India Development Coalition of America--Climate Change

Colori is down with V-O_C

2009-10-24T20:19:00.000-07:00

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Chicago's boutique paint shop launches new paint line this evening

Nothing can transform a room faster than a new coat of paint. But did you know that in addition to that fantastic new color is the immediate addition of pollutant levels up to 1,000 times outdoor levels! EPA studies have shown that VOCs (Volatile Organic Compounds) emitted from traditional household paint result in your living room having 2 to 5 times more pollutants than the air outside.These elevated pollution levels can have significant health ramifications including: eye, nose, and throat irritation; headaches, allergic skin reaction, loss of coordination, nausea; damage to liver, kidney, and central nervous system and possibly cancer.
According to the Paint Quality Institute, VOCs are not just bad for your health, they are bad for the environment too. The industry group claims traditional paints make up 10% of the ozone depleting substances in the US.So how do you avoid these high levels of VOC's during your next decorating project? Click here to learn more.

Links for the Week
Local Events:
Oct 22 Mythic Paint Launch Party, 6pm to 9pm, Colori, 2243 W. North Ave.
Oct 25 Vert Couture: An Evening of Fall Fashion and Environmental Responsibility, 7pm Runway Show, Chicago Cultural Center, Yates Gallery 78 East Washington St.
Oct 29 Climate Control: A Shedd Eco-Social, 6:30pm to 9:30pm, Shedd Aquarium
Oct 30 Late Night Halloween Yoga Party, 9pm to midnight, 2201 W. Belmont

info@afreshsqueeze.com1030 W. Chicago Ave, Ste 300 Chicago IL 60607

Climate Change Action Protests by 350*

2009-10-24T19:47:00.000-07:00

I can hardly believe my eyes.
16 hours ago, citizens in New Zealand gathered before dawn next to a wind turbine on a mountaintop. As local elders said prayers to bless the global event, banners and signs were held high to to greet the planet's first rays of sunlight on this most incredible of days. As the sun continues across the planet we've been receiving photos and video of rallies in Ethiopia, bike rides in Wellington, SCUBA divers in Australia, organizers planting 350 trees in Thailand, hundreds of students marching in India and Nepal and Mongolia. And we're getting reports from 350.org offices around the world that the phones are ringing off the hook with calls from the media who want to cover the story.
The day is just beginning and already it's larger, more powerful, and so much more beautiful than I ever could have imagined. I've been a writer my entire life and yet words truly cannot describe what you have accomplished already. To truly grasp today, please stay tuned to our website as more and more photos come in from across the planet, and especially our evolving photo slideshow.
And the best news of all? The day has just begun!
Bill
P.S. Have a photo to contribute? Just send a decent-quality picture to photos@350.org and make the subject "City, Country" and make sure that the body of the e-mail contains a description of the photo, any necessary photographer credits, and any other information you think we'll need. So many thanks.

Largest Solar Panle Plant in US rises in Florida

2009-10-24T19:40:00.000-07:00

By CHRISTINE ARMARIO, Associated Press Writer Christine Armario, Associated Press Writer Fri Oct 23, 4:55 pm ET

ARCADIA, Fla. – Greg Bove steps into his pickup truck and drives down a sandy path to where the future of Florida's renewable energy plans begin: Acres of open land filled with solar panels that will soon power thousands of homes and business.
For nearly a year, construction workers and engineers in this sleepy Florida town of citrus trees and cattle farms have been building the nation's largest solar panel energy plant. Testing will soon be complete, and the facility will begin directly converting sunlight into energy, giving Florida a momentary spot in the solar energy limelight.
The Desoto Next Generation Solar Energy Center will power a small fraction of Florida Power & Light's 4-million plus customer base; nevertheless, at 25 megawatts, it will generate nearly twice as much energy as the second-largest photovoltaic facility in the U.S.
The White House said President Barack Obama is scheduled to visit the facility Tuesday, when it officially goes online and begins producing power for the electric grid.
As demand grows and more states create mandates requiring a certain percentage of their energy come from renewable sources, the size of the plants is increasing. The southwest Florida facility will soon be eclipsed by larger projects announced in Nevada and California.
"We took a chance at it and it worked out," said Bove, construction manager at the project, set on about 180 acres of land 80 miles southeast of Tampa. "There's a lot of backyard projects, there's a lot of rooftop projects, post offices and stores. Really this is one of the first times where we've taken a technology and upsized it."
Despite its nickname, the Sunshine State hasn't been at the forefront of solar power. Less than 4 percent of Florida's energy has come from renewable sources in recent years. And unlike California and many other states, Florida lawmakers haven't agreed to setting clean energy quotas for electric companies to reach in the years ahead.
California, New Jersey and Colorado have led the country in installing photovoltaic systems; now Florida is set to jump closer to the top with the nation's largest plant yet.
The Desoto facility and two other solar projects Florida Power & Light is spearheading will generate 110 megawatts of power, cutting greenhouse gas emissions by more than 3.5 million tons. Combined, that's the equivalent of taking 25,000 cars off the road each year, according to figures cited by the company.
The investment isn't cheap: The Desoto project cost $150 million to build and the power it supplies to some 3,000 homes and businesses will represent just a sliver of the 4 million-plus accounts served by the state's largest electric utility.
But there are some economic benefits: It created 400 jobs for draftsmen, carpenters and others whose work dried up as the southwest Florida housing boom came to a closure and the recession set in. Once running, it will require few full-time employees.
Mike Taylor, director of research and education at the nonprofit Solar Electric Power Association in Washington, said the project puts Florida "on the map."
"It's currently the largest," Taylor said of the Desoto photovoltaic plant. "But it certainly won't be the last."
There are two means of producing electricity from the sun: photovoltaic cells that directly convert sunlight; and thermal power, which uses mirrors to heat fluid and produce steam to run a turbine power generator.
Taylor said a one- or two-megawatt project was considered large not long ago. The size has slowly increased each year.
Overall, the United States still trails other nations in building photovoltaic plants.
Spain and Germany have made larger per capita commitments to solar power because of aggressive government policies, said Stephen Smith, executive director of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy. And China has announced plans to pay up to 50 percent of the price of solar power systems of more than 500 megawatts.
"If we don't get our market right and send the right market signals and really support growing this technology, we will be buying solar panels from other countries," Smith said.
In April, Arizona-based manufacturer First Solar Inc. announced plans to build a 48-megawatt plant in Nevada, producing power for about 30,000 homes. Even that pales compared to recently announced plans for a 2 gigawatt facility in China. First Solar has initial approval to build it.http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091023/ap_on_bi_ge/us_solar_power_plant
posted by Mohan Jain

