Friday, 29 Apr 2005

There Is a Lord God

Woodpecker thought extinct rediscovered; birders weep like babies

It was spotted several times -- once even filmed -- over the past year and a half. Now, ornithologists writing in the journal Science have officially confirmed the existence of at least one ivory-billed woodpecker, a miraculously tangible token of a species long thought extinct. The discovery -- referred to variously as "a spiritual experience," "thrilling beyond words," and "kind of like finding Elvis" -- was enough to bring at least one grown man to tears. With a wingspan of three feet, the ivory-billed woodpecker is the largest in North America. It was once sought for its feathers, used in women's hats, and for its bill, believed by Native Americans to have magical powers. It became known as the Lord God bird, says ornithologist John Fitzpatrick, because when people saw it, they'd exclaim "Lord God, look at that bird." Conservationists are working in concert with state and federal officials to secure the swampy area of eastern Arkansas where the bird was sighted, and plans to acquire more land in the area are in the works.


Allan Thornton's job as an eco-spy -- or, more specifically, an investigator of environmental crimes -- involves painstaking research, extensive planning, and hushed interviews with sources, as well as the occasional meeting in a dimly lit warehouse. But as this week's InterActivist, Thornton assures readers his job isn't quite the dramatic fantasy portrayed in the TV show Alias. Well, not always, anyway.

Johnson Scores

Senate confirms Johnson to head EPA

Scientist and career agency veteran Stephen Johnson is the new head of the U.S. EPA. After a confirmation process that was oddly turbulent given the mild-mannered bureaucrat's generally warm reception on both sides of the aisle, the Senate voted 61-37 just after midnight last night to approve a cloture motion, which put an end to the procedural roadblock in Johnson's way, and thereafter quickly confirmed him. The roadblock in question was a hold put on the confirmation by appropriately named Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.). Carper's beef was not with Johnson but with the Bush administration, which has refused to authorize studies of the relative effectiveness of alternatives to its Clear Skies legislation. Earlier, the confirmation was stalled by two other Democratic senators objecting to a study on child pesticide exposure, which Johnson agreed to scrap. He replaces Mike Leavitt, who left to head the Department of Health and Human Services. Good luck, Mr. Johnson.


If Bill McKibben isn't seeing art that addresses climate change, maybe it's because he's looking in overly highfalutin places, writes one Grist reader. Other letters in Grist's mailbag this week find fault with our stories on environmental confessions, nasty plastics, and (yes, again) nuclear power. Fortunately, a few folks soften those blows with praise for our juvenile humor and dumb puns. Thanks, we think.

Overwhelming Scientific Consensus Grows Overwhelminger

Climate really changing, oceans reveal to researchers

Hey, did you know that the globe is warming? Really and for true! A new study by researchers at NASA, the U.S. Department of Energy, and Columbia University, published in the journal Science this week, concludes that global warming is real. Really. Lead scientist James Hansen calls the new data a "smoking gun" that confirms the earth's "energy imbalance" -- the difference between the amount of heat the earth absorbs and what it radiates into space. Seems the oceans are a key piece of the puzzle, acting as a repository for much of the heat trapped by the greenhouse effect. Using diving robots (ooh!), the team demonstrated a rise in temperature that matches the predictions of computer models. Meanwhile, the ocean is slowly releasing stored heat, in itself enough to raise the global temp yet another degree Fahrenheit over the next century. "There can no longer be substantial doubt that human-made gases are the cause of most observed warming," Hansen said, demonstrating a rather hopeful view of human nature.