March 2009 Archives

Norris McDonald has lots of pics and coverage of the signing (and a great seat!).

Vancouver's 2010 Olympic/Paralympic committee is shopping for offsets.

In setting its 300,000-tonne carbon offset target, VANOC relied on a 2007 preliminary carbon emissions forecast prepared for it by the David Suzuki Foundation and subsequently reviewed by PricewaterhouseCoopers. The independent foundation predicted that, based on planning at that stage, the Games would produce an estimated 110,000 tonnes of direct carbon emissions and another 220,000 tonnes of indirect emissions from air travel by spectators and other participants.

Are they offsetting CO2 emissions from the athletes too? An energy-conscientious Games is a good thing at any rate.

Prevention reports:

Tossing them in the sink or toilet is no longer advisable--traces of prescription drugs are showing up in lakes, rivers, and drinking water, raising questions about harm to wildlife and people. (The pills you do swallow also get into the water supply as part of normally eliminated human waste, but in smaller amounts.) Some communities are developing prescription drug "take back" programs. The government suggests throwing most old meds in the trash--mixed with undesirable material such as used coffee grounds, then sealed in a plastic bag. See more details [here], which includes a few best-to-flush exceptions to this rule.

-D

From a friend's email today:

Afghanistan is a real experience. You haven't lived until you have raced into oncoming traffic through the streets of Kabul with a probable SVBIED behind you. Definitely gets the adrenline going in the AM on the way to work - probably a lot like DC traffic! Seriously, we lost two Naval Officers this week and another was WIA. Please say a prayer for their families.

Join me in that today, won't you please?

“It’s past comprehension,” said Mary Louise Starosciak, who happened to be bicycling by with her husband while on vacation when they saw the ark looming over the local landscape. “I knew the story of Noah, but I had no idea the boat would have been so big.” In fact, Noah’s Ark as described in the Bible was five times larger than Johan’s Ark.

(Thanks to Scott for the link)

Hospital power turned off for Earth Hour, 15 dead. But think of the carbon savings...

This is the word of the LORD to Jeremiah concerning the drought:

"Judah mourns, her cities languish; they wail for the land, and a cry goes up from Jerusalem. The nobles send their servants for water; they go to the cisterns but find no water. They return with their jars unfilled; dismayed and despairing, they cover their heads. The ground is cracked because there is no rain in the land; the farmers are dismayed and cover their heads. Even the doe in the field deserts her newborn fawn because there is no grass. Wild donkeys stand on the barren heights and pant like jackals; their eyesight fails for lack of pasture."

Although our sins testify against us, O LORD, do something for the sake of your name. For our backsliding is great; we have sinned against you.

-- Jeremiah 14:1-7, NIV

In Joseph's day seven years of famine and drought drove God's people into captivity in Egypt. Far from evil, it effectively led to the concentration of the entire world's wealth into Egypt, wealth that God gave Israel during the Exodus.

But what to make of Jeremiah's drought and this vivid picture Jeremiah paints on behalf of God?

- People in cities and towns in despair and panic.

- Political leaders and the wealthy scramble about wielding worthless power.

- Men are utterly ashamed.

- The earth suffers as flora and fauna die.

Remnants of Israel and Judah - Daniel and his kin - survived the drought safely in Babylon. Those around them languished in the desert. These are the people God's talking about. Henry notes that we should dread God's departure, but we usually dread the removal of our creature comforts more. Such are the consequences of sin, not against the earth, but against The God Who Made It. The drought sufferers got that eventually but it was too late by then. The ones captured by God - they were the survivors.

Eventually this particular drought ended leaving in its dusty wake the beginnings of modern Judaism. This drought transformed a nation - the world, really.

Don't believe drought isn't a problem to you and me. Fast-forward to Jesus and the woman at the well. The only solution to her drought was the living water Jesus would give her. Water that would not only satisfy her, but become a spring that would flow out over others. Water of eternal life.

Droughts have always been a most vivid picture of souls without God. There is only one source for water that truly satisfies the ultimate thirst. There is only one way to get it.

Bloomberg Friday:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said he is open to financing an overhaul of the U.S. health-care system with revenue generated from efforts to rein in greenhouse gas emissions. Reid, a Nevada Democrat, told reporters yesterday Democrats are determined to finance the cost of any expansion of health care with savings found elsewhere in the government’s budget in order to avoid widening the federal deficit.

Only fair. After all, cigarette taxes and gambling revenues fund education.

Bwaaaaaaaahahahahah!

UPDATE: WSJ today on the coming cap and trade war.

Energy Secretary Steven Chu made the protectionist point during an underreported House hearing this month, when he said tariffs and other trade barriers could be used as a "weapon" to force countries like China and India into cutting their own CO2 emissions. "If other countries don't impose a cost on carbon, then we will be at a disadvantage," he said. So a cap-and-trade policy won't be cost-free after all. Apparently Mr. Chu did not get the White House memo about obfuscating the impact of the Administration's anticarbon policies.

Glenn Reynolds:

Why not? It’s clean, reliable, and greenhouse-friendly!

I'll tell you why not. As they used to say about Olympia beer, "It's the water."

BUMPED...

Got an email today from RIIPL asking for support of Earth Hour (their press release is here).

Earth Hour 2009 will be a statement made by individuals and organizations in the form of turning out their lights for one hour at 8:30 local time on Saturday, March 28. It is intended to be a message of global support for action on global warming, aimed at the international negotiators, including those from the U.S., who will be meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark, in December 2009. Organized by the World Wildlife Fund, the action is expected to draw the support of one billion people worldwide. “Global warming is no longer a question, and no longer a mere economic or political problem”, said Howard Brown, Director of RI – IPL. “Stewardship of Creation is a moral issue. It speaks to how we treat the gifts that have been given to us, and what steps we’re willing to take to help protect those less fortunate than ourselves, who will disproportionately suffer the effects of global warming in the form of forced migration and starvation.”

Michelle Malkin suggests we celebrate human achievement hour instead:

This weekend, enviro-zealots will celebrate “Earth Hour” by turning off their lights. They’ve pulled this stunt for a few years now. But this time, they’ve added a new twist: “This year, Earth Hour has been transformed into the world’s first global election, between Earth and global warming. For the first time in history, people of all ages, nationalities, race and background have the opportunity to use their light switch as their vote – Switching off your lights is a vote for Earth, or leaving them on is a vote for global warming.” How about voting for human achievement?