Thousands Gather Worldwide on day of Climate Protests

2009-10-24T19:36:00.000-07:00

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20091024/ts_afp/environmentclimatewarmingaction

Sat Oct 24, 2009

PARIS (AFP) – Kicking off with thousands gathering on the steps of Sydney's iconic Opera House, global warming protests took place around the world Saturday to mark 50 days before the UN climate summit.
From Asia to Europe via the Middle East, activists staged lively events addressing world leaders and to mobilise public opinion around climate issues.
Many waved placards bearing the logo 350, referring to 350 parts per million (ppm) of CO2 in the atmosphere which scientists say must not be exceeded to avoid runaway global warming.
France's politicians received a "wake up" call from several hundred Parisians who chose clocks as their symbol.
Protesters who met in a central square had set their alarm clocks and mobile phones to ring at 12:18 pm (1018 GMT) in reference to the closing date of the summit, which lasts from December 7-18.
The summit is considered crucial as world leaders will try to thrash out a new treaty to curb greenhouse gas emissions in place of the Kyoto Protocol which will expire in 2012.
However, Danish Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen said Saturday that preliminary discussions are not moving fast enough for an international decision to be concluded in Copenhagen.
"It is time to give full speed to the negotiations," Rasmussen said, adding that he wanted a legally binding international agreement to be in place by January.
There is growing concern that a treaty deal in Copenhagen could be hampered by issues including US domestic politics and the problems of securing agreement between developed and developing countries.
Rasmussen underlined that progress had been made on climate issues but that these "key political questions" still had to be resolved ahead of the December meeting.
In Berlin, some 350 protesters wearing masks with the face of German Chancellor Angela Merkel came together in front of the Brandenburg Gate in the city centre.
In London, more than 600 people gathered beneath the London Eye Ferris wheel by the River Thames to arrange themselves into the shape of the number five, according to organisers Campaign against Climate Change.
An aerial photograph of the event will be added to pictures of a giant "three" and "zero" from around the world.
"Hundreds of thousands of people are taking part (globally) and for us that's so important, to have people out on the streets," campaign activist Abi Edgar told AFP. "We want serious action on climate change and we want it now."
Across the Thames, some 100 musicians playing trumpets, trombones, saxophones and clarinets gathered outside parliament to play the same note -- an F, made by the frequency of 350 Hz -- for 350 seconds, organisers said.
In the Lebanese capital Beirut hundreds of activists, many wearing snorkels, held demonstrations in key archaeological sites.
They gathered around the Roman ruins in central Beirut, in the ancient eastern city of Baalbek and along the coast, carrying placards bearing the logo 350.
"It's not the first time Beirut will have gone under water," Wael Hmaidan of the IndyACT group organising Beirut's protests said to AFP, explaining the goggle-wearing, "but this time it's going down because of climate change, and not earthquakes."
In Jakarta, around 100 students from the London School of Public Relations also gathered to form the symbolic number 350, coordinator Candy Tolosa said on Detik.com news website Saturday.
In central Madrid, the Spanish capital, members of the Platform Against Climate Change, grouping social organisations, ecologists and unions, acted out parodies of the "catastrophic consequences of climate change on the planet", the Platform's press release said.
Environmental activists in the Turkish metropolis of Istanbul staged their protest in a boat, unfurling a banner reading "Sun, wind, right now!" under the main bridge linking Asia and Europe over the Bosphorus Strait, Anatolia news agency reported.
They then sailed to the ancient Maiden's Tower, which sits on a tiny islet in the Bosphorus, and unfurled another banner reading "Jobs, climate, justice," the report said.

Sent by Jaya Kamlani, Writer, Atlanta

Love, The Climate and Win a Schwinn-Global Wakeup call-Live Earth

2009-09-22T12:28:00.000-07:00

U.S. Senators are returning to work and the climate is back in the limelight. Join in our "Love, The Climate" Giveaway before the Climate Bill goes to the Senate floor.

What would the climate have to say if it were happy and healthy and had a voice? Thank our senators for creating a world full of green jobs and renewable energy. Post to the Facebook Page, upload a video or photo, or leave a voicemail... You AND the environment can WIN!
Click here for more info and to enter: http://liveearth.org/LoveTheClimate
** Sept. 21 Global 'Wake-Up Call' **

On Monday September 21, Avaaz.org and the tcktcktck campaign are organizing flash mobs around the world to press our leaders to take action on the climate.
Sign up to join one of 1,000+ climate "wake-up calls" or register an event near you. It's simple for everyone involved!
Click here for more info http://www.avaaz.org/en/sept21_hosts/
** 3 New Environmental Movies! **
Some excellent films about the climate crisis are opening in theaters this month:

The Age of Stupid - An old man living in the devastated world of 2055, watching 'archive' footage from 2008, asks: why didn't we stop climate change while we had the chance? http://www.ageofstupid.net/

No Impact Man chronicles the real-life adventures of the Beavan family striving to drastically reduce their carbon footprint and leave no impact on the environment while living in Manhattan. http://www.noimpactdoc.com

Crude - The inside story of the controversial "Amazon Chernobyl" environmental lawsuit. http://www.crudethemovie.com/
Thanks and visit soon!
Live Earth--------The "Love, The Climate" Giveaway: http://liveearth.org/LoveTheClimateFollow Live Earth on Twitter: http://twitter.com/LiveEarthFriend us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/LiveEarthPass it on to a Friend: http://www.joinliveearth.org/page/invite/passiton

