From Mother Jones:

In 2012—after writers for National Review and a prominent conservative think tank accused him of fraud and compared him to serial child molester Jerry Sandusky—climate scientist Michael Mann took the bold step of filing a defamation suit. The defendants moved to have the case thrown out, citing a Washington, DC, law that shields journalists from frivolous litigation. But on Wednesday, DC Superior Court Judge Frederick Weisberg rejected the motion, opening the way for a trial.

According to Guardian, Mann’s lawsuit was tossed out:

The litigation targets two writers: Rand Simberg, analyst at the rightwing thinktank Competitive Enterprise Institute, who published a piece comparing Mann to a convicted serial child molester, and the National Review blogger Mark Steyn, who in a blogpost favorably quoted Simberg and called Mann’s research “fraudulent”. (Mann originally went after both publishers as well, but in 2021 a court ruled that neither the Competitive Enterprise Institute nor National Review could be held responsible for the attacks.)

Seems a bit fucked up that Competitive Enterprise Institute (an extremist right-wing lobby that pushes climate denial propaganda) was let off the hook for defamation. But yet a person working for CEI (Rand Simberg) can still be accountable for defamation. Is this a perverse side-effect of #CitizensUnited, I wonder?

Glad Michael Mann got justice but CEI should have taken the hit AFAICT.

#Chevron (an ALEC member), #Delta Airlines, and #ExxonMobil are obvious and expected. But ~58% of ~300 should yield a bigger boycott list than just those.

If someone could please unjail the PDF of this research and post it somewhere, it’d be much appreciated. The linked article leads to:

https://influencemap.org/briefing/The-State-of-Net-Zero-Greenwash-24402

which leads to:

https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/high-level-expert-group

but the UN site is access restricted, apparently blocking Tor. And worse, the UN is also blocking archive.org!

https://web.archive.org/web/20240205080224/https://www.un.org/sites/un2.un.org/files/high-level_expert_group_n7b.pdf

^ that’s a 403 error.

If you incorporate these ingredients in your cooking, your left-overs will last longer:

• honey
• salt
• garlic
• sugar (only in high amounts according to feedback; small amounts shortens the life)
• ginger
• sage
• rosemary
• sage
• mustard
• cumin

Additionally from other articles:

• black pepper
• mustard seed
• turmeric
• cinnamon
• cardamom
• cloves

Acids mentioned by others:

• vinegar
• citric acid
• lemon/lime juice

I just had some harissa get moldy after just a couple weeks in a jar in the fridge. I was surprised. I suppose it implies a lack of the above ingredients.

Originally posted here but was locked without explanation. Cross-posted in !climate_lm@slrpnk.net to escape narrative-control-driven muzzling, in case anyone wants to comment further.

Most people are unwilling to change their lifestyle significantly in the face of climate catastrophe. In particular:

• refusal to alter their diet
• refusal to ditch their car

Even the idea of simply stopping livestock subsidies is fiercely fought because people would still consider an absence of intervention to be lifestyle intereference. People are hostile toward the idea of changing their commuting and teleworking habits. In the democratic stronghold in California, even democrats voted out a democrat who tried to impose a fuel tax because they are resistant to giving up their car. Examples are endless.

the dominant excuse→ “carbon footprint is a BP invention”

The high-level abstract principle that underpins resistance to taking individual actions is the idea that because the “carbon footprint” was coined by BP in an effort to shift blame, people think (irrationally) that the wise counter move is to not take individual action. Of course this broken logic gives the oil companies exactly what they want: inaction. This has become the dominant excuse people use for not changing their lifestyle.

psilocybin

The deep psychology surrounding the problem is cognitive rigidity-- unwillingness of people to adjust their lifestyles. So how do you make people more open-minded and increase their psychological flexibility? One mechanism is psilocybin, which has been shown induce neuroplasticity and free people from stubborn thinking. It’s a long article but the relevant bit is this:

(click to expand)

The effects of mindfulness training and psychedelic intervention on psychological flexibility

Mindfulness practices encourage individuals to respond to all kinds of experiences, whether positive or negative, without judgment and with openness which fosters psychological flexibility [90]. This acceptance aligns with psychological flexibility's core components, enabling individuals to act by their values even in the presence of challenging emotions [79, [91]. Psychedelics, on the other hand, can lead to profound insights into personal values, and in this way enhance psychological flexibility [92].

