We Are Stardust

Approaching the end of another journey around our creator

[The following is adapted from a post originally published on December 31, 2010.]

For the vast majority of humans around the world who will be celebrating the end of another year, the dawn of a new one is a major marker in time, a signpost, a reminder that we are inexorably moving out of the past and into the future.

Indeed, there are few, if any, moments when nearly the entire human population is cognizant of such a shared sociocultural event as the Gregorian calendar-based New Year's Eve.

The ancient Romans also recognized January 1 as the first day of the new year ever since Julius Caesar established the big event in 46 BC. He dedicated the day to Janus (hence the name of the month, January), the god of doors, beginnings, endings and time. Janus had two faces—one looking at the past, the other looking to the future.

Even the Chinese, in their vast numbers—and who won't be celebrating their new year until January 23—are quite aware of the significance of January 1. It is, after all, the first day of the year on the internationally accepted civil calendar.

YOU SAY YOU WANT A REVOLUTION

But amidst the flurry of anticipation, preparation, celebration and the habitual tendency of humans to use such a portentous moment as an opportunity for intense self-reflection (e.g., "What I Didn't Accomplish Last Year"), self-adjustment (e.g., "This Is the Year I Will Quit Smoking") and self-congratulation (e.g., "My Top 10 Albums of the Year"), it is easy to forget why we have marked our history thusly every 365 days. It is simply the amount of time it takes for the Earth to revolve around the Sun.

In regard to this solitary fact, we are the only species who cares a feather or a fig. The 365-day journey is real. The portent...well, not so much.

A prominence erupting from the Sun's surface in October 2003, observed with the international Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO). A scale-sized image of the Earth was added to the bottom right section of the image to illustrate size comparison. (source: Nustar. credit: JPL/NASA and ESA.)

Unless something really unpredictable happens, Homo sapiens will survive yet another revolution around our parent star onboard spaceship Earth, just as our species has done for the past 200,000 or so years. But Earth has made this 365-day-long journey much longer than we have been around—about 4.6 billion times.

IN THE BEGINNING

At the dawn of the universe, some 13.7 billion years ago, there was just hydrogen and helium. Then around 4.6 billion years ago, a small section of a giant molecular cloud in a corner of the Milky Way galaxy experienced a gravitational collapse. The mass collected in the center, creating the Sun, one in a cluster of many stars that stretched up to 20 light-years across.

The remaining debris formed the protoplanetary disk, and soon after (a few to a hundred million years, a timeframe that constitutes "soon" in cosmological terms), through accretion, the Earth was born, along with the other planets, moons and the asteroids that now make up the asteroid belt. It was a chaotic time of collisions.

A meteorite found in Antarctica called GRA 06129 may have come from a large body that was blasted apart in a collision early in the solar system (image: NASA)

LOOKING AT AND LISTENING TO THE SUN

Douglas Gough, an astrophysicist at the University of Cambridge, says that understanding the immense power at the core of the Sun, where the nuclear reactions are so violent that new particles are born, "helps us to understand the basic physics of elementary matter." In other words, our Sun, like all other stars, is a creator. "To understand the universe," Gough says, "we need to study the stars." But there's only one star that gave birth to and sustains life on Earth.

The Sun photographed by the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) of NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO). (credit: NASA/SDO (AIA))

Seeing the core of the Sun—where all the creation happens—is currently technologically impossible. But scientists have been listening to the Sun's interior by recording the sounds that it makes. Every six minutes or so, the Sun "breathes" in and out, an activity that causes a complex pattern of ripples on the surface—a key to the fire that rages in its belly.

Sound wave of solar sounds generated from 40 days of Michelson Doppler Imager data (Stanford University)

Alexander G. Kosovichev, a senior research scientist at the W.W. Hansen Experimental Physics Laboratory at Stanford University, studies the sounds made by the Sun. The recordings he analyzes were taken by the Michelson Doppler Imager (MDI), a device onboard the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) spacecraft that measures underlying magnetic fields and gas flow patterns on the solar surface.

THE CREATOR

If we must worship a god, we could do much worse than picking the Sun as the object of our devotion. Ultimately, it is the reason we are here and continue to be here. No matter our different races and religions, nationalities and political affiliations, cultures and beliefs, there are just a few fundamental elements from which all of us—and indeed, all things in our solar system—are made, and they came from within the violent thermonuclear cauldron deep within the core of the Sun.

In his 1770 epistle "Épître à l'Auteur du Livre des Trois Imposteurs" ("Letter to the Author of the Three Impostors"), the French philosopher Voltaire wrote, "Si Dieu n'existait pas, il faudrait l'inventer." ("If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.") And invent him we did. Over and over and over again.

Ra-Horakhty is a combined deity of Horus and Ra, and is usually depicted as a falcon-headed man wearing a sun disk on his head. By themselves, Ra and Horus sometimes share similar iconography. Based on New Kingdom tomb paintings. (Wikipedia).

Indeed, we have invented so many names for the "creator" that it's difficult to keep track of them all. Atum. Unkulunkulu. Coatlicue. El. Vishvakarman. Ra-Horakhty. Pangu. Demiurge. Brahma. Waheguru. Allah. God. But in our particular post-Big Bang universe, there is only one kind of creator, a star. And there are many of them. As American astronomer Carl Sagan famously said, "A galaxy is composed of gas and dust and stars—billions upon billions of stars." The European Space Agency (ESA) estimates that there are somewhere on the order of 10²² to 10²⁴ stars in the known Universe.

If, as Wikipedia attests, religion is "a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of life and the universe," then the world's astrophysicists could make a strong case that their line of work constitutes a big chunk of that set—at least the "cause" and "nature" parts. As far as the "purpose" part goes, well...perhaps the monks could chime in on that.

In the 2005 documentary film about him, American astronomer John Dobson (who also happens to be a Vedantic monk of the Ramakrishna Order) suggests that physicists and Vedantics are really searching for the same thing. As he notes, "There are only three ingredients in this universe: hydrogen, helium and the dust of exploded stars." Scientists and philosophers are living in the same reality, so if science and philosophy are to find agreement on the nature of being and existence, agreeing on this basic fact is sine qua non.

This New Year's Eve, take a look into the night sky. You won't be able to see the Sun, for it will be shining on the other side of the Earth, but perhaps you'll be able to see a different star. Much more distant than ours, to be sure, but in its own lifetime, no less influential to the celestial bodies that may be drawn to it by the lure of its gravitational pull.

So go ahead, worship the Sun. After all, you are stardust.

