Visualization

I visited home in Philadelphia this weekend and stopped by my sledding hill, also known as Tommy's Hill. I made a video last time. https://youtu.be/rb0_WfiFzDY This time I'll just show pictures for quick scanning with commentary in the comments. First the most jarring image as a preview, can you see the "word" McDelivery? Someone had McDonald's delivered, then littered the packaging. Packaging from someone who had McDonald's delivered. McDonald's delivered must be one of the most pathetic signals of loss of values. Consider getting McDonald's delivered. What rock bottom of self-respect has this person dropped through? . . . Or rather has our society dropped through that this concept exists? It serves only to impoverish the poor and make more sick the already sick. McDonald's…

Many people try to follow "have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth," interpreting 'have dominion' to mean steward nature to at least not degrade it; to keep it neutral or improve it. I don't know what people imagine, but what can a person do? Nearly not one person on Earth is living sustainably, maybe a few people in hunter-gatherer tribes. The rest of us are trashing the planet. I want to illustrate how far we are from dominion or stewardship. Or to activate you, the reader, I'll ask: can you draw the line from where crossed the line from dominion to trash? You've no doubt seen pictures…

Sorry to get grim, but remember as you read this post that I'm talking about abandoned property in public space. I didn't ask for it. I just found it. In my daily picking up litter, I picked up a brown paper bag sitting on a picnic table in Washington Square Park, amid some garbage from finished takeout (likely doof, but I didn't look close enough to tell) left by someone who, I guess, didn't feel like carrying their garbage to a trash can. Everything comes in disposable packaging. I find all the poisonous waste disgusting, but I seem to be a minority of approximately one. The table was in the northwest corner and it was nighttime, meaning the person who left the garbage was a…

I rarely post other people's content as the main part of my blog, but this video put together a lot of what is predicted to happen the way a few generations ago people predicted global warming and sea level rise. People doubted it not for disagreeing with the observations and predictions but because they didn't want to believe. It made them feel bad. The global economy and human population collapse, meaning billions of people dying, will make people feel bad if it happens. We're reeling from the effects of behaviors of people generations ago so what we do will keep affecting people for decades. Millennia, really. Even with all that damage locked in, there are levels of disaster and we can avoid the worst. https://youtu.be/YsA3PK8bQd8…

The Global Footprint Network posts an online calculator that tells you your footprint (the site defines the term. It's not vague.) It also shows footprints for every country. I've posted my results before, but didn't graph them, which makes them easier to see. If someone as addicted to modern life as I was could change that much, anyone can. The more resources someone has the harder to change, in my experience. People who are privileged believe it's harder for them, which makes sense. The heaviest users of something addictive tend to be the most addicted. I was. Imagine the people in the rest of the world hearing an average American suggesting how to lower their footprint. They must see the average American giving advice like…

I took another early morning walk last weekend to take pictures of our world. New York City seems intent on pushing more outdoor restaurants. They aren't the only cause of this situation, but they augment it. I'm sad anyone has to see things like this. If you want commentary, watch my videos in my post Pride Destroyed the Park. If you want to help, say by lowering litter in your area, please contact me. Systemic change begins with personal transformation. My big goal in this area is for people to stop buying packaged food and doof, the source of most of this litter, so they stop manufacturing it. (By the way, I'm pretty sure the guy next to the restaurant shed wrapped under the blanket…

I can't understand why I never see anyone picking up litter except people joining me. Do I sound like I focus too much on this issue? Look at this picture: Almost within living memory, plastic didn't exist. That scene may be in the third world, but we in the overdeveloped world are catching up. The issue isn't waste management, as the producers say, lying through their teeth. It's overproduction. As bad as that scene looks, we're increasing plastic production. That place used to be verdant and fertile, which is why people settled there. If you think that outcome can't happening where you are, you're lying to yourself as much as the producers. Can you not see your community is part of the way there? I…

Posting yesterday that Eating something healthy doesn't offset something unhealthy suggested a parallel with polluting. People dream that if they do polluting things, they can do something nonpolluting to average it out, as if carbon offsets or recycling had negative pollution that averaged with flying's positive pollution to zero pollution. Offsets don't negative pollute. They're nice, but they don't put pollution we took from underground back underground permanently. You can't undo drilling fossil fuels from underground. Maybe one day we'll be able to sequester carbon permanently, but we have no such ability today. Potential ways of doing it are far from economical or able to work on the scale we need. I edited yesterday's graphic to illustrate and clarify. It doesn't work exactly as much…

"Everyone could fit in Texas with room to spare," people naively say, as if it was the relevant measure. Sadly, some who hear them don't realize that a person needs a lot more space than just their person. They need farmland to grow their food, water to process their waste, and so on. When you factor all those things in, we need more space than exists on Earth. One big need is for animals we eat. Look at how much more animals we use and therefore take up space with than before. We dominate the Earth. Factor in again that your use of animals almost certainly relied on factory farming, which, besides its cruelty, further erodes Earth's ability to sustain life. So don't listen to…