I can’t thank you enough for letting this insightful man speak with little to no interruptions. This was one of the best podcasts across all platforms that I have listened to up to date. Kudos to you, your team, and of course Carlos for coming together and sharing this information with us and bringing all of this full circle. There’s still hope left!
Nate, thank you for all the ways you are bringing information to a wide range of people! This is just another great guest speaking about the need to protect biodiversity. I woke up in the middle of the night last night thinking about your podcast. My mind ruminated on a process of thoughts that i want to share with you. You have brought up often that many of your listeners have asked you to bring up the topic of hope and in many ways you have brought wisdom to the subject of hope. I want to offer some perspective on hope that may help you and others integrate their thoughts into understanding. First, hope and fear are intrinsically linked. To have one is to have the other. Every hope can be stated as a fear as every fear can be stated as a hope. In understanding that to be hopeful is literally to be fearful can help us also understand that to be fearful is because there is something we are hoping for. There are some philosophies that put forth the idea that love is the opposite of fear. While i don’t want to promote this idea as i think it is incomplete, it can be a mapping of how we think that may be helpful. In this idea, fear and hope are about the future and have the innate understanding that change always takes place. It is one of the Buddha’s insights. Everything changes. In some ways, to love something is also to accept it as it is without any desire to change it. I do not think this is sufficient to fully grok love, but it is useful. So loving what is can be a helpful antidote to fear. But it is not enough. In Buddhism, the idea of equanimity plays a significant role in allowing space in the mind to be unperturbed by the changes taking place. The hope/fear coin also is about understanding that change will take place, yet it is about being attached to or rejecting of a given outcome. While there is much more to this insight, i will leave it for you to find what value this map of consciousness might hold. And as a map of one aspect of consciousness, it is incomplete and only points in a direction. The Tao that can be named …. Thanks for your show!!
So Nate, I've seen one or two PBS shows about discoveries archeologists are making in the Amazon that indicate how people lived pre-european invasion. How they managed water around even some very large settlements. Sustainable living apparently to put it in our terms. Is there any value in interviewing those archeologists for insights into how current populations might better fit into the forest without disruption?
I have been watching the podcast for years. Really apreciate it seen Carlos Nobre talking about it Amazon and all. Thanks, Nate. Greatings from Brazil.
This happened 3-4 years ago The fact that we are talking about this only now it kind of scary Thank you for this valuable information, and thank you Dr Carlos for all of your work on this global treasure
A tremendously inspiring guest I'm very grateful to get to know. Talk about mixed news of a dire nature... Well, my understanding of the problem has been fully validated. It occurs to me with regards to seriously reducing beef consumption, we might improve our odds of success by getting as many religious leaders on board as we can reach, from all three of the Abrahamic religions. I don't see how we can make any headway on convincing people to give up beef, especially in a region like the Midwest, when the cattle industry has the full blessings of all 3 of the Abrahamic churches + the Vatican. Christianity in particular advertises God-sanctioned unrestrained consumption of animals ("beasts" is still the popular term, it seems), in large part due to the New Testament teachings of Paul, who, according to some historians, was fanatically anti-vegetarian. I'm no authority historically or biblically, but I guess this has something to do with Paul's inherently conservative tendencies, and vegetarianism being seen as a kind of heresy by the Hebrew traditionalists of the day. The Temple seems to have been engaged at very great profit in the butchering and meat selling business, which would explain why they weren't too keen on the idea of Rabbis advocating for eating veggies. It might be interesting to look into what connection, if any, there is between the modern day Christian Church, Islam, and Judaism, and the current corporate meat-processing monopoly. Coincidentally, I've been asking around lately about what people believe on this very topic: The few evangelical Christians I know here in the Twin Cities are themselves as fervently devout as any of them ever get on this one particular belief about their absolute right to use the Earth and all its creatures (sorry, "beasts") in any way they see fit -- guilt-free, no restraint, no "sin": After all... "God said!" I'm being a little flip, but I'm actually serious. I see these beliefs as a potentially serious impediment to making headway in any area of concern for biodiversity and global warming, excepting in those particular areas that directly and immediately affect human beings. I don't know how we can reach people who put the words of religious texts before anything else in terms of what they do and do not believe, and what they're willing and not willing to do... Except through the only people whose word they seem to take at face value -- their preachers. Something I'm beginning to realize is that there's a lot more people in the world who bottom line identify with these ideas than I had once thought. And that this consequently might actually be playing a large role in why there is so much inertia in the US with regards to the environment. Now the homocentric campaign slogan "Clean water. Clean air." starts to make a lot more sense, doesn't it?
@TheFlyingBrain. Hi! I’ve said it before and will say it again (only bc I’ve learned so well from teachers who say this): beliefs, worldview, are at the root of ecocide. I was raised in the fundie American “christian” industry, and so much of what has warped Abrahamic beliefs is the filler content. All those egos piling on with their interpretations of what prophets said. And all that interpretation coming from dudes living in a specific time with their cultural and political shenanigans adding layer after layer of bias. When it comes to sacred teachings, it would be great if people got out of the telephone game and just had their own direct experiences of wisdom teachings, bare bones and original/authentic (as much as it can be, anyway) and detox from the layers of screaming marketing and politics that got mixed up and more insane, addictive, over the centuries. These traditions are really earth based, common sense wisdom, once the filler content is cut.
In 2015, Pope Francis addressed a letter to all people of good faith globally which tells a very different story from the one you have experienced. It is entitled LAUDATO SI’ - ON CARE FOR OUR COMMON HOME. In it he challenged the notion of the earth as resources and also the anthropcentric approach of some. He advocated an “ecological conversion” for all. Unfortunately, the initial enthusiasm for that letter has not translated into noticeable changes to people’s addictions to overseas travel, consumption, beef eating, etc. So if the leader of the Catholic Church is unable to encourage the members of that religious community to change, I am not sure how Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, etc. will bring about change amongst their adherents. Having said, that, I still agree with your basic sentiments and can see how fundamentalist religion perpetrates and anthropocentric approach that is proving so destructive, environmentally, socially and politically.
