Do you envision yourself the next Thoreau? Or Emerson? Or maybe you just really want to tell someone about your pet polar bear, your fight to save your favorite tree, or your terrifying bike ride to work in the name of the environment?

If you can shape the future of the fight on global warming in just 200-500 words, then submit your personal essay to the anthology Thoreau’s Legacy: American Stories About Global Warming.

Read more of this story »

Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a sabbath unto the LORD. Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and gather in the fruit thereof; But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land, a sabbath for the LORD: thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard. That which groweth of its own accord of thy harvest thou shalt not reap, neither gather the grapes of thy vine undressed: for it is a year of rest unto the land. And the sabbath of the land shall be meat for you; for thee, and for thy servant, and for thy maid, and for thy hired servant, and for thy stranger that sojourneth with thee, And for thy cattle, and for the beast that are in thy land, shall all the increase thereof be meat.1

Like the people and even their God, then, the farmlands were given time to rest from their productive toil, to rebuild their strength in order to be fruitful again after the period of rest so that they might yield bountiful harvests for years to come. As the ancient Hebrews restrained from working their fields, they honored their God and the land itself.

I mention this practice of a “sabbath of the land,” almost entirely forgotten in modern farming (and especially in agribusiness), because it provides a potentially useful paradigm for more than just agriculture. It also provides a good model for us today, for how we might live sensibly and sustainably in a time when natural resources are threatened and the Earth is endangered, at least to some degree, by human actions.

One recent example of honoring/acknowledging the (imperiled) state of nature is in California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s call to Californians not to use, heck not even to buy, fireworks this Fourth of July. Gov. Schwarzenegger made this plea for sensibility with wildfires numbering in the hundreds throughout the state and with state resources to fight those fires as threatened as the homes, lives, and habitats themselves.

Read more of this story »

But even more fortunate for me, my grandmother grew up on what you may as well call a “farm” in Waynesboro, Virginia, which is (well…”was” may be more accurate nowadays) a small town in the Blue Ridge Mountains. She was born in the mid-1920s and lived at home with a big old Appalachian family until she married my grandfather in the ’40s.

I mention all of these biographical tidbits (sorry to reveal your age, grandma!) to provide the context and background for my main point. Having grown up in this sort of an environment, my grandmother has enriched my life with countless stories of what life was like for her and her family in a time without the modern conveniences we rely on and take for granted–including electricity!!! Yes, people actually survived, even thrived without that wonderful force that magically comes out of the wall outlets when you plug something in, that brightens your room when you flick a switch, or that makes driving a little bit safer with traffic lights and so forth.

But I digress. From my childhood up to my last visit, I frequently sit with her as she reminisces, for she has some outrageous and amazing stories to share. My interest has grown ever keener, though, as I have become more involved in environmentalism and have tried to live as sustainably as possible. So I have prodded her to open up her mental treasure trove of memories and dig out lovely items for me again and again…which always proves as enjoyable for her as it does for me.

Why does any of this matter to you, dear (green) reader? Because many of those knee-slappin’ stories from the home-place contain absolute jewels of sustainability, things that glimmer like emeralds (you know, the green gems) waiting for us modern treasure hunters to pick up and put to use. Here are a few things I found most useful, hilarious, and/or praiseworthy:

• For the most part, my grandmother’s family produced all of their own food. They had cows and pigs and chickens and what have you, along with the usual (and unusual–it was the country, after all!) pets. There was a fruitful family garden, which served for all the seasons thanks to canning and preserving–that is, not freezing or refrigerating, but old-fashioned canning and preserving. There was plenty of wild stuff to use for foodstuffs, too, such as apples and pears and berries. They did buy a few things that they could not grow or make–coffee, sugar, salt, flour, etc.–but overall they pretty much fed themselves…and it was a big family.
• No electricity meant no refrigerator or freezer, but they kept perishables good with a rather ingenious, yet utterly simple, device called a “spring box.” This was a box that stayed submerged in the stream nearby, with a rope securing it to the bank. Since the water was always relatively cool, the box served as a refrigerator and helped milk, butter, and so forth from spoiling. The cellar was good, too, as a cool place for veggies and fruits.
• They even managed to make some of their own clothes. My grandmother informs me, with evident chagrin, that they were mostly the family drawers, so no designer dresses or anything like that. She even shared, with evident chagrin, that she once made a dress for my aunt out of a feedbag…and she swears that “it looked good!” Talk about reduce, reuse, recycle: Feed the chickens, clothe the kids!!!
• Forget low-flush toilets and low-flow shower heads. Try outhouses and baths in a tub full of stream water (heated on the stove if you were lucky) that had been lugged up to the house.

