Have you Heard of Global Warming? | Apparently 60% of Providence Hasn’t | Simple Solutions | Turn off Your Idling Engines

Make America Cool Again

You know that Facebook post in which the kid in the car seat is sobbing about the fact that people are killing animals and causing harm, well I’m feeling that way, except that the emotional devastation is being channelled into anger.

Although I had already heard that various oil companies had known of the dangers of extracting and burning petroleum…it wasn’t until I read this article two days ago
“Losing Earth: The Decade We Almost Stopped Climate Change” By Nathaniel Rich
Photographs and Videos by George Steinmetz
….that laid it all out so clearly, that I feel fully incensed.

As I bicycle by idling cars continually and witness the complete disconnect – lack of awareness among the people, I realize that they are completely unaware.

My feeling of exasperation is not going away.

In fact, after talking to a German woman I overhead speaking German today on the sidewalk, walking with her three kids produced clearly through marriage of mixed race, that of course, Germans do not leave their engines idling, they are aware of how their individual and thus collective actions affect the environment.

It occurred to me today that the reason I came here was to encounter this. Coming from the outside and looking in, after having lived in several European cultures in which walking and gathering in public outside of their cars, is extremely more common. Americans are isolationists. They are spoiled. They feel entitled. They seem to be clueless. The technologies (which I use for contact) are pulling them away from an awareness of their connectedness to their immediate present environment. I see students passing by in the neighborhood housing the Ivy League Brown university walking around with heads buried in their cell phones. Incapable of walking without it being in their hand to perpetually be connected to FB or whatever.

This blog is born however from witnessing the exorbitant number of people I pass by sitting in their cars with their engines idling. I’ve asked individuals, have you heard of global warming? 1% respond with recognition. I don’t think that I’m exaggerating.

United States of Addiction, United States of Avoidance

How many times do people reach for their cell phone to avoid eye contact? Inconclusive at this point, but clearly apparent. What about rates of food, drug and alcohol addiction?

With reference to the media or governments’ lack of response, talk about betrayal. The article is long, yet methodically lays out the facts of recognition and then a series of doing nothing, if anything, exacerbating the problem by denying that it exists, discovered over one hundred and fifty years ago.

It was fully understood and undeniably something to act on through diligent awareness, but put aside for business as usual.

US Government administrationss Misleading Public over 50 years regarding the connection between petroleum extraction and burning and subsequent climate catastrophe

in addition to polluting the immediate environment, idling cars and indiscriminate use of plastics are collectively suffocating the planet

This is the letter that I am still attempting to send within the ‘form within the RI governor’s office website’, which doesn’t allow specific characters – like email addresses – to be incorporated in the body of the automated system.

Climate change is real, enforce laws against idling engines to generate income.

This article should be required reading for someone running a US State government office. I have been riding bicycle every day and night for the last 13 weeks throughout the city of Providence, RI. I have discovered that no matter where I go – regardless of age, gender, race, socio economic class (in fact it seems to be more pronounced among middle class professionals), 60% to 80% or more of the population are habitually sitting in their cars with their engines idling. This is not for a quick pickup, but for sustained periods, leaving their engines running. I encounter, regardless of district or neighborhood, a startling number of cars, per block, per minute, with people sitting in their cars, or on top of their cars, or walking away from their vehicles, with their engine left idling. Perpetually running engines. I feel the heat as I cycle by and smell the fumes.

There appears to be a complete unawareness among the population of the fact

1) That global warming exists at all, and is happening all over the planet, today, every minute.
2) And that people in Providence (collectively), indeed affect the air quality of not only other people and animals (if they still exist) in the immediate vicinity of their vehicle as well as what is happening ecologically on other parts of the globe, where warming has already been apparent for the last decade.

What is going on?

