Exploring Humanity’s Place In the Journey of the Universe by : Yale Environment 360

• …There’s starting to be a sense now that  there’s a moral issue about degradation of the environment, that there is something here that’s larger than us, something that’s given birth to all life forms and sustains us. And if we degrade that, it’s to the degradation of future generations. So there’s an inter-generational ethic here. And there’s a new emerging ethic of responsibility to people in other parts of the world who are suffering from our actions with things like climate change, which is affecting people along coastal waters.So where is the moral force going to come from for inter-generational ethics or ethical responsibility for people in other parts of the world? It’s going to come from longer-range thinking, and that’s what the religions can contribute.

• YALE e360

The Age of Man Is Not a Disaster – NYTimes.com

• Yes, we live in the Anthropocene — but that does not mean we inhabit an ecological hell. Our management and care of natural places and the millions of other species with which we share the planet could and should be improved.

Photography in the Style of Traditional Chinese Painting by Don Hong-Oai | Retronaut

Here, photography jumps into, and, dreamily, clarifies traditional Chinese painting. The effect is startling and unique; the images create a median between a far-off reality and a composed ideal.

Preserving Singapore’s ‘Green Spine’ – Southeast Asia Real Time – WSJ

• …away from the crowds and noise is an unexpected sanctuary: a 26-kilometer, century-old defunct railway connecting Singapore to Malaysia, which environmental groups dream of turning into Singapore’s own version of New York’s High Line, the former elevated rail line that was converted into a trendy urban nature walk through Manhattan’s Meatpacking District and Chelsea neighborhoods.

  ________________________________________________________________________________

  Singapore is positioning to be “A city in the Garden”. Julia and I were there briefly, years ago, moving quickly in the blazing heat in search of shadows at midday. The Japanese and Chinese Gardens in the city center are memorable as are the traveller’s palms, sentries in front of the old Raffles Hotel. 

In Scotland’s Search for Roots, A Push to Restore Wild Lands by Caroline Fraser: Yale Environment 360 – Annotated

• As Scotland asserts its identity and its autonomy,
  environmentalists are working to restore its denuded landscape – planting native forests, creating wildlife corridors, and reintroducing species that were wiped out centuries ago.
  by caroline fraser

   

   

• … beneath the superficially peaceful surface of Scotland simmers a longstanding discontent. Politically, the country is roiled by nationalism, fully engaged in “devolution,” the process of hedged independence set in motion a decade ago, when citizens voted in 1997 

   

  …. On the ground, Scots are as restive with an Anglicized landscape as they are with Anglo rule. “Who owns Scotland?” cries Rob McMorran, coordinator of a group of activists known as the Scottish Wild Land Group.

   

• …Environmental groups are buying hunting estates to reforest; private landowners are experimenting with native planting; beaver have been reintroduced after decades of debate. Many such projects fall under the rubric of “rewilding”—the conservation method of restoring core wilderness areas, maintaining corridors between them for wildlife to migrate and disperse, and reintroducing top predators.

   

As Climate Warms, Species May Need to Migrate or Perish by Carl Zimmer: Yale Environment 360

With global warming pushing some animals and plants to the brink of extinction, conservation biologists are now saying that the only way to save some species may be to move them.

• This strategy — which goes by various names including assisted migration, assisted colonization, and, most recently, managed relocation — only emerged in the scientific literature in 2007. Over the past two years it has attracted widespread interest. A number of scientists are now investigating how they can pick new homes for endangered species and move them safely.