Short and blunt 10

James Gustave Speth (see Grist interview here) writes a letter to The New York Times:

The world we have known is history. A mere 1 degree Fahrenheit global average warming is already raising sea levels, strengthening hurricanes, disrupting ecosystems, threatening parks and protected areas, causing droughts and heat waves, melting the Arctic and glaciers everywhere and killing tens of thousands of people a year.

Yet there are several more degrees coming in our grandchildren's lifetimes.

It is easy to feel like a character in a bad science fiction novel running down the street shouting "Don't you see it!" while life goes on, business as usual.

Climate change is the biggest thing to happen here on earth in thousands of years, with incalculable environmental, social and economic costs. But there is no march on Washington; students are not in the streets; consumers are not rejecting destructive lifestyles; Congress is not passing far-reaching legislation; the president is not on television explaining the threat to the country; Exxon is not quaking in its boots; and entire segments of evening news pass without mention of the climate emergency.

Instead, 129 new coal-fired power plants are being developed in the United States alone, and so on.

There are many of us caught in this story. We must find one another soon.

James Gustave Speth
New Haven, Feb. 20, 2006

David Roberts is staff writer for Grist. You can follow his Twitter feed at twitter.com/drgrist.

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  1. Doommonger Posted 7:28 pm
    23 Feb 2006

    Short and bluntYes, there are many of us - there's me for one. But the vast majority are in denial, and the trouble is that those of are who are concerned hold back from doing anything because there's still that worry that we will just be seen as cranks, even now. But as well as shouting in the streets we can all do things to help by changing our own habits and persuading others quietly to change theirs. Sometimes these are just little things, done quietly, but we have to start doing them ourselves if we are going to have any chance of survival.

    Doommonger

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  2. amazingdrx's avatar

    amazingdrx Posted 8:43 pm
    23 Feb 2006

    RoughIt's gonna be rough.  
    Even if we had a brand new energy policy today designed to replace most of fossil fuel combustion in western developed nations, global climate disaster will not be averted.
    It will take 30 years to slow down the increase in greenhouse gases, even if we start now on that serious 10 year plan.
    But given our corrupt corporatist government that works mainly on crony contracting, bribery, and political cowardice in order to protect the huge corporate welfare subsidies for big energy companies; any plan in the next ten years will be nothing but lipservice as a smokescreen for more fossil fuel and more wars over it.
    How many Katrina sized disasters per year will it take until a real plan is developed?  5 mega storms per year for 10 years?  10 per year?
    Katrina will cost 200 billion in direct federal costs, was that the estimate I saw?
    Maybe a trillion in total losses including lost business.
    So take 50 billion per year away from energy company subsidies, for 10 years, and instead use it to get this renewable energy policy off the ground.
    Or pay literally 100s of trillions in storm costs alone over the next few decades.
    There's a real dilemna, nothing false about it.

    http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

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  3. rh Posted 11:51 pm
    23 Feb 2006

    already happeningAmazing,
    I agree that we need to immediately get a renewable policy off the ground, but if we stopped putting carbon dioxide in the atmosphere this afternoon, what's already up there is more than enough to generate those hugely expensive storms you speak of, renewable policy or not.
    We have a bigger problem than most people realize...and what's the response?
    As Speth points out, we decide to build another 100+ coal plants.
    Yikes
    RH

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  4. odograph Posted 12:02 am
    24 Feb 2006

    trendsThe good news is that trends have (I think) been building in the right direction.  More Americans believe global warming, more are willing to support action.
    The bad news is that it isn't happening very quickly.  We can hope for a tipping point ... but whether we get one is unpredictable.

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  5. amazingdrx's avatar

    amazingdrx Posted 3:31 am
    24 Feb 2006

    Hopeless causeRealize at the outset this is a hopeless cause, then keep reminding yourself.
    Somehow that makes sense of it all?
    Then adopt the naxim: only hopeless causes are really worth fighting for.  Onward.
    (WW 2 was a hopeless cause too, remember the Battle of Britain.  So was the Revolutionary War, remember Valley Forge. Remember the '92 election, another hopeless cause, but with Perot's help Clinton beat Bush)

    http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

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  6. amazingdrx's avatar

    amazingdrx Posted 3:41 am
    24 Feb 2006

    EinsteinEinstein said that exponential growth is the most powerful principle/force in the universe.  I think it is what makes life itself possible.
    When a new product takes hold, (computers, frisbees, yo-yos)like electric cars, wind, solar,and  hydrokinetic power, and reaches a certain percentage of adoption, usually 10%, exponential growth often takes over.
    That can shock everyone.  The internet tech boom of the 90s exhibited this property.  But it fizzled.  
    This energy revolution will have a much stronger growth pattern once we get it off the ground floor.  People need energy, computers are not a necessity in the same sense.

