The world’s last great ice sheet is in the process of collapsing. This is not about climate change. It is about gravity and unstable foundations. The West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) will raise North America’s sea levels ten feet when it goes. It will shift some shorelines inland many miles. A new study sets out […]
How about a multi-billion-dollar good-news story? Science may have found a way to grow more food. It’s a source of nitrogen: bacteria that live in leaves. It may be worth a mint in new ecosystem services, which is a name for what Earth does for us by being there. Here’s the scene you need to […]
These days there’s news about the pros and cons of vaccinations. There is good news and there’s bad news. Let’s unscramble them, because we can learn from both good and bad. There is good news about ebola vaccines. Ebola is about eight times less infectious than measles but it’s far more deadly. It’s a gruesome […]
Tweedledum and Tweedledee Agreed to have a battle! Lewis Carroll (1871) ‘Our rock,’ we call it. Its tons of granite became solid some two billion years ago. Most recently―maybe ten thousand years ago―a glacier left it on the shoreline of a lake. On July 6 the spider shows up on our rock. She keeps to […]
Last week, headlines said ANTARCTIC GLACIER LOSS IS UNSTOPPABLE. Melting slowly, said the texts. It’s not a new concern. Forty years ago reinsurer Munich Re warned of such hazards. So, why now and what’s this to you? There’s more to this than meets the eye. Those glaciers are part of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. […]