Category: Sustainability Education Forum

Clifton Ware, Editor-Publisher

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FEATURED EVENTS (More Events at End)

> THIRD ANNUAL EVENT: SUSTAINABILITY FAIR, Thurs., Nov. 20^th, 5:30-8:00 p.m., Silverwood Park Visitors Center, St. Anthony Village (Map). Co-sponsored by the cities of St. Anthony Village, Lauderdale, and Falcon Heights, in collaboration with Three Rivers Park District and U of MN sustainability faculty and students. Exhibits include poster projects presented by 43 students and 20 exhibits presented by local sustainability groups, including CFS. Free and open to the public. 

EDITOR — Hey, Ho, Let’s Go To The Fair!

As the above “featured event” shows, a unique sustainability fair will be held Thursday evening in the eco-friendly visitor center at beautiful Silverwood Park, a natural oasis in the northeast area of the Twin Cities metro. Citizens interested in sustainability are a very supportive group, so a respectable turnout is expected.

As one of the U.S’s top-rated progressive states, Minnesota ranks high in most lifestyle categories — economy, politics, education, environment, social programs, health, and so on. Twin Citians, in particular, are fortunate to have plentiful opportunities for participating in sustainability events and initiatives. Any sustainability enthusiast can select specific areas of interest to pursue, including causes related to protecting endangered species, promoting local food programs, cleaning up waterways, reducing pollution, promoting renewable energy, and working on climate change issues, among other worthwhile pursuits. In sum, there’s something for everyone.

Sustainability fairs provide a prime opportunity for gaining a broader and deeper perspective of relevant issues. They also provide a gathering place for networking with like-minded citizens and establishing collaborative connections. By participating—as a presenter, an exhibitor, a performer, an organizer, or as an observer—the sustainability movement gains strength, and the requisite power for making substantial progress. So let’s go to the fair!

P.S. Don’t miss the movie preview of Origins (see following listing).

ENVIRONMENT (Natural Resources • Wildlife • Climate)

> Well.org: Origins: Our Roots, Our Planet, Our Future (http://origins.well.org/movie/).  The film crew spent the last four years traveling the world to make this piece and, as part of their directive to “help the world first”, they are opening it up for this no-cost world premier preview window for all to enjoy. It will be available until Nov. 22, so view it soon!

> On Earth: Interstellar: Could The New Film Be A Survival Guide For The Planet? Here’s the basic plot: The environment gets so bad that Earth is no longer a suitable habitat for Homo sapiens. As our species hangs in the balance, a handful of amateur astronauts head off into space to find another home.

> Scientific American: 7 Solutions To Climate Change Happening Now (David Biello). Even as the world continues to spew more carbon pollution, change has begun—and is accelerating—regardless of the political scene in D.C.

> Ecological Gardening: Where Do We Find Beauty In A Landscape? (Adrian Ayres).  As our climate changes, hedgerows and greenways could be crucial not only for their carbon-storage properties, but also for their ability to serve as corridors linking larger, wilder areas so that animals and even plants can migrate to more favorable habitats.

> CBS News: Salt-Water Fish Extinction Seen By 2048. The apocalypse has a new date: 2048.That’s when the world’s oceans will be empty of fish, predicts an international team of ecologists and economists. The cause: the disappearance of species due to overfishing, pollution, habitat loss, and climate change.

ENERGY (Fossil Carbon • Natural Resources • Renewables)

> Peak Prosperity: Shale Oil – Crash Course Chapter 21 (Expensive, Over-Hyped, and Short Lived). If you’ve watch the previous video chapter on Peak Cheap Oil, you may be wondering how any of that could be still be true given all the positive recent stories about shale oil and shale gas, many of which have proclaimed that “Peak Oil is dead”. The only problem with this story is that it is misleading in some very important ways. And entirely false in others.

> Resilience: Watching The Watchdogs: 10 Years Of The IEA World Energy Outlook (David MacLeod). Over the last decade the IEA World Energy Outlook has gradually moved from rosy to pessimistic reports, or “increasingly reality-based.” Projected oil demand has gradually decreased by 20 million barrels per day (mb/d), and the projected costs have continued to rise. Yet even their most pessimistic reports fail to capture true reality, largely because of politics.

> On Earth: Dirty Legacy. (article, plus videos) Exposing the lax regulation and health risks of Alberta’s tar sands industry.

> NEF Blog: Energy Round-Up: The Road To Decarbonisation? The latest energy and climate news – subscribe now to get updates straight to your inbox.

> Grist: With Eyes In The Sky, Researchers Try To Link Fracking And Illness. Fracking has long been the oil and natural gas industry’s best-kept secret – in particular, the chemicals found in fracking fluids, which have been linked to a host of weird mystery ailments, like respiratory or gastrointestinal distress.

ECONOMY (Local/Global • Wealth • Finances)

> The Atlantic: Why Aren’t Milennials Saving Money? (Bourree Lam)  This mistrust of banks, along with historically low income and investment, is added to the fact that saving money is just really hard—for everyone. It may be that we need to trick ourselves to do it: Harvard economist David Laibson has some suggestions on how to raise the savings rate for those with jobs, namely an opt-out (rather than an opt-in) system that would make it easier for Americans to save.

> Bloomberg: World Economy Worst In Two Years, Europe Darkening, Deflation Lurking: Global Investor Poll (Rich Miller). Much of the concern is again focused on the euro area: Almost two-thirds of those polled said its economy was weakening while 89 percent saw disinflation or deflation as a greater threat there than inflation over the next year.

> CASSE-The Daly News: Use And Abuse Of The “Natural Capital” Concept (Herman Daly).  In the ecosystem money is fungible, natural stocks are not; money has no physical dimension, natural populations do. Exchanges of matter and energy among parts of the ecosystem have an objective ecological basis. They are not governed by prices based on subjective human preferences in the market.

> The Guardian: US Wealth Inequality – Top 0.1% Worth As Much As The Bottom 90% (Angela Monaghan). Over the past three decades, the share of household wealth owned by the top 0.1% has increased from 7% to 22%. For the bottom 90% of families, a combination of rising debt, the collapse of the value of their assets during the financial crisis, and stagnant real wages have led to the erosion of wealth. See also: Why Economic Inequality Leads To Collapse.

> Resilience: Frugal Value: Designing Business For A Crowded Planet (Carina Millstone).  Growth seems to have become an end in itself. In this article, I critically examine the notion of business growth in our time, reflecting on the purpose, nature and workings of individual firms in the age of the Anthropocene.

EXPECTATIONS (Knowledge • Psychology • Beliefs • Views • Future)

> The New York Review of Books: Can Climate Change Cure Capitalism? (Elizabeth Kolbert). In Naomi Klein’s ambitious new polemic, This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate, “ she claims that “Climate change can’t be solved within the confines of the status quo, because it’s a product of the status quo . . . Our economic system and our planetary system are now at war.” The only hope of avoiding catastrophic warming lies in radical economic and political change.

> Yes! Magazine: 7 Ways To Get Happy—Without Costing The Planet (Sarah Van Gelder).  The starting point is to realize we have choices—like meaningful work, authentic relationships, and gratitude. [Adapted from Sustainable Happiness: Live Simply, Live Well, Make a Difference, edited by Sarah van Gelder and YES! Magazine staff; published by Berrett Koehler. Order now at yesmagazine.org/happiness-book.

> HowEricLives: Energy And The Future Of Food (Eric Garza). The problems we must overcome procuring food over the next 100 years will differ from those we’ve faced before, both in their complexity and their magnitude.

EQUITY (Equality • Health • Social Concerns)

> Common Dreams: The Unforgiven: How College Debt Is Crushing A Generation.  According to the report (pdf), the average bachelor-degree graduate—along with a diploma of increasingly questionable value— leaves school with and an average of $28,400 in personal debt. That number is a full 2 percent increase over 2012.

> Common Dreams: Study: More Homeless Children Now Than Any Point In US History (Jon Queally). Prepared by the National Center on Family Homelessness, the report—America’s Youngest Outcasts (pdf)—shows that with poverty and inequality soaring in recent years, approximately 2.5 million children in 2013 found themselves without a roof over their head or place to call home.

> New Republic: Extreme Wealth Is Bad For Everyone—Especially The Wealthy (Michael Lewis).  In a 2014 book, Billionaires: Reflections on the Upper Crust by Darrell M. West, the author notes that the concentration of wealth in the top 1 percent of American citizens has returned to levels not seen in a century. One percent of the population controls a third of its wealth, and the problem is only getting worse: from 1979 to 2009 after-tax income for the top 1 percent rose by 155 percent while not changing all that much for everyone else.

> Common Dreams: The Super-Rich And Sordid Tales Of Selfishness (Paul Buchheit). Compelling research has demonstrated that the accumulation of wealth leads to a sense of entitlement and qualities of narcissism. For example, rich people are more likely to flout traffic laws, to take items of value from others, and to cheat when necessary to win a prize or position.

