So What, Who Cares (vol 2, issue 8) Why you should worry about the Internet melting
Hello! I want to thank you all for the feedback on the book list question. The unanimous verdict is, "Yes, please assemble a list." So I can do that, I'll be posting three So What, Who Cares? newsletters next week, then putting together the book list and sending you all a link on the fourth night.
Now please enjoy this classic jam to take you into the (long) weekend: A mash-up of "Mama Said Knock You Out" and "Come on Eileen."
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Climate change continues to disrupt the conditions under which different industries operate. We've already reviewed how weather's affecting junk food makers (vol 1, issue 6); agriculture (vol 1, issue 9; vol 1, issue 21; vol 2, issue 7); the vacation and insurance industries (vol 1, issue 12); wine and chocolate (vol 1, issue 55); and the shipping industry (vol 1, issue 63). You can add telecoms to the list. Last week, searing heat led to DSL service outages in Perth, due in part to the failure of a data center's main and back-up air conditioning systems.
So what? As weather patterns become more extreme, regions that suffer polar vortices or heat waves are going to see a rise in what climate scientists call "blocking patterns," where extreme weather conditions move into a region and stay there for days, if not weeks. Blocking patterns have been on the rise since 2000 and are expected to become increasingly more common -- and more severe -- as the climate continues to shift. What this means: infrastructure that relies on climate control, like data centers which need cooling, is not up to the challenges of sustained, extreme temperatures.
Who cares? People who rely on the Internet. And businesses that rely on the Internet. And the companies that have to keep the Internet up and running. We're going to see a boom among the companies that specialize in making high-tech equipment for extreme conditions. Although soon, they'll just be "conditions" to us.
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If you want people to do address climate change right now, ask them to imagine how they'll be recalled by their descendants. A Columbia University psychologist found that people are motivated to alter their attitudes toward environmental issues and -- this is key -- their behavior in the present if they're motivated to think about leaving a positive legacy.
So what? Selfishness has been pegged as one of the reasons people don't see a reason to change their behavior. But asking people to think about how they want others to think about them? That's using selfishness for unselfish results. Expect to see an uptick in appeals along the "We didn't inherit the Earth -- we're borrowing it from our children" variety.
Who cares? Marketers? Also, social scientists -- there are some that caution that framing "Here is why you should care about the environment" in utilitarian terms like "Because it saves you money to carpool" or "Because it would be nice if your grandchildren didn't think of clean water as a luxury" has a long-term effect of making people even more self interested and less likely to do something simply because it's the right thing to do.
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Seven out of ten U.S. teachers will have at least one grieving child in their class, reports NPR. Using U.S. Census statistics, the Coalition to Support Grieving Students forecasts that 1 in 20 children will lose a parent by the time they graduate high school.
So what? The Coalition to Support Grieving Students has launched a new website, Grievingstudents.org, which provides fact sheets, advice and videos for anyone who knows or sees a bereaved child on a regular basis.
Who cares? How many of you read the blurb above and instantly thought of the classmates you knew who had who lost a parent? Addressing children's grief on a practical, daily basis is one of those skills one hopes never to acquire, but it never hurts to have the resource on hand if you do have to rise to the occasion. It's worth noting that we now have a National Center for School Crisis and Bereavement. It's ten years old and it's another resource for helping children deal with the aftermath of someone dying.
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Your pop culture note of the day: I read a horrifying story in New York magazine today, which I will not mention or link to, because it really requires brain bleach and/or it may be a hoax, but anyway, The Toast addressed the article in a magnificent, re-directional way, and the comments somehow dropped me into a Web wormhole and I landed at Tudor Confessions.
This site combines historical pictures from the Tudor era with elegantly concise alternate histories, along with a liberal spicing of opinions from people with really strong opinions about the TV show The Tudors. It is the kind of collision between past and present that keeps on entertaining.
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