Both methods encourage individuals to embrace uncertainty and change, a fundamental aspect of psychological flexibility. Psychological flexibility involves moving beyond limitations imposed by thoughts and emotions. Mindfulness training teaches individuals to observe their thoughts without attachment, reducing cognitive rigidity. Psychedelics often induce experiences that challenge pre-existing beliefs, allowing individuals to transcend the constraining influence of self-concepts and through this way promote adaptability and open-mindedness [3, 38]. Both offer avenues to increased psychological flexibility by fostering acceptance, values alignment, embracing uncertainty, and challenging ego boundaries. Integrating mindfulness skills and psychedelic insights holds promise for sustained psychological flexibility by facilitating a balanced response to internal and external stimuli, and adaptive responses to life's challenges [93].

Other studies have shown increased neuroplasticity through meditation. In any case, we could use a less stubborn population.

Not just for climate, but consider the pandemic where conservatives (by definition the champions of stubbornness) refused to make even the slightest lifestyle change and fought every act of remediation. A population with a higher degree of psychological flexibility would be better to react to changes of any kind.

This bbc episode covers an area of Portugal that’s said to be ideal for off-grid living, at least in part due to being sufficiently south to have plenty of sun light.

Most people are unwilling to change their lifestyle significantly in the face of climate catastrophe. In particular:

• refusal to alter their diet
• refusal to ditch their car

Even the idea of simply stopping livestock subsidies is fiercely fought because people would still consider an absence of intervention to be lifestyle intereference. People are hostile toward the idea of changing their commuting and teleworking habits. In the democratic stronghold in California, even democrats voted out a democrat who tried to impose a fuel tax because they are resistant to giving up their car. Examples are endless.

the dominant excuse→ “carbon footprint is a BP invention”

The high-level abstract principle that underpins resistance to taking individual actions is the idea that because the “carbon footprint” was coined by BP in an effort to shift blame, people think (irrationally) that the wise counter move is to not take individual action. Of course this broken logic gives the oil companies exactly what they want: inaction. This has become the dominant excuse people use for not changing their lifestyle.

psilocybin

The deep psychology surrounding the problem is cognitive rigidity-- unwillingness of people to adjust their lifestyles. So how do you make people more open-minded and increase their psychological flexibility? One mechanism is psilocybin, which has been shown induce neuroplasticity and free people from stubborn thinking. It’s a long article but the relevant bit is this:

Other studies have shown increased neuroplasticity through meditation. In any case, we could use a less stubborn population.

Not just for climate, but consider the pandemic where conservatives (by definition the champions of stubbornness) refused to make even the slightest lifestyle change and fought every act of remediation. A population with a higher degree of psychological flexibility would be better to react to changes of any kind.

Asking the gov to proactively shrink or limit animal products is a non-starter because there are just too many (voting) consumers who would be outraged. It would be political suicide. Same for cars. Forcing car owners out of cars would be political suicide as well.

But what I find baffling is there seems to be no chatter about the fact that the US gov gives (millions?) in subsidies to livestock farmers. And Europe gives tax breaks for “commercial” cars (mischaracterized personal cars). If the gov were to end the subsidies, there could be no reasonable complaint that the gov is interfering. Because in fact the gov would be ending their intervention.

I have noticed that some posts on some Lemmy instances created by others have successfully made use of the details/summary tags which gives an arrow that expands.

When I tried it here, the tags are just literally printed. Am I doing something wrong (i.e. stupid user error), or is this functionality instance or version dependent?

The Amish are often thought to object to the use of electricity, but actually they only have a problem with the grid due to being interconnected with the outside world. They use solar, wind, generators (fossil fuel based), and various other clever hacks.

IIUC, there’s a self-reliance value going on. The grid makes it quite unclear who provides the energy from where, and being reliant on unknown entities outside the village is a non-starter for the Amish.

But what about within the village? I get the impression the Amish are quite okay with transactions and interconnectedness within a village. So my question is - do they ever have a village-wide micro grid? Or even shared power between a couple households? Or are each of them always off-grid on a per-household basis?

