On the way out, a way forward {#SustainablePlanet}
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OPENING DIALOG — Conversation with Arne Wilson — September 8, 2016:
parsing rhetoric and politics on the run-up to the US presidential election
(HTML)
The public needs universal voter registration and on every ballot by the name of every candidate there should be a "veto" option — the right to say No! to a candidate, a party, a referendum issue. [...] Bluntly, we live in a class ordered society that now is plutocratic, oligarchial, and demagogic. Our democracy amounts to the choices set for us by powerful others. [...] We have a system which does evil and presents it as good and it is from that system that we draw our choices, choices for some and lots for others.
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Philosopher Wins 2 Million Euros To Study “Limitarianism” | Justin Weinberg | Dec. 13, 2016 (Daily Nous)
Ingrid Robeyns', project is called “Can Limitarianism Be Justified? A Philosophical Analysis of Limits on the Distribution of Economic and Ecological Resources,” or Fair Limits, for short.
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Erin French Only Accepts Reservations for The Lost Kitchen Restaurant by Postcard (Youtube: 6m23s)
Chef Erin French talks to Drew Barrymore about opening The Lost Kitchen in a remote location and at what point she decided to slow down her waitlist of thousands by only accepting reservations via postcard.
"From Erin French, a life-affirming memoir about survival, renewal, and finding a community to lift her up.Erin reveals the passion and courage needed to invent oneself anew, and the poignant, timeless connections between food and generosity, renewal and freedom. " — (Goodreads)
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"This may sound weird but the doodles are my favorite! I absolutely love your art style. I guess the graphite drawings just speak to me more!" — Charlotte Lorenz
"Thanks, Charlotte, my favorite too. That's where it all began for me. When I was supposed to be paying attention in class at school, I doodled in the margins."
No threads pass through my meanderings more than doodling. I can't say enough about my time spent doodling. So I'll let them speak for themselves. [PDF]
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What life is like for an 11-year-old | Anna Van Dine | Jan. 22, 2022 (NPR)
Avah Lamie, "Some people just have rough times at home, I think. It's not really any of my business. And ... some people just, they want to be tough, because we're going through a really hard thing." That really hard thing is the COVID-19 pandemic.
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"When small men begin to cast big shadows, it means that the sun is about to set."
Lin Yutang (Chinese: 林語堂 ; October 10, 1895 – March 26, 1976) was a Chinese inventor, linguist, novelist, philosopher, and translator. His informal but polished style in both Chinese and English made him one of the most influential writers of his generation, and his compilations and translations of classic Chinese texts into English were bestsellers in the West.
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Arne Wilson, "One influence that extended from Marx to Tolstoy to Gandhi was Percy Bysshe Shelley, tragically drowned at 30."
Percy Bysshe Shelley (4 August 1792 – 8 July 1822) was one of the major English Romantic poets. A radical in his poetry as well as in his political and social views, Shelley did not achieve fame during his lifetime, but recognition of his achievements in poetry grew steadily following his death and he became an important influence on subsequent generations of poets including Robert Browning, Algernon Swinburne, Thomas Hardy, and W. B. Yeats.
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Strife with the royal house drive the family out of the country, and they settle in Iceland.
Egill Skallagrímsson (Old Norse, Modern Icelandic, c. 904 – c. 995) was a Viking Age war poet, sorcerer, berserker, and farmer. He is known mainly as the anti-hero of Egil's Saga. Egil's Saga historically narrates a period from approximately 850 to 1000 AD and is believed to have been written between 1220 and 1240 AD.
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Discipline is not a punishment, or rather,
shouldn't be. Discipline is a process
developing useful habits.
Arne Wilson (Oct, 12, 2016), "One Republican in Florida finally stated that Trump was not a Republican or a conservative. He was a Fascist. Stipanovich went on to cite the racism, sexism, nativism, populism, militarism, nationalism, authoritarianism and so on."
