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Hey brother, can you spare a dime?

Alaska! You rock!

That's right, the rest of you 49 laggards (you too, D.C.!). Alaska is the first state to go green in the United States of Grist.

Let us explain. Yes, we're doing a fundraiser. We gotta. We're a nonprofit and we rely on your gifts to keep going.

"Well shucks," you're thinking. "I rely on Grist for all my environmental news, served with a side dish of humor. My love for the mag is more than enough to prompt me to make a donation!"

Aww, y'all are sweet. But we like to have a twist. We're just like that. This year, we're sick of seeing that damn red and blue map everywhere, and we're sick of being told that the U.S. is composed of two alien groups who can barely recognize each other any more. We happen to believe Americans share some broad goals and principles -- clean air, clean water, and healthy food come to mind. We're all about unity, folks, and we think you are too.

So donate. When the number of donations from your state reaches its number of electoral votes, it turns from red or blue to green. Let's turn the whole country green!

We'll make a point, and oh yeah, we'll be able to keep bringing you award-winning environmental coverage. It's a win-win!

Philippine Philippic

Illegal logging in Philippines contributes to flood devastation Recent storms in the Philippines have wreaked havoc on the country, with hundreds killed or missing in landslides and floods, and enviros and government officials are both taking aim at what they call a principal culprit: illegal logging. Though unusually high rainfall and the geography of the […]

Science

Is a basic understanding and appreciation of science necessary to be an environmentalist?  Does it help?  Does it matter?

I'm inclined to say Yes, an understanding of science -- not necessarily all the facts (that's a lot to ask), but certainly the basic principles of scientific inquiry -- is necessary to act effectively to preserve the natural world.

Which is why stuff like this depresses me to no end. Some 55 percent of Americans believe that God created human beings in their present form. That is to say, they do not believe in evolution. Sixty-five percent want evolution and creationism taught side-by-side in schools, and 37 percent want evolution replaced entirely by creationism in schools.

For the record: The scientific consensus on evolution is orders of magnitude more solid than that on climate change. We can quibble about the epistemological and ontological meaning of the word "fact," but to the extent that science produces any facts at all, the basic notion of evolution by natural selection is a fact. If you reject it, you are -- whether you acknowledge it or not -- rejecting science.

And if your mind's in the habit of rejecting empirical scientific data, why should you believe when scientists tell you that the climate is warming? That species are dying off? That mercury causes birth defects?

If someone wants to make the argument that science and environmentalism are separable -- that the spiritual side of environmentalism is what's important -- I'd like to hear it in comments.

Consensus

Via Chris Mooney: Naomi Oreskes has a short paper in the recent issue of Science in which she reports on her review of peer-reviewed climate science papers from 1993 to 2003.

Her results are stark: Not a single peer-reviewed scientific paper challenged the consensus that climate change is being driven by human activities. Not a single one. She concludes:

Many details about climate interactions are not well understood, and there are ample grounds for continued research to provide a better basis for understanding climate dynamics. The question of what to do about climate change is also still open. But there is a scientific consensus on the reality of anthropogenic climate change. Climate scientists have repeatedly tried to make this clear. It is time for the rest of us to listen.

Indeed.

Dan Aykroyd rants about overconsumption

In an interview done to promote his (widely panned) new feel-good flick Christmas with the Kranks, Dan Aykroyd let loose his opinions on overwrought consumerism:

"[T]he common enemy in North America is the Western consumer. The consumer has driven oil up to $50 a barrel so we have to have these wars," he said. Still, he called for supporting the troops fighting those wars: "we've got to support those young men and women who are out there protecting our big fat bloated lifestyle. ... But let's take that $110 billion we're putting into conflict and put it into hydrogen cell research."

The interviewer pointed out the obvious: "But as a Hollywood success story, you're part of that whole fat bloated lifestyle." To which Aykroyd replied, "Yes, I know. I drive a V10 Ford Excursion and I have to tell folks all the time: look, I've got five kids and a dog and birds. I would have to have two Lincolns with two V8s, you see, so it would be 16 cylinders."

