This is a comment by Dan on the post “Warming Up To Global Warming“.
Dan said:
I think that I’m coming from mostly the same place and therefore discussing this proves worthwhile.
1. ‘I don’t think global warming is the earth’s most pressing concern’
I’d argue that global warming is the earth’s MOST pressing concern. It might not be our country’s most pressing concern, it might not even be humanity’s most pressing concern, but it is more likely than anything, barring a nuclear holocaust, to damage the ability of our planet to support human life both in the short and long term. And if the only thing more destructive is literally nuclear war, then I think it’s a rather pressing concern.
2. ‘Yet, until the global population plateaus and declines, our carbon footprint is no worse than the nuclear waste, eradicated species, and decimated forests that are already trashing our planet.’
Global warming contributes to like, two and a half of the things you mentioned after it! (I’m giving it a ½ for nuclear waste because I think the global warming scare pushes people into using nuclear power instead of trying sustainable methods). Our carbon footprint causes deforestation and extinction. We can’t solve those problems without addressing it.
3. ‘[O]ur core problem is that more than seven billion people live here, and half of them are hungry or starving. The problem is that our resources are insanely mismanaged, or else simply wasted. The problem—if there even needs to be another problem—is that we are all competing for money, energy, and power, and when I make a dollar, you lose a dollar. When my company thrives, yours goes bankrupt. When my country wins the war, yours is bombed to shit. And at any moment, some crazy tyrant could just blow up the world with nuclear weapons, in a matter of hours, just for fun. That’s the core problem.’
This statement confuses me. None of these things are core problems. Some of them (starvation) are symptoms of others. One of them (waste) approaches a core problem with the structure of western society. As for the competition thing, well that’s just a product of capitalism. I mean, obviously we’re all competing for money, energy, and power. We all want those things. Show me a country or person willing to forgo living with electricity for the next year. I don’t really think there are any.
What it seems to me you are expressing frustration with, and please correct me if I’m wrong, is the inherent competitive nature of our society. Instead of building one that encourages sustainable living, long term planning, and raising everyone to a similarly high standard of living, we’ve built one that encourages people to exploit each other to get ahead. As this society globalized, we found that the earth does produce a limited number of resources, and therefore life is a zero sum game.
4. ‘If global warming exists, we humans will gradually adjust our lifestyles. It’ll be awful and unhealthy, but the Earth can adapt.’
I find this attitude present in many people’s minds and I think it’s a dangerous one. I think, when the crisis comes to a head, it won’t be a matter of humans gradually adjusting to new way of life. It’ll be a lot of people dying terribly. The way that global warming kills is through natural disasters, by increasing their severity and frequency. So, for example, crops will fail in certain parts of the world for years on end. It won’t be ‘global warming’ it’ll be ‘drought’ and yet, millions will still starve. Global warming will manifest as extreme drought, or monsoons, or huge hurricanes, or earthquakes. And people will starve, or drown, or be crushed. And it will probably be poor people unable to buy what they need or leave where they are. And slowly, the parts of the world where humans can profitably live will shrink.
So humans will adapt. Of course we will. We’ll just build new cities in new places. And we will adjust. And that adjustment will be paved overwhelmingly with the blood of the poorest people on this planet.
If we care about those people, if we want to “end starvation” then we have no choice but to address global warming. If we don’t care, then we don’t’ need to address it or change the way we live. Simple.
Okay, here ends my rant.
I like the overall message of this article. I think it’s important for any movement, especially one globally focused like the environmental movement, to avoid getting hung up on WHY people do things. We’re looking for change of action, not drastic change of attitude.
Photo credit: Flickr / _sarchi
News:
Even the IPCC acknowledges AGW is BS
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100194166/man-made-global-warming-even-the-ipcc-admits-the-jig-is-up/
If the linked article is too long, see James Delingpole and IPCC.
4. ‘If global warming exists, we humans will gradually adjust our lifestyles. It’ll be awful and unhealthy, but the Earth can adapt.’ “The burden of my thoughts are very much that the climate situation is more complex than we at present are capable of handling, or possibly even in the future. You can’t treat it as a scientific problem alone. You have to involve the whole world, and then there’s the time constant of human activity. Look at how long ago the Kyoto treaty was – 15 years ago – and damn all has been done. The human time constant… Read more »
This article makes me hate science. “It’ll be a lot of people dying terribly. The way that global warming kills is through natural disasters, by increasing their severity and frequency. So, for example, crops will fail in certain parts of the world for years on end. It won’t be ‘global warming’ it’ll be ‘drought’ and yet, millions will still starve. Global warming will manifest as extreme drought, or monsoons, or huge hurricanes, or earthquakes. And people will starve, or drown, or be crushed.” You vastly underestimate the adaptive ability of human beings and overestimate the damage from global warming. Most… Read more »
Does it make you hate science, or hate other things that are cloaked in scientific language? I suspect what you’re feeling is the latter.
Herein lies a key problem when communicating about science. When discussing issues like these, what level of technicality do you pitch to? How much familiarity with climate science and meteorology can I expect from the average reader of GMP? Do I expect they understand the variables involved in evapotranspiration? Do I assume an awareness of the Hadley Cell? When is it time to merely lay out graphs and tables, and when is it time to summarize and editorialize? To be honest the amount of skepticism with science surrounding climate change blows my mind. When Cern found the Higgs Boson everyone… Read more »
A warmer world will be a wetter world…there will be fewer droughts. I would recommend researching “Global Dimming” and how it is affecting understanding on Man Made Climate Change and Climate Modelling You have an interesting and false view – there may be more energy in the atmosphere and the hydrological cycle increased in both scale and speed – but drought is relative. Having 5 inches of rain can be good for crops – but 15 inches causes Flooding, Soil Erosion, Lost Crops, Starvation. Environmental; Stability is a rather large factor in the Climate Change – and shifting hydrology will… Read more »
Really good point MediaHound. Climate Change makes pre-existing extremes more extreme. It will speed desertification.
On a less serious note, I read “shifting hydrology will increase dessert areas” and had to take a moment to imagine just how delicious that would be. Mmmmm if only that’s what climate change did.
I’ll have my Glacier with choccy sauce, whipped cream and a cherry to top! P^) … to go! And Yup the Desertification is a double whammy due to how the heating effect it desert latitudes drives the trade winds. As desert shifts towards the equator it causes the trade winds to loose power – and that means lower rain fall tropically – lower rainfall increases Desertification and induces rain forest drying – so the Amazon basin dries along with central Africa and Equatorial Asia … and as Trees and the water they transpire are a major seeding agent for raindrop… Read more »
I’m not claiming we’re going to be wiped out. I don’t think, in the short term at least, that our species will die out. This isn’t a doomsday prediction. What I’m predicting is we’ve shooting ourselves in the foot. Want to stop starvation? Too bad, crops will randomly fail around the world. In Mississippi it’s a surprise drought, in India, it’s record monsoons sweeping away all the crops. Want to stop a disease outbreak in Africa? Too bad, a key highway just got washed away by a flash flood. Either way it’s not that the human race will die out,… Read more »