#31

Today I have had an article writing day, with some 450 words added to the article "Når gode råd er plagsomme" (When good advice is bothersome), which I co-write with Svein Tuastad.  This was writing day #31 this Autumn (starting July 1st), with a total of 3 of the writing days devoted to article writing to date.

Eleventh Ex.phil. lecture

Today I have given the eleventh lecture in Ex.Phil. this Autumn, as part of the University of Stavanger´s bachelor degree in psychology. The topic was political philosophy, specifically political freedom. I also brought up aspects of US politics in this regard, as made pertinent by the presidential election results that are all over the news today.

Mars and the Earthlings update - my writings in astrobiology

Yesterday was the deadline for submitting revised text to the editors of the book Mars and the Earthlings. I participate in Work group 9, which addresses political, societal and ethical aspects of going to and potentially settling on Mars. Now after recent work and editing, I am credited with having contributed to the following sections made by Workgroup 9, along with other scholars:

"Political motivations and factors for Mars race" 

"Civil liberties vs. security: How much do we have to sacrifice individual freedom to survive on Mars?" 

"Demography"

"Safety and governance" 

"Ethical considerations of non-humans on Mars"

"Novel ecosystems"

Second day of 6th OECD World Forum attended

I have attended the 6th OECD World Forum on statistics, knowledge and policy since all day and will do so until 4 pm, before heading for the centre of Seoul for dinner. Among other things I have heard Jeffrey Sachs´ keynote address, where he had a quite harsh message about the state of current politics internationally, in the US and beyond.

Minding Animals Norway mentioned in Norwegian parliament debate on fur farming

On December 8th, Minding Animals Norway was mentioned in a debate in the Norwegian parliament, by our previous board member Une Aina Bastholm (Green Party of Norway). The debate concerned animal welfare/the living conditions of fur animals. Bastholm pointed out that Minding Animals Norway, "an academic network", is among the organizations and institutions opposing fur farming. Bastholm´s parliament speech is available here (in Norwegian).

The journal Politics and Animals launched; first issue out now

The open access journal Politics and Animals, published by Lund University (Sweden), has now been launched, with the publication of its first issue, featuring contributions by Will Kymlicka and others.

I am in the Associate Editorial Collective (editorial board) of the journal, along with a group of good people.

Defining "utopian realism"

In an email exchange via the biosemiotics email list (web address now added to "Some related academic links", right margin) related to my recent blog post "Why I joined the ISCB", Edwina Taborsky asked me to define what I mean by "utopian realism", the name of this blog. My reply read like this:

[A] utopia is commonly understood as a desirable yet unachievable - impossible - future state, e.g. of a society. By "utopian realism", I mean an attitude to the state of the world that is realistic (e.g. attainable, likely) in the long term. In the short term, a state closely resembling status quo is typically what is most likely to occur. In the long term, however, it is often very unrealistic to envision a continuation of a state closely resembling status quo - and conversely, the possible future states of society etc. which we regard as totally unrealistic today, are often more likely to materialize in the long term than is the status quo. A utopian realist, then, is one who takes the long view, who has the courage to fight for desirable ideas and states of affairs (no matter how their short-term prospects look like), and who has the insight that the status quo is just a passing phenomenon.

The Global Species

I have just finished my journal article 'The Global Species', for New formations.

In this article I will attempt to demonstrate that the historical process of globalization - in the long term - can be outlined in terms of the expanding and eventually practically global range (occurrence) not only of our own species, but of several of our affiliated species as well.

Contents:
The Ecosemiotics of Globalisation
The Beginnings of Globalisation
The Ecology of Capitalism
The Politics of Biosemiotics