• 31 other US states have anti-idling legislation; either statewide or in a particular municipality or county
• The NYC metropolitan area have $2,000 fines per bus if caught idling.
• Citizens in Germany and Scandinavian countries turn off their engines, ALWAYS, some even during red lights. They are completely cognizant of the ecological emergency and climate crisis, with which the United States is perpetually not dealing with, regardless of the fact that we are the primary perpetrators of this crime to humanity and to all other life forms and systems that also inherited the planet.

What are you going to do about it?

It is unconscionable that this is happening and no one is doing anything (except for the scientists and individuals aware who are perhaps silently suffering in the understanding of continued political deadlocks and misinformation due to participating in an economic system based on perpetual growth and profit that has already killed 87% of the other species and will have large swaths of the US turned into a dustbowl and submerge most coastal cities under water.

This is not an economic issue, this is above economics or the Gross Domestic Product.

This is about whether we want to take steps ourselves, together, to do what our federal government has not been able to achieve, and in fact submerges, suppresses and turns a blind eye.

Human actions are creating an inhospitable planet for most other life forms through blind, headlong consumption and a complete disconnection with the natural world and blind faith in advertising and manipulation.

We are destroying the habitats of most life forms on the planet, and simply turning a blind eye. It is your responsibility as a leader, to take measures to impose legislations that will raise the awareness of idling and censure the actions of your populace.

https://sustainableamerica.org/blog/anti-idling-laws-around-the-nation/

https://www.edf.org/attention-drivers-turn-your-idling-engines

http://ksltv.com/394228/students-test-ozone-levels-cars-idle-schools/?

Officially the population of Providence is 179,300. 60 to 70 percent of the people who are in their vehicles, leave their engine on. Let’s say 60% of the inhabitants regularly sit in their vehicles with their engines idling = that’s about 107,500 people.

A fine to cars for idling of $50 x 107,500 residents = $5,375,000. That’s 5 million. Fines to diesel engines – city, state and independent contractors caught idling could be $200 + per vehicle. Fines for cutting down trees, $1,000, for endangering other creatures’ habitats through negligence or pollutants, ranging from $300 per individual to $10,000’s per business.

If nothing else, imposing fines would be a deterrent, and would immediately alert and inform people of their participation in increasing global temperatures and carbon monoxide levels, contributing to the continued increase CO2 levels and global temperatures rising to levels that in 30 years could prohibit human life. If citizens are not informed of this through education or the media outlets, it is your responsibility as a leader to recognize the crisis, and to enforce education and implementation of penalties as deterrents. Ecocide and homicide continues to take place, by ignoring the issue. Fines to coal and petroleum companies, could be in the $100, millions.

India planted 1.5 Million trees in 12 hours, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/india-plant-66-million-trees-12-hours-environment-campaign-madhya-pradesh-global-warming-climate-a7820416.html by creating the possibility and enforcing it, certainly in a manner that brought people together to do something that will benefit each.

We could have many simple solutions through seemingly small actions, in steps that could make an enormous difference. Such as;

asking people to turn off their air conditioning units (except for hospitals and care facilities) – 3 days of the week – as a starter.
To attempt car pooling, public transportation, bicycling or walking several days of the week
To authorize penalties to the use of plastics
Create jobs for people to educate people about plastics
To inform people about how their participation in using plastics and idling cars are collectively suffocating the planet in addition to polluting the immediate environment

Measures could be taken globally to do this together as the human race, instead of being in competition with one another in terms of a race to increase the GDP.

With the fines, you could use the money to pay a fleet of bicycle cops to enforce the law and establish a safe bicycle infrastructure in various municipalities and between them as well as money to invest in public transportation.

After approaching people individually, talking to the mayor, sending a letter to the mayor’s office, talking to someone in a state legislative office to convey the message about the need to enact legislation to raise peoples awareness, I find it necessary to contact the governor.

