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Looking Catastrophe in the Eye
Denial of climate change is deep and it is wide.
Storm clouds move over west of Palmyra, Indiana. (Photograph: David Lee Hartlage/AP)
We woke up this weekend to news of record-breaking tornadoes touching down across a wide swath of the American Midwest, flattening entire townships and leaving behind multiple trails of devastation.
Reading the mainstream media reports, the focus was all on the damage; very little was said about the cause.
Again, a case of focusing on symptoms rather than on the motivating problems. The news media focuses on the “what” but ignores the “why.”
And they are even further away from what’s most important: looking for solutions.
Last Thursday, thanks to the ever-impressive leadership of Senator Bernie Sanders, representatives of the national and international insurance industry came together in Washington to discuss the business implications of climate change.
Co-sponsored by the Ceres Foundation, which has been working to bring business into the sustainable future fold, the meeting was unequivocal in its acknowledgement that climate change is here, it is real, and it must be dealt with head on, before it runs right over us like a tornado.
The reinsurance industry reps were pretty blunt.
“We need a national policy related to climate change and weather,” said Franklin Nutter, president of the Reinsurance Association of America.
Pete Thomas of Willis Re, a global reinsurance broker, cited an alarming statistic: 4 out of 5 Americans now live in federally declared disaster areas. “”Demographics and coastal urbanization are catastrophic force multipliers, making weather events increasingly costly,” he said.
In case you didn’t know, reinsurance companies are the ones that insure the insurers.
A difficult industry, in the age of climate change.
If I were an economist, I would be doing the math to figure out whether we are really coming out ahead as a society when we fight to pay less than $5 a gallon for oil.
What may seem cheap up front is often outrageously expensive in the long run.
Like eating cheap food laced with chemicals to keep costs down, to find yourself paying the exorbitant bills for chemotherapy in midlife.
It just doesn’t make sense.
There has never been a more important time to come forward and demand that government and industry work together to ensure (not insure!) our future.
Let’s stop hiding our heads in the sand and pretending that everything will be all right–until the next tornado, hurricane, wildfire or drought rides roughshod over our house and town.
Sitting at home worrying serves no purpose at all.
If you want to be of use to your grandchildren and all future generations, you should be out on the frontlines, insisting that:
a) the media does its job as a watchdog and reports the whole story;
b) our elected representatives do their job and create policy aimed at saving lives by mitigating and adapting to the effects of climate change; and
c) our fellow citizens get off their butts and start taking responsibility for our collective future.
Comments
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53 Comments so far
Show AllPeople's climate concerns are as fickle as the weather and gas prices.
The denial is wide but shallow. Like in the game of Rock-Paper-Scissors, money beats safety the same as paper covers rock. "We should be on the front lines insisting that..."
a) media lapdog act as a watchdog? - ha haha hehe hoha! - Freaking hilarious.
b) politicians serve people, not oil companies? - hahohehaho! - Bursting at seams.
c) people take responsibility? - hahahohehaho! - Like in the financial collapse?
Sometimes laughter is the best recourse in the face of absurdity. Thank you for a little Sunday morning humor.
I just re-read my articles on the state of science in America, and on the state of denial which you write of Jennifer.
One of the suggestions was to 'change the messenger,' and coincidentally, the insurance industry was mentioned as one of these new messengers as regards climate change.
I don't know about that.
Psychology is a murky business, but we're told that self-identity plays a large role in whether one accepts or denies man-made climate change.
I don't know about that either.
Essentially, most Republicans deny Anthropogenic global warming - and most Democrats accept it.
But I think both sides of the fence are merely following their own respective crowds for the most part - being human.
I think it is more accurate to state that in a democracy we get the government, and consequently the state of affairs, we deserve.
An unconscionably large percentage of the voting population behave as adolescents, are functionally nearly illiterate, and a large majority of the citizenry are scientifically almost completely illiterate.
Conditioned from birth to be consumers and to dominate the world, and yet never to think for oneself or provided with the tools to do this in a highly complex society, we have been led down the proverbial garden path, and all the while told that this is the way it has to be, and that the populace is too stupid to understand complexity anyway.
The results are now in.
From every quarter we are threatened with imminent collapse - real collapse, not figurative.
The human being loves to learn, of this I am sure.
But this innate desire is bludgeoned to death in this society - and most jobs are part of the bludgeoning. There are many other ways we are beaten into the submissive position of the slave.
Learn, and never stop learning.
Manysummits
======
For a fella who's climbed mountains, I'm aghast at ALL that you miss. Maybe it's self-censorship on your part; or maybe your perceptions mirror the mountain climber in seeking a precise and narrow path up to the summit.
You left out the programming of patriarchal religions, such nefarious items as being told for generations, that God gave MAN DOMINION over the earth. You left out the way fundamentlist sects demand obedience to creeds of faith, on the part of their followers (or sheep-like flocks).
By setting a divide between Democrats and Republicans, and then ultimately aiming at those citizens so long programmed that they can't discern the wheat from the chaff on this matter, you cast blame all around... with little aimed at the targets that are most empowered to alter the existing paradigm based on purposeful confusion.
Finally, you say NOTHING about ALEC, or about the oil companies and other industrial behemoths spending untold millions to Occupy Media with distorted messages. These have been designed by PROS; that's PR people with backgrounds in psychology (and/or behavior mod tactics and techniques). Thus they know how to work the subliminal cords that bypass intellect in altering peoples' perceptions.
And where did you get this absurd idea? Plus how would you document it?
"But this innate desire is bludgeoned to death in this society .."
Honestly, get thee to a Mountain top and rethink this... and your entire post. It is to a serious argument in favor of causative factors what Jackson Pollack's expressions were to a blank canvas.
Siouxrose
Actually, it's the possible variations on the route to the summit which are of most interest - not the most direct or most trodden path. One seeks the beautiful route, mirroring what is best in each individual mountaineer - a personal thing - a work of art - expressed in motion and determination and hopefully, unfailing good judgement. Turning back is sometimes the only artistic thing to do - and one has no regrets, for turning back is then the expression of that good judgement.
