Charges Were Just Dropped Against These Climate Activists in the Most Stunning Way Share Bristol County District Attorney Sam Sutter (photo credit: Peter Bowden) “Action from principle, the perception and the performance of right, changes things and relations; it is essentially revolutionary…” —Henry David Thoreau, “Civil Disobedience” Henry’s jaw would’ve dropped. OK, I know that sounds a bit much. And what happened, the truly remarkable thing, was this: the prosecutor, Bristol County District Attorney Sam Sutter, not only dropped the charges (which could have resulted in months, or even years, of jail time); he then proceeded out to the courthouse plaza where he made a statement to the media and to the hundred or more people gathered in support of Ken and Jay. The crowd (myself included) went wild. Then, if possible, it got better. “Well,” Sutter said, “I certainly will be in New York in two weeks,” referring to the much-anticipated People’s Climate March on September 21, just ahead of the UN climate summit convened by Ban Ki-Moon. Please support The Nation.
The Drought’s Alert for Corn FROM where I sit on the north end of America’s grain belt, I can almost hear the corn popping to the south of me. The drought threatens to drive up global corn prices beyond their level in 2007-8, when food demonstrations broke out around the world. But such crises often lead to change — and transformation is what is needed to make our food system less vulnerable. We have become dangerously focused on corn in the Midwest (and soybeans, with which it is cultivated in rotation). The virtue of corn is that it is one of the most productive crops on the planet, a characteristic that has been greatly amplified by years of research and development. Cheap corn enabled the proliferation of high fructose corn syrup, an ingredient that is almost impossible to avoid in the American diet today. America’s corn surpluses also drove global market prices so low that many countries found it cheaper to import grain rather than grow their own. Corn’s weakness is that it is highly susceptible to drought.
The Triumph (and Challenge) of Climate Math - Andrew Winston by Andrew Winston | 12:00 PM November 13, 2012 A nerd hasn’t been this popular since, well, ever. Nate Silver, the creator of the election poll statistical hub FiveThirtyEight was declared the clear winner in last week’s election. The numbers discussion then seeped over from polls to other politically charged topics such as climate change. This awakening about the math (and physics) of climate change has coincided with climate activist Bill McKibben’s “Do the Math” tour, an awareness-raising series of events criss-crossing the country this month. In this article, McKibben lays out 3 fundamental climate numbers: to stay below (1) 2°C of warming (the limit the world’s scientists have said might help us avoid the worst of climate change), we can only burn (2) 565 more gigatons (a billion tons) of carbon dioxide, which will force a battle with the fossil fuel industry since it has (3) 2,795 gigatons in reserve. OK, so the math is not pretty, but it is what it is. It’s not so crazy.
Global CO2 in atmosphere passes milestone level For the first time in human history, the concentration of climate-warming carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has passed the milestone level of 400 parts per million (ppm). The last time so much greenhouse gas was in the air was several million years ago, when the Arctic was ice-free, savannah spread across the Sahara desert and sea level was up to 40 metres higher than today. These conditions are expected to return in time, with devastating consequences for civilisation, unless emissions of CO2 from the burning of coal, gas and oil are rapidly curtailed. But despite increasingly severe warnings from scientists and a major economic recession, global emissions have continued to soar unchecked. "It is symbolic, a point to pause and think about where we have been and where we are going," said Professor Ralph Keeling, who oversees the measurements on a Hawaian volcano, which were begun by his father in 1958.
A Call to Arms: An Invitation to Demand Action on Climate Change | Politics News By Bill McKibben | This is an invitation, an invitation to come to New York City. An invitation to anyone who'd like to prove to themselves, and to their children, that they give a damn about the biggest crisis our civilization has ever faced. Bill McKibben on global warming's terrifying new math My guess is people will come by the tens of thousands, and it will be the largest demonstration yet of human resolve in the face of climate change. Since Ban Ki-moon runs the United Nations, he's altogether aware that we're making no progress as a planet on slowing climate change. But the "world's leaders" haven't been leaders on climate change – at least not leaders enough. Like other world leaders, that is, he's tried, but not nearly hard enough. Obama and climate change: the real story We do, though; we face a crisis as great as any president has ever encountered. In a rational world, no one would need to march. So in this case taking to the streets is very much necessary.
