Home
Biodiversity, Consumerism, Deforestation, Economics, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, Population, Society, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Water Contaminaton, peak oil — by Craig Mackintosh
The following documentary, ‘Home‘, is almost perfect.
As a photographer, I was totally engrossed in the imagery – mostly shot from above, and almost entirely in the magic hours of morning and evening light – as this production gives us a vision of this world we call home that is hard to forget. It also leaves one feeling like part of the human fabric – part of the larger human family that, when you come right down to it, all depends on our planet and its immense (albeit dwindling) diversity to supply our universal, basic needs.
As a writer, that has covered the many converging issues we’re now facing – water, soil, biodiversity, deforestation, peak oil, climate change, etc. – the facts shared are also on target and up-to-date. And, again, beautifully and graphically presented.
Why I say ‘almost perfect’ is because it is only the last ten or fifteen minutes where the documentary turns about in a bid to leave the viewer feeling optimistic before it’s all over. Here it truly fails. Ultimately, it graphically and beautifully tells the tale of humankind’s misguided and unsustainable attempts at finding satisfaction – but delivers only a warm, fuzzy, nebulous feeling of how we’re to retreat from the cliff edge we’re teetering over. Despite its shortcomings, however, I give kudos to all who put it together and for their willingness to freely distribute it to as many people as possible. It’s definitely a must-watch.
‘Home’ trailer
Watch the full documentary here
Also available in Arabic, French, German, Russian and Spanish.
Comments (1)Posted on: June 21, 2009
Osama Bin Lowrider: It’s All the Same Culture
Alternatives to Political Systems, Consumerism, Eco-Villages, Economics, People Systems, Population, Society, Village Development — by Chuck Burr
Our political discussions and media coverage are far too shallow to be useful. We must go deeper and much further back to understand the world today and learn how to get where we want to go.
Almost everyone misunderstands what culture is. Most think it is soda pop, pop stars, blue jeans, language, and TV. Some think it is capitalism, communism, or progressivism. Some see culture as Western culture or Eastern culture.
Look at the motorcycle picture. The motorcycles will fool you. All of the people above belong to the same culture, as does a soccer mom in a Chicago suburb. Keep guessing. This makes a huge difference in how we understand what is happening today and where we are going.
Comments (1)Posted on: April 28, 2009
The 11th Hour
Biodiversity, Consumerism, Deforestation, Economics, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, Health & Disease, Population, Society, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Water Contaminaton, peak oil — by Craig Mackintosh
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Posted on: April 24, 2009
Could Food Shortages Bring Down Civilization?
Economics, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, Population, Society, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Water Contaminaton — by Earth Policy Institute
by Lester R. Brown, Earth Policy Institute, Washington D.C., U.S.A.
 Lester Brown |
In the May issue of Scientific American, Lester Brown discusses how food shortages could be the weak link that brings down civilization. In this feature article, “Could Food Shortages Bring Down Civilization?” Brown reveals that the biggest threat to global political stability is the potential for food crises in poor countries to cause government collapse. Those crises are brought on by rising demand and ever worsening environmental degradation.
“In the twentieth century, dramatic rises in grain prices resulted from poor harvests. They were event driven and short-lived,” Brown says. “In contrast, the recent escalation in world grain prices is trend-driven, making it unlikely to reverse the rise in food prices without a reversal in the trends themselves.”
Demand side trends include the addition of more than 70 million people to the global population each year, 4 billion people moving up the food chain—consuming more grain-intensive meat, milk, and eggs—and the massive diversion of U.S. grain to fuel ethanol distilleries. On the supply side, the trends include falling water tables, eroding soils, and rising temperatures. Higher temperatures lower grain yields. They also melt the glaciers in the Himalayas and on the Tibetan plateau whose ice melt sustains the major rivers and irrigation systems of China and India during the dry seasons. Without a massive intervention to reverse these three environmental trends, Brown argues, more and more states will fail, ultimately threatening civilization itself.
In the article, Brown discusses measures to reverse the trends. “Among other steps,” he says, “it will take a massive restructuring of the world energy economy similar in scale and urgency to the wartime restructuring of the U.S. industrial economy in 1942.”