We shouldn't be feeding grains to ruminates. Beef growers can expand the biodiversity & yield by using Joel Salatins Sustainable & Regenerative techniques of Mobbing, Massing, & Moving, w/ the introduction of rotating other species successively in rotation w/ ruminate grazing.
I am so happy the topic of eating beef and pork came up. Thank you both. I also can’t eat chicken or consume milk, cheese or eggs that come from factories.
I've been long aware that if we lose the Amazon, the viability of the planet will be greatly impacted. I am very grateful to both of you for the information that has so clearly been provided during this discussion. It's been observed that the global convergence zone is shifting northward and according to Paul Beckwith, especially if the AMOC halts, the monsoon rainfall will move further northward away from the Amazon Basin. As indicated in this talk, without subsequent drastic measures the consequences of this would truly unravel life on the planet.
Good interview with Carlos Nobre and I appreciate his research as well as his focus on solutions, something which many of Nate's guest lack. One point I would like to make is that the AMOC has as much or more influence on the change in the wet/dry seasons as the ENSO. Indeed, some scientists say the main driver of drought is the change in the dry season in the Amazon because of the slowing down of the AMOC conveyor belt. I think Rahmstorf mentioned this in Nate's podcast with him but there are plenty of others who have mentioned this recently. In fact, I regard the AMOC as having breached the tipping point, evidenced by the large and growing cold water blob south of Iceland. Similarly, I regard the Amazon deforestation as already having breached the tipping point which Nobre projects out to 2050. We shall see who is correct soon enough. In 1970, I was involved in the general student strikes at the University of Minnesota and was the central distributor of Hundred Flowers, one of two underground newspapers in Minneapolis. (The other was the MInneapolis Flag.) I had several other underground newspapers from around the county, like the L. A. Free Press, Chicago Seed, Seattle Helix, etc., which I sold at a table in the student union on the West Bank of the campus. The Earth Day organizers asked me to sell buttons and books at my table and to do leafletting, which is how I got involved in the first Earth Day. I was living in the back of my head shop because I was poor, so I didn't have cooking facilities. Consequently I ate a lot of cheap burgers and fast food that I could get at the local convenience store. However, 1970 was a real moment of ferment across the country and I underwent several transitions. I went vegetarian that fall and started working on alternative structures, like food co-ops. My motivation was economic and political rather than any quasi-spiritual focus. McDonalds was already getting beef from Brazil and deforestation of the Amazon was already a problem by 1970. So Nobre's and Nate's recommendation to not eat industrial beef is not new. It has been around for a long, long time. The paradigm shift that I find most important is to Stop - Just Stop. Stop eating so much meat, stop consuming so much, stop having children, stop buying cars, stop building new houses, stop doing so much of whatever you are doing. This paradigm has been around since 1970 and it is STILL a foundational paradigm for building solutions. If anyone is interested, there is a review of my latest book Paradigms for Adaptation (2024) on the Resilience website from November 11th. The review is by Frank Kaminski who is a very good writer and reviewer himself.
I grew up in Minneapolis born in 1971!! I turned vegetarian from also learning about the rainforest deforestation from beef imports for fast food - I think it was in Harpers magazine when I was 15 years old - so 1986. I remember putting it on the refrigerator. Also my closest school friend turned vegetarian - he said it was in solidarity with the buddhists of Tibet - his parents were from Taiwan. So then I did intensive activism for my U of Minnesota master's degree that I finished in 2000. I was a regular at North Country Co-op for example and I rented a room in the Holtzerman on the West Bank. Reading Don's activist newspaper - the Winona LaDuke article helped inspire me to do full-time activism for CBE as my first post-high school job in 1989. By early 90s I was at UW-Madison doing UW-Greens work for Rainforest Trust Fund promotion but of course poor students could not donate. hahaha. Oh I see from your book that you moved to Washington state? Thanks for sharing your University of Minnesota activism connection. Yes I kept doing activism as my "career" - then in 2009 I was arrested by a cop at the University since I was taking a nap. The cop wanted to call my landlady and my boss to prove to the cop that I was not homeless. I explained I had a master's degree and I needed to get back to my job. I left the city soon after that as I realized the cops were out of control in Minneapolis. Yes now I have a CSA forest shiitake farm. Wow now you live in Southern France? cool. "b) I was a migrant worker for 8 years in the western United States and there were plenty of “anglos” when I started in 1974, but considerably fewer when I left in 1982. The reason was wages did not keep pace with price increases of everything else. " fascinating - yes I worked hard with Mexican farm workers also - and they had to suffer my bad Spanish for two years! hahaha.
Thank you Nate. It is always nice to hear from people in the field. I want to congratulate you on the honing of your interviewing skills, nicely balanced. It looks like we are underestimating the interconnection between ecosystems, and our predictions are more on the sunny side to keep business as usual. I am afraid, it may not be enough just leaving all the forests worldwide alone to recuperate to their natural state. We have passed that point and need now to invest heavily into rebuilding and building natural systems, like using AI to create, engineer a rainforests and natural oasis. A third of any national budged has to be invested into these projects with a min of hundred year fore side. Only then we are able to make an impact on global weather systems. Now how likely is that going to happen? Time is telling us to unite the whole of humanity to restore our mother planet. Stay sane all
Yet again we need to specify the difference between industrial meat and meat that has ecological value as a surplus of agroforestry. That nitrogen cycle is going to be hard to maintain without pasture integrated into our land management. In the case of the Amazon...it really should be put back just as he describes.
There are thousands of amazing scientists, doctors, professors and people in Brazil. By the way, Brazil has the biggest airplanes industry in the world, highly developed and modern. There are amazing universities and very educated people. Please don’t buy the unreal vision people used to have from developing countries. And I can tell you in many aspects a lot of great cities in Brazil are far more livable and developed than many famous cities in the US. Although with large inequality (which needs improvement, as many countries do), Brazil has a large economy with amazing potencial.
