Before anyone criticizes China for polluting the environment, learn about the history that caused today’s problems first. The First Industrial Revolution took place in England after James Watt developed the steam engine in the late 18th century. Coal and burning wood played an important part in this process. The result, the beginning of serious air and water pollution.

The second Industrial Revolution (1820-1870) was significant to the economic development of the United States, and this process increased between 1870 and 1914 leading up to World War I.

Pollution from industry increased to epidemic proportions after World War II in 1945, because the type of pollution changed significantly. Industries in America and Europe began manufacturing and using synthetic materials such as plastics, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and inorganic pesticides like dichlorodiphenyl trichloroethane (DDT). These materials are not only toxic, they also accumulate in the environment—they are not biodegradable. This brought on increased rates of cancers, physical birth defects, and mental retardation, among other health challenges.

Due to an increase in world trade after World War II and moving a significant percentage of the world’s manufacturing to Japan, then to China after Mao died, the pollution created by using these synthetic materials increased and with it pollution moved to a global scale. Most of the products that are manufactured in China are sold by multinational corporations like Wall Mart where 90% of what they sell in America is made in China.  If you shop at places like Wal-Mart, you are partly responsible for the pollution in China. When you hear criticisms blaming China for polluting the environment, point a finger at yourself as one of the causes. For that reason, I do not shop at Wal-Mart.

Another factor is that there is a lot of pressure from the people of China on their government to improve the standard of living for 1.3 billion people. Only one other country on the planet at this time has the same challenge and that is India.

The changes taking place in China and India today parallel the changes that already took place in America, Britain and Europe more than a century earlier. In the 1960s, about sixty percent of Chinese workers were employed in agriculture. That figure remained more or less the same throughout the 1960s into the early 1990s. In the 1990s, the labor force employed in agriculture in China had fallen to about thirty percent, and by 2000 still further.

By comparison, in 1870, a hundred-and-twenty years before 1990, fifty-three percent of workers in America were in agriculture. Today, that number makes up 3% of the workforce. The rest live in towns and cities with a middle-class consumer lifestyle that many in the world want and that is the cause of much of the pollution in the world today.

What is China doing about its pollution problems? Next week, Learning China will focus on answers to this question.

Science News in Brief

The discovery of a 4.4 million year old fossil skeleton that may have belonged to an early human ancestor was discovered in October.  Now, this discovery is hailed by the journal Science, as the greatest scientific breakthrough of the year.

Poll:

The Copenhagen Climate Summit has come to a close and here are some of the stipulations the loose agreement includes:

1. recognition to limit temperature rises to less than 2 degrees Celsius.
2. promises to deliver 30 billion dollars of aid for developing nations over the next three years, and 100 billion by 2020.
3. includes a method for verifying industrialised nations’ reduction of emissions.

Turd Polishing: Making something crappy look better than it actually is.  That is how I define the above agreement.  It doesn’t look as if it will help much at all.  We are willing to admit there is a problem (the first step), but not willing to change.

Members of the European Space Agency have given final approval to plans to explore Mars.  The mission is to depart in 2018.

Mars Attacks: There have been 15 rovers sent to Mars.  There have been 6 manned missions to the moon.  One seems to interest scientists more than the other.

Cool Creature

The Northern blue-tongued skink, or Tiliqua scincoides intermedia, grows to 24 inches long, making it the largest of the blue tongued lizards.  These azure tongued beasties live in forests, woodlands, and grasslands of Northern Australia.  It is diurnal, and hunts for insects, snails, fruits, berries and wildflowers during the day.  At night, they are much less active and can be found resting in the hollows of logs.

Don't stick your tongue out at me.

Feature Story

Sorry I have once again neglected to post for a week, but exams take precedence.

Anyway, I have decided to post about the Copenhagen Climate Summit: formerly known as Hopenhagen, now seen as Nopenhagen.

I will now admit that I don’t really think that I should blog about this.  So much has already been said about Copenhagen that I will probably just wind up repeating what you have heard.  So, I just want to share with you what I consider an excellent assessment of the Summit.

By Amy Goodman

Denmark is the home of renowned children’s author Hans Christian Andersen. Copenhagen is dotted with historical spots where Andersen lived and wrote. “The Little Mermaid” was one of his most famous tales, published in 1837, along with “The Emperor’s New Clothes.”

As the United Nations’ climate summit, called “COP 15,” enters its final week, with more than 100 world leaders arriving amid growing protests, the notion that a binding agreement will come from this conference looks more and more like a fairy tale.

