Assorted content to start your week. – The Climate Change Performance Update’s latest update shows Canada tumbling to the bottom of the world’s development countries in climate performance – even as right-wing petropoliticians demand that we make matters worse. Justin Ling discusses how we’ve ended up with that painful gap
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Accidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Emily Eaton, Andrew Stevens and Sean Tucker discuss how the corporate fossil fuel sector is blocking workers from pursuing sustainable jobs as part of a just transition. And Kate Yoder writes that there’s an entirely plausible basis to hold big oil accountable for
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Maanvi Singh reports on the corporate purchase of water rights in Arizona which signals the diversion of the necessities of life to the highest bidder once greed and mismanagement have undermined their availability. – Drew Anderson writes about the similar water crisis
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Jenna Wenkoff discusses how “ethical oil” is purely a (risible) marketing concept rather than any meaningful description of actual fossil fuel operations, while Chris Russell discusses how the tar sands’ environmental disinformation is even worse than people assume. Ian Urquhart writes that the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Joan Westenberg discusses how to fight back in the war against knowledge, while Julia Doubleday calls out the lengths to which the New York Times and other outlets are going in avoiding any acknowledgment of the continuing effects of COVID-19. And in
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Cory Doctorow discusses the inherent impossibility of trying to build any public good on an economic system centered on selfishness: This is the problem at the core of “mechanism design” grounded in “rational self-interest.” If you try to create a system where people
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett discuss why the world can’t afford the rich. And Cory Doctorow points out that class-based advocacy for better material conditions tends to be a political winner even in the U.S. – but that it’s not generally presented as an option by
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Bill McGuire discusses why anybody with an understanding of climate science is terrified of a living environment that’s careening out of control. Carbon Brief notes that there’s plenty of public support for meaningful climate action. But Andre Mayer observes that while the wealthiest and most
Continue readingThings Are Good: Floating Flowers Clean Pollution in Waterways
Industrial farming, golf courses, and some industries all contribute an incredible amount of nutrient runoff that enters our waterways. This influx of unexpected nutrients can cause algae blooms and otherwise damage the local ecosystem. To combat this damage from runoff a team from the Florida International University created a floating
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Armine Yalnizyan offers a warning about the spread of the tapeworm economy in which corporate profiteers wriggle their way into public services and siphon off resources. – Julia Velkova discusses how reliance on tech monopolists undermines the capacity to decide and deliver on
Continue readingAccidental 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 readingThings Are Good: How Rotterdam Uses Water to Protect Itself from Flooding
As global warming melts the polar ice caps we are witnessing a human caused increase in sea level. The city of Rotterdam is on the front lines of holding back this tidal increase and they have designed some nifty ways to protect the people that live in the city from
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Afternoon Links
Assorted content to end your 2023. – Shannon Hall discusses new research showing that the positive effects of COVID-19 vaccination include a reduction in long COVID in children. And Erin Prater warns about the building Pirola wave which is already causing record-high infection levels in some countries. – Meanwhile, Carly
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Jessica Wildfire offers a reminder of the breadth and depth of harm continuing to be caused by COVID-19. Julia Doubleday calls out the role of the media in normalizing perpetual reinfection, while Arijit Chakravarty and T. Ryan Gregory discuss the importance of naming
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Sigal Samuel discusses the potential to better target investments toward well-being – though it seems odd to criticize measures of health as a standard alongside GDP. And Cory Doctorow writes about Deb Chachra’s observation that we should view infrastructure as a form of
Continue readingThings Are Good: Desalination on the Cheap for the Masses
Water water everywhere and plenty of drops to drink. Researchers from MIT have found a way to passively convert seawater into drinking water using a setup so simple it seems too good to be true. Their device basically uses heat from the sun rays and a siphon. The apparatus produces
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Afternoon Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Chris Hedges discusses how the end of empire-based colonialism has only given way to an even more exploitative corporate version. And Cory Doctorow points out how surveillance capitalism inevitably turns its resources toward defrauding the people being monitored and manipulated. – Matthew Rosza
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Dawn Bowdish and Andrew Costa provide a reminder as to how to stay as safe as possible from COVID-19 (even as governments have abandoned any attempt to limit the spread of a dangerous disease). – Ryan Meili writes about the connection between the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Eyal Press writes about the problems with the U.S.’ health care system which forces medical workers to subordinate the health of their patients to the demands of corporate investors. And Andre Picard points out that the largest problems with Canada’s health care system
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Afternoon Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Scott Dance reports on the scientific recognition that the Earth’s oceans are warming far faster than previously feared, while Sid Perkins discusses the particularly large temperature increases in parts of the north Atlantic. And the American Geophysical Union points out that humanity’s unanticipated
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