2017 has been anything but a successful year for unions. For a multitude of reasons unions have a bad reputation, although it’s thanks to unions that we have labour rights and weekends. Unions are really good at helping individuals deal with institutions that want to exploit their work; and history
Continue readingAuthor: Adam Clare
Things Are Good: Fighting Myths of the 1%
Income inequality has been growing since the 2008 self-inflicted bank chaos, indeed that banking stupidity from 2008 accelerated the growing gap. The inequity was so obvious that the Occupy Wall Street protests took the streets and the public consciousness of “the 1%” grew out of it. Sadly, politicians failed to
Continue readingThings Are Good: Birds Provide Japanese Train Design
Yesterday a Japanese train company apologized for running 20 seconds ahead of schedule. How did Japanese trains get so fast? The answer for how their famous bullet trains move so quickly is thanks in part to biomimicry, the study of using animals as a source for design. The front of
Continue readingThings Are Good: It’s Time to Think Hard About our Waste Systems
Modern capitalism encourages consumption at levels previously unimaginable which has led to an inconvenient byproduct: the globalization of waste. High levels of consumption means more waste in our system, and with the gift-giving holiday next month we’re going to see a lot of wasteful purchases. This year think about what
Continue readingThings Are Good: 15,000 Scientists Want to Change Climate Change
They want to stabilize the change and, ideally, change the trajectory we’re on. Climate change is happening faster than predicted and the positive feedback loops have started (meaning that it’s even harder to stop climate change) – this is the warning from over 15,000 scientists. The Alliance of World Scientists
Continue readingThings Are Good: NASA Designs Plane Modifications to Save Fuel
A seemingly simple change to airplane design can make a huge difference in fuel efficiency: add another engine. Yes, as counterintuitive as it sounds, NASA has figured out that by adding an engine to the rear of the plane the airflow of the plane itself can provide more thrust. Airplanes
Continue readingThings Are Good: Go Ride the Bus, Busses are Great!
When is a bus not a bus? When it’s a trackless train. Busses are a great solution to traffic congestion, so much so that bus rapid transit (BRT) systems are growing the world over. The problem with getting more money into BRTs and expanding them is the baggage of the
Continue readingThings Are Good: A New Way to Monitor Carbon in Coastal Regions
With the amount of carbon in the atmosphere at a level never before witnessed by human civilization we need to know how what to do about it. Obviously we need to cut back on all emissions and wasteful consumerist consumption. Beyond that we need to actively support carbon sinks. A
Continue readingThings Are Good: Let’s Outright Ban Cars in Large Cities
Vehicles have been used to kill a lot of people throughout 2017, sometimes it’s an act of terror and other times it’s drivers being startlingly incompetent. Either way, people who walk are under threat from vehicular traffic in our cities (remember that everyone is a pedestrian). This past weekend in
Continue readingThings Are Good: The Best Interrogation Technique is to Listen
Over the course of the last decade interrogation techniques involved violence, yelling, and trying to “outsmart” the person being interviewed. Sadly that’s how interrogations were shown in entertainment and in reality at places like Guantanamo (which is still running). This bizarre approach to information gathering bothered psychologists Emily and Laurence
Continue readingThings Are Good: OECD Wants International Action Against Climate Change
One of the most influential international economic is calling for a bigger push to combat climate change. The Secretary-General of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Angel Gurría, gave a talk this week (above) advocating for greater international effort to reach a sustainable economy in regards to the environment.
Continue readingThings Are Good: 70,000 Acres of Rainforest Being Replanted
This week it was announced that carbon in our atmosphere has reached levels not seen for 800,000 years. Clearly we need to do better to reduce our consumption of fossil fuels and the releasing of carbon (and other waste) into the atmosphere. While reduction efforts continue, we need to do
Continue readingThings Are Good: Good Companies Have Good Indigenous Relations
With greater awareness of environmental and social issues investors have asked companies to report on how their activities impact communities. Corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports are standard for large corporations nowadays which let investors (and interested parties) see what the company has been up to reconcile any negative impacts the
Continue readingThings Are Good: Boredom is Good for you
Too many people are afraid of boredom and that needs to change. Boredom can actually be really good for you and helps you develop as a human being. Getting bored means that you’re familiar with what’s going on around you, resulting in your mind looking for stimulus within itself (and
Continue readingThings Are Good: Be Lazy About Happiness
Dan Buettner has travelled the planet looking for ways to make people happy and has found that the best thing one can do is be relaxed about the whole thing. He wrote a book, The Blue Zones of Happiness, that basically says happiness is a journey, not a destination. To be
Continue readingThings Are Good: New Fish Food Doesn’t Require Killing Fish
When fish farms kill their fish for food some of that food is ground up and fed to other fish as nutrient pellets. It’s well known that current fishing practices are really bad for the environment and that fish farms aren’t good for their local environment. Anything we can do
Continue readingThings Are Good: Use a Browser Tab to Raise Funds for Charity
Donating money, time, or resources to charities makes the world a better place, but what if you don’t have any of those things to spare? If you’re using the internet via a web browser maybe you can donate some spare CPU cycles though. A new site called Donate Your Tab
Continue readingThings Are Good: European Cities Announce Bans on Fossil Fuel Vehicles
It’s no shock that cars are bad for health, what is shocking is that we continue to build cities to support automobiles. This is changing in some European cities and hopefully the idea will spread. Quite a few large cities in Europe are outright banning cars that use consume fossil
Continue readingThings Are Good: Using a Blockchain for a Smarter Energy Grid
Blockchain technology stems from Bitcoin and provides a platform for change greater than Bitcoin itself. Researchers in the renewable energy industry have realized that blockchains can be used to replace outdated billing and tracking. Presently when a company produces energy it requires verification form other companies and each step eats
Continue readingThings Are Good: Using Math to Solve for Inequality
Inequality has been increasing globally for years, and developed nations have seen inequality rise in rates comparable to the start of the great depression. This situation is understandably problematic and worrisome. Accordingly, a lot of thinkers have looked into the problem, most solutions come down to some level of redistribution
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