Like everyone posting on this website - I stumble my way to truth - trying to discern some pattern to the seeming chaos.
You are seemingly fixated on the Man thing. The species is physically di-morphic - an objective reality. There are real differences between men and women - we are not the same, and you don't need a scientific background to see and understand this.
As for leaving things out - this is always the case, for everyone here, all the time.
As for learning - I see the young ones full of this innate desire. Then I watch as I see most turn from learning to coping. School - an impediment to learning - a form of indoctrination - repellent to most - who then express this hatred of being made to hoop jump in any number of perverse ways.
But the desire remains - the means available only to the few who can still learn despite the impediments - a lonely task - and therefore anathema to most.
Strange that you would admonish me to another mountain top, when I suspect you have been on so few?
==========
I have trekked through the mountains of Nepal, been to the tops of peaks in the Puerto Rico rainforest and Peru, among other lands.
This is a really juvenile thing to say:
"You are seemingly fixated on the Man thing."
I am EDUCATED on what patriarchal culture, along with its rites & conditioning have done to the Earth, women, and all living beings. Men and women have both been conditioned to live by mores consistent with a top-down, macho-powered dominator society. The advantages to white men have been greater than those allotted to women of all colors, with the exception of those at the top of the pyramid. They enjoy the most fruits.
My point is, you want to blame everyday people as if they lack the desire to learn... and you don't bother to consider or explain the authoritarian structures in place (most with religious ideology at their roots) to thwart those ends.
I find your analyses superficial. Your concept of the way history has evolved is a notch better than that of the 3rd grade textbook, with the white man's version standing in as witness for all. It is not. You should read, "The Chalice & The Blade," and then I think your understanding would deepen.
You are not the only male poster who mistakes what white men took for, and established at point of gunpowder, as unwavering truth, or a highly limited take on the ultimate portrait of human nature. I just get tired of hearing these tired lines passed off as absolute truths when that is hardly the case. Like males who take reality for a status quo that has left off equal input from Others for centuries, you'd prefer to make the matter about me and any alleged prejudices I hold for men. It is FAR bigger than that... and you, Mr. Summit, appear only able to notice the flat earth perspective. Sad.
Yes the species is dimorphic, that is not the problem. The problem is one half of the species is in all the seats of power and has directed the economic and other systems that are destroying the planet and it is the half of the species that is least adept at global housekeeping throwing all its shit into the rivers and oceans waiting for Mama nature to clean it up. Patriarchal culture as Rick Sanitarium recently pointed out puts man in the center not the earth. There is the problem.
http://submedia.tv/endciv/2011/04/30/watch-endciv/
Film premise is great! Stronger than my morning cup of joe, which is saying something. Thank you for the link.
Thanks for the link.. seeing the coverage of this years tornado damage with no reference to last years damage makes one wonder if this is a media conspiracy not to report this stuff or if people are naturally inclined to have selective memory. I'ts like.. ok this is bad.. I feel badly for those affected.. I accept what is happening..now let's move on.
well here we go
normally i skip the climate change fanaticism on cd because the acolytes are so sure of this climate change issue that there are fanatics
this writer ends with "our fellow citizens get off their butts and start taking responsibility for our collective future"
i feel the same way about it as she does except that climate change is not the issue that i feel we need to get of our asses to address
if someone can look at the world today and say that climate change is the biggest thing to worry about well quite honestly i have to worry about their state of mind
good thing the climate fanatics weren't around in the time of the dust bowl - they would be freaked out of their minds
this writer wants media reform to "do its job as a watchdog and report the whole story"
what does that even mean and how desperate is this wish that the corporate media do anything except promote the nwo and the policies of the nwo/rothschilds debt prison
let's consider the wars in which we engage at the present minute - we have killed a couple of million iraqis, displace over 4 million of them, ruined their country and infrastructure, caused the deaths of a million children under the age of 7 and left a corrupt government and twenty militias who will continue this war we started as long as we pay them
in afghanistan we have killed hundreds of thousands and we now admit to protecting the heroin fields as a way of "getting along" with the taliban whom we are supposed to be fighting
we are bombing pakistan on a daily basis killing innocent men, women and children - a couple of thousands already with our drones
we are working with and supporting as clinton now admits al queda as a fighting force in syria, calling it an uprising and the corporate media this writer wants to be on the straight and narrow keeps telling us it is a citizen uprising, egging us into supporting yet another war
in india hundreds of thousands of farmers are killing themselves because of the monsanto/world bank scam that saw gmo's rammed down their throats which now have polluted the ground so badly that nothing will grow
monanto's round up has now polluted most of the midwest and has caused what professor huber calls "an aids like: microorganism in the soil that is killing the soil
europe is falling apart - with countries like greece under nwo management of bankers and are forced into an austerity program that now sees starving people all over that country
oh yeh - and then there's that whole iran thing going on - you know the little dust up that could start ww3 with both russia and china, as could the whole syria dust up
half the homes in the us are worth less than their mortgages thanks to bankster terrorism on wall street
over 40 million amerikans live on food stamps
inflation is running at at least 8% and food is becoming an issue for more and more people
around 50 million amerikans have no health care
only 54% of the kids between 18-29 are working
student loan debt is approaching a trillion dollars - more than the total credit card debt
the radiation from fukishima has been blasting away into the oceans and the atmosphere for months with no end in sight
we have moved soldiers into 5 african countries and are starting wars in each one
half the world has no fresh water
half the world lives on less the 2 dollars a day
our national debt and national unfunded obligations are approaching 200 trillion dollars - threatening medicaid, medicare and social security
our political process is a machiavallian exercise in sadomasochism where all the candidates, excepting ron paul who the media pretends isn't even running, all the candidates are owned by billionaires
in the gop they develop more radical and insane policies at every one of their 26 endless debates and the front runner mittens is dislike by so many republicans that 20% of them are considering voting for obummer
now they are talking about a brokered convention to nominate jeb bush - another one in that family of psychos
many of our cities are dying
many of our farms are dying
we get our crotches rubbed at the airport for a program that has never caught even one terrorist
under the ndaa the government can kill anyone anywhere with no charge no evidence
we have military personnel with machine guns all over the country
we got the fema camps
homeland security has now put out the contracts to man the camps with 72 hour notice
our children are being vaccinated and medicated at absolutely evil levels
we are being sprayed by chemtrails
homelessness is everywhere
not caused by weather but caused by goldman sachs, the rockefellers, rothschilds and wall street
obesity thanks to eating corporate food is killing millions of amerikans
we have the highest rates of cancer in the world
our drinking water is polluted
climate change is the least of our worries
this writer teaches comparative literature and gender studies but not to worry - she has an "activist bent"
wow......
