Because we have not yet grasped the enormity of what is happing.
Why?
Because there are so many dimensions to the climate problem – natural science, social science, policy etc.
It’s all jolly well to say that human-induced climate change is widely regarded as one of the greatest – if not the greatest – moral challenges of the 21st century. Not merely does it raise numerous ethical issues, but many of these are profoundly difficult and take us to the limits of our moral imagination.
Moreover, the ethical dilemmas posed by climate change arise at multiple levels – for citizens, scientists, policymakers, organisations, companies, nation-states and the international community – and traverse many different areas of moral inquiry.
If we go on ignoring climate change there will be a social collapse not because the world is getting warmer but because we will be unable to feed ourselves.
There might well be a growing realisation by the public that the weather is changing but in the scientific community, there is a growing realisation that we are rapidly approaching if not already reaching tipping point.
The distribution of seasonal mean temperature anomalies has shifted toward higher temperatures and the range of anomalies has increased.
If existing feedbacks change because the climate changes, or if new feedbacks like permafrost or methane hydrates become relevant, 2C rise will not be the bottom of the range. Add in the extra warming arising from the loss of ice and you have temperatures rises away above.
You don’t have to be a climate scientist to agree that these anomalies are a consequence of global warming because their likelihood in the absence of global warming is exceedingly small.
It is not possible to continue with unstainable capitalist profit which is destroying itself by ignoring science.
Here are the questions yet to be answered.
What is the nature and extent of our responsibilities to future generations?
What is the value of individual species and ecosystems, and how should we value the possible extinction of millions of species?
How should we make decisions in the face of uncertainty, including the possibility of catastrophic and irreversible damage to our planet?
What criteria should be used to determine the appropriate targets for the
stabilisation of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere?
Who should pay for the inevitable costs of climate change mitigation and adaptation, and to what extent, if at all, should those who suffer the negative impacts of climate change be compensated?
How should the international community respond if certain sovereign states block effective global action or refuse to contribute fairly to the collective effort?
The above are also the reasons that we will be unable to act as one.
Capitalism unsustainable policies for profit ensure this. No one wants to bear the cost.
So there is only one solution to make a profit for profit sake pay.
A world aid commission of 0.05% on all profit. ( See previous posts)
All human comments appreciated. All like clicking and abuse chucked in the bin.
I acknowledge receipt of your email to the Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar T.D.
Is mian liom a admháil go bhfuarthas do ríomhphost chuig an Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar T.D
While I appreciate that it is not possible to reply to everyone this is what is wrong with Politicians, hiding behind the unnamed relying on Algorithms.
So in the vain hope of attracting your attention, I am publishing the letter in my Flipboard Magazines. With a request that my reader past it on.
I have also sent this letter to the Irish Times in the hope they might publish it.
The letter:
16/07/2019
Dear Taoiseach,
I write as a man from the land of the Green.
In my life, I have had the great gift of travelling a great deal of the world both by land and sea.
We have recently celebrated the first man on the moon some fifty years ago.
Then as a much younger man, I watched Armstrong place his foot with the famous words.
“That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.”
Never did I think that our world so full of life and beauty might become the dust that his boot stood on.
Every human being has a relationship with plastic but unfortunately not ever one has a relationship with nature that is now facing a crisis that requires once again International recognition of the Unity of the Globe that the moon landing did all those years ago.
This is where Ireland under your leadership has a moral duty to call on all nations of the world to attend a unity of the global conference, in the Emerald Isle the land of forty shades of green.
The Paris Climate change conference achieved shallow unbinding promises.
The clock is ticking until the next US election starting in November 2020 with the winner inaugurated on Wednesday, January 20, 2021.
Just think of the influence of such a world meeting would have on the election of new USA president and its policies re Climate Change.
If you want to leave a legacy to be remembered by other than the backstop/Brexit what better opportunity to promote the Green.
This gathering should have not just world leaders but leading Industrials, representatives from world organisations and the young that are going to inherit the earth.
Its sole purpose is to present the facts from all side and recognize the need for the world to act as one and achieve a just climate change program that is binding and fully financed – a moon landing moment.
The venue could be at Croke Park.
Ireland could lead by example such as banning combustion engines from its major city centre once a month, declaring clear skies once a month, granting long term repayable governments grants to green energy initiatives like solar panels.
For every participant in attendance.
Ireland could plant a tree to offset their travelling carbon footprint.
As warnings of global climate change grow ever direr, no one knows quite what the effect over time will be.
A slowing Gulf stream, or the melting of arctic sea ice.
Climate is already wreaking havoc in some very weird ways.
Just how bad is it really?
We should be terrified.
Yes, we all know that climate change is a concern, but if you are not currently losing sleep over it you are nowhere near having a proper appreciation of what is at stake.
