scholarly journals From Christian spirituality to eco-friendliness

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 34-38
Author(s):  
Emmanuel Orok Duke

Spirituality connotes praxis informed by religious or faith convictions. This can transform the individual and society at large. Christian spirituality is centered on how a person’s relationship with the God of Jesus Christ informs and directs one’s approach to existence and engagement with the world. The ecosystem concerns humanity and relationship with it is invariably influenced by faith or religious informed praxis. The reality of climate change is convincing many people that humankind’s common homeland needs to be treated with care and respect if created beings are to have a congenial habitat now and in the future. This article avers that Christian spirituality can contribute to eco-friendly behavior through re-formation of the behavior of people and emboldening their goodwill as regards the responsibility of all towards the care of the earth. Finally, this research proffers a three-fold model of eco-spirituality - scriptural, self-control, and sacramental approaches to the earth – as a contribution towards stemming the tide of ecological assaults on creation. Textual analysis is the method used in this research.

2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 108-123
Author(s):  
Sean McGrath

The following paper takes Pope Francis’ Encyclical on Climate Change as an opportunity to re-open the debate, begun in 1967 by Lynn White Jr., on the theological origins of the environmental crisis. I note that the Pope’s critique of consumerist modernity is strong, but his lack of a genealogical account of modernity remains a weakness of the text. I argue, with White, that the technological revolution which has caused climate change would not have been possible without Christian assumptions. The original disenchantment of the world was the Abrahamic revelation which disjoined divinity and nature, and contra to appearances, the disjunction was only exacerbated by the doctrine of the incarnation. With climate change, modernity is returning to this revelation in the form of the sobering experience of the precarity of the planet. Nature is now experienced as finite once again, and it includes us. Modernity, however, cannot be disavowed any more than disenchantment can easily be forgotten. A return to the Christian roots of disenchantment might help us to remember what we have forgotten: the virtue of contemplation, which could qualify modern attitudes of control and domination, and engender a Christian experience of reverence for nature. While this is a Christian response to the climate crisis, other religious traditions will need to come to analogous forms of earth-centered ethics if we are to achieved the integrated ecological pluralism needed for the future of civilization.


2018 ◽  
Vol 100 (4) ◽  
pp. 745-766
Author(s):  
Lillian C. Woo

In the last fifty years, empirical evidence has shown that climate change and environmental degradation are largely the results of increased world population, economic development, and changes in cultural and social norms. Thus far we have been unable to slow or reverse the practices that continue to produce more air and water pollution, soil and ocean degradation, and ecosystem decline. This paper analyzes the negative anthropogenic impact on the ecosystem and proposes a new design solution: ecomimesis, which uses the natural ecosystem as its template to conserve, restore, and improve existing ecosystems. Through its nonintrusive strategies and designs, and its goal of preserving natural ecosystems and the earth, ecomimesis can become an integral part of stabilizing and rehabilitating our natural world at the same time that it addresses the needs of growing economies and populations around the world.


2021 ◽  

Abstract This book is a collection of 77 expert opinions arranged in three sections. Section 1 on "Climate" sets the scene, including predictions of future climate change, how climate change affects ecosystems, and how to model projections of the spatial distribution of ticks and tick-borne infections under different climate change scenarios. Section 2 on "Ticks" focuses on ticks (although tick-borne pathogens creep in) and whether or not changes in climate affect the tick biosphere, from physiology to ecology. Section 3 on "Disease" focuses on the tick-host-pathogen biosphere, ranging from the triangle of tick-host-pathogen molecular interactions to disease ecology in various regions and ecosystems of the world. Each of these three sections ends with a synopsis that aims to give a brief overview of all the expert opinions within the section. The book concludes with Section 4 (Final Synopsis and Future Predictions). This synopsis attempts to summarize evidence provided by the experts of tangible impacts of climate change on ticks and tick-borne infections. In constructing their expert opinions, contributors give their views on what the future might hold. The final synopsis provides a snapshot of their expert thoughts on the future.


Author(s):  
Nancy Langston

Lake Superior is one of the fastest warming lakes in the world, leading to enormous changes in its ecosystems and human communities. How might changing climates affect the mobilization of contaminants in the Lake Superior basin? How might those contaminants affect resiliency toward climate change? And what can we do about it?


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Betts

This is a collection of my 2018 articles in the Green Energy Times (http://www.greenenergytimes.org/ ).This series started in 2016. Many of these articles have been edited or updated from articles I wrote forthe Rutland Herald, sometimes with different titles and pictures.They blend science and opinion with a systems perspective, and encourage the reader to explorealternative and hopeful paths for their families and society. They are written so that a scientist willperceive them as accurate (although simplified); while the public can relate their tangible experience ofweather and climate to the much less tangible issues of climate change, energy policy and strategies forliving sustainably with the earth system.The politically motivated attacks on climate science by the current president have sharpened my politicalcommentary this year; since climate change denial may bring immense suffering to our children and lifeon Earth.I believe that earth scientists have a responsibility to communicate clearly and directly to the public1 –aswe all share responsibility for the future of the Earth. We must deepen our collective understanding, sowe can make a collective decision to build a resilient future.


