The Weird Times
Inner Monologues and Desultory Reporting from Outer Spaces
The Weird Times: Issue 45, March 21 2021
These are the things you are to do: Speak the truth to one another, render true and perfect justice in your gates—from a fragment of a Dead Sea Scroll found in the Cave of Horrors in Israel, 2021
Sonnet 15: When I consider everything that grows
When I consider everything that grows
Holds in perfection but a little moment,
That this huge stage presenteth nought but shows
Whereon the stars in secret influence comment;
When I perceive that men as plants increase,
Cheered and check'd even by the selfsame sky,
Vaunt in their youthful sap, at height decrease,
And wear their brave state out of memory;
Then the conceit of this inconstant stay
Sets you most rich in youth before my sight,
Where wasteful Time debateth with Decay
To change your day of youth to sullied night;
And all in war with Time for love of you,
As he takes from you, I engraft you new.
—William Shakespeare
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Maybe we don’t need to cast billions of people as if they were vague threats to us, or exaggerate the risk of vaccine failure because of them.
How about simply this: we should vaccinate the world because every human being deserves being protected against a disease for which we have safe and efficacious vaccines. —Zeynep Tufekci
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In a recent (paywall protected) piece in the Financial Times, Jeremy Grantham wrote “We are in a global baby bust of unprecedented proportions. It is far from over and its implications are gravely underestimated. The worldwide fertility rate has already dropped more than 50 per cent in the past 50 years, from 5.1 births per woman in 1964 to 2.4 in 2018, according to the World Bank. In 2020, the 20 per cent shortfall below replacement rate in US fertility, together with low net immigration, produced the lowest population growth on record of 0.35 per cent, below even the flu pandemic of 1918. Many countries, including Italy, South Korea and Japan, are predicted to see their populations drop by more than half by the end of this century.”
The Grantham piece relates directly to a book I published a couple years ago by Jonas Salk and Jonathan Salk, A New Reality: Human Evolution for a Sustainable Future, that sets forth a foreword looking understanding of human evolution from a systems perspective. I asked Jonathan to respond to Grantham, and he sent me this:
It is quite true that we are in the midst of an epochal change in population growth. This, however, is a sign of evolutionary change not impending disaster. As we are adapting to planetary limitations, worldwide population growth, which had been accelerating for centuries, has been slowing since the end of the 20th century. This is the result of improvements in health care, lowering of infant mortality, sustainable development and the education of women throughout the world. As we struggle to survive, these changes will be accompanied by a species-wide shift from societies based on competition, independence and wanton exploitation of resources to those built around values of equilibrium, cooperation, interdependence, and sustainability. There is more than a ray of hope that we can and will make this shift, designing our future in a way that not only meets the demands of survival but brings us to new heights in human and planetary well-being.
“We are at a point in the course of human social evolution when the demands of survival converge with the higher ideals of humankind and the well-being and flourishing of human society. It is up to us to see that we navigate this transition, adapting to and emerging in a new reality.” —A New Reality
Enforcing treaty rights and returning land to native peoples who have been dispossessed by generations of land theft and corruption should be a first priority for anyone who believes we must transform our societies to a sustainable form.
Treaty Rights Acknowledged For First Time in Oil Pipeline’s Controversial History: Michigan’s Indigenous communities hold long-standing legal rights to protect lands and waters, Elena Bruess, Circle of Blue, 3/12/21
The Bay Mills Indian Community knows what it’s like to lose a resource, Gravelle says. They don’t want anyone else to lose it either.
“There’s still a lot of work to do to ensure the Great Lakes are around for the next seven generations,” she says. “We finally feel like we have people behind our back and we’re ready to move forward.”
How Mrs. Edge Saved the Birds: Meet a forgotten hero of our natural world whose brave campaign to protect birds charted a new course for the environmental movement, Michelle Nijhuis, Smithsonian Magazine, April 2021
The abundance of raptors at North Lookout owes a great deal to topography and wind currents, both of which funnel birds toward the ridgeline. But it owes even more to an extraordinary activist named Rosalie Edge, a wealthy Manhattan suffragist who founded Hawk Mountain Sanctuary in 1934. Hawk Mountain, believed to be the world’s first refuge for birds of prey, is a testament to Edge’s passion for birds—and to her enthusiasm for challenging the conservation establishment. Bold and impossible to ignore, she was described by a close colleague as “the only honest, unselfish, indomitable hellcat in the history of conservation.”
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In the years since Maurice Broun began his daily raptor count from North Lookout, Hawk Mountain has accumulated the longest and most complete record of raptor migration in the world. From these data, researchers know that golden eagles are more numerous along the flyway than they used to be, and that sharp-shinned hawks and red-tailed hawks are less frequent passersby. They also know that kestrels, the smallest falcons in North America, are in steep decline—for reasons that remain unclear, but researchers are launching a new study to identify the causes.
