At the moment, we are very far away from the understanding needed to ensure a resilient world. A resilience approach opposes the preoccupation with increased production/yeilds/returns. A resilience approach is about weighing up options, keeping options open and creating new options when old ones close.
This, in todays world, is more important than ever.
As the remorseless process of globalisation brings us together, joining our cultures, our markets, our biota, we are becoming increasingly connected and homogenized. The difference that once separated and defined us are getting smaller, our diversity is indeed declining. Technological advances and cutting out genuine waste can make an important contribution, but optimisation, is a large part of the problem. There is no such thing as an optimal state in a dynamic system. The systems in which we live are always shifting, always changing and in doing so they maintain their resilience (to the best they can) - their ability to withstand shocks. When we aim to increase the efficiency of returns from some part of the system by trying to control it, we usually do so at the cost of the systems resilience.
A system with little resilience is vulnerable to being shifted over the threshold into a new regime of function and state. This very rarely provides the goods and services we want.
A resilient framework is all about creating space. Pathways that foster experimentation and innovation that maintain the kinds of diversity that build resilience and enhance the social networks operating in a region. These pathways have the greatest chance for achieving long-term well-being.
So, what might a resilient world be like? What would it value?
According to Dr Brian Walker for the CSIRO,
"Diversity:
A resilient world would promote and sustain diversity in all forms
Social Capital:
A resilient world would promote trust, well developed social networks and leadership (adaptability)
Innovation:
A resilient world would place an emphasis on learning, experimentation, locally developed rules and embrace change
Ecological Variability:
A resilient world would embrace and work with ecological variability (rather than attempting to reduce it)
Modularity:
A resilient world would consist of modular components - everything is not necessarily connected to everything else. Over-connected systems are susceptible to shock - a resilient system opposes such a trend and would maintain or create a degree of modularity.
Tight Feedbacks:
A resilient world would possess tight feedbacks (not too tight). This allows us to detect thresholds before we cross them.
Overlap in Governance:
A resilient world would have institutions that include redundancy in their governance structures and a mix of common and private property with overlapping access rights.
Ecosystem Service:
A resilient world would include all the unpriced ecosystem services in development proposal and assessments."
Resilience thinking is a working progress. To be successful it needs to emerge through people working with their local systems. The list above is by far complete, you may like to add your own ideas to it.
In this lecture, part of the 2008 Deakin lecture series, Brian Walker considers and discusses how resilience theory applies to hot debates about tradition versus innovation.
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/bigideas/resilience-rules/3164690
Sunday 24 March 2013
Saturday 9 March 2013
Water-Droplet Phenomena
When light passes through small water droplets, such as those found in clouds and fog, optical wonders may emerge that, in the past, were ascribed spiritual significance. Well, they do look like a creation from the hand of god... however I personally feel the scientific understanding and explanation is by far 'cooler'.
The leading cause of an unclear sky, a bit like today, is the collection of billions of small water droplets that produce clouds. We all know this right? So, lets hear some facts that you may not know:
Cloud droplets generally have diameters in the range of between 0.01 and 0.02 millimetres, with the largest reaching 0.15 millimetres (not to be exact). Typically, it takes a million cloud droplets to form the smallest rain-drop - a drizzle droplet - with a diameter of 1.2 millimetres.
Such small droplets have a size comparable to, or maybe slightly larger than, the wavelengths of visible light and they can therefore interact with the light waves through a process known as 'diffraction'.
Diffraction occurs when a light wave's path bends around an object or objects of a similar size to its wavelength.
As a wave, light can interact with other light waves, forming combination patterns. The most important interactions are constructive and destructive interference. In constructive interference, the two waves add to produce an enhanced condition characterised by increased brightness of bands of spots. In contrast, destructive interference degrades the overall light quality, resulting in dark bands of spots.
The interaction of light with small water droplets through diffraction produces two distinct types of natural wonders, which characterise coronas and glories. Other optical wonders include our well known rainbows, crystal orbs, haloes, sundogs, arcs, tangents, circles, light pillars and others.
Each of these are a truly amazing visual experiences with far greater complexity and detail that I cannot even go in to explaining without having days and lots of reference texts, however I wanted to make a point of sharing with you how a single water droplet and light can make some of the most breathtaking visual experiences we will ever witness...
Truly awesome stuff ;)
http://www.elightspot.com/lights-and-matter-a-guide-to-optics.aspx
The leading cause of an unclear sky, a bit like today, is the collection of billions of small water droplets that produce clouds. We all know this right? So, lets hear some facts that you may not know:
Cloud droplets generally have diameters in the range of between 0.01 and 0.02 millimetres, with the largest reaching 0.15 millimetres (not to be exact). Typically, it takes a million cloud droplets to form the smallest rain-drop - a drizzle droplet - with a diameter of 1.2 millimetres.
Such small droplets have a size comparable to, or maybe slightly larger than, the wavelengths of visible light and they can therefore interact with the light waves through a process known as 'diffraction'.
Diffraction occurs when a light wave's path bends around an object or objects of a similar size to its wavelength.
As a wave, light can interact with other light waves, forming combination patterns. The most important interactions are constructive and destructive interference. In constructive interference, the two waves add to produce an enhanced condition characterised by increased brightness of bands of spots. In contrast, destructive interference degrades the overall light quality, resulting in dark bands of spots.
