By Christopher Trisos and Alex Pigot | – The impacts of climate change on species and ecosystems are already evident. Poleward shifts in the geographic distributions of species, catastrophic forest fires and mass bleaching of coral reefs all bear the fingerprints of climate change. But what will the world’s biodiversity look like in the future? […]
Veiled Muslim Women abruptly Find Acceptance amid Coronavirus Face Masks: “Nobody is giving me Dirty Looks”
By Anna Piela | – Americans began donning face masks this week after federal and local officials changed their position on whether face coverings protect against coronavirus. This is new terrain for many, who find themselves unable to recognize neighbors and are unsure how to engage socially without using facial expressions. But not for Muslim […]
From ‘Yellow peril’ to ‘Chinese virus:’ Why can’t People remember that Asian Americans are Americans?
By Adrian De Leon | – In a recent Washington Post op-ed, former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang called upon Asian Americans to become part of the solution against COVID-19. In the face of rising anti-Asian racist actions – now at about 100 reported cases per day – Yang implores Asian Americans to “wear red, […]
How the Plague Influenced Shakespeare
By Paul Yachnin | – Shakespeare lived his life in plague-time. He was born in April 1564, a few months before an outbreak of bubonic plague swept across England and killed a quarter of the people in his hometown. Death by plague was excruciating to suffer and ghastly to see. Ignorance about how disease spread […]
Sorry, Climate Change Denialists, but Coronavirus Makes Green Energy even More Urgent
By John Hewson | Climate deniers have been hanging out for the United Nations’ next big summit to fail. In a sense, the coronavirus and its induced policy responses have more than satisfied their wildest dreams, precipitating a global recession that they no doubt hope has pushed the issue of the low-carbon transition well down […]
While we fixate on coronavirus, Earth is hurtling towards a catastrophe worse than the dinosaur extinction
By Andrew Glikson | – At several points in the history of our planet, increasing amounts of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have caused extreme global warming, prompting the majority of species on Earth to die out. In the past, these events were triggered by a huge volcanic eruption or asteroid impact. Now, Earth is […]
2 reasons – and 1 disease – that make peace in Syria so difficult
By Ora Szekely | – Despite many attempts at negotiations, the Syrian war – a conflict with a complicated and constantly changing cast of characters that has killed as many as 585,000 people and displaced over half of Syria’s prewar population – has proved extremely difficult to resolve. As the war grinds on, conditions are […]
Climate Crisis will also be Killing 250K / year Soon, and Needs same Planetary Swift Action as Covid-19
By Eric Galbraith and Ross Otto | – In the past few weeks, governments around the world have enacted dramatic measures to mitigate the threat of COVID-19. It’s too soon to know whether these measures will prove too little to limit mass mortality, or so extreme that they set off economic catastrophe. But what is […]
Pandemic will cause another Housing Crisis, and Without Strong Long-Term Gov’t Policy it Will hit Workers Hardest
By Roshanak Mehdipanah and Gregory Sallabank | – Millions of Americans are suddenly out of work as the financial and economic crisis sparked by the coronavirus pandemic deepens. Without an income, most of these people will have a hard time covering their expenses, including keeping a roof over their heads. But even before the current […]