Tag: Earth

Population

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I was discussing the population explosion fears in the 1970’s with my friend Martha Kennedy here earlier on. She had written a really interesting post about her memories in the 1960’s. I’ll post a link to her post if I can.

But talking about it I remembered doing a collage with ripped up magazine pages. The Earth is at the bottom, a ribbon comes up off the Earth and has a queue or line of people moving up away into space. I can’t remember if they were heading towards the sun or the moon. I think the collage was in landscape mode but my digital canvas is orientated in portrait mode. I’m not sure whether the population had hit 4 or 6 billion… Now it’s over 8 billion. We are like a virus taking over the world….

I tried to post a link to Martha’s blog but it didn’t work sadly.

Butterflies and Moths

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Will we still have butterflies in a few years?

Soon there should be butterflies and moths flying round the buddlea bushes in the garden. But they, and other insects, have plummeted in numbers over the last few decades. Whether this is due to changes in climate, where their food stuffs emerge earlier than they used to and are not available to them. Or because their food plants are removed or not replaced. Or because insecticides like nicotinamides are being used when they are linked with insect deaths? Why don’t we see sense and try and limit increases in Carbon dioxide? Reduce insecticide use and stop being so destructive.

The bible says man shall have dominion over the animals and plants of the world. I wish that read responsibility for their care? We are the guardians of the Earth. We outnumber everything else and our behaviour is appalling in so many things. We should learn to support the Earth more.

Bucket list wish

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One day I want to see

Shimmering Northern lights

Lighting up the sky

The Aurora Borealis, bright.

Green or red or white…

Different colours, different elements

Curtains of particles

Flying on Earth’s magnetic field

Falling to land at the poles

Glowing glory

Suns power manifested in air

My bucket list wish.

Seen in England last week

But hidden by clouds….

On the other side of the sky

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I just looked at the sky from the other side… I mean I watched the film Gravity and it struck me that it looks much the same from above and below? Maybe the clouds are on a different scale, but they are still white and grey, the blue sea mimics the blue of the sky. We are truly a blue and white marble in the deep ocean of black space. We fall up to space, or down to earth, the thin atmosphere is all that protects us against hard radiation and vacuum.

Solstice

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When the sum rose this morning it was on the shortest day of the year. Now the days up here in the Northern Hemisphere will slowly start to lengthen again. At first at a minute or two a day, but gradually a few more minutes around spring time. Then as the Summer solstice approaches the number of minutes slows down. Finally after that the process goes into reverse and the days begin to wane again. So the great cycle of light and dark tumbles along North and South. Only on the equator are day and night lengths balanced out. The cause? Earth is tipped at an angle, so for six months of the year one half of the planet gets more light than the other (which also proves the Earth is a globe).

Happy Solstice everyone!

Digital earth and moon

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This was an old drawing I did online a few years ago. It was at the website called Sketchfu (closed about five years ago). I’ve always loved astronomy and this was a good challenge to try and get a reasonably accurate drawing using very simple tools. The hardest thing was getting the image blurred enough to feel realistic. Colours were chosen from a couple of hundred choices. There were only five sized circular pens and a slider to alter the opacity. Plus an eraser to clear away mistakes. You could add layers so you could show your progress, or do a collaboration with other artists, the only real problem was the images took ages to load.

Post industry

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Industrial,

Smoke belched high in the sky

Soot fell on childrens faces.

Clogged lungs

Cotton fell like dirty snow

From grey clouds

Skudding on a raw east wind.

Blast furnaces glowed

Brightening sullen grey clouds

Into false, rosy sunsets

Men walked, doubled over

In the black and dusty mines

Water dripped hot and dirty

Down bent necks

whilst picks and shovels

Hewed at the coal.

Then suddenly

Worlds changed

Smoke and smog was banned

Cholera and typhoid alleviated.

Government and Unions United for once.

Health for all, insuring life.

Workers deserving clean air and water.

Post industrial, jobs went

To other places, other lands

Workers not so lucky

Breathing a centurys old air

Forced to work for a pittance

One people taking the place of another

Supporting our modern, post industrial life

And money travels upwards

Into more billionaires pockets

On post industrial beaches….

Earth is clean for those that can pay.