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Earth Policy Institute Press Teleconference – How Food Shortages Could Bring Down Civilization
Conferences, Consumerism, Economics, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, News, Population, Presentations/Demonstrations, Society, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Water Contaminaton — by Earth Policy Institute
Teleconference: Thursday, April 23, 11:00 AM EDT
Environmental Analyst Lester Brown: How Food Shortages Could Bring Down Civilization
Washington, DC — On Thursday, April 23, 2009, at 11 a.m. EDT, environmental analyst Lester Brown will discuss how food shortages could be the weak link that brings down civilization. In an article featured in the May issue of Scientific American, Brown reveals that the biggest threat to global political stability is the potential for food crises in poor countries to cause government collapse. Those crises are brought on by rising demand and ever worsening environmental degradation.
Comments (0)Posted on: April 21, 2009
An Industrial Revolution Like No Other
Consumerism, Economics, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, Health & Disease, Population, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Water Contaminaton — by Craig Mackintosh
French illustrator and printmaker Gustave Doré shows the
squalid conditions in London, England created for the urban
labouring classes by the Industrial Revolution
From the very beginning proponents of the industrial revolution looked upon nature as a pirate might look upon a defenseless gold-laden ship – as easy pickings. A long term view of stewardship gave way to the short term mindset of a plunderer.
Comments (0)Posted on: April 20, 2009
A Farm for the Future
Biodiversity, Consumerism, Deforestation, Economics, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, Population, peak oil — by Craig Mackintosh
Seeing Permaculture promoted on the BBC is yet another positive sign of the times. In this 50 minute presentation, wildlife film-maker Rebecca Hosking returns to her farming roots – hoping to take over the reins of her family farm in Devon, UK – and duly considers exactly what kind of farm she wants to develop. Significantly, Rebecca looks at where the world is heading in regards to food production, and, in particular, thinks about the serious implications of peaking oil supplies on our fossil-fuel dependent agriculture.
After talking to energy experts, Rebecca seeks out a few UK-based Permaculturists in a bid to learn how some are managing their land without fossil fuel inputs, and on the way discovers the key lesson in Permaculture – that nature is just waiting to work for us, and very productively, if we’d only exercise a few observational skills.
I’m reminded of the following very astute quote:
Comments (4)Posted on: March 26, 2009
When Population Growth and Resource Availability Collide
Deforestation, Food Shortages, Population, Society, Soil Erosion & Contamination — by Earth Policy Institute
by Lester R. Brown, Earth Policy Institute
As land and water become scarce, competition for these vital resources intensifies within societies, particularly between the wealthy and those who are poor and dispossessed. The shrinkage of life-supporting resources per person that comes with population growth is threatening to drop the living standards of millions of people below the survival level, leading to potentially unmanageable social tensions.
Access to land is a prime source of social tension. Expanding world population has cut the grainland per person in half, from 0.23 hectares in 1950 to 0.10 hectares in 2007. One tenth of a hectare is half of a building lot in an affluent U.S. suburb. This ongoing shrinkage of grainland per person makes it difficult for the world’s farmers to feed the 70 million people added to world population each year. The shrinkage in cropland per person not only threatens livelihoods; in largely subsistence societies, it threatens survival itself. Tensions within communities begin to build as landholdings shrink below that needed for survival.
Comments (0)Posted on: February 13, 2009
Eating Fossil Fuels
Food Shortages, Population, peak oil — by Dale Allen Pfeiffer
Editor’s Note: The most significant ‘gift’ globalisaton has given to the world is the ‘Green Revolution’, the post-WWII industrialisation of agriculture. It is credited with saving millions from famine. Indeed, Norman Borlaug, the ‘father of the Green Revolution’, was given a Nobel Peace Prize for his contribution to increasing food production. However, many people challenge the wisdom behind his work. The article below ably describes why the Green Revolution may have pushed billions of people out onto a rather fragile limb — it may well end up killing many more people that it has saved. This examination is timely, thought-provoking, and just plain scary. After reading it, you may feel the urge to get the gardening gloves out.
by Dale Allen Pfeiffer, originally published on FromTheWilderness.com, October 2003
Human beings (like all other animals) draw their energy from the food they eat. Until the last century, all of the food energy available on this planet was derived from the sun through photosynthesis. Either you ate plants or you ate animals that fed on plants, but the energy in your food was ultimately derived from the sun.
It would have been absurd to think that we would one day run out of sunshine. No, sunshine was an abundant, renewable resource, and the process of photosynthesis fed all life on this planet. It also set a limit on the amount of food that could be generated at any one time, and therefore placed a limit upon population growth. Solar energy has a limited rate of flow into this planet. To increase your food production, you had to increase the acreage under cultivation, and displace your competitors. There was no other way to increase the amount of energy available for food production. Human population grew by displacing everything else and appropriating more and more of the available solar energy.
