« May 2007 | Main | July 2007 »
June 29, 2007
Black Swan watch
by Sylvia S Tognetti
Dave Iverson at Ecological Economic blog, has a post with excerpts from Nassim Taleb's book, The Black Swan
We like stories, we like to summarize, and we like to simplify, i.e., to reduce the dimension of matters. The … narrative fallacy… is associated with our vulnerability to overinterpretation and our predilection for compact stories over raw truths. It severely distorts our mental representation of the world; it is particularly acute when it comes to the rare event. …The narrative fallacy addresses our limited ability to look at sequences of facts without weaving an explanation into them, or, equivalently forcing a logical link, and arrow of relationship, upon them. Explanations bind facts together. They make them all the more easily remembered; they help them make more sense. Where this propensity can go wrong is when it increases our impressions of understanding. …
We … have a hunger for rules because we need to reduce the dimension of matters so they can get into our heads. Or, rather, sadly, so we can squeeze them into our [strictly limited "working memory]. The more random information is, the greater the dimensionality, and thus the more difficult to summarize. The more you summarize the more order you put in, the less randomness. Hence the same conditions that makes us simplify pushes us to think that the world is less random than it actually is.
And the Black Swan is what we leave out of simplification.
Both the artistic and scientific enterprises are the product of our need to reduce dimensions and inflict some order on things. … A novel, a story, a myth, or a tale, all have the same function: they spare us from the complexity of the world and shield us from its randomness. Myths impart order to the disorder of human perception and the perceived "chaos of human experience." …
Our tendency to perceive—to impose—narrativity and causality are symptoms of the same disease—dimension reduction. Moreover, like causality, narrativity has a chronological dimension and leads to the perception of the flow of time. Causality makes time flow in a single direction, and so does narrativity. (pp. 63-70)
A problem that many (though not all) scientists have is that they tend to use the term "myth" strictly in a pejorative sense, and just see their role as shattering existing ones. Some build their entire career on shattering a particular myth. But if, as Taleb also suggests, myths and stories are how humans cope with complexity, another fallacy is to think that myths can be avoided. Whenever I write that in reports that debunk the myth that forests increase the flow of water, it always gets promptly crossed out - so I also write a blog.... But the challenge in communicating science for policy is to create new more appropriate myths, when the existing ones are no longer adequate. That may be a role better left to comedians (as discussed in this previous post). Not long ago, Taleb was interviewed (video link) by Stephen Colbert, who pointed out that he himself is a Black Swan that could not have been predicted. Precisely!
Posted by Sylvia S Tognetti at 6:05 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 27, 2007
How do we know?
by Sylvia S Tognetti
Although most of my regular work is on land and water, I tend to gravitate towards climate issues on the blog because they make it easy to illustrate archetypal problems in science and policy, and it is all related anyway. However I will be gravitating more towards land and water, which become more relevant in any discussion of adaptation and responses and to climate change. In the meantime, for anyone who still needs convincing that humans have become geological agents, a new paper by Naomi Oreskes not only explains how we know the scientific consensus on climate change is not wrong. It also takes the reader step by step through the various ways that knowledge is validated, whether the subject is climate change, the germ theory, the movement of tectonic plates or even evolution, Science is ultimately about validating knowledge and, as she points out, there is no single sacrosanct "scientific method"- but she reviews the way that different kinds of reasoning and evidence all point in the same direction. With respect to climate, she makes a convincing case that I dare any trial lawyer to poke a hole in, that while scientific consensus could be mistaken, no one has come up with a reason to think that it is. It is worth a read even if you don't need convincing. She also makes up for whatever climate scientists are lacking in communication skills.
Because of other obligations, I missed her presentation hosted by the American Meteorological Society last week - it was on my calendar, but hat tip to Andrew Dessler for the reminder and the link to the paper and to her presentation.
Posted by Sylvia S Tognetti at 10:30 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
June 22, 2007
It all depends on what the choices are
by Sylvia S Tognetti
I take most opinion polls I hear about with a grain of salt because what people think usually depends on how you frame the question and what the choices are, and can change as people learn more about the problem. Just now, a new opinion poll on global warming came up on the RSS reader that actually presents the respondents with policy options and cost estimates and shows that the majority of Americans still support taking action on global warming even when presented with costs. It was conducted by the New Scientist with a polling team from Stanford and with some cost estimates and analysis provided by Resources for the Future - and is worth a read. It is also expected to provide a springboard for debate about how best to tackle global warming, which will undoubtedly lead to more learning and possibly to more options...
