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TechnoratiWe Only Have Months, Not Years, to Save Civilization from Climate Change
International agreements take too long, we need a swift mobilisation not seen since the second world war
For those concerned about global warming, all eyes are on December's UN climate change conference in Copenhagen. The stakes could not be higher. Almost every new report shows that the climate is changing even faster than the most dire projections of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in their 2007 report.
Yet from my vantage point, internationally negotiated climate agreements are fast becoming obsolete for two reasons. First, since no government wants to concede too much compared with other governments, the negotiated goals for cutting carbon emissions will almost certainly be minimalist, not remotely approaching the bold cuts that are needed.
And second, since it takes years to negotiate and ratify these agreements, we may simply run out of time. This is not to say that we should not participate in the negotiations and work hard to get the best possible result. But we should not rely on these agreements to save civilisation.
Saving civilisation is going to require an enormous effort to cut carbon emissions. The good news is that we can do this with current technologies, which I detail in my book, Plan B 4.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization.
Plan B aims to stabilise climate, stabilise population, eradicate poverty, and restore the economy's natural support systems. It prescribes a worldwide cut in net carbon emissions of 80% by 2020, thus keeping atmospheric CO2 concentrations from exceeding 400 parts per million (ppm) in an attempt to hold temperature rise to a minimum. The eventual plan would be to return concentrations to 350 ppm, as agreed by the top US climate scientist at Nasa, James Hansen, and Rajendra Pachauri, head of the IPCC.
In setting this goal we did not ask what would be politically popular, but rather what it would take to have a decent shot at saving the Greenland ice sheet and at least the larger glaciers in the mountains of Asia. By default, this is a question of food security for us all.
Fortunately for us, renewable energy is expanding at a rate and on a scale that we could not have imagined even a year ago. In the United States, a powerful grassroots movement opposing new coal-fired power plants has led to a de facto moratorium on their construction. This movement was not directly concerned with international negotiations. At no point did the leaders of this movement say that they wanted to ban new coal-fired power plants only if Europe does, if China does, or if the rest of the world does. They moved ahead unilaterally knowing that if the United States does not quickly cut carbon emissions, the world will be in trouble.
For clean and abundant wind power, the US state of Texas (long the country's leading oil producer) now has 8,000MW of wind generating capacity in operation, 1,000MW under construction, and a huge amount in development that together will give it more than 50,000MWof wind generating capacity (think 50 coal-fired power plants). This will more than satisfy the residential needs of the state's 24 million people.
And though many are quick to point a finger at China for building a new coal-fired power plant every week or so, it is working on six wind farm mega-complexes with a total generating capacity of 105,000 megawatts. This is in addition to the many average-sized wind farms already in operation and under construction.
Solar is now the fastest growing source of energy. A consortium of European corporations and investment banks has announced a proposal to develop a massive amount of solar thermal generating capacity in north Africa, much of it for export to Europe. In total, it could economically supply half of Europe's electricity.
We could cite many more examples. The main point is that the energy transition from fossil fuels to renewables is moving much faster than most people realise, and it can be accelerated.
The challenge is how to do it quickly. The answer is a wartime mobilisation, not unlike the US effort on the country's entry into the second world war, when it restructured its industrial economy not in a matter of decades or years, but in a matter of months. We don't know exactly how much time remains for such an effort, but we do know that time is running out. Nature is the timekeeper but we cannot see the clock.
151 Comments so far
Show AllHere's a response to rfloh, zmann, Arry, and others who have pounced on my citation of Christopher Monckton's ideas in this thread and elsewhere. The problem for those of us without the time or talent to master the science of climate change is that we have to choose whether we accept Monckton's views or those of his critics whose refutations are also beyond our comprehension. An example of the latter is http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/05/moncktons-deliberate-manipulation/.
The solution to this problem is simple: time. Monckton's predictions, and those of Lester Brown, the IPCC (or perhaps I should say the scientists whose work the IPCC writes summaries of), etc., will be easy to judge in the fullness of time. I would think ten years ought to be enough. Just as a weatherman's complicated analysis of factors can be checked the next day, climate change predictions will be confirmed or disconfirmed in a few years.
As a corollary to this, we can look at what people were saying years ago and see how accurate they were.
Monckton's great advantage in this controversy (yes, there is a controversy) is his ability, or willingness, to refrain from ad hominem attacks, in stark contrast to most of his critics. His 2006 reply to Al Gore is a good example (http://ff.org/centers/csspp/pdf/20061121_gore.pdf).
Of course, my critics will rejoin that we can't wait to see who's right about climate change. Maybe it's just a personality trait, but I don't go for Pascal's Wager and "the sky is falling" scenarios. So I'll happily sort through the results, either as already determined or as they come in. If you want to be miserable because you think we're on the edge of catastrophe, that's up to you.
This is a reply to those of you who kindly responded to the above post (manning120 November 4th, 2009 10:00 pm).
First, your recommended reading is on my to-do list, subject to the necessity of keeping afloat financially (that's MY time problem).
Second, the tipping point argument is the scariest. But it's also dependent on a fairly uniform build-up to the tipping point, which, it seems to me, has abated in the last couple of years.
Third, I think consensus has a role in science, but not as decisive a role as work on the merits. I'm expecting that data coming out even short-term will change the consensus, as it should. Also, scientific consensus is a nebulous thing. People need to be more clear about what they mean it. Most scientists, including Monckton (or whoever helps him at least seem like a scientist), agree that GW is real. I have no problem saying there's consensus on that. The severity of the problem, and the practicality of solutions, are two areas where scientific opinions diverge. The IPCC projections are never like "Today's high will be 95," but rather "Today's highs will be around 90 on the coast and 100 inland," to quote a common forecast here in South Texas. Or, "The chance of rain today is 50%." It's hard to miss with this kind of forecast, although we all know there are, nevertheless, frequent misses. Monckton relies on what he says has been specifically predicted in attacking warmist/alarmist theories, which adds power to his presentation.