Usually people (maybe not medmedude) who are aware of all these things, yet still deny climate change, get their information from the sources more bent on conspiracy theory than science, such as Global Research, Alex Jones, etc. I do not wish to diminish the importance of these things, but we are at the point where we need big solutions to solve big problems all at once, we cannot afford exclusion. There are no easy answers. These problems cannot be fixed without difficulty. I do not exclude medmedude's observations and neither should medmedude exclude climate change.
Sorry, Callag, in appearing to be polite, you're granting the forum's chief dissembler on this significant subject cover. Is there an equivalence between accepting the opinion of a rabid racist and that of a humanitarian? Is there an equivalence between the rapist's point of view, and that of the victim? This is pure Rush Limbaugh/Karl Rove, Fox News/Frank Luntz style reasoning... and it's so f--king insensitive after so many people woke up to their homes gone, and loved ones dead. So MED has to push the lie right now asking the naive in this forum to disbelieve what their own senses tell them, and what news report after news report says... just because all the climate models don't line up like some kind of military troop formation. Those who deny this must work for industrial polluters because right now, even the MIC & big Insurance corps get it... and a Pentagon report happened to state that climate change would be the most significant threat in the future.
Giving a liar the benefit of the doubt is dubious, at best.
An award shaped like an ass could be named the Bad Gas Award, or Runs At The Wrong End Award or The Footsie (as in put your foot here) Award. Seriously, I feel sorry this person, but I cannot resist ass-shaped awards.
What egregious nonsense. If we do not do anything about climate change, which is as real as gravity,our grandchildren's lives will be nasty,brutish and short (if they have any).
I'd like to design an award, shaped like an ass, and present it to you ALONE, Med, for this gibberish. Do you have any children or grandchildren? It's possible that a childless individual and/or a chimpanzee might conclude that climate change is not THE most pressing issue of our times... if there's no one in your lineage, you might not need to be mindful of leaving a planet behind that can sustain life.
Also, akin to the baboon is this hierarchical idea that the pressing issues of our time need be addressed in a top-down linear order. MANY times I have quoted Yogananda, who unlike you (here in these threads all day and EVERY day) actually held enough prestige to be invited to speak before an assembly at the United Nations.
It was a different world then (l949), with the World Wars at last won, thinking persons became interested in the spiritual means that would support peace, long-term. So Yogananda carefully explained that human forms of violence disrupt the ethers... the energetic web of forces that is mirrored through the various levels of atmosphere. This "envelope" goes beyond what materially-based science can measure. He made it very clear that further battles and wars would lead to a heightened frequency of tornadoes, earthquakes, floods, storms, etc. So war and climate chaos are utterly related, as is the fact that the MIC has a HUGE fossil fuel footprint.
So there is a powerful connection between war/human violence and dangerous climate/geological events. However, only someone inured to human suffering could PRETEND that the following have not happened with such a dramatic uptick in frequency as to stun climatologists and suggest an overlap of numerous "tipping points." These include:
1. Massive heat wave to Russia killing thousands
2. Massive droughts in portions of Africa leading to food shortages
3. Massive floods to Afhanistan leaving 4 million homeless
4. Massive floods to Australia, even creating an "inland" tsunami
5. Massive tornado outbreaks in the U.S. (in 2 consecutive years)
6. Massive fires to the U.S. southwest & Texas
7. Massive flooding of the Mississippi
8. Massive earthquake to Haiti
9. Massive quake/tsunami to Japan
10. Lots of other smaller earthquakes, storms, and droughts
11. Melting glaciers and Arctic sea ice with methane escaping in dangerous ways
It IS true that earth has experienced these sorts of things for centuries, but what is NOT true is the frequency and intensity of such activity. So for you to downplay this means one of 3 things:
1. You work for an industry that does not want the understanding of climate change to be widely known and understood--for that sort of groundswell is the ONLY shot citizens have at seeing countervailing investments & policies put into motion
2. You are POORLY informed, lest ideology impede your capacity to see the evident truths
3. You want all sentient life to end
In my view, your position on this matter is as morally repugnant as those who invoke war or incite violence. This is less a personal attack than an attack on the false witness you grant. And I find it stunning that you can show up in these threads, read articles by scientifically credentialed persons, and still REDUNDANTLY present LIES.
Perhaps when it's YOUR home that comes into the firing line of climate change, you'll get it... and get down on your hands and knees and pray. Traitor to life!
SiouxRose:
1. Please examine your drivel about Texas droughts. 1955 -1958 come to mind?
Maybe you have forgotten 1918? And these are just the 20th century droughts. Go back a bit further and the 1918, 1956, 2011 drought seem like monsoon seasons.
2. Massive flooding on the Mississippi? Not even close.....try 1927 if you want to see a real flood.
I could go on, but it may be senselss. To understand climate, one has to understand historical perspective, as that is what climate is. A short year or two is weather, and the past couple of years have been well within the boundaries of even 20th century climate/weather.
Disclaimer: I do NOT work for "oil co's"......etc. I am an observer who has a keen interest in climate.