> On the Commons: Walking Is Going Places (Jay Walljasper). Sixty percent of Americans would prefer to live in a neighborhood with stores and services within easy walking distance, according to a recent survey from the National Association of Realtors, nearly twice as many who want to live where stores can be reached only by car.

ENGAGEMENT (Goals • Activism • Solutions)

> ENSIA: To Feed The World In 2050 We Have To Change Course (Timothy A. Wise).  In order to feed a growing population we need to focus on reducing biofuel production and food waste (one third) and spoilage. A U.N. report confirmed that the best area to invest in agriculture is small-scale farming, where the “yield gaps” are the largest and where hunger in the most prevalent.

> Shareable: Community Supported Everything Incubates Social Change In Portland. When people are faced with a dire community challenge, they often turn to their neighbors to create a solution. There’s something powerful about starting where you are, with what you have, with the support of those around you.

> RedOrbit: Fish And Vegetable Diet Could Save The Planet As Well As Our Lives (Jon Hopton). The best diet for both humans and the planet is one built around local foods, especially fruits, vegetables, beans and whole grains. If you eat meat and dairy products, make sure they’re local and make sure they’re organic. Also, avoid “empty calories” such as sugar, fat, oils and even alcohol, which are contributing to greenhouse gases and poor human health.

> MinnPost: Community Voices: Agriculture And Climate Change: A Cause, A Victim And A Potential Solution (Katie Siegner). Properly managed soil is a natural carbon sink, and organic farming is increasingly recognized as a viable, more adaptable, and healthier alternative to conventional modern agriculture.

> Sierra Club: How Solid Waste Is Doing You A Solid (Chelsea Leu). Many zoos compost thousands of tons of manure produced by herbivores like giraffes and rhinos, converting poop to nutrient-rich fertilizer that they sell, give away, or use to enrich their grounds. But the Toronto Zoo is taking their composting to the next level: building the first zoo-based biogas plant in North America.

MORE EVENTS

> MN350-MCAD: Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret (feature-length documentary of a filmmaker’s undercover investigation of the cattle industry). Sun., Nov. 23, 6:30 p.m., MN Institute of Arts Auditorium. 2501 Stevens Ave, Mpls. Free (donation requested).

> U of MN Arboretum: Winter Farmers Market, Sat., Nov. 29^th, 10 a.m.-1 p.m., Oswald Visitor Center. Learn more >

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Will Technology Save Us? (Clifton Ware, Editor/Publisher)

One of the optimistic themes underpinning the functioning of modern society is the common belief that science and technology will save civilization from any future calamities.

Some of the latest projected technical wizardries include: seeking new forms of plentiful, cheap energy; developing space travel; mining for precious minerals on asteroids; engineering ever-more genetically modified organisms; and, most significantly for civilization, artificially modifying Earth’s climate systems through geoengineering.

Advocates of the “dark green environmentalism” persuasion (like me) seriously question the “bright green environmentalism” tribe’s undying faith in technology to solve all of humankind’s challenges. I hasten to add that dark greens do embrace science and the scientific method, especially open-minded searches for answers and solutions based on confirmable evidence.

As humanity continues seeking ways to create a resilient, sustainable future, dark greens advocate finding an equitable balance between unbridled technology and judicious technology. For a brief overview of light, bright, and dark green environmentalism, go to bright green environmentalism (Wikepedia).

I discovered an article this week that addresses this issue with admirable substance, clarity and passion. Actually, it’s a recorded talk, with transcript, of a presentation given by Jerry Mander at the recent International Forum on Globalization “teach-in” (Techno-Utopianism and the Fate of the Earth), which took place October 25th-26th in New York City.

Jerry Mander is the founder, former director, and presently distinguished fellow of the International Forum on Globalization (IFG), a San Francisco “think tank” that, since 1994, has focused on exposing the negative impacts of economic globalization, and the need for economic transitions toward sustainable local economies. Click here to read and/or hear Mander’s talk: Questions We Should Have Asked about Technology.

ENVIRONMENT (Natural Resources-Wildlife-Climate)

> Resilience: Wild Carbon (Courtney White). “You cannot save the land apart from the people or the people apart from the land. To save either, you must save both.” ~ Wendell Berry. This year marks the 50th Anniversary of the landmark Wilderness Act, so I thought I’d add a carbon perspective to the debate: Is there a role for wilderness in the twenty-first century?

> Huffington Post: Tuesday’s Election: A Record Day For Land Conservation (Will Rogers). One clear message was delivered: Americans cherish land and water and want to protect the special places they hold dear. And they sent that message most clearly in three large states — Florida, New Jersey and California –approving record spending to protect land and water. Voters approved 35 local and statewide measures, generating a record $13 billion in funding for conservation purposes.

> NY Times: U.S. And China Reach Climate Accord After Months Of Talks. China and the United States made common cause on Wednesday against the threat of climate change, staking out an ambitious joint plan to curb carbon emissions as a way to spur nations around the world to make their own cuts in greenhouse gases.

> Huffington Post: The Big Climate Deal: What It Is, And What It Isn’t (Bill McKibben).  If we want this to be a start, and not a finish, we’ve got to build even bigger and more powerful movements that push the successors of these gentlemen to meet what science demands. Today’s an achievement for everyone who’s held a banner, signed a petition, and gone to jail — and a call for many more to join us going forward!

> New York Times: Climate Tools Seek to Bend Nature’s Path. Once considered the stuff of wild-eyed fantasies, ideas for countering climate change — known as geoengineering solutions, because they intentionally manipulate nature — are now being discussed seriously by scientists. The National Academy of Sciences is expected to issue a report on geoengineering later this year.

ENERGY (Fossil Carbon-Natural Resources-Renewables)

> Peak Prosperity: Peak Cheap Oil – Crash Course Chapter 20. Energy is the lifeblood of any economy.  But when an economy is based on an exponential debt-based money system and that is based on exponentially increasing energy supplies, the supply of that energy therefore deserves our very highest attention.

> Our Finite World: Oil Price Slide – No Good Way Out (Gail Tverberg). The world is in a dangerous place now. A large share of oil sellers needs the revenue from oil sales. They have to continue producing, regardless of how low oil prices go unless they are stopped by bankruptcy, revolution, or something else that gives them a very clear signal to stop. History shows that many economies have collapsed because of diminishing returns.

> ASPO-USA: Peak Oil Review – 03 November 2014 (Tom Whipple).  Here’s a weekly roundup of peak oil news, including: Oil and the Global Economy; The Middle East and North Africa; Russia/Ukraine; Quote of the Week; and The Briefs.

ECONOMY (Finances-Global-Local)

> Peak Prosperity: Central Planners Are In A State of Panic (Chris Martenson). In short, everything the central planners have tried has failed to bring widespread prosperity and has instead concentrated it dangerously at the top. Whether by coincidence or conspiracy, every possible escape hatch for 99.5% of the people has been welded shut. We are all captives in a dysfunctional system of money, run by a few for the few, and it is headed for complete disaster.

> The Daly News: Do U.S. Election Financing Laws Force Politicians To Ignore Limits To Growth? (Brent Blackwelder). Money in politics has stopped progress toward real economic reform and slowed efforts to move to a true-cost, sustainable, steady state economy. It will continue to do so unless people seeking to end today’s cheater economics, with its global casino-style economy, join in the ongoing efforts to change the election financing laws.

> Shareable: Michel Bauwens On The Rise Of Multi-Stakeholder Cooperatives. A multi-stakeholder cooperative (MSC) is, as the name implies, a co-op that’s governed by two or more stakeholder groups. These groups can include workers, producers, consumers, owners, volunteers and community supporters. The brilliance of MSCs, also known as solidarity cooperatives, is that the various stakeholder groups throughout an enterprise have a shared vision that prioritizes equality, sustainability, and social justice.

> The Archdruid Report: Dark Age America: The End of the Market Economy (J. M. Greer). One factor that makes it difficult to imagine the economic consequences of the industrial age’s end is that we’re accustomed to a world where all forms of economic activity have been channeled through certain familiar forms for so long that very few people remember how things could be any other way. Another factor that complicates our thinking is that conventional economic thinking has invested immense effort into obscuring the possibility that things could be any other way.

EXPECTATIONS (Knowledge-Psychology-Beliefs)

> Common Dreams: Paul Krugman And The Tortoise: Why The Limits To Growth Are Real (Ugo Bardi). In the abstract realm of economics, the GDP can grow without natural resources; in the real world, it is not so. In the end, we need to be wary of abstract theories and remember that the limits to growth are real.

> Resilience:  Genetically Modified Escalation (Eric Garza). How much money, effort and time must be wasted in the service of feeding today’s GMO escalation trap? In her book Thinking in Systems, Donella Meadows articulates several traps that individuals and groups can fall into. Escalation is one of them, and it’s characterized by two or more opposing sides investing ever-greater resources towards the goal of triumphing over their opponents, like an arms race.

