Can a Good Gaian Eat Meat?
By Erik Assadourian, Gaianism
It is foolish to lose the knowledge of animal husbandry and butchering skills. It is only a matter of time when we (in consumer cultures) will need and rely directly on them again. In the meantime, if we choose to eat meat and animal products, we should support those who are caring for their animals humanely and sustainably, who are reintegrating these farming skills and services into our local economies, and who are helping to build or sustain a resilient local food system.
Will the Fracking Revolution Peak Before Ever Making Money?
By Justin Mikulka, DeSmog Blog
When DeSmog first began reporting on the failed finances of the fracking industry, publications like the Wall Street Journal were writing about the optimistic financial future for shale companies. A year and a half later, that optimism has died. But all of these dynamics played out before the industry ran up against “core operational issues.”
In Search of a Sane Economy
By Philippe Van Parijs, Open Democracy
What is a sane economy? An economy that is sane is an economy that doesn't make people sick, and doesn't make our planet sick. Basic income is a way of making the economy more sane.
The Myth of Autonomy
By Damaris Zehner, Integrity of Life
If we were meant to be autonomists, we would look like sabertooth tigers or sharks; instead, we are small and weak on our own, but with the means for complex cooperation and community, we have become the intelligent, flexible species we are today. It’s time to debunk this mythology of autonomy and consider the nature of our true relationships with the world and each other.
A Climate of Desire: Excerpt
By Eduardo Sasso, Resilience.org
Just around a year ago, business sustainability consultant and climate organizer Eduardo Sasso published A Climate of Desire ー a book reconsidering the original roots of Christianity to more fully enable us to respond to the challenges of climate change.
Why I Spent the Last 2 Years Writing a Book about Imagination
By Rob Hopkins, Rob Hopkins blog
It was a quote by my late friend and mentor David Fleming that tipped me over into thinking that writing a book about imagination was something I needed to do. In ‘Lean Logic’, he wrote “if the mature market economy is to have a sequel … it will be the work, substantially, of imagination”. There was something about that sentence that got under my skin.
Farming on the Wild Side: Review
By Mary Wildfire, Resilence.org
But much of the book is philosophical and applicable almost anywhere, as when they question the war against invasive species, or detail the value of leaving some areas wild, even if the neighbors think it’s unkempt. This allows the native ecology to flourish and work harmoniously, controlling pests, pollinating crops, and preventing erosion. Thus, I recommend this book to anyone looking for ideas on how best to steward their land in the most responsible ways.
Apartheid in the Global Governance System
By Jason Hickel, Jason Hickel blog
Ultimately, the voting system at the WB/IMF contributes to the perpetuation of global inequality. The system ensures that the very countries that became rich by plundering the global South during the colonial period are now, by dint of their plunder, empowered to determine the rules of the global economy in their own interests, indefinitely. Inequality begets inequality.
Climate Change: An Appeal to the UN Committee on the Rights of Children
By Joel Stronberg, Civil Notion
On the day Greta Thunberg gave her emotion-filled speech at the United Nation’s (UN) Climate Summit, another historic event involving the Swedish activist and 15 other youthful climate hawks—representing 12 countries--took place. The filing of the first-ever legal complaint about climate change to the UN’s Committee on the Rights of the Child. The communication is titled Sacchi et al. vs. Argentina, et al.
Why De growth is Essential: A Rejection of Left Ecomodernists Phillips, Sharzer, Bastini, and Parenti.
By Ted Trainer, Resilience.org
The left urgently needs to get over its long-term fascination with “productivism”, to realise that the best line of attack against capitalism is to focus on limits and sustainability, and to plunge into Transition Towns and related initiatives.
Green Party Debates Green New Deal
By Don Fitz, Resilience.org
Despite the furor over the Green New Deal (GND), many of its supporters have no idea of the wide variety of views on it, especially within the Green Party (GP), where it originated in the US. From June through August, 2019 Missouri Greens held public discussions contrasting at least three distinct GP views to those from the Democratic Party (DP).
Dear Regents
By John Foran, Resilience.org
The University of California’s investment strategy takes stakeholder views into account – such as student protesters at Berkeley, above, in 2014 – but its divestment program is primarily based on the belief that fossil fuel investments present a financial risk.
The Case for Planting Trees
By Chris Smaje, Small Farm Future
Therefore, to anyone who’s contemplating planting trees on a piece of land because they have specific goals for it, as we did – wind protection, privacy, nitrogen fixation, firewood and timber, amenity value, fruit and nuts, even wildlife habitat or carbon sequestration at a stretch – I say don’t be put off by the permaculture purists who insist on natural regeneration. Go for it.
