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The Green Patriarch: Bartholomew
This is a powerful film on a true spiritual leader who fully grasps the significance of the current moment for the future of humanity and Creation, and who is working behind the scenes to change the way humanity relates to Earth and Nature. (watch The Green Patriarch)
E.O.Wilson: "The world is full of amateurs: gifted amateurs, devoted amateurs... Anybody can pick up information in interesting places, find new species or rediscover what was thought to be a vanished species, or some new biological fact about a species already known, and can provide that right into The Encyclopedia of Life."
NYTimes' David Pogue interview with E.O.Wilson: transcript
Watch a video about E.O. Wilson and the birth of the Encyclopedia of Life project.
Encyclopedia of Life Podcast:
One Species at a Time
The Encyclopedia of Life has been growing rapidly since E.O.Wilson first imagined the project in 2003. It is indeed rapidly developing as the indispensable media-rich database of earth's species, with already 400,000 species pages, and growing numbers of contributors all over the world. There is now a new Learning and Education area where you can for instance develop your own multimedia regional field guides, or listen to and download the EoL's excellent series of podcasts, One Species at a Time.
In Defense of Food
Michael Pollan discusses his latest book, "In Defense of Food"- (watch videos)
Recently at Ecoversity Santa Fe
Powershift 2011
Watch keynote speeches by Van Jones, Bill McKibben, Tim deChristopher, and Al Gore here.
Vanity Fair presents an exclusive collection of the most striking black and white photographs of African elephants by Cyril Christo and Marie Wilkinson, author-photographers of "Lost Africa" (2004) and "Walking Thunder" (2009).
You can also preview their next project, a documentary called "The Last Stand of the African Elephant" here.
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Image Credit: Marac Kolodzinski
Ecoversity is an open-source environmental website promoting ecological awareness, understanding, knowledge and responsibility. Ecoversity.org has over 2,000 active links and over 1,000 videos available with information on tools, practices and skills for sustainable living. Ecoversity's mission is educating the world for a healthy, prosperous and sustainable future for all of the biosphere. We welcome your input and participation.
James Hansen Speaking in Santa Fe, February 2013
James Hansen spoke about climate change, followed by a conversation with Subhankar Banerjee, at the Lensic Theater, a Lannan Foundation event, 20 February 2013.
"If we continue with business as usual, we will get global warming of several degrees, and the last time the planet was several degrees warmer, sea levels were at least 15 meters higher than now. And that means, that on some time scale, we will lose all the cities on coasts around the world if we allow global temperature to go up a few degrees Celsius."
David Suzuki Speaking in Santa Fe, November 2012
With Clayton Thomas-Müller at the Lensic Theater, a Lannan Foundation event, 7 November 2012.
"We say, 'Yeah yeah, but we'll have carbon capture and storage . . .' Wait a minute, Nature already did it! The tar sands oil is carbon captured and stored in the ground. Why do you want to dig it up and burn it and then go, 'Oh we gotta capture it, put it back in the ground.' It's already down there!"
Rainforest Action Network's executive director Becky Tarbotton, Oct 17, 2012.
- Watch the Becky Tarbotten memorial service and talks
Annie Brown's Review of Stephen Levine's "Planet Steward"
"Planet Steward: Journal of a Wildlife Sanctuary" is a breathtaking collection written by author and poet Stephen Levine during is one year stay at a natural sanctuary in Southern Arizona. Levine describes the land and his experiences in both prose and poetry. Set during a time of ongoing war and a growing environmental movement, Planet Steward is as relevant today as it was at the time of its publishing in 1974.
"The spiritual nature of this book is a reminder to environmental activists of the need for a change of perspective, a shift towards mindfulness and reverence, in order to create a sustainable future. Levine is a Buddhist and views the land he protects as sacred, a physical manifestation of our true nature. He writes, "One way or another man will see his spirit reflected in the eyes of his brothers - and in each blade of grass, as the bodhisattva's vow goes." Levine often uses the Tibetan Buddhist term, Tara, or the feminine form of bodhisattva, to describe the earth. She is living, a thing to be cared for, appreciated and spoken to."
