Reading Time: 6 minutes Last week, Nature Human Behavior published “Negativity drives online news consumption”, a study that found a strong connection between negative headlines and higher click-through rates. But desensitization is also a significant risk when grim news abounds, as it has in recent weeks (and months, and years). The latest meeting between war crimes suspect Vladimir Putin […]
Environment
Posted inEnvironment
Too many people
Reading Time: 2 minutes Wealthy, well-developed nations are nearing ZPG (zero population growth), which makes life better for everyone.
Posted inEnvironment
Your plastic grocery sack is a villain
Reading Time: 4 minutes I’ll never forget what I saw in a dirt-poor, dusty Yemeni mountain village more than a decade ago. It was plastic bags—the kind city-dwellers have long toted groceries in—and they virtually covered the steeply sloping mountainsides that fell away from the roadway bisecting the village. I had never before in my life seen such a […]
Posted inClimate Crisis
Four recent failures in climate change response
Reading Time: 6 minutes Welcome to 2023: another year of corporate and political mediocrity when it comes to climate change response. We’re in the middle of the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting, known colloquially as Davos after its Swiss Alps location, so rhetoric around climate change response (and related economic pressure points) is currently running hot. On Wednesday, an […]
Posted inClimate Crisis
Hate-preacher falsely claims Andrew Tate was arrested for denying climate change
Reading Time: 4 minutes Christian hate-preacher Greg Locke proved yet again that he cares more about trashing liberals than acknowledging truth in a massive self-own yesterday defending Twitter’s latest “main character” Andrew Tate, a former professional kickboxer best known for spreading misogyny and alpha male arrogance online. On Tuesday, Tate tagged climate activist Greta Thunberg in a tweet explaining […]
Posted inSpirituality & Ritual
Warmth in winter
Reading Time: 4 minutes The solstice marks the passing of darkness. This year, it also points to a brighter future free from the dominion of petro-tyrants.
Posted inEnvironment
COP15’s grand—and questionable—promise for biodiversity conservation
Reading Time: 4 minutes There are a few ways to read the major concluding deal from this year’s UN Biodiversity Conference (COP15), held in Montreal from December 7 to 19. Over 190 countries ultimately signed on to what is being called a historic deal, the “30×30” pledge to establish 30 percent of the Earth’s natural ecosystems (on land and […]
Posted inEnvironment
EU takes world-first step, banning products linked to deforestation
Reading Time: 3 minutes Change comes fast and slow, as the latest green deal out of the European Union (EU) amply illustrates. On December 6, the European Commission welcomed news of an agreement reached between EU’s parliament and a specific council established for the purposes of reducing Europe’s impact on global deforestation and forest degradation. Companies will now be […]
Posted inClimate Crisis
So what did COP27 actually accomplish?
Reading Time: 7 minutes From November 6 to 20, world leaders and representatives met for the 27th United Nations Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP27), held this year in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. The conference started and ended late due to reluctance around one key initiative: the topic of loss and damage for vulnerable countries hit by climate change […]
Posted inEnvironment
Solar geoengineering: Can we buy time to heal climate change?
Reading Time: 5 minutes We can cool our warming planet by blocking sunlight in the atmosphere. Is this hubris or a way of mitigating the damage we’ve already done?