There are few things to cover today that I have been meaning to talk about! I recently read this blog on the New York Times website about President Obama’s recent speech to the National Academy of Sciences. The author of the blog entry makes an interesting point that Obama is encouraging creativity, over consumerism. IRead More
Category: Society
Profile on Dickson Despommier, Ph.D.
A discussion about vertical farming and some of its environmental implications (Portions of the quoted text have been edited from the raw transcript.) Vertical farming has been brought into the forefront recently, with a spot in the film FUEL, articles in TIME, Scientific American, as well as others in the past 6 months. What thisRead More
new energy generation
Ever thought that maybe the energy expended to shake your booty at a dance club could be converted to useful electricity? I haven’t been clubbing in a long time, but when I do it is usually a good workout, mostly from the bouncing around. Piezoelectric energy allows mechanical stress to generate electric potential. The panelsRead More
Climate change and conflict
(This piece was written in Fall 2008.) Climate change is important to any analysis for the future, environmentally, socially, economically, or politically. The IPCC projects that with rising temperatures, there will be a global increase incidence of droughts, desertification, and extreme precipitation events (IPCC 2007). The increase in temperature will also allow range expansion andRead More
Update on scientific literacy piece
I’m still working on that piece on scientific literacy for my writing about science course. I mentioned it in an earlier post. Here are some of the parts and quotes that I have cut out: A recent Columbia graduate comments on her experience in a course called “Better Planet By Design,” saying that, “It madeRead More
Human-Environment Conflict: Interdependence and the role of cultural attitudes
Interdependence and the role of cultural attitudes (in the context of the global economic crisis) (This piece was written Fall 2008.) Much of the literature on conflict has focused on determining drivers and predictors of conflict. While most have not come to any decisive conclusions, we may still gain insight as to what are theRead More