Carpool Websites see more Traffic, Roads Less in Chicagoland

2009-09-22T11:31:00.000-07:00

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Carpooling and Car Sharing Make Commuting Cheaper
Good choices in Chicagoland growing

By Iya Bakare

A growing number of residents in Chicago and nearby suburbs are opting to leave their cars at home or ditching them altogether by joining carpool groups or tapping car-share companies when they really need some wheels. A handful of good options in the area are enabling local residents to reduce their contribution to green house gases and air pollution.
One carpooling company, eRideShare.com, is a free online service for residents that offers a venue for people to meet other carpoolers and connect with other carpooler groups. It offers a listing for people who are interested in traveling to the grocery store, airport and other destinations. The company also offers services for companies, churches, music festivals and other organizations with large groups that need to travel.
"Global warming has a number of ramifications," says Steve Schoeffler, eRideShare's CEO. "The price of oil and the amount of air pollution generated from driving are great reasons to carpool."

Click here to learn about how you can make your work commute greener

Links for the Week
Local Events:
Sep 24th, Fresh: New Thinking About What We're Eating, 6pm-9:30pm, 1925 W. Thome
Sep 26th and 27th Logan Square Kitchen Open House, 10am to 3pm, 2333 N Milwaukee
Sep 26th, Put the Garden to Bed celebration, 7pm-10pm, 2900 W. Ferdinand
Oct 3rd and 4th Ravenswood ArtWalk, 11am to 6pm

info@afreshsqueeze.com1030 W. Chicago Ave, Ste 300 Chicago IL 60607
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Clinton Foundation to Set Up 3000 MW Solar Plant in Gujarat

2009-09-08T22:21:00.000-07:00

TNN 8 September 2009, 02:31am IST

AHMEDABAD: The Clinton Climate Initiative (CCI), a programme of US-based William J Clinton Foundation, on Monday announced setting up of the world's largest solar power plant in Gujarat with an estimated investment of Rs 50,000 crore likely to flow into the state over the next five years. The proposed 3,000MW plant, one of the four being set up by CCI across the globe promises to make Gujarat the solar power hub of India. Gujarat has identified four locations along its international border with Pakistan for solar projects.

We are setting up similar plants in California, South Africa and Australia. We chose Gujarat because of the state's potential and its policy framework.

A lot of people are talking about renewable energy, but Gujarat has acted,said Ira Magaziner, chairman of CCI, who was in Ahmedabad to sign an agreement with the state government. CCI is in talks with at least a dozen large companies from across the globe willing to invest in the project, which is likely to come up over 5,000 hectares along border districts of Kutch and Banaskantha.

With the state government planning a large gas grid in the region, CCI is also exploring possibilities of making the plant hybrid. Chief Minister Narendra Modi said on the occasion that his government plans to convert the border into a solar hub. We would identify land and create infrastructure for the project. We want Gujarat to become a hub for manufacturing solar power equipment, R&D and generation. The initiative will generate 20,000 jobs, said Modi.

Reinventing Fire-- RMI2009- Conference in San Francisco

2009-09-04T17:08:00.000-07:00

RMI2009: What will spark the transition from fossil fuels to efficiency and renewables?
Rocky Mountain Institute is convening top leaders of business, energy, and security to discuss the most challenging questions of our time on October 1-3 in San Francisco. This two day symposium will explore effective opportunities to achieve economic growth for an era free of fossil fuels.Symposium Highlights

An Introduction to Reinventing Fire:What’s it about? Why is it the focus of Rocky Mountain Institute’s work?

Nuclear Power: Climate Fix or Folly?Amory Lovins and a panel of experts will explore the pros and cons of a nuclear-powered future.

Walking It Like They Talk ItIs the corporate world taking energy efficiency and renewables seriously?

Whole Systems Thinking In Action:Attendees will take a look at RMI’s recent work in leading these key sectors towards a world without fossil fuels:
• Land Transportation
• Industrial Processes• Buildings
• Electrical Systems• Factor Ten Engineering (10xE)

Natural Capitalism: A Decade LaterTen years after its publication, its whole-systems sustainability framework is as relevant today as ever.
Accelerating Vehicle ElectrificationElectric vehicles are coming, and RMI is paving the way.
www.rmi2009.org

