The book of green 5

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1. 

   Angelsnecropolis Posted 4:04 am
   04 Jan 2009

   differencesI may be an atheist and I don't agree with everything religion does but sometimes you have to put aside your differences for the greater good.

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2. 

   taylorshelton Posted 4:21 am
   04 Jan 2009

   fair and balanced?that was actually a surprisingly even-handed interview from FOX News. maybe they really are fair and balanced?
   nah.

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3. 

   katakanadian Posted 4:24 am
   04 Jan 2009

   Hmmm! Who's soul is at risk?Any of those conservative fundies who think that we should condemn billions of people to years of hardship, misery, and starvation by opposing effective climate action have clearly sold their souls to the devil. If they feel so certain of eternal heavenly bliss then surely they shouldn't mind a few years of riding a bicycle and putting on a sweater.

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4. 

   biodiversivist Posted 7:00 am
   04 Jan 2009

   Digital version beats this one hands downVery positive trend. A concern for the biosphere is starting to make headway with mainstream religions.
   
   In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world

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5. 

   traveler255 Posted 3:11 am
   07 Jan 2009

   The hypocrisy of the religious rightLet's be clear. This an exception. Most people of the religious right have this attitude:
   
   God created man to dominate the earth.
   
   This means they can exploit nature as long as they want, no matter how big the damage is.
   
   E.g. Global Warming for them is a hoax because the godless liberals "invented" it. And the earth is of course 6,000 years only. Ridiculous
   
   And the Repugs support this war on nature and science:
   
   --The Republican War on Science
   Science, we imagine, is the realm of objective disinterested geniuses reporting back the findings from their expensive equipment, telling us truths about the world. Politics, on the other hand, is seen as the place for sleazy and corrupt jerks who lie to us in everything they do and try to make everything fit their existing worldviews. So is it any surprise that when the two things meet we're in for a show?
   Journalist Chris Mooney has made a name for himself by writing magazine articles that make this intersection, especially under the Bush administration, entertaining. He's recently released his first book, The Republican War on Science, which tries to combine the various individual stories into a damning case of science politicization. The book tackles a variety of subjects, including:
   global warming
   
   nutrition guidelines
   
   fishing regulations
   
   evolution
   
   embryonic stem cells
   
   safe sex
   
   Each one gets a chapter written in the style of a magazine article (indeed, many have been published as magazine articles), opening with an interesting person or event and expanding to show how a group of Bush backers (drawn from major industry and the religious right) have concocted their own psuedoscience in an attempt to spread confusion about the truth, with a particular focus on its effects in Washington, where Mooney is based. Mooney bookends these stories with some more general thoughts about the relations of conservatives and science.
   The book has been something of a surprise success, recently making it onto the New York Times bestseller list, and Mooney has been busy doing a book tour for it. I went to see him when he spoke just down the street at Porter Square(hotels) Books and talked to him a bit afterwards as he signed my copy. The audience was interested and engaged. I suspect a lot of it was typical anger at the Bush administration (or "the neocon radicals up in Washington and the media" as the angry sort who call in to radio shows and so on always seem to put it), but I think this particular issue strikes at the heart of people's dislike for the administration: the administration refuses to go along with reality, even in its most pure form.
   The book itself is a respectable and highly readable (I went through it in a day's free time) piece of work, although I could not help but feel a little disappointed. In an apparent attempt to gain respectability, Mooney adopts a detached journalistic -- almost legalistic -- style. While Mooney doesn't pull any punches factually -- he will call a lie a lie and refuses to be pulled into the trap of equating conservative science abuses with liberal ones -- such a style lacks the verve of Mooney's more strident online writing, such as when he wrote about Michael Crichton's global warming denialist novel State of Fear:--
   more
   
   http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/gopwar
   
   Never stop using your brain!

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