Global Warming: Mother Earth Knows How To Cure Her Own Fever (With Follow-Up Correspondence)

 

Caribou,

I agree! 

Australia's discovery of a coral as large as the Empire State Building is good news. (Folks are also learning that there are more deep-level corals than we thought.)

However...

I do not talk much about my criticism of "the left," but I do think there is a super-abundance of cataclysmic alarmism on "our" side of the aisle. 

At times, I too am guilty of this alarmism. (Please keep in mind that NOTHING I am about to say exempts us from our core responsibility to nurture and sustain the environments of which we are part, and as well as we possibly can. Part of me is reluctant to say these things at all because "the dumbf*cks" will put such observations to evil use.)

To be sure, many ecosystems as we know them are completely bollixed.

Which reminds me... 

We should talk about my recent realization that I can be so good with words-and-argumentation that only recently have I become wary of my ability to fool myself!?! (Speaking of which, listen to the first sentence of Neil DeGrasse Tyson's "Master Class" promotional ad. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kPINNhHGNw I can't tell you how smiley-face-happy I feel every time I hear this towering genius speak. If I got to know Neil, I expect I would often harbor different views. But his genius just sparkles!)

Yes, we must act as if our lives depended on it.

But we mustn't lose sight of the fact that nature is extraordinarily resilient. 

At a very deep level... 

Are you familiar with the concept of "punctuated evolution?" 

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punctuated_equilibrium

PBS: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/library/03/5/l_035_01.html

Perhaps a decade ago, I asked Arthur Clark -- a pioneering environmentalist - what he thought the ultra-rich would do when they finally realized the world's "entire" coastline was "going under." (Of course a very large part of the world's coast is dominated by cliffs and so rising sea levels will have little impact there.)

Without a pause, Arthur replied: "Move to a higher elevation."

It sounds macabre to say such a thing, but it is a "viable" option. (Which is not to deny the catastrophic impact of this mass migration away from the coast. 40% of America's population lives in counties that border the coast. https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/population.html)

However, not only will fleeing humans escape the sinking coastline, they will take up residence in a compensatorily cooler environment into which -- by way of bonus -- agriculture will expand. God knows we'll soon need new habitats for wine grape production. And we will soon see massive acreage newly opened to agriculture in the Canadian plains, Siberia, Northern Russia and Scandivia.  (Nearly ten years ago, professor Robert Jackson, who specializes in tropical plant hydraulics, told me that desertification was "baked into the cake" and that California would "soon" be "toast" at least as far north as San Francisco.)  

Dman

PS Here is another deep-level prospect for global warming reversal. I think of it as Mother Earth knowing how to cure her own "fever."

https://phys.org/news/2015-07-ice-age.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyAuWeoTm2s

https://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/will-global-warming-trigger-new-ice-age

PPS Speaking of "a coral as big as the Empire State Building reminds of a brilliant F. Scott Fitzgerald story/novella I once recommended to you: "The Diamond As Big As The Ritz." Please keep in mind that it is critically important that you KNOW NOTHING about this story before you read it. The element of surprise is indispensable to full enjoyment. ALL SPOILERS should be VERBOTEN. Here is an online version of this Fitzgerald story that lets you "jump in" without tempting you to indulge spoilers. https://etc.usf.edu/lit2go/224/tales-of-the-jazz-age/5769/the-diamond-as-big-as-the-ritz-chapter-1/ I think you and Abi -- or Selena and you -- would have GREAT fun reading this story out loud. 

On Tue, Oct 27, 2020 at 1:50 PM Johann Pachelbel wrote:

much needed hope.

C

On Tue, Oct 27, 2020 at 11:25 AM Alan Archibald <alanarchibaldo@gmail.com> wrote:

Coral bigger than Empire State Building found in Great Barrier Reef

On Tue, Oct 27, 2020 at 4:17 PM Ed M wrote:

Hola Compa, it sounds like Bou (Boo) is vacillating between Abi ‘n’ Selena ... VERY glad to hear of your recent realization that I can be so good with words-and-argumentation that only recently have I become wary of my ability to fool myself!

It’s a healthy realization, especially coming from within  

... altho I DON’T consider it “alarmist” to spell out impending doom (which is the track we’re on) toward irreversible hell while there is still time (maybe) to survive:   i.e. once the polar reflective ice is gone and darker surfaces (land or sea) MORE rapidly absorb heat, the impending disaster rushes at us w/ NO time to do anything. 

So, to urge action (w/ alarms ringing) NOW, is much more logical than “alarmist”  ...

Remember how our “democracy” works:  we argue back-and-forth, give speeches and copious muttering, until the last minute, before anything is done.  When you have wasted all the “get-something-done“ time and we are on the exponential rise of the consequences, it’s WAY too late.   NOTE: that’s way too late for US —  Once we’re out of the picture Nature will recover just fine!

