The leaders are most often on the margins!!

 Hoorya for Bolvia! I hope they are able to stick to it.

It must have considerable merit, if Beshpin thinks it laughable..

MikePaterson,

W O W -- I so <3 living in the future!  That's awe some.

I will admit when I read this "Bolivia is set to pass the world's first laws granting all nature equal rights to humans." my magpie mind went into overdrive, imagining human sacrifices to nameless, ancient Nature dieties :3  Hey, I think I know some people who would really get into that!

And I'll drink to the laughing, Beshpin; reality is very funny, no matter how one looks at it.

When an honest person of integrity puts forward such a claim, I'd be more than happy to answer it.

Kudos to Bolivia for taking a leadership role.  Adopting the 16 Principles of the Earth Charter globally would be the next logical step to a sustainable planet and life on earth.

Idealism is good. The goals are admirable. The results are immeasurable.

I t is our divine duty to protect Mother Earth’s diversity, beauty and vitality and this duty is highlighted in the 16 principles of the Earth Charter.

1) Respect Earth and Life in all its diversity.

2) Care for the community of Life with compassion, understanding and love.

3) Build just democratic societies that are peaceful, participatory and sustainable.

4) Secure Earth’s beauty and bounty for posterity.

5) Protect and restore the integrity of Earth’s ecosystems, highlighting biodiversity and nature life sustaining processes.

6) Prevent harm to the environment.

7) Adopt patterns of production, consumption and reproduction that safeguard Earth’s regenerative capacities, human rights and community well being.

8) Advance the study of eco sustainability and promote eco knowledge.

9) Eradicate poverty ( Poverty is sin - Shaw ).

10) Ensure that economic activities and institutions at all levels, promote human development in a sustainable and in an equitable manner.

11) Affirm gender equality and equity as prerequisites to sustainable development and ensure universal access to education, health care and economic opportunity.

12) Uphold the rights of all, without discrimination, to a natural and social environment supportive of human dignity, bodily health and spiritual well being, with special attention to the rights of indigenous peoples and minorities.

13) Strengthen the democratic institutions at all levels, and provide transparency and accountability, in governance, inclusive participation in decision making, and access to justice.

14) Integrate into formal education and life long learning the knowledge, values and skills needed for life sustainable.

15) Treat all with respect and consideration.

16) Promote a culture of Nonviolence, tolerance and peace.

This is a cool video of the discovery of some new species worth protecting.

I'm glad someone is doing this. The specifics of what Bolivia is doing is bound to be flawed but by moving forward the specifics of that can be found and adjusted as necessary until good workable environmental law can be moved forward.

I think it's an incredible idea but I wonder about how it will be applied practically. 

And when we get good enough at genetic engineering, we'll be able to make our own species (as we already have done, but much more quickly...) and bring back old species.

To create our own diversity...

We are as G_ds...might as well get good at it.

EDIT:  and this, as well.  Time to give up our various Messiahs, that of Obama 'saving' us, or Harper, or some force in nature or supernature...it's US, baby, and life is a ride.

And if anyone disagrees with Mudder Oith, then the'll have to answer to Mudder Oith's Attitude Adjuster, Mr. Toots :3

I would have thought the tar sands would be a sufficient attitude adjuster for Canadians: a very sticky trap that is going to cost in the end as much as it pays Canada now... and will still leave us with an enduring monument to our short-term cupidity and credulity: a great scar across the centre of the country that will last generations. Good one, Canada!

You really want to live in a tar sands world?  

Bolivia has been ravaged by foreign (Western) resource companies that have found previous administrations in Bolivia open to corruption and intimidation.

So it is not JUST about forests, it is about the exploitation and impoverishment of people, it is about corrupt practice and  it is about the self-interested power of the countries that are mocking this move which, in fact, is a very courageous attempt by a weak and damaged nation to draw a moral line in the sand. We NEED to recognise the moral imperative it represents AS WELL as the environmental stand it is. It is a VERY practical and necessary step for for Bolivians. For Bolivians it is about survival, about hope for the lives of their children.... 