John McKager "Mac" Stipanovich, What Donald Trump represents, the tendencies he exhibits, the emotions he evokes, are frightening and they’re dangerous in my judgment. He’s the ultimate con man. He’s the carnival barker, and it’s just amazing how many rubes there are in the country."
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I believe Aristotle is credited with, "Tell 'em what you are going to tell 'em, tell 'em, then tell 'em what you told them." Today's media has simply converted "the tell" into what to think.
Arne Wilson: "Haha. The US Marines are rather Aristotelian. All marines obey orders. You are a Marine, even if nobody is giving you an order, you still obey."
And then there's the "How to Win Friends and Influence People" rhetorical styling of Dale Carnegie ...
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Why is it that those who have more money
than they ought to, don't want to talk about it,
and those who don't, do want to talk about it?
Terence McKenna was diagnosed with glioblastoma multiforme, a highly aggressive form of brain cancer. In late 1999, McKenna described his thoughts concerning his impending death:
"I always thought death would come on the freeway in a few horrifying moments, so you'd have no time to sort it out. Having months and months to look at it and think about it and talk to people and hear what they have to say, it's a kind of blessing. It's certainly an opportunity to grow up and get a grip and sort it all out. Just being told by an unsmiling guy in a white coat that you're going to be dead in four months definitely turns on the lights. ... It makes life rich and poignant. When it first happened, and I got these diagnoses, I could see the light of eternity, à la William Blake, shining through every leaf. I mean, a bug walking across the ground moved me to tears."
McKenna died April 3, 2000, at the age of 53.
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Relational Reality
“Our hypermodern societies currently possess only a kindergarten-level understanding of the deeply relational nature of reality.”
Charlene Spretnak is an author and activist who has long been fascinated with the subject of interrelatedness. In her Dec 27, 2013 talk, Charlene cites several recent discoveries indicating that all of physical reality, including humans, is far more dynamically interrelated than our modern schooling had supposed. These new discoveries reveal the impact of our relationships — with other people and with nature — on childhood development, intelligence, healing, and our life-long health and well-being. (Youtube: 13m26s )
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This is a string of symbols that make sounds in your head! Sounds you think of as your inner voice, as you. I have a good idea what the sounds in your head sound like as you read this right now, but have no idea what they mean to you. I type, you interpret. There is no call to action here, but even if I type, "Say this out loud," though I am confident of the sounds reverberating in your head, there is no way of me knowing what you'll do with those sounds. Do you call that free will? I don't know. I'm only making noise here. You decide. It's a funny place -- being inside your head, don't you think? My typing making noise in your head and you keep sitting there scanning and reading the symbols not knowing what's next, thinking I'm in your head, using your voice to tell yourself you have free will. Ha ha ha ... just kidding! You're hypnotized, you're an automaton scanning source symbols assigning meaning via a predetermined set of coded instructions. Intrigued, you can't pull yourself away. I've got you by the short symbols and I've stopped typing a long time ago. There's nobody here but you. Wouldn't it be funny if I wrote a whole book from this "in your head" perspective and finally in the last chapter it occurs to you that you're still sitting here listening to ... listening to nothing really. (See what I did there with bending time in your mind?) Okay, truth --- sorry, no message here, sorry for wasting your time. Hope you were entertained. Did you really get this far? Really?! Are you kidding me? What are you looking for? Whatever it is, look somewhere else. Okay then, here is a call to action for you: stop reading this!
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Chimp Haven
At Chimp Haven we believe we’re not that different, humans and chimpanzees. Chimps have personalities, emotions and relationships, just like us, and we’re on a mission to connect them to the happy healthy lives they deserve. That’s why we’re providing and promoting personalized care for chimpanzees (most of whom were retired from biomedical research) by helping them, for their remaining years, live a good life – the chimp life.
Chimp Haven is the world’s largest chimpanzee sanctuary. Located on 200 beautiful forested acres, the sanctuary is dedicated to providing the very best life for more than 300 chimpanzees formerly used in biomedical research and working with urgency to bring those still waiting in research facilities home to sanctuary.
