December 2011
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Happy new year - Bonne année - Buon anno - Feliz...
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Citizens against the arms lobby! →
While brave people across the Arab world oust dictators, Merkel is about to supply Saudi despots with powerful Leopard battle tanks, optimized for clearing crowds and fighting protesters in urban areas – unless public pressure can stop the plan. Germany is not legally allowed to send weapons of war to crisis regions, and certainly not to Saudi Arabia, which sends tanks to crush democracy...
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10 Most Popular Slideshows of 2011 →
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Sinners, repent! How our natural self-bias got us...
Dearest readers, we hope you had a gluttonous, slothful, greedy, and lustful holiday, with only the tiniest touches of wrath. My compatriots and I at the Last Word on Nothing are celebrating the season with a series of posts on the Seven Deadly Sins. I got things started with a conversation with conservation biologist Michael Soule, the founder of the Society for Conservation Biology and The...
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Germany's Wind Power Revolution in the Doldrums
The construction of offshore wind parks in the North Sea has hit a snag with a vital link to the onshore power grid hopelessly behind schedule. The delays have some reconsidering the ability of wind power to propel Germany into the post-nuclear era.
The generation of electricity from wind is usually a completely odorless affair. After all, the avoidance of emissions is one of the unique charms...
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“With the past, I have nothing to do; nor with the future. I live now.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
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STOP SHELL ROYAL BP ENVIRONMENTAL VIOLATIONS →
Why This Is Important
The BONGA OILS SPILLS AND ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER, 21/12/2011
Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Europe’s largest oil company, currently extracts over 200,000 barrel-a-day in just one of its oil fields in Nigeria, the Bonga field. However due to the extreme high poverty in the region and corruption of the Nigerian government, Royal Dutch Shell Plc often sees no reason why it should...
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10 Odd Facts About Coffee →
Since weird, random facts make me tick almost as loudly as coffee does, I was oh-so-glad to be directed to the Daily Shot of Coffee for this quotidian does of obscure nuggets about my morning (and afternoon…) drink of choice. Culled from the book, Uncommon Grounds: The History Of Coffee, here are ten amusing curiosities–for more on caffeine myths and facts as coffee pertains to health, see 7 Myths...
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Satellite Studies Reveal Groundwater Depletion...
Access to freshwater resources has always been a critical need for human and all forms of life on Earth. With a world population estimated at just shy of 7 billion and growing, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization says agricultural production will need to increase 70% by 2050. As agriculture takes up most of human water use, that’s going to put vastly greater demands and strains on our water...
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Germany: Solar power output increases by 60...
The German Solar Industry Association (BSW) has announced that German solar power producers have increased electricity output this year by 60 percent over 2010 to 18 billion kWh. This is more than three percent of total power output volumes.
The solar sector has already produced enough electricity to power approximately 5.1 million households in Germany.
Gehrlicher Solar AG
BSW’s...
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ONE IN ACTION - Please join! →
Time and again ONE Members have been on the front lines in the fight against extreme poverty and preventable disease. Share our exciting new video below with your family and friends ask them to join you. 2012 will be another important year in the fight against poverty - the bigger our movement becomes, the greater the difference we can all make.
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Oil on Nigerian coast after major Shell spill: NGO
The FPSO (Floating, Production, Storage and Offloading) Bonga unit, 120 kms off the coast of Nigeria, south of Lagos, in an aerial view taken in 2008. An environmental group said Tuesday that an oil slick had approached Nigeria’s coastline after a major Shell spill at Bonga last week, but the company insisted that its spill had been largely dispersed.
An environmental group said Tuesday...
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Apps for apes: Orang-utans want iPads for... →
Forget bananas. The biggest hit in zoos this year is an Apple, though orangs have more of a geek streak than gorillas
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Activists Launch Drones to Battle Japanese Whalers
mikebaird/CC BY 2.0
These days, fishing is a high tech business. So is whaling. And so is activism against whaling. In an effort to thwart Japanese whalers, the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has two ships — the Steve Irwin and the Bob Barker — outfitted with drones that can fly out to find ships and get information about them.
CNN reports that the activists were able to score...
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“We have a natural right to make use of our pens as of our tongue, at our peril,...”
– Voltaire
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Egypt: Make Tweets, Not War
signatures: 37,209
deadline: January 27, 2012
signature goal: 40,000
Target: Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak
Sponsored by: Care2.com
Update: After weeks of protest, Hosni Mubarak has stepped down as president of Egypt! We are inspired by the people of Egypt, and we join them in their celebrations. There is still a long way to go on the road to democracy however. Please continue to...
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EVOTOURISM →
Welcome to Evotourism™, Smithsonian’s new travel-information service that will help you find and fully enjoy the wonders of evolution. Whether it’s a city museum or suburban fossil trove, a historic scientific site overseas or a rare creature in your own backyard, we’ll direct you to places and discoveries that figure in the science of evolution or offer eye-opening evidence of the process of...
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Top five New Year’s resolutions for planet and...
It’s that time of year when someone at a holiday gathering inevitably asks about your resolutions for 2012. Feel free to plagiarize mine:
5. Grow more of my own food. China’s biggest dairy admitted that some of its productscontained a toxin commonly found in corn and wheat, transmitted to the milk of cows eating the tainted crops. Maine residents were sickened this month when...
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New satellite observations reveal link between...
Distribution of formic acid observed by IASI in July. The high values observed at mid- and high latitudes are caused by emissions during the plant growth season. Credit: IASB
A team from LATMOS/IPSL, working in collaboration with Belgian researchers from the Institut d’Aeronomie Spatiale de Belgique (IASB) and the Universite Libre de Bruxelles (ULB), have revealed the existence of a major...
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Do we live in 3 dimension
Still have to think about this article.
http://www.universetoday.com/92131/why-do-we-live-in-three-dimension/?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=WordSocial
I think that we only notice the world we’re livin in in 3 dimensions cause our minds arent really able to understand more then this.
But maybe a few can understand it? What about those who are diagnosted with...
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Stop Commercial Shipping From Killing Whales
signatures: 3,552
deadline: ongoing
signature goal: 10,000
Target: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
Sponsored by: Center for Biological Diversity
Stop commercial ships from killing whales by helping set speed limits in our marine sanctuaries. California’s sanctuaries are home to some of the nation’s richest ocean habitat, as well as some of the most...
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The Real Cost of Our Clothes (Video)
Greennovate/Video screen capture
From the true price of gasoline to coal’s disastrous impact on the economy, we environmentalists are well aware of the concept of economic externalities. Still, it doesn’t hurt to get a reminder from time-to-time. And just in case you are admiring all those fancy new clothes you got for Christmas, here’s a little video about the hidden costs...
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The top green and Gristy stories of 2011
Sharing systems are all the rage
Can less consumption be more fun? Yes, when it’s social. The “collaborative consumption” trend didn’t start this year (the Zipcar car-sharing service launched way back in 2000), but the sharing movement has blossomed big-time. Airbnb, which lets you rent your home to travelers, made the biggest splash in 2011. People are also sharing their...
