cspawn

Lexulous is the only thing that prevents me from committing Facebook suicide. I have never thought about joining Twitter or Second Life.  I don’t have a Blackberry or iPhone, let alone an iPod.  I own a laptop by virtue that my sister bought it for me.  I really hate being in front of a computer, and try to avoid it as much as I can.  And I’m also a doctoral graduate student in the social sciences, where knowing what’s going around in the world is, well, very important.

I see a lot of my fellow grad students constantly thumbing their Blackberries or iPhones, checking e-mail (often during conversations) and I admire their ability to multi-task.  I’m the kind of person who needs absolute silence when I read…no classical music for me.  I own a stereo and CDs (and that dinosaur, cassette tapes!), and when I listen to music, I’m usually on my couch…concentrating.  And on the rare times I’m on the elliptical at the gym, I don’t watch the handy TV on my machine…instead I watch the minutes crawl by.  I’m a little bit of a Luddit in other ways, too. Although I own a cell phone, I frequently don’t answer it.  And although I own a television set, I only watch DVDs on it.

Jamey Wetmore once gave a Science Cafe on technologies of distraction.  I think I might be one of the individuals who are not easily distracted– by technology at any rate.  I used to have some misguided notion that this might be a good thing, but now I’m not so sure.

Being a grad student in a field where being aware of current events is crucial to holding intelligent conversations, reflecting on one another’s work, and trying to understand the world, I feel I might be rapidly falling behind.  Browsing through online newspapers, magazines and blogs, and even checking e-mail, requires sitting in front of a computer, which I am always loath to do.  But this is the norm and I do it, albeit unwillingly.  I’d rather be holding a newspaper in my hand.

Ultimately, I think I resist that fact that my performance as a grad student, intimately tied to notions of intelligence, is heavily mediated through technology. It is not just about the medium through which I get my news, but how fast I get it.  If we are all living in a “knowledge society” then I am not soaking up knowledge fast enough.  And if I can’t keep up with the world, then I can’t effectively engage with the world.  (A very Western paradigm, indeed).  But this bothers me a great deal.  As a graduate student, I am acutely aware how technology facilitates how I learn and access materials.  I could be listening to podcasts while walking across campus, checking for the latest news before a meeting starts, and actively engaging in class when a  topic comes up and the professor asks those with laptops to Google it.  I could be present in multiple places at once.

And, of course, there is the issue of maintaining social contacts online.  Posting articles, reading and debating them, and networking with people require a good amount of upkeep, and maintaining a high profile online.  If I don’t regularly talk to people or post interesting status reports, I am no longer interesting and am the object of divestment.  No more Wall posts for me.

All these issues create a very isolating effect, not only from a social network, but also from the new norms of what is considered intelligent, academic behavior.  Listening to NPR is not enough anymore.  Ah well, I suppose I better wise up and get with the program.

I had never calculated my carbon footprint before. I expected that calculating my carbon footprint would shock me into making at least one change to my current lifestyle – shorter showers? Stop eating certain foods? I’m somewhat disappointed that after this exercise, I don’t plan on changing anything, but it was still informative and useful.

I used the calculator from The Nature Conservancy website: http://www.nature.org/initiatives/climatechange/calculator/?gclid=CKLfvobngJ0CFR5HagodHgcrbQ.  Briefly, it has four categories (home, eating, travel, recycling) that start you out at the national average yearly CO2 emission for each category. Then it subtracts from this average if you recycle or use energy-efficient appliances, for example.  Finally, it compares your result to the total national average (27 tons CO2 per year) and the global average (5.5 tons per year). I came out at 11 tons per year, mostly because I don’t drive a car.

Interesting things I learned: 

Sorting all that recycling saves the same as eating organic (0.5 tons / year). I was surprised at how low the savings were for recycling.

My habit of eating less red meat (2.5 tons / year) more than offsets my guilty pleasure of taking long hot showers (0.9 tons per year) – though I still wish our apartment complex would install flow restrictors.

I heard that all incoming freshman at ASU have calculated their carbon footprint during orientation. I wonder what calculator website they used? I liked the Nature Conservancy calculator because it was fast and easy to use, and allowed you to see the change in  CO2 emissions you would make just by toggling back and forth in a category. I’d be interested in hearing about your carbon footprint calculation experience.

This post originally appeared at www.crowdshift.org

An article in today’s New York Times highlights one of the many trans-national water conflicts that will play an increasing role in world affairs over the course of this century. This particular conflict happens to be in our own backyard—where the Colorado River flows into Mexico in Yuma, AZ. What makes it unique is that it concerns the survival of a manmade wetland—the Ciénega—created by water intentionally diverted from the Colorado River.

There are a number of interesting topics of discussion that occur to me while reading this article. However, I find two to be particularly intriguing. To avoid repetition and limit the length of my entry, I won’t summarize the article, so please skim it so the following points make sense.