…While red-tailed hawks are less frequently seen at Hawk Mountain, for example, they are now more frequently reported at sites farther north, suggesting that the species is responding to warmer winters by changing its migration strategy. In November 2020, Hawk Mountain Sanctuary scientist J.F. Therrien contributed to a report showing that golden eagles are returning to their Arctic summering grounds progressively earlier in the year. While none of the raptors that frequent the sanctuary are currently endangered, it’s important to understand how these species are responding to climate change and other human-caused disruptions. (Adapted from Beloved Beasts: Fighting for Life in an Age of Extinction.)
Did the coronavirus leak from a lab? These scientists say we shouldn’t rule it out: For many scientists, challenging the idea that SARS-CoV-2 has natural origins is seen as career suicide. But a vocal few say it shouldn't be disregarded or lumped in with conspiracy theories, Charles Schmidt, MIT Technology Review, 3/18/21
As it stands now, pandemic preparedness faces two simultaneous fronts. On the one hand, the world has experienced numerous pandemic and epidemic outbreaks in the last 20 years, including SARS, chikungunya, H1N1, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, several Ebola outbreaks, three outbreaks of norovirus, Zika, and now SARS-CoV-2. Speaking of coronaviruses, Ralph Baric, an epidemiologist at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, says it’s “hard to imagine there aren’t variants” in bats with mortality rates approaching MERS’s 30% that also have “a transmissibility that is much more efficient.” He adds “That is terrifying.” Baric is emphatic that genetic research with viruses is essential to staying ahead of the threat.
Yet according to Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers University, lab-release dangers are growing as well. The risk increases in proportion with the number of labs handling bioweapons and potential pandemic pathogens (more than 1,500 globally in 2010), he says, many of them, like the Wuhan lab, located in urban areas close to international airports.
This is BIG – cows contribute 5% of all US emissions:
Scientists claim feeding cows seaweed could slash their methane emissions by a staggering 82 percent, Agriculture makes up about 10 percent of emissions in the U.S., Joseph Guzman, The Hill, 3/18/21
Researchers behind a study published in PLOS ONE this week added small amounts of seaweed to the diet of 21 beef cattle over the duration of five months and tracked their methane emissions and weight gain. The cows ate from an open-air container that measured the methane in their breath four times a day.
The study found cattle that consumed 3 ounces of seaweed daily gained as much as their herd mates and released 82 percent less methane into the atmosphere.
“We now have sound evidence that seaweed in cattle diet is effective at reducing greenhouse gases and that the efficacy does not diminish over time,” Ermias Kebreab, director of the World Food Center and agricultural scientists at University of California, Davis, said.
Protect our ocean to ‘to solve challenges of century,’ Helen Briggs, BBC, 3/18/21
The ocean covers 70% of the Earth, yet its importance for solving the challenges of our time has been overlooked, said study researcher Prof Boris Worm of Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
"The benefits are clear," he said. "If we want to solve the three most pressing challenges of our century - biodiversity loss, climate change and food shortages - we must protect our ocean."
Private planes, mansions and superyachts: What gives billionaires like Musk and Abramovich such a massive carbon footprint, Richard Wilk and Beatriz Barros, The Conversation, 2/16/21
We found that billionaires have carbon footprints that can be thousands of times higher than those of average Americans.
The wealthy own yachts, planes and multiple mansions, all of which contribute greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. For example, a superyacht with a permanent crew, helicopter pad, submarines and pools emits about 7,020 tons of CO2 a year, according to our calculations, making it by the far worst asset to own from an environmental standpoint. Transportation and real estate make up the lion’s share of most people’s carbon footprint, so we focused on calculating those categories for each billionaire.
As Mushrooms Grow in Popularity, a Radical Mycology Movement is Emerging: A new book explores fungi’s role in nutrition, food security, ecological healing, and medicinal sovereignty, Gosia Wozniaka, Civil Eats, 3/11/21
Despite their mysterious nature, fungi—a category that includes molds, mushrooms, yeasts, lichens, mycorrhiza, and mildews—are essential to human life and play crucial ecological functions. They have also been shown to help people solve a wide range of problems, from oil spills to clinical depression to food insecurity. Yet they are vastly understudied and misunderstood.
Journalist Doug Bierend spent five years exploring fungi and the emerging subcultures that have formed around them for his new book, In Search of Mycotopia: Citizen Science, Fungi Fanatics, and the Untapped Potential of Mushrooms.
In the Pacific, Global Warming Disrupted The Ecological Dance of Urchins, Sea Stars And Kelp. Otters Help Restore Balance: When ocean heat waves and a sea star disease devastated kelp forests that are critical to sea life and the California urchin fishing, Mallory Pickett and Bob Berwin, Inside Climate News, 3/16/21
Ancient 'computer' may have used bejewelled rings to model the cosmos, Jo Marchant, New Scientist, 3/12/21
The 2000-year-old Antikythera mechanism, often described as the world’s first computer, was a sophisticated bronze device that modelled the cosmos. Researchers have assumed that pointers were used to represent celestial bodies, moving around a dial like the hands on a clock, but a new study suggests that these were instead shown using a series of bejewelled, rotating rings.