Just how worried should you be that climate change might kill your children?
No one can foretell the future.
Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the climate change story is not that we know exactly what is causing the rise in average global temperature, but that we have known about it for so long.
Fantastic, you declare.
So if we know for sure it is the burning of fossil fuels that is the cause of global warming we can just switch over to renewable sources of energy (like solar and wind turbines) and the crisis will be over. Temperatures will stop rising. Right?
Unfortunately, no.
The magnitude of the climate change threat is immense.
With our predictions consistently underestimate the severity of the problem.
There’s just no way, it cannot all come to a swift end in less than 30 years from now.
If you wrap my head around some very extreme predictions of climate catastrophe within the decade basically your worse horror story comes true on the human race, culminating in it being wiped from the face of the planet.
Surely nonsense. Except… It is true.
Savage wildfires, 25-mile long icebergs, disappearing lakes, freak allergies, and the threat of long-gone diseases re-emerging should be enough to convince the most unconvinced.
Here are a few other facts unreported.
Speed up the melting of glaciers, and mountains will rebounding faster.
Slows down satellites, requiring engineers to periodically boost them back into their proper orbits.
Speed up the thawing of permanently frozen soil – lakes draining,(125 lakes in the Arctic have disappeared in the past few decades), mudslides. rock falls, sinkholes- long-dormant diseases like smallpox could re-emerge as the ancient dead, their corpses thawing along with the tundra, get discovered by modern man.
Temples, ancient settlements and other artefacts that stand as monuments to civilizations past will disappear.
Because the earth is warming the migration of birds is changing so is the genetic profile of their entire population changing.
Arctic Phytoplankton Blooms Earlier
Your grandchildren will inherit inexorably rising temperatures that render much of the Earth uninhabitable. Their problem? Yes, but yours, too.
Humans are the most common large animal to ever walk the planet, in the not so distant future we are likely to be besieged by climate “refugees” arriving.
A 4C temperature rise will result in a global economic meltdown, disastrous food shortages and conflicts over natural resources and water.
Cars, trains, roads, and buildings, flood barriers, drains, underground systems, reservoirs, power stations, ports and all are designed for existing temperatures, sea levels and rainfall.
Even worse, the warmer, wetter conditions will encourage the fungal, algal, tick-and-mosquito-borne diseases we usually only see in the tropics. with climate change will be a recipe for social disorder, ill–health and mass grumpiness.
If there are water and power cuts, as expected, then get ready for migrations out of urban areas to the cooler countryside.
4% is quite enough to kill off trees, wildlife, garden plants, insects, and river life.
The notion that human activity, or the activity of any organism, can affect Earth on a planetary scale is still a hard one for many people to swallow. And it is this kind of disbelief that fuels much of the public scepticism surrounding global warming.
However, our intelligence, technology and sheer numbers mean our species packs a punch that can shake the world in wild ways.
Climate scientists confidently expect temperatures to rise up to 4C by 2100.
ARE THEY DETACHED FROM REALITY.
I DONT THINK SO.
Economics is a fully owned subsidiary of the biosphere. The sooner we realize it the better.
Rising productivity is damaging us all.
The economy should serve us all rather than dominate us all and it must work within the planetary ecological boundaries.
We most let more of the real word into economical spending decisions.
If nations invested 2.5 per cent of their GDP, or about $2.4 trillion globally each year, in the restructuring OF OUR WORLD MARKETS they may be able to perform the required transition TO A SUSTAINABLE MARKET PLACE in 20 years.
IN THE MEANTIME;
No matter how high humans cause the mercury to rise and how much damage we do to the planet, Earth and life will survive. It just might no longer be in the form we prefer or the form that allows us to thrive.
Earth could care less.
We will be recorded as a minor perturbation in the Earth system. The Earth will go on.
The question is: Will we?”
We can have no climate justice without migrant justice.
(SEE PREVIOUS POST FOR POSITIVE SUGGESTIONS TO SOLVE CLIMATE CHANGE)
All human comments appreciated. All like clicking and abuse chucked in the bin.
With all our technology and communication tools one would think by now that the messages being sent by Earth in the form of climate change would be ringing alarm bells all around the world.
Unfortunately, our existential anxiety is still not fueled by a burning planet.
We have many world leaders, but no leadership.
Yes, the world is better off when leaders act in their nations’ best interests and it is hard to argue that we’re not in a time of crises. Civilisation is best served when leaders also act in the best interest of their region and that of the community of nations.
That requires leadership.
The reality of climate change is now staring us all in the face but we are unable to take collective action.
We all have different views on today’s reality, but when our world and civilization has been viewed as it truly is, nothing could be more disgusting than what pathetic human rule has done to our entire world population.