Read more of this story »

This thing, whatever it is, seems simply to pop into existence with no more than a strange humming buzz, challenging your presence for a moment, and then popping back into the ether with a nigh-unperceivable tirade of twittering squeaks. You may be tempted to swat at it, thinking it is some monstrously mutated mosquito.

But then your stupor breaks and you realize the truth: You have just had a close encounter of the hummingbird kind.

These winged warriors are fantastic wonders of nature. Hummingbirds know not of fear and will faceoff with just about anything, curmudgeons that they are. They can perform feats of motion that almost defy the laws of physics, that seem to create G-forces strong enough to shatter the strongest material. And yet there they are, again and again, twirling and twittering and teleporting through the air nearly faster than the eye can see.

(And, if humans could understand them, they are probably cussing each other, us, and every other thing that is not sweet nectar. For Sheri Williamson of the Southeastern Arizona Bird Observatory has to be right in thinking that “the hummingbird vocabulary is a hundred percent swear words”!1)

Read more of this story »

But no, it finally scuttled away again, returning once more a bit later with its friend/sibling for another reconnoitering mission. It is still hanging around, eating fallen birdseed and doing various other mischievous things.

While this unusually friendly squirrel was clearly wary as it investigated the baking human, I would not say that it showed a whole lot of fear…even if it did not jump up in my lap and surely would not have let me pick it up.

Later, in a bit of synchronicity, my father told me on the phone about how friends of his had saved a baby raccoon from a tree that was being cut down. It was no more than the size of a mouse when they originally rescued it, and they were raising it as a pet. So now it was sort of like your typical rambunctious kitten or puppy, playing with toys and perfectly content interacting with its owners/rescuers. In saving the baby raccoon’s life, then, these kind people had also domesticated it (along with practicing a bit of “adoptive stewardship”), turning it from wildlife to family pet–with all the familiar behaviors.

Incidents like these where wildlife do not flee from the first sign (sight, smell, or sound) of humans always make me wonder about the nature of animals’ fear of us. I wonder if it is something instinctual, a natural reaction to us and relationship with us, something perhaps developed for survival through the ages. Maybe the ancestors of modern wildlife had bad experiences with our ancestors, who were likely looking for anything to serve as food and clothing and what have you. Maybe those animals saw one too many of their companions captured and turned into workers and/or pets, and so they learned to distrust and avoid us in order to live free.

Read more of this story »

But here is the good news: Green walking is not just “nature walking” per se, not just walkabout. Green walking is also ideal for city travel…helping cut down on many kinds of pollution, smog that obscures the lovely natural views everywhere, travel expenses, resource consumption, and driver rage, just to name a few things.

In order to facilitate your transition from commuter to sustainable commuter, from walker to green walker, I offer here a few more tips on green walking in a city environment…on going urban walkabout.

1. Like walkabouts in nature, urban walkabouts should be as sensual as possible. Although some urban settings have been deliberately “greened up” with strategic flowerbeds, parks, and eco-friendly architecture, many cities are truly urban jungles–forests of concrete. But even here you can listen to the cooing of pigeons or find some green things struggling for life in the cracks of sidewalks. And there are often flower shops, produce stands, and pets to be encountered. So enjoy these instances of nature-here-and-now whenever you can. Of course, the sun is almost always shining–or if not, then rain is falling or wind is blowing–so you still can likely get some sensual stimulation on your urban walkabout if you pay attention.

Read more of this story »

Walking? C’mon.

Yes, walking. Seriously. Walking is not only easy to do and inexpensive (unless you go all out and make it complicated and costly), but it is also a wonderful way to go green–to travel without using up one fuel source or another, to keep the planet and yourself healthy, and to enjoy the health-giving splendor of nature.

If you want to go green, then just go walkabout!

Green Walking? C’mon.

Yes, green walking. Walkabout. Seriously. And in order to facilitate your transition from normal, mundane, boring old walking to green walking, to walkabout, I offer here a brief introduction and field guide, a short vade mecum of tips for all the walkabouters.