Comments (2)Posted on: February 12, 2009
The Crash Course
Alternatives to Political Systems, Consumerism, Economics, Financial Management, Nuclear, Population, Society, peak oil — by Craig Mackintosh
I’ve referenced Chris Martenson’s excellent ‘Crash Course’ a couple of times, but now I’ve discovered Chris has also uploaded it to YouTube, so can embed here for your convenience and viewing pleasure.
For those not familiar, this twenty chapter presentation is arguably the best effort I’ve seen to help people understand our current world predicament, with an emphasis on economics. It’s a must watch (in addition to ‘Money as Debt‘). Do share the link with your contacts.
Chapter 1 – Three Beliefs & Chapter 2 – The Three E’s
Comments (3)Posted on: January 14, 2009
A Better Way of Making a Living for Humanity
Alternatives to Political Systems, Bio-regional Organisations, Consumerism, Eco-Villages, Food Shortages, People Systems, Population, Society, Village Development, peak oil — by Chuck Burr
We are no more able to find our way forward living as Homo modern as we are living as Homo hunter-gatherer. Both ways are blocked. Living today on the infinite growth treadmill as Homo modern results in the death of our planet. Homo sapien has exploded our population to a level that we can no longer run back into the forest to make a living like the Mayan did. So what are we to do?
The question is actually, not “what are we going to do?”, but is “how are we going to make a living?” First lets rule out the obvious, we can no longer make a living as Homo consumer. Peak oil will put an end to our happy motoring and consuming lifestyle before we get the chance to consume the world.
Comments (1)Posted on: January 5, 2009
Woody Harrelson Waxes Poetic on the Life that Shouldn’t Be
Consumerism, Economics, Food Shortages, GMOs, Global Warming/Climate Change, Health & Disease, Musical Interlude, Population, Society, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Water Contaminaton — by Craig Mackintosh
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Posted on: December 15, 2008
The Food Crisis: “A Perfect Storm” – and How to Turn the Tide
Biodiversity, Consumerism, Economics, Food Shortages, GMOs, Global Warming/Climate Change, Health & Disease, Population, Society, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Water Contaminaton — by Craig Mackintosh
A recently released study, the largest of its kind, examines the root causes of, and solutions for, a food crisis that will likely get much worse before it gets better — and that will never get better if we continue with business as usual
I’m hungry.
No, not because I don’t have enough food to eat, but because I’m too busy typing and too lazy to walk to the refrigerator. How I wish it were this simple for the people I keep reading about.
Comments (3)Posted on: November 14, 2008
Powering Down – Will We?
Consumerism, Economics, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, Population, Society, peak oil — by Craig Mackintosh
 Most underestimate the implications… |
Through our Hollywood-tinted glasses we’re accustomed to happy endings. The instinctive “it won’t happen to me” mentality is alive and well, but, whilst perhaps preserving the comfortable status quo (if not our sanity), it does little to promote objectivity. In a world threatened by global warming, potential constructive accomplishments are thus too often hampered and bogged down in the realm of discourse and debate.
In plain English – we need to get real.
On this note, check out the following clip. Richard Heinburg, the author of the book “Powering Down“, has much to say on possible strategies, or failing that, outcomes, for our post peak-oil world. I think it’s time we really examine, not just computer climate models – but societal projections.
Comments (0)Posted on: November 12, 2008
The Rise and Predictable Fall of Globalized Industrial Agriculture
Conservation, Consumerism, Economics, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, Population, Soil Conservation, peak oil — by Craig Mackintosh
Today I’d like to introduce you to a (well written and beautifully presented) report, titled – ‘The Rise and Predictable Fall of Globalized Industrial Agriculture‘ (55 page, 2.4mb PDF). The title says it all. Should you be concerned? Yes.
Your concern, however, should not be that the globalised industrial agribusiness model will collapse – this is not only inevitable, but also necessary, and, might I add, desirable – the focus should instead be on when and how it will fall.
Let me explain.
If you were to ask the Average Joe what is the largest contributor to global warming, many will say cars, trucks and aeroplanes – or coal fired power plants. While these are large contributors, they cannot compete with the largest, yet mostly overlooked contribution from our present system of farming and global food trading. Global warming is primarily due to agriculture. Indeed, much of the above-stated contributors are merely essential aspects in maintaining the globalised agricultural model:
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