> Countercurrents: Ring The Bell: This Is Our Future By John James. When the IPCC promises that mean world temperature will rise by between 3.7 and 4.8 degrees by the end of the century if we go on as we are, what would this actually mean to our daily reality? We are told the likely outcome in very general scientifically correct sentences, but what do these words mean in the actual events we would have to live with?

> Common Dreams: Peace Ecology: Deep Solutions In An Age Of Water Scarcity And War (Randall Amster).  A key concept of what we term “peace ecology” is grounded in the notion that conflicts and crises driven by scarcity of natural resources—such as water—can also be opportunities for us to reimagine what is possible and ultimately foster mutually beneficial solutions and longer-term sustainability.

EQUITY (Equality-Health-Social Concerns)

> Roar Magazine: The Protests, Occupations And Uprisings Changing Our World. The latest book by Cristina Flesher Fominaya, Social Movements and Globalization, comes as a careful dissection of some of the most intriguing concepts relevant to the economic and political processes of the last century and the enduring desire for social transformation. Fominaya provides us with a master compilation of all that catches our attention, grasps our interest and urges our understanding.

> Common Dreams: Please Note: Democratic Candidates Lost, But Progressive Issues Won (David Morris).  My own opinion is that ballot initiatives more accurately take the ideological pulse of the people because debates over issues must focus on issues, not personality, temperament or looks.  Those on both sides of the issue can exaggerate, distort and just plain lie but they must do so in reference to the question on the ballot.

> Common Dreams: The Billion Dollar a Month Club: A Runaway Transfer of Wealth to the Super-Rich (Paul Buchheit). Our national wealth has grown by an astonishing $30 trillion since the recession, but most of it has gone to people who were already wealthy. See also: The Peasants Still Have Their Pitchforks (Sam Pizzigatti).

Yes! 6 Ways Americans Voted Against Corporate Power In The Most Expensive Midterm Elections Ever  (Mary Hansen & Kayla Schulz). In a few statewide ballot measures and local elections, Americans voted against corporate interests, embracing progressive policies. They endorsed protecting the environment from oil and gas companies, getting corporate money (like the record $3.76 billion spent during this midterm election) out of politics, and favoring local businesses over chain stores.

ENGAGEMENT (Goals-Activism-Solutions)

> Washington Post: Israeli Students Find Affordable Housing — In Metal Boxes. The Israeli have discovered a unique use for discarded shipping containers: inexpensive, practical housing for students.

> ENSIA: Can Sports Make Sustainability Mainstream? (Kellen Klein). For better or worse, sports are beyond mainstream. They’re integral to our global cultural fiber and have the kind of following sustainability advocates only dream of. With such a massive global audience, it’s no surprise that professional sports have also been major drivers of societal change.

> Yes! Land, Co-Ops, Compost: A Local Food Economy Emerges In Boston’s Poorest Neighborhoods. From kitchens that buy and sell locally grown food, to a waste co-op that will return compost to the land, new enterprises are building an integrated food network. It’s about local people keeping the wealth of their land at home.

> Energy Balance: Regenerative Agriculture: The Transition (Chris Rhodes). In the face of peak oil and in order to curb carbon emissions, methods of farming that depend less on oil and natural gas, respectively to run machinery and to make synthetic fertilizers, must be sought. Such options are to be found within the framework of regenerative agriculture, but the transition from current industrialized agriculture to these alternative strategies will prove testing.

> Common Dreams: Back-To-The-Future Agriculture: ‘Farming Like The Earth Matters’ (Courtney White). It is easy to forget that once all agriculture was organic, grass-fed, and regenerative. Seed saving, composting, fertilizing with manure, polycultures, no-till, raising livestock entirely on grass—all associated today with sustainable food production—was the norm merely a century ago.

FEATURED EVENTS

> SUSTAINABILITY EDUCATION FORUM (New Format): HUMANS AND THE NATURAL ENVIRONMENT. Sat., Nov. 15^th, 3-5 p.m., St. Anthony Village Library, 2941 Pentagon Drive in St. Anthony Shopping Center. Presentations and discussions include a book, For Love of Lakes by Dave Demsey, presented by Idelle Peterson; plus discussion of articles by various writers, and presented by participants. Seating limited to 20 persons. RSVP (warex001@umn.edu)

> THIRD ANNUAL EVENT: SUSTAINABILITY FAIR, Thurs., Nov. 20^th, 5:30-8:00 p.m., Silverwood Park Visitors Center, St. Anthony Village (Map). Co-sponsored by the cities of St. Anthony Village, Lauderdale, and Falcon Heights, in collaboration with Three Rivers Park District and U of MN sustainability faculty and students. Poster exhibits presented by 43 students and other exhibits presented by local sustainability groups, including CFS. Free and open to the public. 

MORE EVENTS AND INFORMATION

> UM Institute on the Environment: Frontiers in the Environment: Big Questions, Wednesdays, 12:00-1:00 p.m., IonE Seminar Room R380, Learning & Environmental Sciences Bldg., St. Paul. Free. Watch online • Nov.19 — Environmentalists and Corporations Make Strange Bedfellows . . . Or Do They?

> Sierra Club-North Star: Minnesota Beyond Coal To Clean Energy, Sat., Nov.15, 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Sabathani Community Center, 310 East 38th Street Mpls., MN. RSVP: http://sc.org/MNBeyondCoalRetreat  Questions: (jessica.tritsch@sierraclub.org)

> Women’s Environmental Network: Transportation Funding: Opportunities And Obstacles In The 2015 Legislative Session. Wed., Nov. 19^th, Olin-Rice Science Center, Macalester College, 5-6 p.m. Buffet Dinner ($20 professional; $5 student), 6-8 p.m. Panel (Free). Info: http://wenmn.org/

> MN350-MCAD: Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret (feature-length documentary of a filmmaker’s undercover investigation of the cattle industry). Sun., Nov. 23, 6:30 p.m., MN Institute of Arts Auditorium. 2501 Stevens Ave, Mpls. Free (donation requested).

I Believe, Therefore I Must Be Right  (Clifton Ware, Editor/Publisher)

The two words in the declaration “I believe” can make a potent impression on listeners or readers. Thanks to our advanced mental skills, each of us constructs a belief system or worldview that provides a functional psycho-emotional foundation for managing life’s many challenges.

Fortunately, regardless of the validity of our belief system, we are able to survive and perhaps even thrive when living conditions are relatively stable. Proof of this assertion rests in the fact that, although humans worldwide espouse a wide range of beliefs, all are managing to get by in life, albeit some more successfully than others.

And here we may ask: Are some belief systems more serviceably effective than others? I think so, because an effective belief system stimulates greater freedom of expression, the result of nurturing such positive qualities as curiosity, inclusiveness, complexity, flexibility, and creativity—the types of qualities that enable us to consider a wide range of topics, including issues deemed too sensitive, or even taboo in some societies.

Personally, I believe that all topics should be open to intellectual study, intelligent discussion, skeptical criticism, and civil debate. Such open-mindedness ensures the freedom to address the most controversial human concerns, including politics, culture, health, the natural environment, and especially religious beliefs. I think you’ll agree that our most remarkable human attribute is the ability to integrate critical reasoning and temper emotionalism in seeking equitable, practical solutions in managing all aspects of living well.

Each of us depends on others to provide useful knowledge and skills, beginning with parents or caregivers in childhood, and gradually expanding to include family members, teachers, religious leaders, politicians, and media pundits. For most of our adult lives, we rely on conventional media sources for the latest news and views, a topic to be addressed shortly.

When interpreting any news or views, most well-balanced, rational-minded persons rely on using a combination of: curiosity—a desire to learn as much as possible; skepticism—an attitude of doubt or disbelief (when warranted); and critical thinking—a reliance on evaluating, analyzing, and judging any idea or action. As fallible beings, most of us fall short of using our full psycho-emotional capacities in practicing principled thought, talk, and walk. Only saints are capable of thinking and acting rationally in most situations, and they are few and far between.

This leads us to consider the powerful reach of the media in influencing our beliefs. When media are used primarily to shape others’ beliefs, the disseminated information may be construed as indoctrination or propaganda, the systematic propagation of a doctrine or cause that reflects the views and interests of certain causes or groups. This is largely what we’re experiencing daily in the conventional media, with individuals, corporations, and organizations shaping our attitudes and behaviors—to consume more, to vote this way or that way, to support this cause or that cause. The sad reality is that most people seldom question what they hear and see in the conventional media. In such cases, it may be said that we’re not using our “thinking caps”. This follow-the-herd-instinct may be summarized with the biblical text found in Handel’s Messiah: “All we, like sheep, have gone astray!”

So where can we find substantive, factual, less-biased information? For an answer, begin by reading an informative article by Chris Hedges: The Myth Of The Free Press. Also, in the Expectations section you’ll find several articles for curious-minded readers, and none are associated with the conventional media. Trust me, they’re worth reading.

