sarahdasher
Posts by this author
June 21, 2007
Biosphere 2, that famous research boondoggle, has entered a new stage in its lifecycle: condo and ranchette proliferation.
In the early nineties, Biosphere made headlines when eight 'bionauts' were sealed into the air-tight terrarium as part of a two-year experiment in self-sufficiency. The…
June 16, 2007
Aaaah, wilderness.
Fresh air, the smell of pines, the sounds of songbirds chirping...quelling the urge to throw an elbow in Central Park on a sunny Sunday morning.
Intuition tells us that time spent outside is good for our mental health, and myriad studies affirm it. Schools that incorporate a…
June 13, 2007
Summer is nearly here, and beef is in the air: or at least in the mainstream media. A cursory search of Google news earlier this week turned up eighteen different stories about beef posted within a twenty-four hour period, among them: South Korea Opens to US Beef Imports, Pampered Beef Cattle…
May 11, 2007
A new Google Earth overlay allows you to track the progress of HMS Endurance. Sure, it lacks the glamour of Shackelton's initial voyage--but armchair explorers don't have to eat seals.
When the HMS Endurance deploys from Portsmouth, UK every fall, it has a mishmash of strategic and non-strategic…
May 7, 2007
The Earth isn't the only thing that's hotter than ever.
Rob Reiner's famously clueless rock-and-roll trio is reuniting for an unexpected reason: to save the world from global warming.
Twenty-three years after their debut in the cult classic This is Spinal Tap, guitarist Nigel Tufnel, singer…
April 26, 2007
2050: Warming temperatures melt the glaciers off Kilimanjaro (and other equatorial mountains).
2100: Climate change drives a quarter of all plant and animal species to extinction.
2200: Melting ice changes the distribution of Earth's mass enough to actually speed the rotation of the Earth.…
April 19, 2007
Lloyd Godson, a 29-year-old Australian marine biologist, spent the last 13 days submerged in his local wetlands in a home-grown submarine. He was fulfilling a long-time dream.
His submersible, a 9-cubic-meter metal box, was an experiment in self-sufficiency. Air, water, and electricity were all…
April 12, 2007
They sleep an average of 20 hours, and subsist on less than two pounds of gum leaves per day. Yet an absence of natural predators and extremely low metabolic demands may not be enough to keep Australia's koala population alive into the next century.
Development along Australia's coast is…
February 16, 2007
A recent report by the Asian Development Bank predicts that garbage output by Asian cities will more than double by 2025--from 760 thousand tons to 1.8 million tons per day. That amount of garbage would rapidly swamp the municipal governments charged with taking care of trash disposal.
Here in…
February 14, 2007
Manhattan was besieged by a fusillade of ice pellets this morning. Weather like this always makes me think of home.
Meteorologists at the Mount Washington Weather Observatory are known for the weather-related antics they devise to entertain themselves during eight-day winter shifts at the Obs. Now…
February 13, 2007
More than 175 million roses are sold in the U.S. in the the days leading up to Valentine's Day. From seedling to shipping crates, a cocktail of chemicals protects those blooms.
It takes a lot of lethal pesticides to say, "I Love You."
Seventy percent of cut flowers sold in the U.S. are imported…
February 12, 2007
According to a recent poll conducted by ACNielsen, in cooperation with the Sydney Morning Herald, 78 per cent of Australians would be willing to drink recycled sewage water, including toilet water, provided that it was treated to drinking water standards.
This represents a sea change of public…
February 12, 2007
Marine biologist (and Harvard Ph.D.) Randy Olsen gave up his tenured professorship to pursue a career in film. Some might call this a rash move--but it gave Olsen time to create one of the more talked-about scientific documentaries of the decade.
Flock of Dodos is a humorous look at the debate…
February 9, 2007
Most people would rather have five dollars now than ten dollars next month. One Billion Bulbs is doing its best to retrain these hoarding instincts.
