The hobby farm between Logan and Mount Tamborine in South East Queensland where I grew up has a tiny creek running through the front of it. The two houses on the property are far away from the creek, built, in 1977 and 1981 respectively, above the 1974 flood line. I distinctly remember my dad pointing… [Read more…]
January 12, 2011
I smell burning candle wax and steaming asphalt. Over-abundant adrenaline seems to crystallise. Water from the air settles on my skin to mingle with rising sweat. Later, I will smell rotting mud, feel queasy fatigue, and boredom. Things are still. Sounds are the occasional whisper of a passing car or rattle of a truck, buzzing… [Read more…]
December 10, 2010
Here’s some of the bits and pieces of the internet that kept me entertained and interested and thinking this week. Hope you enjoy. The Queensland Government announced that Aboriginal languages will added to our school curriculum next year. Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg is following Bill Gates’s and Warren Buffet’s lead and donating most of his… [Read more…]
November 15, 2010
There was a mini-project within the conference that I haven’t mentioned yet. On the Friday, MC Dick got the delegates to split into groups of five or so to work on a creative project exploring some aspect of climate change. Over the two days, the groups got together during break times to formulate their… [Read more…]
November 15, 2010
On Friday morning at TippingPoint, there were two presentations. One I’ve already written up and the other was entitled Climate Change: Where We Stand. It was delivered by Professor Jean Palutikof, Director of Australia’s National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility at Griffith University in Brisbane. The facility is charged by the Federal Government to provide… [Read more…]
November 13, 2010
Today the open space workshop continued with participants being encouraged to work in a collaborative, action-oriented way, building on the exploration vibe of Friday. Several new topics were suggested and I captured most of them below, including the names of the people who brought them up where I knew who they were. Food sustainability. What… [Read more…]
November 13, 2010
After lunch on Friday, an open space workshop started. I’d never heard of the format before. First of all, the group identifies topics for discussion and then splits into smaller groups for parallel meetings on each of the chosen topics. The conference MC Dick Robertson asked people to suggest topics that they felt personally connected… [Read more…]
November 13, 2010
The crux of Dr Stephen Pekar’s presentation first thing yesterday was this: there is no debate among scientists about the authenticity of climate change and whether human activity is causing it. The challenge, he said, appears to be how to effectively communicate this fact to policy makers and a public that continues to mistakenly perceive… [Read more…]
November 12, 2010
The second presenter at last night’s opening was Natalie Jeremijenko, who Skyped in from Washingon DC. She had been working at The Edge for the last week but had to be in the USA for something this week. Officially, she’s an artist and engineer who has studied both biochemistry and neuroscience and who works in… [Read more…]
November 12, 2010
According to CSIRO’s Dr Stefan Hajkowicz who is an economist, economics has interesting views on climate change. To explain how to an audience of non-economists, he first explained the concept of the ‘invisible hand of the market’ which was what the father of modern economics, Adam Smith, called the self-regulating nature of the market. He… [Read more…]
February 21, 2011
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