sending...World Scientists Statement Of Concern
The Millenium Alliance for Humanity & the Biosphere (MAHB) of Stanford University is a collaboration of natural scientists and social scientists working together to implement behavioral, institutional and cultural changes necessary for humans to “ensure a sustainable and equitable future for everyone.”
The process is called foresight intelligence. It seems that this particular kind of intelligence is innate in humans but not well developed on a large scale. MAHB’s goal is to better tap into our foresight intelligence to reduce humanity’s ecological footprint and social inequities, moving toward true sustainability on a global scale, before it is too late.
The political class in much of the world has barely scratched the surface in pursuing this goal, leaving what MAHB calls the Civil Society to try and make a meaningful contribution.
According to MAHB: “The term ‘civil society’ includes scholars, non-governmental organizations, businesses, social activists, and individuals who share a vision for a sustainable world, respecting the rights and prosperity of all humanity. While the MAHB is pluralistic in its acceptance of differences and diversity a generally accepted core set of values has emerged globally and constitute the public good: that all humans should be able to live peacefully, securely and sustainably.”
MAHB has prepared a “Message to World Leaders,” signed by an impressively large group of individuals representing a variety of disciplines on every continent. Continue reading
Earth Day Global Warming Message 2013
Happy Earth Day 2013
I encourage you make some time in your schedule to watch the new Bill McKibben/350.org video about global warming which premiered on the web today. It’s called “Do the Math” and is available for free viewing at the link below. It is very well done and compelling. You might like to watch it a little at a time if you’re busy.
Here’s the link to the Movie Trailer for “Do the Math”
And here’s the link to the Movie “Do the Math”
And don’t forget my earlier posting today:
Earth Day Population Message 22 April 2013
Earth Day Population Message 22 April 2013
In honor of Earth Day 2013, the award winning film, Mother: Caring for 7 Billion is available for free internet viewing from now until the end of May. Some of you may be familiar with this film, but the current temporarily free streaming offers a golden opportunity to see it and to urge your friends and colleagues to watch a remarkable, modern engagement with the global population issue. I strongly urge you to see this film. –RM
Watch Free Online Streaming of the Award-Winning Environmental Film, Mother: Caring for 7 Billion starting this Earth Day Weekend through the end of May.
News Release from “Mother: Caring for 7 Billion”
Denver, CO – Even though sex and global warming are rarely discussed in the same sentence, much less in the same film, the long ignored connection was recently explored in the award-winning environmental documentary Mother: Caring for 7 Billion.
In celebration of Earth Day, the filmmakers of Mother announced the Internet release of their “Director’s Cut” that will stream online for free from April 19 until the end of May. To view the free online streaming of Mother go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdEspxlq3bo
Christophe Fauchere, director and co-producer of Mother stated, “We want Mother to be viewed by as many people as possible for Earth Day because Mother holds up a mirror and shows people a very different way to look at their role on this planet.”
Lisa Hymas, co-founder of Grist.org says “This is not your father’s population documentary… Mother takes a feminist/humanist view as it explores the issues of our exploding numbers.”
The Price of Carbon
Carbon pollution is not only disrupting lives, it’s costing us money. Comedian and musician Reggie Watts shows how, laying out the billion-dollar connection between fossil-fuel energy and dirty weather events like Superstorm Sandy caused by carbon pollution.
Watch the short new video from Climate Reality and spread the word.
We’ve all been paying for this, for years, but now it can stop. We can start by telling our leaders that it’s time to put a price on carbon and make the polluters pay. It’s just that simple
“Not so simple,” you say? Well, consider this: The CIA has made it easy. They publish and update an online directory of Chiefs of State and Cabinet Members of Foreign Governments regularly.
A book has even been written about how to do it. Titled How to Contact World Leaders, it was written by Rick Lawler and published in 2002.
Here’s a list of names and addresses of U.S. leaders.
Energy is Key to the Continuance or Collapse of Civilization
Recently I was reading Andrew Revkin’s “DOT EARTH BLOG” on the NYT web site dated 18 February 2013 and came across a link to a remarkable lecture by the late Dr. Richard Smalley, physicist, chemist, and winner of the Nobel Prize in chemistry. Smalley’s talk, titled “Our Energy Challenge,” was presented by him at Columbia University in 2003, apparently having been delivered on multiple occasions around that time, as Smalley struggled with the cancer that ended his life in 2005.