Posted by Sylvia S Tognetti at 12:57 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 21, 2007
Hang on to your seat - the tectonic plates of policy discourse are shifting
by Sylvia S Tognetti
Is Congressman Dingell getting ready to retire or something? David Roberts unearthed the following remarks from CongressNow which is only available by subscription:
...Boucher, who chairs the House Energy and Commerce energy and air quality subcommittee, last night said that no decisions have been made about a carbon tax, despite comments by House Energy and Commerce Chairman John Dingell (D-Mich.) yesterday that a carbon emissions "fee" may be necessary to affect climate change in addition to a cap-and-trade scheme....
..."My own judgment is that we are going to adopt a cap-and-trade system and some form of carbon emission fee to achieve the reductions we need," Dingell said when discussing climate change legislation he intends to bring up in September...
Wonder if the Pigou club had anything to do with this? I know he didn't call it a "gas tax" but, as summarized in a previous post - the Pigou Club Manifesto published by Greg Mankiw as an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal, outlines all the reasons policy wonks keep pushing for a gas tax increase, in spite of campaign consultants who tend to steer clear of such proposals. It is good for creating incentives to reduce consumption, carbon dioxide emissions, and road congestion, and places some of the burden on oil companies who would [maybe] reduce prices as consumption goes down. He also argues that consumption taxes are better for economic growth than income taxes because the latter discourage saving and investment, and therefore encourage R&D for gasoline substitutes. And, last but not least, it is a national security issue. To which I would add, that if we all knew what we would get in return, there might even be greater willingness-to-pay a higher gas tax. It would be a small price to pay for a dedicated fund for mass transit that would reduce the need to drive. Like in Europe, where fuel taxes are used to fund an excellent public transportation system. He concludes: "don't expect those vying for office to come around until the American people recognize that while higher gas taxes are unattractive, the alternatives are even worse."
Other previous posts about a gas carbon tax: Seeing purple - which summarizes some remarks made by Daniel Bromley, and a follow-up post,
Addendum: And in case you need any more good arguments for a gas tax, here is a link to everything posted on the topic by the geniuses over at the Environmental Economics blog. The Ecological Economics blog has also had quite a bit of commentary on this one.
Posted by Sylvia S Tognetti at 10:24 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
What would you trade for some cypress mulch?
by Sylvia S Tognetti
I find it hard to believe that, post-Katrina, it is still possible to peddle cypress from the Gulf coast as cheap garden mulch. If you are equally incredulous, go see the video currently posted on the front page at the Gulf Restoration Network and sign a letter to those responsible. And read this op-ed by John Barry about other trade-offs being made in the Gulf, i.e., national economic benefits we all get at the expense of Louisiana and why coastal restoration efforts should be funded.
But there is another reason I am calling attention to the video. Eric Eckl, a communications consultant who writes a very helpful blog about Water Words that Work, points to this video as exemplary of a good communications strategy. I agree but have an additional reason why. Although the video doesn't use the term "ecosystem services", by emphasizing trade-offs between the use of cypress for garden mulch or for protection of the coast - and human lives, and by asking whether one would shred the Constitution for post-it notes, or melt the Liberty Bell for paper clips, it frames the issue in a way that is consistent with that concept. One comment: a mulch boycott is all well and good for those who garden but, what the video doesn't tell me is why cutting these cypress trees for mulch is even legal, i.e., who has the rights to control how the wetlands are used and why and what laws need to be changed.
Ecosystem Services is essentially a frame that allows better connections to be made between ecosystems and human well-being, which was also the mission of the Millennium Ecosystem Asssessment (MA). But it was a laborious case to make because it requires a lot of site specific information to demonstrate the economic significance of what ecosystems produce, the trade-offs being made, and most importantly, what choices and response options are available. So the result was a bit messy, and most of what was publicly conveyed were scary numbers about ecosystem degradation that didn't come across as anything new, and was short on specific response options - and other valuable information that was buried in four thick technical reports (and since I was a lead author for a chapter in the report on policy responses, I know where it is all buried). So, so far, the MA has provided more of a framework for research and synthesis of scientific information than it has for communication. But as this framework begins to be used in the context of threats to real people and places, as is done in this video, I expect it will become stickier.