Hey Sig,
Gosh where have you been, we haven't seen you here in quite some time!
i don't care who you work for. You are simply ridiculous with your ongoing DENIAL that human activity, primarily burning fossil fuels and increasing atmospheric carbon, has initiated a GLOBAL WARMING. You serve no good purpose, whatever you think your intentions are.
Hi Webwalk:
My ongoing denial?....naw.......I don't deny at all that CO2 is a greenhouse gas.
I am not too concerned about the temperature metric of CO2 emissions as the science is showing that a preponderance of the modeled predictions are not being observed. That tells me, and now the literature is confirming this, that the sensativity is much lower than previously thought.
I am concerned about the lowering of the oceans PH. This is basic proven chemistry that can't be disputed and the observations confirm the lowering of the PH. This lower PH will benifit some crustaceans as reported by Woods Hole research, but on balance, I can see no good longterm benifit from a lowered PH, only a negative.
Corral seems to be pretty imune to PH levels as demonstrated by growth on the Great Barrier Reef and other corral areas. However, it does appear that photoplankton is not receptive to lowered PH, as well as other major food sources for sea life.
The climate connection is dubious at best, but the PH connection is a certainty with potential very negative long term results.
While experienced observers are running out of adjectives to describe the severity of the current drought in Texas, Sigurdur summarily throws it all out the window with nary a citation - just baseless rhetoric.
Here's what someone who knows what they're talking about is saying about the drought in Texas:
"From October of 2010 through this September 2011, Texas saw its driest year on record, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
"But these historic dry conditions stretch back even further than that.
"After examining tree-ring data going back to 1550, researchers at Columbia University found that this year’s drought was only rivaled once in the last 461 years. According to the Palmer Drought Severity Index, a system for measuring wet and dry conditions, the last time Texas experienced a drought this bad was in 1789."
Warming-Enhanced Texas Drought Is Once in “500 or 1,000 Years"
http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/11/30/378412/texas-drought-historic-off-the-charts-says-state039s-climatologist/
Joe Romm has extensively explained that, historically, precipitation and heat are not correlated: you have warm droughts and cool droughts. The crucial distinction with the onset of droughts caused by global warming is that they are all hot droughts.
Indiana recently responded to global warming by enacting Right-to-Work legislation.
...Post-Constitutional America
Time of petitioning is past, the government is fascist imperialistic in all branches, lawless, controlled by global corporations, material worshippers.Time to sieze the power you wish to have. Live for Life, Love and Beauty, shun materialism.
I found out about manmade climate change well before the right wing decided to wage a disinformation campaign against it. When I first heard about it the only controversy was if the man made CO2 would cause more clouds to be created which would hold some of the warming in check. I guess the verdict is in on that by now.
I'm a life long amateur astronomer, so I knew about green house cases and the greenhouse effect from learning about the planet Venus probably some 45 years ago. No controversy, nothing to debate, science fact. This has been known for probably a few hundred years.
So it has been a bit bemusing to me to watch the right wing argue against reality. First they denied it was even happening. Then when they thought they might be loosing that argument they argued that it was natural. The fact that there was 50 years of data showing an ever increasing amount of CO2 going into the atmosphere, and the fact that radio carbon dating showed that the CO2 was the result of burning fossil fuels was of little concern to them. Obviously they were not only allowed to have their own opinions, they were apparently also allowed to have their own facts.
New arguments are now being made by the right to further muddy the waters. Just yesterday a poster on CD said; "Property damage, personal injury and death are not a function of climate variation. The increase in the costs of severe weather events is due to the increased population and human development in areas where extreme weather occurs." There is of course a morsel of truth in that statement, in that there is more development in costal areas that are prone to damage by hurricanes. But that poster conveniently leaves out the massive heat waves that recently devastated large areas of Europe, Russia, the historic floods in Pakistan, and the unprecedented drought in Texas to mention just a few of the more recent historic weather events.
I think a good analogy that demonstrates the incredibly reckless deceit of the right can be demonstrated this way. They are like some owners of a very large apartment complex that contains thousands of units. It is the end of the month and the rent is due tomorrow. A fire has started in the basement that can't be put out. If they evacuate the building and it burns down they won't get the rent money. So their scheme is to deny that there is a fire in the building. Some of the renters are calling in saying they smell smoke, but the landlords deny it because they want the rent money tomorrow, and are banking on their hunch that the building wont burn down before they can collect the money in the morning.
If the place does burn down and thousands of people die it is of little concern to the landlords because the apartment building is own by a LLC, and through campaign contributions they own the local and state politicians so nothing his going to happen to them, the owners.
TLDNR: Manmade climate change is real, and the right is lying their butts off against it.
About a year ago I read an article in the paper about an interview some politician gave, which was broadcast on TV. The writer said the politician was unprepared, inarticulate, belligerant, etc. etc. A few days later I read a column in another paper in which the writer said the politican was articulate, well-informed, etc. etc. Both of these guys saw the same interview but came away with totally different perceptions. It makes one wonder if there is an objective reality.
The problem is that the selective exposure we are all subject to results in a particular mind-set. When that mind-set is cemented in place, we then display selective perception. That is, you and I "see" different things because our mind-sets are different.
It does not matter how much the schools, foundations, or the government try to educate the public about a topic such as global warming, people absorb only what is compatible with what they have absorbed in the past. Very rarely do people have an epiphany "on the road to Damascus."
sheepherder
Carl Sagan, who did believe in objective reality I imagine, as do I, spoke of "the dumbing down of America."
That mission has been accomplished it would seem - inablity to distinguish between reality and fantasy.
Self identity, which you allude to - a nebulous concept.
I think self-identity, "what we have absorbed", is mis-named. Surely self-identity must grow over a person's life. If one cannot distinguish between reality and fantasy, what does that mean?
I think it means that many who are thought to possess a self-identity are more accurately described as mentally impaired, or simply ignorant, if you prefer.
A valid self-identity means good judgement grows over time, as a valid knowledge base expands. If the knowledge base is false - what matters good judgement, based on false assumptions?
The world is not flat, not in reality, not figuratively.
