"If there's no action before 2012, that's too late. What we will do in the next two to three years will determine our future. This is the defining moment."
-- Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
If these words don't get you off your butt, you better check and make sure you have a pulse. Yet what can we (everyday Americans, readers of Grist) do now, today, that will be strong enough to change the course of our future? Strong enough to overcome the powerlessness and denial gripping our country?
It is clear that we are standing at a critical moment in human history. Unless we begin to cut global-warming pollution within a few short years, a window for our children and the creatures of this earth will close. Forever.
Instead of stabilizing at 3 to 4 degrees F more warming, the best our kids will be looking at will be more than 5 degrees F. And every 10th of a degree matters, because it raises the possibility that we might trigger some catastrophic outcome -- massive sea-level rise, loss of forests globally driven by intensified fire, or large-scale methane releases from the tundra, pushing temperatures even higher.
Today, cutting emissions on the scale required in the United States seems barely possible. Our nation is, truly, paralyzed. Yet this is a peculiarly American kind of paralysis, one we all understand from high school civics. Our system of government, with its checks and balances, was designed for gridlock, allowing an organized minority to block movement toward change. And yet we all also learned how we overcome this gridlock. When our government fails, Americans set aside their everyday business and drive the country in a new direction. From abolition to women's suffrage, labor rights to civil rights to anti-war causes, again and again, social movements reclaim the moral vision at the heart of America and set a new course for the country.
Over the next year, a powerful, nonpartisan movement demanding global-warming solutions will sweep across this country and change the future, change our future.
Or it won't.
Each of us now has to decide: Will I be a leader in that movement? The science is clear. Our future will be determined, literally, by the readers of this post, who have heard the truth and have said yes -- or will say yes -- to this challenge. And unlike our forbearers, we are not threatened by dogs, fire hoses, blacklisting, firing, beating, torture, imprisonment, or lynchings. We are free (if we choose) to create the future.
Here is how today, this week, you can lead:
On Jan. 31, over 1,300 colleges, universities, high schools and middle schools, faith organizations, civic groups, and businesses will join together in the biggest national teach-in in U.S. history, Focus the Nation: Global-Warming Solutions for America. Across the country, over 10,000 volunteers are building Focus events that will engage over a million Americans, and help move this country beyond an uncharacteristic fatalism to a determination to face up to this civilizational challenge.
The teach-in kicks off with a free, national webcast, The 2% Solution, live on the night of Jan. 30. Featuring Stanford climate scientist Stephen Schneider, sustainability expert Hunter Lovins, and green-jobs pioneer Van Jones, this interactive webcast will set the goal for America. To hold global warming to the low end, we have to jump-start 80 percent cuts by 2050 -- averaging 2 percent cuts per year, starting now, from current levels.
Focus the Nation is not only about education. More critically, it demands direct engagement with political leaders. At Focus events, hundreds of members of Congress, senators, mayors, and city councilors will sit down for nonpartisan, round-table discussions with young people about global-warming solutions -- initiating the dialogue that can change the direction of America.
Also as part of Focus the Nation, students and citizens will be casting ballots for a clean energy revolution, participating in an ongoing, online vote on priorities for action. Go to Choose Your Future, where soon you'll be able to vote for climate solutions that include a coal moratorium, a program to weatherize and solarize millions of houses, and a crash investment program in renewables. And Focus will be awarding three $10,000 scholarships for winning proposals that take global-warming action to the next level.
It is not too late to build a teach-in at your school, at your kid's school, or in your community. The easy way to get involved is to host a showing of The 2% Solution webcast -- at a campus; at your church, mosque, or synagogue; or even at a house party in your home. All you need is a computer, an internet connection, and a projector. Use the show to spark discussion, and then vote online for your top five solutions.
Then, most critically, deliver these results. At the screening, make a plan to visit your member of Congress -- every member of Congress -- with the Choose Your Future solutions. Set the date for Monday, Feb. 18, when he or she will be home for the President's Day recess.