The machine dates to the first century BC and was discovered in a shipwreck near the Greek island of Antikythera in 1901. Scientists have spent more than a century decoding its battered remains, which include inscriptions, measuring scales and more than 30 bronze gearwheels.
New and recent books about women, climate change, and the environment:For Women's History Month, a list of books that highlight women's contributions to climate change understanding and action, Michael Svoboda, Yale Climate Connections, 3/18/21
RATATATAT: Quick Hits
Maple Producers Find Sweet Success Despite Climate Change and the Pandemic, Valerie Puma, WICZ Fox 40, 3/18/21
The surprise catch of seafood trawling: Massive greenhouse gas emissions: A new study shows that one industrial fishing method emits as much carbon dioxide annually as the aviation industry, Lili Pike, Vox, 3/18/21
Iowa Poll: Majority of Iowans oppose fewer days to request, cast absentee ballots; bill doing that is now law, Stephen Gruber-Miller, Des Moines Register, 3/17/21
The Incredible Shrinking Lawn: How to create a nature-friendly yard: Less grass and more wild plant life is good for the environment—and it can make your yard the envy of your neighbors, Theresa Sullivan Barger, Connecticut Magazine, 2/26/21
Think yourself younger: Psychological tricks that can help slow ageing: How old you feel matters for how long you will live. Here's how you can reduce your psychological age, Graham Lawton, New Scientist, 3/17/21
What Will it Take for Farmers to Grow More Organic Cotton? New research shows that organic cotton is much better for the environment. A shift in consumer demand and support from major clothing brands could help more farmers grow it, Nicole Rasul, Civic Eats, 3/15/21
Independent bookstore owners look back at a year spent trying to stay afloat. Not all of them succeeded, Angela Haupt, Washington Post, 3/15/21
A deep dive into Eli Lilly’s tantalizing Alzheimer’s drug data, Adam Feuerstein and Matthew Herper, Stat News, 3/15/21
First Study of the Human Placenta’s Genomic Architecture, Wellcome Sanger Institute, Technology Networks, 3/11/21
Ancient leaves preserved under a mile of Greenland’s ice – and lost in a freezer for years – hold lessons about climate change, Andrew Crist and Paul Bierman, The Conversation, 3/15/21
Premature or precautionary? California is first to tackle microplastics in drinking water, Rachel Becker, CalMatters.org, 3/15/21
South Africa’s Drop in Covid-19 Cases Adds to Questions About Waves of Infections: Surprising decline after surge shows scientists still have much to learn about how the coronavirus moves through society, Gabrielle Steinhauser, Wall Street Journal, 3/14/21
How Dirt Could Help Save the Planet: Farming practices that retain carbon in the soil, or return it there, would limit both erosion and climate change, Jo Handelsman, Scientific American, 3/14/21
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I turn in the direction of the sun and keep walking.
It’s the heart that asks the question, not my furious mind.
--Joy Harjo, “This Morning I Pray for My Enemies,” from Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings: Poems
Joy has just released an exceptional new album of poems and music, I Pray for My Enemies
“The concept for I Pray for My Enemies began with an urgent need to deal with discord, opposition. It could have been on a tribal, national or a personal level. I no longer remember. The urgency had a heartbeat and in any gathering of two or more, perhaps the whole planet, our hearts lean to entrainment – that is, to beat together.”
Though you failed at love and lost
And sorrow's turned your heart to frost
I will mend your heart again
Remember the feeling as a child
When you woke up and morning smiled
It's time its time its time you felt like that again
—Taj Mahal, Take a Giant Step Outside Your Mind
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I recently interviewed historian Claudio Saunt about his most recent book, Unworthy Republic, The Dispossession of Native Americans and the Road to Indian Territory, you can listen to our conversation at Writerscast.com. As this important book demonstrates, the politics and economics of white supremacy are and remain at the heart of the American experience.
March 21 Birthdays
Eddie James “Son” House, Peter Brook, Viv Stanshall, Rosie O’Donnell
March 21, 1952, Alan Freed’s Moondog Coronation Ball is the first rock ‘n roll concert ever presented.
I’m as ready for spring as I have ever been. Planning a bigger garden, tuning up the bicycle, watching spring training baseball games with increasing hope for a new season to begin. Be well all, stay healthy, keep in touch. And hope to see you soon.
David: Good work!
First: Having spent my summers in the little finger of Michigan I never knew about the absolutely egregious land grab from indigenous people that went on there.
Second: The information on Hawk Mountain and the numbers on raptors is fascinating. I really want to read more....so many interesting tidbits - keep it up!
Bill
David, What are the 2 or 3 best historian’s books about the Pequots. I’m especially interested in the group itself, its relations with their indigenous neighbors, and of course their tragic experience with the Massachusetts Bay Colony and the fur trade. Thanks. I enjoy every issue and learn from it. Keep it up! Michael