News Reporter: Climate Coach: The real story of Adam and Eve

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Down-to-earth advice for life on our changing planet.

By Michael J. Coren

Welcome. This week, Methuselah the lungfish and 1.5 degrees remains in play. But first, Adam and Eve.

The Days of Awe are the holiest time of year for the Jewish people. The 10-day period is bookended by Rosh Hashanah, the new year, and Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, when Jews must ask forgiveness from others, themselves and God.

Basically, we're called to dig deep, say "I'm sorry" and try to forgive others. As I sat in synagogue this week reflecting on ways I had missed the mark — and could have helped my wife more with late-night diaper changes — I also thought about how we might ask for forgiveness for the wounds we inflict on the natural world.

Some might see this as unnecessary: Forgiveness for what, precisely? And from whom, exactly?

In the modern imagination, the natural world exists as a loose constellation of things — plants, animals and minerals — that may be bought, sold or destroyed without restrictions.

To find the source of this idea, you don't need to see the Old Testament as scripture, or be religious at all. It's laid out in one famous passage from Genesis.

God instructs Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden to "be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over [it]." Stop reading there, and it's easy to see how ownership of nature became the cultural narrative.

But read the Torah even a bit further, and it's clear how wrong this understanding of nature is for any religion claiming to follow the words of the Old Testament.

Later, after placing humans in the Garden of Eden, God tells them "to till it and to guard it," and warns them that the earth, and everything in it belongs to the divine, not to them. "Pay attention that you should not corrupt it and destroy My world for if you corrupt it, there is no one to fix it after you."

Why, I asked Rabbi Beth Singer, a senior rabbi at Congregation Emanu-El, in San Francisco, has this been ignored in most retellings?

Although the passage in the Hebrew language refers to stewardship, not ownership, she says, the interpretation of the text has been lost at times. "But the growing awareness among biblical interpreters is understanding this as a partnership with the divine," she told me. "Human beings have a responsibility and obligation to steward the earth, not dominate it. They are supposed to be in balance."

Have questions or ideas for the column? Write climatecoach@washpost.com

Snapshot

As temperatures rose to about 105 degrees Fahrenheit, angry residents of Kolkata, India, gathered in the dark, their faces illuminated only by their cellphone screens.

"It is so hot that people are dying here," said Sana Mumtaz, a divorced mother of three who lives with eight relatives in one room.

Yet on the same block down the street, a luxury shopping mall still had power, reports The Washington Post's Annie Gowen.

Sana Mumtaz carries water from the taps, where water flows to the public twice a day in Kolkata. (Atul Loke for The Washington Post)

She and other reporters traveled to Kolkata to understand the inequality of heat. They found stark differences within a city help predict who will get sick or even die because of the heat — and who will be safe.

Check out the entire riveting story in the Post series "The Human Limit."

Field Sample

How do you map India's hottest neighborhoods?

Post graphics reporter Niko Kommenda trekked through poorer neighborhoods of Kolkata, where temperatures were often 10 degrees hotter than in nearby affluent communities, using heat sensors mounted on a backpack.

You can watch how he collected data for interactive graphics here.

The Second Degree

After reading my column about junk mail, you had some solutions of your own: "Junk mailers do not pay for disposing of the problem they create," wrote one reader. "The Postal Service should add a fee to junk mail."

Another suggested locking your credit reports with the three major agencies: "I haven't received a new credit card offer in the mail for years." And someone else gives her letter carrier $100 every Christmas: "He has not brought me any junk mail for the last 3 years."

After reading about ways you can encourage school districts to teach about climate change in last week's newsletter, Linda of Santa Cruz, Calif., suggested supporting the National Center for Science Education, which works to ensure the accurate and effective teaching of climate science in U.S. schools.

On the Climate Front

From The Post:

Biden's allies are scrambling to elevate his landmark climate law most voters don't even know about.

With only about 50 left, a newly discovered whale in the Gulf of Mexico may upend the offshore oil industry.

Under certain circumstances, slightly decreasing the ozone layer could save lives by unleashing the "Pac-Man of the atmosphere."

Most of the world's wind is over deep water. In Bergen, Norway, giant floating turbines are showing how the world can harvest it.

From elsewhere:

The International Energy Agency says it's still possible to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit), reports NPR, updating a more pessimistic report from 2021.

Methuselah, a lungfish that arrived in San Francisco on a steamship in 1938, is now the oldest fish in captivity, writes the Guardian.

"Monster fracks," giant new oil and gas wells demanding astonishing volumes of water, are threatening America's fragile aquifers, says the New York Times.

The new face of nuclear energy? Grace Stanke, 21, the reigning Miss America, who is studying to be a nuclear fuels engineer, reports the Wall Street Journal.

Some countries make recycling easier than others. Alan in Houston sent this photo from a grocery store in The Hague. "I feel so bad throwing away batteries and lightbulbs, and other electronics, but they are so very difficult to recycle in the US," he writes. After seeing this, "my immediate thought was 'brilliant!'"

The Netherlands, with a recycling rate of 57 percent for municipal waste (and 80 percent for all waste), ranks high among OECD countries for recovering its waste, according to the country's statistical agency. The United States recycles about 32 percent of its municipal sold waste.

Have a photo? Send it to climatecoach@washpost.com.