2009 COPUS Year of Science
Let’s serve up a big slice of the science cake for the environment in 2009 please!
It is an indulgence to imagine that a whole year could be dedicated to solving just one of the world’s problems. Nevertheless, specific yearly themes are a good tool to help us focus. The Coalition on the Public Understanding of Science Network (COPUS) has declared 2009 as the Year of Science.
Let us hope that the lion’s share of research inspired by COPUS’s Year of Science is directed at benefiting the environment. It would be a good feeling to think that each passing day was "devoted" to such a cause. But thinking like this too long becomes mind boggling. So many leagues below the sea, and more than those above it (if the same measure can be used) are increasingly contaminated with nuclear debris, waste dumps and sunken vessels. Not to forget the space debris and some shuttles safely plunging into the outer depths of the atmosphere. One begins to think we need to dedicate not just a year but a whole Millennium to environmental science.
Never before have such new and humungous problems posed a threat to this planet.
I can’t help but wonder how different things would be now if America had not ignored the global warming problem for so long? Would the rest of the world have followed them so complacently if they had been leading us in a different direction? Thankfully those at the Kyoto summit sat up and took initiative! Had the timing been different Al Gore’s book might not have been able to ride on the crest of such a "tsunami" of fervour and conviction. The fact that "An Inconvenient Truth" was so well received all over the globe shows people want to know and understand what is going on with the environment; which until recently seemed to be unaffected by change and taken for granted.
To be a success, The Year of Science will need support from the topmost level of international politics all the way down to that of the poorest people of the developing nations. Trappings of globalization such as the internet provide the "associative fibers" to circulate information – supposedly creating a giant, diffusion of knowledge spreading wildly. Still, it often feels like the scientific facts about the environment are not getting through to the people "where the action is". Perhaps it will eventually gather like a storm in a far off ocean, responding to the frequency of a butterfly’s fluttering wings to trigger it off brewing and spewing forth.
The educated and sensitively aware minority must take advantage of 2009, and motivate the world’s population to solve the problems of environment. We can now give the world ultra-modernity minus its hazards on a large and economical scale. The tools are available as never before.
The UN Security council must play a role in this revolution. They should provide security and safe passage to those working for International environmental organisations as well as helping to establish standards of practice. Anyone working in one of these roles must be given acceptance and safe passage, even if that person is from a battle embroiled zone, in a country on which economic sanctions are imposed. Globalisation and the internet make this possible, it should be expected because the people of the world have expressed that they want their governments to support peace and a better environment for humanity to live in – not more wars!
Globalisation brings state-of-the-art technologies to poor developing countries. Several international based NGOs work to assist local adoption of technologies which can be beneficial. These programs normally have initial success, showing what is possible, but once the NGO’s go away the tangible effects vanish overnight. People remain poor, illiterate, and horribly "slummily" dependant. Western academies sometimes boast about their state-of-the-art offshore research centres, but when based in developing country the high-tech infrastructure is normally operated by cheap local labour. The standards in these facilities are not equivalent to their western counterparts.
In one instance a lab worker was thoroughly amused at a negative result, he thought this meant the experiment had failed! It is problematic and potentially dangerous to employ people in labs who do not have a scientific mindset. More comprehensive education is needed for this class of workers otherwise research will be compromised and biological hazards will inevitably escape from labs.
If proper education and discipline is not ingrained in all involved personnel, and the uninvolved public does not understand the influence of this particular education and discipline, then the global environment will be faced with a mess. Let us avoid this, let us facilitate awareness by doing a little wherever we can. It might trigger off some worthwhile action just where it counts.
Foggy is a GP and interested in writing poetry and finding solutions for environmental problems.
READ MORE_There Is A Poem Following Below:
>>……………………………………………………………………………………………….
Gary Barwin (1964-)
After Binyon
1I shall not grow old
2as the part of me that’s left
3grows old
4rage shall not weary me
5nor the damn years
6yes, and at the sunset
7in the morning
8and all afternoon
9and for much of the night
10I’ll remember me
I wonder why the poet does not just say “I’ ll remember me in times of selected solitude?”Why does he open the window to Time outside, in its moments of intense appeal and glory,as significant in his mention of-”sunset;afternoon;morning and night times?”
It is at these times that a person seeks his own company to imbibe the taste of Creation.To know his own feelings and thoughts;it is that moment of introspection,when he enters a bond with Nature,relishing the scenarios of hope and freshness of morning.Here he comes to know of what he truly likes or dislikes, as he makes his appointment with these timings till reaching the wonder of nightfall, which makes him discover his tru self.The secret, that intricate calibration in his cognition which correctly measures the surroundings-living or inanimate, against his tru desires,wants and demands of his intellect.
This crystal clear apex of psychology can only be achieved,if Meditation receives an unpolluted earth atmosphere;to reveal the pristine glory of the times specified to inspire him to remember himself in the bygone days.
Now here are some beautiful ways to help one appreciate the poet’ s aesthetic sense;
http://www.bing.com/search?q=poems+about+morning&src=IE-SearchBox&FORM=IE8SRC
http://www.bing.com/search?q=poems+about+afternoons&src=IE-SearchBox&FORM=IE8SRC
http://photobucket.com/images/night%20sky/
http://www.bing.com/search?q=night+sky+fotographs&src=IE-SearchBox&FORM=IE8SRC
ENJOY!
foggy
June 6, 2009 at 3:46 pm
computer for a drudge of a dredge work!
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/16/science/earth/16dredge.html
G.E. Begins to Dredge Hudson for PCBs
Posted: 04 Jun 2009 05:25 AM PDT
After long battle, E.P.A. and G.E. begin a cleanup of PCB hot spots on the Hudson River. Hot spots of PCBS are mapped by GPS, and a dredge barge scoops up chunks of river mud putting it into a hopper barge, to be sent on to nearby processing facility and then, eventually, transported 2,000 mile on a train ride to a Texas hazardous waste dump. By ANDREW C. REVKIN