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Agrivoltaic systems combine, on one plot of land, crops and dynamic photovoltaic panels in order to optimize the land's potential without damaging ecosystems. In a 2019 article for Nature Sustainability, the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory’s (NREL) Lead Energy-Water-Land analyst Jordan Macknick investigated the potential benefits of co-located agriculture and solar photovoltaic (PV) infrastructure (dubbed “agrivoltaics”) on food production, irrigation water requirements, and energy production. Macknick notes, “The promising results of this work have broad implications for how solar development and farming across the globe could be integrated to provide mutual benefits.”
Matt Ferrell: Solar Panels Plus Farming? Agrivoltaics Explained | Oct 5, 2021 (Youtube: 12m52s)
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Coronavirus epidemic:
Apparently, us humans are the pantry for viruses. And a certain family of SARS-CoV-2 are having a feast. Thing is, the Aligator Lizards in our garden are oblivious. Going about their business like it's a heyday.
This new generation I'm so encouraged by, do they see our flaws? Can they untangle the torrents of dezinformatsiya propaganda and get to the cool, soft facts, the enduring truths. Back then we thought we were 'raising consciousness,' by now we know there is no such thing. It's not consciousness we're raising, it's human intelligence evolving. Human intelligence grows out of the lizard brain base of survival instinct and visceral emotion, primitive guttural communication and complex society forming. Can you say 'gesundheit' through your N95 mask? Life is hard, life as we know it is brutal. Always has been. Compassionate intelligence is what has informed where it has been made easy, or at least easier. At the root we are all the same people, wanting respect and fairness. With the advent of the Information Age we have the responsible computational prowess to globally evolve our compassionate intelligence, our saving grace. Or not.
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A People’s History of the United States
Since 1980 Howard Zinn's, A People’s History of the United States has been chronicling American history from the bottom up, throwing out the official version of history taught in schools – with its emphasis on great men in high places – to focus on the street, the home, and the workplace.
Howard Zinn Tribute Video by The People Speak | Apr 2, 2010 (Youtube: 8m57s)
A tribute to the late great historian, activist and teacher Howard Zinn. Interviews with Zinn, Matt Damon, Josh Brolin, Kerry Washington, Danny Glover, David Strathairn, Anthony Arnove and Chris Moore.
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Democracy Now! • Howard Zinn: “I Wish Obama Would Listen to MLK” • May 13, 2009 (14m...starts 34m58s)
"...the alternative to war is to send food and medicine. If you want to end terrorism, you have to stop being terrorists, which is what war is."
AMY GOODMAN: When Barack Obama was asked in the presidental debates who would MLK endorse, he said, “None of us.”
HOWARD ZINN: Yeah, that’s true, because King believed – and this actually is one of the themes of our people’s history, is that you cannot depend on presidents, and you cannot depend on elections and voting to solve your problems. People themselves, organizing, demonstrating, clamoring, they are the only ones who can push the President and push Congress into change.
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The People SpeakSneak Peek | Mar 15, 2010 (Youtube: 3m32s)
THE PEOPLE SPEAK is a powerful film inspired by Howard Zinn's groundbreaking books A Peoples History of the United States and Voices of a People's History of the United States. THE PEOPLE SPEAK brings to life our nations rich history of dissent and shows its importance for todays movements.
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Rayford Logan
Rayford Whittingham Logan (January 7, 1897 – November 4, 1982) was an African-American historian and Pan-African activist. He was best known for his study of post-Reconstruction America (the so-called Progressive Era), a period he termed "nadir of American race relations". In the late 1940s he was the chief advisor to the NAACP on international affairs. He was professor emeritus of history at Howard University.
HOWARD ZINN: "Rayford Logan giving the history of the early twentieth century, which in traditional American history courses is called the Progressive Era, points out that in this Era, more black people were lynched than in any other era in American history. So, that distortion of our history that takes place when we do it through race, colored lines."