The Attacks on Abqaiq and Peak Oil in Ghawar
By Matt Mushalik, Crude Oil Peak
The world cannot live without Saudi oil. While media focus is on oil prices and how quickly full production can be brought back Saudi Arabia’s underlying peak oil problem has not been discovered yet. Together with the permanent threat of further attacks there is a double vulnerability now.
Amazon Uprising: Defunding the Destruction
By Mark Heley, Iván Sawyer García, Esperanza Project
Obviously, successfully preserving the remaining Amazon will take multiple solutions, both small scale and local and large scale and international. But if you are feeling hopeless about what’s happening, consider joining up to Amazon Uprising and protect some trees, while getting informed about what’s going on in the bigger picture.
Global Water Crisis
By Jody Tishmack, Anima/Soul
“The global water crisis – caused by drought, flood, and climate change – is less about supply than it is about recognizing water’s true value, using it efficiently, and planning for a different future.” Water is a bit like the tale of Goldilocks. One size is too big. One size is too small. One size is just right.
Climate Politics/Capitol Light (32)
By Joel Stronberg, Civil Notion
Impeachment has been the big dog on the political porch this week. It promises to be there for quite some time--possibly through the end of the year. Stonewalling by the White House and the arrest of two colleagues of the president’s lawyer, Rudi Giuliani, suggests there’s a lot of information around that needs to be gathered and gone through.
An Insider’s Look at the Shameful History of EPA’s Climate Inaction – and Why we Must Turn it Around
By Dan Reich, Resilience.org
While the EPA made some headway during the Clinton and Obama administrations, those achievements were undone under George W. Bush and Donald Trump. Throughout the Bush and Trump administrations, the EPA has supported the right of Exxon and other fossil fuel companies to pump greenhouse gases (GHGs) into our atmosphere with no legal or financial constraints and no consideration of the consequences.
Peak Oil Review: 15 October 2019
By Tom Whipple, Steve Andrews, Peak-Oil.org
Oil prices rose 2 percent on Friday after the US and China seemed to hammer out a trade deal that postponed tariffs. However, after studying the details – or lack thereof – investors lost much of their enthusiasm.
Healing the Rift Between Political Reality and Ecological Reality: A Q&A with Shaun Chamberlin
By Stan Cox, Shaun Chamberlin, Green Social Thought
At the urging of Fleming and Chamberlin, TEQs were introduced, studied, and debated in the U.K. Parliament a decade ago but were judged by the government to be ahead of their time. Now, with a global climate emergency widely acknowledged, systems like TEQs warrant further serious consideration.
California wildfires, electricity shutoffs and our troubled energy future
By Kurt Cobb, Resource Insights
Most of the news surrounding the electricity shutoffs in California—done to avert the ignition of additional wildfires by aging electrical infrastructure—has focused on two things: climate change and the greedy, incompetent management of Pacific Gas & Electric. Missing in this discussion is the broad neglect of the complex infrastructure of the United States and possibly other wealthy nations.
From Sunset Strip to the Sierra Madre to a Nobel Nomination
By Tracy L. Barnett, Esperanza Project
Susan Eger was more adventurous than your average UCLA anthropology student in 1975 – even for a psychedelic-savvy follower of Carlos Castañeda. But a chance meeting with a fellow adventurer would set her life course in ways she could never have imagined. Nearly half a century later, with three grown indigenous children, a Mexican nonprofit that’s become a living institution and a Nobel nomination to contend with, Susana Valadez, as she is now known, is on fire with the certainty of one who is living her destiny.
Greta and Tokata at the Front Lines
By Talli Nauman, Tatyana Novikova, Esperanza Project
On a world tour for climate justice, Swedish teen activist Greta Thunberg visited Native America Oct. 6-8, attracting a gymnasium full of enthusiasts at Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, leading a march on Rapid City Hall alongside youth climate leader Tokata Iron Eyes, and speeding off to the Standing Rock Sioux Indian Reservation.
Learning How to Talk
By Asher Miller, Post Carbon Institute
I still find it difficult talking about the climate crisis with people in my extended family and community. In fact, the more concerned I become, the more challenging I find it. Which is why I’m so excited to be hosting a conversation this Wednesday with Karin Kirk and Dr. Susanne Moser, experts in climate change communication, on how we can talk about the climate crisis in a way that inspires collective action.
‘Factfulness’ may calm you down, but won’t change our ecocidal trajectory
By Kurt Cobb, Resource Insights
Yes, we have made tremendous progress for humans taken alone. The problem with such assessments is that they leave out how that progress was purchased.
Despairing about the Climate Crisis? Read This.
By Laurie Mazur, Susanne Moser, Earth Island Journal
So we’re having to deal with completely new environmental conditions, and we will be changed by that. Can we imagine that? No. Can we try to imagine that we’re not just clobbering each other over the head or blowing each other up? I can imagine something different.