1. First and foremost, for walking to be green walking or walkabout, it must be entirely sensual. Your walking should stimulate every sense in some way, and you should appreciate the stimulation and the sources with full reverence and revelry:

Read more of this story »

That scent is so rich, so savory, so earthy, so pungently sweet that just one whiff seems to bury you in an olfactory pleasure dome. And if you keep basking in the aroma, you may well feel driven to grab a pitchfork, plop a straw hat on your head, stick a blade of grass in your mouth, and head on out to the fields. This is especially true on those oh-so-humid mornings in the peak of summer, when the air is so moist and dense that you almost have to put on scuba gear. But any old day is a great day for cow poop.

I confess that I am no connoisseur of creaturely caca, but I would bet that none can compare with the quality of a cow’s. Horse manure comes close, but it pushes pungency at the expense of sweetness, plus it is not very good for fertilizer. The feces of fowls is not even in the same league; it is far too acrid, not to mention slimy and sticky and all around offensive. Elephant excrement is similarly versatile (for example, it makes a great alternative source for paper), yet so far it lacks the time-tested dependability and widespread availability of cow dung; pachyderm poo is thus still an exotic delicacy rather than a common staple. (I cannot speak to its odoriferous character, alas.) And nobody would sing paeans to dog and cat poop. Look at how tenderly people carry those telltale plastic bags when walking their dogs–usually with one arm extended as the dog pulls the leash and the other arm, hand, and pinching fingers extended as far away as possible with the bag bobbing in the air. When it comes to the felines, we have managed to train them to go potty in specified places, cover it with “fresh scent” granules, and graciously shake off anything sticking to their paws. I suppose “domestication,” in part, means proper toilet training…or “house training,” as it is called. And as for “humanure”…I am not even going there.

Read more of this story »

Obviously, nature is often “red in tooth and claw,” as Tennyson puts it.1 However, nature also has its soft-and-fuzzy side, which provides a wonderful lesson and model for how humans in general and environmentalists in particular can relate to nature. A particularly splendid example of this is animals “adopting” other animals.

I have been watching a pair of cardinals parenting a baby cowbird at my bird feeders recently. Cowbirds (like other birds, such as the cuckoo) will lay their eggs in other birds’ nests and let the foster parents do the dirty work–changing dirty diapers, wiping runny noses, feeding at all hours of the night and day. And so along with the little baby cardinals flapping flopping and squawking like mad, this little cowbird is right there with the rest getting dutifully fed by the cardinals. I am sure all pet owners can recount endless tales of cats adopting dogs, dogs adopting cats, and so on.

Read more of this story »

Or did they? After all, here I am writing about them. And, as I have discovered, there are some quite interesting tidbits about turkeys. Here are a few:

• Not only can turkeys fly, however awkwardly, but they actually roost up in trees at night.
• Benjamin Franklin, known for his wisdom and inventiveness and diplomacy, was an unabashed advocate for making the wild turkey America’s national bird. Indeed, he wrote some rather scathing criticisms of the bald eagle, though ultimately in vain. (In the long run, it may be best that Franklin and the wild turkey lost out, since patriotic sentimentality was crucial in saving the bald eagle from extinction. At the same time, though, perhaps America would have better luck with foreign policy if the wild turkey were its symbol. I personally would much rather have the U.S. criticized as “The Great Turkey” than the “The Great Satan”! And perhaps this bird might have given a different spirit to our approach to foreign policy in the first place….)
• Turkeys are extremely curious birds. When it rains, they will stare up into the sky as if pondering the mystery of water droplets hitting them in the face. This habit led to the old wives’ tale that, unlike their promoter Gentle Ben, they were extremely and tragically stupid–so stupid that they would drown themselves by staring up into the rain too long!

Now, almost everyone knows Hans Christian Anderson’s fairytale “The Ugly Duckling.” Unfortunately, the metaphor just does not extend to turkeys. Turkeys are plain old ugly from the egg to the grave. What with that gangly neck, the funky wattle and snood flapping from their heads…and that face! Sorry, turkey fans, but I just am not going to put a poster featuring that mug up on my wall.

Still, me being me, I cannot help pondering these things a bit more as the turkeys run to and fro, gobbling like mad as I walk by. I mean, however “ugly” I think they are, there are still turkeys aplenty doing their little turkey trot day in and day out. There are still little ugly turkey chicks turning into big ugly turkey adults. There are still those strange turkey gobbles coming out of the woods.

Read more of this story »

As I rambled on, pondering over the evolutionary conundrum that is the pileated woodpecker, I became more aware of the entire environmental aria that I had been missing while lost in my own little mental world. Ah, the tyranny of thinking….