I have also been working with Island Press and the Sonoran Institute on a case study of the Colorado River Delta that uses the MA framework to develop future scenarios for the Delta that highlight trade-offs, and make a case for insuring the continued flow of water to the Delta, which I will say more about when the report is released. So stay tuned. In the meantime, for a fascinating read about the challenge of restoration in the entire Colorado River Basin, and the trade-offs involved,I strongly recommend a new book by Bob Adler, Restoring Colorado River Ecosystems: A Troubled Sense of Immensity
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If you decide to move then looking online for Colorado homes may be of interest to you, since by browsing Colorado Springs homes online before visiting them you can often learn more about the
Posted by Sylvia S Tognetti at 5:11 PM
| Comments (1)
| TrackBack
Dani Rodrik - an economist who is esteemed for his work on global trade issues to which he brings an institutional perspective, and who is refreshingly candid about blindspots in his own field, is looking for the benefits of changes in the global financial system that have occurred over the past 25 years or so, and can't find any. For a list of the risks, see this article he links to, by Martin Wolf in the Financial Times, who does a good job of describing some of the mechanics of the "financial engineering" that has occurred. Wolf hasn't quite figured out if this is good or bad: Our brave new capitalist world has many similarities to that of the early 1900s. But, in many ways, it has gone far beyond it. It brings exciting opportunities. But it is also largely untested. It is creating new elites. This modern mutation of capitalism has loyal friends and fierce foes. But both can agree that its emergence is among the most significant events or our time. but promises Rodrik an answer in next week's column. What his article suggests to me is that novelties in the global financial system have unleashed risks and uncertainties as unprecedented and possibly as uncontrollable as those in the climate. If there is indeed a "triumph of the trader in assets over the long-term producer" and if "capital is flowing in the wrong direction, from poor to rich nations" - what does that say about approaches being taken to protect the production functions of ecosystems so as to insure the flow of services, like water and climate regulation, and to alleviate poverty and promote sustainable development? Rodrik concludes: I am among those who see the future risks as being substantial. I think there is a fundamental incompatibility between unfettered global finance and a fragmented system of political sovereignty at the national level. I am also not convinced that this new international financial capitalism has actually lived up to its promise: it has on the whole not been beneficial to developing nations, and it has created great inequality in the rich countries (as Wolf acknowledges). So we need a substantial rethink. All the potential Keynes's out there: we need your ideas! I don't think the answers will all come from economics or that we will find any Keynesian silver bullets but I will eventually flesh out a post about the notion of a "Post-Cold War Reconstruction" as a framework for a substantial rethink and for redefining the whole concept of security, which would answer the question Frank Luntz asked in the Frontline interview: "you tell me where global warming fits in [on the more immediate issues]" Iraq, Iran, terrorism, health care, prescription drugs, education...". There is some good stuff out there - now if we could just get somebody intelligent elected for president who isn't intimidated by complexity or delusional voters.... (Come on Al!)