Tell them what you learned, what your Focus the Nation group voted to support. Tell them that this is our future, this is our children's future. Tell them this is not a partisan issue -- Republicans and Democrats must come together and hammer out a real solution, a set of policies that can spark a clean energy revolution, so that our young people will have the tools they need to make the world a safe and habitable place for their kids.
Most of us have never gone to visit the home office of a congressperson or senator. But the time has come for each of us to make this journey. Contact Focus the Nation if you have any questions about how to set up a meeting in your community with your congressperson's staff.
So, please lead: host a screening of the webcast, get educated, vote online, and then visit your senator or congressperson on Monday, Feb. 18. And please don't leave off reading this and say, "Focus the Nation sounds cool. Good thing somebody is doing it."
We are all busy -- dealing with school, working hard in our jobs, and spending time with our families. But this is one of those times in human history when people are putting aside their own business as usual, understanding that we don't have much time left. This is the defining moment.
Twenty years from now, we must look back and say that we did hear the words of our scientists, and that 2008 became the year that America rose up, launching the clean energy revolution that changed the world.
Twenty years is a short time. Twenty years ago, in the summer of 1988, it was sweltering hot all across the country. For the first time, NASA's Jim Hansen told Congress that this was global warming. Also that year, my first daughter, Emma, was born.
Over her two decades, Emma has witnessed year after year after year of record-breaking heat, the disappearance of mountain glaciers, and the loss of close to half of the summer Arctic ice pack. And here's what Hansen has to say now about her future: "I think that a business-as-usual scenario will guarantee future disintegration of West Antarctica and parts of Greenland." Read: guarantee a sea-level rise of more than 20 feet.
Many people refer to my parents' generation -- who were raised in the Great Depression and fought and won World War II -- as the Greatest Generation. But in fact, today's young people must fast become the Greatest Generation.
To hold global warming to the manageable low end, by the time Emma's cohort reaches my age of 47, they must bring an end to the fossil-fuel era. Within the next decade, they must begin to rewire the entire planet with clean energy technologies, redesign every city on earth, reimagine the global food system, and reinvent transportation. In so doing, they will create tens of millions of jobs, stabilize the global climate, and lay the foundation for a truly just and prosperous future.
The alternative is a planet that will heat up 5 to 10 degrees F. During the last Ice Age, the world was only 9 degrees F colder than it is today. So today's students must prevent a swing in global temperatures of Ice Age magnitude within their lifetime, only in the opposite direction.
My daughter's generation, then, has a simple mission: save the planet. This means hold global warming to 3 to 4 degrees F. That much heating will still cause tremendous ecological damage, suffering for hundreds of millions of people, and the extinction of perhaps 10 to 20 percent of life on earth. The world will be a different and, in many new ways, difficult place. But it will not be unrecognizable. It will still be a planet that can support a vital and sustainable human civilization, and the immense power and beauty of still millions of species.
And perhaps, in that somewhat hotter world, after it has been rewired with clean energy technologies, after globalization of low-cost health and water and shelter and education services has raised the mass of humanity toward a decent standard of living, and after a newfound and profound respect has developed for the remains of creation -- perhaps these changes will carry humanity into a new era of progress.
I am not optimistic about the future. I am not pessimistic either. While it will clearly be hotter, none of us can know beyond that what the world will really be like in 50 or 80 years.
What I do know today is that many of us are very alive to the vision of a rich and sustainable future for our children. And I also know that we stand at a critical moment. Through our leadership today, now -- or through our failure to lead -- we will either enable that future, or lock in a path to an impoverished planet.
I have been talking about global warming for over a decade now, and at the end of my talks I used to never really know what to say: change your light bulb? It just wasn't enough. But now I do know what to say: get your church, mosque, synagogue, Rotary Club, bicycle club, book club, or kid's middle or high school engaged with Focus the Nation. And over the next year, working from that base, continue to build a collective voice -- of students and educators, of citizens and faith communities and businesses -- into a force powerful enough to change the future.
