Living Systems – Ponderings of a Perplexed Primate

Maybe Local Farming Could Save the Planet

...or at least, the humans A climate-concerned friend recently forwarded me a link to an article headlined "Local Farming Can’t Save the Planet," concerned that it had some evidence that…

Culture Change…

A New Wrinkle in Our Time: Transforming the Oil Economy

I've written before about how precarious the fossil fuel industry has actually been for many years now. A friend sent this brilliant summary of the recent oil price crash, and…

Famous Footprints: 50 years ago, 3.6 million years ago (give or take)

20 Jul 201922 Jul 2019

... then, just ~3.6 million years later... Three and a half million years separate the individual who left these footprints in the sands of Africa from the one who left…

Famous Footprints: 49 years ago today, 3.6 million years ago (give or take)

... then, just ~3.6 million years later... Three and a half million years separate the individual who left these footprints in the sands of Africa from the one who left…

News and Links…

Funny, funny apes

Following up from my appearance on Planet Watch Radio, LM asked "What is bonobo's capacity for humor and what function does that serve?" A brief (and admittedly unsatisfying) answer on…

Present and Persistent Palm Oil Problems

The IUCN Oil Palm Task Force has just published a review of the current conundrums of industrial oil palm crops in the tropics. Land-clearing for plantations geard toward international palm oil production remain…

Drawdown tips for Earth Day

Here are some ready-made info sheets for reducing greenhouse emissions, based on Drawdown. The climate solutions team of Santa Cruz Indivisible decided we should post a display with easy steps individuals…

News and Links…

1001 Citations!

I just checked my Google Scholar profile today, and noticed something semi-momentous: "Orangutan Cultures and the Evolution of Material Culture" has been cited by 1,001 other publications. This is the primary publication…

Global Demand for Natural Resources Eliminated More Than 100,000 Bornean Orangutans — Serge Wich’s research and projects

We just published a new paper that indicates a massive decline of orangutans on Borneo. The paper was published in Current Biology. via Global Demand for Natural Resources Eliminated More Than…

Crowdfunding Career and Caring

5 Sep 20173 Nov 2017

Dear readers - can you Help Me Get to Texas for Sustainability Education Conference and Hurricane Relief Volunteering https://youtu.be/eUE3A9wZ7dw Please help me go to Texas to give a talk at…