[December was Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. Posts this month considered various victories that were made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you. And good luck on your next journey around the Sun.]

[top image: sundial jbelluch]

Victory Month | Small Wins for Polar Bears, But Their Plight to Survive Continues

"[This] decision squarely places the fate of the polar bear back in the hands of the Obama administration. Rather than continue to defend an ill-conceived Bush-era rule, the Obama administration should take this opportunity to carefully craft a new rule that meaningfully addresses greenhouse gas emissions, the primary threat to the polar bear.” -- Brendan Cummings, Center for Biological Diversity

[December is Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. As the year comes to a close, each post will review a big or small victory that was made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you.]

In October, thanks to concerned citizens who supported a coordinated campaign by Defenders of Wildlife, the Center for Biological Diversity, Natural Resources Defense Council and Greenpeace, a federal judge struck down a Bush administration rule that exempted greenhouse gas emissions from regulation under the provisions of the Endangered Species Act (ESA), forcing the government to undertake a full environmental analysis of the polar bear's dire situation.

US District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan ruled that the Interior Department violated the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) when it issued a special rule that excluded greenhouse gas emissions from coal plants and other major polluters from federal regulation if they occurred outside the polar bear range. This rule was a just a ploy to allow the dirty fossil fuel industries to keep destroying the environment—and critical polar bear habitat—in the name of profit. Obviously, the Earth's average surface temperature will rise—and melt the polar ice caps—no matter where greenhouse gases are emitted.

"Just this summer, Arctic sea ice reached its second lowest level on record, making polar bear protections more important than ever," said Jason Rylander, senior attorney for Defenders of Wildlife. "Only by acknowledging and accounting for the dramatic effects of climate change can this administration give this Arctic icon a realistic chance of survival."

Defenders of Wildlife also scored another victory for polar bears when a federal ban on the importation of trophy-hunted polar bear parts into the United States was upheld.

While these wins have been critical in the fight to save polar bears and their habitat, these iconic animals are still facing grave dangers on a daily basis and are struggling so hard to survive against the changes brought to their habitat by anthropogenic climate change.

ACTION ALERTS

• Sign the Save the Polar Bear Petition and tell President Obama to rein in global warming and save the endangered polar bear (Center for Biological Diversity)
• Join the almost 2.3 million people around the world who have signed the Universal Declaration of Animal Welfare (AnimalsMatter.org)
• Follow 13.7 Billion Years on Twitter

PAST SERIES

• Of Rice and Men: Cooking the world's most important grain for human nutrition
• 21 Days, 21 Reasons, 21 Recipes, 21 Quotes: Eating plants, loving animals
• Rich Dog, Poor Dog: Considering man's best friend
• Physicists & Priests: Looking at the relationship of science and religion
• Deep Space: Staring at the stars
  
• Gray Matters: Thinking about thinking
  
• Flower Power: Stopping to smell the angiosperms
• Animal Cruelty: Looking at the devil within
• Chemical Month: Exploring the vast laboratory of our daily lives
• Africa Month: Visiting the world's second-largest continent
• Reports from 2050: Imagining the future

image: Center for Biological Diversity

Victory Month | Congressional Extinction Rider Defeated

"While the Interior appropriations bill contains numerous anti-environmental provisions, it’s very encouraging that, even in this extremely polarized political environment, members of Congress on both sides of the aisle are still willing to stand up for core American values like saving imperiled wildlife from extinction." -- Rodger Schlickeisen, president, Defenders for Wildlife

[December is Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. As the year comes to a close, each post will review a big or small victory that was made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you.]

Thanks in part to the concerned citizens who signed the Defenders of Wildlife petition and supported their campaign to protect the Endangered Species Act (ESA), the so-called "Extinction Rider" was defeated in Congress.

The rider was a provision in an amendment to the Interior appropriations bill (H.R. 2584) that would have increased the extinction risk for endangered species by blocking protections for adding new species under the ESA.

In June, the U.S. House of Representatives approved (224-202) an amendment to the bill introduced by Rep. Norm Dicks (D-Wash.) and co-sponsored by Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick (R-Penn.), Rep. Mike Thompson (D-Calif.) and Rep. Colleen Hanabusa (D-Hawaii) that preserves critical protections for America’s threatened wildlife.

"This is a tremendous victory for our nation’s imperiled wildlife and a testament to strong, bipartisan support for upholding the Endangered Species Act—one of our nation's most successful and forward-thinking environmental laws," said Defenders of Wildlife president Rodger Schlickeisen.

"Nearly 40 years ago, our nation made a commitment in the form of the Endangered Species Act to preserve the entire web of life for the benefit of our children and grandchildren...For years, Big Oil, mining, logging, and development interests have been trying to do away with protections for our most imperiled plants and animals....But the majority of House members showed today that they will not tolerate such reckless efforts to dismantle America's safety net for protecting endangered species."

ACTION ALERTS

• Tell U.S. Fish & Wildlife to not grant a permit requested by NiSource, the operator of a 15,000 mile pipeline in 14 states, seeking to legally kill endangered species anywhere along the route of their pipeline for the next 50 years (Endangered Species Coalition)
• Join the almost 2.3 million people around the world who have signed the Universal Declaration of Animal Welfare (AnimalsMatter.org)
• Follow 13.7 Billion Years on Twitter

PAST SERIES

• Of Rice and Men: Cooking the world's most important grain for human nutrition
• 21 Days, 21 Reasons, 21 Recipes, 21 Quotes: Eating plants, loving animals
• Rich Dog, Poor Dog: Considering man's best friend
• Physicists & Priests: Looking at the relationship of science and religion
• Deep Space: Staring at the stars
  
• Gray Matters: Thinking about thinking
  
• Flower Power: Stopping to smell the angiosperms
• Animal Cruelty: Looking at the devil within
• Chemical Month: Exploring the vast laboratory of our daily lives
• Africa Month: Visiting the world's second-largest continent
• Reports from 2050: Imagining the future

image: Bald eagle chicks (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) in nest on Kodiak Island (credit: US Fish & Wildlife Service, Wikimedia Commons

Victory Month | Millions of Animals a Year Saved from Use in Medical Training

"We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals." -- Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), German philosopher

[December is Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. As the year comes to a close, each post will review a big or small victory that was made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you.]

Every year, millions of animals—monkeys, pigs, cats, rats, mice, frogs, rabbits, ferrets and many other species—suffer greatly and are needlessly killed in classrooms. However, there are proven and effective non-animal methods for teaching, recommended by a growing number of ethical physicians, such as those involved with the non-profit animal welfare group Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM).

