Shunya's Notes

Monbiot on Carbon Omissions

In 2006, China surpassed the U.S. to become the leading producer of green house emissions. But a big reason for its higher emissions is that China has become the industrial heartland of the world. Developed countries that claim to have reduced carbon emissions have, in effect, shifted their factories and pollution to China (this is one outsourcing no politician in the U.S. complains about). As consumers, all of us are now a party to China's green house emissions. Each time we buy a plastic toy, a blender, or an iPhone, we inject a blast of CO2 over China.

In a new article and the animation below, George Monbiot describes the bogus accounting that's de rigueur in measuring carbon emissions. It only accounts for territorial emissions, not outsourced emissions. With proper accounting that's linked to consumption, the U.S. is still way ahead of China in its contribution to climate change. The difference is even starker if we consider emissions per capita.

When nations negotiate global cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, they are held responsible only for the gases produced within their own borders. Partly as a result of this convention, these tend to be the only ones that countries count. When these “territorial emissions” fall, they congratulate themselves on reducing their carbon footprints. But as markets of all kinds have been globalised, and as manufacturing migrates from rich nations to poorer ones, territorial accounting bears ever less relationship to our real impacts.

'River of Faith' meets Amazon

Folks, it turns out that River of Faith has done well, amassing 27K views on YouTube in its first 3 weeks [and 75K at the end of 6 weeks]. Which means it has even bested a whole lot of cat videos! Furthermore, I've been persuaded to offer it on Amazon.com for those who like DVDs, including institutions. Check out the DVD cover below (sans barcode and DVD logo). This should be up on Amazon in early April and ready to ship within days (I'll announce in a comment when it is). Also, for the first but hopefully not last time, a magazine introduced me last week as "a documentary filmmaker". Watch out, you documentary filmmakers! :)

Queues, Quacks, and Chaos

Over half of Indians do not have access to any professional healthcare. For those who fall ill, where else in the world is money, in particular, as well as place of residence, such decisive factors between living and dying? How much of this gap—in one estimate, the richest 20% outlive the poorest 20% by over 15 years—can be bridged by a functional public health system? And why isn’t this aspiring superpower building one? In India, questions like these are a dime a dozen. The following video provides a quick overview of the state of Indian healthcare.

David Harvey on Capitalism

David Harvey, social theorist, Marxian scholar, proponent of zero growth in advanced economies, and author of The Enigma of Capital, offers an uncommon perspective on how capitalism has worked out in recent decades, its many crises and modes of resolution. After stating that it is "easier to imagine the end of the world than it is to imagine the end of capitalism", he nevertheless looks at why it is so hard not only to imagine an alternative to capitalism, but even to the kind of capitalism we have today. At the very least, there is food for thought here.

Partition: Recovering Sylhet

For some time now, I've been digging into the partition of India: Urvashi Butalia's excellent, The Other Side of Silence on the experience of the women, children, and Dalits of Punjab (I hope to do a review soon), Remembering Partition by Gyanendra Pandey and Jan Breman, The Partition of India by Ian Talbot and Gurharpal Singh, and Stern Reckoning by GD Khosla (most partisan of this lot). I also recently saw the movies Tamas and The Train to Pakistan (both on YouTube) and plan to watch Silent Waters soon. While much new scholarship has appeared in recent years on the partition of Punjab and Bengal, little is known about "the third site of Partition — colonial Assam, and particularly the region of Sylhet." A friend pointed me to this article in Himal that has more on Partition historiography and the experience of Sylhet.

Sixty-five years after Partition, the scholarship that event generates is varied and contested. Now more than ever before, writers and researchers are questioning the heavy focus on Punjab and Bengal at the expense of the third site of Partition – colonial Assam, and particularly the region of Sylhet, which elected to join East Pakistan in a 1947 referendum. The history of Sylhet opens up new complexities beyond the typical discourse that sees Partition as primarily a matter of religious communalism.

