Category: By Other Authors

By Guy McPherson: Climate-Change Summary and Update: The Case for Near Term Extinction

I’ve followed Guy McPherson for years. I do not have the ability to validate every point he makes, but he speaks thoughtfully and rationally, and his prediction that things will get worse quickly have to date been more accurate than the predictions by the majority of climate scientists, including the IPCC, which present impossibly optimistic futures, including the need for carbon capture and sequestration in their only scenario that might allow business as usual, without telling us they are assuming a non-existent and probably impossible technology, while at the same time ignoring realistic sea level rise models.

So this paper by Guy deserves a careful read, and even if some of his points are too pessimistic, he makes a good case that we are in serious trouble.

I like to think there are degrees of bad, and we might still be able chose a path less bad, but only if the majority of people on the planet reduce their consumption and family sizes, now. But that will require the majority to override their evolved behavior, so the prognosis is not good, to say the least.

http://guymcpherson.com/climate-chaos/climate-change-summary-and-update/

By Chris Martenson: In Denial: We Pursue Endless Growth At Our Peril

Head In Sand

Chris Martenson wrote a pretty good piece today.

“Perhaps it was my own blind spot(s) that prevented me from really appreciating just how powerful human denial really is. But here we are, 40 years after the Club of Rome and 7 years after the Great Financial Accident of 2008, collectively pretending that neither was a sign warning of the dangers we face — as a global society — if we continue our unsustainable policies and practices that assume perpetual growth.”

In Denial: We Pursue Endless Growth At Our Peril

By Gail Zawacki: Perspective and Inspiration by Albert Camus

A video on the philosopher Albert Camus found and introduced by Gail Zawacki that provides some excellent perspective and inspiration.

“I find solace in learning more about Camus because for me his ideas ring true not only to what is known in the sciences – from evolution to geology and climate – but his conjectures also fit perfectly with all I have personally learned in my sixty years revolving around the sun.

His observations – such that humans are “irredeemably corrupt and violent” – still leave room for great joy and love, even within the spectre of inevitable death, and the meaningless indifference of the universe to our demise.  His work firmly places puny human concerns into context of the fanatic demands of organized religions (both ancient and modern), and even, more recently, desperate woowoo dogma, with the same craven desires for spirit, divinity, soul and consciousness.  As the narrater in the video says, “Once you properly realize that life is absurd you’re on the verge of despair perhaps…but also compelled to live life more intensely”.”

http://witsendnj.blogspot.ca/2015/05/he-refuses-to-lie.html

By Gail Zawacki: The Silent War on Trees

Here is an excellent musical meditation on the impact of ozone on trees by Gail Zawacki.

“Ozone is invisible but highly toxic air pollution. As the background level increases, trees that absorb it are poisoned and become more susceptible to insects, disease and fungus. Epidemic attacks are causing forests to decline around the world. More info at WarOnTrees.blogspot.com”

“I am old enough to remember learning about plate tectonics in college, when students were still cautioned that it was a controversial proposition.  I was incredulous that something so brilliantly, obviously true could still be considered unproven.  However, there have been many theories that were treated as heretical when first unveiled – gravity, evolution, the origin of ulcers, and the dangers of tobacco smoking all come to mind.  It is my hope that someday soon, the notion – that spewing poisons known to be toxic to vegetation into the atmosphere at ever increasing rates must and has achieved a threshold that is intolerable to trees – will become crystal clear as well.  It is in that spirit that I made the film.  Please follow the links, and leave any questions in the comments, or email me at witsendnj@yahoo.com.”

By Steve Keen: Production, Entropy and Monetary Macroeconomics (economy and thermodynamics)

Here is Steve Keen, the world’s best economist, linking the economy with thermodynamics.

98% of the economists in the world are too stupid to understand this stuff.

As a consequence all of the economic models that our world leaders use to make decisions ignore the most important variables: energy, waste, and debt.

And we blindly race towards the cliff…

By Gail Zawacki: A Fine Frenzy (trees and ozone)

I just finished reading this superb essay by Gail Zawacki.

Ground level ozone, and its impact on trees, may be the most important ecological problem no one has heard of, myself included. It is particularly worrisome because planting trees, in addition to shrinking our lifestyles, may be the only effective means of making climate change less bad.

http://witsendnj.blogspot.ca/2014/07/a-fine-frenzy-universal-dance-of.html

Gail has also written a book on the demise of trees that you can download for free here:

http://witsendnj.blogspot.ca/p/pillage-plunder-pollute-llc.html

 

By Dave Cohen: Adventures in Flatland

This three part series titled “Adventures in Flatland” by Dave Cohen is a must read for anyone seeking to understand our predicament.

http://www.declineoftheempire.com/…/adventures-in-flatland.…

http://www.declineoftheempire.com/…/adventures-in-flatland-…

http://www.declineoftheempire.com/…/adventures-in-flatland-…