Jakenewton, whoever or whatever he is, has a point. What exactly does Lester Brown mean by "months, not years"? This is one of those "50% chance of rain" statements.
Should we "err on the side of caution"? There are two sides to this. Drastic steps to curb GHG's (as opposed to curbing pollution or starvation, better protecting against floods and droughts, and otherwise adapting to adverse weather) will create lots of problems. Even my Prius will have to go. At this point, I'm more inclined to be cautious about overreacting.
Finally (here I am getting wordy again), Moncton's credentials certainly deserve scrutiny. The mere fact that he's openly Catholic raises serious questions in my mind concerning whether theology means more to him than science; but many scientists are Catholic. I think he's made such an impression that he ought to be confronted by scientists who disagree with him -- not someone like Al Gore -- in a forum allowing immediate give and take. The moderator of such a discussion ought to be a scientist, not someone from the MSM. If his scientific statements aren't really a product of his intellect, that should become apparent fairly soon because of basic errors in fundamental principles. Thus far, to my knowledge, that kind of discussion hasn't taken place. It could occur on a college campus and be televised (not controlled) by the MSM.
"Jakenewton, whoever or whatever he is,"
Be hereby advised, it is not up to you to decide, I am whatever Vanmungo the Advisor says I am. Any deviation by you and *you* will become whatever Vanmungo the Advisor says you are. ;-)
"has a point. What exactly does Lester Brown mean by "months, not years"?"
Nothing much to add to what I said already, he seems to be trying to nail it down in time, but we can quickly see that "months not years" are weasel words.
manning120 -- I'll second Brian's book recommendation. Possibly, after reading it, you should read "With Speed and Violence: Why Scientists Fear Tipping Points in Climate Change" by Fred Pearce. It may alter your sanguine view on the amount of time we have.
It's an individual choice and an element of character whether or not the hard truth makes you "miserable".
The only problem is time is the thing we do not have in this.
And yes, I understand that the science behind climate change in not easily comprehendable to those outside related disciplines, such as myself. That is why I trust the overwhelming majority of climate scientists who say it is real. And Monckton may be the exception that proves the rule. Most climate change skeptics/deniers/what have you do not hesitate to wallow in the racist and hatemonger cesspools of the right-wing fringe...indeed, that's where many of them reside.
But it should be said that Monckton is no scientist. He's a British Conservative newspaper editor and businessman. It hasn't been clear in the discussion.
That too. His scientific sources need to be examined more than him, but I don't know what they are.
"His scientific sources need to be examined more than him,"
Exactly.
Rather than choosing based on your civility meter, perhaps you should look for an explanation that you can follow at your current level of understanding.
Try "The Discovery of Global Warming"
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/index.html
"The solution to this problem is simple: time."
" I would think ten years ought to be enough."
But "We Only Have Months, Not Years".
Be advised:
This person, "jakenewton," is a right-wing troll and confessed long-time Internet conflict addict.
Just a little curiour here.... do you ask for the 10 years to allow corporate profits to hit their maximum? Pollution is big business, both for those who make it, and for those working to clean it up.
The problem I see with your "solution" is that IF you are wrong, we don't have ten years to wait. With just a smidgen of reading you can learn that throughtout geological history, the time from the 'cascade' point to full ice age is measured in decades, not the thousands of years that it took for the earth's climate to warm. Too many people want to believe that since it took thousands of years to warm, it will take a like amount of time to cool. Wrong. This time however, the slope of the warming curve is unprecidented. Nobody can say exactly what is going to occur or when. Trying to predict the cascade point is not likely, or even IF there will be a cooling. We've seen rivers catch on fire in the past, it's not beyond imagination that the same could happen to atmospheric hot spots.
The amount of 'greenhouse gasses' in the pipeline also does not permit a 'wait and see' approach. Even if we stopped putting carbon and methane into the air today, around the world, it would be years before the 'rise' leveled out and a drop in these gasses would be measured.
I'm not saying you are wrong, or that Monckton is a wacko mouth piece for industry, but I believe that IF we are going to err, we need err on the side of caution, and try to alleviate the situation as quickly as possible. (just an opinion)
Some don't believe it. Some don't care. Congress wants only to get reelected.
" Nature is the timekeeper but we cannot see the clock."
Gotta look in the right places...
USGS/earthquake data.
IPCC chart of temp/CO2 in Al's book, Incon Truth.
The Great Iceage, by Chapman, Drury, etal.
NWS satellite wx---organized anti-cyclones around Antarctica (Antarctica will lead the tipping pts by a year or so).
Nat'l Geographic article on Greenland ice sheet.
Love,
snydly.
In my view “climate agreements” are not worth the paper they are written on, they are mainly PR-events, created to portray politicians as responsible leaders when in fact they are still worshipping the old economic “Holy Trinity” (infinite growth – competition – market rule) which is the systemic root cause of all the huge problems we are facing.
They do not understand that the basic principles of our economic system must be changed FUNDAMENTALLY , and even if they did, they would never admit it because this would expose their ignorance or complicity (following an economic dogma that increases poverty and inequality on a global scale and destroys the environment, while concentrating obscene wealth in the hands of a small elite who shape global policies more than any electorate ...)
In this respect Brown is right: forget “climate agreements” but I am afraid he is also suffering from “cognitive dissonance” when he talks about “saving civilisation”.When Ghandi was asked what he thought about “Western Civilisation” he answered: “It would be a good idea...”