The reality is harsher. Negotiations have repeatedly broken down, with divisions between the global North, or industrialized countries, and the global South. Leading the North is the United States, the world’s greatest polluter, historically, and a leader in per capita carbon emissions. Among the Southern nations are several groupings, including the least-developed countries, or LDCs; African nations; and nations from AOSIS, the Alliance of Small Island States. These are places where millions live on the edge, directly impacted by climate change, dealing with the effects, from cyclones and droughts to erosion and floods. Tuvalu, near Fiji, and other island nations, for example, are concerned that rising sea levels will wipe their countries off the map.

New conceptions of the crisis are emerging at COP 15. People are speaking of climate justice, climate debt and climate refugees. Indian scientist and activist Vandana Shiva was among those who addressed a climate justice rally of 100,000 Saturday in Copenhagen. Afterward, I asked her to respond to U.S. climate negotiator Jonathan Pershing, who said the Obama administration is willing to pay its fair share, but added that donors “don’t have unlimited largesse to disburse.” Shiva responded, “I think it’s time for the U.S. to stop seeing itself as a donor and recognize itself as a polluter, a polluter who must pay. … This is not about charity. This is about justice.”

Shiva went on: “A climate refugee is someone who has been uprooted from their home, from their livelihoods, because of climate instability. It could be people who’ve had to leave their agriculture because of extended drought. It could be communities in the Himalayas who are having to leave their villages, either because flash floods are washing out their villages or because streams are disappearing.”

Both inside and outside the summit there is a diverse cross section of nongovernmental organizations, or NGOs, from indigenous-peoples delegations to environmental and youth groups. Their separate but connected efforts have been coalescing into a new movement, a movement for climate justice. Broad consensus exists among the NGOs and the global South that any agreement coming out of the U.N. process must be fair, ambitious and binding, or as they put it, “FAB.”

The Bella Center itself, where the summit is being held, is said by the U.N. to be at capacity. Thousands of people line up daily in the cold, vainly hoping to get in to the Bella of the Beast. Thousands more, from the NGOs, are having their access stripped, ostensibly to make room for visiting heads of state, their entourages and security.

Outside, Copenhagen is seeing an unprecedented police crackdown, with the largest and most expensive security operation in Denmark’s history. More than 1,200 people were detained over the weekend, and as this column goes to press, targeted arrests of protest organizers and police raids of public protest convergence spaces are being reported. Heavy-handed police tactics give another meaning to “COP 15.”

After South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu spoke at a candlelight vigil for children, I asked whether he thought President Barack Obama was following through on climate change. He responded: “We hope he will, yes. He has given the world a great deal of hope. I have said he’s now a Nobel laureate—become what you are.”

Last week, as a polar bear ice statue melted downtown, revealing the dinosaur skeleton hidden within, a small ice replica of Copenhagen’s famous Little Mermaid statue sat outside the Bella Center, melting. She is now gone. Obama is making his second attempt to win a prize in Copenhagen, after the Chicago Olympics embarrassment. Unless he uses the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s new determination that carbon dioxide is a public health hazard and nails down a fair, ambitious and binding agreement, we may see Andersen’s “The Emperor’s New Clothes” played out on the global stage.

The Cosmic Perspective

When will we ever learn?  I will be the first to admit that we cannot “prove” that global warming is occurring.  But, there are two problems with doing nothing.  First, we have very strong evidence to support that assessment.  The so-called “Climategate,” has been largely debunked as overblown sensationalism and nitpicking on the part of climate change deniers.  At this point, countless studies have been done and the most of the ones not backed by large corporations indicate that the climate is most definitely warming:

Second, we don’t have time to wait and see.  We need to act now if we wish to avert the worst that could occur.  I like to use the precautionary principle.  The precautionary principle states that if an action or policy has suspected risk of causing harm to the public or to the environment, in the absence of a scientific consensus that harm would not ensue, the burden of proof falls on those who would advocate taking the action.  If I see a mushroom in the forest, I will not eat it if I am not sure that it is safe.  Likewise, we should not continue on our track of aggressively using up fossil fuels to power our excess.

The entire Copenhagen summit was a debate between developed and undeveloped nations.  Developed nations decry developing nations for using dirty energy to advance their states, while developing nations yell back that developed nations use much more fossil fuels per capita and are already developed, so who are they to say others should not.  After much back and forth nothing much has been done. The developed accord is toothless, and not even binding at that!  It looks unlikely to contain temperature rises to within the 2 degree Celsius  climate change threshold that UN scientists say is needed to avert serious climate change.  Nor will it bring back the levels of CO2 in the atmosphere to 350 parts per billion, the level that scientists believe is the maximum to avert the aforementioned 2 degree change.  Unfortunately, since we are insulated by the bubble of wealth, we do not yet feel the effects of this oncoming storm.  But eventually, every bubble pops.  Will we be ready to deal with it?  Perhaps the one silver lining that I can draw from this meeting is that globally, we have recognized that there is a problem.  Now, we must act and make actual attempts to fix it.