So, finish this article, then spend 15 minutes on the website for Focus the Nation, then a commitment to talk to five friends or colleagues about the project. Say, "I read this cool piece on Grist, check it out. I am getting my kid's middle school signed up to be part of this national teach-in, and you should, too." Don't take no for an answer. There is simply no time.
We are all of us now in a race against the physics of heat-trapping gases. It is a race that we can win. The obstacles to saving the planet are not economic, they are not technical -- they reflect only a lack of political will. And America is changing. Focus the Nation started out 14 months ago with two people in an attic; now there are over 10,000 volunteers leading efforts in their communities. Join us.
Decisions that are ours to make very soon will have a defining impact on the future direction of life on this planet. None of us asked for this. Twenty years ago, global heating was to me, and most of us, only a science-fiction fable. And yet suddenly, we have been called upon to prove of what vision humanity is capable.
What can you do in the next few weeks? Focus the Nation. Enable our children to become the Greatest Generation.
Climate-news poem: Breath-catching edition
Comments View as Flat
katakanadian Posted 8:14 am
10 Jan 2008
2% is too slow
That only yields a 20% reduction by 2020. Anyone involved with this campaign should be stressing 3-5%. Especially in the first 5 years when it makes a bigger difference.
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twoolston Posted 8:23 am
10 Jan 2008
Universities are getting involved
Some universities are following the schedule listed in the article and some are using Focus the Nation as a starting point for their own creative climate change education ideas. Tufts University is doing a bit of both: http://www.tufts.edu/programs/sustainability/FocustheNati ...
What are other folks doing?
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Bill Barnes Posted 8:37 am
10 Jan 2008
Oregon's Regional Chiles Center Event
At the end of our jam packed climate change day at the University of Portland we are hosting the regional "Focus the Nation: LIVE at the Chiles Center!" featuring a live OPB radio broadcast of students from across the state (from 9 colleges and universities) engaging with Governor Ted Kulongoski, Earl Blumenauer (pending), and two other elected officials from the state on climate change solutions. Live Wire! will also be there with great climate themed comedy and commentary, and entertainment. Hillstomp will open the event with a few songs and the band Stars of Track and Field will close out the night with a full set. DON'T MISS AN EPIC EVENING! All at http://climatechange.up.edu
Register for required tickets.
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rossgel Posted 9:46 am
10 Jan 2008
Focus The Nation
While a 2% reduction is too small, even that level of reduction could well kickstart an exponential increase in the rate of change.
Focus The Nation's scheduled Teach-Ins could provide a huge liftoff. Having spent some 10 years giving talks about the climate crisis, I have been repeatedly amazed by the enormous energy and enthusiasm of young people I encounter.
Eban Goodstein is tapping the country's greatest pool of natural renewable energy: young people's passion, dedication and willingness to embrace the most threatening problem of all. This is the target audience that I most believe will succeed (where the rest of us have failed) in reclaiming the planet for our common future.
-- Ross Gelbspan
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gardener Posted 10:43 am
10 Jan 2008
Not just for schools!
Focus the Nation is a great opportunity to participate in a national conversation on this important issue for ANY group or organization.
The national plant group Wild Ones: Native Plants, Natural Landscapes has endorsed FTN because global warming directly impacts our mission of promoting native plants and natural landscapes. The January program for my local chapter of Wild Ones will talk about the things gardeners can do in their own yards to prevent global warming (National Wildlife Federation has a great resource on this topic.) We'll focus especially on raising our own vegetables in our suburban yards to reduce "food miles" and buying produce from local farmers.
The faith community also is involved since global warming is an environmental issue, but it's also a justice issue. The national Interfaith Power & Light organization has endorsed FTN, as has New York Interfaith Power & Light and other faith organizations. On January 27, my own church's worship service will explore this connection between environmental and social justice, and in the afternoon we'll be hosting a sustainability fair, showing the movie Kilowatt Ours 2007 (excellent!), then having a panel discussion with local experts. Then on Wed night Jan 30, we'll show the webcast The 2% Solution.
