Outside/In

Another edition of Ask Sam, where Sam answers listener questions about the natural world. This time, questions about hugging trees, bumpy roads, objects stuck on power lines, and epic hummingbird battles.

Featuring special guests, Maddie Sofia, host of NPR's Short Wave, and Kendra Pierre-Louis, climate journalist with Gimlet's How to Save a Planet.

Also featuring Ferris Jabr, Stephen Morris, Greg Bruton, and Anusha Shankar.

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A lot of us may feel like our time and attention is not our own, and can easily disappear into the ether of work and the internet. But rather than merely suggesting a digital detox, Jenny Odell presents a third way.

In her book How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy, Jenny draws on ecology, art, labor history, and literature, seeking a deeper kind of attention: an attention that probes our sense of selfhood, our relationship to place, time, and other species. An attention that reminds us of our being animal on this planet.

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When producer/reporter Dan Taberski collected data about the long-running reality TV show Cops, he found that it depicts a distorted version of America: Where nearly all crime is associated with violence, drugs, or prostitution, and nearly every police encounter ends in arrest.

There’s another reality TV show about law enforcement called North Woods Law. It follows state conservation officers employed by New Hampshire’s Fish & Game Department. But on North Woods Law, you’re more likely to see an injured loon than an honest-to-goodness arrest.

If COPS presents a world more dangerous than reality, North Woods Law presents something else. But what?

Featuring Jamiles Lartey, William Browne, Erika Billerbeck, Colin Woodard, Colonel Kevin Jordan, Dan Taberski, and Scott Rouleau.

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For many of us during the pandemic, the dark and cold of winter brings a special sense of dread. But it’s not just this year: the seasonal darkness often collectively takes us by surprise. Like clockwork, we forget how dark and cold it gets - and it turns out, there are reasons for that.

But our perception of the seasonal darkness can also be influenced by our attitudes about it.

In Norway, cultural ideas around winter help shape attitudes and experiences of the cold.

The Outside/In winter fund drive is nearly over, and we’re almost to our goal of 100 donors! Visit outsideinradio.org/donate to support the show - and vote on the topic of a potential bonus episode if we reach our goal.

First, there’s the idea of getting cozy, or kosileg. Think candles, slippers, the glow of a fire in the window on a snowy night, eating wood-fired pizza under the stars, or “the smell of baked goods and the Christmas tree,” said Anders Folleras, college friend of Sam Evans-Brown and honorary Outside/In Norwegian cultural attaché.

Koselig is the Norwegian analogue of the Danish idea of hygge. But there’s another concept that goes hand-in-hand with koselig: friluftsliv.

“Being outdoorsy, I’d say,” said Folleras. “Outdoor lifestyle.”

Embracing friluftsliv means open-air living, or getting outside every day, and outdoor adventures for all ages.

So, we think if you really want to get koselig, you’ve gotta get a little friluftsliv too.

For a full list of the suggestions we mentioned in this episode, visit the episode post on outsideinradio.org.

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This week, we’re featuring an episode from A Matter of Degrees, a podcast about climate change hosted by Dr. Leah Stokes and Dr. Katherine Wilkinson. This episode was reported by Julian Brave NoiseCat.

The energy transition isn’t going to be a one-size-fits-all process. In this episode, a broad lesson gleaned from a very specific story: the effort to move from coal to solar in the Navajo nation.

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In the coming decades, the scale of climate migration could be dizzying. In one projection, four million people in the United States could find themselves “living at the fringe,” outside ideal conditions for human life.

Featuring Bess Samuel, Jesse Jaime, Aurelia Jaime Ramirez, Kate McCarthy, Elena Mihaly, Jola Ajibade, Nadege Green, Suzi Patterson, Alex Whittemore, and Mike Hass.

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Links

“Locals Bristle As Out-of-Towners Fleeing Virus Hunker Down In New Hampshire Homes” by Annie Ropeik for New Hampshire Public Radio

Nadege Green’s reporting on climate gentrification in season 3 of There Goes the Neighborhood, a collaboration between WNYC and WLRN.

“Why climate migration is not managed retreat: Six justifications” (2020), coauthored by Idowu (Jola) Ajibade and published in Global Environmental Change.

ProPublica’s Climate Migration project

The EPA’s Climate Resiliency Screening Index (2017). Scroll to page 79 for their list of the top 150 most resilient counties in the United States.

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Marty, Maine coon cat, 12-year resident of the Mount Washington Observatory, and the highest-altitude feline in the Northeastern United states, died after a sudden illness on November 9th, 2020.

In this Outside/In extra, producer Taylor Quimby remembers Marty, beloved companion and a dignified veteran of the Presidential Range.

Featuring Ryan Knapp.

This Outside/In extra was originally broadcast on New Hampshire Public Radio, our home station.

We often link to these special pieces in our biweekly newsletter, which also includes our reading list, peeks behind the scenes, and opportunities to vote on episode ideas and to shape the future of the show.

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A carbon offset is a simple premise: if you take a cross-country flight and are responsible for a half ton of carbon emissions, spend a few dollars to fund the growth of a half ton worth of carbon in the form of a forest. A fossil fuel company can do the same: buy offsets to write off emissions and call it green. But is this just another form of greenwashing?

Do carbon offsets bring us closer to carbon-neutrality?

Featuring Kaarsten Turner Dalby, Heather Furman, Charlie Stabolepszy, Barbara Haya, Jim Shallow, and Adeniyi Asiyanbi.

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Throughout the 20th century, conservationists and environmentalists have looked to protect wildlife and biodiversity through the creation of parks and other forms of exclusionary wildlife zones. Zones that seek to preserve spaces devoid of human impact - or to create them, by displacing indigenous and poor people who already live there. Today, some academics call this strategy by a pejorative name: Fortress conservation.

In this episode, we look at medieval forest law, the early days of Yellowstone National Park, and spreading concern over how conservation efforts are enacted and enforced around the world.

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Featuring Karl Jacoby, Prakash Kashwan, Rosalyn LaPier, Hadrian Cook, and Vicky Tauli-Corpuz.

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Another year… another record-breaking wildfire season. Thanks to climate change the fire season now starts sooner and ends later.  Scientists also say climate change will make lightning more frequent, and winds more powerful. Basically, the world is a tinderbox.

But maybe the problem with these big, out-of-control fires is actually *not enough* fire.

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Featuring Luke Romance, John Bailey, Mike Crawford, Jeff Lougee, Paul Gagnon, Tony Harwood, Steve Pyne and Adele Fenwick.

This episode originally aired in 2018.

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