For all of you not up to date, I suggest you check out Democracy Now! for unbiased news and real journalism:

http://www.democracynow.org/

The Great Pacific Garbage patch is a collection or marine litter trapped in a gyre in the central North Pacific Ocean about twice the size of Texas. An estimated 80% of the garbage comes from land-based sources, and 20% from ships.The plastic debris is trapped by the currents of the North Pacific Gyre and remains there in a vortex. There have been several organizations launched to attempt to cleanup what has been deemed as “the world’s largest dump”, but some fear it’s nearly an impossible feat. The accumulation of garbage is not only disgusting, but a danger; both to marine life, and to us.

“‘In the central North Pacific Gyre, pieces of plastic outweigh surface zooplankton by a factor of 6 to 1,’ according to a report based on Charles Moore’s research. ‘Ninety percent of Laysan albatross chick carcasses and regurgitated stomach contents contain plastics. Fish and seabirds mistake plastic for food. Plastic debris releases chemical additives and plasticizers into the ocean. Plastic also adsorbs hydrophobic pollutants like PCBs and pesticides like DDT. These pollutants bioaccumulate in the tissues of marine organisms, biomagnify up the food chain, and find their way into the foods we eat.’”

We implore you to do some research, and support the organizations that are attempting to clean it up and call it to the general public’s attention. Thanks for reading.

Science News in Brief

Turns out that the Iron Curtain helped isolate Eastern Europe from more than the Western world.  It also blocked the import of alien bird species.  Restrictions on the movement of people and trade in Soviet bloc countries prevented invasive birds being imported, a problem which has plagued much of Western Europe.

There is a difference: An introduced, alien, exotic, non-indigenous, or non-native species is one found outside its native range, having been brought their by humans through deliberate or accidental means.  Invasive species are introduced, but also have a detrimental effect on the environment.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released a statement that the emails hacked from scientists’ computers did not contain information which indicated that human created greenhouse gases were not a factor in global warming.

Quirky Quote: “There is an anti-change group. There is an anti-reform group. There is an anti-science group, there is a flat Earth group, if I may say so, over the scientific evidence for climate change.” –Gordon Brown

Researchers have released a study showing that there are large variations in the amount of carbon being absorbed in the North Atlantic: as much as 10%.   They are still doing research to understand what causes these differences.  Currently, the ocean absorbs about half of carbon emissions from human activities.

Apocalypse Scenario: Here’s a nice positive feedback loop for ya: as the climate warms, the ability of liquids to absorb gases decreases (think pop cold vs pop warm), increasing global temperatures, decreasing the ability of the ocean to absorb carbon dioxide…crap.

Cool Creature: Superb Fairywren

Cute Superb Fairywren

The Superb Fairywren, Malurus cyaneus,  is a a small bird found across south-eastern Australia.  The male of the species has a bright blue head, back and tail, with a dark mask, and buff belly.  The female, however are a dull brown colour.  This example of sexual dimorphism is fairly common in the bird world.  The bird is known for its strange mating behavior.  The male wren will pluck yellow flower petals and display them to females.  Although it is socially monogamous, in that they will form fairly regular pairings, but one male will father many chicks with multiple females.  And, he will help raise most, if not all of them.  This causes a rather complex social dynamic.

Feature Story: Cellular Automata

So this is my first post where I talk about what I do as a bioengineer.  People often tell me, “So you mess with genes and stuff, right?”  First, nobody is “messing” with anything.  Second, not really.  I specifically enjoy working with complex ecological systems.  I work to better understand the causes and effects of environmental changes due to natural and human-caused events. Bioengineering allows me to have a holistic look at ecological systems.  Emergent behaviors result from nonlinear interactions between individuals in these ecological systems.  Eventually, I plan to do field research as well as computer modelling to help change the many problems our environment faces.   One of my tools as a bioengineer is cellullar automata.  Have no fear: this is not going to be a trip down molecular biology lane.  Not necessarily anyway.

Networks are built when individuals interact with their local neighborhood, their surroundings.  Thus, range and links are important in a network.  If a system is a complex system with multiple networks, nonlinear interactions among individuals can spontaneously create patterns from an initially random or uniform area. A grid model made up of many individuals represented by cells, or automata (us engineers like to make things complicated sounding), whose possible states are finite and distinct can be updated based on a function which refers to the state of each automata’s neighbors.

Perhaps a good way to explain this is to delve right into an example.  Image a 100 x 100 grid.  This represents a theater.  Each grid space represents a person in the theater.  We want to test the effects of fire on the movie goers.  Let’s say that if 4  people or more around an individual is scared, the middle person is scared.  Otherwise, the cell’s status is normal.  By using a computer program, we can quickly perform multiple iterations of these tests on each of the 10,000 individuals in the test to see if there is any emergent behavior.  Emergent behavior is such that results from nonlinear interactions between autonomous agents in a complex system. That is, it is neither completely random nor completely structured.