Let’s do this together and make America a global leader in dealing with a crisis that we have alone caused, instead of turning a blind eye.

https://digesthis.wordpress.com/2014/09/30/peoples-climate-march-in-nyc-ww-september-21st-2014-flood-wall-street/

Rising Tide of Awareness blogger talking about Great Pacific Garbage Patch at NYC Climate March 2014

All Life Has Consciousness | Carl Safina | Are Humans Capable of Letting Other Life Continue?

There is Love on Earth Besides Humans

Carl Safina, PhD in ecology, conservationist and writer

I am very grateful to have discovered Carl Safina’s work and this TED talk just a day previous to posting this. Tears ran down my cheeks as I watched and listened to this scientist’s portrayal of animals, and of humans. Tears continued to stream from my eyes after I listened to his last words. I am so disappointed and basically frustrated with what humans deem as important.

I was about to write a blog about Borders? Why are Human Beings ‘Not Allowed’ to Walk Around on the Earth? However, to me, putting this concept out there of recognizing the importance of all other life forms besides humans, is far more important than the absurd political scenarios that humans impose on one another. What we are doing to the natural world and to other life forms, with our over-population, degradation of the environment, human-induced global warming and inciting a mass extinction, to me, far outweighs any of the absurd things that humans are doing to each other. Carl Safina does not by any means bypass this subject in his talk. He says, what humans do to other empathetic creatures is also what they do to one another.

Animals Carl Safina Empathy Sympathy Compassion

I felt an urgent need to immediately post this to both blogs. I feel very sorry for those humans who do not feel compassion and awe with nature and all of life. I thank my parents that nature and an appreciation for all life forms was revered. I grew up with National Geographic and Smithsonian magazines in the home, and was curated to think way beyond my immediate vicinity.

I recently lauded friends who regularly inform and urge people to think about the protection of animals and wilderness. I mention this in association with a concept that is part of a new mode of thinking, systems thinking, seeing all life forms as interrelated. Human beings should prioritize protecting all other life forms, rather than destroying them and wiping out their habitats without any consideration whatsoever. The various bloody traditions of various cultures that consider it ‘sport’ to kill wolves, whales, bulls is disgraceful. The massive consumption of cows, pigs, chickens and use of land to feed these animals needs to be stopped. Wiping out wild horses and donkeys and other creatures because some believe that by eating particular speciality foods that they somehow will maintain their health or erections, also are dramatically mis-informed. Creatures penned in horrible conditions, blood baths and slaughters because of tradition, must all be reconsidered. People need to be educated. It begins with all of us communicating to one another.

The concept of actually recognizing that we share the same genetics and similar brains and spinal cords with other creatures perhaps will bring about a different sense of empathy.

It is the Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh who introduces the concept of inter-being; all life is intricately related.

With a PhD in ecology, conservationist and writer Carl Safina has written several books and papers and has studied various species in their habitat. He was invited by Greenpeace to witness the changing climate in the Arctic and the impacts of industrial fishing on the marine environment.

Human brain exact replica of Chimpanzee brain, merely larger

Dolphin brain larger than human brain, with more convolutions

In his TED talk Safina asks:

“What’s going on inside the brains of animals? Can we know what, or if, they’re thinking and feeling? Carl Safina thinks we can. Using discoveries and anecdotes that span ecology, biology and behavioral science, he weaves together stories of whales, wolves, elephants and albatrosses to argue that just as we think, feel, use tools and express emotions, so too do the other creatures – and minds – that share the Earth with us.”

Animals Carl Safina Albatross nest on most remote islands Full of Plastic

6 month fledgling Albatross Death packed with cigarette lighters

Of the 22 species of albatross recognized by the IUCN, all are listed as at some level of concern; 3 species are Critically Endangered, 5 species are Endangered, 7 species are Near Threatened, and 7 species are Vulnerable.

Welcome Human Life with pics of Animals – Shared Lifes in the World

Since humans tend to adorn the rooms of their new born babies with images of the other creatures with which we share our planet, in which every animal of Noah’s Ark is now in mortal danger, instead of asking the question Do animals love us?, We need to ask, Are human beings capable of letting other life continue?

