Why are natural environments often degraded in the name of economic progress even when this invites disaster, and how can this be overcome?

This was one of discussion questions of the Disasters and Ecosystems MOOC.

Actually the answer is simple. The formula for successful environmental degradation consists of 2 variables – overpopulation and capitalism.

When there are a lot of people – most of them a poor, uneducated and hungry. When you are hungry you will do everything to become less hungry today even if it can potentially lead to negative consequences tomorrow, which you may not even foresee if you are uneducated.

Humans are good in adaptation. When the adaptation is strong enough it leads to abuse (for example, if you are well adopted at the stock market you start abusing it to increase your profit even if it will cost dearly to the other stakeholders – people value their own well-being much more than the other’s and of course much more than the well-being of environment especially when they know that their own impact seems negligible compared to impact of the entire population).  When you live in condition of free market of capitalistic world – you are your only hope for not being hungry (or being more wealthy) now. And as you know from the economic theory – the capitalist economy needs a constant grows of consumption and production – so you need more and more resources to just sustain the economy. In conditions of capitalist market people value today’s profit much more than losses of tomorrow

You see – the capitalist economy needs people to consume more and more; more people – more consumption; more people – more poverty and lack of education; more hungry uneducated people people – more people willing to do anything to survive now and don’t even bother themselves about the future.

Overpopulation and a consumption society (created by capitalist economy) inter-stimulate each other and destroy the environment for the today’s profits or food and doesn’t care much of the consequences of tomorrow because most are either uneducated or doesn’t care at all plus you have to live through today to face consequences of your actions tomorrow (a day-by-day living).

Obviously there are 3 steps to improve the situation:

• Decrease the population.
• Educate people.
• Create new sustainable economy model that would equally value tomorrow’s losses and today’s profits, and would not rely on constantly increasing consumption.

Shearing is caring!

There was a scientific session at my university today. I’ve presented a report about waste management in St. Petersburg and Leningrad region. It was somewhat a “party” for the local scientists, so I was in doubt whether should I put the names of my Finnish colleagues as coauthors or not. It wasn’t that level which would be valuable for them, besides this report was made of my part of our main article. Never the less the decision was made and I’ve put two more names on the front page. I’ve shared authorship of this report.

In the end of the session ex-dean of the faculty came to me and gave a special thanks. “Why? The report and following discussion were good, but there were better” – I thought at the moment. But he thanked me not for the report, but for the foreign coauthors! They brought an international status for our local party! So this publication (and others from the session) will be more valuable. The publication of report became more valuable just because the session became more valuable because of my report presence at the session! It is very interesting thought 😉 But the shearing was in the first place.

There was another shearing story at the session. Google is shearing imagery even if it doesn’t want it))) One of the politicians(!) of the St. Petersburg reported about an expedition to the Altai. He mentioned that they have used an images from Google to create a 1:50 000 map… … Ok, even if he was not aware that for this scale Landsat was just good enough, wasn’t this a violation of the Google’s terms and conditions of usage? “Honestly, I do not know” replied politician to me…

Let’s make it clear: I’m not against robbing Google, I’m against the ignorance.

http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/orEhUEcxHeY?fs=1&hl=ru_RU&rel=0

Let’s save the St. Petersburg!

Let’s show to the “servants of the people” that they have to give some respect to the laws and human rights!

Rally’s place:

http://maps.google.ru/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=ru&geocode=&q=&sll=59.920452,30.334486&sspn=0.002909,0.009817&ie=UTF8&ll=59.920452,30.334496&spn=0.005818,0.019634&z=16&output=embed
Просмотреть увеличенную карту

Repost: Модернизация обещаний. Как «Единая Россия» исполняет свою собственную программу.

Originally posted by ervix at Модернизация обещаний. Как «Единая Россия» исполняет свою собственную программу.

Многочисленные оплачиваемые и добровольные сторонники политической партии «Единая Россия», а наипаче ее, простите, высокопоставленные члены любят вальяжно огрызаться на представителей оппозиции, мол, занимаются оппозиционеры сплошным популизмом, аппаратного и управленческого опыта не имеют, зато огульно критикуют. А мы, единороссы, типа с потом и кровью ударно занимаемся модернизацией страны, не покладая рук внедряем инновации, поднимаем страну с колен, в общем, ведем Россию-матушку в общее светлое будущее.