ENVIRONMENT (Natural Resources-Wildlife-Climate)

> Yes! Matt Damon, Harrison Ford Lead All-Star Cast In Showtime Climate Change Series. If we’re to preserve the planet we call home, it’s time to go big. This 9-episode series weaves together important elements of the climate change story, from how scientists study it to how effects—such as droughts, wildfires, heat waves, and melting glaciers—are playing out. Perhaps most importantly, it thoughtfully explores how politics and religion divide people and impede action on this critical issue.

> TC Daily Planet: When It Comes To Climate Change, Our Feelings Do Matter. We talk a lot about the science of climate change and the economic impacts of various solutions, but we don’t always talk about how we feel about it. Embedded in the science, the calls to action, and the debating are deeply felt emotions: Anger, sadness and despair, and hope that solutions will create a healthier, more equitable world.

> Washington Post: The World’s Climate Change Watchdog May Be Underestimating Global Warming (Chris Mooney). We do not always hear directly from the IPCC about how bad things could be. For instance, by 2100, sea level rise could be plenty worse than the IPCC suggests — and realizing this might lead policymakers around the world to view global warming very differently.

> Associated Press: Climate Change Is Real, Humans Are Mostly To Blame, Time Is Short, UN Panel Says (In MPR)”Rising rates and magnitudes of warming and other changes in the climate system, accompanied by ocean acidification, increase the risk of severe, pervasive, and in some cases irreversible detrimental impacts,” the report said.

> MinnPost: Poor Irrigation Has Poisoned Much Of World’s Farmland With Salts, Study Finds.  Based on the IWEH estimate of 2,000 hectares or 5,000 acres lost per day, and a gazetteer figure of 33.7 square miles for the island of Manhattan, the world is losing that much acreage every four and a half days. It’s estimated that the annual losses attributable to salt-induced land degradation might amount to $27.3 billion worldwide.

> NPR: As Infrastructure Crumbles, Trillions Of Gallons Of Water Lost (In MPR). But not all of that treated, potable water makes it through the system to homes and businesses. In fact, quite a bit of it is lost. Where does it go? Much of it just leaks out of aging pipes and water mains that crack and break.

> Thomson Reuters Foundation: Sao Paulo Running Out Of Water As Rain-Making Amazon Vanishes. South America’s biggest and wealthiest city may run out of water by mid-November if it doesn’t rain soon.
 São Paulo, a Brazilian megacity of 20 million people, is suffering its worst drought in at least 80 years, with key reservoirs that supply the city dried up after an unusually dry year.

> Food Tank: Dirt In Danger: How Soil Around The World Is Threatened (Kathlee Freeman). For a multitude of reasons, including modern agricultural practices, the world’s soil is at risk. According to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), “Half of the topsoil on the planet has been lost in the last 150 years.” “Additionally, as a result of erosion over the past 40 years, 30 percent of the world’s arable land has become unproductive.”

ENERGY (Fossil Carbon-Natural Resources-Renewables)

> Post Carbon Institute: The Peak Oil Crisis: A Reality Check (Tom Whipple). This week the Post Carbon Institute (PCI) released a detailed study of the prospects for US shale oil and shale gas production entitled Drilling Deeper – A Reality Check on the US Government Forecasts for a lasting Tight Oil and Shale Gas Boom. This new study takes a hard, detailed look at what has actually happened during the shale boom to date and at the EIA’s projections.

> Resilience: Is There Really An Oil Glut? (Kurt Cobb). Between consumers who can’t afford to pay higher and higher oil prices, and companies that can’t afford to produce the extra oil we’d like at lower prices, we are stuck in an ever-shrinking no man’s land, a price band really–one that will eventually disappear, as the average cost of producing the extra barrel of oil goes beyond what consumers, and businesses, can and will pay.

> Common Dreams: The Revolution That Wasn’t: Why The Fracking Phenomenon Will Leave Us High And Dry. A new, landmark report shows that hopes of a long-term golden era in American oil and gas production are unfounded.

> Common Dreams: Tar Sands Resistance Blowing Huge Hole In Oil Industry’s Bottom Line: Report. The growing tide of tar sands resistance—seen in blockades, tree sits, petitions, education efforts and calls to divest—is having a measurable negative impact on the bottom line of the tar sands industry, according to a new report, prompting researchers to declare that “business as usual for tar d sands is over.”

> ENSIA: This Infographic Shows Why Renewable Energy Is Here To Stay. This infographic depicts the evolution and future growth of renewable energy, from WWI to the present and beyond.

> Common Dreams: Oil Industry Set To Ignore “Final Warning” On Climate Change (Andy Rowell). The bottom line is that because the fossil fuel industry has so much capital already invested or lined up to be spent extracting fossil fuels, it will just carry on doing so, ignoring the desperate calls for action from the climate scientists.

ECONOMY (Finances-Global-Local

> Post Carbon Institute: How To Shrink The Economy Without Crashing It: A Ten-Point Plan (Richard Heinberg). The human economy is currently too big to be sustainable. We know this because Global Footprint Network, which methodically tracks the relevant data, informs us that humanity is now using 1.5 Earths’ worth of resources.

> Yes! Before The Zombie Apocalypse—These 4 Trade Deals Were Ravaging The World! What really keeps us at YES! Magazine up at night are the international trade agreements [free trade] constantly being negotiated by the United States and its partners—each one more terrifying than the last.

> Bloomberg News: Hackers Probing Financial System’s Defenses Show Why Everyone Should Worry. Financial companies are losing ground to hackers, according to a report by management-consulting firm Deloitte. In 2013, 88 percent of all successful intrusions into the computer systems of financial companies were accomplished in seconds, minutes or hours, not days, Deloitte found, while 79 percent of intrusions were discovered by the targeted firms only after days, weeks or months.

> WeTheEconomy:  We The Economy (22 Short Films, including “A Bee’s Invoice: The Hidden Value in Nature”).  In the current economic climate, the need for citizens to be engaged and informed is greater than ever. Distributed digitally, across multiple platforms and in theaters, WE THE ECONOMY will do both… and best of all: it’s available everywhere, to everyone.

EXPECTATIONS (Knowledge-Psychology-Beliefs)

LastOurs: Last Hours. This 10-minute documentary is a must-see experience for a succinct overview of global-warming’s potential to destroy life on earth.

> Peak Prosperity: About that Shale Oil ‘Miracle’… (Chris Martenson). It’s been said that humans are rationalizing — not ‘rational’ — animals. The deep truth in that statement is that we humans have strongly-held beliefs that color the information we take in and accept. We’re often guilty of recognizing only the data that supports those beliefs while rejecting the rest.

> The Archdruid Report: Dark Age America: Involuntary Simplicity (J.M. Greer). 23,000 man hours is a barrel of oil equivalent (BOE), so if you are employing energy at those rates you can produce debt at those rates, because pretty soon there will be work done to pay off the debt and interest (the energy from fossil carbon doing the work). What has changed with the advent of peak oil is that the future is one of debts not being able to be re-payed, because there isn’t the energy to do the work to pay the debts.

> Solutions: Introduction: Why Resilience? (Joseph Fiksel). While there are many definitions of resilience, it can generally be defined as the capacity for a system to survive, adapt, and flourish in the face of turbulent change and uncertainty.¹ In short, this means the ability to overcome adversity and bounce back.

> The Daly News: Are We Hard-Wired To Think We Can Grow Forever? (James Magnus-Johnston) Is there an evolutionary mechanism stopping us from living within our planetary constraints? In Denial: Self-Deception, False Beliefs, and the Origins of the Human Mind, co-authors Varki and Brower argue that human intelligence is unique in the animal kingdom, but our capacity for denial may be the greatest differentiating factor.

> AlterNet: The Coming Revolution: Evolutionary Leap Or Descent Into  Chaos (David DeGraw) A new paradigm is organically evolving: new economic systems, sustainable communities, solar energy, organic farming, liquid democracy, worker co-ops and new media. For all the problems we are confronted by, there are existing viable solutions. This is Part 3 in a series of adapted excerpts from DeGraw’s new book, The Economics of Revolution. You can read Part 1 here and Part 2 here.

> Resilience: Sufficient Liberal Stories–The Krugman Function Part 4 (Erik Lindberg). The primary narrative of Krugman, Reich, and the whole Liberal enterprise today is a narrative of perpetual repeatability with regard to past accomplishments (FDR’s New Deal, etc.) The introduction just of oil supply and carbon emissions into the liberal field of view pretty much undoes the main story told by mainstream Democrats today.

EQUITY (Equality-Health-Social Concerns)

> AlterNet: Americans Are Huge: 5 Surprising Reasons Why.  Between the 1960s and the 2000s, Americans grew, on the average, an inch taller and 24 pounds heavier. The average American man today weights 194 pounds and the average woman 165 pounds. Almost a third of American children and teens are overweight.

> Common Dreams: Infuriating Facts About Our Disappearing Middle-Class Wealth (Paul Bucheit). People in the U.S. and around the world are being rapidly divided into two classes, the well-to-do and the lower-income majority. This severing of society will change only when progressive thinkers (and doers) agree on a single, manageable solution that will stop the easy flow of wealth to the privileged few.