"A poet, like a policeman, is always on duty" -Stephen Levine
(Read/Download Annie Brown's full review)
Annie Brown has written for and edited several publications in both the US and India, including Manushi Magazine and Microfinance Focus. Her research and writing focus on economics, microcredit, healthcare, women's empowerment, and the environment. Annie graduated summa cum laude from the College of William and Mary with bachelor's degrees in women's studies and history.
Planet Steward is out of print; however copies can be found from 3rd party dealers at Amazon.
Atmospheric CO2 Tops 400 ppm, White House Briefing on Accelerating Arctic Melt
Atmospheric CO2 was at 280 ppm at the start of the industrial revolution. By the time James Hansen first sounded the alarm about CO2 emissions and anthropogenic climate change at a Congressional hearing in 1988, the atmospheric CO2 concentration was averaging 350 ppm.
In 2000 we passed 370; in 2005, 380; in 2010, 390, and on May 10, the Mauna Loa Observatory announced we've officially passed 400 ppm.
The last time CO2 levels were this high, several million years ago, the human species did not yet exist, and sea levels were 100 feet higher. Last week, Ralph Keeling (son of Charles Keeling), director of the Scripps CO2 Program, said "I wish it weren't true but it looks like the world is going to blow through the 400 ppm level without losing a beat." And we just did.
The consensus is now that we have triggered important feedback processes and that the curve of warming- most particularly in the climatologically critical Arctic- is accelerating beyond the worst-case scenarios the IPCC drew up only a few years ago.
While US emissions were dropping, the slack was more than taken up by China and India (where much of our manufacturing is now done). The Times reported last December: "Global emissions of carbon dioxide were at a record high in 2011 and are likely to take a similar jump in 2012, scientists reported Sunday- the latest indication that efforts to limit such emissions are failing.
"Emissions continue to grow so rapidly that an international goal of limiting the ultimate warming of the planet to 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, established three years ago, is on the verge of becoming unattainable..."
Extreme weather, which is predicted by climate scientists to occur more frequently as the atmosphere warms and CO2 levels rise, has already been seen widely in 2013.
Tim Flannery, head of the Australian government's climate change commission, said "We are getting into new climatic territory. And when you get records being broken at that scale, you can start to see a shifting from one climate system to another. So the climate has in one sense actually changed and we are now entering a new series of climatic conditions that we just haven't seen before."
NBC News reports that "Climate Change Creates Maddening 'Weather Whiplash'". You've probably already noticed. But did you know that "Wild Weather Can Send Greenhouse Gases Spiraling"?
Meanwhile, a special briefing was called at the White House to discuss the possibility of the Arctic becoming ice free in the summer within two- yes, two years; those attending included NASA's acting chief scientist Gale Allen, the director of the Department of Homeland Security and the Pentagon.
The Guardian's Nafeez Ahmed reported May 2nd: "White House Warned On Imminent Arctic Ice Death Spiral"
Marine scientist Prof Carlos Duarte, director of the Oceans Institute at the University of Western Australia, one of 10 arctic specialists advising the briefing, said, "We know from the history of ice covering the planet along geological time scales that ice is a strongly non-linear element in the earth's system. It's one of the components that show very rapid, very abrupt changes and tipping points. So we expect that once the ice will be lost quickly from the Arctic and also from the shelves in Greenland, then other forces will be set in motion..."
Listen to Professor Carlos Duarte on Arctic Tipping Points
Related:
Climate change may happen more quickly than expected
In an article published Dec 15 in the journal Nature, a survey of 41 international experts led by University of Florida ecologist Edward Schuur shows models created to estimate global warming may have underestimated the magnitude of carbon emissions from permafrost over the next century. Its effect on climate change is projected to be 2.5 times greater than models predicted, partly because of the amount of methane released in permafrost, or frozen soil. (read more)
Two Degrees of Disaster
"Two years ago, at a meeting in Copenhagen, world leaders agreed on the goal of limiting global warming to two degrees Celsius, or roughly three and a half degrees Fahrenheit. The so-called Copenhagen Accord, which Barack Obama personally helped negotiate, contained no mechanism for meeting this goal, so even though the President called it a 'meaningful and unprecedented breakthrough', many others questioned whether it was worth the proverbial paper it was printed on. Unfortunately, it now seems, the many others had a point."
