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Reductionist science is killing us

In my grad program, we've spent a lot of time talking about Paul Ehrlich and John Holdren's IPAT equation. It's pretty simple:

Impact = Population x Environment

English translation: A society's environmental impact is proportional to its population, its wealth, and its technological capacity to mitigate the impacts of its population and its wealth.

So how do you reduce impact? Well, it's too ethically and politically dicey to do a whole lot about population -- at least beyond educating women. Affluence? Let's put it this way: How would you like to be the one to tell El Salvador or Namibia to stay poor because the world has all the rich countries it can take?

An expose of climate ‘profiteers’

Joel Makower takes note of a new concern on the wackadoo Wall Street Journal editorial page: companies that plan to … avert your eyes, ye of tender constitution! … profit from limits on carbon emissions. Perhaps we should mail some smelling salts to WSJ headquarters?

Too much blog to handle?

I’ve got 12 — count ’em, 12 — posts queued to go up today on Gristmill, and that’s assuming neither I nor any other contributor writes another word. Out of those 12, at least five are essay-length and around nine or ten are substantive and interesting, not just toss-offs. Furthermore, they’re all good. There’s not […]

Observations on human nature

The sun pouring in my windows shut the furnace down hours ago. My daughter had two friends over for the night and we all walked to the local breakfast place this morning. There was a waiting list, so the girls skipped off to the park while I hung out sipping coffee. I would call them when our number came up (they all three have cell phones of course).

As is my habit, I observed. Attempts to strike up conversations with other guys proved fruitless of course. There was a shiny, navy blue Jetta TDI parked out front (with two biodiesel stickers on it, of course). As a status symbol, it is a step in the right direction, but not quite environmentally benign enough (in my rigorously defended opinion), unless it was made from recycled oil instead of soy.

In case you thought Sundays were lazy!

Be sure to check out this week's compilation of global warming news, brought to you by H. E. Taylor each week via A Few Things Ill Considered. It is quite comprehensive, so if 300+ links intimidate you, here are a few highlights:

Passenger rail on the East Coast is a mess

Western Massachusetts has just one passenger train that runs (once a day) up and down the north/south length of the Connecticut River Valley, connecting some of the bigger towns with Vermont and Connecticut. As if one train a day isn't bad enough, the new cover feature of the local weekly exposes just how inadequate it is:

In a few short hours

At around 5:30pm Pacific (8:30 EST) today, I’ll be appearing on Air America radio — specifically Radio Nation with Laura Flanders — to discuss media coverage of the State of the Union speech. And related matters. To tell you the truth, I’m not 100% clear on what I’ll be discussing, but rest assured that I’ll […]

Why the vegetarian critique of meat-eating should make meat-eaters squirm

Edible Media takes an occasional look at interesting or deplorable food journalism on the web. It’s been a rough couple of months for meat eaters. In late November, the FAO issued a startling report claiming that livestock production emits fully 18 percent of global greenhouse gases — more than all the automobiles in the world. […]

Gore should get up in this thing

Grist’s nonprofit status obviously means we can’t endorse any presidential candidate, and I doubt I’ll personally decide whom to support until much closer to the election. But one thing I will say is that — for all the reasons aptly described in Tim Dickinson’s new Rolling Stone piece — Al should run. Run, Al. Run. […]

U.S. schools get schooled on sustainability

Remember how report card time at school brought a mix of emotions — excitement, anxiety, a little bit of vomit in your mouth? Oh, to be a student again. But last week, the tables were turned as 100 universities across the country were graded in a College Sustainability Report Card released by the Sustainable Endowments […]