If your congregation or other organization would like to put on a FTN event, it's not too late. It's simple to show a DVD such as Kilowatt Ours (www.kilowattours.org) or one of the other videos such as Too Hot Not to Handle. The important thing is to start the conversation - for our children's sake!!
-- Janet Allen
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stevenearlsalmony Posted 11:21 am
10 Jan 2008
Focusing the nation on the root causes............
........ of the human-induced predicament that is potentially posed to humanity in these early years of Century XXI.
Unbridled, seemingly endlessly expanding economic globalization on a relatively small, finite, noticeably frangible planet looks to be one primary cause. Two other root causes appear as increasing, unrestrained per capita consumption of limited resources and the skyrocketing growth of absolute human population numbers worldwide.
Steven Earl Salmony, Ph.D., M.P.A.
AWAREness Campaign on The Human Population, established 2001
http://sustainabilitysoutheast.org/
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Bill Barnes Posted 11:21 am
10 Jan 2008
Focus the Nation
Perfectly put, Ross. I too am optimistic about our "young people" (gosh, I can't be talking like this yet, can I?) today. We should remember, however, that this is going to take all of us together............
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pcanan Posted 1:44 pm
10 Jan 2008
Enthusiasm at University of Central Florida
The "Teach In/Reach Out" at the University of Central Florida on the 31st will be an all-day event open to the public, starting with our keynote speaker Hunter Lovins from Natural Capitalism Solutions at 9 am. State, regional, county and city leaders in public and private sectors are staffing climate solutions information tables, along with exhibits from students, staff, and faculty. We're hosting the launching of the Solar Rooftop Project for the Orange County Convention Center, the launching of the new vehicle license plate celebrating the treesarecool campaign, and the planting a tree commemorating this year's effort to Focus the Nation. Held in teh Pegasus Ballroom at the Student Union, tours of Union's green roof will take place all day.
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lamarguerite Posted 2:29 pm
10 Jan 2008
will post on my blog
Thanks for alerting us to this great event. I will make sure to post it on my blog.
http://lamarguerite.wordpress.com
marguerite manteau-rao http://lamarguerite.wordpress.com 'It's All About Green Psychology'
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oakcbay Posted 9:39 pm
10 Jan 2008
A teaching moment for Congress?
Eban Goodstein's clarion call convinced me six months ago to put aside my regular job to help Focus the Nation as its Civic Engagement Director. I'm in DC this week spreading the word in Congressional offices so that they have a context for the invitations they are getting from schools in their districts to participate in the Green Democracy part of Focus the Nation. The response has been very positive. Since "all politics is local" Focus the Nation is shaping up to be a great combination of local volunteers joining up on the same day to create a national event.
I urge any Focus the Nation schools out there who haven't already invited their Congressional reps to do so right away. It's not too late and they may just surprise you by accepting. Easy instructions are on the web site: http://www.focusthenation.org/invitation_congress.php
If Eban's post moved you, I also recommend his book, Fighting for Love in the Century of Extinction (http://www.fightingforlove.com/). Although I've been working to protect the Earth for over 20 years, his book gave me some new insights both in our common plight and in the need, now more than ever, to speak truth to power -- and to do it from the heart.
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bookerly Posted 9:48 pm
10 Jan 2008
Great News
Thanks for this post, and for all the work that all of you are doing!!!
You bring hope to many troubled hearts.
patrick in Beijing
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LGT Posted 10:07 pm
10 Jan 2008
Without a radical change in our system of economy?
Great! Brilliant! Fantastic!
However, without a radical change in our system of economy we haven't a snowball's chance on a globally warmed Earth!
Global warming is only one of the problems, the others being the failing ecosystems.
See: The $500-a-barrel professors!
http://feww.wordpress.com/
and: Failing Ecosystems http://edro.wordpress.com/failing-ecosystems/
also: Collapsing Cities
http://edro.wordpress.com/collapsing-cities/
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stevenearlsalmony Posted 1:32 am
11 Jan 2008
Dear LTG , who knows, perhaps changes.........