What alerted me to the perniciousness of refined sugar, way back when, was William Dufty's book Sugar Blues. I believe it still holds up and still available, likely in most public libraries. It was really tough for me to break the habit, as it was in everyone I knew and everything I ate, especially processed food in the guise of corn starch. And yes, for me too, the subtle familiar pressures of Thanksgiving were the most awkward, having gone cold turkey and trying to hold the front of a strange new land. I doubt if it would be any easier for me today, even with the greater awareness, 'cause it's just so hard for the body to kick and find a new equilibrium. But well worth it when the body does find a balance, for the peace in the relief from the constant 'more, more, more' nagging, plus the added bonus of a wide range of beneficial health issues. Finding your way around and through the effects of refined sugar is definitely a subject worth a deep dive.
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Sustainable Diets Sustainable Diets are defined as "those diets with low environmental impacts that contribute to food and nutritional security and to healthy lives for present and future generations. Sustainable diets are protective and respectful of biodiversity and ecosystems, culturally acceptable, accessible, economically fair and affordable, are nutritionally adequate, safe, and healthy, and optimize natural and human resources."
"Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."
Michael Pollan contends that most of what Americans now buy in supermarkets, fast food stores, and restaurants is not in fact food, and that a practical tip is to eat only those things that people of his grandmother's generation would have recognized as food.
For Gary Snyder the wild is not about pristine landscapes. Instead, it's about landscapes that are rich and diverse enough to be interesting for everybody, human and non-human alike. He writes: "When an ecosystem is fully functioning, all the members are present at the assembly. To speak of wilderness is to speak of wholeness."
The Practice of the Wild (Vimeo: 52m41s)
A profile of the poet and ecologist Gary Snyder. He has been a Zen monk, a fire lookout, and a confidant of beat authors like Jack Kerouac, and Allen Ginsberg — also a back country hiker, writer and essayist.
Addressing the IBM Systems Group, Alan Watts describes the wiggly world of nature and the net we cast over it.
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Half-Earth Project
Half-Earth Project: “protect half the Earth in order to preserve habitat and safeguard the bulk of biodiversity.."With science at its core and our transcendent moral obligation to the rest of life at its heart, the Half-Earth Project® is working to conserve half the land and sea to safeguard the bulk of biodiversity, including ourselves." — E. O. Wilson
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Yuval Hararion why humans won’t dominate Earth in 300 years (Vox.com)
By Ezra Klein@ezraklein March 27, 2017
“It's not because I overestimate the AI. It's because most people tend to overestimate human beings.”
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Sapienship
Sapienship advocates for global responsibility through its mission: to clarify the global conversation, to focus attention on the most important challenges, and to support the quest for solutions. Sapienship highlights: technological disruption, ecological collapse, and the nuclear threat.
By clustering free-floating stem cells together, ‘xenobots’ can assemble baby bots.
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Review on the Economics of Biodiversity
The Dasgupta Review an independent, global review commissioned in 2019 by Her Majesty's Treasury, UK calls for changes in how we think, act and measure economic success to protect our prosperity and the natural world. The Review's framework sets out how we should account for Nature in economics and decision-making.
Abbie Hoffman co-founded the Youth International Party ("Yippies")
| Alan Watts known for interpreting and popularizing Indian and Chinese traditions of Buddhist, Taoist, and Hindu philosophy for a Western audience.
| Alfred W. McCoy: Predicts the U.S. Empire Is Collapsing as China’s Power Grows (Nov 16, 2021)
| Amy Goodman is an American broadcast journalist, syndicated columnist, investigative reporter, author and the main host of Democracy Now!.
| Bernie Siegel (born October 14, 1932) is a retired pediatric surgeon, who writes on the relationship between the patient and the healing process.
| Buckminster Fuller was an American architect, systems theorist, author, designer, inventor, and futurist. Fuller developed numerous inventions, mainly architectural designs, and popularized the widely known geodesic dome | Carol Landrum is a wholitic teacher and couselor specializing in Emotional Release Work. "Just as babies naturally express their emotions, my clients learn to give themselves permission to feel again, in the safety of a healing environment. This is how trauma is healed."
| Cesar Chavez
was an American labor leader and civil rights activist in the United Farm Workers (UFW) labor union.
| Charlene Spretnak is an American author who has written nine books on cultural history, social criticism, including feminism and Green politics.