Global warming is as real as this blog, and evidence of the highest order is present in spades to prove it beyond any reasonable doubt.
Ditto for our current susceptibility to a solar superstorm, geomagnetically induced currents, and the likely disruption of major parts of our electro-infrastructure.
Ditto our susceptibility to asteroid or cometary impact, if at much different statistical scale.
Ditto the carrying capacity of this planet, under the present agricultural constraints, which is probably closer to five billion in good health than seven billion.
Nuclear winter is a certainty given a realistic nuclear exchange scenario, and geo-politically, states and superpowers run by a scientifically illiterate corporate elite or cabal of lawyers is a form of collective insanity.
We will certainly have an "epiphany" on the road to Damascus - when our civilizations collapse.
But will we have the strength to survive in other than dark-age form?
Will it be much worse than the Dark Ages - given the certainty of radio-nuclide mutations, which are almost forever?
It's too crowded down here, there are too few resources, we have already fallen into numerous "progress traps" (Ronald Wright), with more to come.
We need most to grow up.
Pampered and out of touch with the natural world - the fantasy life is dominant today.
But nature does bat last, and makes Babe Ruth look like an amateur.
==========
"Pampered and out of touch with the natural world - the fantasy life is dominant today." Yep michael, you hit the nail on the head there. We have an economy that relies on creating fantasy and making war. The two have to be inseparable. Too many people have better relationships with their i-phones these days than they do with members of their own communities. Everything is controlable with toys and machines. Human relationships are hardly ever this predictible or safe.
Since this is a subject very dear to my heart, as a LOVER of this beautiful planet, I am sensitive to obfuscation and the various ways that truth is being undermined in this forum. Your post, for all its SEEMING intelligent assertions, makes the matter exclusively about what the public is willing to take in. So far on this thread we have the evident climate-change denying, all knowing stooge, who has minor support from three posters who in my view are deliberately muddying the causative factors. That's you, Sheep, Michael D. & Callaghan.
Here's why I am hitting you with the same hammer: you do NOTHING to explain why some people appear to take in a different set of perceptions than another, as if it's just some freely occuring phenomenon along the lines of "free trade" or Adam Smith's alleged "free hand" of the marketplace. As if marketing, advertising, a media Captured by dangerous interests, and fundamentalist churches pushing a variety of faith-based delusions play no insidious role here.
Why is it that the three of you make the playing field SEEM fair, balanced, and honest, as if citizens are getting the best facts on the matter and deciding on that basis? None of you speaks about the enormous money interests invested in making sure that enough uninformed persons will be made to believe the lie that climate change is an UNSETTLED issue...
Cui Bono? Industries. They get to keep polluting. The MIC. It gets to keep fighting on. Libertarians: they get to hold onto their mantra of "get the government off my... whatever." Since without public knowledge leading to consensus, no muscle will ever be in place to rope in the agencies that produce and market products most harmful to the Earth and climate systems. And marketing is a powerful driver of collective behaviors as Bernays well-understood.
There's enough ingenuity to build other techologies if only the WILL were in place to engage it, and rapidly. Shades of a 21st century "Manhattan Project," with this one geared to sustaining life, rather than destroying it.
I was responding to the comment below, as: 1. It's not been tried 2. You don't explain the religious roots of the detachment many feel for Earth and things natural, either.
"It does not matter how much the schools, foundations, or the government try to educate the public about a topic such as global warming."
So you knee-cap any sane effort before it has a chance to bear fruit. That's why I lump you with the obfuscators. Those who speak in ways that damn this planet into oblivion will have MUCH to answer for. You may not believe in global climate change, but like the law of gravity, your belief has NOTHING to do with the reality at work.
Sioux Rose: Your problem is that you have no patience with anyone who does not agree with you completely. Most of the people who post here are too polite to point out that someone who believes in Astrology should not be lecturing others on the logic behind their arguments. Not everyone is that polite, but most have been. I have decided that they are wrong.
I have three degrees in the Earth Sciences and taught about global warming for decades. As someone else mentioned here today, the physics is straightforward, and the data are unequivocal. It is happening, and it is probably too late to do anything about it. Some of the dire predictions are going to happen, even if our generation does not see them.
Because the Jesuits taught me to ask questions and make distinctions, my posts often are a bit askew of the main topic. When I do that it is because I feel that they can make some contribution to the discussion. So I don't really give a damn when some crazy Astrologer criticizes me for not agreeing with her ideas about how the world works. To a scientist, Astrology is about as useful as Numerology, Psychiatry, and Phrenology.
sheepherder
I have to agree. I've been holding back from criticizing Siouxrose for exactly the reasons you propose.
But enough! Siouxrose's comments as regards other posters, not just here but on many other threads, border on slander - and of necessity, because of lack of evidence or basis other than some form of mindreading on the part of, as you put it, an astrologer.
And I agree - astrology is a perversion, diminishing even the supposed common interest in the one common feature - the night sky.
I'd personally appreciate it if Siouxrose would refrain from commenting on my posts, and I shall certainly refrain from further comment on hers.
========
I too used to admire SR's comments. But lately she seems to be attacking everyone. People have a right to post their own opinion.
I was one of the early victims of SR's rancor. Several years ago she accused me of being a shill and posting under several names. Neither is true. Since then I have seen her use this ad hominem tactic frequently. Perhaps she is unaware that like her belief in Astrology, it makes her look like an ass. In any case, I have resolved not to reply to her since I try to avoid arguing with those who are deranged.
You think the issue is patience? Or that of me being a professional astrologer? Need to burn a heretic again, is that it, "Photius"? The only other category you left off in an attempt to marginalize me is my identification with feminism.
The OBJECTIVE facts are, that: Michael D threw around elaborate speculation like a guy who can't aim an arrow at the one target that has meaning. If he really believes that human sentience is the problem, then he should not mind being asked to look deeper into WHY that is so. That is, what societal shaping mechanisms from media marketing to religious values CAUSED a separation from nature to factor into that net outcome.
