Since Darwin’s seminal works, the universality of facial expressions of emotion has remained one of the longest standing debates in the biological and social sciences. Briefly stated, the universality hypothesis claims that all humans communicate six basic internal emotional states (happy, surprise, fear, disgust, anger, and sad) using the same facial movements by virtue of their biological and evolutionary origins [Susskind JM, et al. (2008) Nat Neurosci 11:843–850]. Here, we refute this assumed universality. Using a unique computer graphics platform that combines generative grammars [Chomsky N (1965) MIT Press, Cambridge, MA] with visual perception, we accessed the mind’s eye of 30 Western and Eastern culture individuals and reconstructed their mental representations of the six basic facial expressions of emotion. Cross-cultural comparisons of the mental representations challenge universality on two separate counts. First, whereas Westerners represent each of the six basic emotions with a distinct set of facial movements common to the group, Easterners do not. Second, Easterners represent emotional intensity with distinctive dynamic eye activity. By refuting the long-standing universality hypothesis, our data highlight the powerful influence of culture on shaping basic behaviors once considered biologically hardwired. Consequently, our data open a unique nature–nurture debate across broad fields from evolutionary psychology and social neuroscience to social networking via digital avatars.

doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1200155109

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doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.336.6081.539

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There is increasing interest in the use of biodegradable materials because they are believed to be “greener”. In a landfill, these materials degrade anaerobically to form methane and carbon dioxide. The fraction of the methane that is collected can be utilized as an energy source and the fraction of the biogenic carbon that does not decompose is stored in the landfill. A landfill life-cycle model was developed to represent the behavior of MSW components and new materials disposed in a landfill representative of the U.S. average with respect to gas collection and utilization over a range of environmental conditions (i.e., arid, moderate wet, and bioreactor). The behavior of materials that biodegrade at relatively fast (food waste), medium (biodegradable polymer) and slow (newsprint and office paper) rates was studied. Poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyoctanoate) (PHBO) was selected as illustrative for an emerging biodegradable polymer. Global warming potentials (GWP) of 26, 720, −1000, 990, and 1300 kg CO2e wet Mg–1 were estimated for MSW, food waste, newsprint, office paper, and PHBO, respectively in a national average landfill. In a state-of-the-art landfill with gas collection and electricity generation, GWP’s of −250, 330, −1400, −96, and −420 kg CO2e wet Mg–1 were estimated for MSW, food waste, newsprint, office paper and PHBO, respectively. Additional simulations showed that for a hypothetical material, a slower biodegradation rate and a lower extent of biodegradation improve the environmental performance of a material in a landfill representative of national average conditions.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/es200721s

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Synthetic biology needs more oversight, and the government needs to put in place regulations specific for this field. That is the bottom line for 111 environmental, watchdog, and other organizations that released a report today with specific recommendations for managing new biological techniques for building and remaking organisms for research and commercial uses ranging from medicines to biofuels.Calling synthetic biology “an extreme form of genetic engineering,” the report said that current practices for regulating and assessing biotechnology were inadequate. The group, which includes the watchdog organizations ETC Group and Friends of the Earth, wants to ban the use of synthetic biology to manipulate the human genome or the genomes of microbes in and on the human body. Full disclosure of the nature of the synthetic organisms and of safety testing should be required to ensure the safety of workers and the environment. Until these regulations are in place, the group wants a moratorium on the release and commercial use of synthetic organisms and their products. In 2010, a presidential bioethics commission took a close look at synthetic biology and said that no new regulations were required. At that time, ETC and Friends of the Earth joined forces with other organizations to protest the commission’s conclusions.

