Posted 03 Jun 2009 / 0
A few years ago when I was still a graduate student in Stony Brook University’s Department of Ecology and Evolution, a group of us formed a reading group with the ambitious moniker “Social Policy and Global Progress”. Our ambitions in forming the group were clear: we wanted to ground our understanding of ecology and evolution Read More
A Major Post, Climate Change, Ecology, Food, Hunger, Public Policy, Sustainability, Vegetarianism
Posted 01 Jun 2009 / 1
Pratt Institute, where my primary duties are to teach students about ecology and evolution, is undergoing a green revolution. In many ways this is not all that remarkable: many campuses are “greening” themselves and at least pitching the idea that they are becoming more sustainable. At Pratt, there’s something slightly different going on: we aren’t Read More
A Major Post, Center for Sustainable Design Studies, Greenwashing, Life Cycle Analysis, Pratt Institute, Quantitative Analysis, Sustainability
Posted 22 May 2009 / 0
I was recently taking the Amtrak down from Vermont to New York City when I noticed an interesting contrast, pointed out to me by a chatty fellow passenger. I generally favor trains over planes when it comes to travel: trains have a drastically smaller carbon footprint, are more reliable, and allow more legroom. But one Read More
A Major Post, Consciousness, Evolution, Evolutionary Psychology, Human Evolution, Psychological Adaptation
Posted 18 May 2009 / 0
I just finished reading a fascinating article in The Atlantic entitled “What Makes Us Happy?”. Although I am not all that well-read or at all trained in human behavioral science, I am increasingly interested by it, and this article by Joshua Wolf Shenk does an amazing job covering a lot of ground. In the past Read More
A Major Post, Adaptation, Altruism, Data Limitation, Ecology, Evolutionary Psychology, Happiness, Human Evolution, Long Term Ecological Research, Psychological Adaptation
Posted 13 May 2009 / 0
On May 3rd and 4th I attended and participated in a public symposium at Columbia University entitled “Science and Religion in Dialogue for a Sustainable Future”. The symposium, co-sponsored by Columbia’s Center for the Study of Science and Religion and The Fetzer Institute, was part of the Common Ground symposium series. Jeffrey Sachs, who writes Read More
A Major Post, Cooperation, Environmental Justice, Religion, Sustainability
Posted 18 Mar 2009 / 0
Why blog? That’s a question that I haven’t been able to answer for a long time. A first belief: for me, “belief” in something implies action. I can have an “understanding” of something – I can understand that there is a problem because people are suffering in Darfur – but for me to really “believe” Read More
A Major Post, Belief, Ecology, Evolution