Next up is Medmedude. Med routinely tosses poisoned barbs at Planned Parenthood, Public Education, Jews/Israel, and is a massive climate change denier. So when I challenge these insidious memes (all of them right-wing), I am the one with the problem? Why didn't any of you attempt to counter his lies? COWARDS!!!!
I don't give a flying fig if you have a degree in Earth Science. The sciences are based exclusively on a very limited form of material reasoning. They are good for some things, hardly all. And now that you mention "The Jesuits," your conditioning within a church-based institution probably explains why you have such a blind-spot when it comes to the omssion of half of humanity from all decision-making bodies for centuries. And how that's shaped Western culture so disproportionately around war, and also declared an unspoken war on nature, the GREAT Mother. But why give that any thought, right? Just tell the opinionated woman to shut up.
I stand on Universal Truth. And when I see people deny the evident truths, you're damned right I'll take them on. To the sexist male, the feminist perspective is routinely brushed aside. However, it speaks truths that are not yet spoken for in our society. And they need to be. To the liar/climate change dissembler, the obvious that IS in evidence, is a threat to his morally obscene position.
While I have been a target of major attacks in these threads, not one of you ever came to my aid. But now, when I challenge the linear and limited nature of your views, you suggest that it's not the views that need to be defended, but that I am out of line for challenging you, i.e. not behaving like an obedient little lady.
NONE of you want to talk about the way education is not doing its job because it's under corporate direction. None of you talk about the captured media and the think-tanks paying big money to make sure people do NOT wake up on this issue. I get upset with anyone who blames the public when the public is being lied to every which way. You're probably all right-wing plants, Ron Paul cheerleaders.
This is a contemptible comment likely from another plant, an agent here in these threads to keep the dialog managed.
"So I don't really give a damn when some crazy Astrologer criticizes me for not agreeing with her ideas about how the world works."
So, for disagreeing with you and understanding a language of relationships that has been honored by mystics for centuries, you paint me as crazy? But then suggest that I am the one defaming others' characters for challenging their arguments. Here's one for you that fits, you're a sexist PIG. Just like a typical Mars rules soldier boy... if HE engenders the aggression, it's perfectly Okay. But if anyone else does anything along lines he brands as aggressive, heaven help them! DOUBLE STANDARDS, inc.
I'll BET I am more widely published in my field than you are in yours. And just because YOU are stuck in a flat earth paradigm hardly means some of us don't SEE the stars. It's a sensibility that's been beaten out of people, silenced on threat of death... not because it's crazy or inaccurate... but because it presents a model of the living world that challenges the authority of the church-state. It's always been about that... but the authoritarians prefer to cast off "witches" rather than let their prescient insights speak for themselves.
Siouxrose:
We can take a single cell from a fly and “clone” it to create another fly. We can extract pieces of DNA, alter them and reinsert them into flies. We can make fly with wings growing out of their eyes, legs out of their mouths or antennae, four wings instead of two, twelve legs instead of six. We have gained great insights and manipulative powers.
But you know something? After investing hundreds of thousands of person-year of research, billions of dollars of grant money and all the latest equipment in studying this one species, we still don’t know how they survive the winter.
David Suzuki.
The often quoted saying, keep your friends close and your enemies even closer has proven to be true for me on a personal level. I have often paraphrased this to: believe in what you know of science to be true but believe even more of what it doesn't know.
David has often spoken on the advancement science has made in many areas of our lives and many are positive ones; but his awe for science is not for what it has accomplished but for all that it leaves unknown.
His book - Wisdom of the Elders, after twenty five years as a research scientist he gives voice and credence to indigenous people not to the laboratory. I respect the native spirit for their reverence and invocation of the sacredness of Mother Earth - the greatest cathedrals have already been built so why does man continue to compete with them with wonder mountains and such...? Ultimately it is their wisdom that will prove enduring and not man’s arrogance for attempting to conquer nature to meet his own selfish ends. In a lot of ways our reasoning powers as a society have been compromised with advances in science - holding itself as the true arbiter of truths. I love the poet that echoed the words: I want to live where nothing lives, which is to say everything we need under the sun is where nothing lives.
Sometimes the beauty of the unknown is sheer beauty in life itself. What scientific analysis is needed when a child telegraphs his face with laughter? Not to mention the positive contagion this could spread.
Emily Dickinson says it so beautiful with a dietary of words:
This quiet dust was gentlemen and ladies
And lads and girls;
Was laughter and ability and sighing,
And frocks and curls;
This passive place a summer's nimble mansion,
Where bloom and bees
Fulfilled their oriental circuit,
Then ceased like these.
The ego of Ozymandias will just not go away.
Hello, sheepherder. I have a degree in physics and was "blessed" by a Catholic education also. I agree with your statements about global warming and astrology, but also wish that we could carry on discussions with some politeness and at least an attempt at objectivity.
Sioux Rose seems like a nice person generally, and if we feel she is mistaken it is not helpful to call her a "crazy Astrologer" even if you think astrology is invalid, as I do. If she has been abrasive lately, it doesn't help to add to the emotion. As a child of the Enlightenment, I think that reason should prevail in any discussion. As mom said, it's nice to be important, but it's more important to be nice.
Siouxrose:
1. You make an assertion about money. The money spent by "just" the federal government of the USA to promote climate change consensus completely DWARFS any money spent to show how utterly stupid the idea of "consensus" is.
2. Please read the current literature. The dominance of the "Team" as they called themselves is finally being put to rest as more peer reviewed papers are being published showing the flaws in the AGW hypothosis.
3. Climate will always change. That is a fact. I can only recommend you read the following paper for at least a rudimentary understanding of this:
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2012/2011PA002184.shtml
Thank you for your time and may you continue to be a good steward of our earth.
Hey Sig,
Funny that you should post a cite from the AGU as cover for your denialism. Here's what their President wrote just last month in response to more denialism in the WSJ:
Daniel Patrick Moynihan once said, “Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not to their own facts.”