Or are the mockers here against that too?

How about an object that's more important to you than you job... like the object that makes it possible for you to eat, job or not? (That would be a survivable planet.) And I don't blame you for having a crap job. Without the tarsands, the alternatives could very well give you a better job. You're not a serving a sentence there, you're not in a chain gang... I'm sure you have more versatile skills than the ones you're exercising there... 

I have no idea. You should tell us. Your avatar suggests you're a shoe bomber, or you've stepped in something very strange. My reading would be that your work has something to do with engineering? Probably a specialist?

For all your often aggressively-pitched comments here, I do sense a good wit and a sharp mind there... which is why I reply as I do... so I'm sure there are options. 

I did much the same: worked in a jazz club six nights a week to put myself through university: dounble major in psychology and cross-cultural communications... I started as a dishwasher, progressed to kitchen hand/short-order cook and ended up manager; got called up for compulsory military service and did it with the navy. Then came to Canada to do postgrad at Queen's and got totally shafted by the system there, so went into news work. Finally got to do a PhD in Scotland when I was in my 50s -- and that made me totally unemployable (too old and overqualified). I bake (twice a week) and cook (daily) for pleasure (my wife is a ministers so she's on a 24/7 deal. I bring in some money as a freelance and contract writer; a pittance but it's good conscience satisfying work and i've seen a good chunk of the world through it.

You've got plenty to look forward to. You don't need the tarsands...

I might be working at M&M Meat Shops, and I have a Masters degree in Education. Their Dry Garlic Pork is so amazing, that at $10.25 an hour I can buy it in large quantities.

Not if the investment goes into less destructive energy strategies: it's happening in other parts of the world and our falling behind does us no long-term favours.

Our grandchildren are going to have reason to be seriously angry about the indifference and immediate self-interest of too many Canadians. Especally since it's a mistaken self-interest. It's not the workers who win; it's oil companies who are making record profits right now and they'll continue to do so as long as they can.

Good thing you're (supposedly) studying psych and not earth sciences.

Seriously though Besh, it's pretty obvious that, as usual, you're only in the thread because of your need to be contrary, which is an attempt to buffer your feelings of insecurity and inadequacy.

Which is why we understand that you will simply rail against anything that any of us think might be a good idea. Not because you particularly think it's a bad idea, but because it gets you attention.

I actually prefer the Fracophone term: les sables bitumineux (bituminous sands). It's accurate and not/less inflammatory.

The 'West' gets a lot of bad press about resource extraction: Largely Deserved!

But please note: China is now a major player in resource extraction around the world, as well as Russia. While Ezra Levant's book is possibly hyperbolic, the underlying theme of 'at least in Canada there are some rules' is a great starting point to Get Better Rules in place. For everyone.

 No more eating vegetables in Bolivia. It violates the rights of carrots, etc!

ps: Besh, I think that time is already happening.  WalMart's CEO has made a statement recently that their customer base is buying less because it has less money BECAUSE OF FUEL PRICES. 

The folk that are poised to benefit most from the ongoing situation (running out of oil) are those that are in the 'alternatives' business now.

.

For my degrees I worked at landscaping (50 to 60 hours a week, straight time--agricultural business don't have to pay overtime rates--, labourer in aluminum extrusion plant, trailer shop, parks plumbing, CPR Ogden shops; lab tech for a pipe plant; assistant blending plant operator for 3 summers).  Growing up in a working class familiy in a working class neighbourhood caused me to be a bit testy with the attitudes of some professionals who grew up in families with professionals for parents, and easily irritated by some entrepreneurs who forget that, without workers to produce the goods and services they sell, they wouldn't have a business.  Living in two worlds and closely watching the agricultural and business worlds causes me to be a bit reactive to those who simplistically present one side of an issue.  This is one of my big problems with Stephen Harper--his associates in the NCC and elsewhere bias his world view, leading to policies that have weak foundations.

