Environment

Ah, the (self) pity of it. AW has a long lame series of excuses for why he went all the way to Bristol to hear Michael Mann talk but did not ask, or even try to ask, any questions. Sou takes it to pieces, but you really don't need that. Obviously it wasn't necessary to ask a question in order to want to go - the lecture was fully pre-booked, and who wouldn't want to go and hear In this special Cabot Institute lecture, in association with Bristol Festival of Ideas, Michael E Mann will discuss the science, politics, and ethical dimensions of global warming in the context of his own ongoing…
Science Advice: Cultivating the necessary functions in Canada A rough guide to science advice Principles and politics of scientific advice What do policymakers want from academics? Tips for Academics Who Want to Engage Policymakers Top 20 things scientists need to know about policy-making Top 20 things politicians need to know about science 12 things policy-makers and scientists should know about the public Science in an Age of Scrutiny: How Scientists Can Respond to Criticism and Personal Attacks The Tragedy of the Risk-Perception Commons: Culture Conflict, Rationality Conflict, and Climate…
Quackery has been steadily infiltrating academic medicine for at least two decades now in the form of what was once called “complementary and alternative medicine” but is now more commonly referred to as “integrative medicine.” Of course, as I’ve written many times before, what “integrative medicine” really means is the “integration” of quackery with science- and evidence-based medicine, to the detriment of SBM. As my good bud Mark Crislip once put it, “integrating” cow pie with apple pie does not make the apple pie better. Yet that is what’s going on in medical academia these days—witha…
It's been quite a long while since I've done a "books I'd like to read" post, that's for sure. This fall seems to be have a particularly exciting list of books so I thought I'd pull some of them together (as well as some older books) here for all our enjoyment. These are all books I don't own yet, so they are not part of my towering to-read list. Yet. I'm on sabbatical this academic year so I am trying to read and review books more diligently, aiming for about one per week. Maybe some of these will appear reviewed on the blog in the not too distant future. Enjoy!   WTF, Evolution?!: A…
Pterosaurs: Natural History, Evolution, Anatomy by Mark P. Witton is a coffee-table size book rich in detail and lavishly illustrated. Witton is a pterosaur expert at the School of Earh and Environmental Sciences at the University of Portsmouth. He is famous for his illustrations and his work in popular media such as the film "Walking With Dinosaurs 3D." The first pterosaur fossil was found in the late 18th century in the Jurassic Solnhofen Limestones, in Germany, the same excellent preservational environment that would later yield Archaeopteryx. They person who first studied it thought…
The public health community is mourning the loss of Andrea Kidd-Taylor, DrPH, MSPH, 59, who died on September 1 from cancer. Celebrations of her life were held on September 8-9 in Randallstown, MD. I first met Andrea Kidd-Taylor in 1994 when she was a member of OSHA’s 12-person National Advisory Committee on Occupational Safety and Health (NACOSH). With her masters and doctoral degrees in public health, and her training as an industrial hygienist, Andrea held the NACOSH slot designated for an occupational health expert. At the time, she was with the Health and Safety Department of the United…
Climate Smart & Energy Wise: Advancing Science Literacy, Knowledge, and Know-How by Mark McCaffrey is a book written primarily for teachers, to give them the information and tools they need to bring the topic of climate change effectively to their classrooms. It addresses the Climate Literacy and Energy Literacy frameworks, designed to guide teaching this important topic. The book provides basics on climate and energy, approaches to teaching about climate and energy, and of special interest for teachers, syncing the topics with existing standards. The main point of the book is to get…
It may come as a surprise to those not familiar with the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) – the primary law that regulates chemicals used in the US that go into products other than cosmetics, drugs and pesticides – to learn that about 15,000 chemicals on the TSCA inventory have their identities claimed as trade secrets. According to an analysis included in the petition filed with the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on August 21st by Earthjustice and five other non-profits, approximately 62.5 percent of the 24,000 chemicals added to the TSCA inventory since 1982 cannot be “…
One of the highlights of the year for me is the Lane Anderson Award shortlist announcement. From their website here and here: The Lane Anderson designation honours the maiden names of Robert Fitzhenry's mother, Margaret Lane, and his wife, Hilda Anderson Fitzhenry. The Fitzhenry Family Foundation is a privately directed Canadian foundation established in 1987 by Canadian publisher Robert I. Fitzhenry (1918-2008). The Lane Anderson Award will be administered by Christopher Alam, a partner at the law firm of Gowling Lafleur Henderson LLP. The annual Lane Anderson Award will honour two jury-…
I'm happy to welcome Dr. Heather Lander to the blogosphere and Twitterverse. She's a virologist who has done work with some of the world's deadliest pathogens in a high-security biosafety level 4 laboratory. This is the type of lab where one must wear "space suits" to work with organisms. You've probably seen in dramatized in various movies and TV shows (such as The Walking Dead). Heather describes what it's really like to work in one--even while pregnant. Dr. Lander, 9 months pregnant in a BSL4 lab   TS: Can you tell readers a bit about your background and research? How did you get…