As we look at the ever-increasing attacks on those whose research has established the fact that climate change is real and human activity is most probably the cause, Moynihan’s sentiment still holds true. There are those who would want us to believe that climate change isn’t happening and that human activity isn’t playing a role, but unfortunately wishful thinking won’t make the facts disappear.
Attacking the character and motives of a scientist or organization because they stand behind a conclusion that is politically charged – that the Earth's climate is out of balance and human activities are in all probability responsible for global warming – is counterproductive and short sighted. Likewise, we ignore the scientific evidence for climate change at our peril because it will have an impact on national security, the economy, our food supply, and many other areas that affect our health and well-being.
The research and discovery process that has led scientists to these conclusions is governed by well-established and widely accepted practices designed to ensure the integrity of scientific findings. These same methods have also brought civilization profound achievements like human flight, life-saving vaccines, electric power and the Internet.
As leaders from around the world tackle the challenge of addressing and mitigating the impacts of changing climate, there are three things they can be assured of: (1) Climate change is real, and in all likelihood is being caused by human behavior; (2) There is wide-spread consensus on this point, with 97 percent of the climate science community agreeing; (3) That consensus is rooted in a foundation of scientific knowledge gained through careful, thoughtful, and thorough research, not political or ideological rhetoric.
Michael McPhaden
AGU President
Webwalk:
I think Michael McPhaden had better look at the methodology of the 97% agreement.
The response rate was not very good out of the total quiries sent. But that isn't important.
What is important is what the current literature is showing. It is becoming more obvious that climate sensativity is not as high as previously thought. This is ascertained by measurements, rather than modeled.
And yes, I read the literature......a hobby of mine for over 30 years.
Thank you Aleph & Webwalk for showing up. I am not going to bother with this asshole. Nor am I in the mood to BE polite. It's a full time job monitoring the CRAP and purposeful deception poured into the CD threads day after day. It's worse than "Ground Hog's Day" in that the more evidence piles up, the more the liars, obfuscators, and trained dissembling SEALS go at it. And if you expose them, they show their fangs like vipers.
A friend of mine who had 3 degrees in counseling once told me that it made no sense to argue with a drunk. I'd put a climate change denier in that category. I saw Sig's BS on another thread and WAYNE took him on... these frauds don't want to KNOW the truth, they're paid to just keep "catapultin the propaganda," like Bush, the lesser, their moral equivalent.
I was a teacher for a long time, and it doesn't take an epiphany to 'get' climate change...if one is permitted to teach it. The basic physics is so simple, and the amount of present change so measurable, that most people easily see what is happening.
But then what? Most people are trapped in debt peonage, have no way to produce their own food or realistically reduce energy usage. And now we see people pepper sprayed and dragged off for peaceful protest. What avenues are there?
Dmadrone:
" I was a teacher for a long time, and it doesn't take an epiphany to 'get' climate change...if one is permitted to teach it."
You said a lot in this simple sentence. Meanwhile, a handful of posters are doing their utmost to dance around the issue and muddy the truth to varying degrees.
Michael D: I get it that you understand climate change, but it's the other facts of your arguments that seem off-kilter to me. Even in the above post, where you bring up the possible asteroid collision or the impact of solar flares... at least with the asteroid item, it's years away. That's not so for climate chaos already unfolding. So I wonder why you brought up these further-reaching items, and hope it wasn't to muddy the FACT OF climate change as an immediate threat.
The article alludes to a recent study finding "4 out of 5 Americans now live in federally declared disaster areas."
This map of US weather disasters by county is interesting. The epicenter for US weather disasters seems to be the northwest corner of Oklahoma:
Map of Recent Weather-Related Disasters in the United States
http://www.environmentamerica.org/page/ame/map-recent-weather-related-disasters-united-states
Browdy de Hernandez closes with these lines:
"There has never been a more important time to come forward and demand that government and industry work together to ensure (not insure!) our future.
"Let’s stop hiding our heads in the sand and pretending that everything will be all right–until the next tornado, hurricane, wildfire or drought rides roughshod over our house and town.
"Sitting at home worrying serves no purpose at all.
"If you want to be of use to your grandchildren and all future generations, you should be out on the frontlines, insisting that:
"a) the media does its job as a watchdog and reports the whole story;
"b) our elected representatives do their job and create policy aimed at saving lives by mitigating and adapting to the effects of climate change; and
"c) our fellow citizens get off their butts and start taking responsibility for our collective future."
She is right! Get off butt; engage family friends neighbors and coworkers; take responsibility; hold media and government accountable.
And, be realistic:
Recognize the changed world, "consumer lifestyles," agriculture system, "food security," economy, employment and "career paths" that are coming fast.
Get busy learning what it means to live on the Earth, not in a fossil-fuel economy. Practice, now, the practices of living on the Earth, not in a fossil-fuel economy.
Live by the three rules of Permaculture:
- Care for the Earth;
- Care for the people;
- Share the surplus.
Mar 4 2012 - 2:10pm
Jennifer: The best antidote I’m able to come up with the issues you highlight in your article addressing climate change is a reading of Virginia Wolfe’s - Death of a Moth. I do not wish to suggest this be an elixir to super cede any of your suggestions, but as an accompanied afterthought.
A reminder is needed to the living that all life must be held sacred as the moth treasures’ his. Alone and trapped in the simple environ of a window pane it is helpless in its efforts to ride in the nuanced fabric of the life unfolding effortlessly beyond its view and struggles for that last morsel of living energy with all its strength.
“It was superb this last protest, and so frantic that he succeeded at last in righting himself.”
The author attempts to draw our sympathy for the near ending of one of life’s marginalized creatures:
“The possibilities of pleasure seemed that morning so enormous and so various that to have only a moth’s part in life, and a day moth’s at that, appeared a hard fate, and his zest in enjoying his meagre opportunities to the full, pathetic.”
