Anyone Want to Bet the Planet?
By Donella Meadows
–March 28, 1991–
Some of our most controversial scientists have taken up a new pastime — making bets about the environmental future.
One such bet was put forward by James Hansen, head of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Hansen is known for dramatic Congressional testimony to the effect that the greenhouse warming is already here. Last summer he offered [...]
Dear Folks: March 28, 1991
Dear Folks, 7 PM, IT’S A BOY!
The first lamb of 1991 was born half an hour ago, on Good Friday evening, just at dinnertime, on a sweet, mild night that is supposed to turn to a howling snowstorm by morning. By then the lamb will be dry and warm.
It’s exactly 150 days since we turned Ferdinand the ram in with the ewes [...]
Shopping at the Coop: Anything that Exists is Possible
By Donella Meadows
–March 21, 1991–
In the back of my car I keep a split-oak shopping basket. As we empty plastic containers, glass bottles, and paper bags in the kitchen, I put them in the basket. That way I’m always ready to stop at the Upper Valley Food Coop on my way home from work.
I bother to tell you the intimate [...]
Markets Don’t Make Energy Policy, People Do
By Donella Meadows
–March 14, 1991–
George Bush’s National Energy Strategy is causing heads to shake in disbelief all over the world. It is a strategy for the 1950s, when we thought that energy supplies were infinite, that big cars made us better people, and that the environment was just a pretty scene out the rear window. Worst of all, the Strategy [...]
The Lessons of War
By Donella Meadows
–March 7, 1991–
The war in the Gulf is over but the story-telling is just beginning, and the story-telling is, in the long run, the most important part of the war. What we choose to tell ourselves now will shape our future as powerfully as past stories have shaped our present.
Stories informed the decisions that led to this war [...]
