A New Philosophy for the 21st Century - The Chronicle Review - The Chronicle of Higher Education

"Philosophers have broad social responsibilities that require directly engaging social problems. This can mean activism, but in a bureaucratic age it is more likely to mean working at the project level with scientists, engineers, and policy makers. Rather than philosopher kings, our future is more likely to lie in becoming philosopher bureaucrats."

"Field philosophy means working outside the library or study, doing philosophy at the project level, with scientists, engineers, and policy makers. Unlike applied ethics, where the value of the work is still largely expressed within the discipline, field philosophy adds value out in the world by responding to societal needs."

A New Philosophy for the 21st Century - The Chronicle Review - The Chronicle of Higher Education

New York City's Greenest Roofs

More photos and info on green roofs in NYC.  mm

High-Tech Hydroponic Farm Transforms Abandoned Bowling Alley

• By Dave Mosher
• 
• October 27, 2011  |
  

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NEW YORK CITY — On top of an old bowling alley in industrial northern Brooklyn sits an expansive translucent greenhouse. Inside, a bounty of produce thrives under the supervision of a computer-controlled network of sensors, motors and plumbing.

The 15,000-square-foot hydroponic greenhouse facility, called Gotham Greens, is reputedly the first commercial-scale urban operation of its kind in the United States. Thousands of lettuce and basil seedlings were plopped into a soil-less farming system in May. Since then, three local entrepreneurs say their operation is on track to deliver 100 tons of produce by the one-year mark.

NYC Council FOOD WORKS report

This report details all the dimensions of the NYC food system (processing, waste, jobs, carbon footprint) and recommendations to improve it, especially in terms of local economy.  mm


FoodWorks: A Vision to Improve NYC's Food System. On Monday, November 22, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn released FoodWorks, a comprehensive report outlining policy recommendations for New York City's food system. UDL Assistant Director Michael Conard, who sits on the City Council's Food Policy Advisory Board, and UDL Project Manager Kubi Ackerman, were significantly involved in shaping th report which reflects many of the UDL initiatives around food systems and urbanization. Included is the Urban Design Lab's mapping of the New York City regional foodshed.  The UDL is encouraged by the public interest generated with the release of this report and will continue to develop research and policy recommendations in this expanding field.

Report on Agriculture in Hudson Valley

From the Columbia Urban Design Lab, on NYC regional agriculture

Glynwood Center new report: The State of Agriculture in the Hudson Valley Region
The UDL mapped and analyzed land-use and agricultural parcel distribution in the Hudson Valley Region for a report released recently by the Glynwood Center, a longtime partner of the Urban Design Lab.  This work is part of the UDL focus on agriculture and food systems in the New York City Region and their relationship to urbanization, environmental protection and restoration. Read the report The State of Agriculture in the Hudson Valley Region

The One Percent Actually Benefits from Tax Increases on the Wealthy

By Jay Walljasper

Here is some straight talk about the need for increasing taxes on the wealthy from the great-grandson of Oscar Meyer (yes, that Oscar Meyer), who admits he was born into the one percent.

On the Commons Fellow Chuck Collins—Senior Scholar at the Institute for Policy Studies and director of the IPS program on Inequality and the Common Good—offers compelling reasons, spiced with humor and common sense, on why it’s good for 100 percent of us to raise taxes for the most fortunate Americans. He vividly describes how wealthy entrepreneurs and investors benefit from a host of public services paid for by tax dollars, in other words the commons.

See the video of his talk at the TEDx conference at Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts.

Meet the Movement for a New Economy by Gar Alperovitz

Meet the Movement for a New Economy by Gar Alperovitz

good essay on need for "new economy"

The idea that we need a “new economy”—that the entire economic system must be radically restructured if critical social and environmental goals are to be met—runs directly counter to the American creed that capitalism as we know it is the best, and only possible, option. Over the past few decades, however, a deepening sense of the profound ecological challenges facing the planet and growing despair at the inability of traditional politics to address economic failings have fueled an extraordinary amount of experimentation by activists, economists and socially minded business leaders. Most of the projects, ideas and research efforts have gained traction slowly and with little notice. But in the wake of the financial crisis, they have proliferated and earned a surprising amount of support—and not only among the usual suspects on the left. As the threat of a global climate crisis grows increasingly dire and the nation sinks deeper into an economic slump for which conventional wisdom offers no adequate remedies, more and more Americans are coming to realize that it is time to begin defining, demanding and organizing to build a new-economy movement.