Edward Goldsmith Pioneer of Green Movement A Tribute to his Life

2009-09-01T01:32:00.000-07:00

The Institute of Science in SocietyScience Society Sustainabilityhttp://www.i-sis.org.ukThis article can be found on the I-SIS website at http://www.i-sis.org.uk/EdwardGoldsmith.php
========================================================ISIS Report 31/08/09Edward Goldsmith Pioneer of the Green Movement Dies Aged 80#################################################Edward Goldsmith, founder and editor of The Ecologist (since 1970), lead author of A Blueprint for Survival (1972),founder of the Green Party, died peacefully in his sleep on 21 August 2009 at age 80.Teddy’s monumental life time achievements will need to be assessed by a dedicated biography. He was a prolific andinfluential writer as well as active campaigner. Among his numerous books and essays, the three-volume magnum opus, TheSocial and Environmental Effects of Large Dams, co-authored with Nick Hilyard and published between 1984 and 1992 wascrucial in turning around the policy of the World Bank’s support for large dam projects. Throughout his life, Teddycampaigned tirelessly for the protection of indigenous peoples and traditional cultures.Most of all, Teddy was kind and attentive to everyone to a fault, and always had time for people. He remained a sharpand independent thinker almost to the last. What he enjoyed most was a congenial argument on a finer intellectual pointin philosophy, politics, anthropology, religion, art, or any other discipline you care or dare to engage, as Teddy hadextraordinary breadth as well as depth in the knowledge he was passionate about.I first metTeddy when he invited me to a conference he organised in Cornwall more than 20 years ago on evolution and the Gaia hypothesis. Needless to say, it changed my lifeforever. Since then, he has been a great friend and mentor. We love him dearly, all of us at ISIS, for his big heart andsoul, for his fount of knowledge and consummate story-telling.We owe him a life-long debt for showing us The Way(his last major work first published in 1996), and because he had so unstintingly championed and supported us over theyears.Teddy leaves a huge legacy of love, of friends and followers who are committed to carry on the tasks he has set us.To celebrate Teddy’s life, we republish one of his most important essays, Towards a Biospheric Ethic, which firstappeared in SiS 18 in 2003. Here it is, slightly re-edited, as fresh and relevant today as it was then.Url: http://www.i-sis.org.uk/Towards_a_Biospheric_Ethic.phpSearch date: 1st September 2009
ISIS Essay 31/08/09
Towards a Biospheric Ethic
Modern moral philosophers have tended to study ethics in a void, ignoring the insights of the natural and human sciences. Some eminent scholars have sought to put this right; but based their ethical principles on a grossly distorted view of nature and human society, resulting in a ‘technospheric’ ethic that seeks to equate progress and the moral good with economic expansion and the dominance of man over nature. A new ‘biospheric’ ethic is required to mediate sustainable human behaviour in relationship to society, the ecosystem, the biosphere and the cosmos itself Edward Goldsmith (In fond memory)
A fully referenced version of this article is posted on ISIS members' website. Details here
An electronic version of the full report can be downloaded from the ISIS online store. Download Now
MATERIAL ON THIS SITE MAY NOT BE REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM WITHOUT EXPLICIT PERMISSION. FOR PERMISSION, AND REPRODUCTION REQUIREMENTS, PLEASE CONTACT ISIS. WHERE PERMISSION IS GRANTED ALL LINKS MUST REMAIN UNCHANGED
(Permission obtained for e mal forwards referencing ISIS web site; Santhanam R.)
Is there a principle for ethical behaviour?
One of the first questions to answer in a serious discussion on ethics is whether there exists an acceptable criterion for determining whether or not an action is ethical. Two eminent evolutionists took up opposing views. Theodore Dobzhansky, Russian émigré to the US, thought that there could not be such a criterion, because it would limit “the essential human faculty for the exercise of freedom” [1]. This is very close to what is being said by many scientists today in debates over the ethics of genetic engineering and related applications, from GM crops to human cloning.
Conrad Waddington, British born and bred, said that it is possible to discuss, and perhaps to discover a “supra-ethical” criterion, which would make it possible to decide whether a certain ethical system of values is 2in some definite and important sense” preferable to another [2]. The criterion he suggested is “wisdom”. But who possesses wisdom? Is it the educated, the scientific expert?
Two takes on ‘evolutionary ethics’
We can consider ‘ethics’ as a set of instructions, whose implementation, in the light of the model of one’s relationship with nature, enables human beings to co-exist stably with one another and with the rest of nature.
It has been argued that the way we obtain information about nature has been produced and validated by the process of evolution, and hence evolution should be our source of ethics.
The most notorious attempt to derive ethics from one’s model of how nature evolves belongs to the social Darwinists. Herbert Spencer and his colleagues in Victorian England preached an ethic of individualism, competition and aggression, which they justified as being in accordance with “natural law”. Spencer wrote [3], “Progress is not an accident but a necessity. Instead of civilization being artificial, it is a part of nature, all apiece with the development of an embryo or the unfolding of a flower”.
The social Darwinists painted a distorted view of nature. They saw it as random, chaotic, atomised, competitive and aggressive, totally ignoring its more fundamental, cooperative aspects. For William Graham Sumner, the main prophet of Social Darwinism in the United States [4], “competition was the law of nature which could no more be done away with than gravitation.”
The stress on competition was an essential tenet of social Darwinism, for in terms of Darwinism itself, and later of neo-Darwinism, competition provided the very motor of evolution. For the same reason, it was essential to the course of progress. The poor, the starving and the diseased, who were identified with the ‘unfit’, could thus be cast by the wayside without moral scruple.
“The whole effort of nature was to clear the world of the (unfit) and make room for the better.” Spencer wrote [3]. This was also the ethic of Adolph Hitler, for whom, “the law of selection justifies this incessant struggle by allowing the survival of the fittest. Christianity is a rebellion against natural laws, a protest against nature. Taken to its logical extreme, Christianity would mean the systematic cult of human failure.”[5]
Unlike the social Darwinists, Julian Huxley [6] and Conrad Waddington [2] did not see their evolutionary ethic as implying that it had to be individualistic and competitive. On the contrary, they were firm believers in co-operation and harmony. Their position was a strangely inconsistent one, and their efforts to eliminate this inconsistency unconvincing. They argued that both nature and human nature were themselves subject to evolutionary change, which they identified with progress and tending in the direction of increasing harmony and co-operation.
Julian Huxley rejected his grandfather Thomas Huxley’s thesis that “there was a fundamental contradiction between the ethical process and the cosmic process”. Instead, he thought that the contradiction could be resolved [6], “on the one hand, by extending the concept of evolution both backward into the inorganic and forward into the human domain, and on the other by considering ethics not as a body of fixed principles, but as the product of evolution, and itself evolving.” Progress, an integral part of evolution, had made man less individualistic and less competitive and more co-operative and altruistic.
Thus, although both Julian Huxley and Waddington regarded themselves as proponents of the biospheric or naturalistic ethic, by insisting that progress was part of evolution, and that the technosphere or world of human artefacts was part of nature, they sought to justify the very process of economic development that is leading inexorably to the destruction, indeed to the very annihilation of nature.
This position had previously been articulated explicitly by Henry Drummond [7], the American theologian, who declared that “the path of progress and the path of altruism are one”, evolution being “nothing but the Involution of Love, the revelation of Infinite Spirit, the Eternal Life returning to itself.”
Nobel laureate Belgian physical chemist Ilya Prigogine justified the latest phase of technological progress – genetic engineering – in the same spirit [8]. He saw this technology as a means of achieving a new earthly paradise.
Thus, the stark choice of an evolutionary ethic appears to be between social Darwinism, or one that embraces progress as defined by technological advance, whatever that advance may mean for the biosphere, in effect, a kind of technospheric ethic.
Anti-evolutionary ethics
There were strong reactions against deriving ethics from evolution among the most prominent biologists in Europe; but they all shared Herbert Spencer’s view that the world is selfish, individualistic and aggressive.
Thomas Huxley, Darwin’s most celebrated disciple in Victorian Britain, wrote [9], “from the point of view of the moralist, the animal world is on about the same level as a gladiator’s show. The creatures are fairly well treated, and set to fight – whereby the strongest, the swiftest and the cunningest live to fight another day.”