Elizabeth Kolbert, author of Field Notes from a Catastrophe, (2006), The New Yorker, Nov 11, 2011
IEA warns world headed for irreversible climate change in five years
"The world is likely to build so many fossil-fueled power stations, energy-guzzling factories and inefficient buildings in the next five years that it will become impossible to hold global warming to safe levels, and the last chance of combating dangerous climate change will be "lost for ever", according to the most thorough analysis yet of world energy infrastructure."
International Energy Agency Report: Four degrees and beyond
Capitalism vs. the Climate
Naomi Klein November 9, 2011 The Nation.
". . . This uneasy silence has persisted through the end of the hottest decade in recorded history and yet another summer of freak natural disasters and record-breaking heat worldwide. Meanwhile, the fossil fuel industry is rushing to make multibillion-dollar investments in new infrastructure to extract oil, natural gas and coal from some of the dirtiest and highest-risk sources on the continent (the $7 billion Keystone XL pipeline being only the highest-profile example). In the Alberta tar sands, in the Beaufort Sea, in the gas fields of Pennsylvania and the coalfields of Wyoming and Montana, the industry is betting big that the climate movement is as good as dead.
"If the carbon these projects are poised to suck out is released into the atmosphere, the chance of triggering catastrophic climate change will increase dramatically (mining the oil in the Alberta tar sands alone, says NASAs James Hansen, would be 'essentially game over' for the climate)."
Naomi Klein's Inconvenient Climate Conclusions
December 7. NYT DotEarth's Andrew Revkin does a Q & A with Naomi Klein about her article "Capitalism vs. The Climate"
Recent Developments in Religion and Ecology
A while back we posted an excerpt from a film about an inspiring man, the Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople. The 'Green Patriarch', as Bartholomew is known, has been working quietly for years to reawaken a sense of responsibility for Earth's nature within the Christian tradition. Here we look at some other voices in this field, notably the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology and the legacy of Thomas Berry. (see videos)
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Beekeeping Course Cancelled
Ecoversity will not be offering the beekeeping course this year. For more info, see our Beekeeping page
New at Biomagic:
The Fracking Industry's War on Truth
- Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Here Comes The Sun
Paul Krugman, NYTimes Nov 7
"Lets face it: a large part of our political class, including essentially the entire G.O.P., is deeply invested in an energy sector dominated by fossil fuels, and actively hostile to alternatives. This political class will do everything it can to ensure subsidies for the extraction and use of fossil fuels, directly with taxpayers money and indirectly by letting the industry off the hook for environmental costs, while ridiculing technologies like solar.
So what you need to know is that nothing you hear from these people is true. Fracking is not a dream come true; solar is now cost-effective. Here comes the sun, if were willing to let it in."
Japan quake, tsunami, multiple meltdowns: see our recent updates and resources here.
Alert: "Imprelis" herbicide
"The recently approved herbicide called Imprelis [DuPont], widely used by landscapers because it was thought to be environmentally friendly, has emerged as the leading suspect in the deaths of thousands of Norway spruces, eastern white pines and other trees on lawns and golf courses across the country."(story NYTimes)
Affiliated Blogs:
Biomagic
Monday's Poem
Jeff Harbour
Vortex-Eco
Heraclitus Report
DeChristopher Sentence: 2 Yrs.
"This is not going away. At this point of unimaginable threats on the horizon, this is what hope looks like. In these times of a morally bankrupt government that has sold out its principles, this is what patriotism looks like. With countless lives on the line, this is what love looks like, and it will only grow. The choice you are making today is what side are you on." - Tim DeChristopher speaking to the court at his sentencing.
Read the complete statement at the Biomagic blog
Listen to Robert Davis of Grist discussing the sentence and implications with Sam Sedar:
Record Tornado Onslaught
500 dead; over one thousand tornadoes in April-May. Parts of Tuscaloosa Alabama and Joplin Missouri are leveled by F4 and F5 'multivortex' storms. This is the biggest tornado assault in three quarters of a century, and now there are lots of cellphones, so we have some amazing video: tornadoes: videos and updates
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