Also this week: taking McGill private (?), climate change vs. biodiversity loss (but not in the way you’re thinking), Francesca Gino vs. Data Colada, a theory of social collapse, ESA and CSEE award winners, and more
From Jeremy:
Sad news: Diana Wall has passed away. She started her career at a time when ecology was a very male-dominated field. She became a world-leading soil and ecosystem ecologist, working at the McMurdo Dry Valley LTER site in Antarctica as well as in other systems. Her work greatly improved our understanding of how nematodes and other soil fauna affect litter decomposition and other above- and below-ground ecosystem processes. She won numerous awards, including the 2017 ESA Eminent Ecologist award and elected membership in the US National Academy of Sciences. She also served as ESA President in 2000, and was a formal or informal mentor and role model to countless undergraduates, graduate students, postdocs, and others.
An argument that McGill University should be privatized (!). I don’t know that I’d favor this, and it’s not clear to me how it could actually be made to happen. But this was a more cogent argument than I expected it to be. Commenters who know more than me about McGill and/or Quebec provincial politics are welcome and encouraged to chime in and explain why this is actually nonsense, if in fact it is.
An update from the Data Colada authors on fraudster Francesca Gino’s $25 million defamation lawsuit against them and Harvard University. tl;dr: a court has held a hearing regarding a motion to dismiss the lawsuit. Here’s hoping it’s dismissed soon.
Climate change is politically salient, and international treaties to address it have had some effect. The same can’t be said for biodiversity loss.
A list of 50 major late bloomers in science, the arts, and other walks of life.
A big experimental mindfulness intervention in British schools seems to have backfired, worsening long-term mental health among the teens at highest risk for mental health problems. The linked NYTimes article includes some speculation as to why. I don’t know enough to provide useful commentary; perhaps Meghan will chime in.
Summary of, and commentary on, archaeologist Joseph Tainter’s work on the collapse of complex societies. If, like me, the only things you’ve read on this topic are Jared Diamond’s book and reviews thereof, you’ll probably find this interesting.
Congratulations to this year’s ESA Fellows and Early Career Fellows!
Congratulations as well to this year’s CSEE award winners!
Dynamic Ecology 
Thanks Jeremy. The biodiversity loss vs climate change looks just like what I would expect: Climate Change, we are told by almost any field, is an huge^10 problem that could lead to billions of deaths due to e.g. tipping points. Evenromentalists would like people to pay attention to, as changing ocean currents, huges shifts in climate and weather patterns, and human migration, are frowned upon. Biodiversity loss does not get the same attention, and people complain . Isn’t that what was expected? What else did you have in mind when you said “(but not in the way you are thinking)”
“What else did you have in mind when you said “(but not in the way you are thinking)””
If I write “climate change vs. biodiversity loss” in the intro blurb, most readers are probably imagining a link about how climate change causes biodiversity loss. Which isn’t what the link is about, hence the parenthetical.
Come on Scott, you must know by know that my little intro blurbs for the linkfests are intended to create reader curiosity, not intended as accurate guides to what the links actually say! 🙂
It worked! I was a curious reader!
And managed to get my blood boiling for the day. I’m sure my message did not hide my opinion of the issue.
Sorry! I’m trying to provoke reader curiosity without making them angry.
Something I think readers here may appreciate: https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/bes2.2151
Thanks!
In theory, the argument about privatizing McGill seems reasonable. But I don’t know what value it would bring if it means fewer Canadians can attend the university. As the author noted, privatization of universities often leads to all sorts of problems because you will have to cater to interest groups once you start taking an obscene amount of money from people who can pay. Nobody is thinking Columbia (and a large part of American system in this context) is a good idea and the author seems to acknowledge this. The author also betrayed his pre-occupation with the “Ivy” nonsense that has plagued the American society. And why would we want these kinds of ugliness in the Canadian academic system? Right now, degrees from Canadian universities (big or small) are largely equivalent in the workforce and the rest is about individual competence. Why would we want to sabotage this?
Quebec government’s sense of insecurity aside, I don’t think McGill is in a radically different place in terms of funding compared to the rest of the universities in Canada (I could be wrong here). Be careful what you wish for. Canada is a small country held together by a sense of social responsibility to one another; it is a place and a mindset. We can’t upend this because one university has better government-sponsored coffee than the others. Guess what? Most universities don’t have free coffee.
Working at a bureaucratically bound public master’s granting university, I am struck by the parallels between precarious civilizations or empires and my employer.
Every time there is an change to bylaws (yes, each level of organization at my university – college, department, committees, etc. has bylaws), its in the direction of adding more words, more policies, and more layers in the approval chain. Meanwhile, figuring out how to amend a system that isn’t serving its ultimate goal (frugal spending, for instance) becomes a fool’s errand.
“Working at a bureaucratically bound public master’s granting university, I am struck by the parallels between precarious civilizations or empires and my employer.”
Comment of the day.
Somehow related to the climate change vs biodiversity loss issue
https://atmos.earth/why-doesnt-hollywood-make-more-mass-extinction-films/
Thanks! You inspired a linkfest item that quickly evolved into a standalone post!
Haha. Can’t wait to read it 🙂
Up now: https://dynamicecology.wordpress.com/2024/05/16/why-doesnt-hollywood-make-more-mass-extinction-films-is-that-the-right-question-to-ask-and-are-we-sure-well-like-the-answer/
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