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The Ministry For The Future
''The Ministry for the Future'' is a climate fiction ("cli-fi") novel by American science fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson published in 2020. Set in the near future, the novel follows a subsidiary body, established under the Paris Agreement, whose mission is to act as an advocate for the world's future generations of citizens as if their rights are as valid as the present generation's. While they pursue various ambitious projects, the effects of climate change are determined to be the most consequential. The plot primarily follows Mary Murphy, the head of the titular Ministry for the Future, and Frank May, an American aid worker traumatized by experiencing a deadly heat wave in India. Many chapters are devoted to other (mostly anonymous) characters' accounts of future events, as well as their ideas about ecology, economics, and other subjects. With its emphasis on scientific accuracy and non-fiction descriptions of history and social science, the novel is classified as hard sc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kim Stanley Robinson
Kim Stanley Robinson (born March 23, 1952) is an American writer of science fiction. He has published twenty-two novels and numerous short stories and is best known for his ''Mars'' trilogy. His work has been translated into 24 languages. Many of his novels and stories have ecological, cultural, and political themes and feature scientists as heroes. Robinson has won numerous awards, including the Hugo Award for Best Novel, the Nebula Award for Best Novel and the World Fantasy Award. Robinson's work has been labeled by ''The Atlantic'' as "the gold-standard of realistic, and highly literary, science-fiction writing." According to an article in ''The New Yorker'', Robinson is "generally acknowledged as one of the greatest living science-fiction writers." Early life and education Robinson was born in Waukegan, Illinois. He moved to Southern California as a child. In 1974, he earned a B.A. in literature from the University of California, San Diego. In 1975, he earned an M.A. in Eng ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert A
The name Robert is an ancient Germanic given name, from Proto-Germanic "fame" and "bright" (''Hrōþiberhtaz''). Compare Old Dutch ''Robrecht'' and Old High German ''Hrodebert'' (a compound of '' Hruod'' ( non, Hróðr) "fame, glory, honour, praise, renown" and ''berht'' "bright, light, shining"). It is the second most frequently used given name of ancient Germanic origin. It is also in use as a surname. Another commonly used form of the name is Rupert. After becoming widely used in Continental Europe it entered England in its Old French form ''Robert'', where an Old English cognate form (''Hrēodbēorht'', ''Hrodberht'', ''Hrēodbēorð'', ''Hrœdbœrð'', ''Hrœdberð'', ''Hrōðberχtŕ'') had existed before the Norman Conquest. The feminine version is Roberta. The Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish form is Roberto. Robert is also a common name in many Germanic languages, including English, German, Dutch, Norwegian, Swedish, Scots, Danish, and Icelandic. It can be use ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Complementary Currency
A complementary currency is a currency or medium of exchange that is not necessarily a national currency, but that is thought of as supplementing or complementing national currencies. Complementary currencies are usually not legal tender and their use is based on agreement between the parties exchanging the currency. According to Jérôme Blanc of Laboratoire d'Économie de la Firme et des Institutions, complementary currencies aim to protect, stimulate or orientate the economy. They may also be used to advance particular social, environmental, or political goals. When speaking about complementary currencies, a number of overlapping and often interchangeable terms are in use: local or community currencies are complementary currencies used within a locality or other form of community (such as business-based or online communities); regional currencies are similar to local currencies, but are used within a larger geographical region; and sectoral currencies are complementary curren ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quantitative Easing
Quantitative easing (QE) is a monetary policy action whereby a central bank purchases predetermined amounts of government bonds or other financial assets in order to stimulate economic activity. Quantitative easing is a novel form of monetary policy that came into wide application after the financial crisis of 2007-2008. It is intended to stabilize an economic contraction when inflation is very low or negative and when standard monetary policy instruments have become ineffective. Quantitative tightening (QT) does the opposite, where for monetary policy reasons, a central bank sells off some portion of its own held or previously purchased government bonds or other financial assets, to a mix of commercial banks and other financial institutions, usually after periods of their own, earlier, quantitative easing purchases. Similar to conventional open-market operations used to implement monetary policy, a central bank implements quantitative easing by buying financial assets from comme ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vignette (literature)
A vignette (, also ) is a French loanword expressing a short and descriptive piece of writing that captures a brief period in time. Vignettes are more focused on vivid imagery and meaning rather than plot. Vignettes can be stand-alone, but they are more commonly part of a larger narrative, such as vignettes found in novels or collections of short stories. Examples of vignettes include Ernest Hemingway’s ''In Our Time'', Margaret Atwood’s ''The Female Body'', Sandra Cisneros’ ''The House on Mango Street'', and Alice Walker’s ''The Flowers.'' Vignettes have been particularly influential in the development of the contemporary notions of a scene as shown in postmodern theater, film and television, where less emphasis is placed on adhering to the conventions of traditional structure and story development. Etymology The word ''vignette'' means "little vine" in French, and was derived from Old French ''vigne'', meaning “vineyard”. In English, the word was first docume ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The New York Review Of Books