So how does this relate to the environment you ask.  Well, I recently completed a project to model ecological succession from bare soil.  Each individual tree species is predisposed to a certain environment.  In turn, each tree affects the environment.  For example, most climax trees are shade tolerant, that is, they grow well in light deficient conditions.  This allows them to grow where there are already a number of pioneer (fast-growing, light-loving) trees.  They in turn create more shade, helping climax trees compete against pioneer trees.  In developing my model, I decided to focus on three main variables which determine plant growth: the soil’s water content, the soil’s pH, and the amount of light in the area.  I also chose the most common trees in an Eastern deciduous forest as my possible states.  To account for the possible variables in the environment, I calculated the amount of trees surrounding a given cell.  The higher the number of trees, the higher the amount of shade, and the less sunlight will reach the trees. I also totaled the number of trees surrounding each cell to calculate water usage.  The more trees there were (as opposed to blank spaces), the less water there was for that area of land.  There are no units for the variables per se, but they can be interpreted as described above.  I then developed a function which would analyze the current state of a cell and compute what the future state of the cell will be.  So, if the current state in the cell is bare soil, then it will either continue to be bare soil or a tree will grow there.  The simulation began with a white field (all blank) as would a piece of land after a disaster leaving bare ground.  In the next time step, pioneer trees came on the scene.  Following this, a few climax trees appeared, and more pioneer trees grew, removing many more of the plots of bare ground.  In the subsequent time steps, more climax trees grew and ultimately dominated the field in the simulation.  By the tenth time step, there was some flux, but most of the trees were of the climax varieties.  There would always be some pioneer trees.  When a tree “died” and resulted in open ground, the first trees to fill the gap would often be pioneer trees, but these are quickly weeded out.  Thus, I used cellular automata to model a biological phenomenon involving emergent behavior.

Secondary Succession: A Cellular Automata Application

Cosmic Perspective

What am I, as a bioengineer, doing with this information?  In my example, I modeled secondary succession, an already understood process.  However, there are other applications.  I know individuals who have used this technique to model forest fires based on forest density.  I have seen the effects of the surroundings on a cell’s (living cell, that is) processes modeled to test new drugs.  The future is truly limitless, but we must understand that we must also ask ourselves whether or not our methods are being applied in such a way to help, rather than harm, the world.  Science is useless without ethics.

Sorry about the long wait, but work comes first.  Anyway, I am getting back in the swing of things for a little while.

Science News in Brief

The Large Haldron Collider has resumed operation and set a new world record for energy.  Its particle beams were accelerated at over one trillion volts.  This was just a precursor to the Collider’s primary scientific tests set for the year 2010.

Still No Black Hole: Just to give you a sense of the energy involved here: a lightning strike hits with about 1 billion volts.

A cross-disciplinary team of researchers from universities across America have released a study which indicates that climate change could increase the likelihood of civil war in sub-Saharan African countries by as much as 50% in the by 2050.  These wars would be fueled by decreased water supplies, fewer food sources, and increased poverty rates.

Talking World War III Blues: Already, 5.4 million people have died from civil war the civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo, making it the deadliest conflict since World War II.

Scientists seem to have discovered the reason for the hammerhead shark’s strange head shape.  The shape allows sharks to see almost in 360 degrees in binocular vision.

Weird Animal Fact: The mantis shrimp has the best eyesight in the animal world.  It is the only animal to to have hyperspectral colour vision.  That is, it can see across the electromagnetic spectrum.  We can only see visible light.

Cool Creature

I already covered the kakapo, but I have been dying to post this video.

Feature Story: Remember Me

Are some animal species more important than others?  A recent study which examined 222 carnivore species around the world points to the fact that certain carnivores should be more protected than others due to their ecological importance and individuality.

Even though carnivores are probably the most studied animal group, their taxonomic connections are not well understood.  Thanks to genetic testing, scientists are now able to construct much more accurate taxonomic maps.

The study supports the theory that describes the split of carnivores into two main evolutionary groups: dog-like carnivores (Caniforms) and cat-like carnivores (Heliforms).  The same study also revealed some so-called Confused carnivores which do not fit neatly into the aforementioned classification.

Researchers performing the study also isolated a number of carnivores which are unique in the ecological services they perform and the way they evolved.  They suggest that these species, including monk seals, red pandas, and walruses, should be more protected than others because they are so unique.  Because they are evolutionarily distinct, they have genes and evolutionary history not found in any other species.  This makes it important with regards to biodiversity: by increasing genetic variability.