The UN remains an indispensable world forum to coordinate policies, voice grievances, and even take collective action. But the effectiveness of the world body is determined only by the efficacy of the leaders of its member states, notably those permanent residents of the UN Security Council – the world’s government.
Unfortunately, they preach that which they don’t practise, cause tensions, and create more problems than they solve.
Therefore seeing just how much civilization all around this world has been suffering so badly in many different ways through pollution, genocide, violence, GMO, pharmaceuticals, human trafficking, slavery, torture, and now natural worldwide disasters, you would be right to say the chances of global cooperation to tackle Climate change is impossible.
When all that any individual can really see is all the pain, suffering, and the many difficulties upon billions; all they really want most out of their own life is the way to help all on this earth by taking control but the chances of replacing greed with common sense are zero. As human beings in a messed up world, all that we can do is live day by day with hope for better tomorrows.
This is the reason why we just do not hear the truth that the world is at a pivotal point.
The Earth is a beautiful machine without consciousness hence it will react without any self-monitoring ability.
The old world order is no more, but there’s no new world order either. The confusion allows all to blame all, and in the process, everyone escapes accountability for their lack of international responsibility.
Climate change might sound unbelievable but it is not a false alarm.
It is never wise to underestimate the ingenuity of Mother Nature and I am sure that there is no one doubts that the future will still have unpleasant biological surprises in store.
It seems a sensible precaution, therefore, to start taking action before the climate is wreaking havoc on the human race.
We cannot be sure that anything our primitive species ever designed would be effective against Climate change.
History is full of nightmares, some natural some man-made.
We might have peace of mind before whatever inescapable doom awaits us ( in not the so distant future) Accepting that it is an impossibility to get humanity to act as one we need a country to lead by example.
As there is no good worldwide for the benefit of our entire population, but rather only misleading lies in every direction what better country than Ireland the land of forty shades of green.
WHY NOT CALL A WORLD CONFERENCE:
Every human being has a relationship with plastic but unfortunately not ever one has a relationship with nature that is now facing a crisis that requires once again International recognition of the Unity of the Globe.
This is where Ireland has a moral duty to call on all nations of the world to attend a Unity of the global conference, in the Emerald Isle.
For every participant in attendance, Ireland will plant a tree to offset their travelling carbon footprint.
The Paris Climate change conference achieved shallow unbinding promises.
The clock is ticking until the next US election starting in November 2020 with the winner inaugurated on Wednesday, January 20, 2021.
Just think of the influence of such a world meeting would have on the election of new USA president and its policies re Climate Change.
If you want to leave a legacy to be remembered by other than the backstop/Brexit what better opportunity to promote the Green.
This gathering should have not just world leaders but leading Industrials, representatives from world organisations and the young that are going to inherit the earth.
Its sole purpose is to present the facts from all side and recognize the need for the world to act as one and achieve a just climate change program that is binding and fully financed – a moon landing moment.
The venue could be at Croke Park.
We are now in need of universal laws of logic and we have to assemble them in such a way that at least one of them work.
There is no more room or time for the Blame game.
All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.
In my life, I have had the great gift of travelling the world both by land and sea.
Today we are celebrating the first man on the moon some fifty years ago.
Then as a much younger man, I watched Armstrong place his foot with now the famous words ” A small step for man, a giant step for humankind.
Never did I think that our world so full of life might become the dust that his boot stood on.
Every human being has a relationship with plastic but unfortunately not ever one has a relationship with nature that is now facing a crisis that requires an International recognition of the Unity of the Globe.
This is where Ireland has a moral duty to call on all nations of the world to attend a Unity of the global conference, in the Emerald Isle.
For every participant in attendance plant a tree to offset their travelling carbon footprint.
The Paris Climate change conference achieved shallow unbinding promises.
The clock is ticking until the next US election starting in November 2020 with the winner inaugurated on Wednesday, January 20, 2021.
Just think of the influence of such a world meeting would have on the election of new USA president and its policies re Climate Change.
This gathering should have not just world leaders but leading Industrials, representative from world organisation and the young that are going to inherit the earth.
Its sole purpose is to present the facts from all side and recognize the need for the world to act as one and achieve a just climate change program that is binding, and fully financed – a moon landing moment.
The venue could be at Croke Park.
I Robert De Mayo Dillon are humble available to discuss why Ireland should be the birthplace of a new begging.
THE BASIC SCIENCE BEHIND CLIMATE CHANGE IS ACTUALLY SIMPLE AS IS THE BASIC REALITY OF THE ONE CERTAINTIES IN CLIMATE SCIENCE. THE WORLD HAS GOT WARMER.
It’s no longer an academic question or a question to be arguing from a position of hope.
Dealing with the impact on the environment requires concerted action, not just by a few, but by everyone.
