Posted 26 Jan 2014 / 0
Sweet Fern Productions “The Animated Life of A.R. Wallace” I loved the Sweet Fern video on whale fall, but this is even more valuable as a historical account of Wallace’s life. I really like the way that this video depicts natural selection! Great way of showing differential survival as Wallace might have seen it!
A Minor Post, Biography, Evolution, Evolution Education, Film, Television, & Video, Geography, History, Natural Selection, Science as a career, Science in Art & Design, Speciation, Teaching Tools, The WmD Project, Tropical Forest
Posted 26 Jan 2014 / 0
On Being “Teilhard de Chardin on The “Planetary Mind” and Our Spiritual Evolution” We often give credit to Richard Dawkins — who is undeniably the inventor of the term “memetics” — for introducing an evolutionary approach to cultural change. But as this piece makes clear, de Chardin was already thinking on far more large scales about Read More
A Minor Post, Biography, Cooperation, Cultural Evolution, Ecosystem Ecology, Evolution, Geology, Homo species, Human Evolution, Human Uniqueness, Memetic Fitness, Radio & Podcasts, Religion, The WmD Project
Posted 25 Jan 2014 / 0
NPR Morning Edition “A Bet, Five Metals And The Future Of The Planet” This is an excellent piece that encapsulates the argument between “population pessimists” and “technological optimists”, an argument that seems to have been won by the technologists. It is frustrating how much damage has been done by people like Paul Ehrlich. His overconfidence Read More
A Minor Post, Anthropogenic Change, Carrying Capacity, Conservation Biology, Economic sustainability, Economics, Ecosystem Services, Population Growth, Population Pressure, Public Policy, Radio & Podcasts, Resource Consumption, Sociology, Sustainability
Posted 25 Jan 2014 / 0
NPR Morning Edition “How Mass-Produced Meat Turned Phosphorus Into Pollution” This short feature provides a clear example of how human agricultural practices massively modify nutrient cycles, decoupling what used to be inseparable: where animal feed is grown and where animals are raised. This separation means that we no longer have closed-loop agricultural systems. I would suggest Read More
A Minor Post, Closed Loop Systems, Composting, Economics, Ecosystem Ecology, Eutrophication, Food, Pollution, Ponds & Lakes, Public Policy, Radio & Podcasts, Rivers & Streams, Soil Ecology, Sustainable Agriculture, Vegetarianism
Posted 15 Jan 2014 / 0
I almost fell out of my seat when I found this video while searching for a concise source explaining why we don’t have an international climate change agreement. This short television piece is basically trying to explain the dynamics of climate change agreement as depicted by Milinski and colleagues (2008) in their PNAS paper “The collective-risk Read More
A Minor Post, Climate Change, Environmental Justice, Film, Television, & Video, Game Theory, Sustainability, Web
Posted 14 Jan 2014 / 0
NPR The Salt “California’s Pot Farms Could Leave Salmon Runs Truly Smoked” It is funny because as marijuana becomes legalized it joins tobacco and coffee as a potentially high-impact, low-necessity agricultural product. And I know there are a lot of cigarette smokers, coffee fiends, and potheads taking exception to that last sentence.
A Minor Post, Freshwater Ecosystems, Habitat Destruction, Law, Radio & Podcasts, Rivers & Streams, Sustainability, Water Supply
Posted 07 Jan 2014 / 0
KQED The Lowdown “Rot and Rubbish: The Rancid Truth About How Much Food We Waste“
A Minor Post, Composting, Ethics, Food, Information Design, Political Science, Pollution, Public Outreach, Public Policy, Resource Consumption, Science in Art & Design, Sustainability, Web
Posted 07 Jan 2014 / 0
NPR Morning Edition “Sunday Assembly: A Church For The Godless Picks Up Steam” It is interesting to see people explicitly seeking out the benefits of religious community whilst trying to maintain their objective understanding of the material world. Conventional wisdom is that “god” is needed to make religions work, but perhaps just a collective intention Read More
A Minor Post, Belief, Cooperation, Cultural Evolution, Group Selection, Radio & Podcasts, Religion
Posted 07 Oct 2013 / 0
The Economist “Science’s Sokal Moment” Science “Who’s Afraid of Peer Review?” The correct term for the kinds of journals that publish open-access work that is poorly reviewed is “predatory”. Like unaccredited “universities”, they prey on scientists whose work is not high enough in quality or significance to publish in the larger, mainstream journals by offering Read More
A Minor Post, Articles, Economics, Ethics, Periodicals, Publication, Scientific Fraud, Web
Posted 04 Oct 2013 / 0
Dynamic Ecology “Follow the money – what really matters when choosing a journal” There are so many great ideas to be found in this post. Here are some of my favorites: There is no “innovation” or “risk” being taken by investors in academic publishing: those with money are simply extracting value from both the producers Read More
A Major Post, Ecology, Economics, Ethics, Evolution, Grants & Funding, Periodicals, Professional Societies, Public Policy, Publication, Web