The Cosmic Perspective

All people value equality: the right to be treated with equal respect and dignity as any other human being.  Those who value the environment tend to extend that to the animal world.  We do not like to show preferential treatment to certain animals just because they are cute and cuddly.  So, this study which claims that certain animals are more important from an evolutionary perspective comes as a bit of a shock.  Why should a walrus be more important than a snow leopard?

I look at this from two points of view: that of a scientist and that of an environmentalist, because I consider myself to be both.  As a scientist, I definitely see the merit of protecting certain species.  Different animals perform different tasks in an ecosystem.  Certain animals’ roles are more critical to the functioning of the system as a whole than others.  It is a principle of network systems thinking that  nodes (animals) in a system (ecosystem) can be ranked based on the number of nodes which connect to them and the importance of those nodes.  So, the more important connections an animal has, the more important it is in an ecosystem.  However, even a few important links can prove to elevate a species to a higher status than one with many relatively commonplace connections.

That being said, all animals play an important role in biodiversity.  Biodiversity provides for the astounding variety of different organisms, genes, ecosystems in which they exist, and biological services these organisms provide for life to adapt to changing environmental conditions throughout history.  It would be foolish not to save as much as we can of the already dwindling amount of biological diversity we have on this planet.  We often do not know how important something is before it is gone altogether.

Edvard Munch’s famous painting, the Scream,  is how I feel about what has been done to the Great Lakes.  They have been exploited and abused for 200 years.  Now we have legislation to improve the quality of our environment, but we could all die of old age before it is actually carried out.

There have been some environmental victories.  Ospreys, bald eagles and peregrine falcons have returned after the ban of DDT.  We can’t give up.  When we see something wrong, that is the time to think globally and act locally.

Para petani yang melakukan metode organik tak memiliki resep tunggal untuk meningkatkan kesuburan lahan serta mengatasi gangguan hama dan penyakit tanaman. Masing-masing menemukan teknik sendiri. Kuncinya adalah mendekat pada ibu bumi, memahami keluh kesahnya, dan memberi apa yang dimauinya.

Kata kunci itu barangkali terdengar abstrak bagi sebagian orang. Namun, bagi petani yang telah menerapkannya, metode tersebut sangat nyata. Jauh lebih nyata dibandingkan dengan menggantungkan tanah mereka pada rezim pupuk dan pestisida kimia yang datang dari negeri yang entah.

Disamping teknik yang telah dikenal umum, dengan membuat kompos berbahan baku kotoran hewan atau dedaunan, sejumlah petani organik menemukan teknik dan bahan terbaik untuk pupuk sesuai dengan kondisi daerahnya masing-masing.

Misalnya, Purwanto, petani dari Dusun Klebenm Kelurahan Sidorejo, Godean, Sleman, Yogyakarta, menemukan pupuk dari fermentasi telur itik busuk – dipilih dari telur itik yang gagal menetas dari usaha penetasan telur yang dimilikinya.

Petani 34 tahun ini, selain mengolah lahan warosan mertua seluas 450 meter persegi, juga mengembangkan usaha penetasan bebek sejak tiga tahun terakhir. Setiap bulan dia menetaskan sekitar 2.500 telur dengan tingkat kegagalan sekitar 5 persen.

Limbah telur ini awalnya biang masalah karena biasanya dia membuang telur busuk itu ke sungai. Tetangganya protes karena muncul bau busuk luar biasa. “Suatu malam saya menemukan ide, kenapa telur itu tidak saya pendam di dalam sawah ? Telur kan makanan bergizi bagi manusia, pasti juga baik bagi padi,” demikian logika sederhananya.

Selama dua tahun terakhir dia mempraktikan metode temuannya itu dan sudah sekitar 4.000 telur bebek lengkap dengan cangkangnya yang ditanam di sawah. “Panenan ternyata bagus,” kata Purwanto.

Di Klaten, sekelompok petani memfermentasi limbah tetes tebu dari pabrik gula, yang sebelumnya menjadi masalah lingkungan. Sedangkan di Margoluwih, Sayegan, Yogyakarta, Kelompok Joglo Tani menggunakan air kencing kelinci untuk membuat pupuk.

Para praktisi organik ini percaya bahwa ibu bumi dan tanaman merupakan sosok yang hidup dan bernapas. Karena itu, kebutuhan terhadap unsur hara juga berlainan pada waktu, jenis tanaman, dan tempat yang berbeda. Dengan mengenal dan membaca tanda-tanda alam, para penggiat organik ini menemukan cara masing-masing.