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/4118072

Consumerism is part of the climate problem and perhaps more so a waste disposal problem. Consumerism probably cannot be stopped but it can be reduced. It’s disturbing in the current climate that #BlackFriday still exists. To encourage the kick-off of mass consumption a month before Christmas likely does a lot damage.

I suppose cancelling Black Friday would be impossible in the US (where I suspect it started). A large number of democrats would oppose it and probably every single republican in the US would fight to their death an anti-consumerism action like that.

But what about Europe? Doesn’t Belgium and Netherlands restrict store-wide sales to just two weeks or so out of the year? For Europe, perhaps instead of cancelling it (which many would view as over-interventionist) they could double the VAT rates on that day on clothes and electronics. IDK.. that’s probably crazy talk. Ideas welcome. There’s no real issue with sales on services, but consumption of goods is where the damage is done.

I hate the idea that one of the most environmentally reckless companies in the world (#Amazon) gets a huge boost in sales on Black Friday. It makes the day depressing to see the masses rush to enrich a company they should be boycotting all year. I loved Black Friday back in the days when I was a loose cannon consumerist myself. Now it’s just a shit day where I deliberately avoid shops in order to not support it.

UPDATE

To be clear, I would not propose cancelling the unofficial holiday US employers often give on Black Friday. Just the sales.

Consumerism is part of the climate problem and perhaps more so a waste disposal problem. Consumerism probably cannot be stopped but it can be reduced. It’s disturbing in the current climate that #BlackFriday still exists. To encourage the kick-off of mass consumption a month before Christmas likely does a lot damage.

I suppose cancelling Black Friday would be impossible in the US (where I suspect it started). A large number of democrats would oppose it and probably every single republican in the US would fight to their death an anti-consumerism action like that.

But what about Europe? Doesn’t Belgium and Netherlands restrict store-wide sales to just two weeks or so out of the year? For Europe, perhaps instead of cancelling it (which many would view as over-interventionist) they could double the VAT rates on that day on clothes and electronics. IDK.. that’s probably crazy talk. Ideas welcome. There’s no real issue with sales on services, but consumption of goods is where the damage is done.

I hate the idea that one of the most environmentally reckless companies in the world (#Amazon) gets a huge boost in sales on Black Friday. It makes the day depressing to see the masses rush to enrich a company they should be boycotting all year. I loved Black Friday back in the days when I was a loose cannon consumerist myself. Now it’s just a shit day where I deliberately avoid shops in order to not support it.

UPDATE

To be clear, I would not propose cancelling the unofficial holiday US employers often give on Black Friday. Just the sales.

A new bike has been recently introduced which is designed with the goals of products in the 1960s-- rugged, simple, built to last. Nothing is flimsy on this bike. Even the fenders and sprockets are thick. The design focus was two main goals: robustness and simplicity so owners can fix it themselves. The gears are internal, which seems to reflect ruggedness being prioritized over self-repairability. Derailers are inherently fragile and cassettes wear down relatively quickly and also would impose a thin chain. The internal gears enable the chain to be thick and wide.

The website is in French but I machine-translated the “about” section:

A Bruxellois, magnet to travel by bicycle in town, activist in several environmental associations and working in the design and manufacture of cycles since 2014, established the SUGG srl in 2021 to provide simple, solid, practical, fast, fun, designed and assembled bicycles in Brussels with high quality components often produced in Europe.

The SUGG bikes are aimed at young people from 9 to 99 years of age who wish to move by bike without assistance and prefer to exploit the powerful resources often ignored whose nature has given them. Indeed, with no electric assistance, SUGG bikes are more economical, light, ecological, simple, reliable, durable and fun. At SUGG, the efficiency and ascent qualities of the bike are optimized by the choice of geometry and components. It's fun!

A few objectives of SUGG: to contribute to the improvement of life in our cities thanks to less air and noise pollution, calm and friendly streets, intelligent and respectful traffic, efficient, beautiful and funny movements; to participate in the fight against unemployment in our regions, on the one hand by repatriating the design and assembly in us and on the other hand by procuring the parts with manufacturers not too far away from us

I don’t have one myself but if I wanted a bomb-proof bike that would last my whole life, this is probably what I would get.