It was really just grand (the aria, that is). Every note on the scale was being hit by some living instrument at some moment. The measures were not quite in sync, for sure, and yet the melodies came together in a strangely enthralling harmony that carried me with it as I tripped along.

Read more of this story »

Now (for the sake of time), I would like to say a bit about sacred places future.

How can we ensure that our children and those beyond have places that they can hold sacred? Obviously, on a general level we have to continue (increase!) efforts to preserve species, habitats, resources, and overall biological diversity. That goes without saying. I want focus here on how we can ensure that our children will be sensitive to nature–that every future generation can be a Generation W (Wild) filled with lots and lots of little green men and women.

Even as we fall more and more under the tyranny of technology, even as we enter a “brave new world” that is more like the one Huxley envisioned than Shakespeare, there are many possible sacred places for future children. But I think some of the most will be green homes, green schools, and green screens.

Read more of this story »

Instead, what I refer to here is how the environmental movement is far from homogenous if one truly looks at the diversity of individual motives and methods for going green. The green movement is a patchwork quilt, each patch distinct and yet firmly sewn to those around it, all of them sewn together into one single, strong fabric. E Pluribus Unum.

And I think this diversity is a good thing overall. If environmentalism followed a cookie-cutter, one-size-fits-all paradigm, then I doubt it would ever have been or continue to be a vibrant, viable reality in our lives. More importantly, this diversity allows more and more individuals to practice sustainable living and so reduce humanity’s footprint on the fragile soil of our Earth. In the end, then, every shade of green may be a good one.1

But that statement begs the question: What’s Your Green?

In order to help you answer that very tricky question, I have compiled a list, in no particular order, of some of the many shades of green visible in the world today:

* Single Green Fe/Male: This shade includes any environmentalist actively seeking a significant other. These folks see all Earth Day festivals, rallies, and so forth as opportunities to schmooze and scope for hotties.

* Greenalicious: Any desirable or eye-catching person, place, or thing related to the environment or environmentalism. A frequent term used by the SGFs and SGMs.

* Spring Greening: These people seem to follow the seasons physically and emotionally. They like only spring and summer, when things are warm, alive, and growing. If you have Seasonal Affective Disorder, then you fall in this shade.

* Ooey Gooey Green: All the folks who turn into poets, philosophers, and purveyors of grand clichés whenever they see something “beautiful” (meaning just about everything) in nature.

* Virtually Green: These environmentalists spend nearly all their time online and/or otherwise partaking of nature via technology.

* Greed Green: Largely but not exclusively the shade for corporations, this variety goes green only because it brings in plenty of green. One example, and there are many, is this statement from the spokesperson of a very prominent organic produce company: “I’m not necessarily a fan of organic. … Whether we stay with organic for the long haul depends on profitability.”2 Although purists will surely bristle at all signs of this shade, I am not as quick to condemn a business or person for going green only to make a profit. Certainly I would prefer a pure heart in everything, but when companies go green in any way, even if their motives are mixed, they expand the availability of environmentally friendly products, make more people aware of environmentalism and so able to take part, and so in the end help to make a positive impact.

*Greenback: Here you find all the über-rich environmentalists–those folks with eco-friendly mansions, state-sized estates donated as easements and treated as wildlife/habitat preserves, fleets of hybrids, etc. Although Greenback does not necessarily start from a base of Greed Green, it sometimes may.

Read more of this story »

In an earlier post, I discussed sacred places in our past and “sensory flashbacks”–how our physical senses can open up a wormhole in time and space to take us (mentally speaking) to the places in our past that we cherish. I would like to focus here on the sacred places in our present lives–that is, to discuss the dire need for recognizing the sanctity of our surroundings and why these sacred places (recognized or not) are so crucial.

Anyone who cares enough about nature to become a card-carrying, tree-hugging, thump-stumping “environmentalist”–or even to bother going green at all nowadays–surely recognizes that nature has special sacred places. Places that somehow touch the heart and stir the spirit. Places that somehow capture and convey just what it means to be alive on Earth. Yes so many people recognize that, as Gerard Manley Hopkins put it, “There lives the deepest freshness deep down things.”1

When people think of “sacred places” in nature, though, I fear they most often think that these are also “wild places” exclusively. They believe that nature’s true majesty is found in the places where the human footprints are well buried beneath leaves or worn away by the winds of time. And, they believe, nature is found in the places where it is at its most “extreme,” most overwhelming, and most picturesque, where the sights and sounds and smells and schizophrenia of city life seem like a nightmare vision of some distant planet.