''The New York Review of Books'' (or ''NYREV'' or ''NYRB'') is a semi-monthly magazine with articles on literature, culture, economics, science and current affairs. Published in New York City, it is inspired by the idea that the discussion of important books is an indispensable literary activity. ''Esquire'' called it "the premier literary-intellectual magazine in the English language." In 1970, writer Tom Wolfe described it as "the chief theoretical organ of Radical Chic". The ''Review'' publishes long-form reviews and essays, often by well-known writers, original poetry, and has letters and personals advertising sections that had attracted critical comment. In 1979 the magazine founded the ''London Review of Books'', which soon became independent. In 1990 it founded an Italian edition, ''la Rivista dei Libri'', published until 2010. The ''Review'' has a book publishing division, established in 1999, called New York Review Books, which publishes reprints of classics, as well as ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Laurence Tubiana
Laurence Tubiana (born 1951) is a French economist, academic and diplomat. She served as France's Climate Change Ambassador and Special Representative for the 2015 COP21 Climate Change Conference in Paris, and is recognised as a key architect of the resulting Paris Agreement. Tubiana founded and has headed the Paris-based Institute of Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI), is a professor at Sciences Po Paris, and has previously served as senior adviser on the environment to the former French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin. She has been responsible for conducting international environmental negotiations for the French government and has also been a member of the Economic Analysis Council (Conseil d’analyse économique) attached to the French Prime Minister's office. Since 2013 she has been Chair of the Board of Directors of the French Development Agency (AFD). Since 2017, she has been CEO of the European Climate Foundation. Early life and education Tubiana ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Christiana Figueres
Karen Christiana Figueres Olsen (born 7 August 1956) is a Costa Rican diplomat who has led national, international and multilateral policy negotiations. She was appointed Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in July 2010, six months after the failed COP15 in Copenhagen. During the next six years she worked to rebuild the global climate change negotiating process, leading to the 2015 Paris Agreement, widely recognized as a historical achievement. Over the years Figueres has worked in the fields of climate change, sustainable development, energy, land use, and technical and financial cooperation. In 2016, she was Costa Rican candidate for the United Nations Secretary General and was an early frontrunner, but decided to withdraw after garnering insufficient support. She is a founder of the Global Optimism group co-authored with Tom Rivett-Carnac of The Future We Choose: Surviving the Climate Crisis (2020), and co-host of the popular podcast ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mary Robinson
Mary Therese Winifred Robinson ( ga, Máire Mhic Róibín; ; born 21 May 1944) is an Irish politician who was the 7th president of Ireland, serving from December 1990 to September 1997, the first woman to hold this office. Prior to her election, Robinson was a senator in between 1969 and 1989, and a councilor on Dublin Corporation from 1979 to 1983. Though briefly affiliated with the Labour Party while a senator, she became the first independent candidate to win the presidency and the first not to have had the support of Fianna Fáil. Following her time as president, Robinson became the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights from 1997 to 2002. Robinson is widely regarded as having had a transformative effect on Ireland, having successfully campaigned on several liberalising issues as a senator and as a lawyer. Robinson was involved in the decriminalisation of homosexuality, the legalisation of contraception, the legalisation of divorce, enabling women to sit on ju ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Composite Character
In a work of media adapted from a real or fictional narrative, a composite character is a character based on more than one individual from the story. Use in film *Several characters in the movie '' 21''. *The character Henry Hurt in the docudrama ''Apollo 13'' is portrayed as a NASA public relations employee assigned to the wife of astronaut Jim Lovell, and who also is seen answering reporters' questions. This character is a composite of the NASA protocol officer Bob McMurrey assigned to act as a buffer between the Lovell family and the press, and several Office of Public Affairs employees whose job was to actually work with the press. *Buffalo Bill in '' The Silence of the Lambs'' is a composite based on the serial killers Jerry Brudos, Ed Gein, Ted Bundy, Gary M. Heidnik, Edmund Kemper, and Gary Ridgway. *The character Commander Bolton in the 2017 film ''Dunkirk'' is a composite of several real life people, including Commander James Campbell Clouston and Captain Bill Tennant. * ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jacobin (magazine)
''Jacobin'' is an American political magazine based in New York. It offers socialist perspectives on politics, economics and culture. As of 2021, the magazine reported a paid print circulation of 75,000 and over 3 million monthly visitors. History and overview The publication began as an online magazine released in September 2010, expanding into a print journal later that year. ''Jacobin'' founder Bhaskar Sunkara describes ''Jacobin'' as a radical publication being "largely the product of a younger generation not quite as tied to the Cold War paradigms that sustained the old leftist intellectual milieux like ''Dissent'' or '' New Politics'', but still eager to confront, rather than table, the questions that arose from the experience of the left in the 20th century". In 2014, Sunkara said that the aim of the magazine was to create a publication which combined resolutely socialist politics with the accessibility of titles such as ''The Nation'' and ''The New Republic''. Note: ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Holocene Extinction
The Holocene extinction, or Anthropocene extinction, is the ongoing extinction event during the Holocene epoch. The extinctions span numerous families of bacteria, fungi, plants, and animals, including mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish, invertebrates, and affecting not just terrestrial species but also large sectors of marine life. With widespread degradation of biodiversity hotspots, such as coral reefs and rainforests, as well as other areas, the vast majority of these extinctions are thought to be undocumented, as the species are undiscovered at the time of their extinction, which goes unrecorded. The current rate of extinction of species is estimated at 100 to 1,000 times higher than natural background extinction rates, and is increasing. During the past 100–200 years, biodiversity loss and species extinction have accelerated, to the point that most conservation biologists now believe that humankind has either entered a period of mass extinction, or is on the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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