Carl Safina states, “From all I’ve seen, my main conclusion is that at this point in history, nature and human dignity require each other. Where wild places are destroyed, wild animals lost, and the world degraded and polluted, not only is that itself a great loss for the world, but for people in degraded places it becomes almost impossible to maintain a dignified existence.”

This article in the USA Today describes that global warming continues, with each year breaking record temperatures of the previous.”NOAA’s analysis does not include data from the Arctic, while NASA’s does, NOAA climate scientist Deke Arndt said. The Arctic has been warming faster than any part of the world.”

“This announcement should shock no one,” said Lou Leonard of the World Wildlife Fund. “The key question is what we do about it. With the costs of inaction piling up, Washington, D.C., is largely looking the other way. So it is up to a new class of leaders from American businesses, universities, cities and states to pick up the slack.”

Elephants as in every other species, become who they are

Carol Keiter aka nomadbeatz welcomes donations for her writing, photography, illustrations, eBook & music composition

Emotionally Stunning video ‘Canuck & I’ Explores the Bond Between A Crow and His Human

I found this video through one of the Facebook groups which I hold sacred ‘The More Beautiful World’.

Canuck and I Bond between Crow and Human Audubon

‘Canuck & I’ Explores the Bond Between A Crow and His Human

Now I know why I chose to make another espresso and stay ‘home’ to watch this, prior to going out with my laptop to visit some places, print new cards, sit in a cafe to work on my book and new music.

It’s because I mentioned on Facebook when posting this that I already had tears in my eyes before knowing anything about it, and well, I had tears flowing down my face the entire 20 minutes.

My mother would easily tear up expressing emotion. I simply love animals so much. There is such a vast universe, well, in this case, planet filled with fish and mammals in the seas and animals and birds from tropical forests to deserts.

Humans can be so much more. Our lives can be enriched so, so much more by opening them moment to moment and valuing all of the creatures that we share this planet with, ALIVE.

Hopefully sharing this video will bring warmth, loving feelings, compassion and a desire to protect the habitats of the magnificent species with whom we share this planet.

Walk more, bicycle more, have less children, aim for education to share empowering stories more and buy and consume less. Living healthier and happier lives by living more simply and feeling gratitude and authentic joy from doing things that empower ourselves and one another, will reduce the dependence on needing more money, pharmaceutical companies, insurance and automobile manufacturers, psychiatrists, and help to alleviate addictions… 🙂

Carol Keiter le_blogger, writer & illustrator, musician & composer

Carol Keiter aka nomadbeatz welcomes donations for her writing, photography, illustrations, eBook & music composition

Carol Keiter aka nomadbeatz welcomes donations for her writing, photography, illustrations, eBook & music composition

Greed & Profit-driven Aims to Protect Wealth & Power = Path of Destruction

This blog was incited by having read a comment on someone’s Facebook page, regarding a man’s decision to NOT give a TED Talk, because he wouldn’t be paid.

The idea of some kind of monetary compensation for presenting a TED talk never occurred to me. Of the many excellent presentations I’ve seen, shouldn’t the fact that one’s ideas are considered worthy enough to present them to an audience of potentially hundreds of millions of people, suffice? I was under the impression that the point of TED Talks is to spread ideas, for the good of humanity and all of the other species that cohabit this planet. Through the education and perspective I personally received through my family heritage and genetics, I have been granted a great deal of wealth; health, intelligence, analytical skills and an abundance of creativity. On top of that, I am physically fit, allowing me to move through this world unencumbered. I have education and knowledge, and the resourcefulness and curiosity to obtain more. Yet, I am teetering on the edge of financial poverty. Not because of poor planning, but because of my adventurous spirit combined with idealism, which leads to risk-taking. The wisdom I follow is from those who genuinely care about humanity and all of the other species with whom we share this planet. People like Albert Einstein, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King, Jr., Carl Gustav Jung, Deepak Chopra among others, including the wisdom coming from Native American Indians and literary and spiritual guides from the Middle East and Asia. I wish to continually create possibilities to learn and develop my skills, to be the best that I can be in order to give something back to the world. Reading about a person complaining because the TED talk doesn’t pay the presenter, irked me. It made me stop everything else, to comment. It ignited the fuse of my annoyance regarding the injustices I see presently in the world today.

