operated non-sustainably, and many have already collapsed or fallen to low yields — even though we know how to manage them in such a way as to preserve the environment and the fish supply. If we were to operate all fisheries sustainably, we could extract fish from the oceans at maximum historical rates and carry on indefinitely.
The same is true of forests: we already know how to log them sustainably, and if we did so worldwide, we could extract enough timber to meet the world’s wood and paper needs. Yet most forests are managed non-sustainably, with decreasing yields...
TO mathematicians, 32 is an interesting number: it’s 2 raised to the fifth power, 2 times 2 times 2 times 2 times 2. To economists, 32 is even more special, because it measures the difference in lifestyles between the first world and the developing world. The average rates at which people consume resources like oil and metals, and produce wastes like plastics and greenhouse gases, are about 32 times higher in North America, Western Europe, Japan and Australia than they are in the developing world. That factor of 32 has big consequences.
To understand them, consider our concern with world population. Today, there are more than 6.5 billion people, and that number may grow to around 9 billion within this half-century. Several decades ago, many people considered rising population to be the main challenge facing humanity. Now we realize that it matters only insofar as people consume and produce.
If most of the world’s 6.5 billion people were in cold storage and not metabolizing or consuming, they would create no resource problem. What really matters is total world consumption, the sum of all local consumptions, which is the product of local population times the local per capita consumption rate.
The estimated one billion people who live in developed countries have a relative per capita consumption rate of 32. Most of the world’s other 5.5 billion people constitute the developing world, with relative per capita consumption rates below 32, mostly down toward 1.
The population especially of the developing world is growing, and some people remain fixated on this. They note that populations of countries like Kenya are growing rapidly, and they say that’s a big problem. Yes, it is a problem for Kenya’s more than 30 million people, but it’s not a burden on the whole world, because Kenyans consume so little. (Their relative per capita rate is 1.) A real problem for the world is that each of us 300 million Americans consumes as much as 32 Kenyans. With 10 times the population, the United States consumes 320 times more resources than Kenya does.
People in the third world are aware of this difference in per capita consumption...
If India as well as China were to catch up, world consumption rates would triple. If the whole developing world were suddenly to catch up, world rates would increase elevenfold. It would be as if the world population ballooned to 72 billion people (retaining present consumption rates).
Some optimists claim that we could support a world with nine billion people. But I haven’t met anyone crazy enough to claim that we could support 72 billion. Yet we often promise developing countries that if they will only adopt good policies — for example, institute honest government and a free-market economy — they, too, will be able to enjoy a first-world lifestyle. This promise is impossible, a cruel hoax: we are having difficulty supporting a first-world lifestyle even now for only one billion people.
We Americans may think of China’s growing consumption as a problem. But the Chinese are only reaching for the consumption rate we already have. To tell them not to try would be futile...
No, we could have a stable outcome in which all countries converge on consumption rates considerably below the current highest levels. Americans might object: there is no way we would sacrifice our living standards for the benefit of people in the rest of the world. Nevertheless, whether we get there willingly or not, we shall soon have lower consumption rates, because our present rates are unsustainable.
Real sacrifice wouldn’t be required, however, because living standards are not tightly coupled to consumption rates. Much American consumption is wasteful and contributes little or nothing to quality of life. For example, per capita oil consumption in Western Europe is about half of ours, yet Western Europe’s standard of living is higher by any reasonable criterion, including life expectancy, health, infant mortality, access to medical care, financial security after retirement, vacation time, quality of public schools and support for the arts. Ask yourself whether Americans’ wasteful use of gasoline contributes positively to any of those measures.
Other aspects of our consumption are wasteful, too. Most of the world’s fisheries are still operated non-sustainably, and many have already collapsed or fallen to low yields — even though we know how to manage them in such a way as to preserve the environment and the fish supply. If we were to operate all fisheries sustainably, we could extract fish from the oceans at maximum historical rates and carry on indefinitely.
The same is true of forests: we already know how to log them sustainably, and if we did so worldwide, we could extract enough timber to meet the world’s wood and paper needs. Yet most forests are managed non-sustainably, with decreasing yields...
Holda
By Selena Fox (From beliefnet by way of radical goddess thealogy)
You thought the person in the red outfit giving out treats to children on Christmas Eve was a jolly, overweight elf with a white beard and a team of reindeer leading the way. Nah. That's just what Santa's spin doctors want the world to believe.
Want to know who really decides who's naughty or nice? Try Holda, the Teutonic goddess of winter. She's the beautiful blonde wearing a shimmering gown and red or white goosedown cape who flies through the night sky on December 24 bringing gifts and spreading joy.
In Pagan religions, goddesses are an important part of our celebrations because they help tie us to ancient traditions and the seasons of the year. Holda is one of my favorites. Stories about her are found in old folktales of Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Holland, Denmark, Norway, and other parts of Europe. Her name means " kind" and "merciful."
I first discovered Holda many years ago while researching the Pagan origins of Santa Claus. In addition to learning that the Teutonic Gods Odin and Thor were part of Santa's mix, I found that in some parts of old Europe, it was Holda--not Santa--who brought gifts to children and determined who was "naughty or nice." I also encountered lore depicting her as dressed in red and going down chimneys to bring gifts to children. An old Germanic tradition included leaving an offering of food and milk for Holda on December 24, known as Mother Night.
I decided to learn more about Holda, and connecting with her and her lore has been part of my Winter Solstice celebrations ever since. I invoke her in rituals, and keep a picture of her on my household altar. She is even among the Yuletide characters that appear in the public Winter Solstice pageant that I direct each year in Madison, Wisconsin.
As with many ancient goddesses, Holda is complex. Also called Hulde and Frau Holle, she goes by a variety of names and takes different forms, depending on locale and culture. In her form as a beneficent and noble White Lady, Holda is beautiful and stately, with long, flowing golden hair, which shines with sunlight as she combs it. She wears a white gown covered with a magical white goose down cape. At Yuletide, she travels the world in a carriage and bestows good health, good fortune, and other gifts to humans that honor her. She not only is connected with Winter Solstice itself, but also with the holiday season that continues many of its customs, the 12 days of Christmas--from December 25 through January 6.
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