Remember “COLLAPSE”,  How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, by Jared Diamond (New York., Viking adult, 2005, 592 pages), which reviews multiple societies that have “disappeared“ over history;  the only difference now is that the “writing on the wall” is global (as will be the consequences). 

C’est la f——— vie.     Ed 

Dear Ed,

"We must act as if our lives depended on it."

What I see in the non-stop alarmism is disproportionate, unrelenting focus on political interventions which distract us from the essential, bedrock changes we need to make in our own squanderously consumptive lives.

Admittely, there is a huge role for government policy, but I come back to the paradigm of "the blue plastic bins" which, as good pilgrims we ritualistically carry to curbside once a week, patting ourselves on the back for "doing the right thing," when increasingly there is no market for those recyclables which often end up in the landfill anyway. That said, there is something we can do and here's an outline of the "do-able" from the Sierra Club: https://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/2019-4-july-august/feature/us-recycling-system-garbage

Every time we take recycling to curbside we confirm our personal sense of environmental virtue, without ever asking: "Why is it that I'm hauling so much shit to curbside."

To prompt the most meaningful reflection on personal responsibility, how about cash rebates (in the form of lowered taxes?) for people whose homes use 75 percent less energy than that consumed by a "typical" citizen?

Perhaps we could turn this "reflection" into a competition by eliminating altogether the property tax (or the property tax equivalent, perhaps as a reduction in federal tax) for the household which, per capita, uses the least energy.

Similar enticement could apply for vehicular fuel consumption (taking into account the fossil fuel combusted to provide the electricity to charge electric cars). 

Here's an article that sorts the good information from the bad in Michael Moore's recent documentary production, "Planet Of The Humans," concerning the villainous relationship between the "biomass fuel industry" and environmentalists (like Bill McKibben) who (to say the least) misrepresented the "innocuous" production of "clean electricity" in order to fuel electric vehicles. 

In the following article you can link to Moore's movie which streams freely online. https://theconversation.com/3-times-michael-moores-film-planet-of-the-humans-gets-the-facts-wrong-and-3-times-it-gets-them-right-137890#:~:text=Planet%20of%20the%20Humans%20is,can%20be%20burnt%20for%20energy). 

Although Moore propagates some big factual errors in the documentary's assertions, his core focus on the dastardly biomass industry is both a much-needed antidote to prevalent lies (normalized among widely-admired environmentalists), in addition to being an exemplary illustration of how the Spotlight of Truth can bring Bill McKibben (to mention one of the supposed "good guys") to heel. 

Again, while it is true that politics can -- and must -- accomplish much more than it has, it ALL comes down to individual consumption, whether consumption be through each person's purchase of "goods and services," or the kind of consumption we authorize by "signing off" on "governmental budgets" or, alternatively, refusing to pay that portion of our taxes that are recklessly toxic to the environment. (Not surprisingly, we see Uncle Sam's military - with its nearly trillion dollar budget -- as the chief culprit. Here are those budgetary numbers in planetary context: https://www.pgpf.org/chart-archive/0053_defense-comparison Let me take this opportunity to point out that the average American taxpayer earning between $100K and $200K a year pays $17,186.00 in federal income tax. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/28/how-much-the-average-american-pays-in-taxes-each-year.html  Notably, this amount is considerably less than half what it costs the government to imprison someone for a year. So, as stupid as government can be, if there were a national movement to coordinate tax resistance, not only would tax resistors refrain from participating in ecocide, the  government would soon ask itself if it wouldn't be better to accommodate conscientious tax resisters rather than pay 20,000,000,000 (20 billion) a year to warehouse 500,000 them in federal prisons. (Federal incarceration costs are are a chunk over $100.00 a day. In Colorado, the cost exceeds $150.00 a day.)

Dwight Eisenhower Reveals THE DEEP STATE: Ike's Farewell Address Televised From The Oval Office Sounds The Alarm 

That The "Military-Industrial Complex" Comprises The Greatest Threat To American Democracy By Making Us A Murderous Corporatocracy

https://newsfrombarbaria.blogspot.com/2020/09/dwight-eisenhowers-farewell-address.html 

In part, I was writing in response to Danny's comment that news of the massive Australian coral provided "needed hope."

To the extent that the environmental movement tries to motivate people by making them desparate/desesperado/hopeless, I don't think we do our young people (many of whom have already "checked out" of political participation) any beneficial service. 

On the other hand, encouraging people -- especially young people like Danny -- who are already "fighting the good fight" to remember the remarkable resilience of nature may be just what the doctor ordered - a vision that foresees recovery if only "get smart."

The alternative is -- as you say -- to conform to the way American "democracy" works... "arguing back-and-forth, giving speeches with copious muttering,  until the last minute, before anything is done.  When you have wasted all the “get-something-done“ time and we are on the exponential rise of the consequences, it’s WAY too late."