Climate Change

The Climate Group and Rt. Hon. Tony Blair will host the Climate Week NYC Opening Ceremony on September 21, 2009. An array of global business leaders and policymakers representing some of the world’s most influential companies, cities, states, regions and nations will present a series of bold commitments to the United Nations Negotiation Process. These Read more

CRUDE - Little people Big Oil Movie

Three years in the making, this riveting new documentary from acclaimed filmmaker Joe Berlinger (Brother’s Keeper, Read more

Age of Stupid Premiere

Why didn’t we save ourselves when we had the chance? This is the question the soon-to-be released film, Age of Stupid, poses to us. The film takes place in a future where our world has been ravaged by climate change due to a business-as-usual approach to this growing global threat.

The good news is that this doesn’t need to happen. For now, our fate of being remembered as the Age of Stupid is still within our grasp to reverse. With your help, we can get the word out about climate change and our ability to help avert disaster. Read more

Age of Stupid Global Premiere in Ny during Climate Work

Why didn’t we save ourselves when we had the chance? This is the question the soon-to-be released film, Age of Stupid, poses to us. The film takes place in a future where our world has been ravaged by climate change due to a business-as-usual approach to this growing global threat.

The good news is that this doesn’t need to happen. For now, our fate of being remembered as the Age of Stupid is still within our grasp to reverse. With your help, we can get the word out about climate change and our ability to help avert disaster.

Be part of our live premiere on September 21st by attending one of the 400 theaters across the country that will broadcast the New York City premiere live for this exciting ONE NIGHT ONLY event. For more details on the premiere, how to get complimentary tickets, celebrity attendees, Koffi Anan’s follow up address and how you can help, please see below.

Don’t let us become the Age of Stupid - This is a film premiere you can’t miss!

Age of Stupid Premiere Information:

Brought to you by Fathom Events, The Age of Stupid will launch in America on September 21st, 2009 from a solar-powered cinema tent in New York LIVE to 115,000 people in 400 movie theatres right across the country.

This One Night Only live event is your only chance to see The Age of Stupid on the big screen and is timed for the day before the UN’s climate meeting on September 22nd, when 80 Heads of State - and therefore the world’s media - will gather in New York. (The event has also just been confirmed as being an official part of the UN’s Climate Week NYC.)

Everyone is invited to go to their local theatre to watch the VIPs arrive in Manhattan by boat, bike, rickshaw, electric car or skateboard, before braving the paparazzi on the green carpet. Following the first US screening of The Age of Stupid, there will be a further 40 minute live event featuring Kofi Annan, Gillian Anderson, Mary Robinson, the film’s director Franny Armstrong, the star of the film Pete Postlethwaite, and other leading thinkers, celebrities and political figures from around the world.

Audiences will hear from scientists working in the Himalayas and Indonesian rain forest via live satellite link and from a group of children speaking from the very room in Copenhagen in which all our futures will be decided at the UN climate summit in December. Radiohead’s Thom Yorke will wrap up the evening with a short acoustic performance.

For more information and a theater schedule visit: http://www.ageofstupid.net/usa

The film starts at: 7:30 PM ET/ 6:30 PM CT / 5:30 PM MT / tape delayed 8PM PT

For a taste of what to expect, have a look at the UK launch in March 2009 (http://www.vimeo.com/5234375), which produced only 1% of the emissions of a standard Hollywood event and which broke the Guinness World Record for biggest simultaneous premiere.

Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=122440801800

How you and your readers can help!

We have a grand total of zero dollars for advertising, so please, please help however you can:

1. Post the Age of Stupid trailer on you blog (http://www.ageofstupid.net/video/trailer) and provide ticket and theater information so you your readers can come out and support the film.

2. Buy tickets to your local cinema for you, your mom, your boyfriend, your boyfriend’s hairdresser and all their friends. Please buy tickets now rather than later.

3. Put together an outing for your school/sports team/church - make an evening of it by arranging a meal before or after the event (after may be better, as you’ll all hopefully be inspired to start discussing how you can get involved in climate actions in your area).

4. Email the e-flyer to all your American friends, asking them to pass it on. (It’s either attached or available on our website).

5. Share the word to any mailing list you are part of.

6. Go onto the US listing page (http://www.ageofstupid.net/usa), look through the locations and then send the details direct to your friends in whichever town/city they’re in. There’s an easy widget on each individual theatre’s page, which lets you send the details without messing around with emails.

7. Go mad on Facebook & Twitter

8. Rate/review the film (if you’ve seen it) on the Fandango website (the US ticket sellers). Seeing loads of enthusiastic reviews makes a really big difference to people who are undecided as to whether or not to go

9. Go along to any climate/enviro/activist meetings happening in your area and give a quick one minute talk about the Stupid launch

10. If you are able to hand out flyers / put up posters in your nearest theatre, please email talanne@ageofstupid.net for instructions

11. We may be able to give your group free complimentary tickets for your local theater if you would like to run a competition, or simply as a thank you for block booking lots of tickets (think 10+). Please contact laurel@ageofstupid.net to discuss this or other ideas you have for promoting the event in your area.

Ted Talks, Rebecca Saxe: How we read each other’s minds

Crude Oil, The Movie

Three years in the making, this riveting new documentary from acclaimed filmmaker Joe Berlinger (Brother’s Keeper, Read more

Scandalous affair

www.michaelpollan.com

You might know something about the birds and the bees, but did you know the bees have been having a fling with the orchids? The vivid, vibrant little flowers give what amount to come-hither looks to bees. Some even emit an aroma — a kind of Givenchy for male bees — that tricks the bees into thinking that the orchid is a female bee who finds them irresistible.

Michael Pollan, author of In Defense of Food, has written about the scandalous affair in September’s National Geographic magazine. He tells NPR’s Scott Simon that orchids “practice some very weird sex — even by the standards of the animal world.”

The Ophrys orchid, otherwise known as the “prostitute orchid,” has actually evolved to look like a female bee, viewed from the rear, with her head stuck in a green flower. The male bee starts to “pseudo-copulate,” but soon realizes it’s not working. Aroused, he breaks off for a more suitable mate and frantically tries again with another bloom. His exertions aren’t all in vain; he does succeed in pollinating the flower.

But it’s not just bees that fall for the orchid’s wiles. The tongue orchid fools male Lissopimpla excelsa wasps into thinking it’s a female wasp. In this case, however, the male wasp actually ejaculates onto the flower. This “costly sperm wastage” seems “seriously maladaptive,” says Pollan, “but in fact, it’s a very clever strategy for the flower and for the wasp.”

This kind of wasp produces roughly equal amounts of male and female offspring when a female gets sperm from a male. However, without a male, the female can still produce offspring — but she produces a lot more males. “So the orchid is actually inducing its pollinator into having a large population of males who, of course, are all pollinators and will have to compete fiercely for females.”

On National Geographic’s Web Site

Read Michael Pollan’s article and see more of Christian Ziegler’s photos.

Love and Lies

Orchids Photo Gallery

For this species, Pollan says, “having sex with anything that moves, on balance, is a good reproductive strategy for males.” A male wasp that’s overly picky about its mates will end up leaving less offspring than a male that goes off and has sex with anything that looks like a wasp.

Read more

Pepperdine University displays flags for 9/11 victims on Campus

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