A observers view of environment and climate change.
brianlux
Posts: 42,051
Just read these very wise words by Thirty Bill Unpaid's in the "Marine species turning up where rarely seen" thread:
Even without the science that convincingly tells us so... just casually noting the changes we are witnessing should be enough to convince anyone that we need to figure something out before things are too far gone.
Very serendipitous as I was just thinking earlier today about personal observation and environmental conditions and climate change. In one of his books, Edward Abbey said something similar. I don't find the quote offhand but basically he said, "If you have doubts about what is happening to the planet, go out, walk around, look at the world." It's not that simple, of course. Things don't change that fast.... but they have changed quickly by our hands. I've been interested and concerned about environmental issues for longer than I care to think and I'm a habitual observer of the natural world.
Oddly enough, in some ways, things are better on a small scale. I remember a day in 1965 or '66 living in the Bay Area I was riding fast on my bike around the block and I came home complaining of stinging in my eyes. My uncle was visiting and he told me not to worry, it was just pollution in the air due to a thermal inversion. He was a pilot and understood these things. We had worse local smog days back then due to fewer emissions laws (that right, laws). But at that time Flagstaff Arizona was still counted as a city that always had clean air. No one makes that claim any more. And since then I've experienced bad air in places I hadn't as a kid- Lake Tahoe, Western Washington, Southern Oregon, several desert locations, etc, etc.
I could go on and on and bore you with stories like this but the point is, over all I've seen the world change for the worse in terms of species depletion, widespread pollution, climate change. Most of us are old enough to make similar observations. We don't need fancy graphs or reams of data or stacks of books to confirm what we can see and observe for ourselves. It's time to shit, get off the pot and get our butts in gear.
Even without the science that convincingly tells us so... just casually noting the changes we are witnessing should be enough to convince anyone that we need to figure something out before things are too far gone.
Very serendipitous as I was just thinking earlier today about personal observation and environmental conditions and climate change. In one of his books, Edward Abbey said something similar. I don't find the quote offhand but basically he said, "If you have doubts about what is happening to the planet, go out, walk around, look at the world." It's not that simple, of course. Things don't change that fast.... but they have changed quickly by our hands. I've been interested and concerned about environmental issues for longer than I care to think and I'm a habitual observer of the natural world.
Oddly enough, in some ways, things are better on a small scale. I remember a day in 1965 or '66 living in the Bay Area I was riding fast on my bike around the block and I came home complaining of stinging in my eyes. My uncle was visiting and he told me not to worry, it was just pollution in the air due to a thermal inversion. He was a pilot and understood these things. We had worse local smog days back then due to fewer emissions laws (that right, laws). But at that time Flagstaff Arizona was still counted as a city that always had clean air. No one makes that claim any more. And since then I've experienced bad air in places I hadn't as a kid- Lake Tahoe, Western Washington, Southern Oregon, several desert locations, etc, etc.
I could go on and on and bore you with stories like this but the point is, over all I've seen the world change for the worse in terms of species depletion, widespread pollution, climate change. Most of us are old enough to make similar observations. We don't need fancy graphs or reams of data or stacks of books to confirm what we can see and observe for ourselves. It's time to shit, get off the pot and get our butts in gear.
“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man [or woman] who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.”
Variously credited to Mark Twain or Edward Abbey.
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this is what it's come down to ... like one speaker said - every year we meet, it seems like we are deciding who dies and who stays alive ...
:twisted: :twisted:
The mining company gets to associate themselves with such an event and establish a positive reputation for doing so.
Even the 'Me2We' conference they hold for our youth is now operating on commercial sponsorship- thousands of our kids in an arena as a captive audience to product marketing.
Bottom line: smart and greedy people pander to stupid people. The promise of good paying jobs or free hats at a golf tournament are enough for some to embrace a company. In the bigger picture, smart and greedy people have also somehow managed to paint activists as 'kooks' and the general public tends to eagerly dismiss these people the moment they open their mouth.