Set in the world of a spoofed prescription drug commercial, Nature Rx offers a hearty dose of laughs and the outdoors – two timeless prescriptions for whatever ails you. This award-winning comedy series is a friendly reminder to us Earthly inhabitants what feels good and what is worth protecting once we take an adventure outdoors….
Read More about Warning: this prescription may lead to spontaneous euphoria
The Washington Post reports: In a massive new study published in the influential journal Nature, more than 50 authors from around the world document a so-called climate system “feedback” that, they say, could make global warming considerably worse over the coming decades. That feedback involves the planet’s soils, which are a massive repository of carbon….
Read More about Scientists say a long feared climate ‘feedback’ is now happeningA masterpiece and a dictionary unlike any other, every entry in David Fleming’s Lean Logic presents the author’s deft, original analysis of how our present market-based economy is destroying the very foundations—ecological, economic, and cultural—on which it depends, and his core focus: a compelling, grounded vision for a cohesive society that might weather the consequences….
Read More about Bookshelf: Lean Logic – A Dictionary For The Future
In scientific discovery, the first three paradigms were experimental, theoretical and (more recently) computational science. This new book of essays inspired by the Microsoft researcher Jim Gray argues that a fourth paradigm of scientific discovery is at hand: the analysis of massive data sets. Read John Markoff’s review of the book in The New York Times….
Read More about Is data the ‘fourth paradigm’ of science?
In ‘Tending Our Land’, authors M.G. Jackson and Nyla Coelho present a vivid, historical account of the great human enterprise of food production, an entirely new story– one that reinstates an ancient but eminently relevant imperative for our times. It makes essential reading for policy makers, academia and the budding bold generation of land tenders….
Read More about Bookshelf: Tending Our Land – A New Story
In ‘Tending Our Land’, authors M.G. Jackson and Nyla Coelho present a vivid, historical account of the great human enterprise of food production, an entirely new story– one that reinstates an ancient but eminently relevant imperative for our times. It makes essential reading for policy makers, academia and the budding bold generation of land tenders….
Read More about Bookshelf: Tending Our Land – A New Story
I think the label “Anthropocene” does not represent reality. Not because I doubt that human beings are having a major impact on geology, far from it. My reasons are somewhat complex, and will require a glance back over the history of geology— specifically, the evolution of the labels we use to talk about the past….
Read More about John Michael Greer: The myth of the AnthropoceneWhen we get our story wrong, we get our future wrong. Much like the Trans-Pacific Partnership “trade deal”, everything we’re told about capitalism and our economy is a pack of lies. Time for a new story, says preeminent scholar and critic of corporate globalization, David Korten, the best-selling author of ‘When Corporations Rule the World’….
Read More about David Korten: From serving money to serving life: A sacred story for our timeWhen wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone National Park in the U.S. after being absent nearly 70 years, the most remarkable occurrence of a “trophic cascade” – a single change in a food chain that transforms an entire ecosystem. How exactly did the wolves change the river? Author and environmentalist George Monbiot explains in this video….
Read More about Watch: How the return of wolves rejuvenated an entire ecosystem
Shashank Kela, author of an acclaimed study of adivasi history and politics, writes: This essay aims to make connections between things that are usually studied separately– environmental history, political economy, conservation practice and adivasi politics. The belief that this potential convergence could do with wider discussion is my sole justification for putting it up here….
Read More about Connecting the dots between the environment, conservation and adivasi politics
Does the concept of a living planet inspire and uplift you, or is it a disturbing example of woo-woo nonsense that distracts us from practical, science-based policies? While no amount of evidence can prove it false, we must acknowledge that the science that militates against an intelligent, purposeful, living universe is ideologically freighted and culturally-bound….
Read More about Charles Eisenstein: Fear of a living planet
Brian Kahn writes: Climate change has entered a new phase, according to the UN World Meteorological Organization. Concentrations of carbon dioxide “surged again to new records in 2016,” and the WMO predicts that the annual average for CO2 would remain above 400 parts per million, 44 percent higher than before the Industrial Revolution, for generations….
Read More about Landmark carbon dioxide concentration passed; marks new climate eraLeo Hickman writes: Oscar-winning actor Leonardo DiCaprio has spent the past three years asking a wide variety of people around the world about climate change. His collection of interviews in the film–ranging from Barack Obama and the Pope through to Elon Musk and Sunita Narain– cover the science, impacts, vested interests, politics and possible solutions….
Read More about Watch: 7 key scenes from Leonardo DiCaprio’s climate film Before the Flood
Gana Kedlaya writes: “With India trying to accelerate economic growth and relax forest laws, there is immense pressure to divert forests to non-forests uses. There is a pressing need to undertake an economic valuation of ecosystem services, especially intangible benefits, provided by Indian forests.” professor K.N. Ninan, author of a study on valuing ecosystem services….
Read More about Can we assess the value of ecosystems in monetary terms?Trees operate on very different time-scales from the ones we are used to, both in terms of life-spans and in terms of how long it takes them to process information and translate it into action. Is this the main reason why we find it so difficult to recognise them as truly sentient beings, Wohlleben wonders….
Read More about Video & Review: The Hidden Life of TreesClimate Central reports: In the centuries to come, history books will likely look back on September 2016 as a major milestone for the world’s climate. 2016 will be the year that carbon dioxide officially passed the symbolic 400 parts per million mark, never to return below it in our lifetimes, according to scientists at NASA….
Read More about Point of no return: Earth breaches 400ppm climate threshold, permanently
Representative pic
http://xkcd.com/
Eric Holthaus writes: The latest comic from xkcd, the internet’s most famous science-focused webcomic, zips through 22,000 years of Earth’s climate history, juxtaposed with key moments in the history of civilization. Seeing it, you’ll probably come to an inescapable conclusion: Nothing like this has ever happened, and it’s about to get a whole lot worse….
Read More about Global warming is now off the charts, this stunning comic showsA parallel legal universe, open only to corporations and largely invisible to everyone else, helps executives convicted of crimes escape punishment. In this court, a nation that tries to prosecute a corrupt CEO or ban dangerous pollution can be sued for millions, even billions of dollars for ‘interfering with profits’. A investigative series from BuzzFeed….
Read More about Exposed: The global super court that rules the worldSamuel Alexander writes: ‘Wild democracy’ is a new political orientation, sensibility, and practice. A localised politics with a global perspective, positioning itself ‘in the wild’ beyond the state and yet, at times, pragmatically engaged with it. In short, wild democracy is a revolutionary politics without a Revolution, as such–a paradox I will unpack and defend….
Read More about Wild democracy: A biodiversity of resistance and renewalWatch video recordings of keynote presentations of the just concluded 5th International Degrowth Conference. They cover a range of subjects from critiques of economic growth and capitalism and green economy, to radical alternatives on economic, political, social and cultural fronts; alliances between global north and south; climate justice; the nature and future of work, etc….
Read More about Video: Keynote presentations from the recent International Degrowth Conference