The study of Partition’s more narrowly regional dimensions is a recent development. The first Partition historians – Michael Edwardes, Penderel Moon, David Page, V P Menon, G D Khosla, and others – focused on decolonisation and the high politics of the division of India, with a core focus on Punjab. Punjab had captured the popular imagination because of the enormity of Partition violence there, which completely clouded this first phase of scholarship. The 1960s saw another spurt of Partition studies, including debates on the emergence of communalism, and also the publication of the memoirs of many key political players with a hand in the events of 1947. Still, the main focus remained on Partition in the Indian west. Meanwhile, nationalistic scholars in India engaged in glorifying the new state and eulogising the post-Partition leadership. Little emerged on Partition’s impact in areas distant from the ‘core’ of north India and Punjab; Partition became a largely Punjabi experience and not, as it actually was, a story of both east and west India. Even until recently, many professional historians who have contributed immensely to the study of Partition – Mushirul Hasan, Ian Talbot, Stanley Wolpert, David Gilmartin, Alok Bhalla, Anita Inder Singh, Ravinder Kumar – have been loath to engage with the Partition experience in the east.

I also discovered 1947partitionarchive.org, where I came across this harrowing "eyewitness account" by Major Jagjit Singh.

My Life as a Turkey

On this Thanksgiving Day, consider watching this extraordinary and beautifully filmed Nature documentary in which naturalist Joe Hutto raises 16 wild turkeys from incubation to adulthood, an experience that changed his life. As their turkey mother, Hutto spent over a year in a Florida forest with these birds, each developing a complex and unique relationship with him. He shows us their stages of development, their innate knowledge of the environment, their curiosity and survival instincts. He exults at their distinct personalities, social and emotional lives, individuality and playfulness, and their different appetites for physical affection.

Hutto gets very immersed in their lives, begins to understand their communication, and learns to "talk turkey". He identifies over 30 distinct turkey vocalizations for other animals like rattlesnakes and hawks. He explains how "within each of those calls are inflections that have very different meanings". His bond with one bird in particular, and the way it ends, is especially remarkable and unexpected. En route, Hutto also reveals his own shifting state of mind and what he has learned from this experience about his own life. It might well become hard to see turkeys as "dumb birds" after this documentary, which, incidentally, won the 2012 Emmy for Outstanding Nature Programming.

Kathryn Schulz on Regret

In this TED Talk, Kathryn Schulz takes on the emotion of regret and how we ought to handle it.

The Pearl of Africa

(Cross-posted on 3 Quarks Daily, where it has received many comments.)

A few years ago, Usha and I spent twelve days in Uganda. We visited two national parks to see chimpanzees and other animals, the Ssese Islands of Lake Victoria, the source of the Nile, the town of Jinja, and Kampala. As far as possible, we used the average citizen's mode of transportation and made no advance hotel reservations—choices that I think foster a greater engagement with the locals. As I often do when I travel, I shot some idiosyncratic video footage mostly as an aid to memory, akin to keeping a journal. Watching it again recently, I thought: why not make an amateur documentary? That's just what I did and here is the result (20 mins; also check out some pictures).

Why "Pearl of Africa"? Apparently, Winston Churchill, visiting Uganda at age 33, was so impressed by its mountains, valleys, greenery, lakes, wildlife, and friendly natives that he called it the "pearl of Africa", and the name stuck. I have a rather low opinion of Churchill but I find nothing to quibble about in this case. I too loved my time in Uganda.

Big Sky, Big Money

Here is an excellent PBS Frontline investigation that focuses on a Senate race in Montana to look at how big money has infiltrated American politics. It looks at how the U.S. Supreme Court's 2010 Citizen's United ruling—which allowed corporations to spend money on political issues as part of First Amendment free speech—actually plays out in real life. It shows how shady non-profit organizations are able to legally spend big money on shaping elections without ever disclosing where and who the money comes from. Viva la democracia!

Capitalism Without Growth?

The idea of economic growth based on continuously rising production and consumption, barring short-term hiccups, is integral to modern capitalism and its institutions. Most models of investment today are built upon returns outpacing inflation. Indeed, the promise of growth is fundamental to modern politics. In a world of finite resources, however, the expectation of endless economic growth is rather absurd, a fact now being made amply evident by ecological degradation, climate change, and extinction of species. Many economists are now exploring the idea of "steady state" economics with zero growth. Seemingly, it's only a matter of time when, one way or another, we are forced into such a state (or worse, because we won't accept it gracefully). What might that look like and what might a transition to such a model entail for our societies? Featuring Ben Harris-Quinney, Giles Fraser, and Meghnad Desai, this video has an interesting discussion on the topic (54 mins).