Nate, I think a case can be made for eating pigs that are raised in the wild. Right now they’re being slaughtered as an invasive species because the system is out of balance, the same way that the professor suggest that a diverse ecosystem can provide greater investment than monoculture, we can extrapolate that to the entire planet such that if we’re willing to be flexible in our diets and eat those species that are in the process of increasing a number, we can actually be of service by delaying the point which species reaches carrying capacity into the future and actually increased by diversity. Discussions need to be had for the creation of diets which align long-term global well-being, an optimal, human and community health. By making a big pot of stew, one to maximize both the energy usage and the content of food that is processed an introduced diet, which optimizes human health by getting away from annuals and creating meals, consisting of a component of meat protein, along with tubber legumes and leafy greens.will all feel better live longer and help to restore the planet. Keep up the good work.
Nate, couple of thoughts Rory Sutherland and advertising expert suggested recently that in our current develop societies 80% of the energy that we spend goes to the maintaining and reaffirmation of status within the society we’re not spending energy we’re maintaining status through the expenditure of energy this explains why populist leaders around the world Have no interest in maintaining rainforest or any other logical zone their primary concern is to maintain their own status through the exploitation of energy systems. On a separate point as per this discussion, the Amazon rainforest is 40 million years in the making this contrast greatly to John Fullerton‘s assertion that grassland projects can show meaningful Improvements within one or two seasons. We love John but he’s bringing a Wall Street short term mentality to what needs to be a very long-term perspective on environmental restoration. However, the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago the second best time to plant a tree is today.let’s get planting trees right away. Keep up the good work.
I suggest you take a look at Thorstein Veblen's Theory of the Leisure Class (1899). Another good book is Thorstein Veblen and His America (1934) by Joseph Dorfman. Veblen was well-read in the anthropology and sociology of his era and is the originator of the theory of conspicuous consumption, which is what you are getting at regarding status. Veblen is starting to get some recognition again in the blogosphere and it is about time.
Great interview Nate. The amazon has always been of interest to me as is so unique. Perhaps inspired by the movie Aguire, the wrath of god I spent 1989 in south america , 6 months of that travelling the amazon from the mouth at belem to Iquitos in peru by slow boat and backpacking. Astounding rich ecological environment with something new to see at every rest stop. Army antis, trees, tree toots, flowers, insets etc. Past few years i have shocked at what the human race has done to the amazon through climate change, deforestation and pollution. We will have little left to see of the magic of the planet at this speed of destruction
Interesting episode Nate, thanks. Many of the solutions appear to be in the form of paying farmers or landowners not to deforest, or to reforest. I think that again creates an abstraction, where money is the driver for change, money that can simply be withheld by the next guy. What is required is to remove the abstraction and return to the point where there is a reciprocal arrangement between people and forest. That is the successful model. It doesn't involve markets or money. The people care for, or garden, the forest, and in return the forest provides the people with all that they need.
Also, and this perhaps should have been my main point, what purpose would the university and gene sequencing (and other technology) serve? Is the 14,000 years of evidence of success insufficient? Isn't this the mindset of the colonialist mentioned in the discussion? I'm raising the question, not accusing, we're all either colonised or coloniser, few of us have had any say in this. Edit: what I'm trying (failing!) to say is that aren't these things just inherently known (gnosis)? If we have to resort to measurement and objectification (DNA sequencing) then our knowledge is already lacking, we don't truly understand. That's not to say that we don't experiment, rather that we feel the results of our experiments. Measurements are a product of the superorganism, aren't they? They only exist to "report back to management". I don't really see a space for that in the great simplification (I mean the actual simplification, when it occurs). It doesn't seem to fit. Again, great episode.
I would think the world population is too high for that to be a motivator because not enough people can enjoy that give and take. If it takes money to encourage doing the right thing that's money well spent.
@@teethompson7756 but if it relies on money, then the great simplification is plotting its route to failure, isn't it? What happens when that abstract money construct collapses, becomes worthless or whatever? In this example, I'd say that money is no different to fossil fuels. It's a finite externality that is being used to buy time, or steal from the future. You're probably right about population, although I couldn't be certain about the carrying capacity, but I think that the abstraction of money simply buys you the finite units of energy to defy the numbers for a short time. There is possibly, hopefully, a scenario in which population could be managed down, via fossil fuels and money, to a level that can be sustained. That's a fading hope though.
At the same time Trump won in Missouri by a large margin, on the same ballot, Missouri approved an initiative referendum to protect the right to have an abortion. There are times when people need to claim the direct power to make decisions. We should be able to do so at the global level, also. In addition to our greenhouse gas emissions, militarism and poverty are issues that are not being handled well in the current structure of power. Why are we avoiding talking about changing the structure of power, and constituting ourselves as a global digital democracy?
We don't even have a path to bypass political bosses on a national level in the US. We can't hardly free ourselves from party control of the legal processes. Even the initiative systems in the states keep coming under fire. I agree, it will be impossible to respond to global problems with the present structure.
The global avg temp.'s being stated are falling far short of the actual b/c of ocean expansion acceleration. Research "ocean stratification" and then include all thermal mass (materials mined) which all act as heating elements. "CO2" is but one component.
Those effects are interim system adjustments that only delay atmospheric effects. The added heat in the oceans is bad to the ocean systems, so that is bad, not good. That is like celebrating that some stray drive-by bullets missed you but hit your neighbor.
@@SteveBoyington-i1e you don't even comprehend what is being said. The atmosphere is a product of the ocean and my statement is orthogonal to what you are saying. Learn some physics before sitting at this table or ask some questions.
@@SteveBoyington-i1e Speaking slowly for you: Stating global avg atmosphere temp and it's relative rate of change as the primary marker for "global warming" is likened to measuring the temperature of water in a pot on stove via the air above it without considering the energy of the heat source under the pot; the density of the fluid & pot nor their relative temperatures and rates of expansion; 98% of All anthropogenic thermal mass is in the oceans.
@@SteveBoyington-i1e the temperatures being used are NOT adequate. Nor is CO2 alone at all sufficient. Industry and institutions are controlling the narrative in order to manufacture false "solutions". I have first hand experience with this in the field of physics. IE: it is far worse than being stated.
Was this recorded 45 years ago? That would make his timeline, about right. Don't forget the exponential function. It's already changed so much, Panama doesn't get enough rain to function above 50% of normal. The rain is reduced, from the changes in the Amazon.
