A big animal makes a hearty meal. Not good if you are the big animal, but very good news if you are an ingenious hunter-gatherer like early human beings. Our ancestors were ingenious to the extent that they developed clever methods like traps and spears for killing animals. There is evidence that human beings were wiping out or severely depleting animal populations well before the last ice age. Clever, yes, but sensible, no.
Human beings went on developing their technologies: clay pots, farming, stone structures, selective breeding, metals, ships, steam power, electricity, aircraft and the internet. Each of these technologies…
A stock response from climate deniers (or people who haven’t really thought about climate change very much and just don’t like activists) is that the climate has always changed. Until the end of the last ice age, about 11000 years ago, that was true. But over this 11000 year period, the climate has been remarkably stable. This is the period during which all the activities of human civilisation have taken place; the development of farming, the rise of settled communities, construction, nation-building, medicine, science and philosophy. …
When confronted by the uncomfortable suggestion that their products might be harmful, big business trends to react in a depressingly familiar way. They lie and they fight back. Big car manufacturers sold poorly designed and unstable cars until legislation forced them to design for safety. Tobacco companies insisted their products were safe long after research showed that they caused cancer. Likewise, oil companies have spent fifty years aggressively fighting the idea that fossil fuels are causing dangerous changes to the climate of Earth. So when Michael Mann talks about a climate war, he isn’t exaggerating.
Mann is a leading climate…
We all know who Bill Gates is. He made billions from founding and running Microsoft. So why is he writing about a climate disaster?
The experts in this field are climate scientists like Michael Mann and Katherine Heyhoe. There are many, many more but Mann and Heyhoe are amongst the most vocal. They haven’t restricted themselves to publishing academic articles, they have become public spokespersons for the science around climate change.
It’s easy to see why. Climate change is a story unlike any other. Science has put forward a clear path to the collapse of human civilisation. Wouldn’t you speak…
Beavers are native to Britain and used to be plentiful across the country. But like many other species, they were killed relentlessly and became extinct hundreds of years ago.
There are also very sound reasons why the return of beavers would make a very useful contribution to the British countryside. Their dams across watercourses create large areas of wetland that welcome large numbers of birds, amphibians, insects and plant species. They are a positive accelerator of biodiversity. Retaining water in wetlands and behind beaver dams has a very beneficial effect for humans too. …
Climping is an area in West Sussex between Littlehampton and Bognor Regis. I heard of the damage to the sea defences some time ago, but winter weather and the pesky lockdown stopped me from visiting. Finally, on Sunday I got the opportunity.
Much of the Sussex coast is protected by hard sea defences. Concrete conveys a sense of permanence, a fortification that will stand strong. But at Climping the concrete has been defeated.
I sat in my study thinking about the title of this book; Half Earth: Our Planet’s Fight For Life.
The term “fighting for life” usually refers to a person who has suffered some sort of trauma, a terrible accident or an awful disease. Yet the Earth is fighting for its life because the dominant species on the Earth is ruining it. The Earth is threatened by excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, biodiversity loss, plastic and oil pollution, desertification, loss of fertile soil and deforestation. We did all that. No meteorite collision, no massive volcanic eruption, no hostile invasion from…
If you decide to read a book entitled How Did We Get Into This Mess, it’s reasonable to assume that you think there is a mess. This immediately takes you away from the superficial consensus that everything is going ok.
Think about this for a moment. Advertising, the aspect of media that most actively attempts to grab our attention, does so from a posture of comfort. Well-groomed middle-aged couples contemplate retirement plans, walk-in baths and equity release in sunlit taupe living rooms as birds sing in the spacious, well-managed garden.
Young people with no visible student debts congregate in large…
Step outside of the campaigns that seek to change the course of the climate crisis and try to listen with a dispassionate ear. You will hear a lot of numbers being called out in a game of eschatological bingo.
“Only TEN years to save the Earth”
“SIX feet of sea-level rise by 2100”
“76 MILLION climate refugees by 2050”
This begs the question: are people influenced by numbers? Scientists and economists certainly are as they understand the context in which the numbers are presented. Politicians who listen to advice from scientists and economists are influenced because they trust their advisors…
This is a book full of joy. Tree’s joy in the nature she is now surrounded by and the often accidental route that she took to get there.
Isabella Tree and her husband Charlie Burrell are the owners of the Knepp Estate in West Sussex. Burrell inherited it as a working, but declining farm. The post-war years of intensive farming practices and the use of chemicals had rendered the already marginal Sussex clay soil unproductive. Most years they made a loss and so in 2000 they simply stopped farming. The decision was made in order to prevent further losses.
They…
Chris Jerrey
Photographer, blogger, environmental activist. Interested in the climate crisis, rewilding and trying to make a change for the better.