His thesis was very interesting. He began by showing a slide on “Humanity’s Top Ten Problems for the next 50 years” and explained that during the Q & A at his previous Lectures, he had asked his audiences to contribute their suggestions for the list and wrote them down.
Dear Mr. President
On this day of the big climate change demonstration in Washington, organized by Sierra Club and 350.org and supported by Friends of the Earth, Oil Change International, and others, I’d like to offer some useful tidbits on the subject, plus a call to the President for leadership on the issue.
Dr. Cameron Wake, a climate researcher at the University of New Hampshire, points out that the complex nature of climate change makes it much easier to sell the lie than it is to sell the truth, of which climate change skeptics take full advantage.
My first global warming tidbit comes courtesy of Mike Bellamente, the Director of Climate Counts,who has offered some tips for responding to climate skeptics. One tip is to “Know Your Stuff,” meaning have some fundamental facts to counter the mis-information coming from the climate change skeptics.
What Science Can and Can’t Tell Us About our Future
Astronomy has reached the point of being able to state conclusively that the known universe contains a greater number of stars than the number of grains of sand on all the Earth’s beaches and in all of its deserts.
The age of the universe has been definitively set at 13.7 billion years ago. The age of the Earth is around 4.5 billion years. Life first formed about half a billion years later and the human species is about 3 million years old. Agriculture began about 10,000 years ago. The human population size exploded from about 1 billion to just over 7 billion in a little over two hundred years. That rapid expansion coincided with the industrial revolution and the rapid exploitation of cheap, high energy density, fossil fuel resources.
Astronomy has discovered planets circling other stars and has even reached the point where it can estimate their sizes and distances from their mother stars.
It is logical to conclude that planets circling stars must be a very common occurrence around the vast universe. Based on knowledge of our solar system, planets too close to the star are too hot to support life and those too far away are very cold and receive substantially less radiation from their star, so probably cannot support more than the most primitive life forms, if any at all. There is a “sweet spot” at just the right distance, a habitable zone around all stars, where planets of just the right mineral composition can develop atmospheres and life can form.
For the New Year: Straight Talk on Global Warming
The Kyoto Protocol on Global Warming has occupied a large number of people for many years. The background is amply presented by Wikipedia.
The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), as Wiki explains it, “sets binding obligations on industrialised countries to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases. The UNFCCC is an international environmental treaty with the goal of achieving the ‘stabilisation of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.’ “
The Protocol was adopted on 11 December 1997 in Kyoto, Japan, and entered into force on 16 February 2005. As of September 2011, 191 states had signed and ratified the protocol. The United States signed but did not ratify the Protocol and Canada withdrew from it in 2011. Many environmentalists had hoped it would lead most nations to solid action to reverse global warming. Certainly the Protocol detailed a lot of research to understand the scientific and engineering aspects of the causes, effects, and useful actions to reverse the process. But it has not led to the right kind of action at the scale that is needed.
Dye Markers in Nuclear Power Plant Emissions
A nuclear power opposition group (formed by me and several of my colleagues in and around Chattanooga Tennessee several years ago) has proposed the addition of distinctive visual dye-markers to routine nuclear emissions from nuclear power plants. This seemingly obvious protective strategy has common precedent with the odors added to propane and natural gas, so that leaks of these gases can be immediately detected. Other hazardous solids, liquids, and gases have for years been provided with dyes and other additives in order to make those dangerous substances more noticed by people exposed to them*.
This common-sense suggestion should make all radionuclide emission releases readily identifiable, better to protect the public from this very real public health danger. Continue reading
“Exxon Hates Your Children” – Remarkable New Ad Coming Soon
Click this link to read about the stark new ad with the above title soon to appear.
It is purported to be a “history-making crowdsourced national TV ad [they are] putting on the air across the country.”
They say it’s time to tell the truth about Exxon. The ad is coming from Oil Change International whose web site has more on Exxon here: http://priceofoil.org/