With increasing frequency, evidence of global warming and climate change are making headlines around the world. Politicians, while giving lip service to the dangers that lie ahead for the planet, lack a fundamental understanding of either the dangers or the solution to the problem.
They all promise a technological solution but fail to grasp the social context which makes the problem difficult to solve.
The urgency and complicated nature of a solution put humanity at a distinct disadvantage and many scientists involved in the study of our planet concur that if we act now, we would only be able to make a difference in what is happening by the end of the century.
The problem is that the situation is growing more desperate and yet those in power are not.
Why are these issues so difficult to address?
Because the crisis looms because of the power of money of the oil companies. They have a vested interest in not developing other forms of energy to compete with oil.
Because the present shifts we are experiencing are not global.
At present, there is no chain reaction around the world that pushes Earth into a terrifying new hothouse state from which there is no return.
Because of the diagnosis of climate change is still a scientific issue, the response to it is not.
Because the world, after 30 years of warnings, has barely got to grips with reducing carbon dioxide emissions.
Leaving fossil fuels in the ground is, for example, a question of regulation, while investing in renewable energy is a policy choice, and modernising our housing stock to make it energy efficient is about overcoming the lobbying power of the building industry the energy industry.
Because while extracting new fossil fuels continuing, we are on course for another 2C or 3C to transform Earth this century. At best we are flatlining, with investments in Green energy.
Because none of this climate change will be smooth, gradual and linear changes. It may be fast, abrupt, and dangerous surprises may happen.
Because climate migration is already happening.
Europe is not coping well with even modest numbers of migrants, and future flows look likely to increase substantially as migration itself is an adaptation to rapid climate change.
How will the cooler, richer parts of the world react to tens of millions of people escaping the hotter, poorer parts?
Because if we throw into the mix long-term stagnating incomes for most people across the west and climate-induced crop failures causing massive food price spikes and we have a recipe for widespread unrest that could overload political institutions.
Because we now have inward-looking nationalists that will move us further away from the internationalism needed to ensure the continuation of stable global food supplies and to manage migration humanely. And without cooperative internationalism serious carbon dioxide mitigation will not happen, meaning the underlying drivers of the problems will exacerbate, leading to a lock-in of a deteriorating, isolationist, fascist future.
We are facing the same three choices in response to climate change as we did before this scorching summer:
Reduce greenhouse gas emissions (mitigation), make changes to reduce the adverse impacts of the new conditions we create (adaptation), or suffer the consequences of what we fail to mitigate or adapt to.
So what can be done?
In order to alter the direction of climate change, an effective strategy, based on a consensus between developing and industrialized nations, is essential.
This agreement must address the social factors inherent in the system- inequality.
Politicians will need to understand the real issues involved in technology and its social aspects and adopt plans which will have long term goals.
Can the damage done be reversed? Only time can tell, but climate change is certainly becoming increasingly apparent, and immediate action is necessary if irreparable damage is to be averted.
Given the colossal wealth and the scientific knowledge available today, we can solve many of the world’s pressing problems and all live well.
Given that our environmental impacts are so long-lasting, the future is the politics we make today. The future is up to us if we act collectively and engage in politics.
As I have suggested in previous posts all activities that are profit for profit sake should be made to contribute to a world aid fund. ( See previous posts) Market forces are really important — and that they could be harnessed to fight climate change.
No governments,no countries, no companies, no forms of taxation, no non-binding promises, no tree planting, no electric cars, no world organisations , no one person, no protests, no declaration of an emergency, no extensions, no amount of warming, no amounts of warnings, no natural disasters will make any financial contributions to the trillion that are going to be needed.
We all know our world is in a state of crisis but we have seen nothing yet that is going to accompany climate change.
I am sure that there is no need to draw the picture.
We do know some incontrovertible facts, however. CO2 concentrations, temperatures and sea levels are all rising.
Why are we being such idiots about climate change?
Climate change deniers say nothing is certain. True, we don’t know if the planet will be two degrees or ten degrees warmer in 2100. Yes, humans may be causing climate change, but trying to do anything meaningful would collapse the economy and send us back to the Dark Ages.
The sobering truth is that the planet has already been responding faster than expected. It’s crushingly obvious that fighting climate change should be one of the world’s top priorities.
What gives?
It’s not that they are stupid or blind. Instead, they seem to firmly believe that climate solutions inevitably mean more government, higher taxes and less freedom — and thus are threats to their core values and identity. Dire warnings of the looming climate disaster may just make people throw up their hands in despair, sink into denial, or dig their heels in deeper against government action.
So here’s where we now stand.