The interaction of light with small water droplets through diffraction produces two distinct types of natural wonders, which characterise coronas and glories. Other optical wonders include our well known rainbows, crystal orbs, haloes, sundogs, arcs, tangents, circles, light pillars and others.
Each of these are a truly amazing visual experiences with far greater complexity and detail that I cannot even go in to explaining without having days and lots of reference texts, however I wanted to make a point of sharing with you how a single water droplet and light can make some of the most breathtaking visual experiences we will ever witness...
Truly awesome stuff ;)
http://www.elightspot.com/lights-and-matter-a-guide-to-optics.aspx
Friday 8 March 2013
International Women's Day 2013
International Women's Day 2013
Shhhh! She is travelling between worlds right now. You can see her holding the tension of not knowing ~ she is simply breathing into her unanswered questions. Sometimes she drinks her coffee with quaking hands, not knowing where her relationship or her bank account is going.
But this time, she is holding on to the tension of not knowing, and is not willing to hit the panic button. She is unlearning thousands of years of conditioning. She is not being split between the opposing forces of fight and flight. She is neither naïve nor ignorant. She is a frontier woman, paving new roads & making new choices. She is willing to making a new transcendent possibility emerge.
You may see her now ~ standing at thresholds, or at crossroads ~ breathing into her body ~ intently listening for inner signals. She's learning new navigation skills as she arrives at a most magical moment of her life.
Sukhvinder Sircar
Shhhh! She is travelling between worlds right now. You can see her holding the tension of not knowing ~ she is simply breathing into her unanswered questions. Sometimes she drinks her coffee with quaking hands, not knowing where her relationship or her bank account is going.
But this time, she is holding on to the tension of not knowing, and is not willing to hit the panic button. She is unlearning thousands of years of conditioning. She is not being split between the opposing forces of fight and flight. She is neither naïve nor ignorant. She is a frontier woman, paving new roads & making new choices. She is willing to making a new transcendent possibility emerge.
You may see her now ~ standing at thresholds, or at crossroads ~ breathing into her body ~ intently listening for inner signals. She's learning new navigation skills as she arrives at a most magical moment of her life.
Sukhvinder Sircar
Tuesday 5 March 2013
Issues in Environmental Politics
With the coming election just 4 days away, it is time to seriously think about who you want to stand to make true progress. I have recently joined the Green's and I am extremely privileged in doing so.More than 1.6 million Australians voted for the Greens in 2010 and more support is growing!
The Greens provide a real alternative to the tired, cynical politics of Labor and the Liberal party. Unlike the two old parties, the Greens have a proud history of standing up for what is right, not just what is easy or what polls well.
Over the course of the last four decades, the Greens have become the third force in Australian politics. While promoting meaningful and smart solutions to ensure future generations of Australians have clean air, clean water and clean soil – the Greens are also working in many other areas to champion integrity, decency and fairness. More than 1.6 million Australians voted for the Greens in 2010 and more support is growing! The Greens provide a real alternative to the tired, cynical politics of Labor and the Liberal party. Unlike the two old parties, the Greens have a proud history of standing up for what is right, not just what is easy or what polls well. Over the course of the last four decades, the Greens have become the third force in Australian politics. While promoting meaningful and smart solutions to ensure future generations of Australians have clean air, clean water and clean soil – the Greens are also working in many other areas to champion integrity, decency and fairness.
In the 1970's and early 1980's the damming of Lake Pedder and the Gordon below Franklin were at the centre of Environmental politics in Australia. The management of Australia's native forests, and particular woodchipping, has been a site of struggle for over 35 years. In the late 1990's, Uranium mining in Kakadu National Park in the Northern Territory was a focus on environmental focus, and now we see this today with franking in the Kimberly's.
The issues of environmental politics encompass land use dilemmas, coastal management and development, land degradation (including salinity), degradation of river systems (including eutrophication and salinity), biodiversity, atmospheric issues (including green house gas emissions and ozone depletion). Involved in each of these issues is a number of interested groups, or constituencies.
The obvious global warming / climate change, two inter related issues has been at the forefront of recent politics as we will have seen and heard many times on the news and in media. Suggested 'solutions' to climate change have included the resurges of proposals for nuclear power as a principle source of energy for human societies; a prioritisation of renewable energy; and 'clean' coal (more accurately described as carbon capture and geo-sequenstration or CCG). These are all technical 'solutions' and see global warming/climate change as a problem to be 'solved'.
However, reality is more complex - there are issues of equality, issues of ethics, issues of national interest verses common good, issues around governments, markets, societies, and individuals in combating issues such as climate change and many others. Do environmental priorities trump social or ethical priorities - does national interest trump the common good of the planet and it's human and non-human citizens; can market mechanisms affect change at the rate necessary to prevent 'runaway' global warming or is a more regulatory approach necessary?
The challenge for politics at both international and national level is to negotiate policies/outcomes which balance these objectives, which do consider the differing priorities to be 'incommensurable'.
I urge you to take a look at the Greens Policies and which cover what was outlined above before you make your final decision on the 9th. Be the change you want and vote for the people who truly want the same.
http://greens.org.au/policies
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