Vote for the earth or vote for people? How about a vote for 'none of the above':

Knight, whose house in a south ­London street known as Millionaires' Row serves as the unlikely headquarters for the G20 Meltdown group organising the siege of the Bank of England on 1 April, intends to “harness the rage” of social action groups and wants to use “Earth Hour”, a worldwide “power down” planned by the World Wildlife Fund to express solidarity against ­climate change, to target City firms that fail to turn off their lights at the appointed time of 8.30pm on Saturday night.

And what if some day you don't get a vote. The government decides to impose Earth Hour through your centrally-controlled meter via Google:

We could set up systems so that everybody in each house have their own smart meters that, uhh, will tell you when to turn off the lights, when the peak hours are, can help you sell back energy, uh, that you've generated in your home through a solar panel or through, uh, eh, other mechanisms.  All this can be done, but it also creates jobs right now.  Our biggest problem, we don't have enough electricians to lay all these lines out there.

Ya know, I'm thinking if the whole world stopped - just for one hour - and we all gave God our complete honor and attention and worship, a lot more good would come of it.

Who'd vote for that?

UPDATE: The Eco-Daughter and I were hanging out and one of NWF's Earth Hour commercials came on. Got us thinking:

- Why NOT ask Christians to use Earth Hour as an hour of prayer for the planet, for forgiveness, for the salvation of all those who need to be saved, and for wisdom to be better stewards of the earth.

- So how much carbon do we save if we end up lighting a couple dozen candles for an hour to replace the carbon being burned at the powerplant for our couple dozen lightbulbs?

UPDATE: "All these burning wicks raise the question: Are the emissions from these candles worse for the climate than simply leaving the lights on? After all, candles emit carbon dioxide too." Answer: It depends.

UPDATE: "Lights out for thee, but not for me" in Times Square and in a certain Nobelaureate's home in Tennessee.

UPDATE: The whole thing was as huge a flop as Live Earth. First clue: Diane and Robin's lead story was whether there's such a thing as healthy underwear. LOL! Copious Dissent, L.A. Times, Chicago Trib, and Craig Ashley Russell have more. Agree with CAR - approach this as an energy savings or national security issue, and you'd have more interest. Or maybe just remind folks how candles are so much nicer than crappy CFLs.

Good news is not much anarchy ensued. Well, hmmm. Maybe for all those who didn't doff their lights it was a form of anarchy...

A new study concludes:

But all the power wasted while computers are sitting idle overnight adds up, and one study has finally tried to measure it. The tally: An estimated $2.8 billion wasted on excess energy costs each year in the U.S. alone.

But big numbers like that become almost meaningless in an era of trillion-dollar bailouts, so to put the wasted energy in perspective, the study provides the data in terms you can better understand: If you run a company with 1,000 PCs left on overnight, you can save about $28,000 a year if they are turned off after hours. That's not chump change.

-D

 ¹⁶ Give glory to the LORD your God
       before he brings the darkness,
       before your feet stumble
       on the darkening hills.
       You hope for light,
       but he will turn it to thick darkness
       and change it to deep gloom.

 ¹⁷ But if you do not listen,
       I will weep in secret
       because of your pride;
       my eyes will weep bitterly,
       overflowing with tears,
       because the LORD's flock will be taken captive.

-- Jeremiah 13 (NIV)

_________

The people answered him, We have heard out of the law that Christ abideth for ever: and how sayest thou, The Son of man must be lifted up? who is this Son of man? 35 Then Jesus said unto them, Yet a little while is the light with you. Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you: for he that walketh in darkness knoweth not whither he goeth. 36 While ye have light, believe in the light, that ye may be the children of light. These things spake Jesus, and departed, and did hide himself from them.

-- John 12:34-36 (KJV)

_________

 ⁷Dear friends, I am not writing you a new command but an old one, which you have had since the beginning. This old command is the message you have heard. ⁸Yet I am writing you a new command; its truth is seen in him and you, because the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining. ⁹Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. ¹⁰Whoever loves his brother lives in the light, and there is nothing in him^c]'>[c] to make him stumble. ¹¹But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness; he does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded him.

-- 1 John 2 (NIV)

_________

 ¹⁴"You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. ¹⁵Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. ¹⁶In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven. ¹⁷"Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. ¹⁸I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.

 -- Matt 5 (NIV)

The Archbishop of Canturbury Rowan Williams, from the Ebor Lecture, 25 March 09:

[O]ur care for the world we inhabit is not simply a duty laid upon us but a dimension of life made whole: a redeeming activity grounded in the character of our own redemption, a revelation of the true "face" of creation as we ourselves undergo the uncovering of our own human face before God. Going back to the root meaning of the Hebrew word, what we're asked to undertake is in fact a conversion – a turning – towards the truth: towards the God who is eternally active and giving in ways beyond our concepts, towards the hidden depths of who we ourselves are – and thus towards the face of the earth, seeing it freshly in its unfathomable interrelatedness. As Ps 104 (vv 29-30) has it, when God hides his face, creation is locked in fear and slips towards death; when he breathes on creation (when he "sends his spirit"), creation happens all over again, and the face of the earth is renewed. That turning of the Spirit towards the earth is the movement that carries our love and intelligence in the same direction, so that we can properly make answer for, be responsible for, our world.

Indeed. Set aside a half-hour for this one.

Remember those solar panels the Prez was touring after one of his enormous stimulus bills? So many now I forget which one. Anyway, here's the update:

The Independence Institute asked the Denver Museum of Science and Nature to provide certain statistical information regarding the now-famous solar array. Specifically, the Institute asked for:

1 ) Two years worth of electric bills prior to the installation of the solar array,
2 ) All electric bills following the completion of the installation.

The Museum denied those requests.

Why? Well, they were supposed to provide a "significant" amount of electricity. Turns out it's less than 5%. Bill for the solar array = $750,000. Payoff? Over 100 years. Lifespan of the solar panels? 20 years.

Ya just gotta read the whole thing. h/t

Heh. Not sure I trust these guys much with improving the jobs market. They can't seem to fill their own gaps.

UPDATE: From Cannon's departure memo posted at EPA's homepage.

“Today I am voluntarily removing my name from consideration to be Deputy Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. It has come to my attention that America’s Clean Water Foundation, where I once served on the board of directors, has become the subject of scrutiny..."

Scrutiny by evil Republicans or something? Nope - scrutiny by the EPA.

The Foundation did not comply with the financial and program management standards and the procurement standards promulgated in Title 40 Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), Part 30.