Mark Powell over at blogfish has written a characteristically thoughtful post on the need for getting and appreciating the “wilderness experience.” What he says is really great, especially since he emphasizes that we need “to save the wildness in people” in addition to the wildness in wilderness.

Like surely all environmentalists, I believe that we need to continue protecting the most inspiring, intimidating, and “wild” places in nature. Of course!

But we also need to focus just as much, if not more, on those sacred places whose “wildness” or “naturalness” is not prominent, pristine, or necessarily imperiled. We need to recognize and cherish, to sanctify, all those sacred places in our present lives where nature sneaks in and infuses in us the wild woolly wonder of Nature.

We need to sanctify not only the “extreme” wilderness experiences but also the “boring” nature experiences.”

Read more of this story »

In this period of remembrance, I also think that environmentalists can and should pause to reflect upon why it is they love, fight for, and, yes, fear for nature in all its many manifestations. Why, that is, they even bother to get active for, to serve the Earth.

Let me begin by asking a question: Has anyone ever saved your life?

Yes or no, I am sure you can imagine how grateful you would feel towards the person, as well as how much you would want to repay that great deed by helping ensure his or her welfare.

Well, nature literally saved my life. It was during a time of very deep depression, when health problems (physical and mental/emotional) exacerbated serious discontent with my academic work and with life in general, that I was saved by nature. Sparing you details, I can at least say that “saved my life” is no exaggeration. For I often felt like Milton’s Satan in Paradise Lost: “And in the lowest deep a lower deep / Still threatening to devour me opens wide, / To which the Hell I suffer seems a Heav’n.”1

Read more of this story »

That smell, that fantastically one-of-a-kind scent of wet pine needles.
That smell, sharp but sweet, overwhelming but easy to get used to and ignore.

That smell, wafting through town and country, rising from urban ditch and forest floor, tickling the nose’s nerves and the mind’s memories…

Wet pine needles….

And suddenly I am no longer standing on the side of a country road, warming myself in the just-out-of-the-oven rays of the morning sun like a lizard trying to turn its cold blood hot.

No, now I am back in my aunt and uncle’s house, that place where the smell of pine needles greets you in the morning and tucks you in at night.

Read more of this story »

I am sure that many of you reading this have had some physical-mental “sensory flashback,” as I am calling it, through the time machine of your sensual body. And although there are many reasons why environmentalists go green, I think that these sorts of experiences play a crucial role in making us sensitive to the wonders–and the fragility–of the Earth.

French novelist Marcel Proust gives a superb account of this very phenomenon in the opening “overture” to his grand encyclopedia of sensuality A la recherché du temps perdu (In Search of Lost Time, 1913-27). After eating a bit of a small cake, called a “petit madeleine,” dipped in lime-blossom tea, Proust’s narrator has a profound sensory flashback that launches the novel itself:

No sooner had the warm liquid mixed with the crumbs touched my palate than a shudder ran through me and I stopped, intent upon the extraordinary thing that was happening to me. An exquisite pleasure had invaded my senses, something isolated, detached, with no suggestion of its origin. And at once the vicissitudes of life had become indifferent to me, its disasters innocuous, its brevity illusory–this new sensation having had on me the effect which love has of filling me with a precious essence; or rather this essence was not in me, it was me. I had ceased now to feel mediocre, contingent, mortal.

Read more of this story »

1) “My friends, I am most proud of the change that I brought about in Iraq that saved Americans’ lives.”1

2) “Change is just a word without the strength and experience to make it happen. And I know some people think you have to choose between change and experience. Well with me, you don’t have to choose.”2

3) “…the ways of Washington must change. The genius of our founders is that they designed a system of government that can be changed. And we should take heart, because we’ve changed this country before. … This campaign has to be about reclaiming the meaning of citizenship, restoring our sense of common purpose, and realizing that few obstacles can withstand the power of millions of voices calling for change.”3

No matter how difficult this little quiz was for you, I hope my general point is fairly clear. It seems that nowadays, if someone has any aspiration for any political position, from commander-in-chief to bridge-club president, then that person must be seen as the “candidate for change.” (If somehow President Bush were allowed to run for a third term, would he too try to sell himself as the “candidate for change”?)

And it is not just politics. Even environmentalism and other areas of social activism are simply electrified with the energy of “change.”

