Dieter Helm— Fast-forward to 2050—almost thirty-five years from now. What will the world look like? How will technology have transformed our daily lives? Will it be a world of robots and artificial intelligence (AI)? Of graphene, fusion, and electric transport? Now rewind—back to 1980. This was still a world of
Michael E. Webber— In July 2012, the electric grid in India failed, causing the largest blackout in history. It affected more than 620 million people, nine percent of the world’s population. Although there were many reasons for the power outage, it was a lack of water that triggered the Indian collapse. A
James C. Scott— Historical humankind has been mesmerized by the narrative of progress and civilization as codified by the first great agrarian kingdoms. As new and powerful societies, they were determined to distinguish themselves as sharply as possible from the populations from which they sprang and that still beckoned and
Daniel Lewis— Nature might not actually abhor a vacuum, as it turns out, but humans abhor a gap in nature. Studying birds take place both in the wild and in the laboratory, and it ranges from sweaty, difficult and dangerous physical work to classroom and laboratory settings where the physical
Charles M. Peters— The traditional method of farming used throughout the tropics is called shifting cultivation, roza, tumba y quema, or slash and burn agriculture. A small plot of forest is felled and burned, and corn, rice, cassava, or a variety of other crops are planted in the ash. These
Brandy R. Fogg— Current wolf population management strategies in the U.S are not supported by scientific research and are doing more harm than good. Gordon Haber and Marybeth Holleman’s Among Wolves: Gordon Haber’s Insights into Alaska’s Most Misunderstood Animals brings several issues with current predator management strategies to the light.
Nancy Langston— My goal in writing Sustaining Lake Superior was to write a hopeful book—a narrative of environmental recovery, not just collapse and despair. But holding onto hope can seem perverse when you read recent environmental news. Accelerating climate change has been met with withdrawal from the Paris Agreement. Environmental
The story of Lake Superior’s conservation recovery and what it can teach us in the face of climate change
Leslie Anthony— It’s fall, and many of us are travelling south—Mexico, the Caribbean, Nicaragua. That’s not unusual. But what might be odd is that most of us have stopped talking about Zika, an emergent disease vectored by invasive mosquitos that persists in these areas, and over which we should still
Leslie Anthony— Life on our planet is changing, of that there can be no doubt. That alien invasive species are a measurable component of this is also clear. The questions raised, then, are simple, and essentially those we began with: do we care about this? And if so, what are