Climate Change, Live and Let Live, and Freedom

The Ethics of Climate Change by John Broom asserts that “some people—chiefly the better-off among the current generation—will have to reduce their emission of greenhouse gases to save future generations…” This is part of the conflicting interests that demand ethical questions involved in climate change response. Broom also states that “those who benefit from something should not impose its cost on others who do not” and most people recognize that you should not do something for your own benefit if it harms others. The issue is then to understand the sometimes complex, domino effect manner in which your actions can harm others. The other and perhaps even more difficult issue is the qualifier “most”. An example of this stems from a conversation with a fellow student, whom I loosely paraphrase as stating, I do not believe in ethics, as my philosophy is live and let live, so we should not be telling anyone how to go about living their lives. John Ehrenfeld may see this as a symptom of “hyper-individualism” which he describes in Sustainability By Design. Lester Brown in a May 2009 Scientific American article points out that when a government can’t provide security or basic services the breakdown of society in these countries overflows and has consequences to other areas such as spreading disease, weapons, and violence. This should appeal to the self preservation side of anyone. The irony of “freedom” is that it can lead to the absence of it....continued

Eco-effective Paper Plates

Using papermaking byproducts with natural pulp chemicals such as resin is the traditional way of making paper plates. Consisting of trees mostly from managed forests and tree plantations the traditional paper plate industry is more environmentally-friendly than in the past. There are still issues such as lack of biodiversity and segmenting of biomes that cause environmental harm. Read entire article!

Home Energy Monitors

The need for these home energy monitors is genuine. There are numerous ways to monitor home energy use. Home energy consumption is reduced when people are seeing their consumption as they consume. So everyone benefits!
Choosing a home energy monitor can be daunting. Home energy monitors have different features and applications. So how do you choose one?

Thoughts On U.S. Leadership and Pollution

The U.S. is the world superpower. I argue that the latest world economic troubles only serve to accentuate the extent to which this is true, as economies of the world are suffering due to the domino effect triggered by the collapse of the U.S. housing market. The Kyoto treaty was only a piece of paper without the U.S. on board. The other major polluting nations such as China and India will not take the problem of global environmental change seriously until America does. Copenhagen is a chance to right the ship before it is too late. Our nation is just as capable of steering the ship in the right direction as it is in the wrong direction. This means allowing Earth to take the helm, and remembering humanity adapts to her, not her to humanity.

Decent storm and a lot of rain

Monday night August 5th into Tuesday Muncie had about two inches of rain. This storm produced a tornado report north of Muncie near Wabash. Here there was a report of a large tree down on the east side of town, a few barns and farm strucutres destroyed in the county, brief power outages with at least one gust of aroud 60mph. Lots of cool lightning to bad my camera having difficulties. This system more typical of a fall like disturbance with a mid-level trough just reaching into Indiana and the storms moving from the North west. More of these type storms in late summer and early fall will make for an active second severe storm/tornado season here.

Hot as Hell

Highs to be in the lower 90's this week in Muncie with a few chances of rain here and there. We will need it as with temps this high evaporation rates will be great and crops will dry oout quickly. The heat index will be at dangerous levels. Here is an an explanation of heat index an and accompanying chart to determine levels at a glance.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/872777/temperature_and_heat_index_your_body.html?cat=5

Hurricane Dolly

Dolly has provided for some good images and some damage from high winds and flooding. Some areas recieved about 15 inches of rain. This is a lot of rain for this area to deal with. They are hoping lingering storms will move out of the area today so we have no major levee breaches. Here is a good ireport of pics I found http://www.ireport.com/docs/DOC-49957