Again and again, we see or hear Mahatma Gandhi’s monumental statement, “You must be the change you want to see in the world.” If he were alive today and we gave him a nickel for every time someone used this phrase, the poor man would have a terrible time maintaining his vow of poverty!

So we are told we must be the change by making changes in our lives; we are asked to take part in activities that are making change; we support organizations that are working for change; we get inspired and fired up by promises of real change soon to come; we hear about all the changes that have been and will be made by this, that, or another….

At this point, you will have to forgive me if I say that I am simply sick of change.

Read more of this story »

For every person that has or has had a bird feeder, I need not say more.

Clearly, I am no fan of squirrels–I do not wear T-shirts with cute little squirrel faces, I do not have little stuffed squirrel dolls, I do not have baseball caps with fuzzy squirrel tales waving off the back.

But still, I believe they are some of the most astounding beings on this planet.

And of course some of the most bloody frustrating!!!

With all of my (so-called) education and (supposed) ingenuity, with all of the technological and industrial/mechanical gadgets available to me, I am constantly thwarted by those little demons in gray fur. Just when I think a new ruse has succeeded in keeping their grubby little paws out of my bird seed, alas! They find a way to break the bank (and often break my feeder!)

Now, let me explain. Birds are probably my greatest joy. I can find no better virtual embodiment of the life-force itself. It seems that everything they do, from their songs to their hopping about, is purely an act of delight and self-expression. Birds pulled me up out of a serious, years-long period of depression; they also opened me up to the greater glories of nature, thus starting me on my path to environmentalism.

So when the squirrels come between me and my beloveds, I am pushed closer to breaking my vow of ahimsa (non-violence) than at any other point….

I know many other bird lovers, whatever their particular relationship with their feathered friends, share my frustration with these fuzzy felons from the flames of Hell. Just one of the many testaments to their nigh unconquerable deviousness is the endless variety of “squirrel-proof bird feeders” (probably the biggest oxymoron in the English language—right up there with a “Light Twinkie” and, if you really think about it, “Sustainable Development”). While capitalist CEOs may delight at yet another niche to cater to (and profit from), desperate birders fork out cash for these and many other anti-squirrel devices. But to no avail.

And so again and again, no matter what I do, the squirrels find some way to plunder my stores.

It is not so much that they eat all the food. In fact, they consume much less than many of the birds–blue jays, for example.

It is not so much the fact that they scare away all the birds as they sit on or in the feeders nibbling on a seed, chattering in gluttonous glee, and whipping their little tails in a show of satisfied victory. (Ah, they are some of the most vainglorious creatures on Earth. You can tell they are mocking you and laughing at you, singly and in a collective harmonious unison, as they sit there chit-chatting from tree limb to tree limb.)

No, it is the simple fact that they beat you–once again, they beat you.

Read more of this story »

Having received the Planet Earth complete series on DVD as a birthday gift this year, I have witnessed just how fascinating and enlightening these presentations of the Earth can be. After watching the series (I was hooked after the very first episode), I felt a newfound respect for the Earth; equally powerful was a sense of dedication to preserving all of those wonderful things that the show explored. And there is no way I would have been able to go to the Himalayas, to the African deserts, to the depths of the oceans, to both poles, or to so many other places. Simply put, this birthday gift was one of the best I have ever gotten. (THANKS MOM!)

Through secondhand knowledge (I do not own a television myself), I understand just how popular nature-related programs have become on TV. Thanks to channels like Animal Planet, the Discovery Channel, and PBS, the Earth has become quite a “celebrity” on the small (and, in some cases, big) screen. Like me with Planet Earth, then, millions of people across the planet are gaining new insights about the planet they live and depend upon; perhaps they are gaining newfound respect and love for that planet, too.

So I commend all of these media outlets for what they have done in making the Earth a modern-day pop star. At their best, they provide knowledge that would never be acquired (or even pursued?) otherwise.

But, skeptic and pessimist and Luddite that I am, I have to agree with Pergams and Zaradic in their concerns about this outbreak of videophilia. Those same HDTV screens can be double-edged swords, since the comfort and convenience of nature-on-the-screen all too easily makes the real natural world dispensable, as it were. Why go outside and look at the same old trees and flowers and birds and critters when you can see exotic species, faraway landscapes, and unsolved mysteries in a climate-controlled, hi-def, fully snacked world inside your house? Why bother preserving nature if it is already “preserved” on a DVD or TV reruns?

Read more of this story »