January

 Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

January

"Amidst global inequality and ecological crises, it is questionable whether the virtuous circle of the welfare states is in fact virtuous. (...) I identify three caveats of the policy idea and illustrate how the traditional virtuous circle is actually embedded in a vicious circle of ecological collapse. (...) [1] the belief in cumulative economic growth as beneficial for human wellbeing has proved to be outdated. (...) [2] social goals including human wellbeing and equality became (at least implicitly) suppressed by GDP growth. (...) [3] The policy idea of a virtuous circle established a compromise between social and financial goals without paying attention to the negative environmental consequences of economic growth." Tuuli Hirvilammi (2020). The Virtuous Circle of Sustainable Welfare as a Transformative Policy Idea. Sustainability vol. 12, 391.

January

«If you are aware of a state you call is, or reality, or life, this implies a different state called isn't. Human consciousness is at the same time as being a form of awareness, sensitivity, and understanding, it's also a form of ignorance. The ordinary, everyday consciousness we have, leaves out more than it takes in. And because of this, it leaves out things that are terribly important. (...) The question that is absolutely basic for all human beings is: what have we left out?» Man of No Ego (2015). Slowing Down. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

December

The Secret Random Acts of Kindness Society 

Purpose: Increase kindness and wellbeing in the planet, doing little (or bigger) things, according to member´s availabilities, that can positively impact other Terrestrial lives. 

Rules: Each act of kindness should be as natural as possible. No photos. No names. Just do it and go back to whatever it was you were doing with your life. As natural as your skin. Kindness acts can be planned and include resources belonging to different members as long as they remain anonymous. 

Members & Membership: All religions, cultures, and ages in any part of the Planet. Membership starts when members start doing random acts of kindness. 

Meeting places: Members can convene anywhere in the Planet with other members, face to face only, in order to share experiences between them, and address future acts of kindness needs. No photos and no digital minutes of the gathering are allowed. 

Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

December

“(…) she no longer felt she was there simply to serve the dreams of other people. She no longer felt like she had to find sole fulfilment as some imaginary perfect daughter or sister or partner or wife or mother or employee or anything other than a human being, orbiting her own purpose, and answerable to herself. (…) she was alive, when she had so nearly been dead.” Matt Haig (2020). The Midnight Library. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

Underland

“We find speaking of the Anthropocene, even in Anthropocene, difficult. It is, perhaps, best imagined as an epoch of loss – of species, of places and people – for which we are seeking a language of grief and, even harder to find, a language of hope.” Robert Macfarlane (2019). Underland: a deep journey. 

Photo of tapestry (81 x 90 cm) by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC) 2020.

December

“If the composition of the air we breath depends on living beings, the atmosphere is no longer simply the environment in which living beings are located and in which they evolve; it is, in part, a result of their actions. In other words, there are not organisms on one side and the environment on the other, but a co-production by both. Agencies are redistributed.” Bruno Latour (2020). Down to Earth: Politics in the New Climatic Regime. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

December

“Buddhism. Stoicism. Epicureanism. Christianity. Hinduism. It’s all but impossible to find a philosophical school or religion that does not venerate the inner peace – this stillness – as the highest good and as the key to elite performance and a happy life. (…) The gift of free will is that in this life we can choose to be good or we can choose to be bad. We can choose what standards to hold ourselves to and what we will regard as important, honorable, and admirable.” Ryan Holiday (2019). Stillness is the Key. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

November

I have been hacked. Still trying to figure out the extension and number of hacked accounts. 

I have changed my passwords a couple of times, but still things are happening. I lost access to my previous blogs (namely B2OB, Blogtese), and the capacity to change settings in other accounts that where connected to an email account that I stopped using almost 10 years ago. That account was compromised and someone as been subscribing things with my personal data through that account. Other accounts that I created a long time ago, connected to that email, are also compromised, like flickr where I tried to change my email and it sends me to an error page. If you receive anything you consider unusual through my channels, it might be because it's not me. Hope you know me well enough to figure it out.

The hacking was gradual and it might take some time to get to now the extension of it all. Because we have everything so connected to our emails and phone that it becomes unpredictable and easy to exploit by people whose aim is to do harm.

