Fantastic photos of Saturday’s lunar eclipse.
Category Archives: hippie
Facts and fictions about climate change
“It has become fashionable in some parts of the UK media to portray the scientific evidence that has been collected about climate change and the impact of greenhouse gas emissions from human activities as an exaggeration. Some articles have claimed that scientists are ignoring uncertainties in our understanding of the climate and the factors that affect it. Some have questioned the motives of the scientists who have presented the most authoritative assessments of the science of climate change, claiming that they have a vested interest in ‘playing up’ the potential effects that climate change is likely to have.
This document examines twelve misleading arguments (presented in bold typeface) put forward by the opponents of urgent action on climate change and highlights the scientific evidence that exposes their flaws.”
This PDF from the Royal Society, A guide to facts and fictions about climate change, goes through the evidence (or lack of) for claims like ‘Many scientists do not think that climate change is a problem’, ‘There is little evidence that global warming is happening or, if it is happening, it is not very much’, ‘Even if climate change is occurring, it won’t be that dangerous’ and ‘There is no evidence that climate change will be bad for people. In fact, warmer weather will actually be good for those people who live in cold countries’.
So the next time someone says “there’s no point doing anything about global warming because…” you can point them to that document.
Depressing reading:
‘Tourism is already out of control, and unless the Cambodian government takes some pretty radical action to rein it in now much of Angkor’s magic and heritage could be lost forever.’ Guardian
Yes, blah blah blah, I’m even getting sick of hearing myself crap on about it. But how do I reconcile my travel bug with my hippydom? Is going by rail or road where possible, and flying less and staying longer really enough?
“Travel educates and broadens the mind, and connects us to the rest of the world – which is especially important for Australians.
But how can we do it without being environmental vandals, especially as poor nations are expected to suffer the most from climate change?” Age
Social justice vs the environment vs all a Guardian readers’ issues in one complicated bouquet in this BBC article.
To me the easy answer is ‘don’t buy out-of-season flowers’. Ok, I know it’s not that simple, but it doesn’t seem like European or African flowers are entirely ethical and green, so maybe buying flowers like this just isn’t realistic anymore.
In other news, I think I just saw a robin in the garden. I’ve never seen a robin before!
I went on a tree planting holiday with Treesponsibility on the weekend. It was too snowy to do any planting on the Saturday so we went for walks instead, but on Sunday most of the snow had melted, and the sun even came out. It was lovely to get out of London, and even nicer to do something proactive for the environment. Treesponsibility are based in the Upper Calder Valley but it would be ace if similar projects were available all over the UK.
A quick round up of travel sites that have been mentioned in various papers recently. I haven’t used any of them myself yet, so bear that in mind that these aren’t exactly recommendations.
yoursafeplanet.co.uk is “a global community of local people who can offer information and support for travellers”, for a fee.
travellersconnected.co.uk is another online community with forums, photo galleries and journals.
thelmandlouise.com is “an online community of women worldwide which enables members to meet like-minded women, find travel companions and fulfil their aspirations”.
While on the subject of travel, this documentary tells you everything you need to know about eating Japanese food. If you try it out let me know how you get on.
“Supermarket chain Tesco pledged last night to revolutionise its business to become “a leader in helping to create a low-carbon economy” with a raft of new measures to help combat climate change.
In the most significant step announced yesterday, the UK’s biggest retailer, which produces 2m tonnes of carbon a year in the UK, said it would put new labels on every one of the 70,000 products it sells so that shoppers can compare carbon costs in the same way they can compare salt content and calorie counts.” Guardian
“The UK government is to set standards for carbon offsetting schemes to bring “greater clarity” to the industry.
…
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has named just four offset providers that meet its new guidelines -Pure, Global Cool, Equiclimate and Carbon Offsets.”
BBC