Climate Concerns

Comment

Comment by Ruth Anthony-Gardner on February 10, 2013 at 10:47am

Comment by Ruth Anthony-Gardner on February 6, 2013 at 12:21am

Methane levels rising from 2009 to 2013. See the measurement maps.

The increase is visually dramatic.

Comment by Joan Denoo on February 5, 2013 at 2:22pm

Alan Perlman

"This intellectual achievement by humanity centers on a fundamentally political failure that pits things like mainstream monotheistic religious beliefs and economic hegemony, - and against science." 

~ Alan Perlman

I agree with you. I think religion has become our enemy. It sounds simplistic and sophomoric, but that makes it even more feasible. 

If one believes the Earth is created for man, and if Earth is to be exploited at the pleasure of man, the basic underlying principle creates the kind of thinking that allows misuse and overuse of Earth's rich resources. Male dominance is a real issue, but not the entire story. 

If one starts at the individual level, the belief that man, male, is supreme over everything else, the distortion begins. Years ago, 36 years ago, I attended a workshop in which Elizabeth Dodson Gray, author of "Green Paradise Lost" and "Patriarchy As a Conceptual Trap", spelled out these  ideas for me the first time. 

"Elizabeth Dodson Gray, in her book "Green Paradise Lost", suggests that much of the reason has to do with our hierarchical model for the spiritual and physical world. She draws a pyramid depicting the following categories, in descending order: God, men, women, children, animals, plants, and nature. Each category has dominion over the ones below.

"Whether we realize it or not, most of us are still operating by this worldview. We fail to recognize that it is outmoded, dangerous, and fundamentally incorrect. Men continue to exploit women, expecting unlimited fertility and obedience. Men also continue to treat their children as personal property, to be used for whatever ends fit their desires. Men raise animals for food under unspeakably inhumane conditions, and nonchalantly murder their wild cousins in the name of sport. Men have even learned to manipulate plants, first by hybridization and monoculture, and now with biotechnology. Nature itself forms the ignominious base of this pyramid: the most contemptible and defenseless of all."

~ Customer reviewer Gregory C. Wilcox

I don't agree with the reviewer that Earth is the most defenseless of all; Earth has the upper hand; she will wipe human life and even all living forms off the planet because of natural forces that have nothing to do with what humans want. 

Books by Elizabeth Dodson Gray I highly recommend her books. She is a theologian who "worked out for herself a feminist critique of our male-dominated culture." She started me on my journey of understanding patriarchy, ecofeminism, women's interpretation of religious matters. I, however, have come to the decision that there is no evidence of god. 

 

Comment by Joan Denoo on February 5, 2013 at 1:35pm

My response to Belinda Denoo, Africa, can you spell out the problems, as you see them? By being clear and specific, you may find others who share your thinking.
For example, as I read news from around the world, not commercial news, but health reports, climate experts, labor unions, business news, news from different nations, and different political points of view, I can mesh together what I think is happening and why.
There is a high probability I misinterpret what I read, so I have to keep that in mind, always.
In matters of climate change, I think normal climate change plays a role, but the major role is human caused pollution with particulates from using fossil fuels. What changes we see cause the Earth to adjust, as only Earth can do. Weather becomes unstable, fierce storms occur, rising ocean levels become obvious, even the prediction of 69 foot rise in ocean levels over the next 50 or 100 years.
If that prediction is accurate, than all major ocean front ground will be under six or seven stories of water. Can we lift our buildings that high? Can we build sea walls that high? I don't think so.
It may be too late, however, too late is better than not taking steps to respond to conditions out of our control.

Comment by Alan Perlman on February 4, 2013 at 11:09am

Joan, I found this in the original white paper:

"Generally accepted practices of human culture tend to view the earth from an essentially anthropocentric point of view. This centers on the belief that the earth is here to serve humans rather than humans are actually a part of a complex interdependent ecosystem. This intellectual achievement by humanity centers on a fundamentally political failure that pits things like mainstream monotheistic religious beliefs and economic hegemony, -and against science."

The inescapable conclusion -- something no politician will every say publicly --  is that religious belief is a danger to our future on earth (and that's not even considering the effects of endless religious wars and terrorism).

Comment by booklover on February 4, 2013 at 8:02am

I just received a bumper-sticker in the mail that says: Climate ChangeD.  The D is in a different color.  My daughter took it back to school with her.

Comment by Joan Denoo on February 3, 2013 at 9:07pm

“Climate change is rampaging our planet, our region, and our communities like an unstoppable freight train that has gone off the tracks,” Burney and company wrote in the white paper.  ”We are no longer looking at a ‘predicted’ future of possible highly variable extreme weather conditions and catastrophic events. That future is here now.  “Climate instability has impacts that do and will continue to affect each one of us. Our pocketbooks, food supply, environment and ecology, human health and our social structures will bear the increasingly undisguised and festering scars of this careening train.”

Is climate change ‘rampaging our planet?’

Comment by Joan Denoo on February 3, 2013 at 1:40am

http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/01/climate-desk-greenla...
Humans Have Already Set in Motion 69 Feet of Sea Level Rise

Comment by Joan Denoo on January 29, 2013 at 1:04pm

Extreme Weather and Climate Change

Comment by Joan Denoo on January 21, 2013 at 4:32pm

http://www.space.com/9983-life-mars-lose.html
Where did all the water go?

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