Daniel Dennett (born March 28, 1942) is an American philosopher, and cognitive scientist.
E.O. WILSON was an American biologist, naturalist, and writer. His specialty was myrmecology, the study of ants, on which he was called the world's leading expert, and he was nicknamed Ant Man.
| Gary Snyder is a poet, essayist, lecturer, and environmental activist. He has been described as the "poet laureate of Deep Ecology".
| Herman "Bubsey" Levy was my mentor, he shared his home, his heart and his innate wisdom with me in an indelible way, in a way inseparable from who I am.
| Howard Zinn was a historian, activist and author of dozens of books, including A People’s History of the United States | James Lovelock is a British independent scientist, environmentalist and futurist. He is best known for proposing the Gaia Hypothesis, which postulates that the Earth functions as a self-regulating system.
| Jared Diamond is an American geographer, historian, ornithologist, and author best known for his popular science books, including Guns, Germs, and Steel (1997).
| Joan Baez is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and activist. Her contemporary folk music often includes songs of protest and social justice.
| Joan Halifax is an American Zen Buddhist teacher, anthropologist, ecologist, civil rights activist, hospice caregiver, and the author of several books on Buddhism and spirituality. She currently serves as abbot and guiding teacher of Upaya Zen Center in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
"I look right at you. Let me tell you what you are. You’re a miracle,"Jonathan McReynolds
Jon Kabat-Zinn is the creator of the Stress Reduction Clinic and the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine at the University of Massachusetts Medical School. The stress reduction program created by Kabat-Zinn, mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR), is described in his book Full Catastrophe Living.
| John Muir was an influential Scottish-American naturalist, author, environmental philosopher, botanist, zoologist, glaciologist, and early advocate for the preservation of wilderness in the United States of America. The Sierra Club, which he co-founded, is a prominent American conservation organization.
| John Wesley was an English cleric, theologian, and evangelist. Wesley was one of the most articulate early adopters of Socially Responsible Investing.
| Kachinas Kutenai followed the path of the Apache medicine woman. In the 1990s, Kute guided me through a Vision Quest in a manzanita forest northeast of Los Angeles.
| Michael Pollan is an American author and journalist, known for his books that explore the socio-cultural impacts of food, such as The Botany of Desire.
Naomi Klein is a Canadian author, social activist, and filmmaker known for her political analyses, support of ecofascism, organized labour, left-wing politics and criticism of corporate globalization, fascism, and capitalism.
| Naomi Shihab Nye is an American poet, editor, songwriter, and novelist.
| Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist.
| Norman Cousins was an American political journalist, author, professor, and world peace advocate.
| Norman Doidge author of The Brain that Changes Itself (2007), which was widely recognized to have introduced the concept of neuroplasticity to broader scientific and lay audiences.
| Pete Seeger was an American folk singer, a prolific songwriter and social activist.
| Ralph Abraham is a Professor of Mathematics:
Chaos Theory, Computation and author of Chaos, Gaia, Eros
Ram Dass was an American spiritual teacher, guru of modern yoga, psychologist, and author of the best-selling 1971 book, Be Here Now, which has been described by multiple reviewers as "seminal, and helped popularize Eastern spirituality and yoga with the baby boomer generation in the West.
Rupert Sheldrake: the 'heretic' at odds with scientific dogma. His book, The Science Delusion, addresses what he sees as the limitations and hubris of contemporary scientific thought.
| Sharon Salzberg is an author and teacher of Buddhist meditation practices in the West.In 1974, she co-founded the Insight Meditation Society at Barre, Massachusetts
| Shigeru Ban is a Japanese architect, known for his innovative work with paper, particularly recycled cardboard tubes used to quickly and efficiently house disaster victims.
| Stephen Killelea is an Australian IT entrepreneur and founder of the Institute for Economics and Peace, a global think tank. Killelea is the creative force behind the Global Peace Index study, launched in May 2007, that ranks the world's nations’ and regions’ peacefulness.
