#philip's work

Hello citizens of the Earth, we are losing our forests.

What you should know:

Water covers about 71% of the Earth, leaving only 29% to be covered by land. A third of that land is covered by forests. Forests are home to most of the world’s endangered animals and provide benefits on which 1.6 billion people rely. But every year between 46 and 58 million square miles of forest are lost.

Why you should care:

Forests are often cleared is for agricultural purposes, but removing trees causes soil erosion and the plants used to replace the trees cannot hold on to the soil. With this a forest was just destroyed for no end. More readily importantly to us are the benefits that forests provide such as shelter, fresh water, clothing, food and medicines. And paper. Paper is such a small thing, and no one ever really thinks about it. But look around the house and see how many things are made of paper. The number is countless on my desk alone. Paper alone is so very important in day to day life even though with modern technology it could be obsolete. Moreover, forests are powerful carbon sinks with the ability to filter and re-oxygenate the air we breathe--which seems a little more choking as the years go by.

What you can do:

The World Wildlife Fund has suggested that in order to help you should only buy wood marked with an FSC label, this wood was gained legally and cuts back on the amount of illegal loggers, therefore the amount of deforestation.

You can also stay Connected by following the WWF

You can also become a paperless member of theirs, or take steps toward becoming paperless yourself by using PDFs, digital copies of papers and photos, online bank transactions, (as well as online applications and tickets), getting off of the junk mail circuit by visiting Catalogue Choice, actually making use of the list-making app collecting cyber dust on your phone... These kinds of tips are everywhere. Like here. And Here.

Another tip? R-E-C-Y-C-L-E.

(Please read that as you would R-E-S-P-E-C-T).

Don’t forget: this is possible.

This is the story of every knight you’ve been told of, and of those you’ll never know.

Every knight has a quest. We want to go about open minded, like a humble knight with a pen for a sword, trying not to grovel and not go gloating to anyone else. Have you heard of a truly noble knight who bragged about himself? They go off and fight dragons with no qualms, and without becoming arrogant. And if you can fight a dragon with words, maybe you can kill it more definitely.

Every knight has a quest, but the tasks and trials along the way are often unknown. Make your quest ambiguous and broad, so that you might not be limited in your smaller victories and learnings on the way. Our quest is to leave a mark. To make things better. To pull people of their groveling stupor, get them to stand on their own. We want to change the world. We can try, at least. Maybe we’ll impact one person in a positive way. Maybe we’ll save the world one person at a time. That’s all we can ask for. You see, it only takes one to make a stand, and maybe the one will help someone else.