More on Science and the Environment
Ignoring economic icebergs in pursuit of limitless growth is foolish. Like the Titanic, this ship is not unsinkable.
WASHINGTON, March 26 (Reuters) - Actor and director Robert Redford, a longtime environmental activist, has teamed with his son to film a documentary about the Colorado River system, which conservationists believe is endangered by decades of development and global warming.
The earth seems to have been built specifically with us—all of humankind—in mind.
Science and Environment A Universal Universe Winter 2012 Issue The following excerpt from The New Universe and the Human Future: How a Shared Cosmology Could Change the World by Nancy Ellen Abrams and Joel R. Primack sets out their very optimistic hopes of unifying humanity
Every culture, tribe and religion seems to have its own story about the origins of life and of the universe itself. Today scientists hope to bridge the divides with a unifying story of their own.
Ever since Edwin Hubble’s discovery of the expansion of the universe in
1929, astronomers have sought an answer to a most basic question: How
long ago did the universe begin expanding? To determine an answer, one
must know the rate of expansion, a value called the Hubble constant (H0).
As the United Nations pegs October 31, 2011, as the date when human population passes 7 billion, we can expect increasingly strident calls for a deep evaluation of our planetary role.
Scientists are turning the cosmos upside down in their search for a unifying Theory of Everything. But there’s one place most of them won’t look.
We can learn from our mistakes. Recognizing and correcting errors, and the sources of errors, can help us avoid future errors.
The United Nations has declared 2011 the International Year of Chemistry. While the world celebrates a century of scientific progress, we have to ask how our dreams of a synthetic utopia might end.
Stanford symposium “Connecting the Dots” looks for connections between agriculture, energy and the environment as we anticipate another 2 billion mouths to feed in the years ahead.
April 26 marks the 25th anniversary of the worst nuclear disaster in history. It’s a good time to revisit our individual and collective responsibilities regarding the energy sources we all depend on.
The irony in the timing of the disaster that crippled Japan’s nuclear reactors is not lost on those who have been planning for years to remember the victims of Chernobyl.
Gaylord Nelson was instrumental in establishing the first Earth Day which was held on April 22, 1970.
The topic of stem cells usually elicits a two-sided reaction pitting the moral question of using human embryos for research against the potential of such research for curing disease. But now there is a third side to the stem-cell coin. It is called induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS).
What is it about human beings that makes us always want to push the limits? When it comes to the frontiers of medical science, is it possible to go too far?
Popular references to our planet as Mother Earth, and to the natural forces that govern it as Mother Nature, bring to mind the ancient earth goddess Gaia. But they don’t come close to describing the true nature of our relationship with the earth.
How the universe came into existence continues to intrigue—and baffle—cosmologists, whose ever-evolving theories are still far from revealing definitive answers. Can anyone ever know how it all really began?
Although it does not now have the weightiness of September 11, 2001—clearly a date on which the world changed—May 20, 2010, may one day be known as another key marker, a hinge of history in terms of the human control of life.
At the 40th anniversary of Earth Day, the earth’s nearly seven billion inhabitants were asked to ponder our individual and communal conduct. Is humanity’s current course sustainable?
Hatched in a world that generally acknowledged the need for God, if only as a First Cause, how did Darwin’s theory of natural selection and survival of the fittest become today’s dominant worldview?
Like a newly discovered celebrity, the Mayan Calendar’s 2012 phenomenon is taking hold—first with a notable documentary in 2008 and accompanying book, 2012 Science or Superstition, in 2009 (both published by the Disinformation Company) and also with the recent major Hollywood release, 2012.
Through six editions Darwin continued to pepper Origin of Species with purposeful language. He certainly had ample opportunity to alter some passages, but he did not. Darwin rightly recognized the plasticity of variation and the necessity of an adaptive process; to insist, however, that he did not harbor some small hope that he was wrong about the purpose of creation seems to be more a catering to one’s own interests rather than his.
Even if one accepts the big-bang model on faith, obvious questions come to mind for most people: What came before the big bang?
What is humankind’s intended relationship to the Earth? Unfortunately, misinterpretation of the initial instructions given to the first humans has led to widely diverging views, and with devastating results.
Beginning with Project Ozma in 1960, and for the last 25 years through SETI, Frank Drake has spearheaded the quest to hear from other intelligent beings in the universe.
Our planet shows increasing signs of succumbing to the assault we and our technologies have launched. Although there’s no shortage of far-out ideas on how technology can also help fix the problem, including finding a new planet in case we break this one, the real solution lies close to home.
On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin made the first extraterrestrial steps for mankind. When the lunar module Eagle landed, its touchdown represented the decade-long collective efforts of thousands of laborers in dozens of industries.