As for the bitumenous sands and other hydrocarbon extraction, petroleum is too valuable for lubricants and as a base for petrochemicals to be in a rush to increase their use for fuel.  There are many other good sources of energy.  The rush to burn them also increases the release of materials into the environment that are harmful to human health.

Which puts us on equal footing then... at least in that matter.

Beshpin,

you'll like this

Liberal free speech activist and Lawyer Ezra Levant on the oil sands of Canada

Aren't we wonderful people... a bit squeaky creepy in the context of this guy's somewhat selectively-formed self-righteous conceit... but we get the idea: foreigners are all evil.

I wonder what he's mainlining... he looks very well groomed for an honest writer. Ad hominen... my bad!

There's the little issue of last week's fairly massive pipeline leak... clean, clean, clean...

Re the Athabasca, the cancer deaths are recent. 

MikePaterson, lovely man, these are for you

Onward forced agape

The Great Fallibist Holds Forth

Does democracy inhibit long-range thinking? Do these invisible, immaterial rules run us and not the other way around?

 For you, Whimsey:

MikePaterson,

thanks for the vid -- the music makes Nature raping Nature seem pretty :3

It's a shame that we're wasting so much oil on things like fuel for pleasure transportation...

I also wonder how many artefacts and ancient habitations are being destroyed?

Is this place another Aral Sea?

I remember I went to one of these 'get rich' schemes, just to see what it was like, and they were saying to invest in the Oil Sands because that is one of the things that is still going to be profitable no matter what the market is doing...it was a strange experience, being told that they aren't into the hard sell, but also being told that everyone there had 3 days to make up their minds wether to invest or not...there was another bizarre thing, where they gave away, to people who came with partners, I think it was $100, 000, with the caveat that it be invested in businesses locally.

For those who are interested, talking aboot the environment here, the Henry Ford Museum has the one surviving example of R. Buckminster Fuller's Dymaxion house.  Who was the environmentalist before environmentalism existed?  Who was this guy who was dealing with humanity's footprint before the concept even was in the public domain?  Click on the link to find out this hero who paved the way for the rest of us to follow :3

Also found within that link is another link to more amazement:  we're gonna be able to PRINT BUILDINGS :3

On the subject of saving mother Earth:  those schmart, tough, forward-looking Japanese unveiled a plan to provide for ALL OF OUR ENERGY NEEDS...

It'll be interesting to see which country/corporation gets a more-or-less permanent base on then moon first...hopefully, it won't be anyone TOO terrible, that could lob rocks at Earth just for fun...

And hey, we all can then start making John Koenig jokes for 'real'...:3

MikePaterson,

Why not invest in technology and social change that will, say, force polluters to have more agape for the organisms and the nature around them by having them hooked up to these organisms and nature so that, while they pollute, they get to experience the pain and suffering that these organisms and that nature goes through?

Sound like a potential idea?

Oh, and on the nifty front, it looks like there is going to be intelligent life on Earth:  scientists have created a brain (very simple), that has a short-term memory of 12 seconds.  And they have created the first artificial 'yes/no' neuron.  So Earth is well on its way of having intelligent life for the first time :3  Imagine all the leisure time we'll have :3 (go ask Steve Wozniak -- he says we'll be well-cared for pets).

I thing the agape thing is happening: human induced climate change has been affecting spring run-offs from the Rockies and the consistency of the flow which is getting increasingly out of synch with agricultural needs in the western U.S. now and in western Canada in the future... too bad the economy isn't a bit more resilient, what?

I thing the agape thing is happening: human induced climate change has been affecting spring run-offs from the Rockies and the consistency of the flow which is getting increasingly out of synch with agricultural needs in the western U.S. now and in western Canada in the future... too bad the economy isn't a bit more resilient, what?

