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Most courses on energy deal with it in an instrumentalist manner, as if it were another substance that humans can tap and use for their benefit. Platform for Sustainability and Equity and Ecologise are pleased to announce an online course that places energy at the centre of all transformations— abiotic, biotic and in human society.
Some of the most celebrated scientific ideas and books of the 20th century may not be useful for us in this century, while lesser-known works of the past acquire new relevance. Here, then, is a selection of such works, along with an invitation for readers to critique and contribute their own suggestions to this list.
Requiring no special equipment and no special expertise, and very economical to boot, earthbagging is famous as an ‘idiot-proof’ technique, popular with first-and-only-time owner-builders the world over. Venetia Kotamraju, who moved from busy Bangalore to a farm on the Western Ghats, writes on her experiment with earthbagging. The final installment in a series of four.
Requiring no special equipment and no special expertise, and very economical to boot, earthbagging is famous as an ‘idiot-proof’ technique, popular with first-and-only-time owner-builders the world over. Venetia Kotamraju, who moved from busy Bangalore to a farm on the Western Ghats, writes on her experiment with earthbagging. The third installment in a series of four.
Requiring no special equipment and no special expertise, and very economical to boot, earthbagging is famous as an ‘idiot-proof’ technique, popular with first-and-only-time owner-builders the world over. Venetia Kotamraju, who moved from busy Bangalore to a farm on the Western Ghats, writes on her experiment with earthbagging. The second installment in a series of four.
To mark the bicentenary year of the bicycle, and to promote cycling among children, Ecologise Hyderabad and Ride A Cycle, Bangalore has published book on bicycle maintenance entitled ‘You and Your Cycle: A Guide to Maintenance’. The fully illustrated 40-page book is authored by Lavanya K and Shamala Kittane and is priced at Rs. 50/.
On the occasion of Buddha Poornima, Ecologise presents an exclusive essay co-authored by Nyla Coelho & M.G. Jackson, calling for a fundamental transformation of our perceptions of reality, and a befitting code of conduct to govern our relations with one another and with every other entity on earth; a planetary imperative in need of assertion.
Requiring no special equipment and no special expertise, and very economical to boot, earthbagging is famous as an ‘idiot-proof’ technique, popular with first-and-only-time owner-builders the world over. Venetia Kotamraju, who moved from busy Bangalore to a farm on the Western Ghats, writes on her experiment with earthbagging. The first installment in a series of four.
Editor’s Note: Last week, Ecologise carried the well-known Marxist scholar John Bellamy Foster’s foreword to a new book, Facing the Anthropocene. In response, noted eco-socialist writer Saral Sarkar posted a comment questioning the usefulness of Marxist analysis in understanding the global ecological crisis. This short piece, first published on Ecologise, is Foster’s reply to Sarkar.
We scientists, each one of us, should ask ourselves what the agricultural establishment needs to do in order effectively to address our current agricultural crisis. Given our present mechanistic scientific paradigm, we are part of the problem, and thus cannot, be part of its solution. Our first task, therefore, is to change our outlook fundamentally.
The worldview that informs contemporary global culture was conceived during the European ‘Enlightenment’ of the 17th century. Its shortcomings have become increasingly evident today, and they are beginning to be seen as the root cause of the many seemingly intractable global problems that confront us today. This essay presents an overview of an alternative worldview.
Peak Oil, Food Security and Urban Agriculture T. Vijayendra Abstract Peak Oil refers to the point when oil production reaches a peak, and henceforth can only fall. This has already happened. This has enormous implications for food security. It raises cost and prices of food because farm inputs – primarily fertilisers and pesticides – are petroleum
The Industrial Society or the Carbon Society The present social system that we are living is called Industrial Society. It began with the Industrial Revolution (1760 -1830) in the West and was followed by social revolution in various countries – Holland, France, England and the USA, ending the age old feudal society and ushering in
Why climate scientist James Hansen’s exhortation to embrace nuclear power is just wishful thinking T. Vijayendra Climatologist James Hansen is the former head of NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and one of the world’s leading advocates of the dangers of climate change. Last year, he joined senior scientist Ken Caldeira of the Carnegie Institution’s Department of
By Johnson Dantis, POI member I have been reading many posts on the Peak Oil India website about various events related to environment, sustainability, climate change, energy etc. I often find that such conferences and seminars do not have the seriousness these issues deserve. I sometimes visualize the importance of these as a sort of kitty
By T. Vijayendra, POI Founder-Member “Old age is a tiredness that does not disappear the next morning, as we ingenuously expected upon going to bed”. – Baldomero Fernández Moreno, Argentinean poet OLD AGE People above sixty years are considered old or senior citizens. It is the percentage of old people in the total population that is
Johnson Dantis on the multiple crises that threatens industrial civilisation, and the many handicaps that prevents us from dealing with them effectively. The piece is also in part a response to recent articles by T. Vijayendra and George Monbiot. Let me give you my own idea of hope in life. Hope propels change and change is constant.
T. Vijayendra argues that today’s population explosion is essentially a product of cheap oil, and that the end of oil means we will be forced to consider a new approach to population which many would find unpalatable now – but would ultimately help humans strike a balance between population and resource consumption The twentieth century was
T. Vijayendra, a Founder-Member of POI, writes to the group reminiscing on its formation and offering pointers towards the future It is just about a year since the informal group called Peak Oil India was formed (on June 7, 2013) and we decided to have a website. The website has been active for quite some
In the context of Peak Oil and the general depletion of fossil fuels, we often hear about Nuclear Energy as an option. However, if we look at the empirical data, we will soon discover that it’s not – even if we discount all the dangers associated with Nuclear Energy programme, such as waste disposal problems
