I wrote a new blog entry about our perceptions of nature, old pyrenean forests, time and fluid flows, and how connecting to the natural world can drive us to act. Hope you enjoy it 💚 #nature#ecology#research#forests
If you haven't yet followed the blog through Mastodon, you can do it by following either the handle @lookingup.francois-rincon.org@lookingup.francois-rincon.org (all future posts, included invited ones), or @Francois (just my author's posts)
I need to seriously reduce my time looking at screens, my eyes are virtually hurting.
What are your favourite podcasts? A bit nerdy, informative, deep dives, tech, ecology, queerfeminist discussions, Asia-Pacific.
I'm thinking in the lines of Cultures of Energy, @mel_hogan Data Fix, @parismarx Tech won't Safe Us, @emergencemagazine, Wohlstand für Alle, You're Wrong About, ... but also some format I do not have on my radar. @sts@academicchatter
Today in Labor History March 2, 1997: Earth First! Activist, feminist and IWW labor organizer Judi Bari died. Bari, and her comrade, Darryl Cherney, survived a terrorist bomb attack in Oakland, CA in 1990, when they were organizing Redwood Summer, a 3-month campaign of nonviolent direct actions, during the summer of 1990, to end the clear-cutting of northern California redwood forests. The police and FBI immediately blamed her for the bombing, claiming that she was the terrorist and that the bomb was intended for logging companies. They arrested her and handcuffed her to her hospital bed, as she lay there with a shattered pelvis. Bari and Cherney were eventually exonerated and won a settlement for the FBI’s role in violating their civil liberties. The bomber was never caught. In addition to their organizing and activism, Bari and Cherney were also musical composers and performers. Their song, “Will the Fetus Be Aborted,” (to the tune of “Will the Circle Be Unbroken,”) was performed by Jello Biafra and Mojo Nixon on their Prairie Home Invasion album.
Bari was instrumental in organizing Local 1 of the IWW, an effort to unite timber workers and environmentalists around the same goal of ending the clear-cutting of the forests. Some of the actions during Redwood Summer included preparing breakfast at base camp and getting it to the timber workers at 5 am, before they began work, in an effort to talk with them and organize them. Redwood Summer, as a whole, was well-organized. Veteran Direct-Action activists hosted numerous organizing events in the months that preceded the actions, to train activists in their legal rights, direct action tactics, security, jail solidarity, etc. However, there was little to no training in labor organizing or class solidarity. Consequently, at least for the actions in which I participated, the conversations with timber workers tended toward privileged activists talking down to the workers, telling them how they should be thinking and acting, and the timber workers yelling at them and threatening them. One environmentalist was clobbered with an axe handle. Others were attacked with rocks. And on at least one occasion, assailants fired guns at base camp. Overall, the actions did not stop the clear cutting of the forests, but they did slow things down for a while, and they did reduce Louisiana Pacific’s profits.
Copper beard orchids (Calochilus campestris) near Mallacoota, VIC - colourful heathland plants with wider beards + longer dark hairs than other forms of this variable orchid growing nearby (and flowering earlier) in roadside gravel.
It is called a blanket bog because the peat, which holds water, extends across both the hills and the glens.
The peatland has been building up for about 9,000 years and each metre of depth represents about a millennium.
Zizek explores many different ideologies that crop up around the topic of ecological disaster.
I don't agree with everything he says. I'm sharing this nevertheless, because it made me think if the reason for my objections is due to the text hitting too close to home.
The Visualizing Biological Data 2024 workshop (VIZBI), March 13-15 in Los Angeles, looks very interesting. Speakers will discuss visualization in areas like #genetics, #cellBiology and #ecology. Participants can present a poster and lightning talk. Mine will cover neuVid, which simplifies video production with #Blender3D. Here it is showing some #Drosophila neurons from the FlyWire data set, using #AI to parse my natural language description of the video.
Hey Fedi!
I'm writing an argumentative essay about why cats should not be allowed outdoors unsupervised. If anyone of you have some cool papers relating to this I can read about and add, that'd be very helpful :D
An overturned vessel has caused a huge oil spill along Trinidad and Tobago’s coastline, in what the Caribbean country’s prime minister described as a “national emergency” on Sunday. The spill occurred on February 7 off the southern shores of the Tobago Island, according to the country’s Office of Disaster Preparedness...
'The DSI and the IDI, with support from the 11th Hour Project, launched a new tool called PalmWatch on Feb. 22. Using rigorous data science and advanced, low-cost data visualization methods, PalmWatch traces palm oil supplies from the ground level, where the environmental and social impacts of palm oil cultivation occur, to the consumer brands that use the oil in their products.'
We love being surprised and this story did that! A radical proposal to bring back beavers to New York City.
From Slate: "While you may think that a concrete jungle is not the right place for an animal that clogs up streams with dams, I’m here to tell you that restoring a population of urban beavers could help bring New York City—and, perhaps, other cities like it—into a more prosperous, ecological future."
Does anyone out there in the Fediverse know whether anyone is reporting on the ecological cost of the war in #Ukraine?
I was just looking at the combat zones and I have to imagine some places are experiencing complete food-chain collapse, mass deforestation, displacement, etc.
I’d also love any suggestions if you have reading on ecological recovery post-conflict in general.
Might post back if I find anything interesting myself!
Plummeting prices for solar power and storage make global climate transition cheaper than expected: Study
In just the past 10 years, the cost of electricity from solar has fallen by 87 percent, and the cost of battery storage by 85 percent. Wind power, heat pumps and other fossil-free technologies are also experiencing a sharp drop in prices
That the #RSPB's Tweet is considered far more controversial than the #UK government's greed, #Corruption and ransacking of the #Environment is all you need to know about the #Politics of 'civility'. #Tory liars indeed.
‘Well below 2°C’ Paris Agreement goal will be met, says forecasting consortium
The consortium, whose approach is conceptually distinct from that of scenarios produced by the International Energy Agency (IEA) or the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, sees temperatures peaking at 1.7°-1.8°C by the 2040s, with net zero carbon dioxide emissions by 2060 and net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2080
Most respondents – 57 per cent – believe Australia has started to feel the effects of climate change. But only 15 per cent say climate change is an extremely serious problem now.
About eight per cent think its effects will be felt within the next decade and 13 per cent say they’ll be apparent within 50 years
Celebrating #seagrass with new works by #gamelan group #RhythmInBronze in #SeruanSetu - "Secret Gardens of the Sea". Composers, musicians, videographers, directors & production team first spent several days with the #fishers of #TanjungKupang to understand the habitat & its vital role.
Mysterious oil spill sparks national emergency in Trinidad and Tobago (edition.cnn.com)
An overturned vessel has caused a huge oil spill along Trinidad and Tobago’s coastline, in what the Caribbean country’s prime minister described as a “national emergency” on Sunday. The spill occurred on February 7 off the southern shores of the Tobago Island, according to the country’s Office of Disaster Preparedness...
Ancient redwoods recover from fire by sprouting 1000-year-old buds (www.science.org)
After a devastating conflagration, trees regrow using energy stored long ago