More and more colleges, universities and medical centers have abandoned the use of animals in their classrooms and training programs. And thanks to concerned citizens like you who got involved by signing petitions and supporting animal welfare campaigns this year, 2011 saw several key victories.

In September, thanks to signatories of PCRM petitions, Indiana University announced that it halted the use of cats in its pediatrics residency program and the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (UHUHS) School of Medicine in Bethesda, Maryland, the military medical school for the United States, agreed to stop using pigs in its Advanced Trauma Life Support (ATLS) training courses.

In October, Congressman Roscoe Bartlett (R-Md.) met with Army officials at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland and confirmed that they have agreed to replace the use of live monkeys in chemical casualty management courses with non-animal training methods.

Also in October, Carolinas Medical Center announced that it has stopped using animals in its training courses, including the use of ferrets for endotracheal intubation training, ending a long PCRM campaign.

"Pharmaceutical manufacturers have incorporated non-animal methods in several early steps in the drug development process. In other areas, technical or regulatory barriers present continuing challenges," according to PCRM. But "[i]n some areas, such as medical education, the shift to non-animal methods has been rapid."

Last month, thanks to supporters of PETA India's campaign to end the use of animals in universities, the University Grants Commission (UCG), the governing body for Indian universities, officially recommended that all colleges and universities replace animal experimentation and dissection with modern non-animal methods.

"Animals used for dissection may be captured from their natural habitats or may come from 'biological supply' companies, which not only breed animals but also purchase them from slaughterhouses, pet stores, animal shelters, and dealers who sell lost or stolen companion animals," writes Michelle Sherrow of PETA. "Animals are killed by gassing or drowning and are then injected with formaldehyde, sometimes without first being checked to make sure that they are dead."

"According to Dr. BK Sharma, associate professor and head of the Department of Zoology at the RL Saharia Government PG College in Jaipur, by using computer simulations, interactive CD-ROMs, films, charts, and lifelike models, it is estimated that Indian universities will save 19 million animals every year."

Thanks to your participation in these and other campaigns in 2011, the lives of millions of animals around the globe will be spared. For the human race, these are important steps toward the ethical treatment of our fellow Earthlings. As the U.S. Army and a growing list of universities and medical centers around the world have shown, it is not necessary to use animals in medical training. But there is still much more to be done. Please keep the momentum going strong in 2012 and sign the petitions below. Thank you.

ACTION ALERTS

• Stop the unnecessary suffering of dogs and tell Wayne State University to halt inhumane dog experiments (PCRM)
• Sign a letter urging your federal Representative and Senators to cosponsor the Great Ape Protection and Cost Savings Act (H.R.1513/S.810), which seeks to end invasive research on chimpanzees and release those who are now in labs to the comfort, safety and peace of a sanctuary (HSUS)
• Tell St. Louis Children's Hospital to follow in the footsteps of the University of Michigan and end the hospital's use of animals for intubation training (PETA)
• Let Army medical leaders know that you appreciate the U.S. Army's agreement to end the use of live vervet monkeys in chemical casualty management training, and that the transition should happen immediately (PCRM)
• Visit CutOutDissection.com to learn how PETA can help you get dissection alternatives implemented in schools near you
• Join the almost 2.3 million people around the world who have signed the Universal Declaration of Animal Welfare (AnimalsMatter.org)
• Follow 13.7 Billion Years on Twitter

PAST SERIES

• Of Rice and Men: Cooking the world's most important grain for human nutrition
• 21 Days, 21 Reasons, 21 Recipes, 21 Quotes: Eating plants, loving animals
• Rich Dog, Poor Dog: Considering man's best friend
• Physicists & Priests: Looking at the relationship of science and religion
• Deep Space: Staring at the stars
  
• Gray Matters: Thinking about thinking
  
• Flower Power: Stopping to smell the angiosperms
• Animal Cruelty: Looking at the devil within
• Chemical Month: Exploring the vast laboratory of our daily lives
• Africa Month: Visiting the world's second-largest continent
• Reports from 2050: Imagining the future

image: A female vervet monkey with her baby (credit: Charlesjsharp, Wikimedia Commons)

Victory Month | Land Saved from Fracking in Ohio

"Right now in Washington, money rules. Sooner or later Big Oil will ram Keystone, and fracking, and a thousand other bad ideas down our throats unless we manage to change the system." -- Bill McKibben, founder, 350.org

[December is Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. As the year comes to a close, each post will review a big or small victory that was made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you.]

In another big win for issue-engaged, petition-signing citizens taking part in grassroots advocacy, a big chunk of public land in Ohio has been spared from hydrofracking.

"Fracking opponents in southern Ohio won a victory...when the United States Forest Service (USFS) withdrew more than 3,000 acres of public lands from a federal oil and gas lease sale," writes Mike Ludwig of Truthout.

"The USFS announced that it needed more time to review the potential effects of fracking after receiving petitions and letters from local leaders who used the old-fashioned method of collecting signatures to catch the attention of government officials."

According to a Common Cause report, "A faction of the natural gas industry has invested more than $747 million as part of a 10-year lobbying and political spending campaign to persuade federal authorities to ignore the dangers of hydraulic fracturing, or 'fracking,' a rapidly expanding but poorly regulated method of tapping gas reserves."

(To put that figure into context, the 2011 United States aid commitment to help the people affected by the East Africa drought totals $650 million. Humanitarian agencies have requested $2.48 billion, but as of August, have secured less than half that amount.)

Thank you for taking part in this broad civil action against a dangerous method of gathering fossil fuel, supported by an industry armed with powerful lobbyists on Capitol Hill determined to keep America addicted to dirty sources of energy.