    http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

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  7. sid Posted 11:52 pm
    24 Feb 2006

    loving kindness is the 0nly wayto allow folks to have the courage to wake up

    to the truth

    we see the problem

    we feel so alone

    but just because it's hopeless

    is no reason to give up

    share your feelings

    gardens and everything you have

    if that won't bring people around

    nothing else will

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  8. jdhlax Posted 6:28 pm
    25 Feb 2006

    Not HopelessFirst, differentiate between hope and realistic expectations.  While the most we can realistically hope for is something left to grow back after humans finish their destruction, we should never give up.  Think of "miracle" comebacks in sports, for example.  You never know what's going to happen.  You should always have hope.
    Second, even if your hope is something left to grow back, that's well worth fighting for if you let go of your obsession for humans.  We're far from being the only form of life, so let's fight to give someone else a chance, even if there's no hope for us.

    Jeff Hoffman

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  9. SMLowry's avatar

    SMLowry Posted 4:17 am
    26 Feb 2006

    Re: not hopelessAbsolutely, Jeff. It may be hard, sometimes it may feel impossible, but "miracles" do happen. We know a lot, but there's a lot more we don't know. After my sister was seriously brain injured in a car accident over 20 years ago (she was 21), the doctors told us if she lived, and he gave her a10% chance to live, she would be a "vegetable". Not a great prognosis. But she lived. And she is definitely not a "vegetable". She was in a coma for 8 weeks, it took about 6 months of being in the hospital before she could go to a rehabilitation hospital, where she spent 3 months re-learning the most basic things. Then when she finally came home to live with Daddy (our mother died of cancer while my sister was in her coma -- a devastating time for all of us), it was another two or three years before she came around to where she is now. She definitely has issues related to the brain injury. But she lives a full life, volunteers at the local nursing home, has friends, does things, etc. The doctors knew a lot but they didn't know everything. People say my sister's survival was a "miracle", and I'm not going to argue. However, I learned a lot about love, and hope, and prayer during that time and I also learned that while miracles do exist, they are born of hard work and never giving up.

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  10. amazingdrx's avatar

    amazingdrx Posted 5:20 am
    26 Feb 2006

    Alarming.It is alarming rh.  
    We KNOW that the status quo will continue if we do nothing.  The power behind the present corporate/government energy policy is nearly unbeatable.  
    And for whatever reason, greed, ignorance, insanity, leaders like Cheney just do not care about global climate change.
    As the mega-storms become more frequent though, public opinion will shift, fear tends to do that, as does economic hardship.  60 dollar gas tank fillups.  300 dollar per month heating/cooling bills.
    The head of Walmart has even noticed high gas prices.  He warns on his private website for walmart managers that high gas prices are hurting Walmart sales because it stresses their customers more than it does the upscale retailer's customers.  When even a total porcine tyrant like this can see it, everyone will soon realize it.
    When a huge trend like this occurs, things change  as if by majic.
    And rather than rebuilding coastal cities they will eventually be abandoned.  People will move north and inland farther to avoid drought, fires, months long power outages, riots..all the things that happened from katrina.
    100s of trillions to rebuild will not be there.  But in a few years neither will the capital to finance a large scale solution to global climate change.  The lost economic growth due to climate change and oil wars/terrorism  will deprive society of the savings necessary to finance change.
    The good news is it still maybe possible to maintain a reasonable lifestyle on a family and individual basis by sgifting to alternatives now and moving to refions likely to be protectd from storms, drought, and fire.  It will mean energy and other necessities will need to be produced sustainably within communities, not much commerce with the outside world of constant mayhem will be affordable or safe.
    And then there's always eminent domain, when the big shots need to look for a new capitol they may pick your community, with federal troops enforcing the takeover.

    http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

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