(I mostly agree with your cynical remarks, OleManRiver ....)
A society based on the endless pursuit of profit and brutal competition is doomed to fail, an economic system based on “endless (exponential) growth” is self-destructive, as all systems with no self-limiting principle are (biological: i.e.cancer; economic & financial: massive, global , organized fraud called “securitization” and “financial innovation”)
I have just read a few passages of Brown’s book (in Chapter 4, 7, 8 and 9) and even this glimpse is enough to see the shortcomings of his proposals:
The main premise of his rather optimistic scenario is that if we adopt the right technologies at once most of the huge problems (oversimplified as “climate change”) we are facing can be solved without changing the basic economic architecture.
Brown writes about increasing energy efficieny, recyling rates and resource productivtiy, (reducing materials use) and also about “discouraging non-essential industries by “avoiding unnecessary products” (i.e. bottled water). Quite right. But this rests on the naive assumption that reasonable “demand” regulates supply. As the PR-industry knows perfectly well “demand” can be created, even for the most useless and even harmful product .....Eventually someone has to decide what is “necessary” and what causes so much environmental damage that it should not be produced at all. Here we come to a crucal point: Who controls production in a capitalist market-economy? "the market", of course ...
Although Brown acknowledges “some fundamental weaknesses” of the market - the externalisation of environmental and health costs, ignorance of “the carrying capacity of natural systems” and “showing little concern for future generations” - he does not question the market society per se.
In fact he affirms the old myth of “market efficiency”: “We rely heavily on the market because it is in so many ways such an incredible institution. It allocates resources with an efficiency that no central planning body can match, and it easily balances supply and demand.”
This is exactly the kind of BS that brought us to the current mess. There is no abstract, logical “market” (which neoliberals present as a force of nature), there are millions of people out there and it is their (manipulated) behaviour which constitutes “market forces”. Of course certain organized groups have enormous “market power” (corporations, banks, etc.) while others have been marginalized or reduced to the role of passive “consumers”. So the “market place” is heavily rigged in favour of the powerful players as we have just seen with the “bailout” of the greatest crooks on earth ....
Would the ongoing Ponzi Scheme (“derivatives trade”) financed by the massive plundering of public wealth, count as “efficient resource allocation”? Sure, this is “the (Mafia and oligarch) market” in action .... moral principles cannot be put into mathematical models which economists use to calculate “market efficiency” ....
Besides the dismal state of the planet (indispensable ecosystems on the brink of COLLAPSE, not just “climate change”) is a result of “market efficiency” of politicians, following blindly an economic ideology that is totally incompatible with any “sustainable” system...
Brown totally ignores the power relations in this neo-feudal “market society” (see Karl Polanyi): the big question is not what is technically feasible but how can the resistance of the “financial / corporate / military and yes - congressional complex” to REAL CHANGE be overcome in a comatose democracy?
In Chapter 9 Brown’s ignorance about agro-ecology becomes evident when he deals with “raising land productivity”:
“In one of the most spectacular achievements in world agricultural history, farmers doubled the grain harvest between 1950 and 1973. .... After several decades of rapid rise, however, it is now becoming more difficult to raise land productivity. From 1950 to 1990, world grainland productivity increased by 2.1 percent per year, but from 1990 until 2008 it went up by only 1.3 percent annually.... As farmers attempted to remove nutrient constraints on crop yields, fertilizer use climbed from 14 million tons in 1950 to 175 million (!) tons in 2008.”
There is overwhelming evidence that industrial farming methods are not part of the solution, they are a huge part of the problem. Brown completely ignores the huge energy increase (harvests may have doubled but energy input has quadrupled...), the loss of quality (old varities contained more protein, so now we have to eat more grain to get the same amount ...) the devastating effects of pesticides and the loss of biodiversity this “green revolution” has caused and is silent about the SUFFERING of animals in CAFOs, he is just concerned with “the efficiency with which ... animals convert grain into protein”.
That is why animals came to treated cruelly (like machines) in the first place: if they cannot move, they need less calories ... Finally, anyone who ostensibly tries to “save” ecosystems but does not say A WORD ABOUT ORGANIC FARMING has no CREDIBILITY at all ...
http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/July05/organic.farm.vs.other.ssl.html
http://en.scientificcommons.org/20210711
http://www.pmac.net/miguel.htm
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3833110324043445440#
.
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We can easily double carbon sequestration using minerals extracted from sea water. Doubling carbon sequestration would dramatically cut greenhouse gases.
These minerals can be extracted from sea water using simple "kitchen" chemistry. Simply raise the pH of sea water to 10.78 using sodium hydroxide and wash the resulting precipitate to remove salt.
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With kindest regards,
Barry Carter
sumro@zz.com
Thanks dude. Hey, everybody! Lets fvck with the oceans, raise their pH to 10.78, killing off God-knows how many ecosystems, and then we'll be able to rescue the atmosphere, which is what we humans really care about.
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Civilization is just another perversion of simple truth.
Of course we can see the clock, we are the clock. Whatever you say, whatever you do, how you use your time it is all nature. It is one world and it is all here now.
Look at the headline and consider the source:
"We Only Have Months, Not Years, to Save Civilization from Climate Change
International agreements take too long, we need a swift mobilisation not seen since the second world war"
This is bullshit. WHAT "civilization"? We've needed a "swift mobilization" since at least Bretton Woods in New Hampshire in 1944. We were warned again by Nixon in 1971-72 when he decoupled the dollar from metal. We were again reminded by Jimmy Carter when he wore that cardigan and sat by the fireplace and urged us to turn down the temperature, and the fact that he couldn't get a helicopter into Iran without getting it out. Sand in the air filters you know.