Lest ye judge, though, he properly disposes of his bottles and cans! "But I recycle at home. I started that with my dad in the neighborhood, we started a recycling thing that turned into quite a big thing with all the people in our neighborhood up in Canada doing bottles and cans and glasses."

Hollywood stars: throwing stones from glass houses since the sign was erected in 1923.

States continue to lead the way

Washington Rep. Ed Murray (D), chair of the state's House Transportation Committee, is set to introduce a measure that would have Washington impose greenhouse-gas standards mirroring those recently put in place in California. See if this sounds familiar:

The idea of imposing the tougher standards here was endorsed recently by most members of a task force that included government officials, environmentalists and representatives of some of the state's largest businesses.

The bill will likely face a vigorous fight from the auto industry, which claims the California rules are really an illegal, if indirect, attempt to impose tougher fuel-mileage standards.

Supported by everybody but the auto industry. Who coulda guessed it?

In addition to Washington's laudable effort, recent news reports reveal that Maine, Connecticut, and Rhode Island are either passing or considering similar measures.

UPDATE: Hastily written and misleading -- in a blog post no less! First, the proposed Washington measure has to do with auto emissions, obviously. And the "similar" measures in other states are similar only in that they address auto emissions -- they are not the same thing as the global-warming-focused effort in Cali, but rather Cali's more modest (though still controversial and opposed by automakers) "Clean Car Program," which is about hydrocarbons and smog. Mea culpa.

Smokestacks off the hook?

A flurry of stories today -- see, e.g., here -- report the results of a study that claims carbon (read: auto emissions) is at fault for pollution-related heart problems. The study lets sulfates (read: power plants) off the hook.

Reuters calls the Electric Power Research Institute, which conducted the study, an "independent, non-profit center for public interest energy and environmental research." According to Geoffrey Johnson over at The Green Life Blog, a little more skepticism is warranted.

Free-range pig intestines

Who says organic is for sissies? (Wait, is baseball considered sissy ...? I'm really not tapped into the sports world, being a longtime sissy myself. Anyhoo!) San Diego's Petco Park and St. Louis's Busch Stadium are going to start selling organic hotdogs and bratwursts at the games of, uh, whatever teams play in those stadiums. They expect the dogs to cost about a buck more than the pesticide- and hormone-ridden variety. Hot dogs are still, of course, hot dogs, and even if they come from the happiest pigs on the planet, eating pig guts ain't healthy.  But hey, progress is progress!

Bush taps Nebraska gov to head USDA

Nebraska Gov. Mike Johanns (R) will replace Ann Veneman as secretary of agriculture, if Bush's nomination slithers through the Senate as expected. For those not intimately familiar with Johanns' record (who, me?), Bush provided this helpful tidbit: "He's a strong proponent of alternative energy sources such as ethanol and bio-diesel." A corn-belt governor who digs ethanol?  Who woulda thunk it?  

More on Johanns to come ...

Linking AIDS and conservation

On the occasion of World AIDS day, it is worth taking a harder look at how the pandemic affects natural resource management. The numerous negative links were just under discussion in Bangkok at the IUCN World Conservation Congress that ended late last month. The U.S.-based African Biodiversity Collaborative Group prepared some valuable reference materials for the megaconference. ABCG claims the key impacts of the HIV/AIDS pandemic on natural resource management are:

• overuse of natural resources including medicinal plants, timber for coffins, and wildlife for food;
• changes in land use as agricultural practices change with falling capacity for heavy labor;
• changes in access to resources and land especially when widows and orphans cannot inherit land;
• loss of traditional knowledge of sustainable land and resource management practices;
• loss of human capacity for natural resource management in government, non-government organizations, academic institutions; communities, donor organizations, and private sector;
• increased vulnerability of community-based natural resource management programs as communities lose leadership and capacity, and HIV/AIDS issues take priority; and
• diversion of conservation funds for HIV/AIDS related costs.

Recognizing these conservation impacts is a must. But there is some danger a list like this one comes across as insensitive toward the staggering human toll of the disease. As we seek to understand the costs of AIDS in multiple sectors -- environment, agriculture, the wider economy -- it is imperative that conservationists not lose sight of the catastrophic human toll. Otherwise they risk sounding like they value pandas more than people.