Transition Whatcom

David MacLeod's Blog (111)

Lessons From the Ages for 2013, Part 2

Mayan Calendar

Read Part 1 here.

The Maya Civilization has earned a great deal of respect. Beginning sometime around 2000 B.C., they had a fully developed written language, as well as well developed art, architecture, mathematical, and…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on January 6, 2013 at 10:30pm — 1 Comment

Lessons from the Ages for 2013, Part 1

Brand Spanking New

Brand Spankin’ New (Zony Mash)

Well, here we are in the brand-spankin’ new year of 2013, with all of its rich possibilities before us, as well as all of…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on January 1, 2013 at 10:33pm — No Comments

Crank It Down

Image

I read two related posts today that I wanted to pass on.  The first is John Michael Greer’s latest, which he calls The Beginning of the World.  He begins by discussing the Mayan calendar, and all of the myriad failed predictions, from apocalypse to a…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on December 28, 2012 at 12:31pm — 1 Comment

World Energy Report 2012

The IEA is the international organization that many governmental bodies look to for authoritative data on energy, put in place during the energy crisis of the 1970s.  They put out a major report once per year, and I have been reading the executive summary of this report for about 7 or 8 years.  It is fascinating to see how the report evolves year after year.  I wrote a piece for Energy Bulletin a few years ago, looking at the trend of the reporting from 2005 through 2009 (…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on November 28, 2012 at 9:51pm — 1 Comment

Hurricane Cassandra



Hurricane Sandy as Greek Tragedy

by Mark Hertsgaard, The Nation

Never has a hurricane been more aptly, if tragically, named than Sandy, the superstorm that flooded New York City and battered much of the East…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on November 2, 2012 at 9:51pm — 1 Comment

Whatcom County, Meet the Post Growth Economy (Richard Heinberg)

I've changed the title of Heinberg's latest essay.  See the bolded sentences below.  Beyond the many great reasons already circulating about why we need to "Power Past Coal," here's one more: building a huge terminal for the purpose of sending coal to China could become one of our greatest boondoggles.

- David

Australia, Meet the Post-Growth Economy…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on October 8, 2012 at 9:39pm — No Comments

“extreme energy = extreme methods = extreme disasters = extreme opposition”

Last night I had the privilege of introducing author Andrew Nikiforuk to the “Literature Live” audience assembled at Village Books in Bellingham, WA.  His latest book is The Energy of Slaves: Oil and the New Servitude.  It…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on October 5, 2012 at 5:26pm — 1 Comment

An Empowering 3 Day Sustainabiltiy Event

What if I were to tell you that there was an empowering 3 Day sustainability event that would change your relationships with both the planet and the people around you?

That it would include a formidable number of presenters, with a wide diversity of workshops to choose from – everything from organic agriculture and wildcrafting to natural building and…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on September 27, 2012 at 9:28pm — 1 Comment

Charles Eisenstein: Inspiring Occupy, Integral, and Transition Communities

Where do the worlds of Occupy, the Transition Towns movement, and the Integral community meet?  Perhaps in the work of Charles Eisenstein.

"I consider Charles Eisenstein one of the up-and-coming great minds of our time. Rarely have I met a person who combines such philosophical and spiritual depth with such practical insights into the cultural and institutional origins of…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on August 21, 2012 at 10:30pm — 3 Comments

An Action Request: Emails to Bill McKibben, James Hansen, and Fatih Birol

 
Bill McKibben by Nancie Battaglia, High Res
Bill McKibben by Nancie Battaglia, High Res (Photo credit: 350.org)

In my two previous posts, Global. Warming. and…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on August 18, 2012 at 12:22pm — 1 Comment

Responses to Bill McKibben

This is a continuation of Thursday’s post, “Global. Warming.” We left off discussing Bill McKibben’s phenomenally popular article for Rolling Stone, “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math.” A week ago it had already been viewed 450,000 times, and shared 100,000…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on August 4, 2012 at 10:30pm — 6 Comments

Global. Warming.

A Dust Bowl storm approaches Stratford, Texas ...

A Dust Bowl storm approaches Stratford, Texas in 1935. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

It sure…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on August 2, 2012 at 10:00pm — 1 Comment

Are You Ready for a New Economic Paradigm?

Robert F. Kennedy, Cabinet Room, White House, ...

The gross national product includes air pollution and advertising for cigarettes, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors, and jails for thepeople who break them. The gross national product includes the destruction of the redwoods and the death of Lake Superior. It grows with the production of napalm and…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on May 8, 2012 at 10:15pm — 4 Comments

The Titanic on Earth Day

The sinking of the RMS Titanic, as painted by ...

The sinking of the RMS Titanic, as painted by Willy Stöwer (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

One week ago, on Sunday April 15, 2012, was the 100th anniversary of the…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on April 22, 2012 at 11:39am — No Comments

Lessons from an Activist

This is a beautiful story of one person's journey as an eco-activist.  Where the author ends up is very close to my vision for Transition Whatcom.…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on April 16, 2012 at 10:44pm — No Comments

The Energy Characteristics of Cooperative Culture

Mary Logan, daughter of the late pioneer of systems ecology, Howard Odum, undertook a book review of “Together; the Rituals, Pleasures, and Politics of Cooperation“, by…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on April 15, 2012 at 12:30pm — 8 Comments

A Tough Oil World

Back in 2008, the price of gas and oil was steadily climbing, and there was some openness in the community about the idea of "peak oil."  A task force to study the issue was unanimously supported by both the city and county councils. 



As the task force was going about its work, the economic crisis hit, and the price of oil dropped.  As prices declined, so did the level of concern about the peaking of world oil production.  Few connected the dots to realize that high oil prices…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on March 17, 2012 at 8:34pm — No Comments

Tools for Change

I am currently part of a small study group using material from the online "PDC+++" course on the "People Care" module.  Last week's class looked at why groups fail, and also discussed some communication strategies.  One of the things that came up in our discussion was when we think of…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on December 6, 2011 at 10:30pm — 1 Comment

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Occupation

Published Nov 9 2011      by Post Carbon Institute,       Archived Nov 10 2011

A funny thing happened on the way to the occupation

      by Asher Miller   

Like so many others, we at Post…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on November 11, 2011 at 11:50am — No Comments

The Occupy Movement

The danger in commenting about the Occupy movement, is that so many of us seem to have a desire to project own own ideas onto the movement, kind of like a Rorshach ink blot.

 

Initially blacked…

Continue

Added by David MacLeod on October 31, 2011 at 10:57pm — 6 Comments

© 2024   Created by David MacLeod.   Powered by

Badges  |  Report an Issue  |  Terms of Service