We are trillions of dollars in debt. We can't pay it off. We purchased a future impossible to accomplish. Some of us saw this coming but could do nothing about it. My carbon footprint is a small fraction of the average. So what? (Answer: I still have self-respect!)
It's already TOO LATE. Months versus years is immaterial. I suspect that Lester Brown knows that. It is our economic system that pushes our ecological response.
What if we come to a point in our lives where there is NO SOLUTION? NONE! Now what do you do?
-30-
That's commendable that your carbon footprint is low, but even if every single citizen had a low carbon footprint it would be nearly meaningless. It's the corporations who have to adopt carbon neutral practices if we have any chance of weathering the coming storm.
from the story: "For clean and abundant wind power, the US state of Texas (long the country's leading oil producer) now has 8,000MW of wind generating capacity in operation, 1,000MW under construction...."
Texas also has the highest per-capita energy consumption of nearly any society on earth.
Charlie Jackson
Texans for Peace
http://www.texansforpeace.org
You would make a great governor of TX.
Have each of you completely cut off your electricity, gas and petrol expenditures?
Charlie Jackson
Texans for Peace
http://www.texansforpeace.org
If, as proposed, we have only months ... then we are doomed.
The socio-political process takes much longer.
Charlie Jackson
Texans for Peace
http://www.texansforpeace.org
Oh, if only we could have the WW2 central planning again, when consumer products were effectively banned from production for years in order to combat the biggest threat the nation ever faced. Similar will is what we need now.
Yeah, WWII,... good times, good times. Geez....
Referring to the unprecedented nationwide mobilization for a single effort, the willing sacrifices of the population, the self-reliance in food production with Victory Gardens, the halting of the production of cars for personal use...yes, those are parallels that we can use.
There was at the time of WW2 a clear and present danger, an enemy to fight, Japs and Krauts to kill, somebody to hate. All those things are lacking in the present case. How do you excite hatred and a desire for revenge against carbon? How are you going to get people all mobilized over something that might happen, fifty or a hundred or two hundred years from now, to other people, maybe? The situations are not parallel.
Here is an enemy that USAns hate: slow traffic.
.
http://freepublictransit.org
Not as much as they hate public transport. When I was in my early thirties, I had just gotten married, we had spent all our money on a house, my car broke down, I didn't have the ready cash to fix it, and the upshot was that I had to take the bus to work for a period of about two weeks. I never felt like such a loser in my whole life. A nice lady had to tell me that I wasn't allowed to eat on the bus, or I would be put off. She was genuinely afraid for me. I'll take the traffic any time.
Climate change is a clear and present danger, and consumerism and energy oligarchies comprised of oil, coal, and nuclear industries controlling national and state governments are definitely enemies we can unite and fight against. The only problem is it's not quite as obvious as "Oh, those guys bombed us, let's get 'em". It takes a degree of reasoning to understand these issues...something that the corporate elite has tried to systematically eliminate in this country.
Those putative oligarchies provide people with their jobs, goods, and middle-class way of life (oh, yes they do). People are not going to turn on them, if for no other reason that there is nothing to replace them. No one wants to live a collectivist, low-consumption life style - especially not the people who already do because they have no choice.
Actually, I do want that, and I have been doing my best to live it for the past year. It was partly not by choice because I've been living on $8.50 an hour since January, but I made sure to spend my money wisely to benefit the local community wherever I could. Living a low-consumption lifestyle has made me much happier than living a higher-consumption lifestyle.
Well, there may be a few exceptions, but most people want the upper-middle class thing.
I know it's none of my business, but since you brought it up .... why only $8.50 and hour? You seem like an intelligent guy, you could do much better, I'm sure. Are you still a student?
Sorry if this is out of line.
No worries about offending me, not all Jews are sensitive about money :-)
It was a paid internship, my first job upon graduating college. It's fulfilling to me far beyond the low pay, but it worked out well, since yesterday I was promoted to a full researcher, and now I'll be making basically twice as much plus benefits. But living off $8.50 an hour for the past year has been a very good experience for me. I've learned how to live within, and even below my means, having canceled my credit cards but still paying them off.
Well, congratulations. That's a real job, hopefully with a future.
I'm sorry to have come across this thread only after 66 had been there already.
cheller182 referred me to an article by Christopher Monckton that directly contradicts Lester Brown (http://www.aps.org/units/fps/newsletters/200807/monckton.cfm). Monckton dispassionately critiques the IPCC (2007). I don't see how anyone could accuse Monckton of being unscientific, although I don't (yet?) have the background to understand his equations and analyses.
I discussed this moments ago in the George Monbiot article thread (http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/11/03-1#comment-1333732). The conclusion Monckton reaches (with my emphasis):
"In short, we must get the science right, or we shall get the policy wrong. If the concluding equation in this analysis (Eqn. 30) is correct, the IPCC's estimates of climate sensitivity must have been very much exaggerated. There may, therefore, be a good reason why, CONTRARY TO THE PROJECTIONS OF THE MODELS ON WHICH THE IPCC RELIES, TEMPERATURES HAVE NOT RISEN FOR A DECADE AND HAVE BEEN FALLING SINCE THE PHASE-TRANSITION IN GLOBAL TEMPERATURE TRENDS THAT OCCURRED IN LATE 2001. Perhaps real-world climate sensitivity is very much below the IPCC's estimates. Perhaps, therefore, there is no 'climate crisis' at all. At present, then, in policy terms there is no case for doing anything. The correct policy approach to a non-problem is to have the courage to do nothing."
