Growth up, happiness down

more for the Failing to Learn from History/Destined to Repeat It file.

"Starting in 1990, as China moved to a free-market economy, real per-capita consumption and gross domestic product doubled, then doubled again. Most households now have at least one color TV. Refrigerators and washing machines — rare before 1990 — are common in cities.
Yet there is no evidence that the Chinese people are, on average, any happier, according to an analysis of survey data... If anything, they are less satisfied than in 1990, and the burden of decreasing satisfaction has fallen hardest on the bottom third of the population in wealth. Satisfaction among Chinese in even the upper third has risen only moderately..."

When Growth Outpaces Happiness - NYTimes.com

Food glorious food

Julianne mentioned food waste the other day. If you thought food and climate were in unrelated, consider: 

@GOOD: Eight foods you should stock up on before climate change takes them away http://ow.ly/e0V32 ”-Bourbon, coffee, chocolate…No!

 

This is getting serious...

Terrific TED Talks on food, climate, you name it... 

http://osopher.wordpress.com/2012/09/28/a-greener-future/

The next phase of the movement

"It’s simple math: we can burn 565 more gigatons of carbon and stay below 2°C of warming — anything more than that risks catastrophe for life on earth. The only problem? Fossil fuel corporations now have 2,795 gigatons in their reserves, five times the safe amount. And they’re planning to burn it all — unless we rise up to stop them." Bill McKibben

McKibben's Rolling Stone article: Global Warming's Terrifying New Math

Do the Math - Because We > Fossil Fuels

Vulnerable to catastrophe

"We were looking back in class yesterday at the old Club of Rome report from forty years ago. It forecast catastrophic social, political, & ecological consequences in about seventy years, if we continued as a civilization to worship at at the altar of Gross Domestic Product and perpetual economic growth. Are we there yet?

Well, the Climate Vulnerability Monitor 2012 says yup.

(For another perspective on all this: “Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist.”)

The class wants to do something, a collaborative group project that might actually go beyond the walls of our classroom. We’re now collecting ideas..."

Alive & available « Up@dawn

Climate Vulnerability Monitor 2012

"The Climate Vulnerability Monitor 2nd Edition reveals that climate change has already held back global development and inaction is a leading global cause of death. Harm is most acute for poor and vulnerable groups but no country is spared either the costs of inaction or the benefits of an alternative path.

Commissioned by the world’s most vulnerable countries and backed by high-level and technical panels, the new Monitor estimates human and economic impacts of climate change and the carbon economy for 184 countries in 2010 and 2030, across 34 indicators..."

Climate Vulnerability Monitor 2012 - DARA

The way we were

"while markets can and do fail, society does not intervene to correct market failure.” -Mark Sagoff

It’s exam day– see my general study advice *below, students– but we’re also talking markets & growth in EEA. I’ve asked everyone to identify highlights.

One, for me, is the quote of Amory and Hunter Lovins and Paul Hawken from Natural Capitalism: “Markets are only tools. They make a good servant but a bad master and a worse religion.”

Another, from Frank Ackerman and Lisa Heinzerling: “human life, health, and nature cannot be described meaningfully in monetary terms… market values tell us little about the social values at stake.”

And how about this dated howler: “Mark Sagoff has noted that while markets can and do fail, society does not intervene to correct market failure.”

And then, of course, the infamous classic Limits to Growth.   Jonathan Franzen said it succinctly, in Freedom: “too many damn people on the planet."

Right. Last one to leave, please turn out the lights.

Franzen’s Freedom, btw, has much to say about environmentalism vs. market-driven capitalist consumerism. Much that’s sad, funny, and true. If there aren’t too many of us yet, there certainly are too many of us eager to remove mountaintops and frack the hell out of our interior...

Up@dawn

The Greens

I was recently registering to vote online and was asked what political party I affiliate myself with. There were the obvious options of Democratic, Republican, Libertarian, and Independent and then there was Green. I'd never heard of Green before so I googled it and found their website. After reading through most of it and researching more I think I can honestly say I'm sold. If you haven't heard of this political party it might be something you want to look into. Here's a link to their national website. http://www.greenparty.org/index.php Here's a link to their Tennessee website. http://greenpartyoftennessee.org/

Highlander Folk School

(and what Gandhi really said about change)-the school was founded in the 1930s to help economically disadvantaged whites but by the early 1950s had begun to focus on civil rights. Horton, an admirer of Gandhi, used his school to train his pupils in how to achieve integration and civil rights...