> Resilience-Transition Voice: American Kids In The Age Of Oil: ‘Economically Worthless But Emotionally Priceless’ (Erik Curren). Only in an industrial economy where energy is cheap and corporations provide most of a household’s needs can families afford to turn two generations, the youngest and the oldest, into economically unnecessary people — Two generations of mouths-to-feed who don’t carry their own weight.

> Grassroots Economic Organizing: Ways To Create A Democratized Economy (Gar Alperovitz). This article is excerpted from What Then Can I Do? 10 Ways to Democratize the Economy, which originally appeared on Gar Alperovitz’s website. The full article is also available in PDF format here.

> Green Money: REIT, Drink, And Be Merry: Farmland LP’s Fund Gives Investors, Enviros, And Foodies Something To Cheer About (Rob Dietz & Eric Roach). Farmland LP (www.farmlandlp.com) is an investment fund that buys conventional farmland, converts it to organic using a pasture and crop rotation, and then manages the farmland for an optimal mix of environmental health, food production, and financial returns.

> ENSIA: Cities Are The Greatest Hope For Our Planet (Denis Hayes). Cities matter because they represent our greatest hope for long-term survival, not only for humans but for all species. They offer the best chance to dramatically reduce carbon pollution, provide shelter and community for the world’s growing human population, and protect rural habitat for species in decline.

> Shareable: Sharehub: At The Heart Of Seoul’s Sharing Movement. In 2012, Seoul publicly announced its commitment to becoming a sharing city. It has since emerged as a leader of the global sharing movement and serves as a model for cities around the world.

> TC Daily Planet: No Big Bucks Needed For Complete Streets. Here are some lessons from NYC in creating interesting, safe, attractive, and inexpensive upgraded streets for pedestrian use.

EDUCATION (Local Events- Information)

> SUSTAINABILITY EDUCATION FORUM (New Format): HUMANS AND THE NATURAL ENVIRONMENT. Sat., Nov. 15^th, 3-5 p.m., St. Anthony Village Library, 2941 Pentagon Drive in St. Anthony Shopping Center. Presentations and discussions include a book, For Love of Lakes by Dave Demsey, presented by Idelle Peterson; “The Ebola Crisis”, material presented by Peter Doughty; plus discussion of articles by various writers, and presented by participants. Seating limited to 20 persons. RSVP (warex001@umn.edu)

> THIRD ANNUAL EVENT: SUSTAINABILITY FAIR, Thurs., Nov. 20^th, 5:30-8:00 p.m., Silverwood Park Visitors Center, St. Anthony Village (Map). Co-sponsored by the cities of St. Anthony Village, Lauderdale, and Falcon Heights, in collaboration with Three Rivers Park District and U of MN sustainability faculty and students. Poster exhibits presented by 43 students and other exhibits presented by local sustainability groups, including CFS. Free and open to the public. 

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> UM Institute on the Environment: Frontiers in the Environment: Big Questions, Wednesdays, 12:00-1:00 p.m., IonE Seminar Room R380, Learning & Environmental Sciences Bldg., St. Paul. Free. Watch online

• Nov.12 — How Can We Help Children Connect to the Natural World?
• Nov.19 — Environmentalists and Corporations Make Strange Bedfellows . . . Or Do They?

> Future First: 2014 Women’s Congress for Future Generations, Nov. 7-9, Earle Brown Heritage Center, Mpls., MN. Register> 

> Pilgrim House Unitarian Fellowship: Minnesota Clean Energy Solutions (J. Drake Hamilton, Science Policy Director, Fresh Energy). Sun., Nov. 9, 10:15-11:30 a.m., 1212 W. Highway 96, Arden Hills, MN

> Sierra Club-North Star: Minnesota Beyond Coal To Clean Energy, Sat., Nov.15, 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Sabathani Community Center, 310 East 38th Street Mpls., MN. RSVP: http://sc.org/MNBeyondCoalRetreat  Questions: (jessica.tritsch@sierraclub.org)

> MN350-MCAD: Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret (feature-length documentary of a filmmaker’s undercover investigation of the cattle industry). Sun., Nov. 23, 6:30 p.m., MN Institute of Arts Auditorium. 2501 Stevens Ave, Mpls. Free (donation requested).

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What’s Really Scary —  Clifton Ware, Editor-Publisher

Boooooo! Halloween 2014 is nigh, along with the typical appearances of ghosts, witches, vampires, zombies, and all kinds of nefarious characters—plus benign non-scary impersonations of angels, animals, super heroes and celebrities. For some deep-seated emotional need, we welcome the adrenaline highs associated with being scared out of our wits when experiencing immediate life-threatening danger.

I suspect that most readers of this e-newsletter lead relatively safe and sane lives, with little fear of encountering severe danger. On the other hand, many world citizens live in harm’s way on a regularly basis, including human-inflicted violence.

But there are some long-term potential dangers that we tend to ignore, deny, or bury in our subconscious minds. After all, there are personal obligations to fulfill—earning a living, caring for family members, planning for a financially secure future, and contributing to society in various ways.

If we are sincerely concerned about the kind of future our descendants will inherit, then our attention and efforts should be focused on the really scary dangers, including: the Ebola crisis; the increasing impacts wrought by climate change; the rising terrorism and social discontent; the decline of essential natural resources; the growing gap between the rich, the middle classes, and the poor; the waning of democracy; and the inevitable future dangers caused by a bulging worldwide population. Obviously, in order to lessen or blunt the impact of potential calamities, we need to take positive, constructive, action.

So what can we do? Here are five suggestions:

1) Support organizations and programs that address a wide range of life affirming causes, with your finances and/or through volunteer service.

2) Cultivate a “big-picture” awareness and knowledge of sustainability issues, by attending informative events, seeking information in all reputable media (books, articles, etc.), and participating in study/discussion groups (like the Sustainability Education Forum).

3) Respond to notices from prominent organizations that identify harmful practices by corporations and organizations, and a request to send personal or form letters to designated politicians, corporations, or groups.

4) Adopt a green, healthy lifestyle based on consuming less stuff, and more attuned to nature.

5) Join with others in local citizen groups (like Citizens For Sustainability) to affect positive changes on a community level.

In St. Anthony Village we are fortunate to have a core of citizens dedicated to creating greater resilience, sustainability, and livability for our community. But we can certainly use more citizens to join with us in developing and implementing specific progressive initiatives.

In closing, may we learn to focus on real dangers, not imagined fears. With courageous determination and perseverance, we can take positive steps in confronting whatever lies ahead. Bring on the super heroes and heroines!

(Note: For a complementary view of fear, see The Nature Of Fear, a NY Times article by Akeiki Busch in the Oct. 27 Star Tribune.)

ENVIRONMENT (Natural Resources-Wildlife-Climate)

> Institute for Policy Studies: COMBAT VS. CLIMATE: The Military And Climate Security Budgets. A report argues that a change from 1% to 4% of security spending is not commensurate with the role U.S. military strategy now assigns to climate change: as a major threat to U.S. security. Nor is it remotely sufficient to bring greenhouse gas emissions under control. Download the full report.

> ENSIA: Can We Have Our Cities And Biodiversity, Too? Smart development could mean big benefits for biodiversity and urban areas alike. View a 3-minute video.

> Star Tribune: New Combination Herbicide For Crops Gains Federal Approval. Environmental groups condemned the decision, and said that EPA ignored serious health risks, especially to children, that are associated with 2,4-D. Critics said the chemical has been linked to reproductive problems, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and Parkinson’s disease.

> Huffington Post: ‘Anthropocene’ Term Gains Traction As Human Impacts On Planet (Seth Borenstein). People are changing Earth so much, warming and polluting it, that many scientists are turning to a new way to describe the time we live in. They’re calling it the Anthropocene — the age of humans.

> Take Part: 34 Surprising Facts You Need To Know About California’s Drought. Infographic: Why the Golden State’s long dry spell—and its changing climate—will have implications far beyond the West Coast.

ENERGY (Fossil Carbon-Renewables)

> Post Carbon Institute: Drilling Deeper. This report presents a reality check on U.S. government forecasts for a lasting tight oil and shale gas boom.

> Post Carbon Institute: The Revolution That Wasn’t: Why The Fracking Phenomenon Will Leave Us High And Dry. A new, landmark report shows that hopes of a long-term golden era in American oil & gas production are unfounded.

> Common Dreams: Big Oil Spending Millions To Kill Local Anti-Fracking Measure. Fossil fuel energy companies have spent over $7.6 million to defeat a measure that would ban fracking in California’s Santa Barbara County.

> Resilience: Resilient And Sustainable Infrastructure For Urban Energy Systems. Extreme weather from climate change and growing urbanization are making cities more vulnerable to loss of electric power and damage to energy infrastructure. Policy makers and users of critical infrastructure services are searching for solutions that increase the resiliency of energy systems but are closely tied to other goals, such as sustainability and affordability.