Unlike Spencer, Thomas Huxley believed that “the ethical progress of society depends not on imitating the cosmic process, still less in running away from it, but in combating it.” Indeed “social progress means a checking of the cosmic process at every step, and the substitution for it of another, which may be called the ethical process; the end of which is not the survival of those who may happen to be the fittest, in respect of the whole of the conditions which obtain, but of those who are ethically the best.” This ethical process he identified with material progress.
Sigmund Freud, the inventor of psychoanalysis, perpetrated the same anti-naturalist doctrine [10], he saw the development of civilization as a systematic battle against man’s natural instincts.
American evolutionist Gaylord Simpson put forward a broadly similar argument [11]. “Man is the result of a purposeless and materialistic process that did not have him in mind. He was not planned,” Simpson wrote. “The discovery that the universe, apart from man or before his coming, lacked any purpose or plan, has the inevitable corollary that the workings of the universe cannot provide any automatic universal, eternal, or absolute ethical criteria of right and wrong.”
French Nobel laureate geneticist, Jacques Monod, likewise, said [12], “Since man has no role within the biosphere and is a stranger to it, the biosphere cannot impose any values on man.”
The sociobiologists of the present-day, deriving from Edward O. Wilson [13] see man by nature to be individualist, he is an egoist whose over-riding preoccupation is the survival of his own genes. But this does not mean we have to behave egotistically. Indeed, Richard Dawkins, the most prominent proselytiser of neo-Darwinian theory in Britain today, wrote [14], “We have the power to defy the selfish genes of our birth and, if necessary, the selfish memes of our indoctrination. We can even discuss ways of deliberately cultivating and nurturing pure, disinterested altruism – something that has no place in nature, something that has never existed before in the whole history of the world. We are built as gene machines and cultured as meme machines, but we have the power to turn against our creators. We, alone on earth, can rebel against the tyranny of the selfish replicators.”
And again, “If you wish, as I do, to build a society in which individuals co-operate generously and unselfishly towards a common good, you can expect little help from biological nature. Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish. Let us understand what our own selfish genes are up to, because we may then at least have the chance to upset their designs, something which no other species has ever aspired to.”
Neither Dawkins, nor any of his predecessors tells us where this miraculous power to “rebel against the tyranny of the selfish replicators” or against the innate competitiveness and aggressiveness of human nature comes from.
This school of anti-evolutionary ethics is incoherent and indefensible, and there is nothing that would distinguish it from utter anthropocentrism that can see no wrong in whatever the human species choose to perpetrate on the natural world. But it goes even further than that, for only the cream among the human species can enjoy this privilege.
Morality and the ‘modern man’
Indeed, the cardinal tenet of the ‘technospheric’ ethic – one that is perhaps the most generally accepted by the scientific and scholarly communities – is that morality begins with modern man and that one cannot talk of primitive man, or of other forms of life, as being moral.
Thus, Thomas Huxley tell us that [9] “society differs from nature in having a definite moral object; whence it comes about that the course shaped by the ethical man – the member of society or citizen – necessarily runs counter to that which the non-ethical man – the primitive savage, or man as a mere member of the animal kingdom – tends to adopt. The latter fights out the struggle for existence to the bitter end, like any other animal: the former devotes his best energies to the object of setting limits to the struggle.”
Waddington adopted the same position [2]: “It is only when we pass on from the sub-human world to deal with the evolution of man that ethics must, in its own right, enter the picture.” Simpson, likewise, wrote [11], “There is no ethics but human ethics and a search that ignores the necessity that ethics be human, relative to man, is bound to fail.”
Not just ethics, but purpose is unique to modern man. Most scholars see evolution as a random, purposeless process, due to ‘blind’ chance, until, that is, modern man appeared on the scene. The American philosopher Lester Ward made this explicit [15], “If there is no cosmic purpose, there is at least human purpose, which has already given man a special place in nature and may yet, if he wills it, give organization and direction to his social life. Purposeful activity must henceforth be recognised as a proper function not only of the individual but of a whole society.” Ward distinguished between man-made phenomena that are the result of human purpose, which he called “telic” (from the Greek word telos, meaning goal) and natural or “genetic” phenomena, the result of blind natural forces.
And knowledge also begins with the human species; the best of knowledge, with ‘modern man’. In non-human species and presumably among primitive people, there is only “experience”, whereas with modern man there is “education”, and hence true knowledge. This makes all the difference, according to Ward, “the knowledge of experience is, so to speak, a genetic product, that of education is a teleogical product.”
Monod and Simpson attach so much importance to knowledge that they actually preach an “ethic of knowledge”. Monod saw that as being the only ethic possible for modern man [12]. This ethic would distinguish modern man from “animalistic” man, because the latter believes in teleology – that nature is inherently purposeful – which Monod regards as a hideous failing. For him, that is the opposite of ‘objectivity’, which alone gives rise to “authentic” knowledge.
Monod’s “ethic of knowledge” is clearly an essential part of the ethic of the technosphere, since it is only through the type of “authentic” knowledge that he promotes as ethical that the technosphere is built up.
The unspoken assumption is that all knowledge, even if not every technology produced as a result, must be good. That is why any attempt to make scientists accountable to society in their research is automatically rejected as a curb on the scientist’s “freedom” and “imagination”. In “objective” knowledge, there can be no wrong.
Indeed, it is only on account of consciousness, purpose, knowledge, and all the other unique endowments of modern man, that reason and choice can emerge, without which there can be no morality.
As knowledge builds up, our rational choices will change or rather “evolve”. That means our ethics must be flexible: they cannot be absolute or, for that matter, universal.
Change, Simpson insists [11], is “the essence” of evolution and for that reason alone, “there can be no absolute standard of ethics”. Waddington said the same [2]. Evolutionary ethic “cannot be expected to be absolute but must be subject to evolution itself and must be the result of responsible and rational choice in the full light of such knowledge of man and of life as we have.”
This has resulted in a dangerous combination of scientific fundamentalism coupled with total moral relativism. While scientists insists on doing any research they like from GM crops to creating human embryos for harvesting embryonic stem cells, the role of ‘bioethicists’ is becoming little more than manufacturing spurious arguments to make the morally unacceptable acceptable to the public.
Individualism rules
The ‘technospheric’ ethic is fundamentally individualistic. Simpson [11] argued that even if we wished to derive ethics from nature, they would still be individualistic, for evolution tends towards individualization (as opposed to higher integration as ecologists once maintained). This individualization, Simpson regarded as “good”. Man must be aware of “the goodness of maintenance of this individualization” and he must promote “the integrity and dignity of the individual…Socialization may be good or bad. When ethically good, it is based on, and in turn gives maximum total possibility for, ethically good individualization.”
The individual has no duty to the community, or to the state. Individualism is associated with democracy. Democratic society is the product of the “social contract”. As Sumner wrote [4], “Contract …is rational – even rationalistic. It is also realistic, cold and matter of fact. A contract-relation is based on a sufficient reason, not on custom or prescription. It is not permanent. It endures only so long as the reason for it endures. In a state based on contract, sentiment is out of place in any public or common affairs. It is relegated to the sphere of private and personal relations.”
Julian Huxley and Waddington also accepted the ethic of individualism, but it was tempered with their knowledge that, in Huxley’s word [6], “the individual is …meaningless in isolation”, and in Waddington’s [2], “a fully developed human being is inconceivable in isolation from society.” Nevertheless, Huxley regarded “the fully developed individual” as “the highest product of evolution, the experiences which alone have high intrinsic value, such as those of love and beauty and knowledge and mystical union, are accessible only to human individuals”, but he recognized that, “a certain right organization of society is necessary before those ends can be achieved.”
It goes without saying that for sociobiologists, the only ethic conceivable is individualistic. The individual’s overriding goal is to proliferate his own genes. The notion that this goal may, in the natural world, be subordinated to the more sensible goal of serving the interests of the community or the species or the ecosystem is considered unscientific, and those who suggest it, like British biologist Wynne Edwards [15], are mercilessly derided.