Our world is corrupted by money, and the greed and drive of people to make a profit and protect their power, no matter the consequences. It is the large, incorporated manufacturers of the world, those who have invested in the extraction and transport of non-renewable energy, telecommunications, technology, pharmaceutical industries and those who control information, that often are responsible for the careless and myopic profit-making, resulting in the path of destruction of the environment and eradication of many of the species. The imbalance of wealth, lack of education and instability of the planet (human industry-induced global warming) are all a result of this misplaced greed of a small percentile. The vast majority of people and species, are all suffering from overpopulation and economic misfortune, driven by sustained ignorance.

Many of the scientists, teachers, artists and people with creative insights and ideas who genuinely help to guide people and make the world a better place, are NOT the movers and shakers. Presently, the “leaders” of the United States government are not elected for their insight and desire to do good and justly represent the people, they are corporate sponsored actors who tug the line, speak the voice of those who place them in these positions, for an inflationary cost that is disproportionate to what democratically chosen elections should cost. In the world today, those who have more wealth, are more easily able to carve paths that slide around the rules that everyone else must follow, making deductions, avoiding taxes through all sorts of loopholes, while the vast majority are just getting by. I am absolutely disgusted with the idea of people protecting their wealth and power, at the cost of others.

Malala Yousafzai

Do you think that Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani girl who passionately wants to improve the condition of women in Pakistan, by voicing the right of girls to receive an education (which will ripple to affect many other parts of the world) who was shot by the Taliban because of her courage and honesty, is driven by profit? I could go on, but I’ll share this in another forum – my own blog, for which incidentally, I earn absolutely no money, but am driven by my own passion to recirculate ideas and events, purely because of their value and the wish to share. Thank fucking DOG, because even the concept of GOD, by most religions, has been distorted and compelled by those wishing to sustain their wealth and power.

Obama pledges to combat poaching elephants | If humans are so smart, why do we act so stupidly?

Or shall I say, why do human beings act so irreverently towards the earth and the creatures with whom we share our planet? I’ve written in a former blog about the plight of elephants and rhinoceros due to poaching https://carolkeiter.wordpress.com/2013/02/28/battle-for-the-elephants-documentary-speaks-louder-than-words/

Elephants in Africa

You can read World Wildlife Fund’s article about Obama’s pledge to fight against wildlife crime.
http://worldwildlife.org/stories/obama-pledges-support-to-stop-wildlife-crime-in-africa?utm_source=wildwire&utm_medium=email&utm_content=july2013&utm_campaign=wildlife-trade

