Transition and solutions – Feb 4
– In Transition 2 (trailer of new Transition film)
– The New Hippies
– Time for Transition in Falls Church
– Simplicidad para tiempos difíciles
– Backyard chooks (chickens) cracking the egg market in Australia
Society
Bill Rees’ last lecture
Last December, after more than 40 years teaching at the School of Community and Regional Planning (SCARP) at the University of British Columbia, Bill Rees gave his last lecture as a full-time professor. As one of his last students, I found his class captivating, and in following up with many of his former students, realized they felt the same way. His career defined the modern science of sustainability, and touched the lives of many, inspiring individuals to devote their lives towards adapting our species to live responsibly on this planet.
Bark of popple, twig of willow: In the woods in winter
I should be in the woods at this time of year. Instead, because of the unusually warm winter and heavy rains that have left the ground saturated and soggy, rather than frozen and covered with snow, and because I managed to do something to my shoulder chopping wood. (I turn forty this summer, and my assumption is that the two different minor injuries I sustained in about two weeks were the official “the warranty on your body has expired and it will all go to hell now” notice.) I mostly haven’t been, but they call me. This is the season of trees on a farm.
Transport – Jan 31
-Rails-to-Trails Conservancy Busts Myth That “Nobody Walks” in Rural America
-What’s the Best Way To Get Users To Embrace Mass Transit? – Make it pleasant? Or make it efficient?
-House Transportation Bill “a March of Horribles”
“Sewer mining” – efficient water recycling coming to a community near you
It sounds yucky at best, but mining sewage is growing in popularity, especially in Sydney, Australia, where a decade of drought forced some creative thinking about how to get, use and manage water.
A crucible moment in education
President Obama’s instinct that staying in school is better than dropping out altogether is absolutely correct. It’s just that if we’re going to compel kids to stay in school, we need to make their schooling compelling.
A guide for sustainability advocates
Creating a sustainable world is about getting individuals, organisations and nations to shift their perspectives and practices. What can you do to influence this process? I describe three psychological principles to help sustainability advocates be more effective.
Exploring the ingredients for Transition with Rob Hopkins: (transcript)
“What we have in each of those ingredients, is a problem that we’ve seen that Transition initiatives come up against enough times to think that that is some sort of a common experience; and then the solution to that problem that we’ve seen implemented enough times to have some kind of confidence that it works…”
(Transcript of a long conversation with Transition founder Rob Hopkins – newly edited and formatted.)
The myth of the machine
The strategy discussed in last week’s post–that of walking away from energy-intensive lifestyles before the waning of the age of abundant energy brings them grinding to a halt–is a viable response to the crisis of our age, but it’s also a great way to poke a stick at some of the most deeply entrenched of the modern world’s dysfunctional habits of thinking. Suggest it in public, for example, and you’ll very quickly learn why all that talk about saving the planet has turned out to be empty air: everyone’s quite willing to watch someone else make sacrifices for the good of the biosphere, but ask them to make sacrifices themselves and you’ll see just how far their love of the planet extends.
Centennial of Alfred Wegener’s continental drift theory: the start of Earth systems science
Occasionally, the troubled story of Alfred Wegener’s theory has been perversely appropriated by climate deniers to claim that they are discriminated by the scientific establishment. But that only shows that climate deniers don’t understand how science works.
You Got to Move – Jan 23
– New York Times writer Andrew Revkin on climate change: “Occupy wherever you are to help us have a smarter relationship with energy”
– You Got To Move: Stories of Change in the South (documentary on Highlander Folk School)
– My Path To Transition Organizing
– Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking
Occupy and social change – Jan 21
– The Occupy movement in London: three months on
– Occupy Wall Street’s Next Phase: Avoid Cooptation in Election Season
– 2002-2012: Remembering the Social Movements that Reimagined Argentina
– Goodbye Lenin?