“Saya pernah dianggap gila karena tiap hari merenung di tengah sawah, “ kata Purwanto. Waktu itu tanaman padinya yang mulai mengunging dikeroyok tikus. Beberapa resep tradisional dicoba, tapi tdak mempan. “Tikus itu hewan pintar, mereka juga belajar,” katanya.

Dia akhirnya menemukan teknik merendam sawah saat malam – ketika tikus-tikus iu menyerbu – dan cepat mengeringkan kembali saat pagi. Untuk sementara padinya aman walaupun mungkin suatu saat tikus itu akan menemukan cara menyerang pada saat tengah hari bolong.

Di Purbalingga, pelopor pertanian organik, Mbah Gatot, menggunakan gula untuk melawan tikus. Pertama-tama, dia mencari liang tikus yang masih aktif, yaitu yang masih ada bekas lalu linyas hewan pengerat itu. Lalu di bagian luar liang ditaruj beberapa sendok gula merah atau gula putih. Tujuannya agar setiap ada tikus yang lewat, rambut tikus itu tertempel gula dan terbawa masuk ke dalam liangnya. Gula akan mendatangkan semut, dan semut akan mengusir tikus. Itulah logikanya. Logika yang dipahami dan ditemukan dari hasil pengamatan sendiri, kemudian dicobakan.

Beberapa teknik itu gagal, sebagian berhasil. Tetapi, pada prinsipnya mereka berdialog, belajar, dan mencoba sendiri.

Teknik paling ampuh mengatasi tikus, menurut Purwanto, sudah dikenal oleh petani sejak lama, yaitu menggunakan preadtor tikus, misalnya ular, burung hantu, atau elang, “Tetapi, sekarang predator tikus itu dihabisi oleh predator yang lebuh rakus, manusia,” dan sebagai akibatnya, “petani yang sekarang kesuliyan melawan tikus itu,” kata Purwanto menerangkan konsep rantai makanan.

Jejaring hidup

Seperti ditulis oleh Rachel Carson dalam Silent Spring (1962), buku klasik yang menguvah cara pandang dunia Barat terhadap pupuk dan pestisida kimia, sejarah kehidupan adalah interaksi dengan lingkungan. Saling tergantung dan saling dukung. Tak ada yang tak berguna dalam jejaring alam ini, semua memiliki peranan.

Jauh sebelum manusia menjadi dominan, alam telah menemukan keseimbangannya sendiri. Manusia tidak mencipta apa-apa, termasuk tanaman pangan yang sekarang dikenal, mulai dari padi-padian, gandum, jagung, hingga umbi-umbian. Manusia hanya menyeleksi, memodifikasi, dan membiakkan dengan cepat (sesuai) yang diinginkannyaserta menyisihkan yang dianggap tak berguna.

Aneka tanaman itu sudah ada di bumi, demikian juga serangga yang tergantung padanya. Dan, seperti manusia, spesies pesaing itu juga beradaptasi. Ketika kemudian manusia menganggap spesies itu sebagai hama dan menyerangnya dengan zat kimia mematikan, mereka pun belajar untuk bertahan dengan kemampuan adaptasi yang jauh lebih canggih dibandingkan manusia karena mereka jauh lebih tua.

Contoh yang populer adalah penggunaan dichloro diphenyl trichloroethane (DDT). Pada tahap awal penggunaannya, DDT dianggap pahlawan yang mampu mengalahkan serangga pengganggu, tetapi hanya sebentar karena muncul berbagai varian baru serangga yang lebih kebal terhadap racun ini. Demikian seterusnya, walaupun jenis dan dosis racun ditambah, spesies pesaing itu tetap bertahan dan semakin kebal.

Rachel Carson mengamati, alih-alih menghabisi hama pengganggu, tracun kimia itu justru membunuh aneka spesies yang berguna bagi manusia, seperti lebah penyerbuk dan burung pemakan hama. Pada gilirannya, racun kimia yang ditujukan kepada spesies pengganggu juga menggerogoti tubuh manusia. Singkatnya, menurut Rachel, “perang dengan racun kimia tak akan pernah dimenangi manusia.”

Walaupun tak pernah membaca Silent Spring atau buku-buku sejenis itu, Purwanto tahu betul bahwa racun kimia memang bukan jawaban untuk pertanian. “Kita cukup mendekat pada alam untuk tahu bahwa metode pertanian organik adalah yang terbaik untuk kehidupan,” kata petani muda dari dusun kecil ini. Dia sangat yakin gerakan menuju organik adalah perjuangan “untuk keberlangsungan lingkungan, dan akhirnya untuk keberlangsungan hidup manusia di bumi juga.”