> MinnPost: America’s Energy Future Is Starting To Look Like Our Energy Past. Three interesting takes on America’s complicated energy puzzle showed up in national papers in the last couple of days, revealing renewed interest in exploring geothermal and nuclear power.

> MinnPost: How Minnesota’s Highways Are Poised To Become Renewable Energy Generators. A pilot project proposes up to five 1-megawatt solar panel arrays for public right-of-ways around the state. If the project proceeds as planned, it would exceed the total capacity of a solar installation at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport expected to go online next fall and touted this month as the largest in the state.

> Our Finite World: Eight Pieces Of Our Oil Price Predicament (Gail Tverberg). One big problem is that our networked economy is quite inflexible. Even a small amount of shrinkage looks like a major recession. If there is significant shrinkage, there is danger of collapse. We haven’t set up a new type of economy that uses less oil.

ECONOMY (Finances-Global-Local)

> Peak Prosperity: Energy Economics – Crash Course (Chapter 19). In order for the economy to grow, it must receive an ever-increasing input supply of affordable energy and resources from the natural world. What I’m about to show you is a preponderance of data that indicates those inputs will just not be there in the volumes needed to supply the growth that the world economy is counting on.

> The Daly News: Paul Krugman On Limits To Growth: Beware The Bathwater (Brian Czech). Adam Smith was among the great, classical economists who readily recognized limits to growth, all the way until at least John Stuart Mill. After that and throughout the 20^th century, things got murky for economists as they turned increasingly to microeconomics, losing the forest for the trees.

> Peak Prosperity: How The Federal Reserve Is Purposely Attacking Savers (Chris Martenson). A moral obligation is something that almost never enters into the decision matrix of our society’s richest, or the banking industry. For them, the number one rule is that whatever is expedient and makes the most money is the right thing to do. For the bottom 99%, it’s like playing with a stricter set of rules.

> Boillier.Org: A Paradox To Savor: A High-Quality, Free Economics Textbook (David Boillier). Unlike conventional economics textbooks, which set forth axiomatic principles that supposedly govern an entire field of economic life, the [free] Core-Econ textbook is a big fan of empirical realities, behavioral evidence and economic history. Watch this video or go to the Core-Econ webpage.

> Spiegel Online International: The Zombie System: How Capitalism Has Gone Off The Rails. Today’s issue is “secular stagnation,” as former US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers puts it. The American economy isn’t growing even half as quickly as did in the 1990s. Japan has become the sick man of Asia. And Europe is sinking into a recession that has begun to slow down the German export machine and threaten prosperity.

> Post Growth: The Not-For-Profit World Beyond Capitalism. Research increasingly shows that, under the right conditions, human nature has a tendency towards co-operation (pdf). We’re witnessing the rise of a workforce increasingly motivated by purpose, and we’re realizing the potential of an existing business structure called not-for-profit (NFP) enterprise, that encourages the best aspects of human nature.

EXPECTATIONS (Knowledge-Psychology-Beliefs)

> Huffington Post: Getting A Grip On Ebola (Robert Reich). The real crisis is the hysteria over Ebola that’s being fed by media outlets seeking sensationalism and politicians posturing for the midterm elections.

> Resilience: Living And Breathing In A ‘Black Swan’ World (David Orr). Sustainability implies a stable state that can be achieved once and for all. Resilience, on the other hand, is the capacity to make ongoing adjustments to changing political, economic, and ecological conditions. Its hallmarks are redundancy, adaptation, and flexibility, as well as the foresight and good judgment to avoid the brawl in the first place.

> Resilience: The Infinite Toddler Regress–The Krugman Function Part 3 (Erik Lindberg). Except for the fact that the future of life on Earth may hang in the balance, we should have sympathy for Krugman’s position.  It is not easy to be a Liberal Functionary in this day and age—when ecosystems are crashing all around us, the polar ice caps are melting, and world conventional oil has peaked.

> The Archdruid Report: A Pink Slip For The Progress Fairy (J.M. Greer) I’m aware that true believers in progress insist that this [envisioned collapse] can’t happen to us, but a growing number of people have noticed that the Progress Fairy got her pink slip some time ago, and ordinary history has taken her place as the arbiter of human affairs. That being the case, getting used to what ordinary history brings may be a highly useful habit to cultivate just now.

> Star Tribune: It’s My Belief And I’m Sticking To It (Timothy Taylor). Several studies confirm that result of receiving balanced pro-and-con information was not greater intellectual humility, but rather a greater polarization of beliefs. Student subjects on both sides — who had received the same packet of balanced information! — all tended to believe that the information confirmed their previous position.

> The Atlantic: There’s More To Life Than Being Happy. In a new study, which will be published this year in a forthcoming issue of the Journal of Positive Psychology, the authors write: “Happiness without meaning characterizes a relatively shallow, self-absorbed or even selfish life, in which things go well, needs and desire are easily satisfied, and difficult or taxing entanglements are avoided.”

> Pew Research: From ISIS To Unemployment: What Do Americans Know? Older adults generally demonstrate higher levels of news knowledge than younger Americans, and there are age divides across several of the questions asked on the survey. Differences also show up according to educational background and partisan affiliations.

> Resilience: Could Do Better: Why We Must Set Young Minds Free (Vanessa Spedding). It is time all young people knew this: the work of our time is the work of reconnection, regeneration, restoration and reconciliation. Their talents and open minds, their unselfconscious creativity and determination are all desperately required.

EQUITY (Equality-Social Concerns)

> Common Dreams: Economics As If Future Generations Mattered. Growing numbers of people are waking up to the reemerging Commons ethic, which holds that human systems must be aligned to match ecological ones. People believe that future generations have the inalienable right to a healthy planet, and many are now seeking ways to withdraw their consent to the politics and policies that lead to a toxic future.

> City of the Future: On Public Health And Energy (Lakis Polycarpou). If the question is how to maintain public health in a world of declining energy resources, it’s worth looking at countries with relatively low per capita energy consumption and long life expectancy. Amazingly, in 2011, Costa Rica and Cuba had life expectancies of 79 years — the equivalent of the United States–while consuming only 14 percent of the per capita energy.

> CNN: Americans Taking Fewest Vacation Days In Four Decades.” Americans are work martyrs,” says the U.S. Travel Association. They leave more and more paid time off unused each year, forfeiting earned benefits and, in essence, working for free.” According to the study, in 2013 U.S. employees took an average of 16 days of vacation, compared with an average of 20.3 days in 2000.

> Streetsblog: By A Wide Margin, Americans Favor Transit Expansion Over New Roads. A new poll [PDF] from ABC News and the Washington Post shows that attitudes varied by political leaning, place of residence, and other demographic factors.

> Common Dreams: Bill Moyers: Pro-Democracy Movement Must Challenge Corporate Control. Ahead of final sign-off, veteran journalist tells viewers that reaching out to their fellow citizens and neighbors is the essential task in creating the transformation so desperately needed. “Neither [political party] will change voluntarily because the people in charge have too great a stake in the status quo.”

> Common Dreams: ‘A Generation Cast Aside’: Child Poverty On Rise In World’s Richest Countries. Children remain “the most enduring victims” of the recession in the world’s wealthiest nations, where 2.6 million children have fallen below the poverty line since 2008, a new report from UNICEF reveals. In 2012, 24.2 million children were living in poverty in the U.S.

ENGAGEMENT (Goals-Activism-Solutions)

> ENSIA: Sustainia Wants Us To Start Acting Today, Not Tomorrow. The nonprofit highlights innovative and readily available sustainability solutions happening right now around the world.

> FarmProgress: Prairie Conservation Strips Help Stop Nutrient Runoff From Farms. The upshot is, without affecting yield on the remaining 90% of a field, prairie strips improve the condition of waterways, cut back soil and nutrient loss, and revitalize Iowa’s natural heritage by providing habitat for native species–including natural predators of crop pests.

> Wall Street Journal Online: Warren Buffett Puts Wind In Berkshire’s Sails. Since 2004, Berkshire has invested $5.8 billion into wind projects in Iowa. The Iowa utility, still called MidAmerican under the Berkshire Hathaway Energy banner, has built more than 3,300 megawatts, or 64% of Iowa’s wind-generation capacity, compared with about 100 megawatts it had built there by 2000.

> Growing Cities: A Film About Urban Farming in America. In their search for answers, filmmakers Dan Susman and Andrew Monbouquette take a road trip and meet the men and women who are challenging the way this country grows and distributes its food, one vacant city lot, rooftop garden, and backyard chicken coop at a time.   Watch the trailer>

> NPR: Millennials: We Help The Earth But Don’t Call Us Environmentalists. This is the difference when it comes to millennials, 18-33 year-olds. Young Americans may be turning away from the word “environmentalist.” Previous polls have found people under 30 were more likely than older Americans to favor developing alternative energy sources, and also more likely to believe that humans are responsible for climate change.

