Homestead Aesthetics

I know a lot of people who read “shelter magazines” – which is just a fancy way of saying magazines full of pretty homes. I admit to liking to look at them in checkout lines myself, since they do help me beautify my house – just not the way they are supposed to. I think: ”Wow, that’s a gorgeous sleigh bed – I’d love that…hmmm…8,000 dollars….yeah, my futon’s looking cozier and more elegant already!”

The wealth of nature

The Archdruid continues his survey of ecological economics with a look at the economic role of natural processes. If, as studies suggest, three-fourths of all economic value in the world today is produced by nature rather than human labor, is it time to start treating nature as the primary economy, and human economic activity as a secondary economy dependent on it?