It inspires me that such seemingly opposing interests as environmental groups and water authorities would be so willing to work together. Of course, this sentiment comes with a large measure of skepticism. The Las Vegas water official claims to have interest in maintaining the health of the Ciénega. But what if it turns out that any diversion and desalinization of water from the wetland will have disastrous effects on its health? Or what if the residents of Las Vegas and Southern California require more water than the wetland can afford to give up? There is a major difference between a compromise and a win-win. This is a compromise; when things get tough, who will lose out? Is this an example of transdisciplinarity—of involving stakeholders across academic, policy, and lay perspectives—or is one interest still holding all of the power?

My second reaction is certainly less practical, but maybe even more interesting. This case makes me wonder: is there a hierarchy in the ecology that we need to preserve? We hear all the time about the importance of preserving the little remaining “virgin” or “old-growth” forests in the world. Are they more important than new-growth or manmade? I think at least some ecologists might say yes (although I’ll let them speak for themselves, if they would care to comment). Where does the Ciénega fall in this category? We use the word “conservation” to describe nature, but what qualifies as nature? The Ciénega was manmade, or at least man-initiated. Where desert once was, now a teaming wetland exists. Of course, we only added the water—nature did all of the rest. Since we gave it the water in the first place, do we now have the right to take it away (the parallel to Job is not coincidental)? I suppose I could go on and on about ethical issues such as ownership of nature, intrinsic value, rights, etc. But on a more practical level, do we view man-initiated ecology differently than we do that which existed prior to us?

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/11/science/earth/11quake.html?ref=science

Apparently, drilling deep holes in the earth to try and tap geothermal energy may cause earthquakes.

This has all the makings of a classic STS case: anxieties concerning the erosion of public trust in renewable energies, clashing sources of scientific expertise, differing notions of acceptable risk, and unintended consequences.

As such, it will be exciting to follow the trajectory of geothermal extraction technology. Will there be a technological fix that somehow bypasses earthquakes (even though the causal relationship is currently under dispute)? Or will government and public intervention have other ideas about how the technology should proceed (or not), at least in Germany?

It is revealing to juxtapose the different responses to environmental justice issues associated with extracting geothermal energy (in the form of earthquakes) versus the extraction of oil and petroleum processing (in the form of environmental degradation and pollution). Somehow, earthquakes seem more visceral than polluted lakes. Also, at least according to some, there is a cultural element to how we perceive risk. So it will be pretty interesting to see how geothermal energy plays out in two different political and cultural contexts: the US and Germany.

How I do love acronyms, especially clever ones! Sadly, I can only come up with cheesy/painful approximations for what it means to be part of a CSPO student group.

So, care to you try your hand at clever coinage?

Here are the ones I came up with:
Curious (or Classy, or Crazy, or Callow) Students Pondering Approaches to World Nasties

Conspiring Science-Policy Action With Nuance

Creating Science-Policy Action Windows Now!

Creating Safe Places that Allow Whimsical Notions

Interdisciplinary research and education, particularly related to human-environment interactions, has a rich history and a bright future at Arizona State University. With the proliferation of several new graduate programs that have something to do with human-environmental interactions (or social-ecological systems) from various perspectives, including the School of Sustainability, Environmental Social Sciences, Environmental Life Sciences, and the Human and Social Dimensions of Science and Technology, a group of students associated with the IGERT in Urban Ecology have felt the need for a venue through which these various programs can work together.

Towards that end, we invited you to participate in Graduates in Integrative Social-Ecological Research – GISER – a newly forming graduate student led program aimed at providing graduate students from schools and departments across ASU with the opportunity to move from talking about interdisciplinarity to engaging in product-driven interdisciplinary research. We conceive of social-ecological broadly and envision a diverse group that includes artists, engineers, ecologists, social scientists, ethicists and more (so if you’re not sure you fall into such a group, come and find out!). We know that many graduate students seek to engage in collaborative research projects that complement their dissertation work or provide new and interesting opportunities to broaden their expertise. GISER, an outgrowth from IGERT in Urban Ecology activities, is an opportunity for ALL motivated graduate students from ALL departments and backgrounds to engage in collaborative integrative work.

GISER will be launched in Fall 2009. We need the support of a critical number of bright and motivated students from diverse backgrounds for GISER to succeed. This is a great opportunity for you to get involved in the development and planning of this exciting program. This is a bottom-up approach driven by students with the support of key faculty contacts and dedicated funding.

We are holding a planning meeting on Wednesday, September 9th, 2009 from 4-5:30 PM at LSE106 to engage with various graduate student groups on campus and invite your participation.

Please RSVP to David.Iwaniec@asu.edu by Tuesday, May 5th. If you can’t make the meeting but would like to be involved, please let us know. We look forward to working with you to spread the word and generate ideas.