Tag Archives: WTF

Occam’s Razor and the Former Snows of Kilimanjaro

Occam’s Razor is often interpreted as “the least complicated answer is usually right.” The Huffington Post has a post blaming global warming for the loss of snow on Mount Kilimanjaro. “The increase of Earth’s near surface temperatures, coupled with even greater increases in the mid- to upper-tropical troposphere, as documented in recent decades, would atContinue reading “Occam’s Razor and the Former Snows of Kilimanjaro”

Occam's Razor and the Former Snows of Kilimanjaro

Occam’s Razor is often interpreted as “the least complicated answer is usally right.” The Huffington Post has a post blaming global warming for the loss of snow on Mount Kilimanja. “The increase of Earth’s near surface temperatures, coupled with even greater increases in the mid- to upper-tropical troposphere, as documented in recent decades, would atContinue reading “Occam's Razor and the Former Snows of Kilimanjaro”

Get your facts first

and then you can distort them as much as you please.– Mark Twain Are U.S. forestlands “currently being lost at a rate of 150-million acres annually”? An RSS feed from the Pacific Forest Trust titled, “New Climate Research Supports Forest Protection, Reveals CO2 Storage Potential of Temperate Forests” caught my eye a few weeks back.Continue reading “Get your facts first”

The trouble with Hemp

… there is a solution that is simple, elegant, and wrong. Any time there is a discussion about forests, someone brings up the possibility of substituting hemp for paper and for petroleum products. I read on one discussion forum, “[Industrial hemp] can be harvested every four months while traditional varieties of trees are allowed toContinue reading “The trouble with Hemp”

For Every Complex Environmental Problem

For every complex environmental problem there is a solution that is simple, elegant, and wrong. Any time there is a discussion about forests, someone brings up the possibility of substituting hemp for paper and for petroleum products. I read on one discussion forum, “[Industrial hemp] can be harvested every four months while traditional varieties ofContinue reading “For Every Complex Environmental Problem”

Tree-Free Living is not a Good Idea

… or very silly if you think about it. One of the blogs over at EcoFriendlyDaily.com recommends “Creating a Tree-Free Home.”  “Tree-free” did not turn out to be as onerous as I thought it would be: “Tree-free means reducing or eliminating paper products in the house. There are a million places we use paper everyday,Continue reading “Tree-Free Living is not a Good Idea”

Toilet Paper, Hummers, and Global Warming, oh my!

Peg Fong from the EcoGeek blog asks “Which is worse? Hummers or toilet paper?” She cites a February 25, 2009 New York Times article, Mr. Whipple Left It Out: Soft Is Rough on Forests. According to the Times’ article, “[F]luffiness comes at a price: millions of trees harvested in North America and in Latin AmericanContinue reading “Toilet Paper, Hummers, and Global Warming, oh my!”

Trash Talk – Why I Won't Buy a Kindle Anytime Soon

As a forester, I’d wondered about the claims that ebook readers such as the Amazon Kindle or the Sony PRS-700 would save trees and therefore, be better for our environment than a physical book made from like…trees. I concluded that the question, “Do ereaders save trees?” is not the right question to ask. First question,Continue reading “Trash Talk – Why I Won't Buy a Kindle Anytime Soon”

Trash Talk – Why I Won’t Buy a Kindle Anytime Soon

As a forester, I’d wondered about the claims that ebook readers such as the Amazon Kindle or the Sony PRS-700 would save trees and therefore, be better for our environment than a physical book made from like…trees. I concluded that the question, “Do ereaders save trees?” is not the right question to ask. First question,Continue reading “Trash Talk – Why I Won’t Buy a Kindle Anytime Soon”