Inertia is a powerful motivation for a society not to change. But sometimes it must be overcome. And although the 'public opinion' barometer for the urgency of climate change shows signs of fatigue, the science is offering increasingly stark warnings. How should we start to think about a monumental and sustained problem that will jeopardise the ecosystems upon which our race depends. Yet it over a time frame that exceeds the immediate interests of most current political and economic opinion leaders. But one which lies within the lives of our own children, and probably within the lives of most people on the planet.But moral responses do not require that we only act if we will be affected. The inter-generational tyranny of climate change is an immoral series of actions - and increasingly so as we become more certain of the reality of the phenomenon. If we agree that 'loving our neighbour as ourselves' is a starting point for ethical discussion, and we agree that people in future generations are our neighbours (as we must) then our actions today have strong moral implications.
I encourage you to read this article, which is the text of a talk by Clive Hamilton (a Professor of Public Ethics at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics, a joint centre of the Australian National University, Charles Sturt University and the University of Melbourne and now the candidate for the Greens in the seat of Higgins). It is from a recent talk, and portrays a grim picture of the recent scientific views of anthropogenic climate forcing ('climate change').
He examines the probability of different impacts depending upon different levels of human action. The 'overshoot' strategy of most wealthy nations (seeing to go to say 550ppm of CO2) neglects the 'run away' effects of warming temperatures upon other natural carbon sinks (such as the methane in Siberian permafrost or the albedo effect of polar ice caps). He also cites the Stern review, which argued that reductions in CO2-e (CO2 equivalents) of more than 1% per annum have historically been associated with economic collapse (although the causation here is reverse what it must be now).
The bottom line is that political action, certainly along the lines of current political thinking, is unlikely to prevent the problem. It is likely we will face many of the consequences despite making the modest changes proposed at the moment. In fact, the current political paradigms are somewhat surreal in the light of the changes ahead. The decision of the author to step off the commentary sidelines and run for office suggest that he is taking the problem seriously.
Read the article, and then we should consider:
- Riding a bicycle rather than driving a car
- Not buy new electronic goods
- Growing our own food
- Reducing the length of hot showers to less than 1 minute
- Writing a letter to an Member of Parliament
- Reading more about this issue
- Asking ourselves 'How will children who are born this decade be affected in say 2050 or 2060?'
- See 'Nothing new under the sun' Blog