Questions as Big as the Atmosphere
By Bart Hawkins Kreps, An Outside Chance
What is the best-case scenario for solar geoengineering? For author Holly Jean Buck and the scientists she interviews, the best-case scenario is that we manage to keep global warming below catastrophic levels, and the idea of geoengineering quietly fades away.
A Chat Leads to a Change of View on Climate
By Karin Kirk, Yale Climate Connections
In the March for Science Facebook page, someone asked how group members might engage in productive conversation with a family member who holds opposite ideologies. The query immediately prompted hundreds of comments and suggestions, with the tally increasing by the minute.
Oops! Gene editing not as precise as advertised
By Kurt Cobb, Resource Insights
Sometimes a headline gives you practically the entire story. Take this one: "Gene-Editing Unintentionally Adds Bovine DNA, Goat DNA, and Bacterial DNA, Mouse Researchers Find."
Light Posting from September 27th to October 15th
By Resilience.org Staff, Resilience.org
There will be light posting from September 27th through October 15th due to editoria…
Growing Pain: The Delusion of Boundless Economic Growth
By Ian Christie, Ben Gallant, Simon Mair, Open Democracy
Degrowth’ is a good bet. There is sound empirical and theoretical evidence that our economies are dependent on material and energy resources and embedded in the delicate balance of the Earth’s life systems. And if we pull it off, the payout is huge.
Transitioning from Competition to Collective Resilience
By Tom Llewellyn, Shareable
Paris has been on the cutting edge of a worldwide municipal movement dedicated to making cities more resilient to the physical, social and economic challenges that are a growing part of the 21st century.
Explainer: How Climate Change is Accelerating Sea Level Rise
By Zeke Hausfather, Carbon Brief
Sea level rise (SLR) is one of the most severe impacts of climate change, with rising waters threatening to inundate small-island nations and coastal regions by the end of the century.
Brexit: Systemic Risk and a Warning
By David Korowicz, Geneva Global Initiative
But the reality of our lives, irrespective of wealth or position, is that we are thoroughly interdependent with each other, the socio-economic networks that bind us, and the planet and its living system that holds us all. When we tear at the fabric of our relationships, we undermine the welfare of all, and our capacities to face the dire challenges ahead.
Eating the Earth – Food Miles
By Darius Ghadiali, Bristol Pound blog
If we want to reduce our environmental and social impacts, we need to know the distances, methods and alternatives to our food choices. By using local businesses, it is easier to begin choosing food that doesn’t rely on polluting shipping methods, poor working conditions and unfair pay in the different parts of the supply chain.
Ripping Off the Plaster
By Andrew Curry, thenextwave
They say that your syntax always finds you out. Metaphors can be just as revealing. As George Lakoff observes, metaphors are the devices we use to frame the way we think about the world. In politics, according to Lakoff, it the competition for the frames--effectively, competition between the metaphors--that resolves electoral and political competition.
Returning to—and Tidying Up—the Fold
By Erik Assadourian, Gaianism
To survive we must return to the fold of Gaia. Returning to the fold means “to begin participating in some group or activity that one left for a period of time.” In other words, we have stopped participating fully in the Gaian community, following Earth’s laws, and have been making up our own rules
Scientists’ Advice to People Living in Coastal Areas? Move.
By Dahr Jamail, TruthOut
And you, dear reader, where is it you find your equanimity? Whether it is a place, a person, an activity, or a mental state, please remember to go there, regularly or as you are able, as the unraveling of Earth’s biosphere continues apace.
Youth Who Led Global Climate Strike Are Bringing a New “Spirit” to Climate Fight
By Bill McKibben, Amy Goodman, Democracy Now
As the World Meteorological Organization points out, we’re at a tipping point physically. The planet really is starting to break in profound ways. We’re also at a tipping point, maybe, politically. There’s finally enough recognition, enough demand for action, that maybe things will start to happen.
The Hope of the Green New Deal
By Roger Blanchard, Resilience.org
That begs the question: why aren’t developed nations, such as European nations, rapidly replacing their fossil fuel uses with renewable energy and why do they still have high per capita CO2 emission rates, typically much higher than developing nations?
The Climate Strikes are About so Much More than Green Colonialism
By Asad Rehman, Open Democracy
It will require imagination and political will, it means listening to and being guided by those on the frontlines of extractive projects and climate impacts. Solutions to these crises won’t come in the shape of a battery - they come in the shape of justice, reparations and equity.
Reparations Towards a More Just and Beautiful World
By Douglass DeCandia, Center for Humans and Nature
In the words of Dr. Maya Angelou, “No one of us can be free until everybody is free.” When we move away from domination by supporting and uplifting those who have been most impacted by the worst of it, we are able to move toward equity. Where there is equity there is balance, and where there is balance all life flourishes.