I am very pessimistic about the environmental future.  

Can we really say to the Chinese: Sorry, we had our Industrial Revolution but we screwed up and now there is too much carbon in the atmosphere, so now you must stay poor and not burn coal?   

The problems of trying to replace coal and oil burning are just overwhelming.  There is simply no good solution.  For a while, it like nuclear power might stage a comeback.  Now that seems in doubt too.

Wind and solar are fine as far as they go, but cannot provide anything like 100% because they are not constant--they vary.  

In Germany, where nuclear power was never very popular, the politicians have now agreed to close all the nuclear power plants within 10 years or so (in the wake of the Japan accident).  

They are talking about wind power from huge wind farms in the sea to the north of Germany (and it is windy there).    But there are huge problems with this--a whole new and very large network of high power transmission lines will be required to bring this energy from the north to central and souther Germany, but people don't like transmission lines either!  They protest them furiously.

They will end up burning more coal (they have lots of it), I can just see it happening (I have read quite about this too and I not alone in my pessimism).

If climate change seriously impacts agricultural production, there will be major impacts on the market for other energy users.  If all countries adopt a cost of production pricing for fossil fuels where the costs include environmental costs and social costs, there might be a reduction in demand.  They are also accessing seas of natural gas that are on the verge of making coal and oil non-competitive in terms of cost.

Whatever happens, the earth will continue, and humans endured far harsher changes in climate with much less technology than we have.  humans will persist, though our numbers may end up being substantially reduced.

Yes, the USA is in serious need to be taken over by a foreign power so that it will adopt the post-Empire attitude and stop trying to make the world totally safe, which is doing far more damage imho.

What I think will happen is the Catastrophic Climate Change movement will die off (it already is in the throes of mellowing) and focus instead on adaptation, of being water instead of being stone and do things like work with China so that, to accomodate China's coal and such, the USA will intentionally have more topsoil to suck up the CO2.

(I think the mere fact that humanity is on Earth means that things are gonna heat up -- no CO2 necessary -- we produce heat, our machines produce heat, etc etc.  I don't think we will be able to 'forever' control anthropogenic heat generation, but we can try to manage it, as long as we're still living on Earth, which means we'll have to, I think, eventually modify the economy of 'more GDP via more consumers' idea)

And follow what Japan wants to do, have solar panels on the Moon, where there is no weather at all, so we all can get constant energy and stop wasting fossil fuels on frivolous things like cars for fun and leave it for important things, like computers and hospitals.

I think that humanity will survive this -- technology gets 'better' as time goes on.

Yes, Jim & Whimsey, things will go on, somehow.   Perhaps I am overly pessimistic.  I certainly hope so.

By the way, natural gas also produces carbon, although not as much as coal.

There are schemes like trying to block some of the sunlight coming to the Earth. 

Some scientists do not think it is a coincidence that global warming "took off" (i.e., became very noticeable) a decade or so after the Western industrialized nations put in pollution controls for particulates and sulphur.  The haze you see over China (and used to see at times over places like London) blocked sunlight, so although the pollution was bad for people's health, it counter-acted the warming effect by blocking some of the sunlight.

Here are some other ways we can help 'Mother Earth', want to really show the world you're a Christian?

Hungry?  Stop buying all that rainforest-murdering beef and eat some meat made from human poo.  And stop being such prudes and freaks and get down to the Mother Nature saving (and tasty) eating insects.  Here's the case for it.

Why live with a mortgage which only serves to make Mammon even stronger and ends up increasing your carbon footprint?  After all, how much space do you REALLY need to live?

Tired of all the smugness going around?  Then drive around this baby!  6 mpg!

Whimsey:

Where did you find these things!   Hilarious. 

Good for Bolivia to take on this kind of Leadership.  I especially applaud the point about not altering cellular structure. 

