Unbroken Grounds explains the critical role food will play in the next frontier of our efforts to solve the environmental crisis. It explores four areas of agriculture that aim to change our relationship to the land and oceans. Most of our food is produced using methods that reduce biodiversity, decimate soil and contribute to climate change. We believe our food can and should be a part of the solution to the environmental crisis – grown, harvested and produced in ways that restore our land, water and wildlife. The film tells the story of four groups that are pioneers in the fields of regenerative agriculture, regenerative grazing, diversified crop development and restorative fishing.
In Doughnut economics by Kate Raworth, we see that markets are inefficient and growth is not the holy grail. It's time for a new economics model: the doughnut economics. Kate Raworth's plea for the 'doughnut economics' casts doubt on the credo of economic growth for sustainability: there are hard limits to what you can do to the planet. Kate Raworth's doughnut economics could change our future. Let's have a look.
Ecopoint has teamed up with the Environmental Education Media Project (EEMP), and John D. Liu, Founder & Director of EEMP, is proud to bring you this film. In 2005, the Chinese government, in cooperation with the World Bank, completed the world's largest watershed restoration on the upper banks of the Yellow River. Woefully under-publicized, the $500 million enterprise transformed an area of 35,000 square kilometers on the Loess Plateau — roughly the area of Belgium — from dusty wasteland to a verdant agricultural center.
Geoffrey Hinton - as an elderly man, teenager and young child.
"Of course there are some risks in using this tech for bad applications. But unfortunately, it is not possible to stop technology. So the ethical path we have decided is to release it & make people more cautious" - Dev of voice cloning app @LyrebirdAi on ethics & techno-determinism
"Eventually i think we will become the AI's. We will become intelligent machines. You might think of it as creating a new generation, a new kind of people. Humanity has continued to evolve & why would enhanced people or even designed people not be the next step?" - Richard Sutton
Comment: Hearing people talk about "enhanced & designed humans" (in the context of AI, genetics or elsewhere) always brings up very dark associations: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_eugenics Given the historical context, think it is only right to be extremely careful with such aspirations & wordings.
"It's really hard to predict the future. I think there will be all sorts of things happening we did not except. But there is one thing we can predict: This technology is going to change everything" - Geoffrey Hinton's paradoxical end of documentary statement on A.I
Offline is the new luxury - VPRO Full Documentary (2016)
To be online all the time and everywhere. It sounds great, but it has its drawbacks. As digital networks are closing in, there are fewer places to be really on your own. Being offline is becoming a luxury. Where can you be offline?
We are connected to the internet even in our bedrooms. It’s the ambition of companies like Google and Facebook to connect the entire world, so that we can be online all the time and everywhere. Google has send balloons up into the skies over Sri Lanka to provide the island state with free Wi-Fi for a month. On the ground, more and more devices communicate through the so-called Internet-of-Things. We are going to be ‘glass citizens’ in a transparent house, connected for life to a wireless intravenous drip and traced anywhere via our smartphones. What does it mean?
A small but growing group of people is saying goodbye to lifetime connectability. They are researching ways to keep control. What can we learn from them about life in the digital era? With: Paul Frissen (political scientist), Sherry Turkle (psychologist MIT), Evgeny Morozov (internet critic) and Birgitta Jonsdottir (hacker & founder Pirate Party)
"We use technology as long as *we use it* and it does not get to the point where *it uses us and control us*, that's the bottom line" - A anonymous member of the Amish community.
"You have to understand what drives those companies (google & co). They are only interested in convincing their investors & financials markets that they will keep on growing indefinitely - that they have the capacity to capture the markets in India, China etc." - @evgenymorozov
Money, happiness and eternal life - Greed - Full Documentary:
Can money and power ever make us happy? How much is enough? Our constant desire for more is part of our human nature.
Some call it a useful dowry of evolution, others a fault in the human genetic make-up: The old mortal sin Greed seems to be more ubiquitous than ever. Why can't people ever get enough, where is this self-indulgence leading - and are there any ways out of this vicious circle of gratification?
"People like to have a lot of stuff because it makes them the feeling of living forever," says American social psychologist Sheldon Solomon, who believes today's materialism and consumerism will have disastrous consequences.
Anyone who fails to satisfy his or her desires in this age of the Ego is deemed a loser. But with more than 7 billion people on the Earth, the ramifications of this excessive consumption of resources are already clear. Isn’t the deplorable state of our planet proof enough that "The Greed Program," which has made us crave possessions, status and power, is coming to an end? Or is the frenzied search for more and more still an indispensable part of our nature? We set off to look for the essence of greed. And we tell the stories of people who - whether as perpetrators or victims or even just as willing consumers - have become accomplices in a sea change in values. http://www.dw.com/en/tv/greed/s-32898
"There is a thin line that separates a business man & a criminal. Why? Cause anything i do someone is bound to say i've cheated him. If its Bill Gates or me, people will say we are criminal - its cause we think beyond how other people think" - A leading business man / politican in Zimbabwe