As the modern ethic is the product of conscious choice, based on ‘objective’ and hence ‘scientific’ knowledge, it is authenticated by no other authority but that of modern man himself, endowed as he supposedly is, with all his unique intellectual and moral gifts, and armed with the unique potentialities offered by scientific knowledge. Simpson said [11], “Man can cherish values if he wishes to”, but they are his own, self-imposed values. No absolute ethics can be found “outside of man’s own nature”. Monod is of the same mind [12], “The ethic of knowledge would not be imposed on man. It is he on the contrary who would impose it on himself.” That’s essentially the line taken by scientists today when told they should be socially accountable. No one should have any say on what scientists can do, it is against their ethics of knowledge.
Ilya Prigogine [8] and his disciple Erich Jantsch [16] go even further. For them, the key determinants of progress are “consciousness” and “mind”, which they consider the unique endowments of man. According to Jantsch, “mankind is not redeemed by God but redeems himself.” He identified the evolution of consciousness with the evolution of the universe, which is in turn identified with “self-organisation”. Prigogine, Jantsch and their followers in France Belgium and elsewhere have built up an extraordinary cosmology for rationalizing super-star technologies that are to achieve the latest progress in evolution, all the products of the deified modern man.
The anthropocentric modernist fallacies
The technospheric ethic has led to the systematic substitution of the man-made world for the biosphere or natural world, to fill it with ever more toxic waste products that have brought the earth to the brink of extinction. It is driving the economic globalisation that sanctions exploitation of the poor and weak by the rich and powerful.
It is clear that the technospheric ethic is based on numerous assumptions ranging from the debatable to the fallacious and abhorrent.
Many will argue that consciousness, and purposive behaviour begins much further down the evolutionary tree, with some biologists who spend a lifetime studying single-celled animals asserting that even those creatures are purposive, if not conscious.
Examples abound in nature of animals behaving altruistically, if not morally. Biologists such as the Russian prince, Peter Kropotkin [17] and Amercan naturalist Warder Clyde Allee [18] have argued convincingly that sociality, rather than competition, is the defining feature of the living world. The falsehoods perpetrated about the lack of morality in so-called ‘primitive’ societies are utterly reprehensible.
The emphasis on individualisation and equating it with individualism is fallacious. Individualisation is a term in embryology that describes the processes whereby definite organs take shape within the embryo in the course of development. It has more to do with differentiation of the whole than with individualism [editor’ note: it was C. H. Waddington who invented the term individualisation in embryology]. The natural world is highly differentiated and organised. It is a vast co-operative enterprise, capable of maintaining its homeostasis under wide ranges of variation in its environment, as Jim Lovelock has shown [19]. An atomised, individualistic biophere is a sick biosphere, one that has disintegrated, as ours is, under the impact of economic development defined as ‘progress’. The same is true of an atomised or individualistic society. The alienated members of such a society have lost the power to govern themselves and must be run by a government with a vast bureaucracy. The ethic of individualism is the ethic of ecological and social disintegration.
The neo-Darwinian paradigm, on which the doctrine of competition and individualism is based, has been under ever more serious attack across a wide front, and is increasingly difficult to reconcile with our knowledge of living processes within the biosphere [editor’s note: see my Development and Evolution Revisited [20] for an update on the extent to which neo-Darwinism has been falsified especially in molecular genetics.]
Biospheric morality
A biospheric ethic, one compatible with the ecological view of the world we live in, would be very different. It would involve human beings in helping to sustain the earth’s biosphere. And unethical behaviour would be that which disrupts and destroy the biosphere.
This was undoubtedly what ethical behaviour was taken to be by many so-called primitive societies of the past. The laws or customs of such societies were observed not only because they had the moral force of having been promulgated by the ancestors in the “Dawn Period”, but also because the behaviour that conformed to them was seen as maintaining the cosmic order. So long as that order was maintained, human beings prospered. If it became perturbed, if, in fact, “the balance of Nature” was upset, then disaster inevitably followed.
The indigenous person’s fundamental role in life was thus to maintain the cosmic order, which is done by performing the prescribed rituals, taking part in the prescribed ceremonies and in general by observing the traditional laws of the community. This law is taken to be a moral law, one that applied not only to humans and the society to which they belong, but also to nature, and indeed, to the Cosmos.
French Catholic priest Father Placide Tempels, in his celebrated book on Bantu philosophy, noted [21], “Moral behaviour for the Bantu is behaviour that serves to maintain the order of the Cosmos and hence that maximizes human welfare. Immoral behaviour is that which reduces its order, thereby threatening human welfare.”
This statement could apply to all indigenous societies in all parts of the world. In many of these societies, the pattern of behaviour judged to be ethical is referred to by a word that both denotes the order of the cosmos and at the same time, the ‘path’ or ‘way’ that must be followed in order to maintain it.
Among the ancient Greeks, the word used was ‘Dike’, which also meant ‘righteousness’ or ‘justice’. The Chinese ‘Tao’ is a very similar concept which refers to the daily and yearly “revolution of the heavens”. According to de Groot [23], Tao “represents all that is correct, normal or right in the universe, it does indeed never deviate from its course. It consequently includes all correct and righteous dealings of men and spirits, which alone promote universal happiness and life.” All other acts, as they oppose the Tao, are “incorrect, abnormal, unnatural” and they must “bring misfortune on the bad”.
The Buddhist notion of “Dharma”, the Persian “Asha” and the Vedic “Rita” are very similar concepts: all refer to the Way that must be followed, to maintain the order of the Cosmos, to assure the welfare of the world of living things. To divert from it can only cause disasters like floods, droughts, epidemics and wars.
Although many indigenous peoples may not have formulated the explicit notion of the Way, their idea of morality remains the same. Moral behaviour is still that which conforms to the traditional law and which, at the same time, serves to maintain cosmic order; immoral behaviour is “taboo”. “An act is taboo,” the French philosopher Roger Caillois wrote [24], “if it disrupts the universal order which is at once that of nature and society….as a result the Earth might no longer yield a harvest, the cattle might be struck with infertility, the stars might no longer follow their appointed course, death and disease would stalk the land.”
Conclusion
There can be no more truly immoral enterprise than that to which our modern society is so totally committed: namely, economic development or ‘progress’, which involves the systematic substitution of the technosphere for the biosphere. Such “progress” must inevitably lead to the destruction, indeed the annihilation, of the world of living things. Indeed, the floods, droughts, epidemics and other massive discontinuities, whose seriousness is increasingly every year, are but the symptoms of this destruction: they are the price to be paid for the immorality of the economic policies to which we are committed by institutions like the World Trade Organisation, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
We must abandon these policies and seek to reconstitute, to the extent that this is still possible, the natural world that we have so irresponsibly destroyed. If we want to survive on this planet for more than a few decades, we have no alternative but to return to the Way – and hence adopt once more the biospheric ethic that it so faithfully reflects.
There are 2 comments on this article so far. Add your comment
Hugo Freije Comment left 1st September 2009 06:06:16I think we must considere that Mr.Financial Crack, Dr. Global Change and widow Mrs. Monoculture (nee Biodiversity) argue a lot on contemporary scientific ethic. Please, continue on Goldsmith´s steps. Hugo Freije (Environmental Chemistry -UNS) Argentina
Antonino Drago Comment left 1st September 2009 06:06:24About 'modern' ethics I recall that it started by the 31 Query by Newton: a new ethics from mechanical laws. There exists an authoritative tradition of biospheric ethics, that by non-violent thinkers: Tolstoy, Gandhi, Lanza del Vasto. Of the latter one see Make Straight the Way of the Lord: An Anthology of the Philosophical Writings of Lanza del Vasto, Knopf, New York, 1974; Les Quatre Fléaux, Denoël, Paris, 1957 (a synthesis is online (English translation by Jeans Sidgwick, 2002) on the site forget-me.net); it is a complete foundation of a biospheric ethics, ranging from Christian theology to political sciences; till up to apply it for founding a new kind of communitarian ecological life.