Nate, may I suggest you try and get hold of Walter Jehne of Australia. Soil microbiologist and advocate of the SOIL CARBON SPONGE and the regenerative farming. Lots of talks by him on you tube e.g. th-cam.com/video/t3rIkYUVq5c/w-d-xo.html Jehne has challenged my views as a long time climate activist - and, importantly, giving me a sliver of ... hope. And, importantly, after having WJ as a guest, seat him with a couple of the other wise guys you have had on, a climate scientist like Kevin Anderson, and maybe a movement builder like Mamphela Ramphele for a Roundtable. That encounter could be transformative.
Very interesting, Thanks Dr Carlos & Nate! China imports about 55% of Brazil's beef and may be among the big players behind the sceens in the beef/deforestation push.
Raising animals for food that eat the vegetation foundation of the landscape is kind of like raising termites for food in the walls of your house. Beef is especially bad.
Nate asked about benevolent aliens inquiring about our stewardship of the planet. It brought to mind a relevant movie- The Arrival starring Charlie Sheen.
Top importer for Brazillian soy is not the USA. Soybean oil is used in the bio fuel industry, no? Perhaps an episode on feed stocks for climate-crutial industries is in order?
I'd have thought that the top importer of Brazilian soy is China. Given that they are the top importer of Brazilian beef and that a large proportion of Brazilian soy will be fed to Brazilian cows. Either way, China will be the correct answer!
Are we making the same effort to maintain the sahara as a desert? It is greening for who knows what reason. Surely we cannot allow it to revert to what it once was, lush rain forest by all accounts. The smithsonian, reporting on recent discoveries *Native Americans shaped their environments to suit them, through burning, pruning, tilling and other practices. And the Amazon is no different: Look closer, and you can see the deep impressions that humans have made on the world's largest tropical rainforest*
🤔 I wonder which the US President-elect is mostly likely to invest in A cattle ranch in Brazil where he can put his name on "the best steaks in the world", or a fund that helps to reforest the Amazon?
Is it overpopulation or over consumption? How many people can the planet support living simple lives versus the may Americans, Canadians and Australians live?
First off it's the wrong approach to punish for deforestation this only increases the value and draws more people to do it. Probably if you investigate who is funding the money it would come back to very prominent people, knowing or unknowingly making investments.
Secondly, I don't know how true it is but through satellite imaging stone cities have been observed in the Rainforest, this has also been observed in dense jungles globally, without getting into the connection, I don't believe that there is one...
I am from brazil and i respect Carlos nobre as a great scientist but when He talk about The actual president He made his political blindness appear; The current government talk q lot about Green policies but doesnt have any control about Fire, this crimes described are happening all The time and there are people dying of lung illness, i am upset that Carlos dont have The gusts to point this lack of commitment of the left government; does not matter your side...left or rigth Will both cry in a percy shelley verse: ozymandias....
Ok Rafael… obviously the blind person is you. Remember what the far right “environment minister” was recorded saying? “We need to aprove cattle laws in Amazonia while people are distracted with the pandemic”. You think the far right government was protecting or destroying the Amazon? If you voted for that last president you know what they did… they ended the forest fiscalization in the Amazon… and now, as you heard, people are intentionally burning what they can to keep having more cattle… but the machinery to do that gets caught now because of the left government you think is bad, but cares about environment for real. Please respect real scientists and save your opinion for yourself.
How much time have you got? Given the full spectrum of all possible forms that can co-exist in any single space-time, it would be best if you exercised your imagination. My method is the Imaginary mix and match of individual attributes to create unique form.
Congressional UFO / UAP hearings to be held today, November 13th, 2024. Apparently we have the technology to resolve much of climate change however many in the defense department feel sharing the technology to be too risky
Nate, couple of thoughts Rory Sutherland and advertising expert suggested recently that in our current develop societies 80% of the energy that we spend goes to the maintaining and reaffirmation of status within the society we’re not spending energy we’re maintaining status through the expenditure of energy this explains why populist leaders around the world Have no interest in maintaining rainforest or any other logical zone their primary concern is to maintain their own status through the exploitation of energy systems. On a separate point as per this discussion, the Amazon rainforest is 40 million years in the making this contrast greatly to John Fullerton‘s assertion that grassland projects can show meaningful Improvements within one or two seasons. We love John but he’s bringing a Wall Street short term mentality to what needs to be a very long-term perspective on environmental restoration. However, the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago the second best time to plant a tree is today.let’s get planting trees right away. Keep up the good work.
I can’t thank you enough for letting this insightful man speak with little to no interruptions. This was one of the best podcasts across all platforms that I have listened to up to date. Kudos to you, your team, and of course Carlos for coming together and sharing this information with us and bringing all of this full circle. There’s still hope left!
Great conversation! Thank you Dr. Hagens, for having Carlos on your podcast.
ditto!
Nate, thank you for all the ways you are bringing information to a wide range of people! This is just another great guest speaking about the need to protect biodiversity.
I woke up in the middle of the night last night thinking about your podcast. My mind ruminated on a process of thoughts that i want to share with you.
You have brought up often that many of your listeners have asked you to bring up the topic of hope and in many ways you have brought wisdom to the subject of hope. I want to offer some perspective on hope that may help you and others integrate their thoughts into understanding.
First, hope and fear are intrinsically linked. To have one is to have the other. Every hope can be stated as a fear as every fear can be stated as a hope. In understanding that to be hopeful is literally to be fearful can help us also understand that to be fearful is because there is something we are hoping for.
There are some philosophies that put forth the idea that love is the opposite of fear. While i don’t want to promote this idea as i think it is incomplete, it can be a mapping of how we think that may be helpful. In this idea, fear and hope are about the future and have the innate understanding that change always takes place. It is one of the Buddha’s insights. Everything changes. In some ways, to love something is also to accept it as it is without any desire to change it. I do not think this is sufficient to fully grok love, but it is useful.
So loving what is can be a helpful antidote to fear. But it is not enough. In Buddhism, the idea of equanimity plays a significant role in allowing space in the mind to be unperturbed by the changes taking place. The hope/fear coin also is about understanding that change will take place, yet it is about being attached to or rejecting of a given outcome.