But for whom life is given, and its associated hierarchy, the answer(s) is(are) probably lost in the consciousness of probabilities - that mysterious period of time before life was created; energies condensed in an acorn and then released at some point to bear fruits which very little is known. But clinging to that which we do understand should be held in a sacred trust till the very end; not doing so forfeits our very own alleluia chorus to the [self ] and rightly so – “The moth having righted himself now lay most decently and uncomplainingly composed. O yes, he seemed to say, death is stronger than I am.”
“He is happiest, be he king or peasant, who finds his peace in his home.”
That [home] is mother Earth; life cannot continue with disrespect for that which sustains ones’ very existence. In the end, I would have preferred had you concluded with a spiritual reflective musing to the problems of climate change than one pondering the musing of an economist - tied to the media - tied to your representative – tied to the markets of consumerism; hence, reality capitalism for a real world. An invocation for change by circumventing the middle men is more often to the point when dealing with those who have the most to loose; as money is always under the illusion that it can always buy its way out of anything that afflicts everyone else.
In a way our existence mirrors' that of the moth looking through the window pane - one flight forward two flights back, with the will to live quickly eroding. We would do well to right some wrongs and praying that Mother Earth not loose Her temper by sneezing us right onto the way of the plowman's plough while preparing for Her next harvest.
Interesting post, Andrea 2.
A few years ago I took a night train from Singapore to the north of Malaysia to spend several days in the rainforest there. The travel agent told me I'd get picked up at the station around 6 AM, but didn't mention that the train might get in closer to 4 AM. It was seedy, and I felt vulnerable as some of the town's men were out drunk and hovering nearby. What caught my eye were these HUGE insects in the family of the Cicada that made the loudest noises as they repeatedly darted towards the overhead lights. These things were about 4-5 inches long...
Anyway, I learned that they only live for a very short time, mature quickly, mate and die... so that all that excitement in the buzz of their existence was around the simultaneity of mating AND dying, two acts closely following one another.
BTW: When something doesn't fit snugly it's loose, but to forfeit an item is to lose it. (You said Earth Mother might loose it, a common error.)
Siouxrose:
Thanks for that little bit of editing pertaining to my loose brain:)
Tis we too.
Picasso is quoted as saying: it took me fours years to paint like Raphael and a lifetime to paint like a child. I've come to hold that to be ever so true. Knowing that the motion is not tethered in any way takes on a beauty all of its own. The intrinsic purity that exists when the subject is devoid of hierarchy or quantitative purpose is to mimic that which you describe with the Cicada – pure resonance for whatever length of time is allocated to their being! One almost feels the implied rumble of Mother Earth whispering in our ears: leave a habitable existence for those to follow.
I love these two verses by Neil Young paying homage to nature that less is more.
On the roller coaster ride
That my emotions have to take me on
I heard a newborn baby cry
Through the night.
I heard a perfect echo die
Into an anonymous wall
of digital sound
Somewhere deep inside
Of my soul.
It makes me sad to see this kind of in-fighting among people who are at heart probably kindred spirits. We will not help our common cause of awakening the larger world to the tsunami of climate change about to bowl us over by standing here arguing with one another! We don't need to agree with each other, we just need to respect each other and be willing to put our shoulders to the wheel together for the good of all.
You may not expect someone to object to your Rodney King plea: "Can't we all just get along?" But I often see this line in CD threads, and it kind of bothers me. I mean, what's wrong with vigorous, spirited debate? People think and articulate more clearly when challenged to defend their reasoning. It's called the dialectic method, and it's been in use at least since Socrates.
If, on the contrary, I only encountered a bunch of drones singing from the same hymnal in these threads, I'd be bored to tears. I'd figure that people around here had lost all vestiges of critical thinking skills. I'd find someplace else to hang out.
You can take your "kindred spirit" malarkey and stick it where the sun don't shine. (Just kidding!)
jbrowdy:
And with that comment, a guid willie waught for the lady to end the evening!
Thanks for commenting here.
The infighting seems inevitable; partly because that's an easy option in the semi-human "interaction" that takes place in truncated virtual spaces like comment threads; but also because some persons are simply not here for decent purposes.
i think often there is an over-estimation of the number of posters who truly come here to disrupt, and an under-estimation of the numbers who disrupt instinctively, naively, naturally, stupidly, inadvertently or dysfunctionally.
But there certainly are some who disrupt purposefully, tactically, strategically; some who are not here to share Common Dreams, are not "kindred spirits." Some of these intentional disruptors are frankly working for the industries and governments you are trying to call to accountability for their roles in the economy and the ecology.
Thanks for your work.
a) the media does its job as a watchdog and reports the whole story;
99% of the media is owned by corporate power.
b) our elected representatives do their job and create policy aimed at saving lives by mitigating and adapting to the effects of climate change; and
99% of elected representatives are owned by corporate power.
c) our fellow citizens get off their butts and start taking responsibility for our collective future.
99% of citizens are 'owned' by the 99% propaganda spewed by the fawning media. Return to (a)
Peak Oil and 9/11 were just the beginning. The need to acquire rapidly declining petroleum resources may well involve more false flag operations. The reality is that Iran may be next. I fervently hope not, as I would guess it will be even less of a "walk in the park" than was Iraq.
(Re- this possibility see Steve Alten's fast-moving and unique book, which incorporates little-known facts about 9/11 with a proto-fictional account of our next covert false-flag operation - set in America in 2012. The goal of the FFO? To manufacture reasons for going after Iran and its Oil - militarily. Deja VIEW, anyone?)
~~~~~~~
Yet the issues run still deeper.
Duane Elgin has sketched out the powerful, contemporary negative trends that are already in evidence.
A few of these: global climate change, the rapid extinction of species, the depletion of critical natural resources, the continuing increase in world population, and the rapidly growing gap between the rich and the poor.
However, due to the interdependence of, and interactions between, these highly consequential problems, the whole is much more than the sum of the the parts.
These and other trends are converging into a whole-systems crisis, creating the possibility of a massive societal disintegration within one generation, if large portions of humanity do not quickly recognize the necessity of finding new, sustainable ways of living.