Sumber  :

Kuncinya Mendekat pada Ibu Bumi, Ahmad Arif
Kompas, 18.09.2009

ddT das dynamische Trio die Welt liegt uns zu Füssen denn wir farn drauf, wir chilln drauf!! Bevor wir fallen, falln wir lieber auf!!!

http://das-dynamische-trio.de.tl/Home.htm

The hard core uneducables who make of the hard knot at the center of the anti-science and anti-environmental movement just refuses to jettison their adored myths about science, regardless how many times those myths are shown to be false.

It’s a religious exercise with them, and their faith in error and bad applications of science won’t be shaken.

Have you ever read Tom Wolfe’s Radical Chic & Mau-mauing the Flak Catchers? Claiming Ruckelshaus an enemy of Africans and Rachel Carson a mass murderer is the new Radical Chic, and constant writing about it the new Mau-mauing.

Natalie Sirkin writes screeds for newspapers in Connecticut, I understand from an odd blog that collects these misdeeds, Don Pesci’s Connecticut Commentary:  Red Notes from a Blue State.

(Pesci has a particular fetish for DDT myths, and Sirkin’s been there, too.  He’s hard-core — no amount of information can sway him.)

Sirkin’s latest screed is “Myths for Fun and Profit,” and includes as one of the myths DDT’s ban in the U.S.  Her complaint is badly worded, but from the brief and grossly wrong explanation, we can see she thinks that DDT shouldn’t have been banned, and that map and calendar challenged, she thinks the ban on using DDT on cotton in the U.S. in 1972 somehow led to a rise in malaria in Africa in the 1980s. (Mosquitoes don’t travel that far, generally, either across the ocean from the U.S. to Africa, nor in time, from 1972 to 1980, nor the other way around.)

Sirkin wrote:

8….DDT, the most wonderful chemical ever. “It is estimated that in little more than two decades, DDT has prevented 500 million deaths that would otherwise have been inevitable,” concluded the National Academy of Sciences in 1971, the year before EPA head William Ruckelshaus banned it. Thanks to Ruckelshaus, Rachel Carson, environmentalist extremists, and the WHO, millions of Africans including children are dying or disabled today.

Why, these irrational policy errors?

So I responded:

Banning DDT from agricultural use was an extremely rational act, as vouched for by the summary judgment against the DDT manufacturers in both of the cases brought against EPA for the ban, and as vouched for by the removal of the bald eagle and brown pelican from the Endangered Species List.

Sirkin wrote:  “DDT, the most wonderful chemical ever. ‘It is estimated that in little more than two decades, DDT has prevented 500 million deaths that would otherwise have been inevitable,’ concluded the National Academy of Sciences in 1971, the year before EPA head William Ruckelshaus banned it.”

EPA relabeled DDT in 1972, not 1971, effectively banning the use of DDT on cotton.  Under that rule, DDT could be available to fight malaria in the U.S., and DDT was manufactured in the U.S. for export to anyone who wished to use it.  There has never been a ban on using DDT to fight malaria.

But DDT ceased to work well against malaria-carrying mosquitoes in the 1960s.  Africans are not stupid.  Had DDT been a panacea, I’m sure they would have used it.

But while I worry about your implicit denigration of Africans and Asians in suggesting they are somehow incapable of deciding for themselves to use an effective weapon against disease, I am more concerned at your erroneous characterization of DDT’s value.  The National Academy of Sciences made an editing error, so part of your error is understandable.  DDT was never credited with saving 500 million lives.  During the entire time DDT has been available to fight malaria, from 1946 to today, the death rate worldwide from malaria has never exceeded 4 million a year, and since the 1960s the death rate has been about a million year.  At 4 million deaths per year, to save 500 million lives, DDT would have had to have been used for 125 years prior to now.  Insecticidal properties of the stuff were discovered only in 1939, 70 years ago.

At about a million deaths per year, to save 500 million lives, DDT would have had to have been used for 500 years.

Clearly there was an error in math, or confusion in citations.  About 500 million people are afflicted with malaria annually, noted earlier in that NAS book, which is where I think the 500 million figure came from.

But let’s leave that aside for a moment.  That 1970 publication by the National Academy of Sciences was an evaluation of chemicals in the environment.  That sentence crediting DDT with saving so many lives, erroneous as it was, was in a call to ban DDT as quickly as possible, and to increase research to find alternatives to DDT in order to get DDT use completely stopped.

NAS recognized the value of DDT, but said it was too dangerous to keep using.

Don’t cite NAS’s credit to DDT without noting they said we must stop using it, because its dangers outweigh the benefits.

You can find a more thorough discussion of the NAS report at this blog. [You should go see, Dear Reader -- neither Sirkin nor Pesci will likely ever bother.]

Sirkin wrote:
“Thanks to Ruckelshaus, Rachel Carson, environmentalist extremists, and the WHO, millions of Africans including children are dying or disabled today.”