We have a pretty clear understanding of the threat climate change poses to us, our children and our grandchildren. We are already being forced to cope with more droughts, more floods, more extreme storms. At the same time, we have in our arsenal effective policies that are difficult for rational people to demagogue as crippling to the economy or as a subversion of our cherished way of life.
We thus face a stark choice. Do we let future historians excoriate us for our failure to act in time? Or do we step up to meet the challenge?
So it’s really up to you.
Insist that climate change be a key issue in elections and all future elections.
Combat the lies and deceit from the Koch brothers/ Donald Dump Presidents and other deep-pocketed climate deniers. Push for a reasonable fee on carbon and for incentives for renewable energy (and energy efficiency steps) at all levels of government.
Make Greed Pay:
To day we celebrate man landing on the moon. In not the so distant future we could be celberating the last man on earth.
All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.
Humanity has not yet learned how to live in harmony with nature.
With coming climate change just how humanity and nature can co-exist in a period of insurmountable capitalist contradiction, especially when humanity takes the form of small business people hoping to exploit natural resources under duress is yet to be answered.
The planet will and would heal itself in a mere 5,000 years, probably. And that’s the blink of an eye in the lifetime of our planet. Earth can shrug off humanity without breaking a sweat.
Perhaps we got it wrong.
It’s not global warming but global dimming that is going to do the damage. It might be getting warmers because of Co2 but it is also getting dimmer. Less light is reaching the surface of the planet today than at any time since the last great volcanic blowout.
Both, in turn, affects ocean water temperature, which alters water currents, which alters water evaporation, which alters weather patterns, which leads to unnatural variation in those weather patterns (i.e. natural disasters).
One way or the other if we continue to destroy the environment and terrorize the ecosystems of this planet, there are going to be consequences and these consequences will, one way or another, ultimately bring the planet back into balance.
It is humanity’s decision whether that balance will include the human race.
It doesn’t even count how we’re poisoning rivers and streams, obliterating the rainforest, destroying ocean ecosystems, and now we’re even poisoning our own water supplies with traces of prescription drugs. How stupid is that?
We even poison ourselves. So much for “advanced civilization.”
Forget about bioterrorists — nature is the biggest threat to human life as we know it on this planet, simply because modern human life is largely a threat to nature.
Unless we learn from our lessons and find a way to honour and respect the very planet that has given us life, this planet will take it away from us.
It’s frightening but true:
Our planet is now in the midst of its sixth mass extinction of plants and animals.
It would be long before we’ll be struggling to mitigate the effects of climate change, which means we’ll be running out of land to grow crops, fresh water, our coasts will be disappearing, and anything edible in the sea is probably going to cook by the rapidly rising temperatures.
We could soon be sparring with the kinds of enemies were not even close to knowing how to deal with.
Take temperatures for example.
As a species, we have endured the heat of re-entry into our atmosphere, about 2,000 degrees Celsius. And yet people have died at temperatures around 20 degrees Celsius from Hyperthermia.
We can tolerate the condition up to 50–55-degree Celsius above that our body will either die of dehydration or due to core body temperature fluctuation no one will survive if core body temperature rises above 40–41-degree Celsius…(sweating and shivering) that lets us maintain a temperature of about 36C.
Since higher pressure makes it harder for sweat to evaporate the lower the humidity, the higher the temperature needed to kill a person.
Like a modern Adam and Eve, we ass individuals might be trying to set the example for a new Garden of Eden but we are headed down a path of certain self-destruction when looking at the world as a whole.
One only has to look out the window to see the effects of temperature and humidity in our daily activities.
Our world behaviour is simply not sustainable.
Either we learn how to respect nature, or we’ll be wiped out and nature will make the adjustments for us.
The vast majority of species that will be affected by climate change in the short term are insects.
As a result, immense shifts are predicted in population dynamics, abundance and geographical spread of insects.
Some people say that we urgently need to build our understanding of how climate change will affect health, especially through insect-borne disease. Bugs thrive in warmer climates,
There will be little point if we are all fried or drowned.
But here is the good news.
One area of particular concern is how climate change will affect the spread of insect-borne diseases. These include dengue fever, malaria, Lyme disease, West Nile virus, Rift Valley fever, chikungunya and yellow fever. They are spread through the bite of ‘vectors’ such as mosquitoes, ticks and flies.
Adult cat fleas die in temperatures colder than (8°C), and hotter than (35°C). Fleas can’t survive outdoors when temperatures surpass 35c for more than 40 hours a month.
How much we must cut emissions remains unresolved.
In August 2003, Europe’s summer was about 3.5 degrees Celsius above average and an estimated 45,000 people died over two weeks.
The lag between growing emissions and the corresponding increase in temperature means that we can expect at least another 0.6-degree Celsius global temperature rise over the next few decades.
All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.
Earth will survive Global Warming because it couldn’t care less.