Specifically, the Foundation (1) could not provide support for any of its general journal entries; (2) included duplicate transactions in its accounting system; (3) recorded labor charged to EPA grants incorrectly; (4) could not support the recorded indirect costs; (5) claimed unallowable preaward costs; (6) recorded EPA cash draws inaccurately; (7) did not submit required indirect cost proposals to EPA; (8) did not complete the required single audits for fiscal years ended June 30, 2003, June 30, 2004, and June 30, 2005; and
(9) did not submit a Federal Cash Transactions Report when required.

The Foundation’s procurement practices and procedures did not comply with the grant regulations. The Foundation awarded sole source contracts without performing the cost/price analysis required by Title 40 CFR 30.45. It also awarded a contract to a member of its Board of Directors, contrary to the conflict of interest provisions at Title 40 CFR 30.42, and reimbursed a contractor for billings above contractual ceilings. Because the Foundation did not adequately document its costs and did not comply with the EPA regulations, we questioned the Federal share claimed of $25,372,590.

One would think if a person a top EPA lawyer* knew enough about EPA to get the DEPA appointment he'd know this was a problem, like, before letting the President nominate him.

But hey - maybe his taxes were squared away.

*[From the comments: looks like the biggest difference between Obama and Jesus is that Jesus could actually build a cabinet. Heh. Agree with another commenter that the Inhofe thing is weird.]

UPDATE: Michelle has more (of course).

First thought when I read this was "gee, Palo Alto's pretty far from the coast to need that..."

FrontPage Mag:

Officers of the U.S. National Council of Churches (NCC) merrily visited Shanghai last month to converse with officials of Chinese government-controlled Protestant agencies to seek an “even deeper working relationship that allows us to consult regularly with one another and to speak and act together in response to contemporary issues."

According to the NCC, among those “contemporary issues” that will unite the chronically left-wing NCC and the official Chinese church groups are Global Warming!  After all, the U.S. and China are the world’s leading emitters of ostensibly deadly carbon.

Among the issues on which the NCC will not cooperate with the official Chinese Protestant agencies are spreading Christianity and asserting religious freedom, topics on which the NCC has long since lost interest in favor of political causes of the left.

Somehow I'm not surprised.

Grieved, actually.

Honored by some of my favorite folks today - and on World Water Day, no less!!!

Newscientist.com: (via Drudge)

It is hard to conceive of the sun wiping out a large amount of our hard-earned progress. Nevertheless, it is possible. The surface of the sun is a roiling mass of plasma - charged high-energy particles - some of which escape the surface and travel through space as the solar wind. From time to time, that wind carries a billion-tonne glob of plasma, a fireball known as a coronal mass ejection (see "When hell comes to Earth"). If one should hit the Earth's magnetic shield, the result could be truly devastating.

Stanley and I chatted by email this week, discussing the possibility of climate change as an eschatelogical event. Scanning the Newscientist piece it's clear that there are a number of ways civilization could end in fire.

Along with this possibility of course. And then there's the old fashioned way.

Makes a half degree celcius temp rise per decade predicted by climate changers sorta, well, tame by comparison.

Associated Baptist Press:

"Putting a price on carbon is regressive," Land said. "It's not only a tax, it's a regressive tax that hurts those who make the least the most, because poor and middle-income households spend much more of their paychecks, percentage-wise, on things like gas to drive to work or to go get groceries or for home heating and air conditioning." [snip]

Christian anti-global-warming activists disagreed with Land's reasoning. Land is "lash[ing] himself to dirty coal, sacrificing human health and the global environment to corporate greed," according to Robert Parham, executive director of the Baptist Center for Ethics.

"As a global-warming denier, Richard Land continues to distort the overwhelming agreement within the scientific community about climate change," Parham, author of Loving Neighbors Across Time: A Christian Guide to Protecting the Earth, said. He said Land's "repeated claims about Earth cooling do not negate global warming."

Jonathan Merritt, national spokesman for the Southern Baptist Environment and Climate Initiative, said Christians who care about God's creation and recognize that something must be done about the global energy and environmental crisis "are growing increasingly weary of those claiming to represent us who preach relentlessly about what [they] oppose, yet refuse to offer policy alternatives."

He added, "I find it curious that we are first in line to support the coal industry that is polluting our air and destroying the Appalachian Mountains, yet when it comes to actual pro-environmental legislation, we are nowhere to be found."

Couple thoughts:

- The whole thing may be moot soon anyway.

- Whatever Land may think, John Merritt is not going away.

- Parham's name calling is counter-productive if he wants to use Christ as his baseline for ecology. Let alone "love on his neighbors."

A little oo-rah for your Thursday Wednesday... (you can tell I'm ready for Friday!)

I set out to reduce my home's electricity use by 20% in 2008 without getting rid of all of my newish but nonenergy efficient appliances, by not installing alternative energy generators, and with minor home improvements. At the end of the year I tallied up my savings and found out that I didn't make my goal - I beat it! Here's the lowdown on how I did and how I did it. (Follow Condo Blues on Twitter @condoblues)

Got Concensus? Dirty Geek:

You'll often see climate change deniers citing a "consensus" from the 1970s that "global cooling" or "a new ice age" were at hand, as a way to imply we shouldn't trust those stupid scientists. Most frequently cited as the man behind this cooling theory is James Hansen, who heads the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York City, a part of the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, Earth Sciences Division. He's one of the world's leading climatologists and a major figure for global warming, so you can imagine how, if this were true, it would be a big deal, right? Well, a lot can change in 30 years, so even if it were true that the research results had changed, it would still be understandable. Of course, it's NOT true. (DG's PBP Public is here)

Fair Trading, now established as an effective advertising label, also needs a regular upgrade or review of the market forces involved. So quickly, what starts off as an excellent and highly ethical move can end up - or rather - downgraded to meaningless words on 'green' labels of the usual corporate suspects products.

Somehow, in the middle of a recession, organic food sales in Ireland are up by 11%, as compared to this time last year. Isn't that amazing? How and why has this happened in Ireland, when there are so many negative stories abounding about all kinds of eco and ethical products and their sales rates in changed economic times? Oliver Moore investigates.

The impact to the environment is inevitable in the current industrialized world. But as an individual, everybody is able to minimize such impact.

We all know we could do a little more when it comes to reducing our household landfill waste, right? We put off those procrastination jobs for another day / week / month / until infinity and we sulk around making excuses when we could be doing something proactive instead. Thursdays at MyZeroWaste are now officially 'Get off your arse Thursday's' and it's your opportunity to get a little support and encouragement to take that next step. Why not join in with us and let us share your celebrations with you? This week we've been setting up compost heaps, sorting out clothes to pass to others, and checking school recycling bins. What could you do next week to decrease your impact on the environment?