While there is much more to this insight, i will leave it for you to find what value this map of consciousness might hold. And as a map of one aspect of consciousness, it is incomplete and only points in a direction. The Tao that can be named ….
Thanks for your show!!
thank you Fermi for your thoughts. it does make sense...and I am both hopeful and fearful.🙏🌎
This changes my purchasing decisions. Thanks…a wonderful guest and host.
What an articulate and humble man. Thank you both
These shows are the highlight of my week
So Nate, I've seen one or two PBS shows about discoveries archeologists are making in the Amazon that indicate how people lived pre-european invasion. How they managed water around even some very large settlements. Sustainable living apparently to put it in our terms. Is there any value in interviewing those archeologists for insights into how current populations might better fit into the forest without disruption?
A life saving conversation for all ! Thanks for all your efforts here and...
👍 Rock on friend 🙂.
I have been watching the podcast for years. Really apreciate it seen Carlos Nobre talking about it Amazon and all. Thanks, Nate. Greatings from Brazil.
This happened 3-4 years ago
The fact that we are talking about this only now it kind of scary
Thank you for this valuable information, and thank you Dr Carlos for all of your work on this global treasure
when you write "This" what are you referring to? the tipping point of the Amazon turning into no longer being a co2 sink?
the empire is so arrogant it has gone blind to its suicidal greed that breaks these non reversible systems life depends on
A tremendously inspiring guest I'm very grateful to get to know. Talk about mixed news of a dire nature...
Well, my understanding of the problem has been fully validated.
It occurs to me with regards to seriously reducing beef consumption, we might improve our odds of success by getting as many religious leaders on board as we can reach, from all three of the Abrahamic religions. I don't see how we can make any headway on convincing people to give up beef, especially in a region like the Midwest, when the cattle industry has the full blessings of all 3 of the Abrahamic churches + the Vatican. Christianity in particular advertises God-sanctioned unrestrained consumption of animals ("beasts" is still the popular term, it seems), in large part due to the New Testament teachings of Paul, who, according to some historians, was fanatically anti-vegetarian. I'm no authority historically or biblically, but I guess this has something to do with Paul's inherently conservative tendencies, and vegetarianism being seen as a kind of heresy by the Hebrew traditionalists of the day. The Temple seems to have been engaged at very great profit in the butchering and meat selling business, which would explain why they weren't too keen on the idea of Rabbis advocating for eating veggies.
It might be interesting to look into what connection, if any, there is between the modern day Christian Church, Islam, and Judaism, and the current corporate meat-processing monopoly.
Coincidentally, I've been asking around lately about what people believe on this very topic: The few evangelical Christians I know here in the Twin Cities are themselves as fervently devout as any of them ever get on this one particular belief about their absolute right to use the Earth and all its creatures (sorry, "beasts") in any way they see fit -- guilt-free, no restraint, no "sin": After all... "God said!"
I'm being a little flip, but I'm actually serious. I see these beliefs as a potentially serious impediment to making headway in any area of concern for biodiversity and global warming, excepting in those particular areas that directly and immediately affect human beings. I don't know how we can reach people who put the words of religious texts before anything else in terms of what they do and do not believe, and what they're willing and not willing to do... Except through the only people whose word they seem to take at face value -- their preachers.
Something I'm beginning to realize is that there's a lot more people in the world who bottom line identify with these ideas than I had once thought. And that this consequently might actually be playing a large role in why there is so much inertia in the US with regards to the environment.
Now the homocentric campaign slogan "Clean water. Clean air." starts to make a lot more sense, doesn't it?
@TheFlyingBrain. Hi! I’ve said it before and will say it again (only bc I’ve learned so well from teachers who say this): beliefs, worldview, are at the root of ecocide.
I was raised in the fundie American “christian” industry, and so much of what has warped Abrahamic beliefs is the filler content. All those egos piling on with their interpretations of what prophets said. And all that interpretation coming from dudes living in a specific time with their cultural and political shenanigans adding layer after layer of bias. When it comes to sacred teachings, it would be great if people got out of the telephone game and just had their own direct experiences of wisdom teachings, bare bones and original/authentic (as much as it can be, anyway) and detox from the layers of screaming marketing and politics that got mixed up and more insane, addictive, over the centuries. These traditions are really earth based, common sense wisdom, once the filler content is cut.
In 2015, Pope Francis addressed a letter to all people of good faith globally which tells a very different story from the one you have experienced. It is entitled LAUDATO SI’ - ON CARE FOR OUR COMMON HOME. In it he challenged the notion of the earth as resources and also the anthropcentric approach of some. He advocated an “ecological conversion” for all. Unfortunately, the initial enthusiasm for that letter has not translated into noticeable changes to people’s addictions to overseas travel, consumption, beef eating, etc. So if the leader of the Catholic Church is unable to encourage the members of that religious community to change, I am not sure how Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, etc. will bring about change amongst their adherents.
Having said, that, I still agree with your basic sentiments and can see how fundamentalist religion perpetrates and anthropocentric approach that is proving so destructive, environmentally, socially and politically.
We shouldn't be feeding grains to ruminates. Beef growers can expand the biodiversity & yield by using Joel Salatins Sustainable & Regenerative techniques of Mobbing, Massing, & Moving, w/ the introduction of rotating other species successively in rotation w/ ruminate grazing.
I am so happy the topic of eating beef and pork came up. Thank you both. I also can’t eat chicken or consume milk, cheese or eggs that come from factories.
Cannot isn’t true. It’s your desire not need. A growing number of people is the pressure consuming the forests.
The US just reelected Trump. You really think people are going to stop or even reduce beef consumption? Please...
I've been long aware that if we lose the Amazon, the viability of the planet will be greatly impacted. I am very grateful to both of you for the information that has so clearly been provided during this discussion. It's been observed that the global convergence zone is shifting northward and according to Paul Beckwith, especially if the AMOC halts, the monsoon rainfall will move further northward away from the Amazon Basin. As indicated in this talk, without subsequent drastic measures the consequences of this would truly unravel life on the planet.