> Open Democracy: Oxford Real Farming Conference: Power, Lies, And The Need For Agrarian Resistance (Colin Tudge). The world’s global strategy of food and farming is founded on three great untruths – lies, in effect. Overall, the world needs a Renaissance – to build a different and better world in situ. Agrarian Renaissance is key because agriculture sits right at the heart of all human affairs and if we get it right, then everything else becomes possible.

> Resilience: The Archaic Arts And Skills (Brian Miller). We on a small farm are learning the archaic arts—harvesting manure to build soil fertility, constructing secure fences that do indeed make good neighbors, planting vegetables that, when they mature, will feed us for a month, creating a plate of shortbread cookies that nourishes the soul—and all connect us with long past practitioners of these arts in ways that Facebook and Walmart never can and never will.

EDUCATION (Local Events- Information)

> SUSTAINABILITY EDUCATION FORUM (New Format): HUMANS AND THE NATURAL ENVIRONMENT. Sat., Nov. 15^th, 3-5 p.m., St. Anthony Village Library, 2941 Pentagon Drive in St. Anthony Shopping Center. Presentations and discussions include a book, For Love of Lakes by Dave Demsey, presented by Isabelle Peterson; “The Ebola Crisis”, material presented by Peter Daughty; plus discussion of articles by various writers, and presented by participants. Limited seating—20 people. RSVP (warex001@umn.edu)

> THIRD ANNUAL EVENT: SUSTAINABILITY FAIR, Thurs., Nov. 20^th, 5:30-8:00 p.m., Silverwood Park Visitors Center, St. Anthony Village (Map). Co-sponsored by the cities of St. Anthony Village, Lauderdale, and Falcon Heights, in collaboration with Three Rivers Park District and U of MN sustainability faculty and students. Poster exhibits presented by 43 students and other exhibits presented by local sustainability groups, including CFS. Free and open to the public.

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> UM Institute on the Environment: Frontiers in the Environment: Big Questions, Wednesdays, 12:00-1:00 p.m., IonE Seminar Room R380, Learning & Environmental Sciences Bldg., St. Paul. Free. Watch online

• Nov. 5 —  How Can We Make the Most of Agriculture’s 21st Century Transformation?
• Nov.12 — How Can We Help Children Connect to the Natural World?
• Nov.19 — Environmentalists and Corporations Make Strange Bedfellows . . . Or Do They?

> CERTs: Midwest Gateway To Solar Conference. Tues., Nov. 4, 8 a.m to Wed., Nov. 5, 5 p.m., Hilton-Airport/Mall of America. Learn more and Register >>

> MN Environmental Fund: Shop For A Cause, Tues., Nov. 4, 5-8 p.m., Ten Thousand Villages Gift Store, 867 Grand Ave., St. Paul. Click here to learn about Ten Thousand Villages

> Future First: 2014 Women’s Congress for Future Generations, Nov. 7-9, Earle Brown Heritage Center, Minneapolis. Register> 

> Pilgrim House Unitarian Fellowship: Minnesota Clean Energy Solutions (J. Drake Hamilton, Science Policy Director, Fresh Energy). Sun., Nov. 9, 10:15-11:30 a.m., 1212 W. Highway 96, Arden Hills, MN

> UM Cont. Ed: Building Minnesota’s Capacity For Climate Adaptation: Second Conference On Climate Adaptation, Nov. 6, 7:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m., Hyatt Regency Hotel (1300 Nicollet Mall, Mpls.) Information:) Online Registration>>

> Sierra Club-North Star: Minnesota Beyond Coal To Clean Energy, Sat., Nov.15, 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Minneapolis (location TBD).RSVP: http://sc.org/MNBeyondCoalRetreat Questions: (jessica.tritsch@sierraclub.org)

Transitioning      (Clifton Ware, Editor/Publisher)

In company with many organizers of sustainability-oriented groups, I’ve learned that promoting sustainability and recruiting active participants is quite a challenge, especially for an old fellow. The reality is that most people are up to their hairlines in negotiating a variety of personal and professional activities, including earning a living and caring for loved ones.

Next March I’ll be 78 years of age, so this seems to be an opportune stage in life to turn the CFS leadership reins over to others. To make it official, I recently submitted my retirement announcement (via email attachment) to core CFS members.

Nearly two years after the founding of CFS (Jan.’12), I’m confident that a substantial foundation is in place. A group of dedicated members have accomplished some significant initiatives, with others underway. There’s no question that, with ongoing interest and commitment, CFS will continue creating greater resilience and sustainability within St. Anthony Village and surrounding communities.

Of course, Bettye and I intend to continue participating in some type of supportive roles. For instance, I’ll probably continue producing this newsletter, though changes will be made, including the temporary title (Sustainability News-Views Digest).

The newly formed sustainability education forum (formerly sustainability book club) is expected to continue on a reduced level, with perhaps six forums annually. The new forum format is meant to encourage more individual participation, as organizers, presenters, and coordinators.

At the Nov. 15^th Sustainability Education Forum, which will be held at the St. Anthony Library (3-5 p.m.), participants will discuss if they wish to continue holding sustainability education forums, and if so, according to what collectively determined terms and conditions. Please note that this forum is open to anyone interested in studying, presenting, and discussing all topics and issues associated with sustainability. However, since seating is limited to 20 persons, RSVPs will be greatly appreciated (warex001@umn.edu). Also, any feedback you wish to offer is warmly welcomed.

In closing, I extend my sincerest thanks to all who have participated in CFS activities and events, especially those who have taken on leadership roles. I also wish to thank readers of this newsletter for allowing this publication to grace your email inbox I hope my commentaries, and the news and views expressed in numerous articles, have expanded your awareness of primary sustainability issues, and possibly encouraged you to take constructive action.

And now, here’s some of the week’s top sustainability articles, plus upcoming events.

ECONOMY

> Peak Prosperity: Fuzzy Numbers – Crash Course Chapter 18. What if it turned out that our individual, corporate and government decision-making was based on misleading, if not provably false, data? As we detail in this latest chapter of the Crash Course series, that’s exactly the case today with the key indicators (inflation, GDP, employment, deficits, etc.) our central planners are using to guide the future of the global economy.

> Telesur: The Next Financial Crisis May Be Just Around The Corner  “The market pathologies we all grew to know during the crisis of 2008 are returning,” writes the Financial Times.

> The Daly News: The New Economy Versus Today’s Flat Earthers (Eric Zencey). Beyond all reason and evidence, standard economics remains dedicated to the idea of perpetual increase in our species’ stock of wealth, income, and material wellbeing. We need a new, steady state economy suited to the planet we have, not the one that economists thought we had two hundred years ago.

> Star Tribune: Commentary: Will Steger: In Minnesota, Jobs Are The Newest Sign Of Climate Change Today we can celebrate more than 15,300 Minnesotans working in a clean-energy economy that is creating an increasing number of high-paying jobs, decreasing dependence on fossil fuels, and improving air and water quality in the state.

> Daily KOS: Wealth Inequality Hurting Corporate Profits. Corporations that get their revenue from the shrinking middle class are starting to worry about their customer base. 68% of the top 100 retail companies in the U.S. (including Walmart, Apple, McDonald’s and J.C. Penney) say that stagnant wages pose a major threat to their bottom lines, according to a Center For American Progress report.

> MinnPost: Anchor Initiatives: Local Food Means Business For Local Neighborhoods. “Anchor” describes institutions that are rooted in a particular locale, and want to make sure their communities remains stable and safe. “Colleges and hospitals are embedded in their community and have a real stake in seeing that it thrives.”

ENERGY

> Resilience: Peak Oil Review – Oct 20. Four oil-related topics are discussed.

> Common Dreams: World War III: It’s Here And Energy Is Largely Behind It (Kurt Cobb). It can be no accident that the raging fights in Syria, Iraq, Libya, and the Ukraine that all coincide with areas rich in energy resources or for which imported energy resources are at risk. There are other conflicts. But these are the ones that are transfixing the eyes of the world, and these are the ones in which major powers are taking sides and mounting major responses.

> Resilience-Resource Insights: Oil Decline: Price Makes The Story (Kurt Cobb). When it comes to short-term price movements, the whole issue of oil prices is too complex and too lacking in transparency to be discussed intelligently. In what looks like declining demand, it’s likely the Saudis are encouraging falling oil prices to maintain their worldwide market share, by cutting prices.

> New Economics: Energy Round-Up: Sinking Oil. High oil prices threaten our economy; low prices threaten the oil industry. How much longer will we rely on this volatile industry that is not only destroying our environment but also destroying itself? The argument for kicking oil before it kicks us is stronger than ever.

> Weathering the Storm: Oil’s Unsustainable Surge (M. Conley). The perfect storm clock is ticking. An intertwined array of recent energy and economic events has accelerated the countdown. See also: “Energy 101: There is a Better Way“.

> Duluth News Tribune: Save Or Shiver: Ways To Conserve Energy As Winter Looms. Here are some practical energy-saving steps to take in your home this winter, and for all seasons.