Gandhi didn’t exactly say everything he said (as Yogi Berra might put it), including the ubiquitous ”be the change you wish to see in the world” slogan. But he did say

“If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. … We need not wait to see what others do.”

Same sentiment, slightly less bumper stickery. But only slightly. We need not wait. We dare not wait.

The Movement needs a new Highlander School...

(Continues, with video & music, at Up@dawn)

A Bacterial Arms Trade In Our Soil?

"Harmless bacteria from American soils carry the same antibiotic-resistance genes as many pathogenic microbes around the world, suggesting there is a secret arms trade running between the bacteria in our soils and those that ravage our bodies with disease. Such a trade has long been suspected, but Gautam Dantasfrom the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis has now found the clearest evidence for it. “The genes are 100 percent identical,” he said."

http://the-scientist.com/2012/08/30/soil-harbors-antibiotic-resistance/

European Air Pollution

"There are many ways to harm your respiratory system such as smoking or breathing in asbestos. For urbanites living in cities across Europe, merely living and breathing in the city can be bad. A new study released by the European Environment Agency (EEA) found that most residents of European cities breathe toxic pollutants exceeding international health standards. The most deadly air within the EU is found in the eastern countries of Bulgaria and Romania, but there are few urban areas that escape unhealthy pollutants like ozone, nitrogen oxides, and particulate matter. The published study is already being seized upon by environmental groups who demand much tougher EU standards."

Source:
http://www.enn.com/pollution/article/44995

Treesitting returns

“Today I climbed a tree in the path of Keystone XL to demand TransCanada stop construction of this dirty and dangerous pipeline. This pipeline is a disaster for everyone it touches, from the cancer tar sands extraction is causing indigenous communities, to the water poisoned by inevitable tar sands spills, to the landowners whose land has been seized, and to everyone that will be affected by climate change,” said Mary Washington, one of the Tar Sands Blockade members sitting in a tree."

BREAKING: Eight People Climb Trees And Start Indefinite Tree Sit to Stop Keystone XL » Tar Sands Blockade

How ‘Silent Spring’ Ignited the Environmental Movement

not sure I'd call it a "revolution," but definitely a watershed moment.

“Silent Spring” was published 50 years ago this month. Though she did not set out to do so, Carson influenced the environmental movement as no one had since the 19th century’s most celebrated hermit, Henry David Thoreau, wrote about Walden Pond. “Silent Spring” presents a view of nature compromised by synthetic pesticides, especially DDT. Once these pesticides entered the biosphere, Carson argued, they not only killed bugs but also made their way up the food chain to threaten bird and fish populations and could eventually sicken children. Much of the data and case studies that Carson drew from weren’t new; the scientific community had known of these findings for some time, but Carson was the first to put them all together for the general public and to draw stark and far-reaching conclusions. In doing so, Carson, the citizen-scientist, spawned a revolution..."

How ‘Silent Spring’ Ignited the Environmental Movement - NYTimes.com

A New Low For Arctic Ice

on the radio this morning.

This summer, the Arctic ice cap shrank—melted– to an all-time tiny size. Half what it was in 1980.  The planet is changing.

“The apparent low point for 2012 was reached Sunday, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center, which said that sea ice that day covered about 1.32 million square miles, or 24 percent, of the surface of the Arctic Ocean. The previous low, set in 2007, was 29 percent.”-nyt

 “That difference between the previous record and this year’s is larger than the entire state of California, and almost as large as the state of Texas.  An ice-free summer in the Arctic, once projected to be more than a century away, now looks possible decades from now. Some say that it looks likely in just the next few years.”-Scientific American

A link to the broadcast, Greenpeace video from the Arctic, etc. at A New Low For Arctic Ice | On Point with Tom Ashbrook

How to survive mass extinction

Be wide ranging, be free to move, be good at surviving stress. More good reasons to ride a bike.

...if the species has a global distribution, some are likely to reside in a spot that's largely unaffected by the crisis. If you already inhabit multiple habitats, then some will likely be less affected or you can move from one to another.

Be free to move. An animal that can move freely will do well – it can escape the prevailing conditions and carry on. If the arctic was wiped out tomorrow, there are birds and whales that could move to the Antarctic and better conditions within days.

Be good at surviving stress. Animals used to going for long periods without food or water (like many reptiles or hibernating mammals), or have burrows, are likely to do better than those that require copious clean water, or can only survive a few hours in the wrong temperatures..."