Good interview with Carlos Nobre and I appreciate his research as well as his focus on solutions, something which many of Nate's guest lack. One point I would like to make is that the AMOC has as much or more influence on the change in the wet/dry seasons as the ENSO. Indeed, some scientists say the main driver of drought is the change in the dry season in the Amazon because of the slowing down of the AMOC conveyor belt. I think Rahmstorf mentioned this in Nate's podcast with him but there are plenty of others who have mentioned this recently. In fact, I regard the AMOC as having breached the tipping point, evidenced by the large and growing cold water blob south of Iceland. Similarly, I regard the Amazon deforestation as already having breached the tipping point which Nobre projects out to 2050. We shall see who is correct soon enough.
In 1970, I was involved in the general student strikes at the University of Minnesota and was the central distributor of Hundred Flowers, one of two underground newspapers in Minneapolis. (The other was the MInneapolis Flag.) I had several other underground newspapers from around the county, like the L. A. Free Press, Chicago Seed, Seattle Helix, etc., which I sold at a table in the student union on the West Bank of the campus. The Earth Day organizers asked me to sell buttons and books at my table and to do leafletting, which is how I got involved in the first Earth Day. I was living in the back of my head shop because I was poor, so I didn't have cooking facilities. Consequently I ate a lot of cheap burgers and fast food that I could get at the local convenience store. However, 1970 was a real moment of ferment across the country and I underwent several transitions. I went vegetarian that fall and started working on alternative structures, like food co-ops. My motivation was economic and political rather than any quasi-spiritual focus. McDonalds was already getting beef from Brazil and deforestation of the Amazon was already a problem by 1970. So Nobre's and Nate's recommendation to not eat industrial beef is not new. It has been around for a long, long time.
The paradigm shift that I find most important is to Stop - Just Stop. Stop eating so much meat, stop consuming so much, stop having children, stop buying cars, stop building new houses, stop doing so much of whatever you are doing. This paradigm has been around since 1970 and it is STILL a foundational paradigm for building solutions. If anyone is interested, there is a review of my latest book Paradigms for Adaptation (2024) on the Resilience website from November 11th. The review is by Frank Kaminski who is a very good writer and reviewer himself.
I grew up in Minneapolis born in 1971!! I turned vegetarian from also learning about the rainforest deforestation from beef imports for fast food - I think it was in Harpers magazine when I was 15 years old - so 1986. I remember putting it on the refrigerator. Also my closest school friend turned vegetarian - he said it was in solidarity with the buddhists of Tibet - his parents were from Taiwan. So then I did intensive activism for my U of Minnesota master's degree that I finished in 2000. I was a regular at North Country Co-op for example and I rented a room in the Holtzerman on the West Bank. Reading Don's activist newspaper - the Winona LaDuke article helped inspire me to do full-time activism for CBE as my first post-high school job in 1989. By early 90s I was at UW-Madison doing UW-Greens work for Rainforest Trust Fund promotion but of course poor students could not donate. hahaha. Oh I see from your book that you moved to Washington state?
Thanks for sharing your University of Minnesota activism connection. Yes I kept doing activism as my "career" - then in 2009 I was arrested by a cop at the University since I was taking a nap. The cop wanted to call my landlady and my boss to prove to the cop that I was not homeless. I explained I had a master's degree and I needed to get back to my job. I left the city soon after that as I realized the cops were out of control in Minneapolis. Yes now I have a CSA forest shiitake farm. Wow now you live in Southern France? cool. "b) I was a migrant worker for 8 years in the western United States and there were plenty of “anglos” when I started in 1974, but considerably fewer when I left in 1982. The reason was wages did not keep pace with price increases of everything else. "
fascinating - yes I worked hard with Mexican farm workers also - and they had to suffer my bad Spanish for two years! hahaha.
Beautiful discussion.
Thank you Nate. It is always nice to hear from people in the field. I want to congratulate you on the honing of your interviewing skills, nicely balanced.
It looks like we are underestimating the interconnection between ecosystems, and our predictions are more on the sunny side to keep business as usual.
I am afraid, it may not be enough just leaving all the forests worldwide alone to recuperate to their natural state.
We have passed that point and need now to invest heavily into rebuilding and building natural systems, like using AI to create, engineer a rainforests and natural oasis. A third of any national budged has to be invested into these projects with a min of hundred year fore side. Only then we are able to make an impact on global weather systems.
Now how likely is that going to happen?
Time is telling us to unite the whole of humanity to restore our mother planet.
Stay sane all
Yet again we need to specify the difference between industrial meat and meat that has ecological value as a surplus of agroforestry. That nitrogen cycle is going to be hard to maintain without pasture integrated into our land management. In the case of the Amazon...it really should be put back just as he describes.
Thanks for this Nate, another great episode.
Great guest,prob one the most educated on this region of the world
There are thousands of amazing scientists, doctors, professors and people in Brazil. By the way, Brazil has the biggest airplanes industry in the world, highly developed and modern. There are amazing universities and very educated people. Please don’t buy the unreal vision people used to have from developing countries. And I can tell you in many aspects a lot of great cities in Brazil are far more livable and developed than many famous cities in the US. Although with large inequality (which needs improvement, as many countries do), Brazil has a large economy with amazing potencial.
Nate, I think a case can be made for eating pigs that are raised in the wild. Right now they’re being slaughtered as an invasive species because the system is out of balance, the same way that the professor suggest that a diverse ecosystem can provide greater investment than monoculture, we can extrapolate that to the entire planet such that if we’re willing to be flexible in our diets and eat those species that are in the process of increasing a number, we can actually be of service by delaying the point which species reaches carrying capacity into the future and actually increased by diversity. Discussions need to be had for the creation of diets which align long-term global well-being, an optimal, human and community health. By making a big pot of stew, one to maximize both the energy usage and the content of food that is processed an introduced diet, which optimizes human health by getting away from annuals and creating meals, consisting of a component of meat protein, along with tubber legumes and leafy greens.will all feel better live longer and help to restore the planet. Keep up the good work.
