Assorted content to end your week. – Anthony Leonardi writes about the reality that COVID-19 is intrinsically more harmful than “ordinary” respiratory viruses due to its continuing effect on the immune system. And Chinta Sardathan discusses new research showing that the fallout from COVID infection includes higher rates of dementia
Continue readingTag: climate change
Accidental Deliberations: Thursday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Mark Poynting reports on the latest data showing that global warming reached the 1.5 C threshold over the past year. And Adrienne Berard discusses new research finding that the climate breakdown’s devastating feedback loops include the potential that hotter, drier conditions will make
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Meghan Bartels interviews Maria Van Kerkhove about the continuing and emerging threats in the fifth year of a pandemic which most of the powers that be have long since disappeared from any discussion. And Crawford Kilian talks to Ziyad Al-Aly about the unconscionable lack of
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Cordell Jacks writes about the need for an economic model which evolves beyond the short-term exploitation of people and the planet. And Jessica McKenzie interviews Charlotte Kukowski about the importance of reprioritizing in the context of readily-apparent feedback loops between inequality and the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Claude Lavoie examines the problems with the far-too-rarely-questioned assumption that public policy needs to be oriented toward top-end economic growth at the expense of human well-being and environmental sustainability. – George Monbiot calls out how the wealthiest few have torqued the law to
Continue readingA Puff of Absurdity: Seize the Moment!
Until we redefine prosperity, consumption will continue to drive us down a destructive path (from Joe Tegerdine). People are going to fly to vacation spots to sit in the sun to get a tan, a bit annoyed when all the smoke blocks the sun and they have to move hotels
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Ian Welsh discusses how COVID-19 is the second-most important story in the world – and how our failure to respond with appropriate regard for human life and well-being mirrors our inability to address any social challenge. And Ruth Link-Gelles et al. find that
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Stephanie Soucheray examines new research showing that a large majority of respondents have concealed infectious diseases out of perceived economic or social necessity. And Zoya Teirstein discusses modeling showing that we’re vastly underestimating the death toll from the climate crisis – with
Continue readingA Puff of Absurdity: The Hot Model
Enjoy yourself. It’s later than you think! Sabine Hossenfelder, physicist and science communicator, posted this 20 minute video: “I wasn’t worried about climate change. Now I am.” She describes the “hot model” that people originally questioned because it seemed so impossible that we’d go beyond 5°C this century, but now
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – David Michaels, Emily Spieler and Gregory Wagner examine how negligent pandemic policies (even when COVID-19 wasn’t being treated as a matter of general denialism) resulted in tens of thousands of worker deaths in the US alone. Olivia Man et al. find that prenatal exposure
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Colin Carlson discusses why we should be treating the climate crisis as a health emergency (while also recognizing that such a thing demands urgent action rather than enforced denial). Debra Werner discusses the progress being made on at least identifying methane emissions
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Chris Walker discusses new research showing that over half of the increase in U.S. consumer prices over the past 6 months is pure corporate greedflation. And Michael Harris warns that Pierre Poilievre is planning to use discontent among Canadian voters as to a
Continue readingA Puff of Absurdity: Climate Memes
I know weather is different from climate, but it feels like April outside today. All the snow’s melting (at least we got some snow after a very green Christmas), and I started peeling off layers as I walked. Leon Simons (the “gentleman” climate scientist, not the Snowfall character) created the meme above. When
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Pinelopi Koujianou Goldberg examines why seemingly healthy macroeconomic indicators – and even positive personal expectations – haven’t translated into public satisfaction with political economic leaders. But Dougald Lamont is setting out how our economic system has been torqued at the behest of corporate robber
Continue readingIN-SIGHTS: Everything else becomes moot
Climate scientists tell us to reduce and ultimately eliminate burning of fossil fuels, products that are the dominant cause of global warming. Worldwide, the oil and gas industry and its supporters in governments and elsewhere plan for us to burn more…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Tim Murphy discusses the many similarities between Russia’s oligarchs and the U.S.’ – including how both take advantage of deliberate policy choices to facilitate the concentration of wealth in secret. And Kevin Kharas’ interview with Bertrand Monnet includes the recognition that their shared
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – KFF Health News offers a reminder that the COVID pandemic is far from over, even if the highly effective public health measures which previously kept us relatively healthy have been discarded in favour of determined denialism. And Hayley Gleeson discusses what Australian scientists
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Afternoon Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Nathalie Grandvaux writes about the causes and impacts of a triple epidemic of respiratory viruses. And Erin Goerlich et al. study the cardiovascular effects of COVID-19, while Beth Mole reports on research showing that COVID vaccinations help protect against strokes and heart attacks
Continue readingA Puff of Absurdity: Elderly Activism
Fiona Atkinson, retired teacher, gave a couple of MPs a lesson that they refused to learn: This is a video that was on the news in October, but then hit TikTok yesterday, so is just now being spread on social media. Funny how that works. The interviewers are also MPs, something
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Julia Doubleday offers a reminder that any remotely responsible definition of “living with COVID” would include doing everything reasonably possible to upgrade air quality. And Dylan Matthews discusses the prospect that UV light may help to reduce the spread of viruses generally –
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