As one old saw goes, in the 60s, we thought computers would enslave us, and drugs would set us free. Jury still out on computers, but clearly the drug thing did not work out as hoped.
There’s been a lot of research showing positive impacts on substance abuse, depression and other negative behaviors.. But I long ago gave up on the idea that psychedelics, especially in uncontrolled settings, could actually make people into, well, better people. If you’re a jerk, they can just make you into an even bigger jerk. For personal growth, there is ultimately no substitute for the old fashioned way – dealing with anxiety, boredom, suffering and mortality, and opening to the growth opportunities that present in every day living, working, loving or not, accepting death, (or not, and dying anyway).
That said, there can undeniably be moments, catalyzed by certain substances, that can bump us to another, more genuine path.
There’s some science to back up the woo-woo. In 2017, the Journal of Psychopharmacology published a study showing that using LSD, psilocybin and mescaline — “classic psychedelics” — led to a boost in self-reported “pro-environmental” behaviors. The study even controlled for other substances that don’t cause tracers, like cannabis, and for personality traits that might predispose participants to being green, like “openness to experience, conscientiousness, conservatism.” The result, while correlative and not causative, suggests that long-term psychedelic use changes how people think about their place in the natural world.
Enough people to turn the tide on climate change? Not anytime soon, but early findings are intriguing. Another study, “From Egoism to Ecoism,” found a positive link between lifetime psychedelic use and “feeling close and kindly towards nature,” especially for participants who experienced “ego-dissolution,” wherein the sense of self dies during the hallucinogenic experience.
“Psychedelics are default mode network dampeners” that “lower our awareness of the individual self,” says Joel Brierre, who leads retreats at the Tandava Center in Mexico, where participants ingest a powerful psychedelic known as 5-MeO-DMT. Mode network dampeners battle the brain system that keeps us from paying attention to the world around us; Brierre says many of his clients have emerged with new resolve to live cleaner, greener lives.
To the delight of Instagram aficionados around the world, Australia’s bright pink lakes may be increasing in number, thanks to climate change.
The bubblegum-pink lakes found in the south of Western Australia draw vast numbers of tourists every year. They gain their strange hues from a collection of bacteria and algae living in the water. Because of the effects of climate change, new lakes may start turning pink, while others will dry out entirely.
These lakes, which are found dotted across Western Australia and South Australia, include Lake Hillier, Hutt Lagoon, Lake Bumbunga and Lake MacDonnell. The lakes are extremely salty and get their characteristic pink colors from the salt-tolerant algae that live in them. The main culprit is the green algae species Dunaliella salina, but other species of algae and bacteria have also been found in the lake waters and may contribute to the color.
Dunaliella salina can live in waters with up to a 35 percent NaCl (salt) concentration. By comparison, seawater contains only 3 percent NaCl. At very specific salinities, temperatures and light conditions, the algae may produce a red carotenoid pigment called beta-carotene—it gives carrots their red-orange hue—that may be responsible for the lake water turning pink.
“For climate change, halophilic (salt tolerating) bacteria are present in many of these locations, and can grow with the right conditions, including higher salinity and warmer waters,” Gabriel Filippelli, a professor of Earth Sciences at Indiana University, told Newsweek
“The pink pigment expressed by the bacteria in western Australia is beta-carotene and is produced by a number of halophilic bacteria. We see similar phenomena in other extreme lake environments, like in Yellowstone hydrothermal ponds,” Filippelli says.
“Why these bacteria choose to express these proteins is still up for debate as there is a metabolic cost involved, but they must accord some ecological damage (perhaps inhibiting the activities of their competitors?)”
Climate change is expected to lead to lower levels of rainfall and higher temperatures across Australia’s southwestern region. Therefore, these changing conditions are expected to alter the water content of the lakes, making some more salty and therefore more receptive to the color-changing algae.
“We are expecting that these lakes are going to receive less water and hold water for shorter periods of time,” Angus Lawrie, a salt lake ecology specialist at Murdoch University, told radio station ABC Great Southern.
“Because pink lakes tend to be at the more saline end of salt lakes, we are probably expecting to see more pink lakes. It’s only pink under the very specific circumstances that those microorganisms need to turn it pink,” he said.
The crisis first began in early 2022, after biologists discovered an estimated 10 billion crabs disappeared — a 90% plunge in the population.
“The first reaction was, is this real? You know, we looked at it and it was almost a flat line,” said Ben Daly, a research coordinator with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
A recent survey of the species showed little sign of a rebound.
“Environmental conditions are changing rapidly,” Daly told CBS News last year when the snow crab season was canceled for the first time ever. “We’ve seen warm conditions in the Bering Sea the last couple of years, and we’re seeing a response in a cold-adapted species, so it’s pretty obvious this is connected. It is a canary in a coal mine for other species that need cold water.”
According to new research from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, a marine heat wave linked to climate change impacted the snow crabs’ food supply and drove them to starvation.
Biologists hope this second round of suspensions will give the remaining snow crab population time to bulk back up.
But with the climate threat only growing, there’s concern the snow crabs, along with the industry that depends on them, will continue to shrink.
“I’m a fourth-generation fisherman,” Songstad said. “I would like to say that this is gonna be here for my kids, but the reality is we’re a dying breed and if we keep going the way we’re going, there’s not going to be any of us left.”
For one Michigan legislator, evidence of a conspiracy.