Pollution in our air, water, and food is harmful to our bodies. But can sick bodies be harmful to the environment? Wellness is the responsibility of all of us... for all of us. Twitter Beth here.

Chimpanzees are known to share 98% of humans' DNA, so it's not surprising that they have a lot of human characteristics. A male chimp named Santino has been in the news lately, because he's been observed "stockpiling" weapons for later fits of rage. Animal behaviorists say Santino is one of the first non-humans to clearly demonstrate "planning ahead." Read about Santino's belligerant behavior on Veggie Revolution this week - and Sally's thoughts about why we should save some space on the planet for our wild cousins.

Imagine an electric supercar that is powered by the energy it generates from the sun. It may sound too good to be true, but believe it!

If you need more reason to for organic makeup, consider this: Lead has been found in 61% of tested brand name lipsticks. And nobody in the industry is doing anything about it.

After the post I made a couple days ago on motorhome racing, I wondered if there was anybody out there crazy enough to race an Airstream.

What good are greenhouse gases? Hugh Ross explains that they are part of God’s design in More Than a Theory: Revealing a Testable Model for Creation :

The end products of greenhouse gas removal [through water cycle, plate tectonics and biological processes] - coal, oil, natural gas, limestone, marble, gypsum, phosphates and sand - are all valuable resources for launching and sustaining human civilization...

Fine-tuning this removal to compensate for the increase in solar luminosity demands fine-tuning of all seven factors governing silicate erosion plus all the factors governing the abundance, diversity, growth, decay, extinction and burial of organisms. Furthermore, all this fine-tuning had to be exquisitely timed and regulated throughout the past 3.5 to billion years.

This continual planning and fine-tuning over an extended time period challenges any reasonable naturalistic explanation.

Ross' excellent new book spells out a testable scientific design model. Something that the intelligent design movement at large as been weak on. -D

Joshua told the people, "Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the LORD will do amazing things among you."

-- Joshua 3:5

Gotta tell ya, I read tons of stuff about Christians looking for transformational change in our attitudes toward Creation. Most seem to be attacking these problems in their own, albeit collective, strength.

The simple truth in this passage from Joshua is this: The walls don't come down in the world - political and regulatory issues, public attitudes, pollution problems, ending deforestation - until the walls between each of us and our Savior come down. Once that happens God will do amazing things among us almost immediately.

Really want to change the world, brother? Start by hitting your knees.

 My Dad and I spent many summers hiking in Washington's Gifford Pinchot National Forest.

Like John Muir and other "progressive Republican" conservationists of his era, Pinchot was a man whose environmental ethic was an effortless extension of his faith in God.

His wife Cornelia Bryce Pinchot was one of several speakers at the Forest's 1949 dedication. Of the many things in her address she had to say about Pinchot the Forester ("conservationist with a capital 'C'"), this bit leaps off the page:

To Pinchot, you see, man himself is a natural resource. The basic resource for whose material, moral and spiritual welfare the Conservation doctrine is invoked. Man, without whose energy, the energy of coal and oil, of electricity, yes of atomic science itself, is inert and meaningless.

Believing, as Pinchot did, that the planned and orderly development of the earth and all it contains is indispensable to the permanent prosperity of the human race, Conservation in its widest sense became to him one of the guiding principles through which such prosperity might be achieved. A bold creative affirmation in spiritual and ethical terms, of our faith in the dignity of man as a child of God.

[Photo: Pinchot (r) with President Theodore Roosevelt on the deck of the steamer Mississippi during a tour of the Inland Waterways Commission. US Forest Service, Library of Congress, 1907]

WaTimes: "We all looked at each other like, 'Wow, that's a big number...'" Now it's three times that. Sheesh.

UPDATE: It's two of these: $1Trilliondollars.pdf

Hey Church:

I totally respect your buying into climate change doctrine. I agree with you that reducing carbon fuel pollution is a good thing, as is switching over to renewable resources. I agree that waste is wasteful and stewardship of creation is a loving act.

But, my Climatist brothers and sisters in Christ, we are human beings created in the image of God. And we worship a God who made us with his own hands. He has an individual, infinite love for each and every person on this earth, including those yet to be born.

Many of you promoting a faith-based response to climate change have also been willing to accept the labeling of unborn babies as a "choice." Do you now want to be a party to those who are looking at our children, God's precious gifts, as a "carbon legacy" to be eliminated in lieu of a CO2 offset? 

I pray with all my strength that you'll come to your senses as to what's going on. And may God have mercy on us until then.

"The word of the Lord came to [Jeremiah], saying: "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; Before you were born I sanctified you."

-- Jeremiah 1:4-5

Excerpt:

Writing for the scientific journal Global Environmental Change, two academics at Oregon State University - Paul Murtaugh and Michael Schlax - identify this lifestyle change in a paper entitled "Reproduction and the Carbon Legacies of Individuals." In this treatise they attempt to quantify, in their words, "the carbon legacy of an individual," and to examine "how it is affected by the individual's reproductive choices," based on the premise that "a person is responsible for the carbon emissions of his descendants, weighted by their relatedness to him." So what did they find?

The two researchers calculated that a woman in the United States would reduce her lifetime CO2 emissions by about 486 tons if she implemented the green-approved household and transportation activities mentioned previously. But they estimate that if she were to have just one child, that child, over its lifetime, would eventually release nearly 20 times more CO2 to the atmosphere than the reductions achieved by its mother via her more mundane green activities.

In light of these calculations, Murtaugh and Schlax conclude that "the potential savings from reduced reproduction are huge compared to the savings that can be achieved by changes in lifestyle," adding that "enormous [our italics] future benefits can be gained by immediate changes [our italics] in reproductive behavior," and, therefore, that "an individual's reproductive choices can have a dramatic effect on the total carbon emissions ultimately attributable to his or her genetic lineage."

Will Congress kill farmers markets? Some following the new Food Safety Administration think so.

UPDATE: Holly Rossi sends this:

FYI, I just posted some questions from a pastor in Arkansas who wants to start a garden but has questions on everything from what tools to buy to how to choose who is "in need" and deserving of donated garden produce. Thought you might be interested

Very! In fact, it begs the question whether church gardens are also going to get hammered by this legislation.

UPDATE: Clobbering these would go right along with Obama's intent to dismantle donations to non-profits. But it seems there's a charity revolt to accompany the growing tea party movement. 

Buyers remorse?

Unemployed? Monster.com reports big labor shortages in a number of white-collar niches including environmental scientists. Now'z your chance...

