Articles by David Roberts

From Lubes to Lemurs

Lube job Folks sometimes worry about sustainability during sex — just not the environmental kind. To make your pleasure greener there’s the Veg Sex Shop, a collection of vegan and eco-friendly sex toys, including a solar-powered vibrator and a dazzling variety of oils and lubes. Look on the bright side Global warming may result in […]

Science wars

Great column by Chris Mooney on the science wars of the 90s and the 00s, respectively.

Do hybrids have to get beefier and sacrifice mileage?

So I'm flipping through a magazine this morning and stumble on a glossy ad featuring a muscley sports car. The tag line:

THE CHARGER HYBRID -- IT BURNS GAS AND RUBBER

Sigh.

Anyway, speaking of hybrids, I have a question. As everyone's noticed, the hybrid market seems to be moving toward performance-based cars that boost power without doing much to boost gas mileage. Greens no doubt view this as a disaster. But lots of auto-geeks think that, as this Autoblog post puts it, the "honeymoon is over" for hybrids in terms of fuel economy, what with constant reports that their real-world mileage doesn't approach their advertised mileage.

So, are hybrids making a necessary shift to preserve their expanding market? Or are performance-based hybrids a reflection of the greed and perfidy of automakers and autobuyers alike?

Eco-wonderlands

I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels ambivalent about this sort of thing. On one hand, it would be nice if people for once would just stay the hell out of an "eco-wonderland." On the other hand, these places do instill a kind of reverence for nature that carries over to other parts of a traveler's life.

What do you think?

(via Divester)