Like a nighttime soap opera, the dramatic search for another earth added a new episode in April. Corresponding to the 39th anniversary of Earth Day in the United States, astronomers at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) announced their discovery of a small, apparently Earth-like planet orbiting the star Gliese 581.
Comparison of some major stratigraphically significant trends over the past 15,000 yr. Trends typical of the bulk of immediately pre-Holocene and Holocene time are compared with those of the past two centuries. Data compiled from sources including Hooke (1994), Monnin et al. (2001), Wilkinson (2005), and Behre (2007). Original in J.A. Zalasiewicz, etal, “Are we living in the Anthropocene?” GSA Today Volume 18, Issue 2 (February 2008)
Skeptics question the ability of human activity to initiate planetary change. They wonder if building cities, removing forests and increasing the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere really matter in the big picture of life on earth.
Although at times we all wonder, “Why am I here?” and “What is the meaning of my life?” these questions of individual purpose arise from a larger crisis of identity. It is not a question of one man’s identity; it is the problem of mankind’s identity. What are we? Why are we here?
Fifty years have passed since 67 countries participated in the global physical science project known as the International Geophysical Year. But despite the wealth of knowledge gained both during the IGY and since, too many of us may still take the Earth for granted.
After about two months of Martian days on the surface, NASA’s Phoenix robotic lander is well down the road to completing several important aspects of its mission.
A decade has passed since James Thomson first showed how embryonic stem cells could be cultured under laboratory conditions. Long known for their embryonic potential—the stem cells’ ability to grow and differentiate into a complete human being—the cells’ healing and regenerative potential quickly came to the forefront of investigators’ interest around the world. If new stem cells could be grown in the lab, could a patient’s cells be cloned and used to replace or repair his degenerative disease like Parkinson's?
Phoenix settled on an arctic plain called Vastitas Borealis, comparable in latitude to central Greenland or northern Alaska. In the Martian permafrost the mission will look for evidence of organic molecules and the history of a habitable environment in the planet’s past.
How much would you pay to know what thoughts are swimming around in someone else’s head? And if you could really know their truthfulness how much more would you pay?
Today, events such as Earth Day and the combined international efforts to complete and man the ISS are offshoots of the original cooperative Sputnik mission of 1957.
Vision reports on the State of the Planet Conference at Columbia University in New York, March 27-28, 2008.
The Intelligent Design versus Evolution battle again comes to the fore with the release of the Ben Stein film, Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed.
Are human awareness, conscience and even consciousness itself simply a lucky mix, a repackaging of something that our biological ancestors somehow had in part?
Almost 55 years have passed since the publication in Nature of Francis Crick and James Watson’s description of the structure of DNA.
The J. Craig Venter Institute announces that researchers there have succeeded in synthetically recreating the genome of the bacterium Mycoplasma genitalium.
Whether one believes global climate change is related to human use of fossil fuels, the anthropomorphic production of carbon dioxide, or not, the politics of climate alternation seem to be here to stay.
The Worldwatch Institute released its State of the World for 2008 today, and while it was very bleak in the current assessment of environmental and economic conditions it sounded some positive notes about changes in attitudes from business, industry and governmental institutions.
The term “theory” in science is lavished only on the big ideas that appear to have predictive power. But doing science this way is like performing a secret-number trick: a magician, by getting an audience member to apply a certain sequence of mathematical operations to a secret number, amazingly comes up with the hidden number.
This table outlines a few fundamental observations of cosmology, accompanied by interpretations of each one according to the standard (big bang) view and the alternative view.
The most confounding question that arises from the big bang theory is a simple one: if the big bang is the origin of the universe, what happened before? Doesn't an origin event, however one eventually describes it, still require a cause?
Our age is a unique and exciting one: we now possess the means of exploring many of the great questions of our place in the universe. But will we find the answers we’re looking for?
The most widely accepted model of the origin of the universe is known as the hot big bang. It seeks to describe a practically unfathomable instant in the vicinity of 15 billion years ago when the material of the universe came into being.
A successful space shuttle mission such as the recent Endeavor journey is a triumph of human ingenuity and inventiveness over the harsh elements of extraterrestrial travel.
Evidence for this picture of an expanding universe has been gathered over the last century. But while we might view this model as a product of modern scientific investigation combined with mathematical theory, it seems as if Edgar Allan Poe knew it all before its time and wrote all the notes that we now play.
There is not a much bigger question than “Where did the universe come from?” and the theory of origins called the “big bang” has become the dominant answer to that most fundamental question. But giving the event a name simply frames a new question: What happened before the big bang?
International debate continues on the primary question: Are GMO foods "Safe?"
Since ancient times the heart has been considered to be at the center of human life.
Stem cell research using mouse cells is increasing our knowledge of human growth and development.