Dan Miller on Climate Change

In this talk, Dan Miller describes how climate change is shaping up to be worse than was predicted by the movie An Inconvenient Truth, why most humans are unable to grasp this threat (because it is invisible, without historical precedent, has a complex causality, is seen to have long drawn out or intangible consequences, lacks a well-defined enemy to pursue, etc.), and what we ought to be doing about it pronto.

Robert Sapolsky: Are Humans Just Another Primate?

A thought-provoking lecture by Robert Sapolsky, professor of neurobiology and primatology at Stanford, in which he tries to discern, to the best of our knowledge, what it is that separates us from other animals. He narrates lots of fascinating experimental results from recent decades. This lecture, archived on Fora.tv, is one of several in a series called Being Human: Connecting to Our Ancient Ancestors.

Leslie Chang on China's Workers

In this TED talk, journalist Leslie T. Chang focuses on the migrant factory workers of China — mostly young women who make our shoes, handbags, computers, and cellphones — in the industrial city of Dongguan. The stories she tells are from their perspective: how do they see their own lives, what aspirations do they have, what do they complain about. If you like this talk, also check out this longer talk with many more absorbing stories followed by an audience Q&A. Chang is the author of Factory Girls, which covers this subject matter in more detail. 

Jensen on the Future of Journalism

Robert Jensen, whose work I like and have linked to before, has made available a video of his introductory course in Journalism, broken up in 10-minute chunks. I haven't seen them all but here is one I liked, in which he also introduces the veteran journalist Robert W. McChesney.

Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar - the Movie

Last night I saw an absorbing film made in 1999 on the life and times of BR Ambedkar that is now on YouTube (in English, 3 hrs). It provides a good biographical sketch of an extraordinary and inspiring man who prevailed over some breathtaking odds. This movie shows why in terms of sheer intellect, critical scholarship, and humanistic vision, Ambedkar was head and shoulders above the better known leaders of the Indian nationalist pantheon, including Gandhi and Nehru. The movie also won several National Film Awards in 1999.

Also check out the 20 Aug, 2012 issue of Outlook India magazine that is dedicated to analyzing Ambedkar and his legacy.

American Rodeo

Anthropologically interesting (depressing?) clips from a rodeo competition I saw in Jackson, Wyoming earlier this week, where rodeo is the official state sport, patriotism and Jesus rule, and the free and the brave gather to make a sport out of dominating frightened animals.

This was my first rodeo and in terms of animal cruelty, it seemed to me much less egregious than what happens in many other rodeo events nationwide. While partly true (is it because, owing to Yellowstone NP, Jackson caters to an audience from all over the country and the world?), I realize now that my ignorance too had led me to this assessment. For instance, I was told at the event that every bucking horse is an "unbroken horse" behaving naturally when a rider gets on. That's not true. These horses buck wildly because a strap is tightened around their flanks and they try to get rid of this irritant. That's why the horse keeps bucking until the strap is released, long after it has thrown off the cowboy. Alongside, spurs are driven into its shoulders and electric prods are often used to aggravate it at the start. Not pretty. Some of the worst abuse though happens to terrified calves.

Tapped

Check out this multi-award winning documentary "Tapped" and say NO to bottled water, if you haven't already. Blurb and trailer appear below; the full movie can be seen on YouTube for $1.99 (75 mins). A related excellent documentary is Blue Gold: World Water Wars (the full movie is on YouTube for free).

"Tapped" documents how the bottle water industry is wreaking havoc on the environment and examines the role of the bottled water industry and its effects on our health, climate change, pollution, and our reliance on oil. Bottled water doesn't just come from your grocery store. It comes from small towns across America where citizens argue their way of life and ecosystem have been disrupted as a result of corporations coming in and claiming ownership of the public's water supply. With only 20% of bottled water containers recycled in the U.S., every day Americans dump 30 million single-serve plastic water bottles into landfills. Because of America's poor recycling rate, much of our plastic ends up in the Pacific Ocean. Specifically in an area known as Plastic Stew - an area twice the size of Texas where the ratio of plastic to plankton is 46:1. "Tapped" highlights how everyday heroes have taken on the fight for our most precious resource - water.

Peaceable Kingdom

HumaneMyth.org is a site dedicated to exploding the myth of "humane" farming of animals for food. It is run by animal activists who not only recognize factory farming of animals for the massive barbarism that it is (thanks to people like us), but go beyond and argue that it is not "possible to use and kill animals in a manner that can be fairly described as respectful or compassionate or humane." These activists desire a "peaceful transformation of our society that fully respects the inherent dignity and worth of animals and people alike."

Revisiting the site recently, I came across a documentary film, Peaceable Kingdom: The Journey Home. Below is a blurb and the trailer. Also check out the video excerpts of the bonus features on the DVD at the film website (one, two, three, four) and award ceremonies (one, two). It's just out on DVD and I've ordered my copy.

Peaceable Kingdom: The Journey Home explores the powerful struggle of conscience experienced by several people from traditional farming backgrounds who come to question the basic assumptions of their way of life. A riveting story of transformation and healing, the documentary portrays the farmers' sometimes amazing connections with the animals under their care, while also providing insight into the complex web of social, psychological and economic forces that have led to their inner conflict. Interwoven with the farmers' stories is the dramatic animal rescue work of a newly-trained humane police officer whose sense of justice puts her at odds with the law she is charged to uphold. With strikingly honest interviews and rare footage demonstrating the emotional lives and intense family bonds of animals most often viewed as living commodities, this groundbreaking documentary shatters stereotypical notions of farmers, farm life, and perhaps most surprisingly, farm animals themselves. Directed by Jenny Stein. Produced by James LaVeck.

Arithmetic, Population and Energy

A brilliant lecture by Dr. Albert A. Bartlett, professor of physics, that looks at population growth, energy use, and sustainability in light of basic arithmetic. Insightful and alarming, Bartlett shows why "sustainable growth" is an oxymoron and how many "experts" do not get this. According to Bartlett, a person in the U.S. on average consumes ~30 times the resources than a person in an underdeveloped country. One encouraging trend I found elsewhere is that per capita energy use in the U.S. has fallen in the last three decades though more than offset by population growth in the U.S., and by growth in population and per capita energy use in developing countries. Hardly a better case can be made for zero population growth and massive investments in renewable energy than the one made by Bartlett (from 2002, via 3QD).

On Eating Animals

(Cross-posted on 3 Quarks Daily, where it has received many comments.)

In a Montana slaughterhouse some years ago, a Black Angus cow awaiting execution suddenly went berserk, jumped a five-foot fence, and escaped. She ran through the streets for hours, dodging cops, animal control officers, cars, trucks, and a train. Cornered near the Missouri river, the frightened animal jumped into its icy waters and made it across, where a tranquilizer gun brought her down. Her "daring escape" stole the hearts of the locals, some of whom had even cheered her on. The story got international media coverage. Telephone polls were held, calls demanding her freedom poured into local TV stations. Sensing the public mood, the slaughterhouse manager "granted clemency" to the "brave cow". Now called Molly, she was sent to a nearby farm to live out her days grazing under open skies—which warmed the cockles of many a heart.

Cattle trying to escape slaughterhouses are not uncommon. Few of their stories end happily though. In Omaha some years ago, six cows escaped at once. Five were quickly recaptured; one kept running until Omaha police cornered her in an alley and pumped her with bullets. The cow, bellowing miserably and hobbling like a drunk for a few seconds, collapsed and died on the street in a pool of blood. This brought howls of protest, some from folks who had witnessed the killing. They called the police’s handling inhumane and needlessly cruel.

It is tempting to see these commiserating folks as animal lovers—and that's how they likely see themselves—until one remembers what they eat for dinner. A typical slaughterhouse in America kills over a thousand Mollys a day—lined up, shot in the head, and often cut-open and bled while still conscious, an end no less cruel and full of bellowing—all because Americans keep buying neatly-packaged slices of their corpses in supermarkets. Raised unnaturally and inhumanely, over a million protesting birds and mammals are violently killed in the U.S. every hour (that's 300 per second!). Is it then unreasonable to say that nearly all meat-eaters in America participate quite directly in a cycle of suffering and cruelty of staggering scale?

Yet the idea persists that Americans love animals, largely because of their love and concern for a class of animals called "pets" (and other "cute animals" like dolphins, polar bears, and pandas). Most Americans have had at least one pet at some point in their lives. Most see their pets as extensions of their families, photograph them, swap stories about them, buy them gifts and treats, spend money on their sicknesses, support taxes to build shelters for them, and mourn their deaths. Yet, the question continues to rankle, as Elizabeth Kolbert put it:

"How is it that Americans, so solicitous of the animals they keep as pets, are so indifferent toward the ones they cook for dinner? The answer cannot lie in the beasts themselves. Pigs, after all, are quite companionable, and dogs are said to be delicious."[1]

What might explain this odd behavior? From humankind's long community with farm animals, how has it come to this?

The Emotional World of Farm Animals

Here is a delightful documentary "about the thinking and feeling side of animals that are all too often just viewed as food. Jefferey Masson ... leads viewers through the personal journey he underwent while writing his latest book, The Pig Who Sang to The Moon. This journey into the sentient, emotional lives of farm animals brings Masson to animal sanctuaries around the country where caregivers and the animals themselves tell their harrowing stories of rescue and escape. Masson delves into the rich ancestry of these curious and intelligent animals and interviews top experts in animal behavior who offer scientific perspectives on these amazing creatures." (52 mins)

Education, Khan Academy Style

In this interesting video, Salman Khan "talks about how and why he created the remarkable Khan Academy, a carefully structured series of educational videos offering complete curricula in math and, now, other subjects. He shows the power of interactive exercises, and calls for teachers to consider flipping the traditional classroom script — give students video lectures to watch at home, and do "homework" in the classroom with the teacher available to help."

A 50-Year Plan for Energy

In this TED talk, Amory Lovins, an energy researcher, lays out a plan for a whole new private-sector energy industry that will save trillions while decimating fossil fuel use, creating jobs, reducing oil conflicts, and growing the economy. For more, visit ReinventingFire.com.

A Film on Bismillah Khan

A friend pointed me to this wonderful 1989 film on the life and times of Bismillah Khan (1916-2006), a musician as great as any that India has produced. It reveals Khan's enduring sense of place, his syncretic faith, his modesty and egalitarianism, and his extraordinary talent and devotion to music. The film presents many vanishing old world values, stories, and traditions of musical learning, with footage of the narrow alleys of Varanasi and its ghats by the Ganga, which Khan loved and missed on his travels. Though a pious Muslim, he also revered the Goddess Saraswati and often played at the famous Vishwanath temple on the ghats of Varanasi. (90 min, Hindi, no subtitles.)

It so happens that Bismillah Khan presided over the union that made my existence possible in the world! He played at my parents wedding in 1959, when he was a rising star, as a favor to my maternal grandfather who was a pretty senior official in the UP state bureaucracy. The photos on the right are from that occasion.

Vinay Lal on the "Imperialism of Categories"

Professor Vinay Lal "is a cultural critic, historian, scholar and writer who divides his time between Los Angeles and New Delhi. He writes widely on the history and culture of colonial and modern India, popular and public culture in India (especially cinema), historiography, the politics of world history, the Indian diaspora, global politics, contemporary American politics, the life and thought of Mohandas Gandhi, Hinduism, and the politics of knowledge systems." [From Wikipedia.]

In this impassioned lecture bubbling with insights (and red meat for leftists), he discusses the "imperialism of categories", i.e., the taxonomy of classifications, analyses, and judgments that postcolonial societies have adopted wholesale from the West. He then talks about what one can do by way of resistance and alternative conceptions (see also my related essay). On his blog, Lal Salaam (leftist pun surely intended), he probes in more detail the issues raised in this lecture. This was part of a 2010 meeting that "brought together academics and activists from around the world to share their experiences in understanding and resisting Western hegemony in various areas, including agriculture, education, health care, history, media, politics and science." Many other lectures are archived here but I haven't seen any yet.