....... to the interlocking national economies of the global human economy are in the offing.
Let's consider how ECONOMY could figure in precipitating the distinctly human-induced predicament that appears before humanity, already dimly visible on the far horizon, in these early years of Century XXI.
Human beings are members of a wondrous, marvelously endowed species on a relatively small, finite, noticeably fragile planet. That planet has an economy of its own. That is to say, Earth's economy is balanced, self-regulating and self-renewing. Earth's economy is organized biologically and physically according to "laws" of the natural world and the Universe beyond, I suppose.
By comparison, a second economy exists on the surface of the Earth, the manmade global economy. The problem with the human economy is that it is an artificially designed, human construction. This economy is unbalanced, not self-regulating or self-renewing. This economy is organized, operated and "grown" without regard to limits to its growth that are inevitably imposed by the "laws" of nature.
As many other people have suggested for a long time, perhaps the time has come to reorganize the soon to become patently unsustainable manmade global economy so that it is structured and functions more like the sustainable economy of nature.
Sincerely,
Steve
Steven Earl Salmony, Ph.D., M.P.A.
AWAREness Campaign on The Human Population, established 2001
http://sustainabilitysoutheast.org/
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SMLowry Posted 2:27 am
11 Jan 2008
Not easy
Steve, that would be the obvious solution, but easier said than done. As you noted, people, myself included, have been expounding on such an idea and even implementing projects to bring it about for the past few decades, but the current dominant system is still growing. While the many sprouts of a new, ecologically sustainable economy have been and continue to be created, they just seem so tiny and fragile compared to the greedy monster that is market-based capitalism. One of the reasons for this, I feel, is that the average person buys into the dominant view that creating such an economy, much of which would be smaller scale than what we have (though economies of scale would have to come into play - not every region can or should manufacture everything)is impractical and unrealistic. In effect, such an economy is doomed by this thinking before it's given a chance. But I agree, this is what is needed and it's not impossible if folks would stop believing that it is. Most people these days seem to think that the economy we have was handed down to us by god from on-high and we simply cannot tamper with it. In fact, as you pointed out, the economy was created by (mostly)men and can be changed by all of us. Or, if they think it can be changed, it must be done by experts who know more than simple common folk. Which is also a myth.
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Ted Wolf Posted 4:02 am
11 Jan 2008
Building a Movement
Al Gore never misses a chance to remind us that "political will is a renewable resource." Focus the Nation is one powerful way that it can get renewed, and not a moment too soon. A movement with (young) faces like Step It Up, Powershift, the Campus Climate Challenge, and Focus the Nation can change the landscape by putting decision-makers on notice about the choices they must make. This is a very exciting point in our democracy, find a Focus event on a campus or at a school near you, and join in!
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Jon Isham Posted 4:32 am
11 Jan 2008
A great start to 2008
To echo the previous comments, Focus the Nation is clearly a great way to jump-start the next phase of the climate movement. All folks who are reading this should go to the Focus the Nation website (http://www.focusthenation.org/) and learn how to join -- or start -- an event. And a huge tip of the hat to Eban and his crew: January 31, 2008 will be a day to celebrate our coming clean-energy future.
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DrScience Posted 6:19 am
11 Jan 2008
Regarding that 2%
Don't forget, the 2% effect is compounded annually and it must be compared with the outcome of a business-as-usual growth scenario.
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schamberlin Posted 9:09 am
11 Jan 2008
We Can Change the World!
At least four Orange County colleges and universities will participate in Focus the Nation, a national day-long teach-in Jan. 31 that's meant to motivate people to find ways to deal with global warming.
UC Irvine, Fullerton College, Orange Coast College and Golden West College are among an estimated 1,000 schools across the country that have signed up for the event, which was created by a coalition of environmentalists.
