Holly:
Thanks. A lot of new terrain to explore, but not for several weeks. See few
notes below.
On Jan 7, 2014, at 1:11 PM, Holly J <holly.jean.b...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Greetings,
>
> Ron, I'm glad you were able to take a look at the piece. It's true you won't
> find surprising new research findings in the piece— it's more focused on
> opening up the gender and geoengineering conversation. Is low participation
> of women in geoengineering research any different than, say, women's low
> participating in designing & programming the software-mediated reality we're
> increasingly spending time in? You decide; I do think there are some ways in
> which geoengineering is distinct from just a "lack of women in engineering"
> situation, which we go into a bit in our paper.
> [RWL1: The “programming” link was depressing as I have five
> grand-daughters - all exceptionally (as Garrison Keillor would say) good in
> STEM areas.
The “mediated” link didn’t make sense to me.
The “lack of women in engineering” is also depressing. Biochar is
probably about average in technical career circles - but there are quite a few
excellent female ag and soil scientists. IBI is mostly staffed by women.
Unfortunately I am also depressed that the main two biochar critics are women.
This is counterbalanced I hope by a general (at least my) belief that
biochar will assist women more than assist men (coming from my own background
in char-making stoves). I note that Hillary Clinton is nominal head of the
largest stove organization [GACC] - which is mostly staffed by women (Julia
Roberts serves as “chief spokesperson”). Biochar is in there a small amount -
but growing in awareness.
> On ecopsychology, I'm sure there are other list members (perhaps my
> co-authors) who are better-versed. My sense is that understanding
> environmental despair, ecological anxiety, etc., is crucial to understanding
> people's feelings about geoengineering (which are more relevant than we give
> them credit for— rational economic choice models aside, this stuff deeply
> influences decision-making). Ecopsychology is crucial to understanding why
> humans would go about such an environmentally destructive path in the first
> place (which I tend to ascribe to politics and power relations, but there are
> psychologies and pathologies there, too). Better language, and neologisms
> like solastalgia, could help with talking about the psychological side. I
> don't know of any work which does much of this with regards specifically to
> geoengineering (you can find more on the Anthropocene more broadly).
[RWL2: I also found a new word Solaphilia. Also that the American
Psychological Association has a Climate-change task force. I will try to
return to this area - and am now wondering if similar disciplines do have
geoengineering-related task forces as well.
I have found nothing yet to help me better understand why different people
look at geoengineering (and especially biochar) differently.
> The field of environmental psychology (studying how an environment affects in
> inhabitants, e.g. the effects of biodiverse green space on health) is quite
> strong, and would be incredibly rich with regards to geoengineering. Though
> I imagine it could suffer from some of the same challenges as biophysical
> research does of how to conduct controlled experiments (on whiter skies, for
> example— quite expensive to design a simulation of this in the lab). All of
> these fields bring up where you draw the boundaries of "nature", and whether
> an engineered nature "counts" or affects people in the same way as
> non-engineered nature. Personally I'm not too fond of the nature / culture
> binary, and believe we could build biophilic cities or engineer beautiful
> natures if we wanted to.
[RWL3: I have read quite a few articles on biochar along this biophilic
line. I’ll have to think more on the "nature/culture binary”. I guess no-one
has yet commented on this list on the “fact” that marijuana culture (different
sense of that word I think) in Colorado (my home state) is heavily into using
biochar as a base soil. The many marijuana greenhouses we have seen on TV
probably count as “biophilic”.
>
> Speaking of Roszak, I think his 1969 classing The Making of a Counter
> Culture, in which he coins the term "technocracy", would be worth revising
> with regards to geoengineering— at least understanding opposition to /
> discomfort with it and the perceived technocratic forces behind it.
[RWL4: This to acknowledge Jim Fleming’s correction on earlier uses. I
will try to get back to this - but so far think Roszak may be helpful on the
psychology end - which should be helpful to anyone interested in either selling
or tearing down any part of geoengineering. Maybe also on gender issues.
I don’t want to get into this too far, but have to note that our two US
political parties have a close gender correlation in membership and climate
beliefs. I guess maybe similarly in higher degree for the tea party wing?
Sorry I couldn’t spend more time on these several topics. Again, Holly,
thanks. Ron
>
>
> cheers,
> Holly
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Mon, Jan 6, 2014 at 8:57 PM, Ronal W. Larson <rongretlar...@comcast.net>
> wrote:
> Andrew and list cc Holly Buck
>
> 1. I meant to respond earlier after reading the Christmas day piece below
> (which no longer is free and my draft is somehow blocked by my computer,
> although saved). I read it because I have been much impressed by other
> material by Ms. Buck. I didn’t find anything new and surprising re “Gender
> and Geoengineering”, but agree that Geoengineering would undoubtedly benefit
> from increasing attention from more women like Ms Buck (now getting her PhD
> at Cornell).
>
> 2. Last night I (purely by chance) was able to skim through a 1995
> collection of essays called “Ecopsychology" (edited by Theodore Roszak), and
> found quite a few references to Gender. This is to ask Holly (who has
> contributed before, and I guess will know this field) to tell us more about
> Ecopsychology and geoengineering (gender included, but not restricted to
> gender). Obviously this list will be interested in this discipline’s view
> of both SRM and CDR. Googling says there are plenty of entries for the
> marriage of Ecopsychology and Geoengineering, but I need a tutor.
>
> 3. Thanks in advance.
>
> Ron
>
> On Dec 25, 2013, at 4:46 PM, Andrew Lockley <andrew.lock...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/hypa.12083/abstract
>>
>> Buck, H. J., Gammon, A. R. and Preston, C. J. (2013), Gender and
>> Geoengineering. Hypatia. doi: 10.1111/hypa.12083
>>
>> Abstract
>>
>> Geoengineering has been broadly and helpfully defined as “the intentional
>> manipulation of the earth's climate to counteract anthropogenic climate
>> change or its warming effects” (Corner and Pidgeon , 26). Although there
>> exists a rapidly growing literature on the ethics of geoengineering, very
>> little has been written about its gender dimensions. The authors consider
>> four contexts in which geoengineering appears to have important gender
>> dimensions: (1) the demographics of those pushing the current agenda, (2)
>> the overall vision of control it involves, (3) the design of the particular
>> technologies, and (4) whom geoengineering will most affect and benefit.
>> After detailing these four gender dimensions, we consider three ways in
>> which the geoengineering discourse could be enriched if it became more
>> sensitive to issues of gender. These include increasing the focus on the
>> concrete other, recognizing the socially transformative potential of
>> geoengineering technologies, and engaging in value-sensitive design.
>> Although ultimately remaining agnostic on the desirability of
>> geoengineering, the paper brings gender considerations into a discussion
>> from which they have been conspicuously absent.
>>
>>
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