Posted by Sylvia S Tognetti at 4:04 PM
| Comments (0)
| TrackBack
Given that the blogosphere has formed largely in response to the inadequacy of the media, it was only a matter of time before scientists started grumbling about science journalism. Chris Mooney seems a bit miffed, particularly at a comment on Tara's blog that suggests journalists are entirely unecessary - and that scientists just need good editors. This could easily be read and dismissed as a fight about who gets the byline but there is of course much more to it. I have put off weighing in on these and related framing issues because there is way too much I want to say and, since I am not a journalist by training, it still takes too long to write briefly - but here goes some of it... Science journalists aren't all useless but it does seem awkward and pretentious to have journalists - even when they have scientific background - calling the shots about who is "reasonable" and where the "middle ground" is in technical scientific debates. The entire scientific enterprise is set up to examine reasonableness of scientific claims via peer review of individual papers and more broadly, via assessments that evaluate science relevant to policy decisions. I speak from experience, not as a journalist but as someone who once upon a time served as staff for committees at the National Academy of Sciences, and even identified participants for some of those committees, at a time when I had only a BA in environmental studies. It was a humbling experience in that I was well aware of this paradox so I spent a lot of time doing homework and on the phone to scientists in search of overlapping recommendations and finding out what perspective different experts might contribute to a particular study. Then I disappeared to graduate school - and, being hopelessly interdisciplinary, thought more about what happens when scientists from one particular discipline decide what is relevant. That is another can of worms but it is also where the need for broader participation comes in, and why scientists should be challenged from outside their profession. So the public should be more engaged in the assessment process and can and should raise questions about relevance of the science to a particular problem and context, inconsistencies with other sources of knowledge, as well as contribute contextual knowledge and to problem framing. This is where journalists can play an important role. But science at its best is also about constructing new frames of reference when old ones are inadequate. (One major fallacy is to treat "science" as a monolithic entity. At its worst, science is guilty of the same kind of sin - of assuming it can provide a universally applicable silver bullet.) Much of the tension with journalism comes not from misquoting scientists but from from trying to fit even accurate quotes, and new ways of thinking, into old and inadequate frames. What if, instead, journalists saw their role as finding ways to connect new to existing frames, or to compare and contrast them. Journalists aren't all alike either and some of them do at least strive to do that. (in other words, this is not a comment on Chris, who has learned a few things along the way). Challenging existing world views is hard work and is not highly valued but is badly needed and will take all of the skills we can collectively muster. More to come on different frames within science....
Posted by Sylvia S Tognetti at 4:56 PM
| Comments (0)
| TrackBack
Denialism blog blogs an article in Harpers Magazine by Ken Silverstein (available only by subscription) who reports on the strategies of major lobbying and public relations firms - based on information he apparently learned first hand by posing as a businessman with interests in improving the image of Turkmenistan, and who represents a front company that has some influence on the direction of oil revenues. Among the tactics proposed by APCO, winner of the PR Agency of the Year award from PRWeek magazine: organize campaigns against "biased" news stories and hold forums for journalists academics and politicians hosted by a third party. They also link to an earlier article in the Boston Globe about academic consultants being hired "to change the public conversation" about their client, against whom several charges had been filed by Eliot Spitzer, in part by raising doubt about the effectiveness of the legal and regulatory environment. But if these tactics are legal, we do indeed have an ineffective legal and regulatory environment. In other news, a couple of Yes Men turn the tables on this tactic when, posing as representatives of ExxonMobil and the National Petroleum Council, they presented the keynote speech at the Go-Expo Conference in Alberta Canada, where they were expected to deliver the long-awaited conclusions of a study commissioned by US Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman. In the speech, "Shepard Wolff" (aka, Andy Bichlbaum) announced that: He went on to describe a technology for turning human flesh into a new product called Vivoleum, using 3-D animations. "Exxon rep" "Florian Osenberg" (aka, Mike Bonanno) added that "With more fossil fuels comes a greater chance of disaster, but that means more feedstock for Vivoleum. Fuel will continue to flow for those of us left." Members of the audience even lit candles made of the stuff, to commemorate an "Exxon janitor" who dies after cleaning up a toxic spill, before become aware of the hoax when... oh just go read the press release. It reads like a modified soylent green scenario, which I sometimes point to as an example of the economic concept of substitutability between natural, manufactured and human capital. There may be substitutes for everything but whether they are acceptable or anyone would freely choose such substitutes is another matter. The company that organized the event had them dragged away from reporters and detained by private security guards but they were released by the Calgary Policy as no laws were violated. But hey, its legal...