UPDATE: Timely how-to-land-a-green-job newsletter from SustainLane.com.

Heh.

Michael Spencer in the Christian Science Monitor is pessimistic about the future of evangelicalism. "We fell for the trap of believing in a cause more than a faith."

Yep.

Related thoughts here.

allAfrica.com headlines a BBC survey of Nigerians who think climate change is being caused by a vengeful God.

The findings of the BBC survey fitted into the 'God-frame' thinking. Religious leaders and groups as well as local people said since change in the whether pattern had been ordained. The logic of what had been planned and set on course by divine agency naturally led to an iron-cast fatalism. People saw themselves as powerlessness and could do little or nothing to change events.

The article ties this thinking to how "primitive religous culture" looks at all weather phenomena - sun gods, harvest/rain gods, and the like. Interesting enough.

For the Christian it raises this question: If God indeed controls the climate is it that far-fetched to think this is possible? I mean, He's done stuff like this before, like the drought in 1 Kings 17-18.

Couple probs with this. First, the problem was not CO2, but Baal worship. Second, the solution is prayer and repentence, not a government response. And third, the real savior of mankind is not mankind at all, but God.

I don't exactly know how the IPCC would write that up.

AFP Wire:

Hanging over the conference proceedings like an invisible cloud were the apocalyptic predictions of the monstre sacre of Earth sciences, 90-year-old British scientist James Lovelock.

A true iconoclast, Lovelock commands respect because he understood decades before his peers that Earth behaves as a single, self-regulating system composed of physical, chemical and biological components, a concept he dubbed the Gaia principle.

In his just-released book "The Vanishing Face of Gaia", he basically says we have already passed a point of no return, and that it is now impossible "to save the planet as we know it."

"Efforts to stabilise carbon dioxide and temperature are no better than planetary alternative medicine," he wrote.

It is perhaps telling that more than a dozen scientists interviewed could only say that they hoped Lovelock was wrong.

None could say -- based on the science -- that they knew he was wrong.

The french idiom monstre sacre is a label for a public figure beyond criticism or attack. In that pundits have spent almost a half-decade now comparing climate science to religion, seeing Climatists address one of its patron saints as sacred monster, well, seems fitting.

No wonder these people are depressed.

WaPo over the weekend:

Some environmentalists and congressional Democrats are unhappy that Salazar cleared the way for hunting of the once-imperiled wolves just days after President Obama declared his support for federally protecting vulnerable species.

"Making the decision to adopt the Bush administration's flawed delisting proposal the same week that the president pledged his commitment to the Endangered Species Act certainly calls into question whether the Interior Department was coordinating as closely as one would expect to have done with the White House," said Bob Irvin, senior vice president for conservation programs at the advocacy group Defenders of Wildlife. "This was a controversy that did not need to happen."

One House Democrat, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, framed it in even more blunt political terms. "I just don't see what this does for us," the lawmaker said. "Here we are alienating people who did the most -- who did a lot to help us in the last election."

Politics? Huh - I thought this was a decision based on science.

Jeff Yeager writes:

...join me in leaving your car parked at home for at least one week during this season of Lent. Go car-free for a week? Heresy -- if not a metaphysical impossibility -- I know. But let's think about it and give it a try.

According to the AAA, on average it costs almost one dollar to drive the typical car one mile. That's after factoring in the cost of the car/depreciation, gas, insurance, maintenance, repairs, parking, tolls, traffic tickets, etc. The average American spends almost 20% of their income on their cars and spends about 20% of their work week sitting behind the wheel ... much of it to get to and from work, in order to earn that 20% of their income they need to pay for the trip! At about a buck per mile, just think about how much you'll save by going car-free for a week.

And if all that driving is killing our household budgets, it's also killing our planet. How would you like to be stuck at a railroad crossing, waiting for a 50,000-mile long train to pass? According to Environmental Defense, you'd need to burn all the coal that train could carry in order to generate the CO2 emissions generated by U.S. cars and trucks in a single year. That's about 314 million metric tons of CO2, and the train would circle the world, twice.

-D

"I looked around and observed how many of my friends held eight-to-five jobs they could barely tolerate. The average American owned two cars, a house with a 30-year mortgage, a color TV set and a stack of bills on luxuries and ‘necessities’ long worn out and discarded. It seemed to me that he did not work to enrich his life. Instead, he worked to support his possessions, all the while feeling compelled to continue to buy and buy in hopes of ever new and more wonderful possessions making him happy." - Charles W. Sasser, The Backwoodsman, Jan/Feb 2009.

More from From Dr. Don Colbert's Eat This and Live! :

Almost all nonorganically grown produce may be tainted by pesticides, herbicides, parasites and chemicals...Pesticides are absorbed in the intestinal tract froam an animal's feed...When you eat meat, it eventually goes into your fatty tissues - including your brain. If you eat processed foods, you welcome a host of chemicals into your body, including synthetic dyes, flavoring agents, chemical preservatives...Chemical food additives are usually made from...petroleum or coal tar products.

Basically, the same kind of chemicals that poison our environment, also poison your body. So even if you aren't concerned much about the environment, how about your health? The government always asks "How can we pay for everyone's health care?" That's the wrong question. The right question is: "How can we reduce sickness and in turn the resulting costs?" The simplest, and most obvious way, is by living healthier. Which, as we have seen, is closely related to eco-concerns. -D.

From Dr. Don Colbert's Eat This and Live! :

I used to recommend fish much more heartily than I do now, but new studies keep emerging about the high mercury content in fish...Because the oceans, lakes and rivers have suffered from the toxic onslaught of chemicals...fish are no longer free of toxins...But if you are careful about which fish you eat, they can be your best source of healthy omega-3 oils...

What fish does the Dr. recommend as being safer? Wild Alaskan or Pacific salmon, sardines, Tongol tuna, Mahimahi (from Florida), tilapia, halibut, grouper and striped sea bass. Avoid shark and swordfish as "they have some of the highest levels of mercury and pesticides of any fish in the sea." Also look for fish from cleaner waters in the seas surrounding Chile, New Zealand and Greece. -D

James Holtkamp finds an interesting passage in the Book of Mormon (it's Mormon 8:31, actually).

FuturePundit:

Suppose, however, that the atmospheric CO2 build-up really is going to cause us big problems. Carbon taxes that come with matching cuts in other taxes could (at least in theory) reduce fossil fuels consumption in a revenue neutral way. If proposals from the Left for cutting CO2 emissions came with tax changes that were revenue neutral I think the ideological divisions over global warming would lessen.

