Tag Archives: peak oil

Letter to the White House for “Advise the Advisor”

This is the long version of my response to today’s prompt on Advise the Advisor, which is about innovation: Innovation doesn’t just happen in the world of the Internet. The biggest need for American innovation exists in some of the … Continue reading

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Selecting Species for Coppice Firewood

With all the snowstorms blanketing much of the US right now, I feel a bit guilty that I’m still visiting family in Florida, where I grew up and where it is a cool 72ºF/22ºC outside.  On top of that I’m … Continue reading

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Evolution, resilience, and building “antifragile” systems

Via Ran Prieur, I’ve been directed to this post by Professor Nassim Taleb introducing the concept of “antifragility”—the property of systems to flourish in circumstances of disorder. In summary, it suggests that the opposite of fragility, the tendency to collapse … Continue reading

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Sustainability must include resilience

Sustainability — Of systems, practices, processes, or cultures, that which can be continued indefinitely without destroying the foundation of its own existence. Antonym: suicide. Resilience — adj. Of systems, practices, processes, or cultures, the ability to adapt creatively to a … Continue reading

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Remembering Why

Because I have everything to live for. Because I love nature—the feel of the warm sun and cool breeze, the miracle of green growing things, the softness of little sheep muzzles and ears, the taste of a strawberry seconds from … Continue reading

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Happy Beltane

After several rainy and changeable days, yesterday dawned bright and windy. Emerald Earth fairly vibrated with intense excitement and joy. I think even the animals were feeling it. The newly divided flock of chickenlets—older adolescents in a coop near the … Continue reading

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This is a rescue mission

(I’m appropriating the title of this post from the masturbation fantasy that was The Invisibles, by Grant Morrison.) The good news about everything that is unsustainable is that, by definition, no matter what we do, it will eventually stop. On … Continue reading

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