ACTION ALERTS

• Tell Congress to support the Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals (FRAC) Act, which would close oil and gas industry loopholes in the Safe Drinking Water Act and require disclosure of chemicals used during hydraulic fracturing (Earthjustice)
• Tell the U.S. Department of Energy not to issue a report on fracking without waiting for the environmental study being conducted by the Environmental Protection Agency, especially when the Department’s report is written by industry insiders (Food & Water Watch)
• Support ActionAid's efforts to help the 10 million people suffering from the East Africa drought (ActionAid)
• Follow 13.7 Billion Years on Twitter

PAST SERIES

• Of Rice and Men: Cooking the world's most important grain for human nutrition
• 21 Days, 21 Reasons, 21 Recipes, 21 Quotes: Eating plants, loving animals
• Rich Dog, Poor Dog: Considering man's best friend
• Physicists & Priests: Looking at the relationship of science and religion
• Deep Space: Staring at the stars
  
• Gray Matters: Thinking about thinking
  
• Flower Power: Stopping to smell the angiosperms
• Animal Cruelty: Looking at the devil within
• Chemical Month: Exploring the vast laboratory of our daily lives
• Africa Month: Visiting the world's second-largest continent
• Reports from 2050: Imagining the future

image: Anti-fracking rally outside the Manhattan office of New York governor Andrew Cuomo, June 25, 2011 (credit: Owen Crowley, Flickr Creative Commons)

Victory Month | Threatened Bluefin Tuna Get Some Help

"It's abundantly clear to me that overfishing is pushing our oceans towards an irreversible collapse." -- Ted Danson

[December is Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. As the year comes to a close, each post will review a big or small victory that was made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you.]

Fears about overfishing will continue for some time, especially as the human population continues to swell, but bluefin tuna conservationists scored a major victory at the 22nd meeting of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT), held last month in Istanbul.

At the meeting, governments agreed to implement an electronic catch documentation system for bluefin, which will help maintain healthier fish stocks.

Fetching up to $100 a pound, bluefin is a coveted fish whose populations have plummeted since the mid-1990s due to overfishing -- and the explosion of the global sushi industry.

According to the Pew Environment Report "Mind the Gap: An Analysis of the Gap Between Mediterranean Bluefin Quotas and International Trade Figures," 141 percent more bluefin tuna was sold worldwide last year than is permitted by ICCAT quotas.

"This change is long overdue," writes Lee Crockett of the Pew. "Putting the squeeze on illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing is critical to conserving threatened species."

That doesn't mean you should go hog-wild eating bluefin tuna. It will take some time for this system to be implemented and currently, the fish is in serious decline. Eating less or none of it now will help their populations recover from the voracious human appetite.

Danson, a board member of the marine conservation group Oceana, said that bluefins "need a generational breather to prevent total collapse."

ACTION ALERTS

• Take the Pledge to Avoid Bluefin Tuna (Center for Biological Diversity)
• Join Ted Danson and tell Congress to fight overfishing and prevent an empty ocean (Oceana)
• Join the almost 2.3 million people around the world who have signed the Universal Declaration of Animal Welfare (AnimalsMatter.org)
• Tune into Big Cat Week on NatGeo (NatGeo)
• Follow 13.7 Billion Years on Twitter

PAST SERIES

• Of Rice and Men: Cooking the world's most important grain for human nutrition
• 21 Days, 21 Reasons, 21 Recipes, 21 Quotes: Eating plants, loving animals
• Rich Dog, Poor Dog: Considering man's best friend
• Physicists & Priests: Looking at the relationship of science and religion
• Deep Space: Staring at the stars
  
• Gray Matters: Thinking about thinking
  
• Flower Power: Stopping to smell the angiosperms
• Animal Cruelty: Looking at the devil within
• Chemical Month: Exploring the vast laboratory of our daily lives
• Africa Month: Visiting the world's second-largest continent
• Reports from 2050: Imagining the future

image: Keith Ellenbogen, Oceana

Victory Month | Obama Protects Clean Air

"These historic new health standards will save lives." -- Gene Karpinski, president, League of Conservation Voters

[December is Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. As the year comes to a close, each post will review a big or small victory that was made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you.]

Yesterday, the Obama administration set America's first-ever regulations on mercury and other toxic air pollution from power plants, helping safeguard Americans—in particular children and pregnant women—from an array of health risks, including heart attacks, asthma, chronic bronchitis and premature death. The public pressure on Obama to enact these regulations was strong: More than 900,000 Americans submitted comments to the EPA (including 50,000 Earthjustice supporters and 10,000 NRDC supporters)—the most comments ever submitted regarding an EPA rule.

"I am glad to be here to mark the finalization of a clean air rule that has been 20 years in the making, and is now ready to start improving our health, protecting our children, and cleaning up our air," Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator Lisa Jackson said at an event at the Children's National Medical Center in Washington. "Under the Clean Air Act these standards will require American power plants to put in place proven and widely available pollution control technologies to cut harmful emissions of mercury, arsenic, chromium, nickel and acid gases. In and of itself, this is a great victory for public health, especially for the health of our children."

"Until now there have been no federal standards that require power plants to limit their emissions of toxic air pollutants like mercury, arsenic and metals—despite the availability of proven control technologies, and the more than 20 years since the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments passed," according to the EPA.

At a time when many environmentalists have given up on President Obama's commitment to a greener America—a failure to push through cap-and-trade climate change legislation, abandoning a move by the EPA to strengthen standards to reduce smog pollution, allowing BP to continue deep-sea drilling in the Gulf and potential approval of the Keystone XL oil pipeline are among the reasons of their exasperation with the White House—this news was roundly praised.

"The significance of these new standards cannot be understated," said League of Conservation Voters president Gene Karpinski in an email. "The negative health impacts of toxic air pollution are well-known and documented—and the EPA is estimating that these new standards will save thousands of lives, prevent up to 120,000 cases of childhood asthma and avert 11,000 cases of acute childhood bronchitis every year starting in 2015."

Power plants are the biggest emitters of mercury (50 percent), acid gases (over 75 percent) and many toxic metals (20-60 percent), according to the EPA.

But the fight for clean air is far from over: The coal- and oil-fired power plant industry will be contesting the new rules.

"President Obama has stood up against intense pressure from polluters who launched a last minute blitz to get him to broadly delay the implementation of these protections," said Earthjustice president Trip Van Noppen in an email. "In the new year, these polluters will turn their attention back to the courts and to Capitol Hill, where they will ask Congress to block these protections from being implemented."

ACTION ALERTS

• Tell St. Louis Children's Hospital to follow in the footsteps of the University of Michigan and end the hospital's use of animals for intubation training (PETA)
• Join the almost 2.3 million people around the world who have signed the Universal Declaration of Animal Welfare (AnimalsMatter.org)
• Tune into Big Cat Week on NatGeo (NatGeo)
• Follow 13.7 Billion Years on Twitter

PAST SERIES

• Of Rice and Men: Cooking the world's most important grain for human nutrition
• 21 Days, 21 Reasons, 21 Recipes, 21 Quotes: Eating plants, loving animals
• Rich Dog, Poor Dog: Considering man's best friend
• Physicists & Priests: Looking at the relationship of science and religion
• Deep Space: Staring at the stars
  
• Gray Matters: Thinking about thinking
  
• Flower Power: Stopping to smell the angiosperms
• Animal Cruelty: Looking at the devil within
• Chemical Month: Exploring the vast laboratory of our daily lives
• Africa Month: Visiting the world's second-largest continent
• Reports from 2050: Imagining the future

image: EPA

Victory Month | Sharks Get Help Around the World

Sharks have been swimming the Earth's oceans unchallenged for 420 million years. Then humans arrived. And the Chinese developed a taste for shark fin soup. In 2011, sharks got some much needed help

[December is Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. As the year comes to a close, each post will review a big or small victory that was made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you.]