The proposals of Lester Brown and others would have far-reaching consequences. I believe more study is needed before the world commits to the kind of drastic steps that would be needed to reduce GHG's as much as Brown and others think we should.
And no, I don't work for an oil company or any other corporation, or get paid anything for writing in CD.
Even if the climate change problem were over-stated (which I don't believe it is) the world would still be benefiting by shifting over to carbon-neutral energy practices, as they are sustainable practices.
Yes, I've mentioned that before. Fossil fuels create many more problems than just carbon emissions and climate change.
Here's the latest on the faker Monckton from Real Climate.
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/05/
moncktons-deliberate-manipulation/
There is a lot more if you do a search for Monckton on realclimate.org.
Arry and zmann -- Thanks for the links. I will get to them.
Monckton makes stuff up.
http://mediamatters.org/research/200910200042
Okay, so, suppose that MOCKTON is correct.... that means that THOUSANDS of other global scientists and weather researchers are wrong.... no, perhaps you're right, we sit here and wait, and wait, and wait, .... and wait.....
IF, as your source says, the temperatures have indeed been falling, then why pray tell, has the melting of the ice caps and glaciers been ACCELERATING? just wondering.... I do however believe that the temperatures WILL reverse the trend soon, but THAT will not be a good sign for humanity....
Let's not forget the methane burp after which the sky turns green and we do too.
No conservatives, no problems. Vote them out.
Global warming sceptics might benefit from viewing recent photographs showing the rapid melting of glaciers that's taking place. The Himalayan glaciers which supply the water needs of a billion people, for example, will be gone in twenty years, based on its present rate of shrinkage. If this isn't convincing enough, try googling Arctic glaciers melting, and learn what the Inuits have to say about what's happening to their civilization, or google Vanuatu & global warming, so as to learn how climate change is effecting the inhabitants of that low-lying South Pacific Island. Surely, if anything can change one's perspective on global warming, that will. If, that is, one has any concern for the billion people in India & China whose very existence depends on the rivers that are fed by these glaciers. But it seems that some doubters would rather challenge the findings and conclusions of scientists such as Lester Brown, accusing them of being on ego-trips, prefering instead the findings of this or that self-designated "expert", who usually have mile wide conflicts of interest, on account of their being on the payroll of Big Oil &/or some other C02 producing industries. These doubters wouldn't be harmful to life on earth if it wasn't for the fact that MSM posits said "experts" alongside real experts, such as Lester Brown, as if to say "Hey, folks, it's too close to call", and a lot of help that is. Why had MSM been around 4 centuries ago, it probably would have covered the trial of Galileo with something like, "Hey, folks, Galileo claims the earth rotates around the sun, the Church says vice-versa, so best you decide, since it could go either way." Except back then which celestial body rotated around which didn't have much practical import, whereas, human activity driven global warming (or not) has to do with the survival of all living beings. Which means that doubters, whatever their motives, by interfering with or otherwise delaying efforts to reverse global warming, will have enabled global warming to do us all in. On the other hand, if despite the doubters, international efforts to reach carbon-350 succed in stabilizing global temperature, no harm no foul from their having sewed the seeds of doubt. Furthermore should their take on global warming turn out to be correct, yes, there'll be changes in lifestyles, such as our having to eat less meat, use public transportation or drive electric cars fueled by voltaic cells, but no lives will have been lost. And isn't this everyone's paramount concern?
If the Church had won out over Galileo, we wouldn't be worried about anthropogenic climate change now. It was the Enlightenment (so called) and the unleashing of free inquiry without respect (torturing nature's secrets from her, as Bacon put it) that led to the science that led to the technology that led us here. The problem with "progress" is that it isn't.
And if you do think that "no lives will have been lost" is everyone's paramount concern, you can't have been observing human beings for very long.
Your point is well taken about what would have happened if the Church had won, but it didn't, so what do we do now? Say what the hell, it's our own damn fault or try to undo what we've brought upon ourselves? As for whether or not there's concern for human beings, there damn well better be, because it's not just some other in a distant land whose life is on the line, it's each & every one of us.
So the cure for hubris is more hubris? The same technocratic attitude that got us here will, get us out? I don't know about that. Still the same old human beings. I really do think that it might be better for nature to just take its course - which is what I think will happen anyway. Saying "there damn well better be, " as though necessity forces a change in human nature, doesn't do much. Human beings are still tribal, and love their own rather than the stranger.
"The same technocratic attitude that got us here will, get us out? "
I repeat: who will save global warming from civilization?
Mankind's attempts at control rarely pan out.
Well said again. My reply is that not only is global warming a threat to the stranger, it's a threat to our very own.
Many people in the so-called developed world secretly or not-so-secretly think that, even if climate change does turn out to be disastrous, they in the developed world will come out on top because of superior wealth and military power, and will be OK in the end.
It just plain scary.
~ dubli
Some Posters write as if GW is coming.
Anybody who is paying attention knows that it is already here.
1) 90% of mountain glaciers are rapidly vanishing, threatening billions with no potable water or irrigation.
2) Oceans are heating up thus expanding and rising, threatening low lying nations.
3) Artic, Antartic and Greenland Glaciers rapidly melting and again rising sea levels and who's fresh water may very likely disrupt climate controling ocean currents ( I would like to see someone try to realign an ocean current that has been vastly altered)
4) Highest average yearly temperatures in history of man.Causing both desertfication and heavier percepitation.
GW warning is like an oderless toxic gas entering a room, when you realize it's presence your too incapacitated to react.
If you had lived like the Tribes used to live in this land we wouldn't even be having this conversation now.
