Category Archives: Science

The Outrage Economy

It just so happened that two books I put on hold at the library ages ago (Team Human and How To Do Nothing) became available at the same time and were about mostly the same thing: the attention economy, why it is very bad for us, and how we need to reconnect with each otherContinue reading “The Outrage Economy”

Group Think: When Two Heads are Worse than One (Science and Sewing, in one post at last!)

It’s my untested belief that expertise in any technical field will result in a near-total loss of respect for journalism. I know it did for me. The more I learned about climate change, the biodiversity crisis, environmental regulations, and renewable energy, the more I realized that newspaper articles reflected reality only by chance, in passing.Continue reading “Group Think: When Two Heads are Worse than One (Science and Sewing, in one post at last!)”

Don’t. Be. Nice.*

So this ancient article finally made its way through the blogosphere to roll across my FB feed this morning, and you’ve probably seen it already, but I’m going to share it with you anyway: Psychologists Find That Nice People are More Likely to Hurt You (from io9.com) People who are agreeable are also more likelyContinue reading “Don’t. Be. Nice.*”

Another thing to feel guilty about.

Via Treehugger: Say! Did you know that laundering your synthetic clothing may be contributing to ocean pollution? Apparently studies have found that washing releases up to 1900 microfibres from each piece of synthetic clothing per wash. These bits of plastic are too small to be removed by conventional filtres and water treatment, so the plasticContinue reading “Another thing to feel guilty about.”

Review: The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History

I may have mentioned that 2013 was a steamroller of a year, and that Hibernation 2014 was basically me burying my head in the sands of sewing until I felt like I could look at the world again. After about nine months of denial, I thought I might be ready to test the waters of environmentalContinue reading “Review: The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History”

Fireflies!

The Royal Botanical Gardens is an extra treat for those of us who live nearby; it has the gardens, yes, but also many kilometres of hiking trails through nature preserves and active nature education programs for artists, adults, kids and families. Naturally Frances has been a constant attender of the daycamps since we moved hereContinue reading “Fireflies!”

Failing Better is Still Failing

Ontario’s Environmental Commissioner released the annual update report on provincial progress on greenhouse gas emissions. The good news is, we are not failing as badly as we were. Our greenhouse gas emissions are falling provincially, largely due to decommissioning coal electricity plants. The bad news is, we are still failing. We are still above ourContinue reading “Failing Better is Still Failing”

Monarch Caterpillar

Taken this past weekend at a friend’s cottage, walking in the woods, where a bunch of largeish monarch caterpillars are fattening themselves up on milkweed in preparation for metamorphosis. Look at the size of that thing! Also, they’re soft, if you’ve never tried petting one. Velvety. Given that it’s august and the monarch migration toContinue reading “Monarch Caterpillar”