Sharks scored several wins around the world in 2011, thanks in part to public pressure. Here are some key victories.

European Commission Moves to End Shark Finning

In November, in a move to support better shark conservation, the European Commission proposed closing loopholes in the European Union shark finning ban. Shark finning is a cruel practice in which the fins of live sharks are cut off and their finless bodies are deposited back in the water, where they sink to the bottom and die a slow and horrible death, often eaten alive by other fish. The fins are used to supply the market for shark fin soup, a traditional Chinese recipe. Over 73 million sharks are killed in this horrific fashion every year around the world -- just for soup.

"Since the early 1990s, finning has been banned by approximately 30 countries, with the EU ban occurring in 2003," according to the Pew Environment Group. "Most international fisheries bodies banned finning in 2004 and 2005. The current EU regulation, however, cannot ensure that finning is not continuing undetected and unpunished. EU Member States, for example, can grant special fishing permits that allow fishermen to remove shark fins at sea and bring bodies and fins to separate ports."

If the Commission proposal is adopted by the European Parliament and Council of Fisheries Ministers from the EU’s 27 member states, special fishing permits would not be allowed, ensuring that "all sharks taken by EU vessels or in EU waters are landed with their fins naturally attached to their bodies."

Stop Shark Finning has compiled a list of restaurants around the world that sell shark fin soup and has urged the public to boycott these establishments.

Florida Protects Sharks

Beginning in January, it will be illegal to kill tiger sharks and three species of hammerheads (scalloped, smooth and great hammerheads) in Florida's waters. If any of these species are accidentally caught, they must be released immediately. This is a huge victory for these sharks, as the waters off the Florida coast are an important habitat.

"Tiger sharks have declined drastically in recent decades—up to 97% in US Atlantic waters," writes Rebecca Greenberg of the conservation group Oceana. "And these three species of hammerhead sharks have declined about 70% in northwest Atlantic waters. Sharks are often caught for their fins that eventually end up in shark fin soup."

California Makes Shark Finning Illegal

In October, California governor Jerry Brown signed AB376 into law, making the possession, sale and trade of shark fins illegal in the state beginning in 2013. This is a huge victory for sharks, especially considering the many Chinese restaurants in Los Angeles and San Francisco that sell shark fin soup.

"The practice of cutting the fins off of living sharks and dumping them back in the ocean is not only cruel, but it harms the health of our oceans," said Governor Brown. "Researchers estimate that some shark populations have declined by more than 90 percent, portending grave threats to our environment and commercial fishing. In the interest of future generations, I have signed this bill."

No Shark Cull in Western Australia

Following a spate of shark attacks, officials in Western Australia considered a shark cull. But thanks to the more than 18,000 people who signed a Care2 petition and the advocacy of Care2 member and marine neuroecologist Ryan Kempster, founder of the conservation group Support Our Sharks, the government rejected the cull option and instead invested more than $13 million in research, helicopter surveillance patrols, swimmer education and a shark response unit.

"This is a fantastic outcome for public safety and shark conservation in WA," said Kempster, in a Care2 announcement. "The shark mitigation measures outlined by WA Fisheries Minister Moore set a benchmark for other Australian states and will place WA as a national leader in beach protection and shark conservation."

There's No Such Thing As a Shark Attack

Western Australia's logical response demonstrates an awareness that when we go into shark territory, we are uninvited guests there. The comedian Gilbert Arenas put it best:

"We’re humans. We live on land. Sharks live in water. So if you're swimming in the water and a shark bites you, that's called trespassing. That is not a shark attack. A shark attack is if you're chilling at home, sitting on your couch, and a shark comes in and bites you; now that's a shark attack. Now, if you're chilling in the water, that is called invasion of space. So I have never heard of a shark attack."

ACTION ALERTS

• Avoid these restaurants and any restaurants that sell shark fin soup, and tell them why you're not supporting their business (Stop Shark Finning Boycott)
• Join the almost 2.3 million people around the world who have signed the Universal Declaration of Animal Welfare (AnimalsMatter.org)
• Tune into Big Cat Week on NatGeo (NatGeo)
• Follow 13.7 Billion Years on Twitter

PAST SERIES

• Of Rice and Men: Cooking the world's most important grain for human nutrition
• 21 Days, 21 Reasons, 21 Recipes, 21 Quotes: Eating plants, loving animals
• Rich Dog, Poor Dog: Considering man's best friend
• Physicists & Priests: Looking at the relationship of science and religion
• Deep Space: Staring at the stars
  
• Gray Matters: Thinking about thinking
  
• Flower Power: Stopping to smell the angiosperms
• Animal Cruelty: Looking at the devil within
• Chemical Month: Exploring the vast laboratory of our daily lives
• Africa Month: Visiting the world's second-largest continent
• Reports from 2050: Imagining the future

image: hammerhead shark (credit: National Geographic, Wikimedia Commons)

Victory Month | Russia Bans Harp Seal Skins

"The door to one of the largest markets for seal products has now been slammed shut." -- Sheryl Fink, Seal Team Director, International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW)

[December is Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. As the year comes to a close, each post will review a big or small victory that was made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you.]

In a major victory for seals and animal activists, Russia has banned the import and export of seal skins, essentially shutting down 90 percent of Canada's export market.

"It’s the biggest victory in the campaign to end commercial sealing since the European Union (EU) banned non-Inuit seal products," said Sheryl Fink, Seal Team Director, International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), in a blog post.

She says that this trade ban is "a significant victory that should be celebrated by all concerned with animal welfare and wildlife conservation...With the Russian market closed to harp seal fur products, and a long-promised deal to export seal meat to China at risk due to concerns over food security, the future looks bleaker than ever for the dying Canadian sealing industry. The time has come to acknowledge that the world does not want, nor need, cruel seal products. It is time to stop commercial seal hunting once and for all."