Another idea: taxes on carbon dioxide emissions could be used as tax credits to lower the prices of cleaner replacements. For example, taxes on coal burning for electric power could provide tax credits for promising new nuclear power plant designs. Governments would not be enriched by carbon taxes.

If only. Sorry, Randall - enrichment is non-negotiable 'cause the money's already spent.

UPDATE: [I]s slapping a price on carbon emissions to raise government revenue, as outlined in the Obama budget, a redistribution of wealth? Of course it is, says Jason Grumet, an energy adviser to the Obama campaign and the president of the Bipartisan Policy Center.

Excerpts:

Despite opposition from the White House, a proposal to tax motorists on the number of miles they drive each year is gathering speed on Capitol Hill.

Supporters say that a mileage tax would be a more reliable source of funding for the upkeep of the nation's roads and bridges. Many environmentalists endorse it, saying that it would lead to less driving and less pollution.

The proposal already is fueling privacy concerns.

Critics are objecting to proposals to use Global Positioning System devices to keep track of how many miles drivers log and where they go. The technology is part of federally funded test projects that are under way in Oregon and elsewhere.

For [Senator] Boxer, it's a "Big Brother system tracking your every move." While she says a mileage tax "is the way to go," she said she wanted to scrap the technology and rely on an honor system in which drivers would simply certify the number of miles they drove each year.

Many environmentalists endorse the proposed mileage tax, saying that it would lead to less driving and less pollution. However, some critics fear that it would have a disproportionate impact in states with long commutes.

They forgot the part where no one leaves their homes because of the mileage tax and the economic fallout makes current economic problems look mild. -D.

The spring 2009 issue of American Archaeology reports:

A complaint filed with the [EPA's] Office of Inspector General states that the EPA has routinely ignored cultural preservation laws and destroyed significant archaeological sites at toxic clean-up sites across the country...[the complaint alleges] more than 7000 cubic yards of archaeological deposits [were disturbed]...

Of course, the EPA claims these allegations are untrue. Various groups are investigating. Pick up a copy of the magazine and decided for yourself. Regardless, it is sad how much of this country's archaeological sites have been destroyed and still are in danger. If you want to help change that, check out the Archaeological Conservancy. -D

Malkin:

Out of necessity, a consumption-based society is learning to live within its means. For decades, government policies fueled that insatiable appetite — and new government programs are desperately trying to preserve it. But the Obama administration’s frantic efforts to encourage more brainless home-buying, car-buying, and consumer borrowing aren’t producing their desired results. Generational theft, it seems, has a silver lining.

Good for the planet in more ways than one, I guess.

UPDATE: Thomas Friedman embraces The Great Disruption.

Our SecState today:

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told an audience Friday "never waste a good crisis," and highlighted the opportunity of rebuilding economies in a greener, less energy-intensive way.

...breath...continuing:

Highlighting Europe's unease the day after Russia warned that gas flows via Ukraine might be halted, she also condemned the use of energy as a political lever.

One man's opportunity is another woman's political lever. Heh.

By the way, just because our elected officials are making rash statements and decisions doesn't mean we should.

A quick shout-out to Rachel Lessne, proprietress of Green Envy ('An Eco-Friendly and Fair Trade Boutique') for hosting last night's Green Drinks of Newport. If you're in Newport RI you owe yourself the pleasure of browsing her great selection of Creation-friendly items.

Also, many thanks to the lovely and gracious Kara DiCamillo for planning these each month. Along with her support for Carnival of the Green and her community blog at Treehugger, she does much behind the scenes to help many others to be better stewards of the environment.

That's a very good thing.

Drop her a note if you're interested in either the Carnival or this monthly fellowship. She's at kara (at) treehugger.com. I know she'd love to hear from you.

I'm off to Norway next week for a NATO conference. Yeh, your tax dollars at work. :-)

Long flight. What to do for tunes? I've wanted an iPod-like creature for a long time but I'm a PC/Windows Media Player guy vice iMac/iTunes. Also wanted something small for the gym but plenty of storage to support my podcast habit.

And I don't have enough hair for an iPod Shuffle.

So I picked the Sanza up yesterday. Already very happy with it. A bit bigger than a Shuffle but the tradeoff is a compact but easily viewable screen that gives the option to play stuff randomly or to select it directly. It comes with a 6" long USB chord that provides power and a link to your PC, and a pair of earphones. The FM radio actually works, and so does the built-in microphone for recording your own wav files.

There's Rhapsody software enclosed but skip it. When you connect the Clip to a Windows machine it pops up like a drive and syncs right to WMP. Took less than 5 minutes from the time I opened the box to transfer all my files, with 6 gigs left over. Sweet! Should also function well as a flash drive for data files.

Wanted some noise reduction for the plane, so on the recommendation of a reviewer at Amazon I sprung for a pair of SkullCandy earbuds. He was right - cuts the background noise a lot (don't use these while driving) and I'm hearing things in the music I hadn't before. The packaged earphones are fine, but try these. You'll like 'em.

Price: Been watching Sanza Clip's storage capacity rise and prices fall for a while and now's a good time to buy. Got the 8gb Clip at Wally World on sale for $44 and the SkullCandy buds at F.Y.E. on sale for $14.95. Amazon has good deals too, but I saved shipping.

Bottom line: A huge bang for your buck.

Pros: Seemlessly links to PC/WMP. Cheap - half the cost of an iPod. Terrific sound, especially with upgraded earbuds. Eco-friendly - built-in battery recharges off USB chord or any mini-USB cell phone plug charger. Tiny size. Quality feel.

Cons: No micro SD slot. Not sure how it works with iTunes, since I don't use this. Permanently-installed clip may bother some.

The (compact flourescent) lightbulb clicks on for Grant Draper at My Green Element:

Here in New York, the city council passed a bill in January that requires large stores and retail chains, such as CVS, Duane Reade, Rite-Aid, and Wal-Mart, to recycle plastic bags prominently in their establishments.  Mayor Bloomberg, in his effort to make New York the “greenest city in the U.S.,” also announced plans in November to implement a 5 cent tax on the 2.8 billion plastic bags distributed in the city annually.  He estimates this program has the potential to bring in $84 million in new revenue for the city.

This is all well and good from 30,000 feet, but if a city is considering a tax on plastic bags, it really comes down to how this money collected is going to be spent.  For example, money collected by states that have bottle deposit laws typically spent on anti-littering awareness campaigns, but rather directly into the state general fund for a number of unrelated projects. Let’s make sure that if we are going to be adding yet another tax, the monies should go towards solving the problem.