We will be recorded as a minor perturbation in the Earth system.
The Earth will go on.
The question is: Will we?
This is a tricky question because even starting the conversation is a point of
no return.
No matter how high humans cause the mercury to rise and how much damage we do to the planet, Earth and life will survive but not us.
Humans are the most common large animal to ever walk the planet but the notion that human activity, or the activity of an organism, can affect Earth on a planetary scale is still a hard one for many people to swallow.
However, the idea that biology can alter the planet in broad and dramatic ways is now widely accepted. It just might no longer be in the form we prefer or the form that allows us to thrive.
So what will?
Though it might seem as if humans are mere fleas along for a ride on the back of an immense animal called Earth, our intelligence, technology and sheer numbers mean our species packs a punch that can shake the world in wild ways.
The highest populations aren’t strictly on Earth at all, but floating in its atmosphere. Tardigrades.
WHAT IS AN TARDIGRADE?
Micro-animals, so small that they can be visually observed only under a microscope.
They are able to survive temperatures of close to absolute zero (−273 °C (−459 °F)), temperatures as high as 151 °C (304 °F), and radiation that would kill other animals, including all humans.
They can go almost a decade without water. They have the ability to dry out until its body is less than 3 per cent water, and then come bounce back once they’re rehydrated.
Since 2007, tardigrades have also returned alive from studies in which they have been exposed to the vacuum of outer space in low Earth orbit.
There are around 1,000 species, all capable of outliving any of us.
They don’t have to eat for 30 years and if necessary can turn to cannibalism.
Tardigrade fossils have been found as far back as 520 million years ago evolving with their own unique genes over that protracted period of time.
They can clone themselves.
Tardigrades are nearly see-through but you can see them under the right light with the naked eye.
Their entire genome has been sequenced with roughly one-sixth of the tardigrade’s genome stolen from other species. 1.2 per cent of the tardigrade genome comes from other organisms, including plants, fungi, bacteria, and viruses. Another words “proprietary,” and not the result of horizontal gene transfer.
Their genomes contain more copies of an anti-oxidant enzyme and a DNA-repair gene than any other animal.
Instead of thinking of the tree of life, we should be thinking about the web of life.
Genetic material crossing from branch to branch.
Basically, they are nearly impossible to kill.
They oxygenated the Earth’s early atmosphere as they began to harness the power of sunlight through photosynthesis.
We don’t consider them as part of the Earth system right now in our calculation about what’s going on, and we don’t consider them in terms of how the Earth system will move forward into the future.
These microbes anchored soil to the ground; We owe them everything.
Earth might still be frozen today if not for the appearance of new life forms.
As organisms evolved, many developed the ability to breathe oxygen.
In the process, they exhaled another greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide, which eventually thawed out the world.
They are capable of mobilizing things beyond there own biology.
They will inherit the earth that they made in the first place.
All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.
It’s no secret that our planet is in a pretty dire condition.
The Earth’s importance is self-evident.
Over the past 250 years, the activities of humans have caused enough harm that they may lead to dramatic environmental changes.
It is now unbelievable that we are being told that if we continue with the status quo our way of life could come to an end within the next fifteen years.
So why is it unbelievable that we, (and we mean all of us) cannot take a stand to stop our present course.
If we don’t protect the planet we and all that are on it can kiss our collective ass goodbye.
The reason is we are unable to see beyond greed. Climate might do it subtly or brutally but we are doing it by encouraging profound inequity.
Wealth in the hands of a few.
As the world heats up we will see more ecological degradation, scarce resources and even scarcer opportunities, which will lead to great swathes of people moving.
Right now, right at this very second, you are aligning yourself with a particular version of the world. You’re creating it around yourself with every breath, with every thought so you think, but a belief is an assumed truth.
We hear Scientists warnings, Paris Climate change promises, countries declaring an emergency while the main themes of the 2019 G20 meeting were:
Global economy
Trade and investment.
Innovation.
Environment and energy.
Employment.
Women’s employment.
Development.
Health.
For me the issue is clear. The current version of capitalism is a disaster. Worse yet, it is unsustainable.
Knowing what we can have, is just as important as knowing what we no longer want.
Tinkering with the current version of shareholder capitalism simply won’t do.
The connective tissue between business and society needs to be ripped apart.
Look back at some of the most tragic episodes in human history and you will find words and images that stripped people of their basic human traits. It’s hard to see the good in anything anymore when you see what is happening to our world.
Dehumanising of the planet continues unabated with Algorithms, Machine Learning, Data Mining, Face Recognition, the invasion of the human body, removing the need for a working memory, Donald Trump anti-Mexican/Muslim rhetoric, digitally manipulated by virtual reality, Suicide bombers and terrorists who don’t care if the other side lives or dies.