Posted by Sylvia S Tognetti at 4:08 PM
| Comments (0)
| TrackBack
Following up on all the buzz about what Michael Griffin said on NPR - as noted at ThinkProgress and on The Colbert Report (video link)[sorry, this video seems to have disappeared] based on reporting by Andrew Revkin in the NYT in July 2006 - when NASA Administrator Michael Griffin said it is "not NASA's mission to make policy regarding possible climate change mitigation strategies," it is because he changed the mission. This was done very quietly in February 2006, with a clause in the 2006 Earth Science Research and Analysis Budget bill that replaced the words "to understand and protect our home planet" with "to pioneer the future in space exploration, scientific discovery and aeronautics research." According to James Hansen, that bill also retroactively slashed the 2006 earth science research budget by 20%. Not that I had anything to do with it but, in a January '06 post about the conflict between James Hansen - NASA's chief climate scientist, and George Deutsch, a politically appointed public affairs officer who tried to prevent him from discussing the policy implications of scientific findings about climate change, I suggested that "Bush could, of course, seek a change in the law so as to redefine NASA's mission - and admit that he gives higher priority to searching for water on Mars than to the health and welfare of Americans and other human beings, for which maintaining a habitable Earth is a prerequisite. And if he is successful, we would then be able to send him to Mars too. But if not, let the impeachment proceedings begin" as it would provide a clear case of an administration not willing to carry out its responsibilities under the law. Besides forcing the administration to go on record that it does not believe it is the government's role to conduct science to support the well-being of its citizens it would also remove the fig leaf provided by obscure and misleading technical debates about whether or not there is human induced climate change. So Griffin's honesty is refreshing but incomplete. Little did I know, in a 2005 interview in the Washington Post (hat tip ClimateScienceWatch) Griffin also said: ...But the goal isn't just scientific exploration . . . it's also about extending the range of human habitat out from Earth into the solar system as we go forward in time. . . . In the long run a single-planet species will not survive. We have ample evidence of that . . . [Species have] been wiped out in mass extinctions on an average of every 30 million years... ...I'm talking about that one day, I don't know when that day is, but there will be more human beings who live off the Earth than on it. We may well have people living on the moon. We may have people living on the moons of Jupiter and other planets. We may have people making habitats on asteroids. We've got places that humans will go, not in our lifetime, but they will go there... ...To me it's important [that Americans lead the way] because I like the United States, and because I know -- I don't know the date -- but I know that humans will colonize the solar system and one day go beyond. And it is important for me that humans who carry -- I'll characterize it as Western values -- are there with them. ...there are other stars in our near neighborhood . . . four light-years away . . . 12 light-years away.... ...I don't know that it's a concern that others get there first. What does concern me is that where other people go, the United States must also be. I'm not trying to stomp other people into the ground, but I would like to be assured that wherever the frontier of human civilization is, that people from America are there as well. . . . It should be viewed as an investment in carrying American culture, American values.... Regardless of what Americans have come to believe about climate - based on misleading information that has been in circulation, I suspect that an overwhelming majority support the use of science to understand the rapid global and climatic changes that are affecting us all regardless of who or what caused them, and that they would prefer tax dollars to be spent on that rather than on delusions of colonizing outer space. What I don't know is whether any surveys have ever framed questions in that way but if not, it would be a good research project. I find it inconceivable that Bush would have even come close to being elected had people known that he intended to reduce capacity not only to monitor climate change, but to forecast the weather, including hurricanes and El Ninos, but maybe thats just me..... Rocket scientists have not always been the best communicators regarding the relevance of various kinds of satellite data but, according to an NAS report released earlier this year, the capacity of all of our earth observing systems is expected to decrease by 40% by the end of the decade and many critical measurements are expected to cease altogether, jeopardizing this capacity, at a time when changes in climate are affecting global precipitation patterns, and land use patterns changing rapidly as well. ClimateScienceWatch also has an internal NOAA/NASA report from December 2006 recently obtained by AP, and provides briefing notes regarding the specific capacities for climate related measurements that are being jeopardized which sums up the importance of long term data in the opening paragraph: Detecting climate change, understanding the associated shifts in specific climate processes, and then projecting the impacts of these changes on the Earth system requires a comprehensive set of consistent measurements made over many decades. Many climate trends are small and require careful analysis of long time series of sufficient length, consistency, and continuity to distinguish between the natural long-term climate variability and any small, persistent climate changes. Interruptions in the climate data records make the resolution of small differences uncertain or even impossible to detect. To confidently detect small climate shifts requires instrument accuracy and stability better than is generally required for weather research and most other scientific uses. For more than thirty years, NASA research-driven missions, such as the EOS, have pioneered remote sensing observations of the Earth’s climate, including parameters such as solar irradiance, the Earth’s radiation budget, ozone vertical profiles, and sea surface height. Maintaining these measurements in an operational environment provides the best opportunity for maintaining the long-term, consistent, and continuous data records needed to understand, monitor, and predict climate variability and change. According to James Hansen, the massive budget cuts happened just as major changes are beginning to be detected, thanks to these long term data collection efforts. Speaking about the Landsat mission, one of my former professors at UMD, John Townshend, said the scientific community failed to speak up loudly enough when some of these programs were delayed because they simply assumed continuity. Once upon a time, that would have been a reasonable assumption. If you haven't been following this one, for other commentary on the rest of what Griffin said, see this post by Kevin Vranes, and this one at Dynamics of Cats, to name a few.
