News of the world
environment | |
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NEWSLETTER | FEBRUARY 6,
2026 | |
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The
Antidote is Love
Last
Saturday, I woke up with a rather dramatic
outbreak of hives: My eyelids and cheeks were
puffed up with hot, itchy welts that took days
to subside. I’ve suffered from this condition
since I was a teenager. It comes and goes,
sometimes lingering for months on end before
disappearing without a trace for years. Multiple
doctors and allergy tests have failed to reveal
any specific triggers, or cures. So, it’s been
written off as “chronic idiopathic hives,”
likely autoimmune in nature. (“Idiopathic,” by
the way, is medical speak for “we don’t know
what’s causing this.”)
What
all this means is that, for some unknown reason,
my immune system sometimes attacks my body
instead of defending it.
As
I slathered on all sorts of salves and lotions
this week in hope of some relief, I found myself
thinking about how what I’m suffering through is
so akin to what’s happening in our country:
America is at war with itself; we are being
attacked by the very forces that are supposed to
defend our body politic.
The
only difference between my affliction and what
ails our democracy? The latter is not an
idiopathic condition.
We
know the triggers — greed, intolerance, lust for
power among them (the list of our baser
instincts is long, my friends). Luckily, as the
good people of Minnesota are showing us, we also
know the cures — building community, extending
compassion, learning to love and look out for
our neighbors even if they look and sound
different from us.
Nothing
complicated there; it’s stuff most of us have
been taught since preschool.
As
I watch the spark ignited in Minnesota light up
little fires of solidarity across the nation,
it’s clear the antidotes are already at work.
Our better angels will prevail. It’s only a
matter of
time. | |
|
Maureen
Nandini Mitra
Editor-in-Chief,
Earth Island Journal
PS:
Have you been following the incredible Walk of Peace to Washington, DC,
by 19 Buddhist monks and their dog, Aloka (a stray from India)?
That’s another act of radical love that I’ve been
drawing strength from. |
Researchers
are using AI and machine learning to translate
sperm whale “language.” The efforts are moving
us closer to interspecies communication, opening
up opportunities for conservation as well as
legal and ethical
questions. | |
In
2015, a Volkswagen employee finally spilled the
beans about the carmaker’s decade-long scandal
of evading US emissions tests by installing
secret software. But why did the employee take
so long to come clean? A criminal psychologist
investigates. | |
A
year and a half after a wildfire tore through
Jasper, Canada, animals are roaming the
surrounding boreal forests again. But will they
survive the growing threat of supercharged
blazes fueled by climate
change? | |
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Latest
Podcast
Demand
for lithium and other minerals is booming —
reshaping landscapes, supply chains, and
geopolitics. In this episode of Terra
Verde, political scientist and author Thea
Riofrancos talks about the hidden costs and
contested promises of “clean energy.”
▶️ Listen
now
| |
ICYMI
Snow
White
As it turns out, one of the
most tired similes — “white as snow” — doesn’t
quite pan out. In reality, snow is just flakes
of ice, clear as water, and we have a sparkly
light trick to thank for our seemingly white
winter landscapes. Read
Quackery
Over
680 members of the National Academy of Sciences,
including several Nobel Prize winners, are
calling on Congress to impeach Health and Human
Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Supporters of the campaign can send a rubber
duckie, or “Quack-o-Gram,” to their House
representative. Learn
more | |
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