| Stephen Levine was an American poet, author and teacher best known for his work on death and dying. His books include "A Year to Live," "A Gradual Awakening," and, with his wife Ondrea, "Embracing the Beloved." His son, Noah Levine (born 1971) is an American Buddhist teacher and author of Dharma Punx.
| Thich Nhat Hanh was a Vietnamese Thiền Buddhist monk, peace activist, and founder of the Plum Village Tradition, historically recognized as the main inspiration for engaged Buddhism.
| Ty Landrum is an author, poet, philosopher and somatic explorer teaching Ashtanga Vinyasa yoga at the Yoga Workshop.
William James was an American philosopher, historian, and psychologist, and the first educator to offer a psychology course in the United States. James is considered to be a leading thinker of the late 19th century, one of the most influential philosophers of the United States, and the "Father of American psychology." Along with Charles Sanders Peirce, James established the philosophical school known as Pragmatism, and is also cited as one of the founders of functional psychology. James's work has influenced many philosophers and academics, including W. E. B. Du and Bertrand Russell.
| Walt Whitman was an American poet, essayist and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works.
| Winslow Eliot is the author of ten novels and metaphysical practitioner, most of all, she loves stillness.
| Yuval Noah Harari is an Israeli public intellectual, historian and a professor and the author, including Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind (2014).
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{{ Narrative by element BLEND: 01
Appropriate Scale > Agrivoltaic > Alliance > Sustainable Land Management > Sustainable Diets > New Foods > Fusarium Venenatum: Quorn > Intentional Community > Buy Nothing >
Sustainable, sustainable, #SustainablePlanet, that's what we're talking about here! And how to get there from here.
Laughter > Waterless Toilets > Freedom
Laughter plays a crucial role. Laughter plays a crucial role in every culture across the world. It’s not clear why laughter exists, but it's the perfect lubricant for a well-functioning community taking on a seemingly impossible vision. While it is evidently an inherently social phenomenon — people are up to 30 times more likely to laugh in a group than when alone — laughter’s function as a form of communication remains mysterious. If you don't have a sense of humor, it just isn't funny. The comedian John Cleese once said: “Laughter connects you with people. It’s almost impossible to maintain any kind of distance or any sense of social hierarchy when you’re just howling with laughter.” Useful tool for discovering new ways to work/live/play and share resources with each other. Come to think of it, it's odd — kind of funny — that we would fall into a not so funny practice of sending our personal excrement to pass for miles under our cities, wasting tons of potable water in the process. It's fast becoming time we deal with our own shit. Laughter can help with that, as well as learning How Waterless Toilets Work. There's a path to a sustainable freedom, knowing how things work and taking personal responsibility to make it work for everyone — for all within an appropriately scaled community. And when we talk about community here, is it too soon to talk about diversified inclusion in our membership, about the expansion of including as many, if not all sentient beings? As the song says, "Can't be free 'til we're all free."
This special episode of 60 Minutes has two reports of research on once endangered top predators — the Atlantic great white shark and the grey wolves in Yellowstone Park. The primary tool the researchers use to get data on the animals in the wild is to 'tag' them with tracking devices so they could follow thier movements. Not dissimilar in effect to the data collected on humans via mobile phones.
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25 years after returning to Yellowstone, wolves have helped stabilize the ecosystem | Christine Peterson
Published | July 10, 2020 (Nat Geo)
New research shows that by reducing populations and thinning out weak and sick animals, wolves have a role in creating resilient “leaner, meaner and healthier” elk herds.
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The hidden environmental costs of dog and cat food | Karin Brulliard | 8/4/2017 (Washington Post)
America’s dogs and cats animal-derived calorie intake amounts to about 33 percent of that of humans, or about as much as 62 million people. If these pets established a sovereign nation, it would rank fifth in global meat consumption. Producing that meat — which requires more land, water and energy and pollutes more than plant-based food — creates a lot of greenhouse gases: as many as 64 million tons annually. And pet ownership is on the rise, which means the demand for meaty pet food is, too. Even as interest grows in the environmental impact of our own meat consumption, there has been almost no effort to quantify the part our most common pets play. ONE FOOD FOR THOUGHT, the backyard pet chicken trend ... pet chickens make protein, while dogs and cats eat protein.