SUNY New Paltz Sets Local Food on Plates

i have heard that Metropolitan at BC is purchsing food from Long Island farms, wonder how much etc.  mm

As with many institutions, feeding a population of thousands of customers is a big production, often requiring the dining service to be run and supplied by large corporations. How can an institution integrate local and organic food when so much of the food is tied to a wholesaler that is not necessarily connected to local farms, and is likely more concerned with quantity and price than with quality and sustainability? SUNY New Paltz’s story involves many different constituents: farmers, students, staff, corporate-run dining service representatives, the USDA, and more. In a collaborative effort, fueled by persistence, the stakeholders worked to bring more local food to the tables of SUNY New Paltz’s dining halls.

How It All Began

SUNY New Paltz’s Environmental Task Force was convened in 2005 under the leadership of long time Environmental Consortium member and professor of sociology, Brian Obach. Along with several colleagues and students, the Task Force brings together many constituents from campus to address environmental concerns. Members of Students for Sustainable Agriculture, as well as the New Paltz Recycling Club, overlap with the Task Force members, creating a wealth of connections and synergies that make the interest and pursuit of sustainable measures possible at New Paltz.

New Paltz students Marigo Farr, Katy Kondrat, and John Wilson co-founded Students for Sustainable Agriculture that same year with a mission to promote a sustainable food system that is healthy for consumers, farm-workers, and the environment. The group has worked tirelessly ever since to bring changes to their campus. Co-founder Marigo Farr remarks, "After approximately 5 years of educating the campus, rounding up support from the student body for a change in food policy, and numerous meetings with Campus Auxiliary Services and Sodexo Corporation, Sodexo approved a new vendor that was capable of providing the university with local food.."

Complaint Box: Powerless in Brooklyn - NYTimes.com

This has got to be a major topic at the journalism department at BC, right? I never really thought about it this way.

Of the boroughs outside Manhattan, Brooklyn gets the most buzz — as a tourist attraction, a “hipster brand” and an incubator of art and artisanal products. That has provoked a backlash from longtime Brooklynites and others wary of smugness from the borough’s Brownstone Belt.

However entertaining these debates, Brooklynites — and, I dare say, all of us in the non-Manhattan boroughs — share one common problem: we’re essentially powerless. We lack meaningful local government, as well as broad-based media and civic organizations.

Complaint Box: Powerless in Brooklyn - NYTimes.com

Worldwatch Institute's State of the World 2011 Shows Agricultural Innovation Is Key to Reducing Poverty, Stabilizing Climate | Worldwatch Institute

In Kibera, Nairobi, the largest slum in Kenya, more than 1,000 women farmers are growing "vertical" gardens in sacks full of dirt poked with holes, feeding their families and communities. These sacks have the potential to feed thousands of city dwellers while also providing a sustainable and easy-to-maintain source of income for urban farmers. With more than 60 percent of Africa's population projected to live in urban areas by 2050, such methods may be crucial to creating future food security. Currently, some 33 percent of Africans live in cities, and 14 million more migrate to urban areas each year. Worldwide, some 800 million people engage in urban agriculture, producing 15–20 percent of all food.


Worldwatch Institute's State of the World 2011 Shows Agricultural Innovation Is Key to Reducing Poverty, Stabilizing Climate | Worldwatch Institute

The Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund : Why Did Progressive Media Miss This Important Progressive Story?

The gasfracking stuff is gonna get heated here in NY State and its crucial to look at what Pittsburgh did last year to ban it. This article cites the important pieces but also engages in a very important critique of so-called left progressive media. mm


"What would change if We awoke from our century-long slumber and started questioning corporate Constitutional “rights” again? If we began to understand that in fact there is no greater political power in this country than We the People, acting together. We are the Goliaths, if we dare to see ourselves as we truly are. And this is exactly what the good people of Pittsburgh and 120 other towns in four northeastern states are beginning to understand and to act upon. They are relearning their history and discovering that they have the legal authority to govern themselves, regardless of what state government or corporate leaders claim. They have the right to prohibit corporate engagement in whatever ways they deem necessary for the common good. That regardless of whether they are conservative or progressive, rural or urban, they’re tired of being told that there’s nothing they can do to protect their communities and natural areas from corporate harm. Pittsburgh banned corporate drilling for natural gas. Other towns have passed bans on corporate water extraction, corporate mining, corporate factory farms, etc. And all of them have reclaimed their community’s right to self-governance – to design and define their communities’ futures."

The Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund : Why Did Progressive Media Miss This Important Progressive Story?