Ants in My Pants
Tuesday, May 31, 2005
Not so random associations
So today's/last night's news contained 3 separate stories: 1) a 9 year old stabbed and killed her 11 year old friend, over a Spaldeen ball 2) a 12 year old strangled her mother to death and 3) a teenager shot and killed 5 family members, and then himself.
It does make you wonder, doesn't it?
There's an argument to said for the theory that we're just too damn overpopulated. Not that overpopulation makes any specific crime like these happen. Just that we're losing our sense of personal space, and with that going somewhat psychotic as a species.
Interesting that in this ecology/biology book I'm reading, "The Forest and the Sea" by Marston Bates, he writes (and this was published in 1960), that "...the usual ecological controls on population growth are gone, and the human species has started on a dizzy spree of multiplication that, if not checked, may in the long run be disastrous both for man and the rest of the world. We have embarked on the enterprise of suspending 'natural' controls on one side of the population equation; we must, it seems to me, give corresponding attention to the other, the birth, side."
Hmph, tell that to the Pope.
The other non-fiction book I've just started reading is "The Ancestor's Tale", by Richard Dawkins. (I never read "The Selfish Gene" that he wrote, apparently a good read.) This one is a backwards journey through time, as homo sapiens meets up with other species as they've branched off, going backwards until meeting the common ancestor of all life on earth. He crafts it as a Canterbury Tales style of meeting fellow travellers on a road and hearing their stories. Some of the science is a little bit of a head-spin for me (not having taken a science class in 15 years), but as someone with a strong layman's interest in the subject, I do find it very interesting so far. So far we've only gotten 7 million years or so back, to meeting the gorilla, but I am looking forward to grinding my way through the rest of it.
Two Community-Minded Things You Can Do, Even if You Faint at the Sight of Blood
1 - Recycle - Paper, Plastic, Glass, etc.
2 - Compost - a better way to get rid of kitchen/yard scraps, than adding it to a landfill.
Do I need to google and find some links for why this is good for all of us? Maybe later...
Comments:
come now sir sam-
can you really say recycling makes economic sense after you consider all costs and pollution associated with collecting sorting and processing "recyclables"
can you really say recycling makes economic sense after you consider all costs and pollution associated with collecting sorting and processing "recyclables"
# posted by 
: 6/01/2005 11:23 AM
: 6/01/2005 11:23 AM
I'll ignore the Anonymous poster's condescending tone, and say, yes. As I tend to look at long-term analyses of issues, as well as my own moral code, there's a couple of arguments to be made. First, morally, the concept of "think globally, act locally" applies to recycling: if you think of the effects global pollution has on the world, doing your little bit to reduce, reuse, recycle, does make sense in the grand scheme of things. The world isn't yours to use, you borrow it from your children, and your children's children, and your children's children's children. What do you want to leave them is the question.
As for economics, you can surely find lots of links which argue that the economics of recycling are not going to be high-profit, for example see this one, from an industry site: http://www.polystyrene.org/environment/econ.html
But in favor of the argument that higher costs are not necessarily so, that recycling is an economically viable idea, see: http://www.dnr.mo.gov/alpd/swmp/pubs-reports/rececon.htm or http://www.ravenrecycling.homestead.com/files/lr4.html or http://www.zerowaste.ca/articles/column23.html
For a simple (7-8th grade level) math example, see: http://www.epa.gov/grtlakes/seahome/housewaste/quiz/cornel29.htm
I'd also recommend the Newsweek article I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, regarding the Eco-architect.
As for economics, you can surely find lots of links which argue that the economics of recycling are not going to be high-profit, for example see this one, from an industry site: http://www.polystyrene.org/environment/econ.html
But in favor of the argument that higher costs are not necessarily so, that recycling is an economically viable idea, see: http://www.dnr.mo.gov/alpd/swmp/pubs-reports/rececon.htm or http://www.ravenrecycling.homestead.com/files/lr4.html or http://www.zerowaste.ca/articles/column23.html
For a simple (7-8th grade level) math example, see: http://www.epa.gov/grtlakes/seahome/housewaste/quiz/cornel29.htm
I'd also recommend the Newsweek article I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, regarding the Eco-architect.
Hmm...who is Mr. or Mrs. or Miss Anonymous I wonder? Weird.
Weird. I didnt know there was even a debate. Seems like recycling is so much part of our psyche and daily routine that to NOT recycle would seem sacrilegious.
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Weird. I didnt know there was even a debate. Seems like recycling is so much part of our psyche and daily routine that to NOT recycle would seem sacrilegious.
# posted by : 6/02/2005 4:37 PM
: 6/02/2005 4:37 PM