THE WORLD DREAM BANK: FUTURES: DUBIA, A GREENHOUSE EARTH World Dream Bank home - add a dream - newest - art gallery - sampler - dreams by title, subject, author, date, places, names A portrait of a possible Earth one thousand years from now by Chris Wayan, 2003 Dubia's premise is simple enough in theory. But part of Dubya's dream is that oil goes on ruling the world for another generation. So our grandchildren live in a world with C02 levels double ours, 600-700 ppm. That world heats up. But once the catastrophe's happened and the survivors replant, and adjust to redwoods at the poles, and farms in Siberia, and jungles on the prairies, and coral seas where great cities once stood... what if they don't change it back? So... they leave the new world alone, to stabilize. I couldn't resist--even though I admit that any climatological projection this long-term and radical is inherently dubious... Dubia. I've processed these orbital photos very little. Let's start with a land that once was just a tongue of Asia with cultural pretensions.
Revisiting why incompetents think they’re awesome In 1999 a pair of researchers published a paper called "Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments (PDF)." David Dunning and Justin Kruger (both at Cornell University's Department of Psychology at the time) conducted a series of four studies showing that, in certain cases, people who are very bad at something think they are actually pretty good. They showed that to assess your own expertise at something, you need to have a certain amount of expertise already. Remember the 2008 election campaign? In all of this, uninformed idiots blame the Greeks for being lazy, the Germans for being too strict, and everyone but themselves. It has been more than 10 years since Dunning and Kruger published their work. "The paper gave voice to an observation that people make about their peers, but that they don’t know how to express," Dunning said. This paper has become a cult classic.
Victory at Hand for the Climate Movement? - Paul Gilding - Independent writer & advisor on sustainability. There are signs the climate movement could be on the verge of a remarkable and surprising victory. If we read the current context correctly, and if the movement can adjust its strategy to capture the opportunity presented, it could usher in the fastest and most dramatic economic transformation in history. This would include the removal of the oil, coal and gas industries from the economy in just a few decades and their replacement with new industries and, for the most part, entirely new companies. It would be the greatest transfer of wealth and power between industries and countries the world has ever seen. To understand this incredible potential we first have to step back and understand the unique structure of this social change movement, which may rank among the most influential in history. That is the reality of the climate movement – it is massive, global, powerful, and on the right side of history. Is that it? Most definitely not.
The Rebellion to Save Planet Earth: Why Civil Disobedience Could Be Our Last, Best Hope Photo Credit: ixpert / Shutterstock.com September 7, 2014 | Like this article? Join our email list: Stay up to date with the latest headlines via email. The politics of climate change are shifting. Jeremy Brecher, a freelance writer, historian, organizer and radio host based in Connecticut, has documented the environmental movement’s turn toward direct action and grass-roots activism. His latest book, “Climate Insurgency: A Strategy Against Doom,” which will be released early next year by Paradigm Publishers, examines the structural causes of our climate conundrum and calls for a “global nonviolent constitutional insurgency” to force environmental action from below. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. First, let’s unpack the book’s key term: What is a “global nonviolent constitutional insurgency”? Now, “constitutional” insurgency: That also sounds paradoxical.
Climate change: A guide for the perplexed - environment - 16 May 2007 Our planet's climate is anything but simple. All kinds of factors influence it, from massive events on the Sun to the growth of microscopic creatures in the oceans, and there are subtle interactions between many of these factors. Yet despite all the complexities, a firm and ever-growing body of evidence points to a clear picture: the world is warming, this warming is due to human activity increasing levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, and if emissions continue unabated the warming will too, with increasingly serious consequences. Yes, there are still big uncertainties in some predictions, but these swing both ways. With so much at stake, it is right that climate science is subjected to the most intense scrutiny. So for those who are not sure what to believe, here is our round-up of the most common climate myths and misconceptions. There is also a guide to assessing the evidence, as well as a blog looking at the history of climate science. What is happening now? More from the web
Are Financial Blogs Trustworthy? The talking heads say that financial blogs aren’t trustworthy. But the whole debate about blogs versus mainstream media is nonsense. In fact, many of the world’s top PhD economics professors and financial advisors have their own blogs. For example (in no particular order): Nouriel Roubini Paul KrugmanNassim Nicholas TalebSimon JohnsonFrank Shostak Willem BuiterTyler CohenGreg MankiwRichard BaldwinMark ThomaMichael PettisBrad DeLongJames Hamilton and Menzie ChinnMichel ChossudovskyMichael HudsonYves SmithRolfe WinklerSteve Keen And the conclusions of economists who don’t have their own blogs are collected by other bloggers and on YouTube videos. And you’ve got blogs like Zero Hedge that break stories about Goldman and high-frequency trading months before the mainstream media. So what is “news”? Indeed, as of February, only 5% of the pundits discussing various government bailout plans on cable news shows are real economists. Of course, many financial blogs are not very good. Print this post