“Risk on” and “Risk Off” are terms heard among stock market traders, analysts, and investment advisors. They indicate whether the speaker feels that risk is high or low for investing in markets or in a particular stock. Risk is always a matter of degree, except under conditions of certainty—and when does that happen? Yet, “risk … More Risk On Risk Off: Likely or Unlikely, Catastrophic or Not
Now that I have read President Biden’s “fact sheet” on his infrastructure plan, dubbed the American Jobs Plan, I have to wonder whether it will devolve into an “upgrade” to “modernize” business-as-usual. What we need is a genuine emergency response to the converging crises of climate, a crumbling main street economy, and the continued enrichment … More Building Back Better: Deferred Maintenance vs. Emergency Response
The confusion is palpable as it is widely ignored. We have a new, slightly progressive administration headed by Joe Biden, the empathetic traditional former long-term senator. He knows how to “reach across the aisle” and make deals with Republicans. But wait, those senators were the Republicans of old, who were actually willing to make compromise … More The Infrastructure Illusion: Historic Neglect and Crucial Confusion
Climate scientist Dr. Andrew Glikson’s brief assessment of our global prospects in his article, “How long for civilization?” is uncomfortably right on target. He begins his short essay, published the day after Christmas, 2020, with an epigram consisting of Albert Einstein’s famous statement, ‘The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over … More Earth System Discontent with Civilization
“Nobody could have seen it coming or how bad it could be.” Wrong! Epidemiologists and virologists saw the earliest warnings of the global danger of the COVID-19 pandemic and warned the politicians. Even I, with my modest background in epidemiology, knew as soon as I saw the characteristics of this novel corona virus that its … More Dress Rehearsal: Failed Pandemic Response is the Harbinger for Climate Chaos Policy Failure
Leah Stokes is an important young climate writer and Assistant Professor or political science at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She recently wrote an eloquent description of the relation of California’s record wildfires to the accelerating global climate chaos in an article in The Atlantic. It reflects her solid work on the growing climate … More Why Climate Policy is Failing
In a recent blog post on the Corespondent.com, Eric Holthaus’ observations were as astute as ever. I frequently hear advocates for social, economic, and climate justice argue for the inclusion of justice actions along with climate action. As an extension of fossil-fueled empire-building following colonial confiscations and brutality, the global political economy was founded in … More Climate Action that works IS Social and Economic Justice
It is not difficult to see the several consistencies between the COVID-19 pandemic and the Climate Emergency. You can find them in more than one dimension. Some involve the trajectories of the crises, while others reside in the human response or lack thereof. Things like acceleration and lagged effects are important for understanding crises that … More Too Late and Too Soon: Corona-Climate Crisis Consistency
I deepened my carbon footprint this week by flying to Toronto for a conference at the University of Toronto, Mississauga, on “Sustainability: Transdisciplinary Theory, Practice, and Action,” (STTPA) The topic seems crucial for understanding how we must move forward to stem the tide of planetary destabilization of climate, ecosystems, and the threat of societal collapse. … More Renewable Energy and Sustainable Life
We live in increasingly complex systems, more and more of them are of our own making, though not always of our own conscious design. There are two basic kinds, natural complex adaptive systems, such as the Earth System and its many subsystems, and human-made complex adaptive systems, such as social groups and corporations. It appears … More How to Control Complex Adaptive Systems to Survive
