Earth Day: Vandana Shiva and Maude Barlow

I just wanted to draw your attention to a very inspiring talk by two amazing human beings: Vandana Shiva and Maude Barlow. This is a Democracy Now Earth Day special. In the discussion they both claim that the only way humans will survive is for us to recognize the intrinsic worth of the nonhuman world. They speak about this in terms of the rights of nature. I spent a number of years reading the philosophical literature on this issue, and despite what many foolish academics have argued, the idea of recognizing the intrinsic worth of the natural world is key to moving past the current silliness that environmentalism has become. Rather than this being a strange and foreign view, as many Westerners seem to believe, Vandana Shiva notes that this is actually the dominant view among non-industrial people around the world. Anyhow, check out the video clip and post your thoughts below. http://www.democracynow.org/2011/4/22/earth_day_special_vandana_shiva_and

Your electronics can be re-used; So, don't cut the cords!

I was walking along the street the other day and saw an old vcr. My girlfriend is looking for one. So, I stopped to investigate. On closer inspection I noticed that the person who threw it out had cut the power cord off, rendering it all but unusable! Why on earth do people do this? I've never understood this. I can also recall seeing an iMac on the street one day. It looked in perfect condition, but someone had cut the power cable from the machine, again rendering it all but useless. What a shame. What are people thinking exactly? Is this malice? Or are they worried someone will hurt themselves? It seems completely senseless and wasteful. Please spread the word.

Another thing I've noticed is that whenever people throw away appliances, like fridges and stoves they ruin the machine by prying the door off of it. Now, if you're old enough, you might recall the advertisements on the TV about not disposing of a fridge with a door in tact. But this was because those old fridges had a latch that locked and couldn't be opened from the inside. So, if a child climbed in and closed the door behind them they might die inside. Indeed, this happened a few times and got the media into a frenzy. But we don't have fridges like that any more. And stoves never were air tight nor do their doors lock shut, unless they are some sort of industrial stove. So, please don't pry the door off of your appliances. You see this even with driers and washing machines. This means nobody can re-use them and they will end up in land fill, which is wasteful and is frankly quite irresponsible. Even if we're not careful about our own consumption, at least we can not ruin our electronics preventing someone else from making use of it once we're finished with it.

My next post is going to be on disposable highlighter (hiliter) pens. I can't believe we throw these away. There are alternatives.