Для того, чтоб с фактами на руках показать патологическую лживость всех агитационных и программно-идеологических документов партии «Единая Россия», рассмотреть, кто на самом деле является популистом (пока не будем тыкать в наглую медвежью харю) и узнать, а что из обещанного жителям России реализовано партией власти, предлагаю вдумчиво изучить Предвыборную программу Политической партии «Единая Россия», утвержденную 20 сентября 2003 года на III съезде всероссийской политической партии «Единство и Отечество» – «Единая Россия».

Как оказалось, найти программу «Единой России» не так просто. Как будто кто-то специально ее прячет подальше, как только выборы состоятся. Однако, будучи уверенным, что судить надо по результатам деятельности, программу косолапых за 2003 год удалось-таки отыскать на сайте http://www.archive.org. Выбор именно 2003 года не случаен – именно тогда, в результате общенациональных парламентских выборов, «официальная» партия власти получила серьезнейшее преимущество в парламенте, которое с тех пор не только не уменьшала, но всячески наращивала. С другой стороны, 7 лет являются хорошим сроком понять, исполнены ли предвыборные обещания или нет. Обманула ли «Единая Россия» ожидания избирателей полностью или только частично. К сожалению, подавляющее большинство своих обещаний партия власти не выполнила. Впрочем, не будем забегать вперед и вернемся в 2003 год.

А началось все очень оптимистично:

( Стабильность развития и выбор большинства )

( Как Единая Россия отказалось от какой бы то ни было идеологии )

( Как Россия обгоняла Евросоюз )

( Как единороссы коррупцию побеждали )

( Эффективная международная политика )

( Единороссы как гаранты свободы слова )

( Сказ про то, как Россия вместо нефти станки продавала )

( Мудрое регулирование тарифов на электричество )

( Как единороссы построили нам полный ГЛОНАСС )

( Хит сезона – доступное жилье )

( Медвежья законность )

( Очевидные успехи в сфере удвоения ВВП )

Граждане России, вы согласны оставаться еще несколько лет недалеким электоратом, или готовы спросить у партии власти за исполнения ее обещаний многолетней давности?

Может хватит голосовать за обманщиков?

Прошу поддержать. Пусть как можно больше людей узнают, как единороссы выполняют свои обещания.

Even children are against Russian president!

Brains of the Russian leaders are so damn fucked that even child is able to notice that. President wants to destroy Utrish (the unique area at the shore of the Black Sea) for his amusement… bastard! 

Will he be able to listen to the children of the region?

I don’t think he is able to hear anything but the call of his own greed and greed of mister Putin.

Call out for solidarity!

Call for Solidarity actions with the accused COP15 activists
On the 18th of August there will be a solidarity demonstration in Copenhagen to mark the trial of the first two people accused of ‘organizing’ the protests around the COP 15. We
urge everyone to spend the day or the following days on demonstrations and statements of support and solidarity – demonstration and manifestations outside Danish embassies,
press work and articles – all are welcome and appreciated.
During the climate summit in Copenhagen, around 2000 people were arrested preventively and held in custody while they were trying to get their voices heard. These people along with thousands of other activists from around the world were trying to set a different and
more just political agenda in the climate debate.
Approximately 20 people were detained for up to a month, out of which four people are faced with trials this autumn.* These people are accused of charges including planning violence against police, systematic vandalism and serious disturbance of public peace and
order. Some of these charges are drawn from the Danish terror package and the penalties are strenghtened by the new Danish anti-protester laws introduced just prior to the COP 15. The charges they face are unfounded, but can still potentially result in years in prison. During COP15 thousands of people from around the world gathered in Copenhagen to challenge the farcical political negotiations at the Bella Center and demand just solutions to the climate crises. We demonstrated for solutions that are not only favouring the rich western world. We protested for real solutions which are challenging the capitalist system, because this system has a constant focus on growth and profit that is obviously not able to solve the climate problems.
This dawning climate justice movement was met with antipathy and arrogance of power from the Danish government, which was reflected in the form of a massive police repression. During 2009 the Danish government and the Danish police carried out an intense scare campaign in the media to demonize protesters and activists. Police were given extra power and economic resources for the COP 15. This led to thousands of preventive arrests, month-long surveillance of telephone and raids of private homes and accommodations, and
grotesque and unnecessary detentions.
The police actions were completely out of proportion and a clear violation of our democratic rights. Their actions attempted criminalization of our right to organize ourselves politically. It was made clear that any movement that dares to challenge existing power
structures and demand political changes are not welcome in Denmark today. Instead of listening to the massive criticism of the negotiations, the Danish government revealed a hypocritical lack of interest in solving the climate problems. And now the Danish state is trying to make four individuals responsible for a whole movement’s collective decision-making and collective protests.
In our view – the right to protest and everyone’s right to be heard, is an essential element in a democracy – even if you are speaking against the existing capitalist system. We therefore call on everyone to show solidarity with the accused and make the criticism of the ongoing
processes visible.
We would like to receive information and documentation of any actions you take to collect on our website.
The coming trials is not just about the fact that innocent people might be convicted, but about everybody’s fundamental right to demonstrate, protest, take action and organize politically. It is important that we do not sign away these rights, but continue the fight.