Fink also notes, "In 2009, the same year that the EU banned non-Inuit seal products, Russia ended its own hunt for harp seals in the White Sea and Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin called it a 'bloody industry' and something that 'should have been banned years ago.'"

It is called a "seal hunt," but there's not much hunting going on when killer humans simply run around clubbing defenseless baby seals, most no older than 12 weeks.

"This year, they've authorized sealers to slaughter 468,200 seals, an increase of 80,000 from 2010," said Rebecca Aldworth, Executive Director of Humane Society International/Canada, who travelled to Canada's east coast with HSI's Protect Seals team in April to document the killing of these helpless, newly-born pups. "Rather than protecting this vulnerable population, the Canadian government is encouraging the commercial slaughter of them."

This cruel and inhumane practice does very little for the economy of Canada and puts a black mark on the nation's image in the global community. Actress, comedienne and TV host Ellen DeGeneres has made a personal plea on her website to end the hunt, saying, "Seal hunting is one of the most atrocious and inhumane acts against animals allowed by any government."

In 2009, the EU voted to ban products made from Canada's seal slaughter and the United States Senate passed a resolution introduced by Senator Carl Levin (D-MI) urging the Government of Canada to end the commercial seal hunt. Belgium, the Netherlands, Italy, Austria, Croatia, Slovenia, Germany, Switzerland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Mexico and Panama have either banned seal products or have made moves to do so.

Even the majority of Canadians are expressing their distaste for the hunt. A recent poll found that 72% of Canadians support regulations banning the hunting of seal pups and 81% would not be upset if the commercial seal hunt were to end altogether. The hunt represents a very small portion of the nation's $1.3 trillion GDP. It is a leftover from a dark past, and must be stopped. But Canadian lawmakers insist on keeping this horrible legacy.

There is however one Canadian senator who is taking a stand: Mac Harb. "Canada’s commercial seal hunt is a dying industry based primarily on demand for fur for luxury items," writes Senator Harb on his Web site. "But markets for seal fur are disappearing and sealers’ earnings have plummeted." Each sealer earns about $1,000 minus expenses for participating in the hunt. Harb has introduced a bill to end the hunt.

"IFAW supporters have worked so hard to help us close down the markets for seal products around the world," said IFAW President Fred O'Regan in an email about the Russian ban. "And this news will inspire us to work even harder so that together we WILL finally see an end to Canada's commercial harp seal hunt."

ACTION ALERTS

• Avoid Canadian seafood, sign the Canadian Seafood Boycott Pledge to save seals (HSUS)
• Stop Namibian seal slaughter. Seal culling is a tragic practice outlawed in most of the world. Namibia is the only country in the southern hemisphere that still tolerates it, even though the repeated clubbing to death, torture, or harassment of any animal, including seals, appears to be technically illegal. Sign this petition to urge Ombudsman John Walters to place a moratorium on seal slaughter until this issue is resolved. (Care2)
• Support IFAW's efforts to end seal hunts (IFAW)
• Join the almost 2.3 million people around the world who have signed the Universal Declaration of Animal Welfare (AnimalsMatter.org)
• Tune into Big Cat Week on NatGeo (NatGeo)
• Follow 13.7 Billion Years on Twitter

PAST SERIES

• Of Rice and Men: Cooking the world's most important grain for human nutrition
• 21 Days, 21 Reasons, 21 Recipes, 21 Quotes: Eating plants, loving animals
• Rich Dog, Poor Dog: Considering man's best friend
• Physicists & Priests: Looking at the relationship of science and religion
• Deep Space: Staring at the stars
  
• Gray Matters: Thinking about thinking
  
• Flower Power: Stopping to smell the angiosperms
• Animal Cruelty: Looking at the devil within
• Chemical Month: Exploring the vast laboratory of our daily lives
• Africa Month: Visiting the world's second-largest continent
• Reports from 2050: Imagining the future

image: IFAW

Victory Month | Caracas Bans Bullfighting

"It sickens me to know that in this day and age, people are still paying money to see an animal suffering in such a horrific way." -- actor Ricky Gervais in an anti-bullfighting film he made for the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA).

[December is Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. As the year comes to a close, each post will review a big or small victory that was made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you.]

Caracas has banned bullfighting, becoming the first city in Venezuela to officially outlaw the cruel bloodsport.

Some people call it a "sport." But as PETA UK notes, "For the bull, bullfighting is no 'competition.' It is simply slaughter for human entertainment." According to Humane Society International (HSI), approximately 250,000 bulls are killed in bullfights every year.

The decision was handed down by the Venezuelan Supreme Court, annulling the 1988 Ordinance on Bullfights, which contradicts a newer federal law that affords protection to all species.

"As anyone who has ever seen a bullfight will know, la corrida involves a huge amount of suffering not only to bulls but to horses as well," according to the UK-based animal welfare group League Against Cruel Sports. "All of this cruelty can only serve to have a negative impact on society."

Though Caracas hasn't hosted a bullfight in 14 years and declared itself an anti-bullfighting city in 2009, animal welfare advocates see this move as a significant step in spreading the anti-bullfighting movement across the country.

While the global anti-bullfighting movement has been growing and attendance at bullfights have been dwindling (72 percent of Spaniards have no interest in it), there are still factions of rabid supporters. In October, a group of ninety-five activists were brutally attacked by a mob of pro-bullfighting thugs as they staged a peaceful sit-in at a bullring in Rodilhan, France.

For now, anti-bullfighting activists can notch one victory in Venezuela. But the battle to save all bulls from this horrific fate continues.

ACTION ALERTS

• Sign a petition to ban bullfighting in Spain (PETA UK)
• Sign a petition telling the Council of Pamplona you are against the San Fermin "Running of the Bulls," which ends in a bullfight (Care2)
• Want to help bulls even more? Take these steps to stop bullfighting (Humane Society International)
• Join the almost 2.3 million people around the world who have signed the Universal Declaration of Animal Welfare (AnimalsMatter.org)
• Tune into Big Cat Week on NatGeo (NatGeo)
• Follow 13.7 Billion Years on Twitter

PAST SERIES

• Of Rice and Men: Cooking the world's most important grain for human nutrition
• 21 Days, 21 Reasons, 21 Recipes, 21 Quotes: Eating plants, loving animals
• Rich Dog, Poor Dog: Considering man's best friend
• Physicists & Priests: Looking at the relationship of science and religion
• Deep Space: Staring at the stars
  
• Gray Matters: Thinking about thinking
  
• Flower Power: Stopping to smell the angiosperms
• Animal Cruelty: Looking at the devil within
• Chemical Month: Exploring the vast laboratory of our daily lives
• Africa Month: Visiting the world's second-largest continent
• Reports from 2050: Imagining the future

image: Care2

Victory Month | NIH Curtails Chimp Research

"The NIH has funded a lot of research that's just been deemed unnecessary. Even though they have stopped short of the ban, it's a welcome first step." -- Jarrod Bailey, science director, New England Anti-Vivisection Society[1]

[December is Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. As the year comes to a close, each post will review a big or small victory that was made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you.]