Life is good. What an experience! It's always best to forgive.
"One in Five Mammals Threatened With Extinction"
Well, at least we won't need to payoff the national debt.....
Jeevee
Lester Brown is one of the greatest names in planetary ecology. Please
take his message to heart and ACT on it to the best of your ability.
Amen to halting the subsidies to coal and oil. We should also seize and nationalize them and begin the rationing. That fuel must be carefully hoarded to power the emergency transition to a sustainable economy. It's last use should be in trying to undo the damage of its prior use.
Or will we not be able to afford to buy the gas from Exxon to save civilization?
Who's "we" who will be doing this seizing and rationing? And how do you know that the rest of us won't fight you?
the good news... we can all be like the gov't and spend like drunken sailors. When the bill comes due, it won't matter. BTW--If I used about 50 times the energy I do now, I still would use less than Albert Gore III. I figure if I am using less than Albert Gore III, then I am doing OK.
What do you imagine the connection is?
I mean, I figure I'm prettier than Jimmy Carter, so I'm doing fine.
No need to develop a huge ecological footprint just because Gore has one. I don't feel like committing suicide with either of you.
My ecological footprint is approximately 30% of the average for Mexico, where I live--or approximately 10% of the USA average.
"Months, not Years"
How many months? Who ever wrote the above is off the hook given that years can be expessed in months.
A study in contrasts:
jakenewton:
Far-right-wing Internet troll / loser.
Lester R. Brown:
The Washington Post called Lester Brown "one of the world's most influential thinkers." The Telegraph of Calcutta refers to him as "the guru of the environmental movement." In 1986, the Library of Congress requested his personal papers noting that his writings "have already strongly affected thinking about problems of world population and resources."
Brown started his career as a farmer, growing tomatoes in southern New Jersey with his younger brother during high school and college. Shortly after earning a degree in agricultural science from Rutgers University in 1955, he spent six months living in rural India where he became intimately familiar with the food/population issue. In 1959 Brown joined the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Foreign Agricultural Service as an international agricultural analyst.
Brown earned masters degrees in agricultural economics from the University of Maryland and in public administration from Harvard. In 1964, he became an adviser to Secretary of Agriculture Orville Freeman on foreign agricultural policy. In 1966, the Secretary appointed him Administrator of the department's International Agricultural Development Service. In early 1969, he left government to help establish the Overseas Development Council.
In 1974, with support of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Lester Brown founded the Worldwatch Institute, the first research institute devoted to the analysis of global environmental issues. While there he launched the Worldwatch Papers, the annual State of the World reports, World Watch magazine, a second annual entitled Vital Signs: The Trends That are Shaping Our Future, and the Environmental Alert book series.
Brown has authored or coauthored 50 books. One of the world's most widely published authors, his books have appeared in some 40 languages. Among his earlier books are Man, Land and Food, World Without Borders, and Building a Sustainable Society. His 1995 book Who Will Feed China? challenged the official view of China’s food prospect, spawning hundreds of conferences and seminars.
In May 2001, he founded the Earth Policy Institute to provide a vision and a road map for achieving an environmentally sustainable economy. In November 2001, he published Eco-Economy: Building an Economy for the Earth, which was hailed by E.O. Wilson as "an instant classic." His most recent book is Plan B 4.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization.
He is the recipient of many prizes and awards, including 24 honorary degrees, a MacArthur Fellowship, the 1987 United Nations' Environment Prize, the 1989 World Wide Fund for Nature Gold Medal, and the 1994 Blue Planet Prize for his "exceptional contributions to solving global environmental problems." More recently, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Italy, the Borgström Prize by the Royal Swedish Academy of Agriculture and Forestry, and appointed an honorary professor of the Chinese Academy of Sciences
Well, alright, but how many months was that, again? A round number would be just fine - even a number of digits would help.
I didn't see anything so right-wing about what jakenewton wrote. All he said was that years can be made to look like it is months. Let go back to the article and examine this quote:
"since it takes years to negotiate and ratify these agreements, we may simply run out of time. This is not to say that we should not participate in the negotiations and work hard to get the best possible result. But we should not rely on these agreements to save civilisation."
Well that leaves me wondering what then we should rely on and why should we simply believe that prediction? The author may have a great background but for this article, he's trying to make a whimsical prediction sounding as if it is the end of the world. In this article he whimsically predicts that global warming will have done its share of the damage by the predicted time the agreements are ratified without giving consideration to other ideas such as marketable ones that could slow down whatever the damaging effects of global warming. I am not afraid of Peak Oil or Global Warming. They have come and gone and the harder it hits, the more people will cooperate to stave it off.
I think that this is what jake is referring to but he will have to confirm or correct this.
"I didn't see anything so right-wing about what jakenewton wrote. "
Thank you for your response. "vanmungo" is a stalker and has an obvious crush on me. :-)
I notice he refused to to link to our last discussion, I wonder why. Decide for yourself:
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/10/26-5
In sum I simply asked questions about some studies he cited. I asked the same questions a few months ago. He refuses to answer them. Instead, he goes Ad Hominem on me, and makes wholesale changes in the rules of logical discourse to suit him. I tried to direct him to some resources on Critical Thinking, such as the well established Logical Fallacies, but in response he says I can't compose sentences and that I must not have very gone far in school. He tends to focus on minor spelling errors too.
See the picture? It's all there.
I refuse to try to help someone who refuses to help themselves, but when he finally gets it, he'll never forget who got him started on the right track. Of course, none of this has anything at all to do with left/right politics, it's just basic to all discourse involving facts and reasoning.
" a whimsical prediction "
"I think that this is what jake is referring to but he will have to confirm or correct this."