Governments and business must get off the shelf and face reality.
Its time to take positive action like banning cars from the city centre a least one day a week, like clearing our skies one day a week, banning flights, like offering non-repayable green energy grants, like planting on unproductive land with trees, like banning consumption advertising, like financially supporting the phaseout of combustion engines, like stop fooling ourselves that we have fifty years for technology to come up with a solution.
Lip service is no longer acceptable.
Why?
Because we know that Greenland is melting and no human has ever seen the collapse of an ice sheet. There is nothing in recorded history.
We know the climate is warming. Look out the window.
Greenland is already contributed 200/300 billion of ice melt a year. Over the past years, it has lost a trillion tons of ice.
Unfortunately, Climate change remains so far from our imaginations we are unable to fully appreciate that it will determine our future.
However, people are starting to see the power they have if they get together but we continue to live our lives as if nothing is going to happen.
WE ALL MUST TAKE A STAND.
There is no point in reading the small print like hurricanes, droughts, flooding, wildfires, all put done to an extreme weather event.
There is no point in independent countries declaring climate emergencies.
There is no point in creating new forests of trees especially trees of one variety that will take years to mature.
There is no point asking Opec to stop the production of oil. They want to sell every last drop no matter what the cost.
There is no point appealing to the President Trumps of the world.
As the saying goes, “there is no point in crying over spilt milk”.
Based on the Universal Law of Cause and Effect.
The effects of Co2 emissions combinded with Methane as the permafrost melts will and is rising the temperature which is the essence of all laws in nature.
Our lives these days are filled with television, wasting time on social networks like Facebook and Twitter. But when you see something you like online, do you check to make sure that it’s true before you share it?
The climate change the final events are upon us.
“People’s lives matter more than any political game.
All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.
AND NOW HAVE TO SOLVE OUR PROBLEMS WITH STONE AGE RULES.
WE CAN CALCULATE WHEN WE NEED TO BE DONE AND IT’S FRIGHTING WHATEVER WAY YOU LOOK AT IT.
IT’S ONLY US THAT CAN DESTROY THE CLIMATE OR CHANGE HUMAN BEHAVIOUR ENOUGH TO STOP IT.
We must now face the inevitable that long before Voyager Two sents back its last message it is most likely that there will be on here to hear it.
It’s happening everywhere, you can see it and you can feel it but for the most part, it is the invisible that will change first. Environmental change, Human factors, Economic effects and Political effects.
But, wait! There are people who are convinced that such a thing will never happen. Our ingenuity, they say, it is more than able to take care of that situation.
Without a habitable planet, we’re not destroying the world, we’re destroying ourselves.
There are six factors that make earth the habitable planet that it is now: water, temperature, atmosphere, energy, biogenic compounds and distance from the sun.
THERE IS NO POINT talking about it, writing, protesting, crying, the price has to paid now not in the distant future.
The change that is to come when we are the past will not suffice.
THERE IS NO POINT WAITING TO SEE WHAT WILL HAPPEN.
THERE IS NO POINT IN PARIS CLIMATE AGREEMENTS WHICH CANNOT BE INFORCED OR PAID FOR.
THERE IS NO POINT DECLARING AN EMERGENCY ON DEAF USA /CHINA/ RUSSIAN/ INDIA, EARS.
THERE IS NO POINT ASKING THE CAPITALIST SYSTEM TO CHANGE OR PAY FOR THE DAMAGE DONE.
These ecosystem services are taken for granted and their willful obliteration proceeds at an ever-accelerating pace, despite ample evidence that we are committing suicide.
THERE IS NO POINT RELYING ON TECHNOLOGY TO RECTIFY THE PROBLEMS.
THERE IS NO POINT IN PRAYING TO WHATEVER GOD OR GODS YOU BELIEVE IN.
THERE IS NO POINT RECYCLING PLASTIC BY BURNING FOSSIL FUELS.
We now pretend that returning to plant carbon that is produced in annual cycles will somehow replace the geological carbon sources produced over eons.
THERE IS NO POINT planting trees, virtue will not be rewarded.
THERE IS EVERY POINT TO TACKLE INEQUALITY.
Scarcity of resources that can be alleviated only by market-based solutions.
Unfortunately for all Earthlings of whatever religious persuasion, the pristine lakes, rivers and streams, clean beaches, thriving forests, living oceans and seas, and fertile unspoiled land, cannot be “produced” by more regulations or by less.
Despite recycling efforts, almost 9 million tons of plastic end up in our oceans.
To deliver biofuels that would displace all fossil fuels, as well as food, we would have to manufacture and colonize six extra Earth-like planets.
I submit to you that this is the grandest of the many delusions that have ripped through human cultures over the millennia.
So here is a blog to read that tell the truth.