Regenerative medicine is quickly moving forward. At the recent Stem Cells World Congress organized by Select Biosciences, LLC, in La Jolla, California, an international slate of presenters outlined both current applications and future hopes of stem cell research.
E.O. Wilson in his new book, The Creation, an Appeal to Save Life on Earth, asks for an abatement of aggression and calls for cooperation from the sacred and secular communities.
Until recently it was generally thought that we are incapable of producing new brain cells after early childhood. The reversal of that idea has profound social implications.
As neuroscience develops tests for particular psychological traits and medical predispositions in individuals, ethicists wonder what moral framework will govern such information.
The geography of Palestine and Israel provides a useful analogy for the ultimate solution to the world’s water problems.
Can fly fishermen teach us a lesson on life?
Modern science may be coming face-to-face with the very circumstance that Darwin said would cause his famous theory to break down.
Remarkable feats of genetic engineering are unleashing the ability to reorganize all life at the genetic level. With these amazing developments come enormous economic, social and moral ramifications with the power to dramatically transform society. And therein lies the controversy.
Life patenting research issues.
When a company gets a patent on a biological product, it has monopoly rights and can charge any price it wants for that product.
Many believe that if living things can be patented, life is reduced to a mere commodity.
Arguments in favor of life patenting.
Increasing numbers of DNA-based patents are being applied for on a daily basis. Vision examines some of the implications of the battle over who owns life.
Probably the single biggest threat to the Middle East’s water supply is the region’s burgeoning population.
An amazing technology promises freedom from our genetic predispositions.
Surprisingly, what geneticists are seeking to discover by probing the mysteries of life was revealed long ago.
Although the science of how our bodies operate at the chemical level is multilayered and technically complex, the landmarks of the cellular processes that function within us are actually rather simple.
Information revealed through the decoding of DNA 50 years ago has been astounding, but there is still much to be learned. Is science up to the challenge?
Darwinian philosophy today controls the educational and scientific communities and influences most other aspects of society just as inflexibly and stiflingly as did Aristotelian philosophy in Catholic Europe during the days of Galileo. The reach of Darwinian ideas into our lives is nothing short of amazing.
The Bible nowhere states when the earth was created.
Most in the scientific community consider evolution a fact. But is it good science, or bad philosophy?
A commonly expressed thought in the wake of natural disasters is that God must be punishing humanity for sin. But where does this belief come from?
With the Indian Ocean tsunami disaster still haunting Southeast Asia, Vision looks at other potential trobule spots on the earth's fragile surface.
At the end of March, Vision was invited to attend the State of the Planet conference at Columbia University in New York. In recognition of Earth Day ceremonies in the United States, we offer the following report from the conference.
Three astronauts are slated to board the International Space Station this fall. Will the ISS play a role in the human conquest of space? Or is there another route to the ends of the universe?
Oil isn't the only resource that helps shape the peace and regulate the balance of power in the Middle East.
Contributing writer Rebecca Sweat interviews W. French Anderson, M.D., director of Gene Therapy Laboratories at the University of Southern California School of Medicine. He is the program coordinator for gene therapy at the school’s Institute of Genetic Medicine and has been involved in gene therapy research for nearly four decades.
What effect do our actions have on the environment and on the future?
In revising its position on the origin of the universe, science has unwittingly come to agreement with the Bible.
While most novelists of the late 19th and early 20th centuries warned society of the dangers of unchecked technological advances, Jules Verne excited his readers with romantic tales of fantastic adventures made possible by wonderful new machines. But what did he really think about man's progress and advancements? A recent discovery offers insight into this question.
Book Reviews: When Things Start to Think by Neil Gershenfeld; Wired Life by Charles Jonscher; The Age of Spiritual Machines by Ray Kurzweil.
In the next few decades scientists say we will witness an explosion of new discoveries and advancements from the medical community that will present difficult ethical challenges. Vision reports from the Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s 13th Annual Molecular Medicine Tri-Conference, San Francisco.
Coming to understand the synaptic processes that gather, store and retrieve information throughout the brain is the cutting edge of modern neuroscience.
Recent discoveries in neuroscience are providing exciting insights into the nature of beign human.
Last week the U.S. observed the 20th anniversary of the tragic loss of the Space Shuttle Challenger. It was a reminder that for NASA there is no room for error. What can we learn on a personal level from the deep introspection that the U.S. Space program is going through?
To expect to see God is akin to expecting to see television signals through our unaided eyes: both are outside the realm of human detection.
How can moving faster through space somehow slow the movement of time?
More than a century has passed since the publication of Albert Einstein's first papers on relativity and the structure of the universe. As we look back, we may marvel at how much we once did not know; more challenging, though, is to contemplate what has yet to be revealed.