Yes, the phrase in question first struck me as such, but while trying to narrow it down he does it in such a way as to not really say anything. Thus, he's off the hook. Stay tuned.
These are all lies.
Anyone reading the threads can see that I answered his "critiques"--all of them plagiarized from crank right-wing Web sites--time and again; to boot, I exposed this troll as a mindless plagiarist and parrot of far-right propaganda, with detailed citations. So much for his vaunted critical thinking, which he, with a typically illiterate flourish, renders in initial caps, as though he were talking about a proper noun.
Moreover, asked to produce any peer-reviewed scholarly studies that challenge the conclusions of the ones he was "critiquing" (LOL!), he could produce none. His objective was to discredit peer-reviewed scholarly studies showing that the United States has the worst health-care system in the industrialized world. This right-wing troll could produce no such studies, despite repeated challenges to do so.
One should not be surprised to see that this dolt is a pathetic liar is well.
I saw the thread and I just now saw his responses. I am sorry to see his nasty attacks on you. You don't deserve that whatsoever. You aren't alone though. Not too long ago, there was a war on this forum with one guy requesting proof of a claim that he was some paid troll and the rest defending the accuser who couldn't prove it.
I had come across a similar poster, GoldenMean, who attacked you viciously with nothing to back up his/her claim:
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/08/01-1
It was very rude and that same poster attacked other people, some of whom were very candid progressives as far as their posts were concerned, and called them "Pentagon trolls" with nothing to prove that claim. I thought you did a wonderful job reminding them that the burden of proof lies on the individual who makes the allegation first. Then GM further attacks you as if he or she wants to have fun playing punchbag with you. GM's meandering attacks were totally laughable I almost cracked my ribs laughing at what GM posted.
That's what I mean when I say that this kind of name-calling and online negativity has to stop.
Goldenmean isn't too bad. Some people can have their moments of paranoia and get too overprotective. I ran into such people when I first came on to this site and said where I worked at while trying to also add my support for single payer health care. I had my arguments with them at first but we eventually reconciled. He can be helpful and is willing to reason. He might think differently but he isn't mean. I would say JenniferB was remarkable in showing patience and perseverance despite being called a "Pentagon troll". Name calling and classifying others on this forum is sophomoric at best. Jake said it best when he countered that proving that Pentagon trolls exist is like trying to prove that God physically exists. I can believe in God but I acknowledge that I can't prove that it physically exists. I have worked with companies related to the Pentagon and have visited the Pentagon myself. They don't pay people to troll since it is impossible to do so without getting put on public display. If the Pentagon had really done that, they would have been held accountable. That alone proves that "Pentagon trolls" is just fear mongering and name calling. I agree that the name calling has got to wind down and that we should not discriminate people on where they come from, who they work for, or whatever. Like JenniferB would always say, think with your heart and mind and don't judge a book by its cover but by its contents.
"Jake said it best when he countered that proving that Pentagon trolls exist is like trying to prove that God physically exists."
Thanks for your response. I don't recall saying this offhand but it is more or less so. Better still I think is trying to flesh out a viable business case for "professional" trolling. I don't think the case exists.
Hi Jake, I got to hand it to you. Today's discussion on the Glenn Greenwald article was pretty good and interesting for a change.
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/11/04-1
When I came across someone who said 50% according to the polls, I asked them to see the breakdown of the questions being asked. rfloh gave the information and it got interesting from there. It is good to be able to closely examine the make up of polls being taken so that it can be figured out the extent to which public opinion is actually being skewed before deciding to trust that same polling company in the future.
I went back and took another look at that commentary under the article Marco posted. The part where you said that some people suspend their critical thinking even though they articulate well I found interesting. I think it's due to their personal biases conflicting with what I believe is logical connected to critical thinking. From what I have experienced myself, losing a debate is almost always the result of allowing a personal bias to interfere with one's critical thinking. Sometimes, people don't realize it and will often deny it vehemently. Namaste, Erroll, Goldenmean, vanmungo, etc ... mean well but their emotions and personal biases however good or bad can interfere with their otherwise unbiased critical thinking. I don't know how old they are but the older one gets, the harder it is to train them out of that habit since some of their thinking is fixed.
As far as professional trolling is concerned, I think it is almost impossible to make that case. Not everyone needs money to think and will think on their own free will. Nonetheless, this world is full of weird thinkers and thinking.
I looked through the discussion. It's always a good idea to ask yourself some questions about a poll, such as it's methodology, the exact manner the questions are asked, and the limitations of what the poll can tell you. If you look for the answers yourself and you don't easily find them, I see no reason why you couldn't pose the question to the group. You can even ask the questions if you do know the answers, as a means of getting people to open up the discussion and to learn where people are coming from.
pollster.com is a good blog about polling, particularly political polls. There are some very good general articles that can get very technical and involve somewhat advanced math, but you don't have to understand that completely as they translate the important points into layman's terms.
Also keep in mind that questions have no veracity, and in asking questions you are never violating the rules of discourse, so if you are attacked for that you should get a pretty good idea about the person doing the attacking.
" people suspend their critical thinking "
Everyone does this. Knowing that you do it keeps you on guard against it. We are very selctive, we beleive what fits or world view and discard what does not.
"From what I have experienced myself, losing a debate is almost always the result of allowing a personal bias to interfere with one's critical thinking."
Depends on who is judging the "winner". The audience can also suspend critical thinking. Often a speaker has great style, and while speaking pure garbage the charisma wins over the audience.
Bye.
Quel idiot!
Thanks for showing up again, you right-wing nut.