Yesterday was a landmark day for chimpanzees, our closest genetic relatives. The National Institutes of Health (NIH), the public agency of the U.S. government responsible for biomedical and health-related research, announced that it would cut its use of chimpanzees in medical research, putting a moratorium on new chimpanzee research grants after an independent scientific panel deemed the apes are not necessary for most biomedical research.

"I think it was a very thoughtful set of recommendations from a distinguished group of experts who spent many months taking in input from lots of different perspectives," said NIH Director Francis Collins. "I found their recommendations very compelling and scientifically rigorous." Collins said that because of their close genetic relationship to humans, chimps deserve "special consideration and respect."[2][3]

While the 190-page report didn't recommend an outright ban on chimpanzee research (Hepatitis C, for example, only infects humans and chimps), the decision was hailed as an advancement by both animal welfare advocates and scientists.

"Science is evolving," said committee member Warner Greene, the director of the Gladstone Institute of Virology and Immunology at the University of California, San Francisco. "We have alternative ways of testing drugs."[4]

There are between 900-1,000 chimps currently incarcerated in research labs across the United States, many of them having spent decades behind bars, suffering dart-gun knockouts, biopsies and repeated infections.

The panel set a high bar for chimp research moving forward, saying they should only be used in biomedical research if there is "no other suitable model available," if the research "cannot be performed ethically on human subjects" and if not using chimps would "significantly slow or prevent" important advances.

In September, 38 research chimpanzees infected with HIV were released to the Gut Aiderbichl Animal Sanctuary, near Salzburg, Austria. The majority of them were kidnapped from Africa as babies and sent to research facilities in Europe. It was the first time they saw the sun or felt grass for 30 years. It was also the first time they were able to really touch each other, having been separated by bars or bulletproof glass. Watch a video of their release here.

The Great Ape Protection and Cost Savings Act (H.R.1513/S.810)—a bill that would phase out invasive research on chimpanzees in laboratories in the U.S., retire the more than 500 government-owned chimpanzees to sanctuaries, end breeding of chimpanzees for invasive research and save taxpayers approximately $30 million every year—is currently making its way through Congress.

"This report was the result of months of work by PCRM and our supporters to prevent the Alamogordo chimpanzees from being moved into a research facility, where they would be subjected to painful experimentation," said Elizabeth Kucinich, director of Public and Government Affairs at the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM), which has been collecting signatures from American citizens to stop chimp research, in an email.

"The conclusions reached by the committee take us many steps closer to ending invasive research on great apes and is a very positive addition to the increasing institutional support this action is receiving...Now more than ever, it is crucial that we pass the Great Ape Protection and Cost Savings Act."

ACTION ALERTS

• Sign a letter urging your federal Representative and Senators to cosponsor the Great Ape Protection and Cost Savings Act (H.R.1513/S.810) (HSUS)
• Join the almost 2.3 million people around the world who have signed the Universal Declaration of Animal Welfare (AnimalsMatter.org)
• Follow 13.7 Billion Years on Twitter

PAST SERIES

• Of Rice and Men: Cooking the world's most important grain for human nutrition
• 21 Days, 21 Reasons, 21 Recipes, 21 Quotes: Eating plants, loving animals
• Rich Dog, Poor Dog: Considering man's best friend
• Physicists & Priests: Looking at the relationship of science and religion
• Deep Space: Staring at the stars
  
• Gray Matters: Thinking about thinking
  
• Flower Power: Stopping to smell the angiosperms
• Animal Cruelty: Looking at the devil within
• Chemical Month: Exploring the vast laboratory of our daily lives
• Africa Month: Visiting the world's second-largest continent
• Reports from 2050: Imagining the future

NOTES

[1] http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/MED-CHIMPS_6826308/MED-CHIMPS_6826308/
[2] Ibid.
[3] http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/16/science/chimps-in-medical-research.html

[4] Ibid., 1.

image: UC Davis

ABOUT 13.7 BILLION YEARS

On March 9, 2008, The New York Times reported on research that has provided the most precise age of the universe to date: 13.73 billion years -- give or take 120 million years. Five days later, 13.7 Billion Years was launched to explore planet Earth...in context.

Victory Month | Fur Banned in West Hollywood, California

Every year, more than 50 million animals are violently killed (gassed, electrocuted or having their necks broken) for the fashion industry. West Hollywood, California, will have none of it

[December is Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. As the year comes to a close, each post will review a big or small victory that was made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you.]

Last month, West Hollywood became the first American city to ban the sale of fur products, thanks in part to the thousands of compassionate and concerned individuals who signed a Care2 petition urging Mayor John Duran and members of the city council to modify an existing ordinance that would make the city fur-free.

On November 8, West Hollywood city council members voted 3-1 in favor of the ban, which begins in September of 2012.

“We have pledged to be a place that is free of cruelty to animals and we can no longer support the barbaric fur trade by selling the products of that cruelty in our city," said council member John D'Amico.

West Hollywood is a bastion of animal welfare, having been declared a "cruelty free zone for animals" over two decades ago when cosmetic testing and steel leg-hold traps were banned in 1989. Last year, the city banned the sale of dogs and cats in pet stores. West Hollywood is also the first American city to ban the declawing of cats and also one of the so-called "guardian cities" where pets are not called pets, but rather "animal companions."

It is ironic, considering the city's strong sense of animal welfare, that it is home to the Fur Information Council of America (FICA), a fur lobbying group. But as the 6th-century BC Chinese general and military strategist Sun Tzu once advised, "Keep your friends close and your enemies closer."