Nate, couple of thoughts Rory Sutherland and advertising expert suggested recently that in our current develop societies 80% of the energy that we spend goes to the maintaining and reaffirmation of status within the society we’re not spending energy we’re maintaining status through the expenditure of energy this explains why populist leaders around the world Have no interest in maintaining rainforest or any other logical zone their primary concern is to maintain their own status through the exploitation of energy systems. On a separate point as per this discussion, the Amazon rainforest is 40 million years in the making this contrast greatly to John Fullerton‘s assertion that grassland projects can show meaningful Improvements within one or two seasons. We love John but he’s bringing a Wall Street short term mentality to what needs to be a very long-term perspective on environmental restoration. However, the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago the second best time to plant a tree is today.let’s get planting trees right away. Keep up the good work.
I suggest you take a look at Thorstein Veblen's Theory of the Leisure Class (1899). Another good book is Thorstein Veblen and His America (1934) by Joseph Dorfman. Veblen was well-read in the anthropology and sociology of his era and is the originator of the theory of conspicuous consumption, which is what you are getting at regarding status. Veblen is starting to get some recognition again in the blogosphere and it is about time.
Should the world be paying the Amazon for maintaining such crucial ventilation and purification services?
The world benefits, the world should compensate. Especially developed nations that have contributed most to our current predicament.
yes
This was suggested by Carl Sagan in 1992 and I'm sure there were others.
To my knowledge it's still not happening.
@teethompson7756 It is easier to weigh and measure oil, minerals, metals, foods and so on.
@@chyfieldsI'm sorry, I'm not following you. ???
52:15 agroforestry 🎯 (Nate, I'm looking forward to an agroforestry episode one of these years 😉)
Great interview Nate. The amazon has always been of interest to me as is so unique. Perhaps inspired by the movie Aguire, the wrath of god I spent 1989 in south america , 6 months of that travelling the amazon from the mouth at belem to Iquitos in peru by slow boat and backpacking. Astounding rich ecological environment with something new to see at every rest stop. Army antis, trees, tree toots, flowers, insets etc. Past few years i have shocked at what the human race has done to the amazon through climate change, deforestation and pollution. We will have little left to see of the magic of the planet at this speed of destruction
We're toast
Interesting episode Nate, thanks. Many of the solutions appear to be in the form of paying farmers or landowners not to deforest, or to reforest. I think that again creates an abstraction, where money is the driver for change, money that can simply be withheld by the next guy. What is required is to remove the abstraction and return to the point where there is a reciprocal arrangement between people and forest. That is the successful model. It doesn't involve markets or money. The people care for, or garden, the forest, and in return the forest provides the people with all that they need.
Also, and this perhaps should have been my main point, what purpose would the university and gene sequencing (and other technology) serve? Is the 14,000 years of evidence of success insufficient? Isn't this the mindset of the colonialist mentioned in the discussion? I'm raising the question, not accusing, we're all either colonised or coloniser, few of us have had any say in this.
Edit: what I'm trying (failing!) to say is that aren't these things just inherently known (gnosis)? If we have to resort to measurement and objectification (DNA sequencing) then our knowledge is already lacking, we don't truly understand. That's not to say that we don't experiment, rather that we feel the results of our experiments. Measurements are a product of the superorganism, aren't they? They only exist to "report back to management". I don't really see a space for that in the great simplification (I mean the actual simplification, when it occurs). It doesn't seem to fit.
Again, great episode.
I would think the world population is too high for that to be a motivator because not enough people can enjoy that give and take.
If it takes money to encourage doing the right thing that's money well spent.
@@teethompson7756 but if it relies on money, then the great simplification is plotting its route to failure, isn't it? What happens when that abstract money construct collapses, becomes worthless or whatever? In this example, I'd say that money is no different to fossil fuels. It's a finite externality that is being used to buy time, or steal from the future. You're probably right about population, although I couldn't be certain about the carrying capacity, but I think that the abstraction of money simply buys you the finite units of energy to defy the numbers for a short time. There is possibly, hopefully, a scenario in which population could be managed down, via fossil fuels and money, to a level that can be sustained. That's a fading hope though.
At the same time Trump won in Missouri by a large margin, on the same ballot, Missouri approved an initiative referendum to protect the right to have an abortion.
There are times when people need to claim the direct power to make decisions. We should be able to do so at the global level, also.
In addition to our greenhouse gas emissions, militarism and poverty are issues that are not being handled well in the current structure of power. Why are we avoiding talking about changing the structure of power, and constituting ourselves as a global digital democracy?
We don't even have a path to bypass political bosses on a national level in the US. We can't hardly free ourselves from party control of the legal processes. Even the initiative systems in the states keep coming under fire. I agree, it will be impossible to respond to global problems with the present structure.
The war machine needs to eat. If you could take the profit out of war it would cease to exist.
The global avg temp.'s being stated are falling far short of the actual b/c of ocean expansion acceleration. Research "ocean stratification" and then include all thermal mass (materials mined) which all act as heating elements. "CO2" is but one component.
Those effects are interim system adjustments that only delay atmospheric effects. The added heat in the oceans is bad to the ocean systems, so that is bad, not good. That is like celebrating that some stray drive-by bullets missed you but hit your neighbor.
@@SteveBoyington-i1e you don't even comprehend what is being said.
The atmosphere is a product of the ocean and my statement is orthogonal to what you are saying. Learn some physics before sitting at this table or ask some questions.
@@SteveBoyington-i1e Speaking slowly for you: Stating global avg atmosphere temp and it's relative rate of change as the primary marker for "global warming" is likened to measuring the temperature of water in a pot on stove via the air above it without considering the energy of the heat source under the pot; the density of the fluid & pot nor their relative temperatures and rates of expansion;
98% of All anthropogenic thermal mass is in the oceans.
@JMW-ci2pq What is your point?
@@SteveBoyington-i1e the temperatures being used are NOT adequate. Nor is CO2 alone at all sufficient. Industry and institutions are controlling the narrative in order to manufacture false "solutions".
I have first hand experience with this in the field of physics.
IE: it is far worse than being stated.
Was this recorded 45 years ago? That would make his timeline, about right. Don't forget the exponential function.