The teach-in will feature a wide variety of activities; UCI plans everything from a tree planting to lectures on such topics as how climate change affects water supplies to a tutorial on sustainable foods. Fullerton College also has an ambitious schedule, setting up a series of talks that include Bill Patzert, a well-known Jet Propulsion Laboratory climatologist who will discuss how global warming could affect California. Jonathan Mayer, a student, will talk about emphasizing the use of computers over paper in the classroom.
"While you can argue all day about whether the effects (of global warming) will be mild or severe, we have a responsibility to get young people involved in a conversation about this issue now," says Sean Chamberlin, an earth scientist professor at Fullerton College.
"Rather than take a political position on the issue, we can educate kids about the science and let them decide."
W. Sean Chamberlin, PhD Professor, Earth Sciences Fullerton College
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LGT Posted 10:03 am
11 Jan 2008
Exponential growth economy is THE primary cause!
Dear Steven
Thank you for your wonderful, heartening posts!
"Unbridled, seemingly endlessly expanding economic globalization on a relatively small, finite, noticeably frangible planet looks to be one primary cause."
The exponential growth economy is THE primary cause. Unless the primary cause is addressed, any effort to "solve" the problems would be an expansive waste, an inimitable opportunity carelessly discarded.
Below excerpt is from "The Death of Homo Sapiens Sapiens," a series of six article available at http://msrb.wordpress.com/selected-articles-and-links/
"We have reached an ecological threshold whereby any economic activity within the malignant culture of exponential growth triggers a host of destructive forces that are detrimental to the environment and human welfare."
Best wishes
LGT
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laurawestwood Posted 10:18 am
11 Jan 2008
Focus Minnesota!
Here in Focus the Nation HQ, we receive inspiring updates from our organizers every day. I wanted to share a quick highlight from the midwest: Focus Minnesota. Arctic explorer Will Steger will give a presentation at a rock-venue in downtown Minneapolis. Sponsored by the Bell Museum, the Will Steger Foundation, and Focus the University of MN, this event is going to draw over 1,000 Minnesotans!
To check out more motivational stories, check out: http://www.focusthenation.org/updates.php
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GreenStreets Posted 12:44 pm
11 Jan 2008
Helping people try going green
Sometimes even when you want to do something, it's hard to know where and how to begin. I wanted to share a way our city has found to convince people to try "green" transportation:
Sixth grade Zach once said, "People will only do it if it's fun..." That's in part the thinking behind the creation of Walk/Ride Days, which have spread from many cities in the Boston area to Portland, ME, and are threatening to land elsewhere on the east coast soon. Walk/Ride Days were created in March, 2006 by a group called the Cambridge Green Streets Initiative; now other communities are creating their own "Green Streets Initiatives".
Walk/Ride Days are once-a-month city-wide celebrations - parties - that take place in a city, town, or other region, generally on the last Friday of every month, year round.
As the www.portlandgreenstreets.org website says,
"On these days, we encourage people throughout Greater Portland to:
* Wear Green (shirt, pants, socks, whatever!)
* Commute Green (walk, bike, bus, carpool, telecommute, etc.!)
* And then to Celebrate (with freebies, discounts, & raffle items from local businesses) !
The idea is to encourage each individual - and institution -- to celebrate and encourage people in its own way."
Everyone is included in the festivities every month, and special rewards are given to those who go green. By including even those who may have have gone "brown" that day encourages them to go "green" the next time.
Walk/Ride Days' success has been that it's a tiny and repeating commitment... (Who can't carpool once a month?!... and if people miss it one month, they often resolve to do it the next.) It's all voluntary and fun. Doing it on a single day, with a huge celebration, takes advantage of positive peer pressure (enthusiasm?), light competition, and community pride. It also makes the streets much safer with more cyclists and pedestrians and fewer cars on the roads. Local retailers love it and help with incentives.
The changes we see have been tremendous. People who never dared cross certain thoroughfares with children outside of their cars tried it for the first time... and their children would not let them return to their old ways. Office staff enjoy it, and people rise to the challenge. We have seen car usage in classrooms and offices cut in half on those days.