When the Navy recycling program bought things around the base with recycling money, we let sailors know their efforts paid off. I think most folks are happy to do the right thing by recycling. They're even more happy to do it when they see tangible results. So I agree with Grant on that point. 

But what money? ROTFL! You mean, like cigarette taxes paying for health care? Check this out:

When states instead have structural deficits — the inability of current revenue sources to fund the normal year-to-year growth in programs — increased cigarette taxes would add to those deficits. (pp. 3)

What's he talking about? Do the math. 

$.05 charge per bag x 2,800,000,000 trash bags  =  $140,000,000

Right away I'd be asking "hey pal, you only said we're making $84 mil. Where's the other $56,000,000?" Sucker. Bloomberg is telling you it's going to cost New Yorkers fifty-six million bucks a year for NYC's finest (unionized) waste management technicians to recycle plastic bags, watched carefully by plastic bag recycling enforcement officers cruizing your local pharmacies.

Maybe the Big Apple does net $85 mil the first year. What happens when people switch to their own bags? Ba da BING - bag money goes away. All those tourists aren't smart enough to bring their own bags, so maybe the revenue drops to half. Now Grant and his friends are paying $56 million to collect $42 million in taxes, a net loss of $12 million. That's what the "structural deficit" thing is about.

Why doesn't the bag collection cost decrease? Because collection is a sunk cost. You pay it whether you recycle one bag at every store or a hundred.

Remember also that whole point of this tax exercise is to get to zero bags. Plastic bags are eeeeeeevil. They come from oil which increases CO2. They kill wildlife and farm animals. Plastic bags live forever in landfills. And they're unsightly.

What would Jesus do? Tell Bloomberg to use the $56 million he's going to lose trying to make $85 million to give people a nickel a bag. They'll turn them in by droves. Then let companies bid for the right to collect these bags, and turn around and sell them to petrochemical companies who, in turn, would enjoy the lower cost of production for plastic bags.

Best of all, it makes everybody greener, not just New York's bureaucracy.

My sister Holly was involved in representing the grocer's perspective when Seattle imposed its 20 cent bag tax. Wonder what she thinks about all this...

At the Beeb:

Mr Done, chairman of the Diocesan Rural Life Group, said: "We can have a positive debate between the badger groups, farmers and the department for environment, food and rural affairs - with all sides looking at the interests of one another so we can have healthy wildlife and cattle for the benefit of those of us who love our countryside."

Well, yeh. Perhaps the peacemakers are not only blessed, but bless creation too.

(link to video here)

No, really:

Dr. Roger Angel, an astronomer from the University of Arizona has come up with a theory that he thinks will stop, and perhaps even reverse global warming. His theory involves a massive sun shield. The shield would cover about 100,000 square miles and be made up by trillions of mirrors that would be launched (fired) into space about one million miles above earth.

Using a huge cannon. At a cost of $350,000,000,000,000.

No - really:

So far, Dr. Angel has secured NASA funding for a pilot project.

DoD cuts fuel use in half in 10 years.

Touchstone Mag:

An interesting article, two actually, on Gobleki Tepe, an archaeological site in eastern Turkey that was viewed in the 1960s by a team from the University of Chicago and passed over as a "medieval cemetery. It turns out Gobleki Tepe seems to predate Stonehenge by 6,000 years, which is more time than that separting Stonehenge from us.

More here.

Christianity Today pans The Green Bible:

The Green Bible's packaging almost parodies itself: soy-based inks, recycled paper, and a stylish, earthy cotton/linen cover made through a process in which "all air is purified before exhausting into the atmosphere and all water is purified and recycled." Surely this was a marketing necessity; the publisher could not afford the charges of hypocrisy that would follow if it printed The Green Bible the way it prints … well, its other books. [snip]

Despite the publisher's intent, spending time with The Green Bible makes me more aware than ever of the gulf separating ancient Israel from the Sierra Club, and warier of forcing environmentalism, anti-environmentalism, or any other contemporary agenda into passages of Scripture. [snip]

What is The Green Bible, then? Despite its worthwhile intentions, its packaging, assumptions, and interpretive shortcuts suggest it's not the rigorous guide to biblical creation care we need, but a hybrid of two things: an ideological fashion accessory, and a vehicle for promoting conventional progressive environmentalism.

Would have to agree, especially given the translation. On the other hand, the reviewer loves The Green Bible's introductory authors (John Paul II, etc), saying their thoughts carry the whole intellectual burden of the green faith argument the way Scofield and Oxford commentary drove orthodox evangelicalism. That's quite a statement given the point of The Green Bible is to highlight God's words specific to creation care.

The whole review's worth a scan.

Keep in mind that the Green movement is probably only a fad, so you know what? let’s do as much as we can until the world’s united focus becomes something else. Just because the unbelieving world is doing something, it doesn’t mean it’s bad. God used plenty of wicked people to work His divine will...

-- Blogger Amanda Garcia

I think campuses, agencies, and parishes in—ahem! again—“non-evangelical” camps can learn something of the how and why of “creation care” from works like this, be they Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, Marginal, or Ecumenical, because this has come to be an ecumenical cause open to alliances in a pluralistic world. The “care of creation” tree huggers may have arrived late, but they come on strong.

-- Theologian Martin E. Marty

Word Mag:

President Barack Obama came out of his Feb. 19 meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper sounding remarkably similar to his predecessor. Obama resolved to pursue carbon-capture technology, a system that would allow industry to avoid cutbacks in energy use. He also stated that the participation of China and India are "absolutely critical" for the success of any worldwide energy pact, a position that echoes the Bush administration if not the existing Kyoto Protocol.

Scientific American: EPA using a souped-up biz jet to "better understand global warming."

UPDATE: Largest greenhouse gas polluter in D.C. = The Capitol Power Plant

Protests are expected at the plant today, as some environmental campaigners continue the push to curb the use of coal-fired power plants, which produce large amounts of CO₂.

Changes already have been implemented to make the plant run more efficiently, reduce its energy consumption and use cleaner-burning natural gas. But according to The Associated Press, the House said on Friday that it would no longer purchase offsets because there was no way to verify whether the investments work to remove CO₂ from the atmosphere.

Vending Miser cuts off the power when they're not being used. Made in the good ol' USA and pay for themselves in a year. (h/t)

So says examiner.com and discovery.com.

The discrepancy gets to the heart of one of the toughest problems in climate science -- identifying the difference between natural variability (like the occasional March snowstorm) from human-induced change.