Posted by Sylvia S Tognetti at 2:33 AM
| Comments (0)
| TrackBack
Eric Boehlert's column at Media Matters, re: The Media Assault on Reason, provides an excellent review of the media reviews of the packaging of Al Gore's book. To To find out what is actually in Gore's book, you are just going to have to read the actual book - the whole thing
Posted by Sylvia S Tognetti at 10:01 AM
| Comments (0)
| TrackBack
I'm back... as the trip to Ireland was a vacation, just a few highlights and observations not unrelated to topics normally covered in the PNT. We (my companion Tom and I - joined later by some of his siblings), started in Dublin with a visit to Trinity College to see the Book of Kells, which seemed really old until we got to the megalithic tombs seen in the later part of the trip. Because of a high water table, the grounds of Trinity also have the world's largest Oregon Maple trees. Visited a number of old castles and monasteries - some abandoned and containing 14th century graffiti, others restored along with the "Great Gardens of Ireland" that surround them. The garden at the Birr Castle has the world's tallest box hedges, some of the only unploughed areas of its habitat type, and what was the world's largest telescope for about 75 years after it was built in the 1840s, aka, the Leviathan. This telescope, built by William Parsons, the Third Earl of Rosse, is set along the north to south meridian line, further marked with stones in the garden that point to a spiral of trees modeled after the whirlpool nebula M51, that he discovered in 1845 using this very same telescope. The trees were planted 150 years later in honor of this feat. The castle itself was off limits as it is now inhabited by the Seventh Earl of Rosse. Allowing visitors into the gardens and the science museum no doubt helps to pay for its upkeep. Given that a national election was taking place, we learned a few things about parliamentary politics along the way, as we tried to figure out who the characters were that we saw on the ubiquitous campaign signs. We finally found out who "Bertie" is when it was announced that he won the most votes, but we left unsure who "Bertie's team" will be, since he did not get enough votes to govern without forming a coalition. According to TaraWatch, negotiations are still underway, the outcome of which may have implications for whether or not there is a shot at saving the Hill of Tara, threatened by construction of the M51 highway - an issue I learned about from Afarensis blog. We visited the Hill of Tara briefly on the way back into Dublin and did not find the group that has been keeping a vigil but did speak with someone from another group, Friends of Tara, who told us about all of the alternatives available that have been proposed, including more mass transit. This should sound all too familiar to anyone who has read my posts about the ICC, or Inter-County Connector here in Maryland, on the outskirts of the capitol city of the US, which would not destroy ancient monuments that we know about, but would destroy important watershed and wetland areas as well as what remains of open space between Washington DC and Baltimore, and also preempt badly needed funding for mass transit. I am making a purposeful digression here to observe that it is much easier to talk about global climate and other changes somewhere else or in the abstract, than the more immediate threats from the siting of new roads, mass transportation routes, and development patterns, where disagreements tend to be face-to-face. Some day, I will talk more about development controversies in "Muddy Spring"... But the point is that these issues are usually off the national radar screen and dismissed as local and parochial, although even local officials do their best to keep them off the table in election debates by saying things like, "we fully support the ICC but, after the election we will look at transportation throughout the entire region and have all the options on the table." Yes, this is a reminder to Governor O'Malley of Maryland and his deputy, Anthony Brown, whom I am quoting from a pre-election campaign event (but not from a transcript so the quote may not be word for word). I suggest that, before any construction proceeds, that Maryland, DC and Virginia collaborate on the development of future scenarios of the regional landscape in 2050, in which the expected impacts of climate change and peak oil are a given. Then we can go back to bickering about transportation priorities and how to pay for them. But back to Ireland... The Hill of Tara, important in Christian