ENVIRONMENT

> Peak Prosperity: Ebola! (C. Martenson), Let’s spend some time understanding the nature of Ebola, specifically, and viral contagion, more generally. At the very least, Ebola can serve as an instructive reminder about how our society’s responses to a viral outbreak could prove to be at least as disruptive and damaging as the virus itself.

> MPR-Associated Press: Ebola Escalation Could Trigger Major Food Crisis. U.N agencies and non-governmental organizations are scrambling to scale up efforts to avert widespread hunger.

> Huffington Post: Another Month, Another Global Heat Record Broken. Earth is on pace to tie or even break the mark for the hottest year on record, federal meteorologists say. That’s because global heat records have kept falling in 2014, with the hottest September in 135 years of record keeping.

> Common Dreams: 2014 Set To Be Hottest Year In Recorded Human History: NOAA. The “combined average temperature” of land and ocean surfaces for September was the highest in recorded history, the report states. Furthermore, October 2013 to September 2014 was the warmest 12-month period ever recorded.

> Inside Climate News: Will Climate Change Denial Become A Political Liability? U.S. climate change envoy Todd Stern speaks at Yale University on October 14 about U.S. climate policy and global climate treaty talks. “I doubt, even a year from now, whether major political candidates will consider it viable to deny the existence of climate change,” he told the audience.

> Grist: Why Minneapolis’ Beautiful Bike Freeways Are Totally The Best. Minneapolis is unusual, as cities go, because it has a funny-shaped park system called the Grand Rounds Scenic Byway that encircles most of the city like a ring road, a nice freeway system for bikes.

> Common Dreams Small Scale Food Producers Are The Solution To The Global Food Crisis. Governments around the world have sidelined small-scale food producers for decades, pushing millions of them into hunger. Yet, even today, most of the world’s food is still grown by them, using traditional seed varieties and without the use of industrial inputs.

> ENSIA: When It Comes To Food Packaging, What We Don’t Know Could . [Hurt Us].  Recent analyses raise disturbing questions about the health and environmental effects of the stuff that encases our edibles.

> ENSIA: The Vaults In This Bank Hold Something More Precious Than Money. Kew’s Millennium Seed Bank Partnership is working to provide a safety net for global plant diversity by collecting and storing seed samples from plants all across the globe. View this 5-minute video.

> Organic Consumers Association: Ten Reasons Why You Should Care What You Wear. The choices you make regarding your clothing are not only expressions of style or identity, but are vital to personal health as well as environmental and ethical responsibility. Every consumer dollar spent on clothing has an impact—from economic to environmental, ethical to health. ‪

> Mercola.Com: Herbicide & Insecticide Use On GMO Crops Is Skyrocketing. Over 99% of GMO acreage is engineered by chemical companies to tolerate heavy herbicide (glyphosate) use and/or produce insecticide (Bt) in every cell of every plant over the entire growing season. The result is massive selection pressure that has rapidly created pest resistance.

EQUITY-EQUALITY

 > NY Times: Where Are The Hardest Places To Live In The U.S.? A Times magazine study looked at six data points for each county in the United States: education (percentage of residents with at least a bachelor’s degree), median household income, unemployment rate, disability rate, life expectancy and obesity. Then each county’s relative rank in these categories was averaged to create an overall ranking. Conclusion: Several southern states were ranked the lowest.

> Common Dreams: The Top 1% Own… Half. The 2014 Global Wealth Report (pdf) provides figures that give more evidence that inequality is extreme and growing, and that economic recovery following the financial crisis has been skewed in favor of the wealthiest.

> Grassroots Economics Organizing: Another World Emerging? Well, Maybe. Some thinkers and observers are envisioning a new kind of economics that fosters cooperation, abundance, and solidarity on a broad scale. That fosters a lot of caring rather than a lot of gouging or co-opting, and requires four core elements related to the infrastructure of regional cooperative/solidarity movements.

> Resilience: Challenging Corporate Power In A Not-For-Profit World. A not-for-profit (NFP) model presents an alternative macroeconomic framework with the potential to revolutionize how we produce goods and services, and thereby pave the way for an ‘economics of enough’ approach.

> MinnPost: Blog: Become A Midlife Revolutionary: Walk To Work. Minneapolis is among the 10 safest cities for pedestrians in the country. Although walking to work is most common among young adults with relatively low incomes, it creeps up again among people 55 and older.

> Kateraworth: Want To Get Into The Doughnut? Tackle Inequality (Kate Raworth). Humanity’s central challenge in the 21st century is to meet the human rights of all people within the capacity of Earth’s life-support systems.

> Resilience-Truthdig: The Imperative Of Revolt (Chris Hedges). “Democracy has been turned upside down,” Sheldon S. Wolin said. “It is supposed to be a government for the people, by the people. But it has become an organized form of government dominated by groups that are only vaguely, if at all, responsible or responsive to popular needs and popular demands.”

EXPECTATIONS, ENLIGHTENMENT, EDUCATION

> Resilience: The Krugman Function, Part 2: Whole-System Thinking (Erik Lindberg). Whole-system thinking reminds us that our economy cannot be intelligently assessed without an understanding of resources and energy.

> Archdruid Report:  Dark Age America: The Hour Of The Knife (J.M. Greer). The disintegration of social hierarchies, the senility of ruling elites, and the fossilization of institutions all lead to the hour of the knife.

> Resilience: Shades Of Green: A Movement In Search Of A Narrative (Part 3; Kari McGregor). There really is no wrong shade of Green, provided one’s environmentalism is approached with integrity and a willingness to observe the system as a whole. Assimilating shared values and working toward shared goals with complementary means is integral to the success of the movement, but it does not have to come at the cost of diversity.

> Contributoria: Bringing The Jungle To The City (Brett Scott). Here’s a techno-shamanic quest to reconnect urban life to ecological reality.

> Media Matters: The More You Watch, The Less You Know.  Viewers who watch cable news closely are the ones who are the most misinformed about Ebola. The overheated rhetoric of the news media is to blame: http://mm4a.org/1ra06PQ

> MPR: A Classroom Runs Through It: Vermillion Teaches Students, Stewardship. A teacher and his students study and work to save Lake Vermillion.

> Resilience: Limits To Growth: Where We Are And What To Do About It (Nate Hagens). In this video talk (for the New Economy Week 2014 in Vancouver, BC) Nate Hagens synthesizes the current landscape of global energy, environment and financial risks while offering suggestions on what to do as a hominid living on a full planet.

> Peak Prosperity: Richard Gould: Learning From Ancient Human Cultures. Hunter-gatherer societies, while often rarely exceeding subsistence-level living standards, were quite successful at meeting their needs. This stands in stark contrast to modern society, where our base needs may be easily met, but we have an endless string of unfulfilled wants and manufactured “needs”.

ENGAGE (Local Events and Information)

> SUSTAINABILIY EDUCATION FORUM (New Format): HUMANS AND THE NATURAL ENVIRONMENT. Sat., Nov. 15^th, 3-5 p.m., St. Anthony Village Library in St. Anthony Shopping Center. Presentations and discussions include “The Ebola Crisis”, material presented by Peter Daughty; plus discussion of articles by various writers, and presented by participants. Limited seating—20 people. RSVP (warex001@umn.edu)

> THIRD ANNUAL EVENT: SUSTAINABILITY FAIR, Thurs., Nov. 20^th, 5:30-8:00 p.m., Silverwood Park Visitors Center, St. Anthony Village (Map). Co-sponsored by the cities of St. Anthony Village, Lauderdale, and Falcon Heights, in collaboration with Three Rivers Park District and U of MN sustainability faculty and students. Poster exhibits presented by 43 students and other exhibits presented by local sustainability groups, including CFS. Free and open to the public. 

> U of MN Institute On the Environment-Frontier Lecture Series: The Role Of The Environment In This Year’s Minnesota Elections, Wed., Oct. 29, Noon-1 p.m., R-380 Learning and Environmental Sciences, St. Paul; Online via UMConnect. Speakers: David Gillette, special correspondent, Twin Cities Public Television; Amy Koch, small business owner and former Minnesota Senate majority leader; and Mark Andrew, president, Greenmark. Learn more >

> CERTs: Midwest Gateway To Solar Conference. Tues., Nov. 4, 8 a.m to Wed., Nov. 5, 5 p.m., Hilton-Airport/Mall of America. Learn more and Register >>

> UM Cont. Ed: Building Minnesota’s Capacity For Climate Adaptation: Second Conference On Climate Adaptation, Nov. 6, 7:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m., Hyatt Regency Hotel (1300 Nicollet Mall, Mpls.) Information: (http://wrc.umn.edu/news/PreparingMinnesotaforClimateChangeAConferenceonClimateAdaptation/) Online Registration>>

> Sierra Club-North Star: Minnesota Beyond Coal To Clean Energy, Sat., Nov.15, 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Minneapolis (location TBD).RSVP: http://sc.org/MNBeyondCoalRetreat Questions: (jessica.tritsch@sierraclub.org)

> MN Dept. of Health (planning tools; data): Minnesota Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment
; Public Health Data & Resources for Planning
; MDH Strategic Plan