Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

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From Gaia to Medea: More Hubris

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THE Gaia hypothesis first proposed by British scientist James Lovelock – the notion that all living things are interlinked as a single self-regulating body – is popular with some scientists and accords with the idea that because human activity has changed the chemical composition of the atmosphere we are likely to be interfering with the climate and upsetting the balance of nature.  

Paleontologist, Peter Ward, rejects the notion of Gaia, and is running a contrarian but equally hubris argument in his new book, ‘The Medea Hypothesis: Is Life on Earth Ultimately Self-Destructive?’ [1].   Professor Ward suggests because there is no balance of nature mankind will needs to intervene and thus advocates geoengineering solutions including to climate change.  

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Coal is King in China

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China is aiming to increase its coal production by about 30 percent by 2015 to meet its energy needs, the government has announced, in a move likely to fuel concerns over global warming.  Read more here.

Magazine Duped by anti-GM Activist – A Case of More of the Same

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I SUBSCRIBE to a magazine called Quadrant.   It comes out every couple of months and often includes interesting articles by well-known Australian conservatives, libertarians and mavericks on a range of topics from dinning in New York to global warming and it is the only magazine I read that includes pages of poetry. 

When I first took out my subscription to the magazine it was edited by a fellow called Paddy McGuinness – a Veteran Sydney journalist who apparently once worked for a Russian bank in London and for many years was editor of the Australian Financial Review.  In an interview before his death last year, Paddy said that he had been able “to ‘re-establish’ Quadrant as a ‘sceptical and non-ideological’ journal in the conservative spirit of Samuel Johnson, the literary colossus of 18th century England.”

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