ACTION ALERTS

• Sign the pledge to be fur-free (PETA)
• Join the almost 2.3 million people around the world who have signed the Universal Declaration of Animal Welfare (AnimalsMatter.org)
• Follow 13.7 Billion Years on Twitter

PAST SERIES

• Of Rice and Men: Cooking the world's most important grain for human nutrition
• 21 Days, 21 Reasons, 21 Recipes, 21 Quotes: Eating plants, loving animals
• Rich Dog, Poor Dog: Considering man's best friend
• Physicists & Priests: Looking at the relationship of science and religion
• Deep Space: Staring at the stars
  
• Gray Matters: Thinking about thinking
  
• Flower Power: Stopping to smell the angiosperms
• Animal Cruelty: Looking at the devil within
• Chemical Month: Exploring the vast laboratory of our daily lives
• Africa Month: Visiting the world's second-largest continent
• Reports from 2050: Imagining the future

image: fox (credit: Kris *V*, Flickr Creative Commons)

Victory Month | State Department Orders New Review of Keystone XL Pipeline

"Should Congress impose an arbitrary deadline for the permit decision, its actions would not only compromise the process, it would prohibit the Department from acting consistently with National Environmental Policy Act requirements by not allowing sufficient time for the development of this information. In the absence of properly completing the process, the Department would be unable to make a determination to issue a permit for this project." -- U.S. State Department, December 12, 2011

[December is Victory Month on 13.7 Billion Years. As the year comes to a close, each post will review a big or small victory that was made possible in 2011 in part by the actions taken by you through signing petitions, making donations, sending letters to your elected representatives, asking companies to change their policies, making a statement at the cash register as an ethical consumer, joining a public protest or engaging in other types of activism. By taking a moment to get involved, you have helped to make a difference. Thank you.]

Thanks in part to the thousands of citizens who signed petitions, contacted their elected representatives, shared their concerns with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and joined public protests, the U.S. State Department will conduct a new review of the controversial proposed Keystone XL pipeline project, which would carry synthetic crude oil and diluted bitumen from the oil sands in Alberta, Canada, almost 2,000 miles to the Gulf Coast of Texas.

UNDERMINING GREEN INVESTMENT

While proponents of the pipeline say that it would create tens of thousands of jobs, opponents have voiced concerns about potential spills and damage to the environment and species habitat. In a 2010 report, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) said that "the Keystone XL Pipeline undermines the U.S. commitment to a clean energy economy." Certainly, a case can be made that approving the pipeline would undermine President Obama's call for green investment.

In a their final Keystone XL environmental impact statement (EIS), the State Department said that "decision-makers and the public would benefit from additional public review," and prepared a supplemental draft EIS that includes "additional information on groundwater, potential spill impacts, alternatives to the proposed Project, Environmental Justice considerations, crude oil composition, potential refinery emissions, and greenhouse gas (GHG) and climate change considerations." The review process could take until early 2013.

CAPITALIST MYOPIA: MISSING THE FOREST FOR THE TREES

Perhaps the public processes that helped instigate this new review will help prevent the Keystone XL pipeline—and indeed any new project that involves fossil fuel and new threats to the environment—from being influenced by capitalist myopia, a condition in which otherwise logical people miss the forest for the trees, choosing short-term financial gain while ignoring the destructive effects those actions may cause. It is a condition in which context is neglected and decisions are made in a vacuum.

"[A]t the very moment that we seem to have become serious about reducing our use of petroleum," writes Curtis White in his 2009 book Barbaric Heart: Faith, Money, and the Crisis of Nature, "here comes coal from the ravaged mountaintops of West Virginia and tar sands from Canada, the dirtiest and most destructive energy sources of them all." It defies logic. In the case of mountaintop removal mining in West Virginia, the industry—which has destroyed hundreds of mountaintops—accounts just 1.2 percent of jobs and a mere 2.6 percent of the state's total revenue. That is a case of capitalist myopia par excellence.

IRREVERSIBLE EFFECTS

In his essay "Silence Is Deadly," released in June, James Hansen, the head of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies and one of the first scientists to issue warnings about global warming, notes that the impacts of the Keystone XL project include "irreversible effects on biodiversity, the natural environment, reduced water quality, destruction of [the] fragile pristine Boreal Forest and associated wetlands, aquatic and watershed mismanagement, habitat fragmentation, habitat loss, disruption to life cycles of endemic wildlife particularly bird and Caribou migration, fish deformities and negative impacts on the human health in downstream communities."

Are these impacts worth the jobs that would be created by the pipeline? That's really the ultimate question, and one we should actually be asking our children and grandchildren. But why should job creation be pitted against being good stewards of the environment? "The challenges that we face are interrelated," said UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, "So, if we are smart about it, if we spot and utilize the interconnections among these problems, solutions to each problem can be solutions to all." We shouldn't have to choose between crises. Indeed, the idea that they are separate could lead to not solving any of them.

RETHINKING OUR OIL ADDICTION

For the moment, Keystone opponents can notch one victory. But the fight is far from over. In yet another case of political brinksmanship on Capitol Hill, House Republicans said that they plan to include Keystone XL approval in the payroll tax cut bill. But on Monday, the State Department warned that any plan to fast-track the decision would violate environmental laws and force the department to withhold approval.

"I know that revisiting the flawed review process will result in the right answer: America does not need to deepen our oil addiction with this tar sands pipeline," wrote NRDC president Frances Beinecke in the Huffington Post. "As we await that final decision, we have succeeded in closing the spigot on more than a half million barrels of the dirtiest oil on the planet every day." One key battle won. The war against dirty fuel continues.

ACTION ALERTS

• Take the pledge to stop Keystone XL (Tar Sands Action)
• Tell Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to reject the Keystone XL pipeline (NRDC)
• Take the pledge to end mountaintop removal mining (ILoveMountains.org)
• Follow 13.7 Billion Years on Twitter

PAST SERIES

• Of Rice and Men: Cooking the world's most important grain for human nutrition
• 21 Days, 21 Reasons, 21 Recipes, 21 Quotes: Eating plants, loving animals
• Rich Dog, Poor Dog: Considering man's best friend
• Physicists & Priests: Looking at the relationship of science and religion
• Deep Space: Staring at the stars
  
• Gray Matters: Thinking about thinking
  
• Flower Power: Stopping to smell the angiosperms
• Animal Cruelty: Looking at the devil within
• Chemical Month: Exploring the vast laboratory of our daily lives
• Africa Month: Visiting the world's second-largest continent
• Reports from 2050: Imagining the future

ABOUT 13.7 BILLION YEARS

On March 9, 2008, The New York Times reported on research that has provided the most precise age of the universe to date: 13.73 billion years -- give or take 120 million years. Five days later, 13.7 Billion Years was launched to explore planet Earth...in context.

image: Keystone XL protest (credit: NWFblogs, Flickr Creative Commons)