Earth Days Movie by Earth Day Network

2009-08-30T19:23:00.000-07:00

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It is now all the rage in the Age of Al Gore and Obama, but can you remember when everyone in America was not "Going Green"? Visually stunning, vastly entertaining and awe-inspiring, Earth Days looks back to the dawn and development of the modern environmental movement-from its post-war rustlings in the 1950s and the 1962 publication of Rachel Carson's incendiary bestseller Silent Spring, to the first wildly successful 1970 Earth Day celebration and the subsequent firestorm of political action.

Earth Days' secret weapon is a one-two punch of personal testimony and rare archival media. The extraordinary stories of the era's pioneers-among them Former Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall; biologist/Population Bomb author Paul Ehrlich; Whole Earth Catalog founder Stewart Brand; Apollo Nine astronaut Rusty Schweickart; and renewable energy pioneer Hunter Lovins-are beautifully illustrated with an incredible array of footage from candy-colored Eisenhower-era tableau to classic tear-jerking 1970s anti-litterbug PSAs. Directed by acclaimed documentarian Robert Stone (Oswald's Ghost, Guerrilla: The Taking of Patty Hearst) Earth Days is both a poetic meditation on humanity's complex relationship with nature and an engaging history of the revolutionary achievements-and missed opportunities-of groundbreaking eco-activism.