I should have known, but did not, that being read aloud to was a learned skill. It never occurred to me to think about it from my privileged place in the world of literacy. I was, for a time, though a teacher of writing, a fish who swam in words without thinking of the water. Like a lot of book-valuing, over-educated parents, I read to my sons from the moment they were born. Tiny babies snuggled on my lap as I read _Charlie Parker Played Be-Bop_, _Jamberry_ and Eli's favorite cliff-hanger _Who Says Quack?_. We graduated on to picture books, and then Winnie the Pooh, Little House and other…
Lots to talk about here: Published on Aug 1, 2014 Arctic Emergency: Scientists Speak On Melting Ice and Global Impacts (1080p HD) This film brings you the voices of climate scientists - in their own words. Rising temperatures in the Arctic are contributing the melting sea ice, thawing permafrost, and destabilization of a system that has been called "Earth's Air Conditioner". Global warming is here and is impacting weather patterns, natural systems, and human life around the world - and the Arctic is central to these impacts. ------------------------------------------------- Scientists…
The original hoser, I'm told by an unimpeachable source from way up in Canada, was the guy who went out to his front yard in the middle of the winter and hosed down the lawn in order to make some flat ice, so he and his friends could play hockey. A better way to get ice is to find a cove or embayment along a small lake that is protected from the wind; clear off the snow and you've got a nice flat surface. If that is not available, clear the snow off the rugged and rough ice that forms on many lakes, build a dam of hard packed snow around it ... and hose that down. Even better, build a…
This weekly posting is brought to you courtesy of H. E. Taylor. Happy reading, I hope you enjoy this week's Global Warming news roundupskip to bottom Sipping from the Internet Firehose...June 29, 2014 Chuckles, Snark, UNEA, Risky Business, Neonicotinoids, Energiewende Bottom Line, Subsidies, World Bank, Thermodynamics, CookFukushima: Note, News, Policies Melting Arctic, Methane, Geopolitics, AntarcticaFood: Crisis, Fisheries, Prices, Land Grabs, GMOs, GMO Labelling, Production Hurricanes, Monsoon, Notable Weather, Forecasts, New Weather GHGs, Carbon Cycle, Aerosols,…
I'm not quite awake enough yet to deal with reviewing copyedits and reformatting figures for the book-in-process, so while I wait for the caffeine to kick in, let's talk something simple and cheerful: rural poverty. This week, Vox and the New York Times both touched on this, the former with a story about the food stamp cookbook and the latter with a magazine story about Clay County, KY, spinning off a statistical study of the hardest places to live in the US. The Vox piece is mostly on poverty in general, and how there's more to the bad diets of poor people than just lack of money--…
This weekly posting is brought to you courtesy of H. E. Taylor. Happy reading, I hope you enjoy this week's Global Warming news roundup skip to bottom Confronting a New Age of Consequences Solstice Edition June 22, 2014 Chuckles, COP20+, Ocean Summit, PIDF, G77, IOREC, GreenPeace, Energiewende Bottom Line, Economics, Pricing Nature, Thermodynamics, Cook Fukushima: Note, News, Policies Melting Arctic, Sea Ice Forecats, Antarctica Food: Crisis, Fisheries, Land Grabs, GMOs, Production Hurricanes, Notable Weather, Forecasts, Extreme Weather, New Weather GHGs, Aerosols…
This weekly posting is brought to you courtesy of H. E. Taylor. Happy reading, I hope you enjoy this week's Global Warming news roundup skip to bottom Logging the Onset of The Bottleneck Years June 15, 2014 Chuckles, COP20+, Globe, Mischief, EPA Carbon Rule, Wenju Cai, Warnings, Energiewende Bottom Line, Subsidies, Economics, Pricing Nature, Thermodynamics, Cook Fukushima: Note, News, Policies Melting Arctic, Polar Bears, Forecasts, Methane, Geopolitics, Antarctica Food: Crisis, Fisheries, Prices, Food vs. Biofuel, GMOs, GMO Labelling, Production Hurricanes,…
The tl;dr: maybe a little but for benign reasons. If fertility is important to you and you are a man, don’t put hot things in your pockets. This may fall into the category of switching from tidy whities to boxer briefs. A study came out in September suggesting that it does. It is a meta-analysis by Jessica Adams et all, published in Environmental International, called “Effect of mobile telephones on sperm quality: A systematic review and meta-analysis.” The study considered the effects of radio-frequency electromagnetic radiation (RF-EMR) on sperm motility (movement), viability, and…
This weekly posting is brought to you courtesy of H. E. Taylor. Happy reading, I hope you enjoy this week's Global Warming news roundup skip to bottom Another Week in the Ecological Crisis Information is not Knowledge...Knowledge is not Wisdom June 8, 2014 Chuckles, COP20+, Globe, Singapore, EPA Rule, EPA Reaction, Abnormal Autumn Energiewende Bottom Line, Carbon Tariffs, Crap Detector, EcoCrime, Cook Fukushima: Note, News, Policies, Related Papers Melting Arctic, Polar Bears, Antarctica Food: Crisis, Fisheries, Prices, GMOs, Production Hurricanes, Monsoon, Notable…
This weekly posting is brought to you courtesy of H. E. Taylor. Happy reading, I hope you enjoy this week's Global Warming news roundupskip to bottom Information Overloadis Pattern RecognitionJune 1, 2014 Chuckles, COP20+, Post WGx, Kohout, Weber, Warnings, Energiewende Bottom Line, Subsidies, Pricing Nature, Economics, CookFukushima: Note, News, Policies Melting Arctic, AntarcticaFood: Crisis, Fisheries, Prices, GMOs, Production Hurricanes, Monsoon, Notable Weather, Extreme Weather GHGs, Carbon Cycle, Aerosols, Volcanoes, ENSO, Temperatures, Satellites Oceans,…