With the great assistance of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and continued efforts of the World Health Organization, several African nations have cut malaria rates by 50% to 85% with the use of bednets and “integrated vector management” (IVM), usually known as integrated pest management (IPM) in the U.S.

Anyone who reads Carson’s astoundingly accurate book knows that she did not call for a ban on DDT, but instead called for the use of an integrated program of pest management.  Had we listened to Rachel Carson in 1962, we could have saved several million children from death, in Africa, from malaria alone.  It is scurrilous, calumnous, and inaccurate to the point of sin to blame Rachel Carson for deaths caused by failure to listen to her and heed her words.

Ruckelshaus acted with full knowledge of the National Academy of Science’s calling for an end to DDT use due to its harms, known and then unknown.  It is foolish to blame people for acting with hard evidence and careful, rational thought.  It’s particularly ungraceful to then accuse them of acting irrationally.

I doubt that either Pesci or Sirkin will ever change their tune.  They’d have to concede that science works, that scientists are not all evil, and that sometimes environmentalists, and even liberals, get things right.  More importantly, they’d have to concede they erred — and that would be like Baum’s Wicked Witch of the West taking a shower.

Cronache da Thule è felice di proporre un validissimo metodo risolutivo per la questione TV-decoder-digitale terrestre, che interessa molti italiani e sulla quale continuano a permanere dubbi e perplessità:
Il metodo è di semplicissima attuazione:

Assolutamente efficace e risolutivo, come detto: l’importante è seguire solo un paio di avvertenze:
a) assicuratevi che niente e nessuno transiti sul luogo ove avete deciso di mettere in atto il metodo suddetto… La TV è già nociva di suo, meglio che non lo sia anche di più…
b) una volta attuato il metodo, è bene ripulire il luogo perfettamente, affinché anche altri lo possano utilizzare con immutata efficacia, e gettare quanto resta nell’immondizia, quale perfetto suggello finale – anche “morale” – all’azione.

Risultati ottimi garantiti, oltre a una meravigliosa, impagabile, sensazione di libertà… E, nel caso, c’è sempre la web-TV…

Ok, so it seems those nasty little blood suckers are back. No, it’s not election season ‎again – we’re talking bed bugs. That’s right – BED BUGS. These little insects have been ‎wreaking havoc for millennia, then in the 1950’s they were all but wiped out by the ‎pesticide DDT. However since then, through a variety of factors such as the banning of ‎DDT, increased international travel, genetic evolution and even global warming, they ‎have made a startling comeback. The US East Coast has been particularly hard hit, with ‎New York being seen as bed bug central.‎

So, what to do about it? A case could be made for unsheathing all those old nuclear bomb ‎shelters from the cold war and just riding it out until a cure comes along, but ‎conventional methods might be more prudent. Enter Bedbug.com’s line of anti-bed bug ‎protective products. ‎

While there are mattress, box spring and pillow covers, which are outstanding, and make ‎up the end cap of a total pest control solution to bed bugs (not to mention a nice party ‎gift), there is one product we wish to point out, if for no other reason then its sheer ‎uniqueness within the pantheon of bed bug products. Introducing the SecureSleep™ ‎Laundry Bag. ‎

Now, we’ll understand it if you don’t get warm fuzzies over a laundry bag, but give it a ‎chance, and you might. This, you see, is no ordinary laundry bag. Is it made of titanium ‎and kryptonite? No. But, it is made of 100% micro-polyester, which won’t allow these ‎insidious creatures to get in or out. Add that to a patented zipper design, known as Zip ‎Tech™ (what else would you call a patented zipper technology?), specially reinforced ‎seams, a rubberized liner for extra durability, and there you have it – one fancy-schmancy ‎and effective anti-bed bug Laundry Bag. Even has a lifetime warranty. Pretty good, huh?‎

Ok, we know that by now, you are probably asking why laundry bags are important when ‎it comes to bed bugs. After all, don’t they attack you in your bed? Well, yes they do. But ‎to get there, they generally crawl along the floor first, and yes, you guessed it – that’s ‎where most folks keep their dirty laundry (see elections above, as well).‎

Seriously, though, part of any effective bed bug prevention plan includes keeping these ‎bugs out of your clothing. The females of the species lay about 5 eggs per day, so what ‎starts out as a small problem with bed bugs can suddenly end up being a very nasty, ‎expensive, itchy and large one. Trust us here – you don’t want it. ‎

So, be pro-active and make sure you stock up on these beauties – use them for your clean ‎clothes AND your dirty clothes. Use them when you travel, along with anti-bed bug ‎luggage liners and travel pillows with encasement. Use ‎them while you’re away at college – bed bugs are a real big problem on campus, too. ‎Also, keep a few extras for your guest room, because goodness knows where those folks ‎have been! ‎