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Optimum Limit of CO2 PPM to Reverse Climate Change

2009-08-30T19:11:00.000-07:00

Dear friends,

For once, this email isn't asking you to do anything at all. It's merely sharing the news--the amazing news--that arrived about 45 minutes ago at 350 headquarters.

Rajendra Pachauri is the U.N.'s top climate scientist. He leads the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which every five years produces the authoritative assessment of climate science. Their last report, in 2007, helped set the target of 450 ppm (parts per million of CO2) that many environmental groups and national governments have adopted as their goal for Copenhagen.

As you all know, that number is out of date. When Jim Hansen and other scientists looked at phenomenon like the Arctic ice melt of the last two summers, they produced new data demonstrating that 350 is the bottom line for the planet.

But it's been hard to get that news out to the powers that be.

So today it comes as enormous and welcome news that Dr. Pachauri, from his New Delhi office, said that 350 was the number.

"As chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) I cannot take a position because we do not make recommendations," said Rajendra Pachauri when asked if he supported calls to keep atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations below 350 parts per million (ppm).

"But as a human being I am fully supportive of that goal. What is happening, and what is likely to happen, convinces me that the world must be really ambitious and very determined at moving toward a 350 target," he told Agence France Presse in an interview.

It's your work that has made this breakthrough possible. In fact, Pachauri specifically cited the last big piece of news for 350: the decision of 80+ small island nations and less developed countries to endorse the 350 target.

"I think this is a good development," said Pachauri. "Now people -- including some scientists -- see the seriousness of the impacts of climate change, and the fact that things are going to get substantially worse than what we had anticipated."

This news makes it much easier for all of us to push hard leading up to the International Day of Climate Action on the 24th of October (signup to start or attend an event at www.350.org) , and the UN Climate Conference in Copenhagen this December.

It's clear now that science is powerfully on the side of the 350 target. Now we need the political world to follow suit. You will make that happen in the next two months. Oct. 24 is officially 60 days away, and we're building just the momentum we need to make it count.

Thanks for all you do,

Bill McKibben

P.S. Once you've spread this news around your networks (click here to share it on twitter or here to share it on facebook), please go celebrate. And speaking of celebrations, our friends at The Age of Stupid report that the Global Premier of their new epic climate change film takes place on September 21--you can find details on local screenings here: www.ageofstupid.net

What will spark transition from fossil fuel

2009-08-30T19:09:00.000-07:00

--- to renewabls--Rocky Mountain Institute--Click Below for informative article

http://nc.rmi.org//page.redir?target=http%3a%2f%2fwww.rmi2009.org%2fblast%2frmi2009.html&srcid=21917&srctid=1&erid=1296924

India's environmental situation Alarming: PM

2009-08-30T18:58:00.000-07:00

IANS 18 August 2009, 07:03pm IST

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/news/environment/pollution/Indias-environmental-situation-alarming-PM/articleshow/4907353.cms |

NEW DELHI: The "multiple environmental crises that confront our country have created an alarming situation", Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said here Tuesday, while asking state governments to curtail pollution, clean rivers and fight climate change.

Opening a daylong conference of environment ministers from all state governments, Manmohan Singh said: "Climate change is threatening our ecosystems, water scarcity is becoming a way of life and pollution is endangering our health."

"We have to make fundamental choices about our lifestyles," the prime minister said, assuring his audience that the "challenges are not insurmountable".

Describing climate change as a "major global challenge", he said India was conscious of its "responsibility to present and future generations" and would ensure the "ecological sustainability of its development path".

Manmohan Singh sought the cooperation of all state governments to implement the eight missions that the centre has outlined under the National Action Plan on Climate Change. He asked the assembled ministers to have state level action plans in concordance with the national plan.

The prime minister also called upon state governments to modernise their forest departments and to fill up vacant posts, pointing out that many states would now get huge funding for compensatory afforestation projects, as the Supreme Court has recently unfrozen over Rs.9,000 crore meant for this. The money was lying in escrow accounts for over seven years.

Welcoming the prime minister, Minister of State for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh said the first tranche of these funds, Rs.400 crore, had been transferred to 10 states Tuesday morning, and Rs.1,000 crore would be transferred "in the next few days".

Manmohan Singh underlined the "need to ensure that local communities benefit from forest conservation. Tribals have guarded our forests for centuries. Their wisdom and experience should be utilised for conservation rather than turning them into environmental refugees".

He said the Tribal Rights Act was the best way to guarantee these rights.

The prime minister expressed concern that rivers all over India were still being degraded. He referred to the increased allocation in this year's national budget to clean rivers, and asked state pollution control boards to curtail release of industrial effluents into waterways, "which account for 25 percent of total pollution in rivers".

Manmohan Singh felt that India's mandatory environmental clearance rules had led to a "licence raj" and had become "a source of corruption". But he expressed confidence that the National Green Tribunal bill would change this by setting up an independent regulator. The bill was introduced in parliament during the last session.

"India's energy needs will increase sharply," the prime minister pointed out. "We have to ensure we meet this demand in an environment-friendly way." He sought more investments in green technologies and a boost to research and development in this field. "Environmental degradation threatens our economic security and our well-being," Manmohan Singh warned the assembled ministers.

While welcoming the prime minister, Ramesh appealed for more money for river and lake conservation and to set up joint effluent treatment plants in industrial estates.

minister referred to an anomaly in the rules, due to which states had to transfer the water cess they collected to the centre, which then sent 80 percent of the amount back to the states. It would make more sense for the state to simply send 20 percent of cess to the centre, he pointed out. Ramesh also sought "special bonuses" for states that maintained their green cover, and wanted this institutionalised through the Finance Commission or the Planning Commission.