Check out Portland's website and the overall one at www.GoGreenStreets.org, and start Walk/Ride Days in your community/institution/school. It's easy, and a lot of fun! Whether an urban, suburban or rural community, people will be thankful for having been given a chance to participate and to take an easy step toward doing good. Once they've taken one step, they are so much more likely to take another!
Janie Katz-Christy, Director, Green Streets Initiative,www.GoGreenStreets.org. Go Green and Wear Green on the Last Friday of Every Month!
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alexmctink Posted 1:20 pm
11 Jan 2008
We have the technology, politicians lack will
That's why we need this day of education and civic engagement so badly - to make it clear our demand for real policy solutions to global warming, and even clearer our sense of urgency and determination.
Cap and auction policies work to reduce emissions effectively. The technologies to re-wire our country on clean renewable energy already exist. What are we waiting for?
There is a huge opportunity for growth, for the re-vitalization of our economy, our society and our ecosystems. It is time for America to take a huge step forward; its time for us all to step up and focus on making Congress act now, while we still can.
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JMG Posted 1:55 pm
11 Jan 2008
Paging DrScience
2% compounded is still far too little, far too late. 5% per year does the job (88% reduction by 2050, with the first 50% drop in 14 years, and almost 20% by 2012 --- in other words, a serious response to the urgency of the problem).
See this from Oregon Peaceworks about the
5% Solution Project
http://oregonpeaceworks.web.aplus.net/site/index.php?opti ...
Save the world: Reduce greenhouse gas emissions 5% annually.
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Nucbuddy Posted 2:05 pm
11 Jan 2008
The negative-three percent solution
I would suggest the -3% solution. Increase carbon-emissions by 3% per year (which is the same as 10-trillion-fold per millennium). A mild tax by a global government should be able to cover the cost of liming the atmosphere.
By the way, what is it we are trying to solve?
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Bobette Posted 8:22 pm
11 Jan 2008
Students Do Have Solutions - We Have to Listen
I agree with Ross and others who know that our students hold the solutions to the crisis. We just have to listen!
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stevenearlsalmony Posted 10:43 pm
11 Jan 2008
Questions...................................
Do the dearth of political will and the absence of moral courage among our leaders present the family of humanity with greatest human challenge of our time?
Where are to find able leadership, that is prepared to do what in necessary to save life as we know it as well as the integrity of Earth and its frangible global ecosystems?
Steven Earl Salmony
AWAREness Campaign on The Human Population, established 2001
http://sustainabilitysoutheast.org/
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Dallas Posted 2:38 am
13 Jan 2008
Focus the Nation is having important influence
From what I can see, Focus the Nation is really having an important impact on many campuses. My alumni campus U.C.Davis has an extraordinary day of activities and Focus is basically taking over the consciousness of the entire campus for the day, apparently in a variety of fields across campus. Candidates in the presidential primaries just a few days later may end uprushing to commit to specifics to capture this enthusiasm. The momentum is amazing.
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WWAGD?! Posted 3:44 pm
13 Jan 2008
We could save the world-if they only knew
2012. That again.
Look, just because some Mayan city planners made a calendar with a Year 5000 bug, doesn't mean we have to running for the hills.
Except for Gristers, of course. Break out the incense and paint the VW vans a purple shade of paisley and wait on the butte for the sky to fall.
As far as gridlock -- Thank God for that! If we ever let the cuckooforcocoapopsosphere access to the public trough they'd have us spending it on solar powered windjammers and geothermal crytal healing orbs.
My Log
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horrorz Posted 3:24 pm
14 Jan 2008
Santa Monica College's Partticipation
At Santa Monica College, in California, we will:
- have our faculty members present.
- panel discussion on solutions from NRDC, Coalition for Clean Air, Treepeople, and Global Green
- Student clubs present solutions
- End the event with a spiritual solutions to climate change
An aspect that will make our teach-in unique to other teach-ins in Los Angeles is our theatrical enactment of Dr Seuss's The Lorax. We have are expecting 200 kindergarden and 1st grade students from the area.