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Want to help animals? Don’t forget the chickens | June 8, 2017 | Garrett M. Broad (The Conversation)
Most of the money Americans give to animal welfare charities helps causes that aid companion animals.
The money you spend to help cats, dogs and other human companions could be used more effectively to improve the lot of chickens, pigs and other animals raised in farms for food. Since farmed animals suffer most and the issue has long been neglected, there’s a greater need to support that cause.
More than 99 percent of the animals used and killed by humans in the U.S. are farmed. But by far most donations to animal welfare charities support causes that help companion animals.
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How to build wildfire-resistant communities on the wildland fringe February 1, 2022 | Jeanne Homer (The Conversation)
How homes are built and landscaped affects their ability to withstand a wildfire.
Key strategies that communities and anyone building in the wildland-urban interface need to consider. Research shows that every $1 spent on prevention can save at least $6 in emergency rescue and recovery later. With thorough risk assessment and several lines of defense, neighborhoods can be safer. Researchers are also testing the performance of active systems for use in imminent threats, such as exterior sprinklers that don’t require electricity, large fire blankets that can cover a house, and fire-retardant foam that can be sprayed on structures. These strategies will have to be balanced with long-term costs, realistic maintenance expectations and efforts to mitigate future anticipated threats. As storms become more intense and wildfires more frequent, we should be designing to reduce risk and our impact on the environment.
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Some cancers are preventable with a vaccine — a virologist explains February 1, 2022 | Ronald C. Desrosiers (The Conversation)
Human papilloma virus (HPV) have been associated with cancers, especially cervical cancer.
One-fifth. Nearly 20% of cancers worldwide are caused by a virus. These viruses don’t cause cancer until long after they initially infect a person. Rather, the viruses teach the cells they take over how to escape the natural biological process of cell death. This strategy sets these altered cells on a path for other genetic changes that can cause full-blown cancer years down the road. These particular viruses are unique and interesting, both for their effects on patients and because of the potential ways they might be treated or prevented. Vaccination campaigns have eradicated smallpox and effectively eliminated polio, measles and certain other infectious diseases. Let’s hope that ongoing vaccine efforts can make HPV-induced cancers and hepatitis B virus-induced cancers a thing of the past as well.
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New flood maps show US damage rising 26% in next 30 years due to climate change alone, and the inequity is stark | January 31, 2022 | Oliver Wing, Carolyn Kousky, Jeremy Porter, Paul Bates (The Conversation)
Climate change is raising flood risks in neighborhoods across the U.S. much faster than many people realize. Despite recent devastating floods, people are still building in high-risk areas. With population growth factored in, we found the increase in U.S. flood losses will be four times higher than the climate-only effect. The results stress how critical land use and building codes are when it comes to adapting to climate change and managing future losses from increasing climate extremes. Protecting lives and property will mean moving existing populations out of harm’s way and stopping new construction in flood-risk areas.
Our hope is that people will look these creatures in the eyes, and be inspired to care, while there is still time.
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Photographing 12,000 Animals Is Hard Work | National Geographic | Dec 3, 2015 (Youtube: 1m55s)
Think taking pictures of your pet is hard? Try an armadillo or a full-grown tiger. It's all in a day's work for photographer Joel Sartore, who's on a mission to create portraits of the world’s 12,000 captive species before they disappear. Sartore must wrangle the unruly, distract the curious, and clean up all the unexpected messes that come with photographing wild animals.
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Joel Sartore is an American photographer focusing on conservation photography, teacher, and a long-time contributor to National Geographic magazine. He is the head of The National Geographic Photo Ark project, a 25-year effort to document the approximately 12,000 species living in the world's zoos and wildlife sanctuaries.
