Beyond GDP input given to UN via Spanish government; now available on UN´s Beyond GDP webpage

In late August I sumbitted input to the "Beyond GDP" initiative in the UN system, which was coordinated by the government of Spain. My written input (2 pages), titled "Beyond GDP input", is now available at the UN´s Beyond GDP page under "Documents and reports" - see "Download Non-Member States ZIP file" and locate the file "Morten Tønnessen_Beyond GDP Input" there.

"Wasted GDP in the USA" referenced in Mongabay news story and podcast; and South Africa Today

My article "Wasted GDP in the USA" is referenced in the news story "Can ‘degrowth’ solve our ecological, social & economic problems?" by Mike DiGirolamo and Rachel Donald which was published on the international environmental issues news site Mongabay on January 30th, along with a podcast featuring economist Timothée Parrique, who is currently based at Lund University, Sweden. In the podcast, Timothée talks about my research around 18m30s - 21m40s, and later on, around 59m - 1h05m, Mike and Rachel discuss it.

The Mongabay article has been republished by South Africa Today on February 2nd.

Excerpts:

Recent research indicates that the United States wastes 65% of its economic output on things that do not provide essential or quality-of-life needs, bolstering the argument that the economy could be strongly scaled back to decrease its impact on the environment. 

Research published in the journal Humanities and Social Sciences Communications finds that just in the United States, trillions of dollars are wasted on things that do not improve the quality of life for Americans. Podcast guest Timothée Parrique, an economist and researcher at the Lund University School of Economics and Management, argues this is strong evidence that the United States (and other wealthy, industrialized nations) could significantly scale back production and consumption, thereby decreasing their impact on the planet’s stretched ecological limits — the Planetary Boundaries — allowing low- and middle-income nations the latitude they need to raise their standards of living.

My article "Wasted GDP in the USA" has now been referred to in media based in the USA, Spain, and South Africa, in addition to Mongabay.

See also:

News story on "Wasted GDP in the USA" article in Spanish online newspaper La Politica Online

"Wasted GDP in the USA" mentioned in Counterpunch news story 

News story on "Wasted GDP in the USA" article in Spanish online newspaper La Politica Online

My journal article "Wasted GDP in the USA" is featured in a news story in the Spanish online newspaper La Politica Online, titled ""PIB desperdiciado": cuando el crecimiento económico no repercute en el bienestar humano y social" (""Wasted GDP": when economic growth has no impact on human and social well-being"). The journalist who wrote the story, which features extensive description of my article, and some comments made by Jason Hickel on Twitter, is Andrés Arctis.

This is what is currently shown on the front page of the newspaper:

"Wasted GDP in the USA" shared 1200 times on Twitter, 800 reads last two days

According to the latest Altmetric data my article "Wasted GDP in the USA" now has an Online attention score of 706, after having been mentioned by 1202 X users (Twitter users). This includes mentions by 49 scientists and 18 science communicators, as well as 1122 "members of the public". The article is partlularly widely shared in Spain (200+). The Online attention score is +140 since yesterday, with 400 more Twitter users sharing the article the last day. According to the article metrics (journal homepage), it now has 2536 article accesses (+785 since Monday), and the Online attention score places the article as #488 among 288.745 articles of a similar age, and #1 among the 183 tracked articles of a similar age in Humanities and Social Sciences Communications.

Member of committee for publication project at University of Valladolid

I have agreed to be part of a committee related to a publication project at University of Valladolid (Spain) run by Juan R. Coca which involves publishing a digital book on biosemiotics, and another one within biosociology.

Code biology conference 2018 - Granada

The Fifth International Conference in Code Biology will take place in Granada, Spain, June 5-9th 2018. Abstract deadline is January 15th.

Proceedings chapter: "The changing imagery of the big bad wolf" - reference; errata

A brief article of mine, "The changing imagery of the big bad wolf", based on a conference presentation in 2009, has been published online (and on a CD) - in 2012, it appears. Abstract is available online, as is the full PDF.

Reference:

Tønnessen, Morten 2012. The changing imagery of the big bad wolf. Proceedings of the 10th World Congress of the International Association for Semiotic Studies (IASS/AIS) (Universidade da Coruña (Spain)), ISBN: 978-84-9749-522-6, pp. 1543–1548. 

Errata:

1. "Morten Tønnessen, University of Tartu, Moscow (Russia)": Not sure where this came from. Tartu, where I took my PhD, is in Estonia.

2. “Rendalen happens to be [Southern!] Norway’s biggest municipality, measured by land area."

On site in A Coruña, Spain

I have just arrived in A Coruña (Galicia), Spain, where the 10th world congress of semiotics takes place. It has been a long journey. I have been travelling (first by ferry, and then) by train - more than 3,000 km. It is my first time in Spain. Se my approximate route here.

Friday I will be presenting my talk "The changing imagery of the big bad wolf" - with examples from the Norwegian national election September 14th.