Global Change: Intersection of Nature and Culture
The purpose of this forum is to explore big questions about society and environmental change, such as
- What does the good life mean in the 21st Century?
- How do personal choices and values play a role in this conversation?
- What do the natural sciences have to say about the way our world is changing?
- What do the social sciences and humanities have to say about the ways that the social and the cultural intersect with questions surrounding environment?
- How can we address environmental and social challenges at the same time?
- How is environmentalism changing in response to these pressures?
- What’s the role of higher education in facilitating sustainability and environmental literacy?
There are a lot of environment blogs that assess daily political battles on energy and climate. Others take a “100 things you can do to save the environment” approach. And many others provide a laundry list of daily news, from solar panels to tree frogs to Copenhagen to sea ice, and so on. Those approaches are useful and helpful, especially for fast-moving matters like policy. But they sometimes lose sight of the big questions we need to be asking in our quest to develop a more ecologically sustainable and socially just world. The blogosphere delivers a great deal, but it also fails in making important interdisciplinary connections that foster a more-sophisticated, substantive analysis.
globalchangeblog.com forges a new path (to visit the blog, click here). I want to analyze environmental change by focusing on the interaction between nature and culture, showcasing big ideas from all disciplines —sociology/anthropology, ethics, ecology and other natural sciences, psychology, history, political science, ethnic studies, religion, literature, visual and performing arts, and so on.
I hope this forum will provide the creative space to attract the best and most-interesting ideas for how we might get to a more ecologically sustainable and socially just world. I hope that the constellation of posts can lead to a more useful integration of ideas around these big questions.
Join this group to read posts and participate in the discussion.
An invitation to visit Solar Utopia, another future is possible! Website
Go to our website www.solarUtopia.org which features our peer-reviewed report "A Solar Transition is Possible" with important updates, including an estimate of how much conventional petroleum is needed to bring about a full solar transition in just a few decades while supplying all of humanity with the rough minimum 3.5 kilowatt/person, the necessary condition for a state of the science life expectancy and quality of life. Also test out our two calculators, one relating to our model of solar transition, the other the Energy Calculator that will connect power and energy units.
Best wishes,
Capitalism with a Human Face: A Proposal for the Establishment of a Sustainable Capitalism.
Capitalism with a Human Face:
A Proposal for the Establishment of a Sustainable Capitalism.
online: http://www.modelearth.org/modest.html
Signs of Change National e-Conference
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Our experiences and expectations define our reality. We have heard so much about what is wrong, and what is unsustainable.
The Signs of Change National e-Conference is a national conversation showcasing the signs of change, no matter how small. The conference is not an academic talk fest. Businesses from all fields, Transition Town groups, Farmers, Faith Organisations and Experts are giving evidence of a path other than business as usual.
Citizens Dividend
With the Green Tax Shift and Green Subsidy Shift, reform the flow of public revenue. End subsidies, especially the destructive ones such as to agribusiness and the rest of corporate welfare. Shift taxes off wages, useful enterprises, and buildings, and onto pollution, extraction, and locations respectively. Note that the Property Tax Shift -- off improvements, onto land -- always drives efficient land use. Compact cities are what cut demand for energy and release minimal pollutants; it has worked wherever tried.
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