The goal of One Billion Bulbs is to convince users that switching from incandescent to compact fluorescent lightbulbs makes good environmental and…
February 9, 2007
An estimated 14,000 buyers from 7,000 retailers will descend on New York City this weekend to attend The American International Toy Fair. Thirteen hundred exhibitors--Richard Simmons among them--will be present to pedal their wares.
Electronics are an increasingly dominant presence at this event…
February 8, 2007
More than 85 evangelical Christian leaders have banded together to form the Evangelical Climate Initiative, a group aimed at mobilizing conservative Christians against climate change.
They kicked off their campaign this month with a television spot and full-page print ads in The New York Times…
February 8, 2007
Researchers at Purdue University have created a portable refinery that converts food, paper and plastic trash into electricity. The prototype biorefinery generates approximately 90 percent more energy than it consumes.
Its efficiency owes to a series of steps:
1. Separate organic food material…
February 7, 2007
It's New York Fashion Week, and all eyes are on the models. This time, though, they are facing a new kind of scrutiny.
In 2006, Madrid's Fashion Week made headlines for banning models with a body-mass index of less than 18.5--in other words, a 5'9" model must weigh more than 124 pounds. The…
February 7, 2007
The MO is simple: Propagate. Mutate. Kill.
As a neophyte virus, I obliterated 86% of humanity. One glance at the high scores shows me that I have a lot yet to learn.
Click here to play for yourself.
February 6, 2007
The launch of Microsoft Vista may initiate a massive wave of computer obsolescence. Where do we put all the refuse? Take a guess...
Guiyu, China
These women are picking through computer wires that have been exported to rural China for disposal. Once sorted, the wires, insulated with PVC and coated…
February 4, 2007
In the wake of the IPCC report, you may have missed out on this proposal, which bears integrally on our economy, our environment and our health.
The 2002 Farm Bill is up for renewal. On Wednesday, Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns introduced a new Farm Bill that, while not as…
February 3, 2007
The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, a sea-faring radical environmental group known for using guerilla tactics to disable Japanese whaling vessels in Antarctica, has once again had its registration revoked. Their craft, a 180-foot steel-hulled enforecement ship christened the Farley Mowat, is…
January 31, 2007
I enjoy the occasional chain-store burrito. I consider(ed) them a healthy alternative to traditional fast food. Then I entered my personal burrito preferences into this Chipotle nutrition calculator:
Chipotle Nutrition Facts
Serving Size: 1 Burrito
Amount Per…
January 30, 2007
Dave Ng and his loyal readers are are propagating their own viral version of the Truth, using a Google bomb campaign to climb Google's search rankings. It's not as nefarious as it sounds:
Currently, the Truth is #30 in the Google search rankings, up from #300 a week ago. With a little help from…
January 29, 2007
Anyone know how to explain this?
Story at The Economist.
Hat-tip, Evan Priestley.
January 29, 2007
If you were king for a day (or President for a century), could you slow the course of climate change? This Flash game from the BBC challenges you to create a carbon-neutral future, while still maintaining your coffers--and your presidency.
With international carbon-reduction treaties to contend…
January 26, 2007
Watch as births, deaths, and CO2 emissions mount worldwide, in real time, at BreathingEarth.
January 25, 2007
Over at Retrospectacle, there was some discussion about whether the richest countries were the most polluting countries. This little tool from Google has an answer, and so much more.
The US is represented by the large yellow circle in the (predictably) upper-right corner. Most European…
January 22, 2007
It used to be just a blurb on the outside of the Ben & Jerry's container: CONTAINS NO rBGH. But over the last decade, consumer advocates have succeeded in making "hormone-free milk" a part of America's shopping vocabulary. Now Starbucks has joined the fray: under pressure from consumers,…
January 19, 2007
In his State of the Union address on Tuesday, Bush is expected to call for increased focus on biofuels, to mitigate U.S. dependence on foreign oil. Meanwhile, in Bush's home state, Interstate I-10 through Houston is being expanded to 18 lanes.
"Texas has always been pretty far over on the side…