I didn’t think of how small my building’s elevators were when I bought a sofa after moving into my current apartment. It didn’t fit. The deliverymen tried to bring it up the stairs too. They made the first landing, but couldn’t make the turn to go up the next flight. They had to take it back. I ended up paying a $300 restocking fee plus big tips for the deliverymen’s[…] Keep reading →

Here’s an exercise I’ve enjoyed playing around with. I’ve written in other posts that the sustainable population of the Earth is 3.7 billion. I’ve read other reports that it’s more like 2 billion. The number depends on the standard of living we choose, how much we wreck the Earth on the way to sustainability (it could go to zero), and other factors. I don’t know why people want a bigger[…] Keep reading →

Everyone knows we can’t use fossil fuels sustainably. The future means living without them. But the sun doesn’t always shine and the wind doesn’t always blow. Fusion may never work. Fission has huge problems that its proponents downplay but never go away. I recommend Caltech-trained UCSD physics professor and podcast guest Tom Murphy‘s assessment in his recent book that does the math on nuclear’s challenges. So what do we do[…] Keep reading →

This headline, Goodwill Doesn’t Want Your Broken Toaster, reminding me of my recent post that lines to dump worthless junk on Goodwill are often longer than the lines to buy it prompted me to post an idea I’ve had for a long time but for some reason haven’t posted. Pollution on the Earth is obesity on our bodies, manifesting our values and behaviors in different places. This: is this: The[…] Keep reading →

You may remember a couple years ago the headlines that we have about ten years to bring our greenhouse emissions to zero or we’d pass irreversible milestones. If we start thawing permafrost that releases methane, we won’t be able to stop it from releasing huge amounts that will augment the warming that caused its release. Many people misinterpret the prediction to say that we’ll all die then. We won’t all[…] Keep reading →

I saw a TEDx talk on population where the speaker spoke thoughtfully and persuasively on overpopulation. I consider the topic among the most important on the environment, yet nearly no one talks about it, so I had to find out who she was and invite her to the podcast. She turned out to be a huge celebrity. Most people who talk about population are academics, at least in my experience.[…] Keep reading →

I saw a TEDx talk on population where the speaker spoke thoughtfully and persuasively on overpopulation. I consider the topic among the most important on the environment, yet nearly no one talks about it, so I had to find out who she was and invite her to the podcast. She turned out to be a huge celebrity. Most people who talk about population are academics, at least in my experience.[…] Keep reading →