as well as pre-Christian traditions, contains just one of a number of stone monuments we saw that date back to between 2000 and 4000 BC, and that have been regarded as sacred and that have been protected by communities as well as private landowners for the past 5,000 years. Others we saw included the megalithic tomb of Poulnabrone in the Burren that dates back to 3,800 BC, the cairns at Carrowkeel in the Bricklieve mountains near Sligo, and the passage tomb of Newgrange at Brú na Bóinne. The Hill of Tara just happens to be the closest one to Dublin but with the pace of economic development now taking place in Ireland as well as other well known places in the the EU, threats to the other sites may not be far behind. A common feature is that they are situated prominently on hilltops from which there are spectacular views into the distance, i.e., the kinds of places coveted by housing developers and home buyers, and are situated in relation to one another as well as to the sun, as part of the same landscape. The sites at Brú na Bóinne have been designated UNESCO World heritage sites, and the Hill of Tara was just added to the World Monuments Fund list of most endangered sites but the challenge will be to go beyond a piecemeal approach and implement an integrated landscape approach to conservation. At one of the Heritage Centers, I picked up a copy of the latest edition of Heritage Outlook - a publication of the Irish Heritage Council that had some interesting articles on the subject, that brought my attention to the European Landscape Convention, which, of course, I intend to learn more about. It may be little more than paper for the moment, but the definition seems like a good point of departure: "Landscape is an area, as perceived by people, the character of which is the result of the action and interaction of natural and/or human factors." I have long suspected that one of the barriers to conservation is that, in spite of all of the talk about integrated approaches, the environment is compartmentalized into land, water, mountains, wetlands, oceans, neglecting the interactions between them, which is where all the interesting stuff occurs, and where the richest habitats are to be found. Perhaps the most interesting landscape in Ireland is the Burren which, because of the diversity of microhabitats in the rock formations, contains a unique combination of highly diverse flora derived from Arctic, Mediterranean, European mountain regions. As I learned about the geological processes that shaped this place, which includes the Cliffs of Moher, it made the megalithic tombs seem very recent. But the landscape only appears as it does because of farming and grazing practices that have been in place since those monuments were built by the first farmers, to whom the Burren looked very different. Among the major threats to the Burren now is scrub vegetation that is appearing as management practices change, and of course tourism. The picture above was taken on the Aran Island of Inishmore which is not, or is, considered part of The Burren - depending who you ask, but where geological continuities are obvious. The miniature house was like many seen built near regular houses around the Island - our tour guide on the Island, a local, said they were built for the Fairies, which may or may not be Blarney. Blarney was also among the castles we visited earlier on the trip where, of course, we kissed the stone. Now I'm reading The Book of the Burren ~~~~~~~~~~ Addendum to the last post - the pub that was out of Guinness turned out to be liittle more than a stones throw from the Guinness estate, which bordered on a lake that we saw the next day from an overlook in the Sally Gap in the Wicklow Mountains, also the source of Dublin's water supply. To be fair, it was a Monday that followed a big game.
Posted by Sylvia S Tognetti at 2:00 AM
| Comments (0)
| TrackBack
June 20, 2007
Root causes
by Sylvia S TognettiJune 19, 2007
Science and journalism
by Sylvia S TognettiJune 15, 2007
What goes around...
by Sylvia S Tognetticurrent U.S. and Canadian energy policies (notably the massive, carbon-intensive exploitation of Alberta's oil sands, and the development of liquid coal) are increasing the chances of huge global calamities. But he reassured the audience that in the worst case scenario, the oil industry could "keep fuel flowing" by transforming the billions of people who die into oil.
June 14, 2007
Making policy based on science fiction
by Sylvia S TognettiJune 13, 2007
must read
by Sylvia S TognettiJune 12, 2007
Roundabout Ireland
by Sylvia S Tognetti