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Beautiful photos of animals facing extinction | Joel Sartore | TEDxMidwest | Nov 25, 2013 (Youtube: 19m53s)
As more than half of the world's species are threatened with extinction, Joel Sartore has embarked on a personal mission to document a world worth saving. With his Photo Ark project, Joel looks animals in the eye and shows you why we should care.
The National Geographic Photo Ark, led by photographer Joel Sartore, is a multiyear effort to document every species living in zoos and wildlife sanctuaries, inspire action through education, and help save wildlife by supporting on-the-ground conservation efforts.
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Joel Sartore: Capturing Endangered Species | Nat Geo Live | Jul 16, 2012 (Youtube: 14m27s)
Photographer Joel Sartore portrays some of the world's most imperiled creatures—from whooping cranes to wolves—before they become extinct.
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In the PAST 50 years ...
The World Lost Two-Thirds Of Its Wildlife In 50 Years.We Are to Blame (NPR)
Insects have declined by 75% in the past 50 years — and the consequences may soon be catastrophic. (The Guardian)
In the NEXT 50 years ...
UN Report: Nature’s Dangerous Decline ‘Unprecedented’; Species Extinction Rates ‘Accelerating’ | 06 May 2019 (UN.org)
The Report finds that around 1 million animal and plant species are now threatened with extinction, many within decades, more than ever before in human history. Current global response insufficient; ‘transformative changes’ needed to restore and protect nature; opposition from vested interests can be overcome for public good; most comprehensive assessment of its kind; 1,000,000 species threatened with extinction.
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These are the species most at risk of going extinct | Martin Armstrong | 10 Sep 2021 (weforum.org)
A quarter of all species are threatened with extinction, according to a new report by the UN. The most at-risk species were amphibians, of which 41% are considered at risk, followed by sharks and conifers, at 37% and 34% respectively. Human activity is having a devastating impact on the environment, but that it is not too late to halt this trend and improve.
Our planet now faces a global extinction crisis never witnessed by humankind. Scientists predict that more than 1 million species are on track for extinction in the coming decades. But there’s still time to halt this crisis — and we need your help. By taking part in our Saving Life on Earth campaign, you can help build a coast-to-coast network to ensure the United States is a leader in saving the world’s biodiversity.
Marc Bekoff, Ph.D., is professor emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and co-founder with Jane Goodall of Ethologists for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.
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Jane Goodall Institute: a global community conservation organization that advances the vision and work of Dr. Jane Goodall. By protecting chimpanzees and inspiring people to conserve the natural world we all share, we improve the lives of people, animals and the environment. Everything is connected — everyone can make a difference. It starts with Jane and leads to you ...as a force of compassion for all living things.
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People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) is the largest animal rights organization in the world, and PETA entities have more than 9 million members and supporters globally. Founded in March 1980 by Ingrid Newkirk and fellow animal rights activist Alex Pacheco, PETA works through public education, investigative newsgathering and reporting, research, animal rescue, legislation, special events, celebrity involvement, and protest campaigns.
Soil is a living and life-giving natural resource.
"My tongue, every atom of my blood, form’d from this soil, this air,..." Walt Whitman, Song of Myself
Spaceship Earth: "I’ve often heard people say: ‘I wonder what it would feel like to be on board a spaceship,’ and the answer is very simple. What does it feel like? That’s all we have ever experienced. We are all astronauts on a little spaceship called Earth." — R. Buckminster Fuller
1
I celebrate myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
[...]
52
The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me, he complains of my gab and my loitering.
I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,
I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.
The last scud of day holds back for me,
It flings my likeness after the rest and true as any on the shadow’d wilds,
It coaxes me to the vapor and the dusk.
I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun,
I effuse my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags.
I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,
If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,
And filter and fibre your blood.
Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,
Missing me one place search another,
I stop somewhere waiting for you.
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[Source: Leaves of Grass (final "Death-Bed" edition, 1891-2)]
UN Sustainable Development Goals (Global Goals)