I’m honored that Obama has shown his concern and taken action to defend the rights of other species with whom we share this planet. He recognizes the delicate process required to affect change. It’s an integrated system that has to be dismantled. The actual poachers have a quasi militaristic/mafia type organization with sophisticated weapons and transport. Barack Obama as well as Hillary Clinton and others realize that not only does money need to be infused into local economies to combat this problem, but also education. The way to counter this criminal warfare against elephants and other species which inhabit this earth, is to withdraw the incentive; use money and programs to leverage against the poaching operations. Since the indigenous inhabitants of areas of Africa where this poaching exists are lured because of its financial rewards, the people need to be educated about the true worth of these creatures (as opposed to ivory torn from a dead elephant) and enticed with incentives to no longer have interest in poaching. For example, if programs would become available to guide people into ways of conserving water, land, reveal alternative types of farming, growing, building, and display renewable ways of generating energy, etc. and showing the true benefits and appreciation of real ‘live’ elephants (i.e. their uniqueness and intelligence) the people would no longer feel the need or desire to engage in this trade that destroys their treasures. By creating means for local people to help themselves and learn techniques to live more prosperously and harmoniously in their environment, they will be less inclined to ‘sell out’. Certainly part of this investment Obama pledges will also need to go into educating people on the ‘buyers’ end, who want ivory for various reasons. Though the demand for ivory carved for ornamentation or for alleged cures may be ingrained in generations (or over millennia) of people in China and other parts of Asia, the world is a different place now. Our world suffers from over population for one thing. And in this post industrial era, desires of the past need to be reassessed. It is no longer okay to plow through acres of forests, wetlands, to dump toxins into water supplies, or to act in any other careless ways that obviously damage or obliterate pristine environments, just because there may be profit in it for someone. Whereas somehow actions such as these were overlooked or tolerated when the earth seemed to offer an endless supply of abundance of everything, we now know that this is far from the truth.

As our technological advancements have increased our knowledge of the world and extended our reach to every corner of the globe, we have effectively shrunken our world to within reach of a click. Many of the things that we produce to make our lives easier and more convenient have made a dramatically negative impact on our environment. We can no longer blindly pretend that our actions don’t have consequences; drilling for oil, fracking, dredging, coal mining all affect the delicate balance within the ecosystems where these procedures happen. Our production of tools and toys have repercussions affecting everything around us; i.e. superfund sites (designated toxic waste areas) speckle the areas where high tech production of computers and electronic gadgets takes place. Many of these are out of sight, yet can’t be ignored; we can’t discount the consequences that affect air and water quality, environmental health, the dramatic increase in extreme weather (storms, draughts, fires) and the physical and mental health of human beings. We have continued to scourge the earth in the last 60 years. Despite all of our sophisticated high-tech gadgets, the human condition is dramatically out of balance and morally bankrupt. Our emotional and psychological insights haven’t evolved in the same exponentially rapid pace as our technological knowledge. Smart devices have outsmarted human relations. We have machines that talk to us, and yet neighboring countries or rivaling ethnic groups still haven’t mastered the ability to talk through their feuds. Yet what is more savage than warfare against our fellow humans, is the fact that our modern luxuries and expectations coupled with overpopulation and negligence towards other species, means that in the not so distant future, the plethora of creatures who inhabit this earth, of which we are the guardians, will be gone. Massive extinction precipitated by ignorance, greed, short-sidedness and a complete lack of reverence for life. It will no doubt ultimately precipitate the decimation of our own species, by playing too recklessly with the delicate balance of our ecosystem.

Ironically, it is primarily modern ‘civilized’ man of the ‘developed world’ who is responsible for so dramatically destroying the health of our planet and annihilating an alarming number of creatures. There is something glaringly uncivilized about the way in which we have continued on this path of environmental destruction and species irradiation, without having empathy for our fellow man and fellow inhabitants of this planet. As one observes the hierarchy of predators and prey in all species, nature reveals that it is the strong that survive. My question is, if we human beings are so intelligent, with our abstract thinking and rational thought, what has gone so glaringly wrong? Perhaps there’s something very lopsided and obviously missing, when merely measuring the standard IQ, intelligence quotient. We have been fatally disregarding emotional intelligence (EQ) in this equation, and for that matter, an empathetic quotient. It seems to be pretty clear that actions strictly driven by economic motives and consuming, is where we continually go wrong. We need to make more ‘conscious’ assessments about how each of our thoughts and actions affect and ripple throughout our entire environment. Considering that this incredibly beautiful planet with its inextricably interwoven life forms is our only home, to not act responsibly is criminal. If human beings are so ‘gifted’ and the most intelligent species, why have we done more damage to all of life than any other species? What is missing, that we have been so tragically unconscious and acted so unconscionably towards the miraculous ‘gift’ of life? “Don’t destroy what you can’t create.”