I hope to see anyone who reads this who is in Los Angeles or Santa Monica to attend our event on January 31st from 8am to 5pm.
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stevenearlsalmony Posted 1:40 am
15 Jan 2008
Of course, we can save what is precious if .......
..... the family of humanity chooses to do what is clearly within its power: save itself, other creatures and Earth from itself?
Humanity could soon be confronted with a huge challenge that takes its astounding shape from continuously skyrocketing absolute global human population numbers as well as from economic globalization and per-capita consumption of limited resources by the human species.
Perhaps it will become dangerous to life as know it on Earth for the human community much longer to pursue the prized "business as usual" course of the predominant culture: unbridled overproduction, unrestrained overconsumption and unchecked overpopulation because, when these distinctly human activities are taken together, a force of nature exists that could become unsustainable on the relatively small, evident finite, noticeably frangible planet God blesses us to inhabit and steward, and surely not to overwhelm.
Steven Earl Salmony
AWAREness Campaign on The Human Population, established 2001
http://sustainabilitysoutheast.org/
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geochrista Posted 2:36 am
15 Jan 2008
"Focus the Nation" at Hofstra University
I am excited by the national energy that is being generated by the "Focus the Nation" events. Here at Hofstra University, the Environmental Priorities Committee, Students for a Greener Hofstra, and the National Center for Suburban Studies are putting together four days of events: movie screenings, The 2% Solution webcast, a presentation by a NASA scientist, 5 faculty panels on various topics, and a panel of local politicians. I look forward to the national day of dialogue!
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Jason D Scorse Posted 2:42 am
15 Jan 2008
Can we stop using "Save The Planet"?
It's about saving ourselves. The planet couldn't care less what temperature it is or how much ice there is.
I teach environmental economics and blog at www.voicesofreason.info.
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mland Posted 2:26 am
16 Jan 2008
Hudson Valley Region Focus the Nation
The Environmental Consortium of Hudson Valley Colleges & Universities is holding its annual conference on January 24-25 at Fordham University as a regional kick-off to Focus the Nation. Climate Change: Science, Culture and the Regional Response will serve as an intellectual toolkit for FTN events taking place on January 31st. Included in the agenda is an interdisciplinary Roundtable moderated by Andy Revkin of The New York Times, to discuss cultural apathy toward global warming. The question will be examined by a journalist, physicist/historian, artist, and political scientist.
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oakcbay Posted 3:59 am
16 Jan 2008
Focus the Nation on Congress
Since my last comment, I traveled to DC to talk to House and Senate offices about Focus the Nation events in their districts and states. Already 15 House members and 5 Senators have confirmed they are going to an event either in person or by videoconference (we are providing a carbon-friendly way to participate via SightSpeed). Just today, four Senators (2 Democrats and 2 Republicans) sent a letter to all Senators urging them to attend a Focus event (you can see the letter here: http://www.wildhavens.org/documents/Focus the Nation Senate Dear Colleague 011608).
I'm greatly heartened by the response. If you are working on a Focus event, it's not too late to invite your members of Congress. If you've already invited them, call today and ask them to commit.
-- Scott Highleyman
Civic Engagement Director
Focus the Nation
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oakcbay Posted 4:07 am
16 Jan 2008
Fixed link on Senate Dear Colleague letter
Let me try this again:
http://www.wildhavens.org/documents/Focus%20the%20Nation% ...
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elrod Posted 4:15 am
17 Feb 2008
international focus too?
Kudos for the great initiatives out there, but too bad imho that they seem to be limited to "national" focus.
The US national science foundation (NSF) is finally starting to put some serious money into international cooperation, to allow strong US-based PhD students to travel a bit and to mix with Europeans and other internationals, in events such as the Vespucci summer schools (institutes).
This June (2008) a Vespucci week is focused on creating and exploiting (better) Virtual Globes (aka geobrowsers) to assist in global science.
6th Vespucci Summer Institute on GeoInfo Science (June 9-20; Tuscany)
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