Neil Everndens’ - ‘Natural Alien’

‘The public expectations of the environmental movement have fallen out of register with the aspirations of thoughtful figures within that movement’.

 

This weeks Green Thoughts are taken from Neil Everndens’ ‘Natural Alien’ (2nd Edit. 1993).

Naomi Orestes and Eric M. Conway - 'The Collapse of Western Civilisation'

‘Bridge to renewables’ – The logical fallacy, popular in the first decades of the 21^st century, that the problem of greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion could be solved by burning more fossil fuels, particularly natural gas. The fallacy rested on an incomplete analysis, which considered only physical by-products of combustion, particularly in electricity generation, and not the other factors that controlled overall energy use and net releases of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere.

Taken from the highly plausible 2014 sci-fi history-from-the-future The Collapse of Western Civilisation by the American historian-scientists Naomi Orestes and Eric M. Conway.

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/07/16/3460540/collapse-of-western-civilization-oreskes-conway/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naomi_Oreskes

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_M._Conway

Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje

To live simply is to be compassionate to yourself and the world. A life full of material goods and barren of compassion is quite unsustainable.

 

The July entry in the Tibetan Buddhist 17^th Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje in ‘ Cherish the Earth’ the 2015 Environment Calendar.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ogyen_Trinley_Dorje

http://kagyuoffice.org/

Russell-Einstein Manifesto

There lies before us, if we choose, continual progress in happiness, knowledge, and wisdom. Shall we, instead, choose death, because we cannot forget our quarrels? We appeal as human beings to human beings: Remember your humanity, and forget the rest. If you can do so, the way lies open to a new Paradise; if you cannot, there lies before you the risk of universal death.

Resolution:   We invite this Congress, and through it the scientists of the world and the general public, to subscribe to the following resolution:

“In view of the fact that in any future world war nuclear weapons will certainly be employed, and that such weapons threaten the continued existence of mankind, we urge the governments of the world to realize, and to acknowledge publicly, that their purpose cannot be furthered by a world war, and we urge them, consequently, to find peaceful means for the settlement of all matters of dispute between them.”

 

This week is the 50^th anniversary of  the Russell-Einstein Manifesto  9 July 1955 signed by

Max Born
Percy W. Bridgman
Albert Einstein
Leopold Infeld
Frederic Joliot-Curie
Herman J. Muller
Linus Pauling
Cecil F. Powell
Joseph Rotblat
Bertrand Russell
Hideki Yukawa

all (excepting Leopold Infeld andJoseph Rotblat) were Nobel Laureates.

http://www.countercurrents.org/avery140215.htm

 

http://pugwash.org/1955/07/09/statement-manifesto/

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%E2%80%93Einstein_Manifesto

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pugwash_Conferences_on_Science_and_World_Affairs

Thích Nhất Hạnh - ‘The Art of Power’

 

If we continue abusing the Earth this way, there is no doubt that our civilisation will be destroyed. This turnaround takes enlightenment, awakening. The Buddha attained individual awakening. Now we need collective enlightenment to stop this course of destruction. Civilisation is going to end if we continue to drown in the competition for power, fame, sex, and profit.

This weeks Green Thought comes from the 2008 book ‘The Art of Power’ by the expatriate Vietnamese Zen Buddhist monk, teacher, author, poet and peace activist Thích Nhất Hạnh.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thich_Nhat_Hanh

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plum_Village

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mindfulness_%28Buddhism%29

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Thich_Nhat_Hanh

Herman Scheers - Energy Autonomy

Reducing all questions exclusively to price……( results in) the idea of the market economy degenerate(ing) from an economic ordering principle into organised social irresponsibility.

This weeks Green Thought is taken from Herman Scheers 2007 book Energy Autonomy. The late Hermann Scheer ( 1944 - 2010) was a member of the German Bundestag (Parliament), President of Eurosolar (The European Association for Renewable Energy) and General Chairman of the World Council for Renewable Energy. In 1999, Scheer was awarded the Right Livelihood Award for his "indefatigable work for the promotion of solar energy worldwide".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_Scheer

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Autonomy

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/tech/home

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy

George Monbiot - Workforce (Guardiuan Article 9/6/15)

We know that our conditions of life are deteriorating. Most young people have little prospect of owning a home, or even of renting a decent one. Interesting jobs are sliced up, through digital Taylorism,  into portions of meaningless drudgery. The natural world, whose wonders enhance our lives, and upon which our survival depends, is being rubbed out with horrible speed. Those to whom we look for guardianship, in government and among the economic elite, do not arrest this decline; they accelerate it.

This weeks Green Thought comes George Monbiots Monbiot.com article ‘Workforce’ posted on 9^th June 2015

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Monbiot

 

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/feb/28/education-jobs-middle-class-decline