And yes, I use anti-virus and I do not click is ads and I even stop reading journals, news and other informative site (like public national TV online!) because they make me loose the right to my privacy and install an «army» of data collection cookies on my artefacts.

So, if you know me, you know how to contact me if you want to. 

Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

November

 My computer does not allow me to uninstall Xbox Network and it connects by itself. Microsoft does not let users decide what games they want to play and when? I don´t want to play this game and I don´t want to have it in this computer. 

Systemic risks

"The first generation of AI-enabled offensive tools is already emerging and there is growing evidence of AI being used by attackers. Deep fakes have already been leveraged to create new cyberattack vectors and voice-mimicking software has been used in major thefts." in Cybersecurity, emergingtechnology and systemic risk (2020) by World Economic Forum in collaboration with the University of Oxford. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

Cyber criminals

"Attackers will often use a tool called a ‘web inject’ to monitor the internet browsing of an infected user. When the victim attempts to access their normal internet banking platform, the malware will serve up a fake web page that looks exactly like their real online banking web page. It will steal the victim’s login details and password, and trick the user into entering their token authentication, or SMS authentication, so that the attacker can quickly replicate the process on the genuine web page in order to get access to (and steal from) the account." in Cyber crime: understanding the online business model, by Matt Carey Head of London Operations Team, NCSC. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

November

IP 89.40.182.187

November

September

"Stillness presents a break or pause in the flow of habitual events, whilst illuminating temporal gaps and fissures within which alternative, even unexpected possibilities - for life - might emerge. (...) Here, stillness offers the simultaneous possibility of termination and also of a new beginning." Emma Cocker (2011). Performing stillness: community in waiting. in Stillness in a Mobile World, edited by David Bissell and Gillian Fuller. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

August

"The stories illustrate that biodiversity, climate and inequality are inseparable agendas. (...) The biodiversity community needs to move beyond the technocratic approaches that currently dominate ways of thinking about the future (...). This means that researchers have to acknowledge that imagining the future, whether in a model or a story, is political" Wyborn, C., Davila, F., Pereira, L. et al. Imagining transformative biodiversity futures. Nature Sustainability, number 8, volume 3. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

June

"A certain conception of «nature» has allowed the Moderns to occupy the Earth in such a way that it forbids others to occupy their own territories differently. (...) The current situation (...) is not simply a matter of economics but rather of civilization itself. (...) The new conflicts do not replace the old; they sharpen them, deploy them differently, and above all they finally make them identifiable." Bruno Latour (2020). Down to Earth: Politics in the new Climatic Regime. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

June

Resilience "is a passive process, implying the ability to absorb blows and get back up. Regeneration, on the other hand is active: we become full participants in the process of maximazing life's creativity." Noami Klein, 2015. This Changes Everything. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

June

Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

May

“The information society is like a tree that has been growing its far-reaching branches much more widely, hastily, and chaotically than its conceptual, ethical, and cultural roots. (…) The risk is that, like a tree with week roots, further and healthier growth at the top might be impaired by a fragile foundation at the bottom.” Luciano Floridi (2010). Information: a very short introduction. Oxford University Press. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

May

“Growing our connections to nature will allow us to push past mere intellect to embrace sensory experiences, emotions, intuition. (…) For the first time, a large body of research is illuminating the fact that our world arises from a sprawling, highly dynamic set of rhythms and relationships. (…) An especially intriguing aspect of this scientific shift – of this effort to break science out of the intellectual boxes we built for it – is the effort by some to merge traditional science with indigenous wisdom.” Gary Ferguson, 2019. Eight Master Lessons of Nature. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

May

“(…) whenever suitable conditions to move demand and supply closer can be identified by reducing the number of technological and human intermediaries and intermediations, a series of effective possibilities emerge to reduce the amount of non-renewable energy inputs via increasing the quality of technology outputs and their social usefulness.” Transforming innovation for decarbonisation? Insights from combining complex systems and social practice perspectives. Nicola Labanca et al (2020). Energy Research & Social Science, vol. 65, 101452. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

May

 