111 Organizations Call for Synthetic Biology Moratorium – ScienceInsider

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Here is how Biofuels Digest reported this story:

“Over the past several months, the Digest and other media noted that California was importing ethanol from Brazil, a 6000 mile, diesel-churning tanker haul.Now, before the California Low Carbon Fuel Standard was put into place, California would have sourced its ethanol needs from, say, Nebraska, some 1200 miles to the east.The 6000-mile trek was justified, said the authors of the low-carbon standard, on the basis that Brazilian ethanol was produced with a much lower carbon intensity than the aforementioned Nebraskan ethanol.So, what was happening to the offending gallons from the Nebraska? Were they no longer produced at all?Actually, they were being exported via a 6000 mile, diesel-sucking tanker haul to Brazil, to make up for the shortfall in the Brazilian market.Same ethanol molecule, same emissions when burned.12,000 miles of hauling, instead of 2,400, to burn the same tankfuls of molecules. All in the name of reducing carbon emissions.We wondered about that. A lot.”

The question is a sticky wicket. Lowering the carbon intensity of transportation fuels in California is a good thing, right? But bringing in ethanol to California from Brazil instead of Nebraska seems like a bad thing, right? Wouldn’t it produce less GHGs to simply ship the ethanol from Nebraska to California? Well actually, no. Same tankful of molecules, yes, but different production efficiencies. Although it might defy this type of ‘common sense’ analysis, cane ethanol shipped to California all the way from Brazil is actually less carbon intense than corn ethanol from Nebraska. But what about if you include the fact of the additional GHGs from shipping Nebraska’s corn ethanol to Brazil? Does that then make the whole system (Brazil to California plus Nebraska to Brazil; I’ll call this the ‘Big Circle System’ for now) worse than simply sending the corn ethanol from Nebraska to California? Well that is a good question and one I would like to see answered some day, but from the point of view of California’s LCFS, it is simply beyond the scope of California’s jurisdictional scope. California can have no authority over what fuels Nebraska produces or to whom it sells these fuels or what fuels Brazil chooses to import and combust.

Let’s step back and look at the big picture. If the the answer to the ‘Big Circle System’ question is: ‘no’, then that is that, and we have no environmental policy paradox. However, if the answer is yes, then California’s LCFS may be better from California’s point of view but is, paradoxically, worse from the world’s, and when it comes to GHGs and climate change, all that matters is global emissions. This case study is a good example of why a global climate change strategy is really the only option with any hope of success. So yes, it would be better that we have an enforceable global emissions cap. But we don’t and won’t anytime soon. And it would be better if the US had a national emissions policy, but the US Congress was unable to pass such legislation in 2009 and won’t anytime soon. So where does that leave us? We need concerted global and national action but we ain’t gonna get it and if an individual actor such as California decides to take uniliateral action then this could, apparently, make matters worse in certain cases such as this ethanol situation. Maybe we should all just do nothing and let everyone make and consume whatever fuels they want? Wrong!!!!!!!

The crux if this puzzle is what could be called the life cycle assessment ‘boundary fallacy’. If we limit the scope of our analysis to the one case of Midwestern corn ethanol vis a vis the Brazilian ethanol shortfall, then it might appear that indeed the California LCFS  is not good environmental policy and should be repealed from that perspective. But this is not the proper scope of the analysis. Instead the proper frame of reference is the effect of the LCFS on the carbon intensity of California’s entire transportation fuel budget. That is a very big and important question for analysis and one for which I do not have immediate data. However, I would speculate that as part of the legislative analysis that went into the formulation of that policy and legislation, this very question was addressed and I would suspect that the answer given was one supporting the soundness of the LCFS on climate change policy grounds. If that is not the case then I would be the first to support its repeal since good intentions are of no use to me. Let us then take this moment of judicial nullification of environmental policy to review the policy analysis and to make sure that California’s LCFS is, in effect and not just in intent, good for the earth’s climate.

I should also add that I see no commerce clause violation in the LCFS since the low carbon intensity standard applies to in-state and out-of-state producers alike. I believe that every state has a compelling interest in protecting the health and well being of its citizens and if California sees climate change as a threat then it is entitled to pass laws protecting Californians from this threat. The real question is whether this action will do anything to divert or mitigate that threat and this goes to the question discussed  in the preceding paragraphs.

US federal court issues injunction against California Low Carbon Fuel Standard : Biofuels Digest

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5) BIO-DIGESTION TOILETS – Indigene Community

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