You will see Corporate Social Responsibility in the Annual reports of many publicly traded companies.  Here is an excerpt from a forest products company  " Canfor is committed to the responsible stewardship of the forest resources entrusted to our care.  Canfor's operations are located on public land, thus public acceptance of our forestry practices is imperative for us to remain in business.  So too is recognition by our customers that Canfor's forest stewardship meets their expectations."  We can extract the resources from the earth in a sustainable manner.  

My daughter leaves in about a week for Bolivia with Canada World Youth for three months.  She did a research paper two years ago for her thesis for her honours degree on the status of women around the world and Bolivia was one of the countries she used for comparisons.  Bolivia in several ways is much more civilized  and progressive than Canada.

FROM: issue 2818 of New Scientist magazine, page 4:

A new report by the International Programme on the State of the Ocean(IPSO) assesses how climate change, overexploitation, pollution, habitat loss and other stressors are affecting the ocean as a whole.

The conclusion? We're on course for a mass extinction that would include coral reefs and the menagerie of species that rely on them, as well as multiple species of fish consumed by people, although it may not be as severe as the "big five" extinctions of Earth's distant past.

"We're seeing a combination of symptoms that have been associated with large, past extinctions," says Alex Rogers, the head of IPSO.

Rogers says the biggest problem is the rapid pace of climate change, which is "virtually unprecedented". The closest comparison is the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum of 55 million years ago, when 2.2 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide was released every year for millennia and many deep-sea species were wiped out. Today we release over 25 gigatonnes every year.

Many harmful factors combine to cause additional damage. For instance, the oceans are acidifying as a result of CO2 dissolving in the water, and this makes corals more susceptible to "bleaching".

Rogers recommends nothing less than slashing CO2 emissions, establishing Marine Protected Areas covering up to one-third of the ocean, and restoring marine ecosystems.

I saw the report about our oceans on the news today. Although not terribly surprising, still horrible.

Also, read about a young guy in Oregon who peed in an open water reservoir...so they flushed 8 million gallons of water out because of the "yuck factor" ...such a waste.

Would anyone be interested in starting a social action/ environmental action topic (or both) on here, dedicated to social and environmental efforts and ways to take action...alerts about new initiatives, community efforts, petitions, letters to MPs etc. ? Innovative ways to get involved? 

It is too much for me, being a pessimist.  I can't even bring myself to read the whole thing.

Thank goodness for the internet -- going going gone are the old days where we relied on our various 'saviours' to 'fix' our problems, now we have this internet (GLOBAL AGAPE EVERYONE!!!) bringing together innovaters who will try to 'fix' IPSO*'s problem.

It's amazing the endless opportunities universe gives us.  Bless Hir :3

* hopefully IPSO doesn't suffer from the same problems as the IPCC; part of their data came from Greenpeace.  Science gotta be neutral; no oil company involvement, no Greenpeace involvement :3

Mother Nature,

tired of those bits of yourself mussing up your hairdo with all their effluents?  Don't stop at just convincing some of those naked beach apes into giving you rights to strip mine them and consume them...

Time to get back!  Get them while they're not ready, before they become capitalist!

You can show them the error of their ways in their madcap movement to keep sucking your toxic life fluids!

Heck, you could have fun at the same time as enacting some revenge on those little pests who dwell inside you!

You could invent new games, like "Outrun the Nuee Ardente", "Name that pyroclastic flow" and "Lake Nyos hold your breath!".  They'd FLOCK to these.

Keep up the good work with your pollution!  Your algal blooms, eruptive mountains and leaking toxic chemicals are doing well!  And with the help of your Space Sisters and Brothers (gamma ray bursts, supernovae, asteroids, the variable sun, and such) you've got it made, Mother!

With enough effort, you would be able to enjoy peace and quiet...that is, until your Space Brothers & Sisters decided to visit you and put you out of their misery; something those past-gone naked beach apes could have helped you with.

