6°C? 2° is more than enough!
In 2007 Mark Lynas brought out a book called ‘Six Degrees‘. It brought together and synthesised all the recognised scientific articles written in peer-reviewed journals in the preceeding few years which addressed the issue of climate change and made predictions for levels of temperature rise over time. He organised their evidence and predictions into gradients from 1°C through to 6°C of temperature rise. Well, a decade later, he thought to ‘revisit‘ the subject in the light of new research results which seem to generally suggest that the predictions in his earlier book were, if anything, conservative (shocking enough though they were). The new book title and details linked / and below embodies this fact: Our Final Warning. Six...
Re-Re-Confinement
This is Carcassonne, which withstood a fairly long siege and survived, but it was nothing like as long as this: The siege of Candia (Heraklion, Crete) apparently lasted 21 years…. which, as one astute commentator put it, meant that those born at the beginning of the seige were old enough to fight in its last battle (they lost to invading Ottomans). Our lockdowns are tough, but let’s be thankful for small mercies!!! ...
Reconfinement – nearly finished?...
Well, we’re in Reconfinement still. The faint whiff of the merest hint of the slightest possibility of a remote chance of perhaps just maybe letting us ‘off the leash‘ here in France for Christmas, seems to be hanging, tantalizingly in the air. But it has taken a month of a second confinement (and all the associated privations, hardships and financial losses) to get daily new infection figures down from 50,000 to ‘a mere‘ 15,000 per day. Statistically, if I have read the figures correctly in France, approaching 2% ofthose diagosed as CoVid positive do not walk out of hospitals: that is at least 300 per day (2000 per week or 8/10,000 per month). Is that small/modest enough to...
Reconfinement???
Well… will it all STOP again on Monday in France??? I guess we’ll have to wait and...
CoVid & me Rentrée 2020
No…. CoVid might do many things, but it does not help one to grow back long-lost hair!! Sadly! Oh, and by the way, what I am wearing is actually hair combed off our two white Golden Retrievers – I was scratching my scalp for ages afterwards – thanks kids! This News item is a very economical one for me, as my wife penned it for her site and I am largely using her text as a base as we both find ourselves in the same situation as regards our teaching this rentrée. Well, it looks like we’re going to have to deal with CoVid for a while to come. After 3 months of lockdown, which...
Thinkpiece on Sustainability at UHA
I’ve been teaching ‘Sustainability’ and ‘Sustainable Development’ at Degree and Master’s levels since 1990. Latterly, I’ve been teaching the subject on environmental-based courses at UHA and I have also been seizing the opportunity to introduce and develop the subject on courses upon which I teach English. After all this time, I believe I have a sense of what is going on (or, more correctly, what does not appear to be going on) with this issue, so I feel it is my personal responsibility as a citizen of France (and Britain) Europe and the planet and as a university lecturer to put some things ‘out there‘ to be considered by those in power who control decision-making and the budget...
About Me
Here is the link to my professional site personal profile if you are that desperate to know a bit about me, my career and life and thoughts in general! Surprising how many actually read it!