Asterisk: Matt Maddock is a Michigan legislator and husband of Meshawn Maddock, former Chair of the Michigan Republican Party under indictment as a “fake elector” in an elaborate scheme to (allegedly) defraud voters.
About 50 ice anglers had to be rescued from a northern Minnesota lake on New Year’s Day after a pressure ridge they were near split and left them stranded, officials said Tuesday.
Most years, the ice would be thick enough by now for vehicles and wheelhouses, and we’d be seeing a steady procession of them heading north,” he said. “But this year isn’t ‘most years,’ and the ice is changing constantly. It’s absolutely vital that anyone who heads out checks the thickness frequently, pays close attention to the weather, and has a plan in case the worst happens and they wind up in the water
Surviving climate change will take, among other things, a major restructuring of agriculture towards more sustainable systems. Part of that effort is going to be encouraging local, organic production. I happen to know a couple of organic growers who are working very hard at this transition, in the rural Ozark region of Arkansas, not far from Fayetteville. My son Brendan and spouse Liesel have been bootstrapping organic farms over a decade from Maine to Maui. Now they’ve settled in the Ozark, where Liesel has nearby family.
After doing a tremendous amount of work to bootstrap an organic operation, while working full time farm manager jobs at the same time, two hours away, they’ve gotten a customer base and regular cash flow started, and are now ready to take the next steps. I’m sure they’d be grateful for any support from climate concerned folks around the world, at their website - snugglebugfarm.com
German emissions were at their lowest point in around 70 years, as Europe’s largest economy managed to reduce its dependence on coal faster than expected, a study published Thursday showed.
Europe’s biggest economy emitted 673 million tonnes of the greenhouse gases last year, 73 million tonnes fewer than in 2022, according to the energy think tank Agora Energiewende.
The figure was at its lowest point “since the 1950s”, Agora said in a statement, while warning that Germany had work to do to further reduce its emissions.
The drop was “largely attributable to a strong decrease in coal power generation”, Agora said.
Germany resorted to the fuel in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, when Moscow cut off gas supplies to the European giant. But since then, Berlin has managed to pare back its use significantly.
Electricity generation from renewable sources was over 50 percent of the total in 2023 for the first time, while coal’s share dropped to 26 percent from 34 percent, according to figures published by the federal network agency on Wednesday.
The cut in coal use accounted for a reduction of 46 million tonnes in CO2 emissions, the think tank estimated.
The renewables record brought Germany closer to its target to produce 80 percent of its electricity from wind and solar by 2030, Agora chief Simon Mueller said.
“When it comes to the generation of electricity, we are on a very good path,” Economy Minister Robert Habeck said in a statement.
Strong wind generation and low demand during the holiday period sent electricity prices below zero in Germany, while wholesale markets turned negative for some hours in France, Denmark and Britain.
Paul Ziemkiewicz has been working to clean up streams for decades, but the discovery that acid mine drainage or AMD, holds the elements used in electronics has made that effort not only noble, but potentially profitable. The most valuable — neodymium, praseodymium, terbium and dysprosium — that make high-performance magnets and others that fire up flat screen televisions, smart phones and LED lights, can be found in the leftover gunk from coal mines that turns streams orange and sterile.
Ziemkiewicz, a self-described “water guy,” said acid mine pollution is the biggest water problem in the state. Deckers Creek is a good example of the generational trauma that West Virginia’s streams have endured.
Thirty years ago, the nearly 25-mile length of Deckers Creek ran red all the way from the headwaters to the Monongahela River. But work by the Friends of Decker’s Creek, WVDEP and WVU has restored most of the creek.
Now, the abandoned mine at Richard is the last big source of AMD. It dumps into the otherwise clean stream, where fish now glide beneath the surface — at least until they get to the pollution — and farther upstream from the mine, trout are making a comeback.
“It’s the last big insult to Deckers Creek,” Ziemkiewicz said of the plume of acid mine drainage that still flows into the larger stream. And it’s here where the concrete arch of a brand-new bridge and the hum of equipment signal that something is happening within sight of the cut stone entrance to the mine where generations of men crawled on their hands and knees to remove the coal from the 48-inch Freeport seam.
Abandoned in the 1950s, the huge expanse of the underground mine complex stretches from Dellslow, just east of Sabraton, to a hillside above Cheat Lake. As the sandstone formation above the mine entrance dips toward the west, so the does the coal seam below it.
Nearly extending to I-68, Ziemkiewicz said the mine below this point is flooded. The water looks clear as it rolls out of the large pipe adjacent to the entrance, but in a four-foot-deep concrete trench buttressed by blocks on each side, the iron oxides leave a thick, orange mass, warning of its toxicity.
I honestly don’t know if this is real or satire. It certainly has a Monty Python skit quality to it.
This is very much like the “I own the view of your cornfield but, hell no I won’t help pay the taxes or upkeep on it” – an argument that we hear so often from anti-clean energy types.
Its now official: 2023 was the warmest year on record in the JRA-55 dataset, at 1.43C above preindustrial levels. It beat the prior record set in 2016 by 0.14C, and continues a rapid warming trend thats seen global temperatures rise around 1C since 1970.
This year really stands out when we look at daily temperature anomalies in the JRA-55 dataset as much warmer than any prior year, particularly during the latter half of the year.
It equally stands out when we look at absolute global temperatures over time:
Here are monthly temperature anomalies for the year, showing how 2023 was far warmer than any prior year for each month of the year from June onward, with a particularly large record (0.5C!) set in September:
