sexta-feira, 31 de julho de 2009
Dormir Nu É Ecológico
Visual Essays por Franke James (My Green Conscience blog)
quinta-feira, 30 de julho de 2009
Is Peak Oil Real? A List of Countries Past Their Peak Oil Production
in Planet Thoughts
Only 14 of the 54 oil producing nations in the world are still increasing their oil production. The era of cheap oil is definitively over.
Country | Peak Prod. | 2008 Prod. | % Off Peak | Peak Year |
---|---|---|---|---|
United States | 11297 | 7337 | -35% | 1970 |
Venezuela | 3754 | 2566 | -32% | 1970 |
Libya | 3357 | 1846 | -45% | 1970 |
Other Middle East | 79 | 33 | -58% | 1970 |
Kuwait | 3339 | 2784 | -17% | 1972 |
Iran | 6060 | 4325 | -29% | 1974 |
Indonesia | 1685 | 1004 | -41% | 1977 |
Romania | 313 | 99 | -68% | 1977 |
Trinidad & Tobago | 230 | 149 | -35% | 1978 |
Iraq | 3489 | 2423 | -31% | 1979 |
Brunei | 261 | 175 | -33% | 1979 |
Tunisia | 118 | 89 | -25% | 1980 |
Peru | 196 | 120 | -39% | 1982 |
Cameroon | 181 | 84 | -54% | 1985 |
Other Europe & Eurasia | 762 | 427 | -44% | 1986 |
Russian Federation | 11484 | 9886 | -14% | 1987* |
Egypt | 941 | 722 | -23% | 1993 |
Other Asia Pacific | 276 | 237 | -14% | 1993 |
India | 774 | 766 | -1% | 1995* |
Syria | 596 | 398 | -33% | 1995 |
Gabon | 365 | 235 | -36% | 1996 |
Argentina | 890 | 682 | -23% | 1998 |
Colombia | 838 | 618 | -26% | 1999 |
United Kingdom | 2909 | 1544 | -47% | 1999 |
Rep. of Congo (Brazzaville) | 266 | 249 | -6% | 1999* |
Uzbekistan | 191 | 111 | -42% | 1999 |
Australia | 809 | 556 | -31% | 2000 |
Norway | 3418 | 2455 | -28% | 2001 |
Oman | 961 | 728 | -24% | 2001 |
Yemen | 457 | 305 | -33% | 2002 |
Other S. & Cent. America | 153 | 138 | -10% | 2003* |
Mexico | 3824 | 3157 | -17% | 2004 |
Malaysia | 793 | 754 | -5% | 2004* |
Vietnam | 427 | 317 | -26% | 2004 |
Denmark | 390 | 287 | -26% | 2004 |
Other Africa | 75 | 54 | -28% | 2004* |
Nigeria | 2580 | 2170 | -16% | 2005* |
Chad | 173 | 127 | -27% | 2005* |
Italy | 127 | 108 | -15% | 2005* |
Ecuador | 545 | 514 | -6% | 2006* |
Saudi Arabia | 11114 | 10846 | -2% | 2005 / Growing |
Canada | 3320 | 3238 | -2% | 2007 / Growing |
Algeria | 2016 | 1993 | -1% | 2007 / Growing |
Equatorial Guinea | 368 | 361 | -2% | 2007 / Growing |
China | 3795 | 3795 | - | Growing |
United Arab Emirates | 2980 | 2980 | - | Growing |
Brazil | 1899 | 1899 | - | Growing |
Angola | 1875 | 1875 | - | Growing |
Kazakhstan | 1554 | 1554 | - | Growing |
Qatar | 1378 | 1378 | - | Growing |
Azerbaijan | 914 | 914 | - | Growing |
Sudan | 480 | 480 | - | Growing |
Thailand | 325 | 325 | - | Growing |
Turkmenistan | 205 | 205 | - | Growing |
Peaked / Flat Countries Total | - | 49597 | - | 60.6% of world oil production |
Growing Countries Total | - | 32223 | - | 39.4% of world oil production |
- Russian Federation - Russia's oil production collapsed by the early 90's as the Soviet Union collapsed, but despite a decade of growth, Russia's own oil execs don't think the old peak can be surpassed.
- India's production appeared to plateau in 1995, and has stayed within a steady range since. The EIA forecasts Indian oil production to remain flat or decline slightly in the near future.
- Republic of Congo (Brazzaville) hit a production plateau in 1998, though current production is still very close to 1999 peak levels.
- Other Central & South America - The remaining countries of the Americas hit a production peak in 2003, though it's still too soon to know if this will be final peak.
- Malaysia has been on a production plateau since 1995, and the EIA projects flat or falling production.
- Other Africa - Oil production in much of Africa is potentially impacted by above-ground constraints, so it's definitely possible that production will rise here. It will rise from a low base of only 50,000 bpd however, and may not have much impact on total world production.
- Nigeria is impacted by domestic insurgencies in its oil-producing regions, and may be able to lift production if the political situation improves.
- Chad's oil production history is too short to definitively identify a peak in production, but the drop-off since 2005 has been dramatic.
- Italy has been on a production plateau for over 10 years, and it's unlikely that a mature economy is significantly under-exploiting its resource potential.
- Ecuador's production grew rapidly until 2004, but has leveled off and declined somewhat since then.
Música do BioTerra: Machine Gun (Slowdive Trip Hop Cover)
quarta-feira, 29 de julho de 2009
Velas e Carbono* Candles and Carbon
The widespread practice of misguided eco-Luddites turning off their lights for Earth Hour and burning candles as a source of light is grossly misguided and actually contributes to increased carbon dioxide emissions. [reading more here: Physical Insights]
In a society where 94 percent of the electrical energy generated is generated using fossil fuels, ordinary citizens using electricity are not to blame for anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions.
* Ref: Relatório Estatístico dos Consumos Energéticos 2009 da IEA
Ideia entretanto também referida em Calor: Como Impedir o Planeta de Arder, de George Monbiotterça-feira, 28 de julho de 2009
Como evoluiu a vagina? Vagina Evolution
Em praticamente todos os seres vivos, à excepção dos Mamíferos, o sistema reprodutor combinado com o sistema digestivo e urinário, desembocam todos num único tubo com contacto para o exterior, a cloaca. Há cerca de 150 milhões de anos, contudo, uma provável alteração nas funções do oviducto (aparecimento do útero, com funções de desenvolvimento interno do embrião) devido, muito provavelmente, a modificações epigenéticas, terá levado ao aparecimento de toda uma nova estrutura: a vagina.
Formation of the Müllerian ducts |
- An epigenetic side effect of other evolutionary changes in the body leading to a novel physical structure in the organisms.
- The genetic consolidation and individuation of the novel structure.
The basic assumption of a molecular evolutionary approach to the study of evolutionary novelties is that changes in developmental regulation have left traces in the molecular structure of the genome and a comparative study of genomic structures should be able to identify genetic changes coincidental with a phenotypic novelty. (emphasis mine)
We propose that a research program to explain evolutionary novelties has to focus on the question of whether novel characters arise through the evolution of novel regulatory links among developmental genes. We further propose that a detailed analysis of the evolution of developmental genes involved in the development of a derived, novel character can reveal molecular changes that could be causally involved in the origin of evolutionary novelties. The case study presented here suggests that the statistical methods of molecular evolution are strong enough to provide specific hypothesis for experimental test. The success of this research program will depend on the ability to connect the patterns of molecular evolution with the functional role of these molecular changes.
- Lynch VJ, Roth JJ, Takahashi K, Dunn CW, Nonaka DF, Stopper GF, Wagner GP (2004) Adaptive evolution of HoxA-11 and HoxA-13 at the origin of the uterus in mammals. Proc Biol Sci. 271(1554):2201-7. [pdf]
- Wagner GP, Lynch VJ (2005) Molecular evolution of evolutionary novelties: the vagina and uterus of therian mammals. J Exp Zoolog B Mol Dev Evol. [Epub ahead of print]
- Cifelli RL, Davis BM (2003) Marsupial Origins. Science 302:1899-1900.
- The evolution of female genitalia
segunda-feira, 27 de julho de 2009
Como evoluiu o pénis? Penis evolution
Embora em inglês, quem melhor para abordar a evolução do pénis por PZ Myers (biólogo e Professor Associado da Universidade de Minnesota, Morris).
Os pénis embrionários tiveram uma história complexa. Eles evoluíram independentemente várias vezes, e talvez o mais preocupante para o ego masculino, que tenham sido perdidos secundariamente, pelo menos, algumas vezes. E cada vez que eles têm evoluído, as evoluções convergem numa solução morfológica notavelmente semelhante.
What, then, can we conclude if we observe convergence at more than one anatomical or functional level? Multiple levels of convergence could imply that there are more constraints on the system—that there are fewer possible anatomical designs that successfully meet the selective regime. Therefore, if there is only one way to solve the problem imposed by the selective regime, we will see convergence at more levels than if many equally successful anatomies can evolve.
If this hypothesis is true, the evidence from mammals and turtles suggests that the amniotes that have evolved inflatable penises have been subjected to an extremely restrictive selective regime. Penile convergence in mammals and turtles does not stop at gross functional similarity; they have converged on a single anatomical design down to the level of specific collagen fiber arrangements. The differences in penile collagen fiber layering that exist between mammals and turtles do not, as of yet, seem to have any functional effect on penile stiffness. It may be that the way the axial orthogonal array is put together is less critical to the problem of increasing penile flexural stiffness than the presence of the array itself.
domingo, 26 de julho de 2009
sexta-feira, 24 de julho de 2009
Dossiê Bicicleta
Tratado de Não Proliferação de Combustíveis Fósseis
Bicicleta Larissa
Bicicletas e Etc.
Bicicleta na Cidade
Bicicleta Portugal
Bicicloteca
quinta-feira, 23 de julho de 2009
6 Mil Milhões como Nós (6 billion others) - mais um projecto de Yann Arthus-Bertrand
quarta-feira, 22 de julho de 2009
segunda-feira, 20 de julho de 2009
Richard Dawkins e o Gene Egoísta
sábado, 18 de julho de 2009
10 maneiras de ser solidário através dos media sociais disponíveis
This guest post is a collaboration between Mashable's Summer of Social Good charitable fundraiser and Max Gladwell's "10 Ways" series. The post is being simultaneously published across more than 100 blogs.
Social media is about connecting people and providing the tools necessary to have a conversation. That global conversation is an extremely powerful platform for spreading information and awareness about social causes and issues. That's one of the reasons charities can benefit so greatly from being active on social media channels. But you can also do a lot to help your favorite charity or causes you are passionate about through social media.
Below is a list of 10 ways you can use social media to show your support for issues that are important to you. If you can think of any other ways to help charities via social web tools, please add them in the comments. If you'd like to retweet this post or take the conversation to Twitter or FriendFeed, please use the hashtag #10Ways.
Blogging is one of the easiest ways you can help a charity or cause you feel passionate about. Almost everyone has an outlet for blogging these days -- whether that means a site running WordPress, an account at LiveJournal, or a blog on MySpace or Facebook. By writing about issues you're passionate about, you're helping to spread awareness among your social circle. Because your friends or readers already trust you, what you say is influential.
Recently, a group of green bloggers banded together to raise individual $1 donations from their readers. The beneficiaries included Sustainable Harvest, Kiva, Healthy Child, Healthy World, Environmental Working Group, and Water for People. The blog-driven campaign included voting to determine how the funds would be distributed between the charities. You can read about the results here. You should also consider taking part in Blog Action Day, a once a year event in which thousands of blogs pledge to write at least one post about a specific social cause (last year it was fighting poverty). Blog Action Day will be on October 15 this year.
2. Share Stories with Friends
Another way to spread awareness among your social graph is to share links to blog posts and news articles via sites like Twitter, Facebook, Delicious, Digg, and even through email. Your network of friends is likely interested in what you have to say, so you have influence wherever you've gathered a social network. You'll be doing charities you support a great service when you share links to their campaigns, or to articles about causes you care about.
In addition to sharing links to articles about issues you come across, you should also follow charities you support on the social networks where they are active. By increasing the size of their social graph, you're increasing the size of their reach.
When your charities tweet or post information about a campaign or a cause, statistics or a link to a good article, consider retweeting that post on Twitter, liking it on Facebook, or blogging about it. Following charities on social media sites is a great way to keep in the loop and get updates, and it's a great way to help the charity increase its reach by spreading information to your friends and followers. You can follow the Summer of Social Good Charities: Oxfam; The Humane Society; Livestrong e WWF
4. Support Causes on Awareness Hubs
It's important to follow and support organizations on these sites because they're another point of access for you to gather information about a charity or cause, and because by supporting your charity you'll be increasing their overall reach. The more people they have following them and receiving their updates, the greater the chance that information they put out will spread virally.
5. Find Volunteer Opportunities
Using social media online can help connect you with volunteer opportunities offline, and according to web analytics firm Compete, traffic to volunteering sites is actually up sharply in 2009. Two of the biggest sites for locating volunteer opportunities are Volunteer Match, which has almost 60,000 opportunities listed, and Idealist.org, which also lists paying jobs in the non-profit sector, in addition to maintaining databases of both volunteer jobs and willing volunteers.
For those who are interested in helping out when volunteers are urgently needed in crisis situations, should check out DoSomething.org, a site targeted at young adults seeking volunteer opportunities in their communities.
6. Embed a Widget on Your Site
7. Organize a Tweetup
8. Express Yourself Using Video
You can use sites like 12seconds.tv, Vimeo, and YouTube to easily record and spread your video message. Last week, the Summer of Social Good campaign encouraged people to use video to show support for charity. The #12forGood campaign challenged people to submit a 12 second video of themselves doing something for the Summer of Social Good.
That could be anything, from singing a song to reciting a poem to just dancing around like a maniac -- the idea was to use the power of video to spread awareness about the campaign and the charities it supports. If you're more into watching videos than recording them, Givzy.com enables you to raise funds for charities like Unicef and St. Jude's Children's Hospital by sharing viral videos by e-mail.
9. Sign or Start a Petition
There are a large number of petition creation and hosting web sites out there. One of the biggest is The Petition Site, which is operated by the social awareness network Care2, or Change, which has collected more than 79 million signatures over the years. Petitions are extremely powerful, because they can strike a chord, spread virally, and serve as a visual demonstration of the support that an issue has gathered.
Social media fans will want to check out a fairly new option for creating and spreading petitions: Twitition, an application that allows people to create, spread, and sign petitions via Twitter.
10. Organize an Online Event
In March, 12for12k ran a 12-hour tweet-a-thon, in which any donation of at least $12 over a 12 hour period gained the person donating an entry into a drawing for prizes like an iPod Touch or a Nintendo Wii Fit. Last month, 12for12k took a different approach to an online event by holding a more ambitious 24-hour live video-a-thon, which included video interviews, music and sketch comedy performances, call-ins, and drawings for a large number of prizes given out to anyone who donated $12 or more.
sexta-feira, 17 de julho de 2009
quinta-feira, 16 de julho de 2009
Colin Tudge - Alimentar as pessoas é fácil
Há muito tempo atrás li a sua obra Feeding People is Easy. Deixo aqui o resumo e conclusão de um artigo da sua autoria. Excelente e merecia a tradução para Português.
Feeding People is Easy
Resume
Artigo completo aqui
Conclusion:We could all be well fed. Indeed, everyone in the world who is ever likely to be born could be fed to the highest standards of gastronomy as well as of nutrition until humanity itself comes to an end. We already have most of the necessary technique: perhaps all that is needed. We could always do with more excellent science but we need not depend, as we are often told from on high, on the next technological fix. The methods that can provide excellent food would also create a beautiful environment, with plenty of scope for other creatures, and agreeable and stable agrarian economies with satisfying jobs for all.
In reality, in absolute contrast, we have created a world in which almost a billion are chronically undernourished; another billion are horribly overnourished, so that obesity and diabetes are epidemic, and rising; a billion live on less than two dollars a day; and a billion live in urban slums (a figure set to increase and probably at least to double over the next half century); while other species are disappearing so fast that biologists speak of mass extinction.
quarta-feira, 15 de julho de 2009
A vida interna das nossas células (The inner life of cell) - só a animação
Teste também os seus conhecimentos sobre Biologia Celular, tentando legendar esta animação. As respostas serão fornecidas na próxima postagem.Clica aqui para saberes mais sobre Cellular Visions: The Inner Life of a Cell
terça-feira, 14 de julho de 2009
Stephen Hawking coloca grandes questões sobre o Universo
Toda a biografia e mais ligações
domingo, 12 de julho de 2009
Merce Cunningham - meu tributo
sábado, 11 de julho de 2009
Yann Arthus-Bertrand’s TED talk - "A wide-angle view of fragile Earth"
Yann Arthus-Bertrand captura em grande-angular o frágil planeta Terra.
sexta-feira, 10 de julho de 2009
Evolução: conhecer melhor o pensamento de Daniel Dennett
Dennett, do ponto de vista da evolução é visto como sendo fortemente adaptacionista, em consonância com a sua teoria da atitude intencional, e os pontos de vista do biólogo evolucionista Richard Dawkins. Em Darwin's Dangerous Idea, Dennett mostrou-se ainda mais disposto a defender o adaptacionismo de Dawkins, dedicando um capítulo inteiro a uma crítica das ideias de Gould.
As teorias de Dennet tiveram uma influência significativa sobre o trabalho do psicólogo evolucionista Geoffrey Miller. Ele também escreveu sobre e defendeu a noção de memética como uma ferramenta útil filosoficamente, mais recentemente, em seu Cérebros, computadores e Mentes.