( “In order for us to maintain our way of living, we must, in a broad sense, tell lies to each other, and especially to ourselves. It is not necessary that the lies be particularly believable. The lies act as barriers to truth. These barriers to truth are necessary because without them many deplorable acts would become impossibilities. Truth must be at all costs avoided.
When we do allow self-evident truths to percolate past our defences and into our consciousness, they are treated like so many hand grenades rolling across the dance floor of an improbably macabre dance party. We try to stay out of harm’s way, afraid that they will go off, shatter our delusions, and leave us exposed to what we have done to ourselves and to the world, expose us as the hollow people we have become.
And so we avoid these truths, these self-evident truths, and continue the dance of world destruction.” Derrick Jensen, A Language Older Than Words, Context Books, New York, 2000, Silencing, page 2.
People all across the world are scared, angry and disoriented, and their governments routinely fail to explain the very basics of what is going on. Why is that?
Perhaps for the first time in modern western democracy, our leaders and leading intellectuals are relying in an essential way on keeping people confused. This puts us on the opposite side of the moon from the attitudes of John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Voltaire, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, and so on, who did their best to explain their thinking clearly to all. When these great men lived, the Earth surely seemed infinite, but she is very small today.
Here is the kicker: To pretend nowadays that the Earth is infinite, as most of us effectively do, and is capable of feeding our runaway economy ad infinitum requires some serious self-delusion.
In fairness to our leaders, they lie and we eagerly consume their lies, because otherwise, we would have to change from within, and for most people change is genetically impossible. Generally, we leave change to political campaign slogans which so obviously lies that we do not have to do anything.
So, this is how it goes. Someone lies about an economic recovery which is just around the corner; someone else lies about the banks that must be saved at any cost with our money because they are too big to fail; and yet somebody else professes that converting over half of our fossil-fuel driven food to a fossil-driven biofuel is good for all. And we all listen to these empty lies and eagerly try to believe them, for what else we can do. That is a good question, isn’t it: What else can we do? Can you think about a thing or two you could change on your own?
How far do we need to step outside of the current system of lies that are fact to most?
Not that far, it turns out. All we need to do is to admit that the Earth is finite, her resources are finite, and the current global economic system cannot grow. In Europe, Japan, and the U.S., the respective economic systems have already reached the maximum attainable complexity and must undergo deep simplifications.
My Conclusions
“ “Maturity,” Bokonon tells us, is “bitter disappointment for which no remedy exists, unless laughter can be said to remedy anything.” ”Kurt Vonnegut, Cat’s Cradle, Chapter 88, page 198.
More of the tropical forest has been burned alive and a new oil palm or soybean plantation is born. This plantation will produce biodiesel or feed for Chinese livestock. The good environmentalists will observe that the carbon footprint of the clean biodiesel produced on this plantation is negligible. The good marketers will say that a free-market solution is used to develop an idle resource in a third-world country. I say that everybody lies to cover this self-evident crime, but the living Earth is diminished further, in exchange for 10 – 20 years of someone’s illegal cash profits, most likely financed with a World Bank loan. After that, the polluted, depleted, and eroded-away land will be abandoned, and the plantation will take over another area of the forest. And so on, until we run out of the forest.
I am mature alright, and I laugh a lot, but this is what I must say through tears: The Earth is not in a state of “environmental crisis” that would imply a temporary condition amenable to remediation. Because of too many people, who consume too much and produce too many things using messy technologies, the Earth is in the state of chronic environmental degradation which shows signs of acceleration, not abating. There are no global solutions, but there are ever more deleterious designs on what is left of the environmental services of the planet. One such big design involves the production of biofuels in the tropics, and Europe and the United States of America are deeply implicated.
We want to avoid the outcome of Cat’s Cradle: All life on Earth being exterminated by superior science. Thus, we need to step out of the bounds of our current systems thinking and look from the outside on the false security of our complex societies. Perhaps then we will be able to see more clearly where this continuing environmental degradation leads us and do something.
It is safe to say that my difficult and unpleasant suggestions will not be heard by mainstream journalists and politicians on the left or the right. But what is bound to happen then? My natural laughter freezes when I think about the consequences of stumbling along, while also knowing that exactly nothing will happen until it is way-way too late“.)
Most people don’t realize What happens to our heat-trapping fossil fuel emissions after we release them, … will continue to expand even though Earth’s atmosphere has begun to recover.
A human can live for only 5 minutes without air, 3 days without water, and 30 days without food.
If you want to live now is the time for Profit Capitalism to be made to pay. ( See previous posts on a World Aid
With Climate change now becoming a by-product of consumerism we will unfortunately all end up as products of our cultures.
There is no second world that any of us are going to to visit.
All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.
Global economy