 «The new Earth 2.0 that will emerge after COVID‑19 will be a “new normal”, but many fundamental challenges will still exist. Chief among them is the imperative to collectively work towards an effective and inclusive energy transition. (…) The era of compounded disruptions is a litmus test for the energy transition, asserting the importance of the twin objectives of robustness and resilience.» WEF (2020). Fostering Effective Energy Transition. Italics added. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

(re)growth

 

Define growth: the process of increasing in size. the upward growth of plants. the process of developing physically, mentally, or spiritually. the process of increasing in amount, value, or importance. Similar to growth: development, germination, flourishing, thriving, expansion, progress, advancement, headway, improvement, furtherance, rise, success, blooming, upturn, upswing. (as defined by Google search). Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

mobility

 Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

May

“We are nature. When we stand firm on that undeniable fact, shedding the long-standing illusion that there’s nature “out there” and then there’s us “in here”, we’ll be able to see in a new light some of our most troubling, persistent problems. (…) It really is possible to mend our relationship to the world around us and, through that mending, release an intelligence millions of years in the making.” Gary Ferguson, 2019. Eight Master Lessons of Nature. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

May

“Expectation, fantasy and reality are intermingled on the surface of our skin, a stage on which our life is played out. (…) Touch is exquisitely sensitive. It is emotional. It influences our thinking and sense of self. But it is also indescribable.” Monty Lyman (2020). The Remarkable Life of the Skin. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

May

"In categorical thinking the boundaries are drawn. But mystery is open-ended, messy, full of promise, and lacking in certainty. (...) What if we could free ourselves from the confines of certainty - to learn to dance with the fact that reality zigs and zags across shifting ground? (...) The effect is to create a fresh canvas onto which entirely new, more relational ways of thinking can be painted." Gary Ferguson, 2019. Eight Master Lessons of Nature. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

May

Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

April

"Given enough solitude and enough time, the mind shifts into default mode and pans through connections that at first seem wholly random. It explores problems with a curiosity and openness we might never choose to entertain. But this randomness is crucial.” Michael Harris (2017). Solitude: In Pursuit of a Singular Life in a Crowded World. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

April

“It is a matter of broadening the definitions of class by pursuing an exhaustive search for everything that makes subsistence possible. As a Terrestrial, what do you care most about? With whom can you live? Who depends on you for subsistence? Against whom are you going to have to fight? How can the importance of all these agents be ranked?” Bruno Latour (2020). Down to Earth: Politics in the New Climatic Regime. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

April

“(…) it’s time to wake up the tissues of perception that have been there all along. We are nature. When we stand firm on that undeniable fact, shedding the long-standing illusion that there’s nature “out there” and then there’s us “in here”, we’ll be able to see in a new light some of our most troubling, persistent problems. (…) It really is possible to mend our relationship to the world around us and, through that mending, release an intelligence millions of years in the making.” Gary Ferguson, 2019. Eight Master Lessons of Nature. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

Diversity

"(...) trees and plants aren´t simply competing with one another. (...) Instead, over millions of years vegetation has built vast collaborative networks to allow the system as a whole to thrieve. And that system includes us." Gary Ferguson, 2019. Eight Master Lessons of Nature. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

March

"Wherever you are now, however urban or interior your life, nature is still there for you - anchoring, inspiring, helping you become more of what it is you set out to be." Gary Ferguson, 2019. The Eight Master Lessons of Nature. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

March

Carbon dioxide (CO2) sink in the city / Sumidouro de dióxido de carbono (CO2) citadino. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).

Symbiosis

"Mutualism is a subset of symbiosis in which there exists between organisms a prolonged relationship that is interdependent and reciprocally beneficial. (...) In the case of the tree-fungi mutualism, the fungi siphon off carbon that has been produced in the form of glucose by the trees during photosynthesis, by means of chlorophyll that the fungi do not possess. In turn, the trees obtain nutrients such as phosphorus and nitrogen that the fungi have acquired from the soil through which they grow, by means of enzymes that the trees lack. (...) the fungal network also allows plants to distribute resources between trees in a forest: a dying tree might divest its resources into the network to the benefit of the community, for example, or a struggling tree might be supported with extra resources by its neighbours. (...) the network also allows plants to send immune-signalling compounds to one another." Robert MacFarlane, 2019. Underland: a deep time journey. Image by Monica Pinheiro, license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).