GOOD ONE, AUSSIES!

From NEW SCIENTIST:

Australia's 500 biggest polluters will pay A$23 (US$24.6) per tonne of carbon emitted into the atmosphere from July next year.

The country has one of the highest rates of greenhouse gas emissions per head of population in the developed world. The population of 22.6 million is responsible for around 1.3 per cent of the world's carbon dioxide emissions.

By 2020, the new carbon tax plan should cut Australia's carbon emissions by 5 per cent, relative to 2000 levels. This adds up to around 159 million tonnes of carbon pollution – equivalent to removing 45 million cars from the road, according to the Australian government. And by 2050 the government is promising to reduce its carbon emissions by 80 per cent, relative to 2000 levels.

The scheme was announced by Australia's prime minister Julia Gilliard in anaddress to the nation on Sunday. "We are going to create a clean energy future," she said.

The price of carbon, initially fixed at A$23 per tonne, will rise by 2.5 per cent each year in real terms until July 2015. After that date an emissions trading scheme will be introduced.

A$10 billion of the expected revenue from the package will go towards funding low pollution measures, energy efficiency initiatives and renewable energy technologies including solar, wind and geothermal power. Other revenue will go towards improving energy efficiency in the manufacturing sector, training support to move people from jobs in polluting industries, and tax cuts so the cost of living doesn't rise for most Australians.

"The package is not perfect," says Don Henry, executive director of theAustralian Conservation Foundation. The starting price of carbon is "less than ACF called for", he says, but it is a "foundation on which we can build a low-carbon economy".

Some Mother Nature Home Movies

Bears were never meant to fly

No rest for the weary, Mother Nature?

It looks like one of your games has already caught on; good marketing

One of the many places where you have been poisoning yourself for the past 10 centuries, pumping in that toxic pollutant, CO2, into your ocean and murdering your kin.  Why do you treat them with such cruelty, don't you love them?

But hurry up, your Space Sisters & Brothers are waiting...

Seems the Aussies are just stringing a line....

Scientist Fred Pearse writes:

Australia's shiny new carbon tax, announced this week, is unlikely to change the country's status as the largest per-capita emitter of greenhouse gases in the developed world.

Loopholes threaten to undermine its modest promise to cut emissions by 5 per cent by 2020.

First, emissions from forestry, farming and cars are exempt from the tax. These are a significant omission. Some years, deforestation is responsible for as much as a quarter of Australia's emissions.

Second, the biggest emitters are being protected. Prime minister Julia Gillard has promised tax rebates to key industries, including electricity generation and steel makers of between 66 and 94.5 per cent. The scale of the rebates may undermine the incentive to cut emissions.

Australia's climate policies have a long history of being confused and contradictory. It signed up to the Kyoto Protocol in 1997, but only after securing permission to increase its emissions by 8 per cent.

Kyoto targets

Since 1990, the baseline year for the Kyoto targets, its emissions from burning fossil fuels have in fact risen by around 30 per cent – more, even, than US emissions but it has, in effect, offset its rising industrial emissions by reducing deforestation: levels in 1990 were particularly high.

Gillard reports that emissions are growing by 2 per cent a year, but says her carbon taxes would set the country on course for a 5 per cent reduction in emissions by 2020 relative to levels in 2000. But, once again, this ignoresemissions from forests and farming. What's more, the decision to set a target relative to 2000 emissions is strategic. The growth in emissions between 1990 and 2000 means a 5 per cent reduction amounts to significantly less when put in the context of 1990 emissions.

In fact, the target could allow Australia to increase its emissions. According to Bill Hare, chief scientist at the non-governmental organisation Climate Analytics, once deforestation and the base year are taken into account a 5 per cent reduction could see Australia's real emissions as much as 26 per cent higher than 1990 levels by 2020. It is a far cry from the call of scientists at the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change for cuts in emissions from developed nations of 25 to 40 per cent by 2020.