2019 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 105
Author(s):  
Susana Borràs

<p>In the new 'Age of the Anthropocene', the Earth's atmosphere, like other elements of Nature, is rapidly being colonized by a minority of the world's population, at no cost, threatening the security of all humanity and the stability of the planet. The development processes of the great emitters of greenhouse gases have transferred social and environmental costs to all the world population, especially the most impoverished ones. This article is a critical analysis of how the legal climate change regime continues to legitimize the onslaught on the atmosphere. It reflects on the need to move to a new "climate justice law", characterized by responsibilities and obligations centered on the prevention, repair, restoration and treatment of damage and related risks linked to climate change, while protecting human rights and the atmosphere, as a common interest of humanity and the Earth.</p><p><strong>Keywords: </strong>Atmosphere, climate change, common concern of humankind, climate justice law<strong></strong></p>


Earth ◽  
2022 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-71
Author(s):  
Dhurba Neupane ◽  
Pramila Adhikari ◽  
Dwarika Bhattarai ◽  
Birendra Rana ◽  
Zeeshan Ahmed ◽  
...  

Climate prediction models suggest that agricultural productivity will be significantly affected in the future. The expected rise in average global temperature due to the higher release of greenhouse gases (GHGs) into the atmosphere and increased depletion of water resources with enhanced climate variability will be a serious threat to world food security. Moreover, there is an increase in the frequency and severity of long-lasting drought events over 1/3rd of the global landmass and five times increase in water demand deficits during the 21st century. The top three cereals, wheat (Triticum aestivum), maize (Zea mays), and rice (Oryza sativa), are the major and staple food crops of most people across the world. To meet the food demand of the ever-increasing population, which is expected to increase by over 9 billion by 2050, there is a dire need to increase cereal production by approximately 70%. However, we have observed a dramatic decrease in area of fertile and arable land to grow these crops. This trend is likely to increase in the future. Therefore, this review article provides an extensive review on recent and future projected area and production, the growth requirements and greenhouse gas emissions and global warming potential of the top three cereal crops, the effects of climate change on their yields, and the morphological, physiological, biochemical, and hormonal responses of plants to drought. We also discuss the potential strategies to tackle the effects of climate change and increase yields. These strategies include integrated conventional and modern molecular techniques and genomic approach, the implementation of agronomic best management (ABM) practices, and growing climate resilient cereal crops, such as millets. Millets are less resource-intensive crops and release a lower amount of greenhouse gases compared to other cereals. Therefore, millets can be the potential next-generation crops for research to explore the climate-resilient traits and use the information for the improvement of major cereals.


2015 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Diane Williamson

AbstractWhile climate change involves spatial, epistemological, social, and temporal remoteness, each type of distance can be bridged with strategies unique to it that can be borrowed from analogous moral problems. Temporal, or intergenerational, distance may actually be a motivational resource if we look at our natural feelings of hope for the future of the world, via Kant’s theory of political history, and for our children. Kant’s theory of hope also provides some basis for including future generations in a theory of justice.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Orestis Stavrakidis-Zachou ◽  
Konstadia Lika ◽  
Panagiotis Anastasiadis ◽  
Nikos Papandroulakis

Abstract Finfish aquaculture in the Mediterranean Sea faces increasing challenges due to climate change while potential adaptation requires a robust assessment of the arising threats and opportunities. This paper presents an approach developed to investigate effects of climate drivers on Greek aquaculture, a representative Mediterranean country with a leading role in the sector. Using a farm level approach, Dynamic Energy Budget models for European seabass and meagre were developed and environmental forcing was used to simulate changes in production and farm profitability under IPCC scenarios RCP45 and RCP85. The effects of temperature and extreme weather events at the individual and farm level were considered along with that of husbandry parameters such as stocking timing, market size, and farm location (inshore, offshore) for nine regions. The simulations suggest that at the individual level fish may benefit from warmer temperatures in the future in terms of growth, thus reaching commercial sizes faster, while the husbandry parameters may have as large an effect on growth as the projected shifts in climatic cues. However, this benefit will be largely offset by the adverse effects of extreme weather events at the population level. Such events will be more frequent in the future and, depending on the intensity one assigns to them, they could cause losses in biomass and farm profits that range from mild to detrimental for the industry. Overall, these results provide quantification of some of the potential threats for an important aquaculture sector while suggesting possibilities to benefit from emerging opportunities. Therefore, they could contribute to improving the sector’s readiness for tackling important challenges in the future.


Author(s):  
Matthew Kelly

This introduction considers the ‘environmental turn’ taken in the humanities, and particularly in historical study, suggesting ways in which these developments might animate the future study of nineteenth-century Ireland. Question of agency and the relationship between human and non-human nature are addressed. Also considered is how current environmental concerns, and climate change in particular, should lead us to think anew about the past, rendering familiar subjects unfamiliar. Particular attention is paid to how Ireland’s past might be located within larger global processes, attracting the interest of scholars from throughout the world. It then introduces the individual contributions in the volume, tracing a narrative thread through them in order to demonstrate how a change in optic can significantly change how we think about Ireland’s recent past.


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