Culture & Behavior

No more Ms. Nice Girl

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What’s a silver-streaked lady ecology writer to do? Be nice, be friendly, avoid the troubling topics, read the classics, don’t feel morally obliged to infect others with a perfectly warranted alarm and pessimism. Who am I to tell 10,000 ostensibly complacent neighbors that the ship is going down … especially at the height of summer, when the days are so fine and fair?

Free speech and the fate of humanity

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We all know that even in the United States the guarantee of free speech has limits. The Supreme Court long ago said that no one has the right to endanger his or her fellow citizens by, for instance, falsely yelling “fire” in a crowded theater. Such acts of speech are said to pose “a clear and present danger.” James Hansen, perhaps the most respected climate scientist on the planet, thinks that the fossil fuel lobby and its disinformation campaign about global warming may pose a similar threat.

Is electricity really the lifeblood of civilization?

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We are currently in a deep and horrible disaster, being visited on the world’s poorest and the tentacles are gradually crawling up the anchor to take down the rest of the ship. But I also think that there is a good deal of reason for hope – we have vast capacities, vast resources and vast imagination.

One more thing

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As the energy crisis explodes on the rest of us, I’d like to advocate for mercy for those who don’t yet fully understand. … sympathy and kindness are not small things to be rationed out by droppers, only to those perfectly deserving – they should be ladled out and poured from buckets and flow out of us like rivers. Any scarcity of kindness is artificial – and far too many things are growing scarce for us to have artificial shortages of generosity.