'How to survive mass extinction | Science | guardian.co.uk

Activism on wheels

"Integrating cycling into our daily routines is one easy form of “activism” for the environment open to us all. “A short, four-mile round trip by bicycle keeps about 15 pounds of pollutants out of the air we breathe.” Just ride!

James Garvey, environmental ethicist and editor of The Philosophers’ Magazine, is on a long bike-ride: 1,000 miles across Britain. He seems to be having second thoughts, or at least concerns, about striking the correct balance between mental and physical exercise..."

(continues at Up@dawn)

To everything a season, burn burn burn

"My ancient firewood man came around with a rick last night, just in time. It’s 45 degrees this morning. And I know, a wood fire is considered environmentally incorrect by many. Alright, then, I’ll just go to hell. I still love my Earth Stove..."

Up@dawn

Green Aristotle: Virtue, Contemplation and the Ethics of Sustainability

"Sustainability ethics, a subspecies of environmental ethics, refers to a set of positions that emerge when the environmental state of things is not simply regarded as irritating, but as immoral, bad, wrong or evil.[1]  Environmental ethics in general and sustainability ethics in particular shares a framework in common with the rest of contemporary ethical philosophy, though it also has a suite of unique problems.  Although most environmental ethics is human-centered in which environmental damage is largely considered reprobatory because of the consequences for human welfare, there are, more controversially, a set of ethical positions that center on concerns beyond those of our own species.  In common though with other normative ethical frameworks, environmental ethics can be approached from a so-called consequentialist, deontological, or virtue ethical perspective..."

3quarksdaily: Green Aristotle: Virtue, Contemplation and the Ethics of Sustainability

The Mismeasure of All Things

"Gross Domestic Product (GDP) might seem benign enough. After all, it’s just a number. But it has emerged as the principal way the public evaluates a nation’s status and whether times are good or bad. News organizations report rising GDP as a sign of recovery, and stagnant or declining GDP as a portent. But GDP mismeasures all things. It is about as indicative of human progress as a body count is of success in war; it’s not only blunt, but also blind to the destruction behind the number. It denies that “growth” makes us poorer in the long run and in the short run benefits only a few. The inventor of GDP, the economist Simon Kuznets, never intended it as an indicator of progress or happiness..."

The Mismeasure of All Things | Orion Magazine

"Bridge at the Edge" Q&A

• Is Speth's assessment that "all we have to do to destroy the planet's climate and biota" is keep on doing what we're doing now too bleak? (x)
• What sort of "civic unreasonableness" do you think is now appropriate or necessary? (xiii)
• Is the Golden Rule + Aldo Leopold all the environmental ethic we need? (xvi)
• Is Martin Rees too pessimistic? (5-6)
• What's wrong with "maiinstream environmentalism"? (9)
• Are education and poverty (etc.) environmental issues? ((13)
• Are we closer to a "tipping point" with respect to public opinion regarding climate? (26)
• How can a "concerted international response" be achieved? (28)
• Why is the loss of biodiversity bad in itself, apart from disruptions to the ecosystem of which human civilization is a part? (36)
• If humans are "a new force of nature," does that fact contain a silver lining? (39)
• Are you a "solutionist"? Or what? (42)
• Do you participate in the "secular religion" (47) of rapid, never-ending economic growth?
• Why don't Americans demand "shorter workweeks, longer vacations" etc.? (48)
• What would be an "appropriate price" for a sustainable environment, in market terms? (52-3)
• How do we create sighted markets (instead of the "blind" ones operant today)? (54)
• (Your suggestions...)

And some factual questions:

• What 1980 report was prescient? (18)
• What was the predominant nature of the environmental challenges that spurred the first Earth Day?
• CO2 is at its highest level since how long ago? (21)
• Sea level rises attributable to the melting Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets can be traced to at least what year? (22)
• What are some of the leading health problems associated with climate change? (23)
• 20% of the world has contributed to how much of the world's present emissions? (28)
• [Leaving the rest of ch1 to you guys]
• What's our "secular religion"? (47)
• 
  

Too little too late

Or can we possibly cross "from crisis to sustainability"? We begin Gus Speth's Bridge at the Edge of the World today. Speth was Jimmy Carter’s environment guy in the White House, the one who put up the solar panels Ronald Reagan made such a show of removing. Talk about a symbol of our subsequent decline!

He’s now a mild-mannered Yale Dean, but his recently-blasted two part Orion manifesto “America the possible” is anything but reticent..."

(Continues at Up@dawn)