It's already changed so much, Panama doesn't get enough rain to function above 50% of normal. The rain is reduced, from the changes in the Amazon.
Nate, may I suggest you try and get hold of Walter Jehne of Australia. Soil microbiologist and advocate of the SOIL CARBON SPONGE and the regenerative farming. Lots of talks by him on you tube e.g. th-cam.com/video/t3rIkYUVq5c/w-d-xo.html
Jehne has challenged my views as a long time climate activist - and, importantly, giving me a sliver of ... hope. And, importantly, after having WJ as a guest, seat him with a couple of the other wise guys you have had on, a climate scientist like Kevin Anderson, and maybe a movement builder like Mamphela Ramphele for a Roundtable. That encounter could be transformative.
💔
This is quite confusing, a few years ago was TARF on the edge of a tipping point.
Talk to Paul Rosolie of Jungle Keepers.
Very interesting, Thanks Dr Carlos & Nate! China imports about 55% of Brazil's beef and may be among the big players behind the sceens in the beef/deforestation push.
Both are a part of the BRICS nations
Yay! Finally someone directly states: reduce eating meat! It will help the Amazon forest❤
Raising animals for food that eat the vegetation foundation of the landscape is kind of like raising termites for food in the walls of your house. Beef is especially bad.
Hope you are working on an election grief episode. I'm stuck in anger mode.
That's a you problem.
@@TheCompleteGuitarist I suspect there are millions of us with that "you problem"
Anger is an energizing emotion. Consider how best to use your energy.
@@ExtinctionLife stop fighting about things that have no real impact. Neither candidate will/would have done anything.
@@guapochino140 well said.
Nate asked about benevolent aliens inquiring about our stewardship of the planet. It brought to mind a relevant movie-
The Arrival starring Charlie Sheen.
12:03 This is news to me. I was of the impression (obviously wrong) that the carbon content of Amazonian soils (aside from terra preta) was near 0%
Top importer for Brazillian soy is not the USA. Soybean oil is used in the bio fuel industry, no?
Perhaps an episode on feed stocks for climate-crutial industries is in order?
I'd have thought that the top importer of Brazilian soy is China. Given that they are the top importer of Brazilian beef and that a large proportion of Brazilian soy will be fed to Brazilian cows.
Either way, China will be the correct answer!
I never heard about slaves creating societies in the Amazon. Curious.
Are we making the same effort to maintain the sahara as a desert? It is greening for who knows what reason. Surely we cannot allow it to revert to what it once was, lush rain forest by all accounts.
The smithsonian, reporting on recent discoveries
*Native Americans shaped their environments to suit them, through burning, pruning, tilling and other practices. And the Amazon is no different: Look closer, and you can see the deep impressions that humans have made on the world's largest tropical rainforest*
Our species has turned suicidal.
You only just realized?
Source that 100% photosynthesis failure at 43C 110F ?¿
Last had seen selected studied top canopy trees were having failure but like 15%
🤔 I wonder which the US President-elect is mostly likely to invest in
A cattle ranch in Brazil where he can put his name on "the best steaks in the world",
or
a fund that helps to reforest the Amazon?
Somewhere between obeying the law and going to college is enough sense to figure out climate change, overpopulation, and ecological overshoot.
Is it overpopulation or over consumption?
How many people can the planet support living simple lives versus the may Americans, Canadians and Australians live?
Yea! +1000% regenerative ag FTW!!! KNF with syntropic agroforestry will restore our damaged forests and woodlands and grow healthy food.
I do not favor a global government, but we need* global governance. Tax the north to reforest the south.
First off it's the wrong approach to punish for deforestation this only increases the value and draws more people to do it. Probably if you investigate who is funding the money it would come back to very prominent people, knowing or unknowingly making investments.
Next weeks episode will discuss this - Andre Guimaraes
Secondly, I don't know how true it is but through satellite imaging stone cities have been observed in the Rainforest, this has also been observed in dense jungles globally, without getting into the connection, I don't believe that there is one...
I am from brazil and i respect Carlos nobre as a great scientist but when He talk about The actual president He made his political blindness appear; The current government talk q lot about Green policies but doesnt have any control about Fire, this crimes described are happening all The time and there are people dying of lung illness, i am upset that Carlos dont have The gusts to point this lack of commitment of the left government; does not matter your side...left or rigth Will both cry in a percy shelley verse: ozymandias....
Ok Rafael… obviously the blind person is you. Remember what the far right “environment minister” was recorded saying? “We need to aprove cattle laws in Amazonia while people are distracted with the pandemic”. You think the far right government was protecting or destroying the Amazon? If you voted for that last president you know what they did… they ended the forest fiscalization in the Amazon… and now, as you heard, people are intentionally burning what they can to keep having more cattle… but the machinery to do that gets caught now because of the left government you think is bad, but cares about environment for real. Please respect real scientists and save your opinion for yourself.
It would have been a bit funny, if you would have put video full of pictures of each animal species known in Amazon.
How much time have you got? Given the full spectrum of all possible forms that can co-exist in any single space-time, it would be best if you exercised your imagination. My method is the Imaginary mix and match of individual attributes to create unique form.
l have that time what this video has. It depends how much time is spent on each image.
Congressional UFO / UAP hearings to be held today, November 13th, 2024. Apparently we have the technology to resolve much of climate change however many in the defense department feel sharing the technology to be too risky
stop
we must save the unique fauna and flora only found in the Amazon .
Nate, couple of thoughts Rory Sutherland and advertising expert suggested recently that in our current develop societies 80% of the energy that we spend goes to the maintaining and reaffirmation of status within the society we’re not spending energy we’re maintaining status through the expenditure of energy this explains why populist leaders around the world Have no interest in maintaining rainforest or any other logical zone their primary concern is to maintain their own status through the exploitation of energy systems. On a separate point as per this discussion, the Amazon rainforest is 40 million years in the making this contrast greatly to John Fullerton‘s assertion that grassland projects can show meaningful Improvements within one or two seasons. We love John but he’s bringing a Wall Street short term mentality to what needs to be a very long-term perspective on environmental restoration. However, the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago the second best time to plant a tree is today.let’s get planting trees right away. Keep up the good work.