Category: Passionate About

  • Permaculture and Me

    I am pleased to announce that I have just returned from the spectacular Vancouver Island to the also spectacular, if colder, Cape Breton Island, bearing a new Certificate in Permaculture Design: I can’t tell you how excited I am to show you this. Also, isn’t it pretty? A couple of weeks ago, I undertook the…

  • Science is not Technology

    Consider this to have the word, “Draft” as a watermark. Ask many questions; it will help me flesh it out. This will eventually be expanded to be a mini-chapter in the book I’m working on, and if I don’t take this leap, it will spend the rest of my life in limbo. Which would be…

  • The Wonder of the Heavens

    My entire life would have been different if it weren’t for the constellation of Orion. It was the signpost that arose in my life saying, “Astronomy! Over here!” I don’t remember much in the years before I saw Orion (I was about 10 at the time), but from that point on, every birthday and Christmas…

  • Greenwashing of the Week

    I am hereby bestowing my illustrious “Greenwashing” award, which will be noted by at least 50 people, to the company Future Shop, for their not-quite-stated Earth Day flyer. It is hard for me to write this, because they have pulled off the most creative and effective form of greenwashing, namely, making a significant financial contribution…

  • Sunk Costs – More About Nuclear Power

    Edit: It occurs to me that I neglected to mention that I used to work in the nuclear field. Just in case that might be relevant to whether you are going to write me off as a crank, or something. Not that I’m not cranky. But I’m an informed crank. *** Also known as, “Throwing…

  • On Uranium – Briefly

    Can nuclear power get us out of this mess? I am working on a series on nuclear power for the near future, but I’m totally tipping my hand by starting with uranium supplies. The International Atomic Energy Association’s projections in 2000 showed possible shortages as early as the late 2020’s/early 2030’s if there were dramatic…

  • Gluons Make me Dance

    Why teaching about gluons made me hop up and down in front of a class of undergraduates.