A semiotic analysis of WSJ article on Bayer’s glyphosate problems

by | Jun 18, 2019 | Environmental Justice, Fake Freedoms, fake loops, folly, Fragmentation, glyphosate, Greenwashing, Industrial Epidemics, pollution, Priorities, Public Health, Semiocide, Semiotics, Syndemics, Systems thinking

The original article, published here, takes a rather pro-industry “we’ll engineer our way out of this” approach. Rather than observing a fundamental problem in putting artificial inputs unsustainably into agriculture, the article plays to the upbeat...

Science and Politics of Glyphosate Workshop June 6, 2019

by | Mar 1, 2019 | agroecology, Conferences, Environmental Political Theory, exploitation, Extended Producer Responsibility, folly, glyphosate, Industrial Epidemics, Normal is Over, Perverse Incentives, philosophy of science, Plants, pollution, Side-effects, Syndemics, Systems thinking, Talks

My Erasmus University Rotterdam colleague Alessandra Arcuri and I are organizing a day-long workshop on the most used pesticide in the world: glyphosate. Glyphosate, the active ingredient in RoundUp, Monsanto’s flagship herbicide, has been linked with cancer by...

Disposable is NOT Environmental

by | Jan 20, 2019 | beyond idealism, Climate Change, conservation, deus ex machina, Discursive Gap, Energy, Environmental Justice, exploitation, Extended Producer Responsibility, folly, Greenwashing, Industrial Epidemics, Normal is Over, normalization, object-oriented-ontology, Perverse Incentives, pollution, Priorities, Side-effects, Systems thinking, the real, Wolves in sheep's clothing

I was perusing Kickstarter when I happened upon a solution to a problem that I didn’t know was that big of a deal: spices going bad. As it turns out, it’s not that big of a deal, it’s what could easily be classified as a “first world...

E-cigarette e-waste litter is an environmental health harm that can be stopped before it metastasizes

by | Oct 15, 2018 | beyond idealism, e-waste, Extended Producer Responsibility, Industrial Epidemics, Publications, Side-effects, Syndemics, Systems thinking, Tobacco Industry, Uncategorized

My op-ed in the American Journal of Public Health that appeared this week discusses the new tobacco waste stream of electronic cigarette waste. Electronic waste is already the fastest growing waste stream globally. Creating a new product that has no current...

The Elon Musk of E-waste

by | Jul 12, 2018 | beyond idealism, Climate Change, e-waste, Energy, Extended Producer Responsibility, Industrial Epidemics, Perverse Incentives, pollution, Side-effects, Syndemics, Systems thinking, Uncategorized

My new article, “Is This Man the Elon Musk of E-Waste?” in my favorite popular science online magazine Nautilus, describes the Right to Repair movement, and the necessity to move from a linear manufacturing process built on planned and perceived...