Yep.

Along these lines I was looking at a slideshow on climate data and came across this:

You could probably conclude from this that storm seasons are cyclical, or that large storms trended down between the 1990s and 2000s, and so on.

But what sticks out to you? Yeh - what's the big deal with 1973? Must have been an awful year for tornados!

Turns out 1973 was the first year weather services used the Fujita scale to predict and measure tornados. It was also the first year advanced monitoring equipment including 10cm doppler radar was used to track them. So there could have been a 400% increase in large tornados, but at least part of the jump was due to better tornado monitoring methods.

Measuring infinitesimal climate variation is a good thing and leads to a better understanding God's world. But such accuracy is also a relatively new thing, and that makes understanding mankind's effect on the climate a challenge.

UPDATE: AccuWeather.com's Brett Anderson sez it's a "conspiracy." That's the most reasonable explanation I've heard yet.

UPDATE: I blame trees.

I s'pose that's an understatement. Check this out.

When St. Ursula School in Parkville stepped up its annual recycling contest this year, the students stepped up, too. "It's kind of funny, because I can't keep up with the paper," said Kathy Bivons, the school's environmental coordinator and a sixth-grade teacher. Bivons, who started the school's environmental club a few years ago, estimated that the club collects about 5 tons of paper each year for recycling.

The latest diesel VW = 71.3 mpg. Batteries not required. (h/t)

More: Electric Porsches. Bring it on. But "Greenster?" Uhgh. C'mon guys, you can do better than that.

The Business Insider: "How Low Can the Market Go?"

Three major bubbles are not enough historical precedent to confidently conclude where the S&P 500 will bottom this time around, but it seems reasonable to conclude that the trough will be in line with--or below--the preceeding lows (Given that we just had the highest peak in history by a mile, it doesn't seem absurd to think that we might be headed for the lowest trough in history by a mile.)

Dailytech.com: "Temperature Monitors Report Widescale Global Cooling"

A compiled list of all the sources can be seen here.  The total amount of cooling ranges from 0.65C up to 0.75C -- a value large enough to wipe out most of the warming recorded over the past 100 years. All in one year's time. For all four sources, it's the single fastest temperature change ever recorded, either up or down.

What's the point? Just an observation that the human beings modeling/predicting the future of our global economy are the same sorts of human beings predicting the end-state of our global climate.

I'm putting on my jacket and going for a walk to spend my last 4 bucks on a sandwich.

By Lisa Schiffren at the Corner today.

Includes a capitalist wire-brushing of the Lorax (a well-written "...soft brained environmentalist rant..."). Heh.

“The world needs to reduce its emissions of CO2 at the same time as dealing with a crisis in our debt-based economies. This is an opportunity for human society to build a new kind of low-carbon economy which is more fulfilling, more sustainable and more equitable,”

-- Rt Rev Christopher Hill, Bishop of Guildford, writing to Mr Brown on behalf of the House of Bishops’ Europe Panel.

The notion of capping CO2 is adding to a dogpile on global markets. But I'm all for carbon-free-energy if we could pull it off.

I wonder: Is anybody asking God for this? Or just talking to politicians...

The Independent:

So you drive a Prius, eat organic and boycott anything made in China – but will that help to fight climate change? Simon Usborne faces the facts many ecologists would rather ignore.

First line: "Cute animals will have to die" Whole thing's worth a scan.

Gulf News:

Mumbai: Following a Bombay High Court order on noise pollution, environmentalists are appealing to the public to approach the municipality to get their area included in the "silence zone" if it falls within 100 metres of a religious place, hospital, nursing home, court or educational institution.

Fascinating. Usually it's the political class trying to silence church noise. And that both Muslim and Christian congregations are "protected" by this seems noteworthy.

Hewitt:

Two of the president's proposals to cripple the charitable and mortgage interest deductions are indeed "radical" as they are squarely aimed not just at high income families who will see their deductions slashed but also at the churches, charities, schools and every not-for-profit that will be greatly damaged if the charitable deduction is reduced

Will World Wildlife Fund be crippled by the elimination of charitable tax deductions the same way Salvation Army or your local church will be?

Not with millions of your tax dollars going to WWF, it won't.

This is an issue where green "progressive" churches should join with evangelicals and push back. But I doubt they will.

Boston Globe:

What happened to landscape painting? Its decline in status is even more surprising given the current moral, scientific, and political preoccupation with the environment. One might think that scenes of nature - central to our culture for centuries - would still have a role to play now, having done so much to cultivate our appreciation of the environment in the first place. In a sense, however, landscape never went away: It was just transformed into something unrecognizable...

Interesting that the first word that pops up is "moral," no?

So what did happen to landscape painting? Francis Schaeffer once wrote:

For a Christian, redeemed by the work of Christ and living within the norms of Scripture and under the leadership of the Holy Spirit, the Lordship of Christ should include an interest in the arts. A Christian should use these arts to the glory of God -- not just as tracts, but as things of beauty to the praise of God. And art work can be a doxology in itself.

And this:

But the basic reality of God is plain enough. Open your eyes and there it is! By taking a long and thoughtful look at what God has created, people have always been able to see what their eyes as such can't see: eternal power, for instance, and the mystery of his divine being. So nobody has a good excuse. What happened was this: People knew God perfectly well, but when they didn't treat him like God, refusing to worship him, they trivialized themselves into silliness and confusion so that there was neither sense nor direction left in their lives. They pretended to know it all, but were illiterate regarding life. They traded the glory of God who holds the whole world in his hands for cheap figurines you can buy at any roadside stand.

My theory: Landscape painting eventually became a painful reminder of The God Who Is There. Making it unrecognizable was the artistic equivalent of a child sticking his fingers in his ears and squishing his eyes closed.

Want a green house? Try a greenhouse. More great pics at the link.

In New Zealand.

Ed bumped me this Grist link about polar ice melt in response to my SustainLane post today.

The International Polar Year survey found that warming in the Antarctic is "much more widespread than was thought," while Arctic sea ice is diminishing and the melting of Greenland's ice cover is accelerating. Rising sea levels and changes in ocean temperatures triggered by the melting ice also heralded shifts in weather patterns worldwide and potentially more coastal storm surges, scientists said. "We're beginning to get hints of change in ocean circulation, that'll have a dramatic impact on the global climate system," IPY director David Carlson told journalists.

Got me thinking: The Gore Effect (courtesty of James Hansen) was so successful in D.C. this weekend - maybe we should fly them up to the Arctic for a while...

More on the US Geological Service side of IPY here.