I hope people do link to out last discussion, where I definitively outed you as an outright plagiarist of lunatic right-wing Web site material, which you then try to pass off as the product of your highly evolved "critical intellect." (Of course, all his right-wing boilerplate is marshalled to discredit every scholarly study that shows how wretched and unjust the U.S. health-care system is.)
Please, by all means--see that thread in order to understand the depth of this twit's psychopathy.
"In this article he whimsically predicts that global warming will have done its share of the damage by the predicted time the agreements are ratified without giving consideration to other ideas such as marketable ones that could slow down whatever the damaging effects of global warming. I am not afraid of Peak Oil or Global Warming. They have come and gone and the harder it hits, the more people will cooperate to stave it off."
No, he doesn't predict that GW will have done its share of the damage. He predicts that the damage it will do will be unrecallable. What's always been strange about GW is that its a slowly rolling disaster. It can be seen from a long ways off, but remedial action to prevent its worst effects requires action in the present, well before they present themselves. The idea that GW is one of those phenomena for which 'the harder it hits, the more people will cooperate' is naive. What's key here is the response of the oceans, not the atmosphere. The ocean is the 800 lb gorilla to the atmosphere's 0.5 lb canary. The canary pushes on the gorilla for 150 years, and finally the gorilla starts moving. Tell me, who is going to stop the gorilla once it starts moving? You? And what army? That's the nature of the problem we are facing here, and it matters not a twit how 'unafraid' you are.
ubrew, thanks for clarifying that distinction (the damage it will do). Some people on this site are in the "I'm fine, so everything is fine" mode. That is the standard response of the majority of the public. If you can't look at the past to see what direction you're headed, basically you're going along with your eyes shut. Although some of the responsibility for this attitude does lie with the corporate media. But there is blame to go around. A dumb down educational system and a self absorbed, self indulgent citizenry for starters. An enlightening read is "When Society Becomes an Addict" by Anne Wilson Schaef.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
UBrew and BFK,
Where are you getting the idea that some of us are in the "I'm fine, so everything is fine" mode. I didn't say everything was fine nor did I deny GW or PO. As you have lived through the last few decades, there have been warnings of GW and/or PO but things were done to offset the disasters as much as possible. It could have been better but at least the damage wasn't fully done. There are plenty of ways to slow down GW and PO and possibly reverse it. It's only a matter of time before the ideas catch on. I don't believe in doom and gloom but positive thinking and trying out the best. I'm not denying worst case scenarios but those scenarios will only exist assuming nothing changes at all. I thought the author actually contradicted himself by mentioning some positive developments and giving us some ideas to soften future damages. Is there something that I don't get?
I have heard something like this before. If more drastic actions for longer periods of time are needed, then that's what will have to happen. I'd love to cry doom and gloom but I believe in positive thinking and figuring out ways to slow down the damage so that we can have time and room to possibly reverse it. It has been done before. It might turn out differently but I still believe we can correct the problem.
To solve the problem, you have to believe there is a problem.
And, therein lies the problem...
I wasn't denying that the problem existed. I see the problem but I also see that some of it can be solved within a year while the rest will take time. This doesn't necessarily mean it's the end of the world unless other factors and solutions not mentioned in this article were actually taken into consideration. How do any of us know whether he took into consideration green jobs, clothing, eating, travelling, etc... ideas? We don't. The author is one thing but the way he describes the problem and the impressions he leaves readers in general matter as well. I don't expect these kinds of articles to motivate people into solving the GW and/or PO crisis completely.
"I don't expect these kinds of articles to motivate people into solving the GW... crisis" Actually, if you really want action on GW this is exactly the tact to take. The right does this all the time. You mention that we need to take communal action against GW, and the FIRST thing they start off with is that this is GLOBAL COMMUNISM. No 'government oversight'. No 'increased socialism'. No 'increasing government control'. Just GLOBAL COMMUNISM!!! And the FIRST thing they mention is the millions of Russians that Stalin killed. That's the FIRST THING off their minds.
Our society suffers from a repeated forgiveness toward RightWing hyperbole, and a absolute intolerance for the same from the left. And your responses absolutely reflect that attitude. Stalin DID kill millions of Russians. But Hitler killed more, and significantly, the people Hitler killed weren't primarily his own people. I give a better grade toward a dictator who is annointed by HIS OWN PEOPLE, and ends up killing them en mass, than toward a dictator who is annointed by his own people, and ends up killing people en mass who had NOTHING TO DO WITH HIS RISE TO POWER.
"If more drastic actions for longer periods of time are needed, then that's what will have to happen... I still believe we can correct the problem." THAT is where you are being naive. As the author to this piece indicates, we have already PASSED the point of 'longer period' solutions. We cannot now correct the problem without drastic SHORTER TERM solutions, thanks to the rightwing denialist community. And with each passing year, the potential solutions become more and more drastic.
Close, but should be a 3-lb canary (or maybe chicken).
Mass of ocean (1.4 10^21 kg) is about 270 times the mass of the atmosphere (5.2 10^18 kg).
Really? I would have guessed a higher ratio than that... although a 3 lb chicken will do, since I was talking metaphorically.
Hello Professor, your post reminds me how few people have retained the lessons of scientific notation, namely the ability to make sense of huge or tiny numbers and how they compare to one another. The media has to remind us, assuming they understand the subject to begin with, that it's "Trillion with a T" and other such cliches. It's all 'illions and 'illions now.
jakenewton--
Tell us something about your education.
Where did you go to college?
What degree?
What kind of work do you do?
What, if any, is your real area of expertise other than plagiarizing and then parroting right-wing critiques of peer-reviewed scholarly studies?
And distressingly frequently, it's the wrong 'illion.
Indeed. :-)