In Solidarity – The Climate Collective
www.cop15repression.info or www.climatecollective.org
email: cop15repression@climatecollective.org
* The four accused are: Natasha Verco, Noah Weiss, Stine Gry Jonassen and Tannie
Nyboe. Natasha and Noah’s trials are on the 24th, 25th and 31th of August, and Stine and
Tannie’s trials are on the 6th, 27th and 28th of October. The prosecution case against the
Danish state about the preventive arrests are on the 23th and 30th of August and the 1st of
September.

Civil war presentment

There is a news story – interview with a leader of antifascists which made a mess with the building of Himki administration.  For better understanding of causes of this mess you should read digest of events for Himkinsky forest rescuing (you may read only red colored text) – the conflict between common people and the capitalistic Power (government, local administration, criminals and even church).

Not the interview with the Antifa leader is interesting by itself but the following video-interview with the correspondent of the paper. In the end of the video he said that he has a civil war presentment… 

I have that presentment too… And what about you?

http://www.kommersant.ru/media/00007083.swf

Idea 2017

Recently I thought on a subject “how to create a better life in Russia”. I was riding on my bicycle at that moment. Riding at the beautiful Lahti town in Southeastern part of Finland – one of the Northern Europe counties as Sweden, Norway and Danemark for example. And for a long time Finland was a part of Sweden. This 4 countries are well known for its high quality level of life and economic development as for environmental preservation and strong social support system. On the picture below we’ll compare the most important social and economic aspects of development for Russia (red), Norway (green) and Finland (blue).

Finland, Norway and Russia comparison (click to enlarge) – Nuff said / facepalm (source: Legatum Prosperity Index)

Actually we can see from this picture, that Russian government do not give a fuck about the population – only about the money (no, it is not about wellbeing of common people – it’s about wellbeing of corporations and bureaucrats).

So I thought what if we can place some smart people from Norway for example (‘couse they know how to use natural resources in the wright way) in charge in Russia to let them develop the country in the way it should be?! Sounds crazy, isn’t it?

But I’m even not original! This idea is like 12 hundreds years old! And the most unbelievable is that it was realized with Nordic guy named Rurik! And even the name “Russia” is after Nordic people.

So let MedvePut (yes Medvedev and Putin are one being with Gazprom as holy spirit) to have a rest. And we’ll invite some people who knows how to create a better world.

It is hard to take public control over government, so let’s not get hurry but state the deadline to change Russia for good. To my mind 2017 is a reasonable deadline. Which month? October is a wright month for such things, isn’t it?

Where are oligarchs?

marker.ru (site that I mentioned in the previous post) provide us with incredible opportunity to watch over trails of yachts of Russian oligarchs. Here you can find a name, owner, cost, image, location and speed of yachts that belongs to robbers of the ex-great country.

Comments are so friendly:

“Does these coordinates precise enough for rocket launchers?”

P.S. Spatial source for the service is here (it is interesting to see too – you can find information about lot of ships).

P.P.S. I assume that marker.ru specialized in economical corruption-revealing news. This is uncommon and strange… but cool!

Africa exploitation

I like maps and GIS. But I want to show you something that is neither one nor another, but quite similar. It is very nice flash animation for information about export from Africa to developed countries – exploitation in other words. You can play with it here and I will just provide a couple of screen-shots.

Here you can chose country of your interest and click to see stats

Example of the stats