we need a bang, not a whimper

JB and fellow environmentalists from the north have one wild card in this crap shoot: If there is to be a liberation of a “new power of critical planetary dialogue” it will depend entirely on the strength of opposition displayed by state leaders and protestors from the developing South. Without meaningful opposition, the herd of stampeding elephants will trample everything and everyone in their path.

Exiting Consumption Capitalism

... with its linear throughput of 'take, make, waste' is already successfully transforming toward a closed-loop 'natural capitalism' based on bio-mimicry:
http://sarahsoquel.com/other/Teaser_TNIR.html

Moving beyond carbonated growth:
http://www.rmi.org/rmi/Natural++Capitalism

Critical Thinking On the Rise

Prof. M'Gonigle is joining the ranks of many, many other authors. All of whom are discussing the abject failure of monopoly captialism/statism, a monstrous hybrid empire scheme without any semblance of competition or efficiency. It is virtually 'state planning' at its worst, hidden behind endless rhetoric of 'freedom', 'democracy' and 'free trade'.

The systemic propaganda repeats itself over and over and over again until even Fox News and CanWestGlobal pretend to believe it. But as more and more citizens know, it is an awful system of continuous growth, with little regard for human needs.

Excellent article. Can't wait for his follow up.

seth: what about mining the

seth: what about mining the uranium? you can only make these claims if you externalize all costs (money and co2 and fossil fuels) while, for no honest reason, being incredibly optimistic about nuclear's performance, despite the mountain of past evidence that contradicts it - if nuclear power was lucrative, why do the companies that build reactors refuse to do it without government subsidies - and miss the article's main point about infinite growth being impossible anyway.

adam M: our ability to occupy and exploit natural systems wasn't evolved, it was forced on us by ... lets call them "resource extracting oligarchies," who then came up with philosophical and scientific justifications that told us the behaviour was inevitable and that it was also a good thing. we have the ability to cooperate, co exist, make reasonable decisions, we also have the ability to not destroy a forest just cause it's there, we just have to realize it.

This is all about the

irrational need we have for dominance of 'our kind'. The choice was presented to us when we grew and met at the boundaries of the territories of adjacent villages. There must have been a blazing neon-sign there over everyone's heads, proclaiming "Go big or go home". Since we are sooo easy to manipulate that no one wanted to 'go home' - always portrayed as being with one's tail between one's legs - this is where the trouble started. Everyone was buying into the paradigm of 'going big', one empire to the next, miserable decay after miserable decay, 'fall' of the empires and the start of new ones. Our empires will also 'fall', as will the next ones and the next ones after that. Just look at the stupid pissing contest we see in this little village crossroad right here! If we finally do ourselves in, the writ on everyone's headstone will be: 'Mine's bigger than yours'. If instead the thing back then had been settled with a handshake and a grin on that borderline, and everyone had 'gone home' and learned how to live sustainably, we would have had it made.

So yes, you are eminently right about economic growth as the big bugaboo. I saw - and wrote letters to the editor in my village about that maybe thirty-five years ago, and I'm sure Ed deak sees it too, and has for e long time.

I don't know if we can uproot that fundamental paradigm. Never seen a culture that did so successfully. I place the Olympics as a demanded outlet for 'going big', which we maybe deliver at taxpayer's cost instead of something worse. And what do you think gang warfare is rooted in?? There is no diff between the fundamental psychology of the Bacon Brothers and the big princes of industry, only that the latter have managed on the 'right side of the law', which as we all know, from time to time is a mere technicality.

So, it all comes down to what's in our heads, and a few other places. Maybe those who think we should get more women involved in running things have the right of it. There is that little matter of twice the number of connects between the brain hemispheres, which supposedly make us better at 'global thinking'.

Good article!

This is one of the best

articles I have read that encapsulates the crux of the matter!

Refreshing yet so sad that, as Dorothy said,"Everyone was buying into the paradigm of 'going big', one empire to the next, miserable decay after miserable decay, 'fall' of the empires and the start of new ones. Our empires will also 'fall', as will the next ones and the next ones after that. "

I think it will take a collapse before we can re-design the way we live and shake hands with the neighboring villagers at the crossroads.

I hope I am around for the re-designing!

Climategate exposed the fraud which the Banksters put together

Copenhagen's Hidden Agenda: The Multibillion Trade in Carbon Derivatives
Architect of Credit Default Swaps behind the Development of "Carbon Derivatives" As I have previously shown, speculative derivatives (especially credit default swaps) are a primary cause of the economic crisis.

And I have pointed out that (1) the giant banks will make a killing on carbon trading, (2) while the leading scientist crusading against global warming says it won't work, and (3) there is a very high probability of massive fraud and insider trading in the carbon trading markets.

Now, Bloomberg notes that the carbon trading scheme will be centered around derivatives:

The banks are preparing to do with carbon what they’ve done before: design and market derivatives contracts that will help client companies hedge their price risk over the long term. They’re also ready to sell carbon-related financial products to outside investors.

[Blythe] Masters says banks must be allowed to lead the way if a mandatory carbon-trading system is going to help save the planet at the lowest possible cost. And derivatives related to carbon must be part of the mix, she says. Derivatives are securities whose value is derived from the value of an underlying commodity -- in this case, CO2 and other greenhouse gases...

Who is Blythe Masters?

She is the JP Morgan employee who invented credit default swaps, and is now heading JPM's carbon trading efforts. As Bloomberg notes (this and all remaining quotes are from the above-linked Bloomberg article):
continues
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=16449

excellent article

Michael M'Gonigle has done a fine job of exposing much of the capitalism monster with which I have been wrestling more than half of my life.

Dorothy's "pissing contest" pixels had barely found their way to the comments board for us to read before her words were pissed upon by Dr. Alexander. The shameful irony found in their juxtaposed comments makes bitter my morning coffee. Our pissing contests have given us trickle-down economics. Hence, nearly everyone has been trickled upon. There is nowhere left for our piss to run, we have been poisoning ourselves in our very own waste, our very own Made in USA economic system. Harper and Campbell have been poster children for a continuation/exacerbation of the mine's bigger than yours mentality. We are fools if we continue to support objectivism: the sellout, the "materialistic incorporation" of our souls.

I surmise (as does Adam M., apparently), we may have reached the tipping point. In the Olympic year, 2010, we may be witnessing the beginning of the descent of our species. Our human infestation of planet Earth may be showing us to have reached our "best before" date. It has been some time since we passed the smell test nor even the passing glance test.

My insurance policy:
It is time, now, for me to finish building my deep-in-the-woods homestead. With its organic garden, wind and solar generators, and aquaponics system, etc., perhaps as things get worse, my children and their children may be able to survive long enough for humans to start anew.

I do not need science for me to know

our way of life/system is f...ing the planet!

Just like this…

This is the kind of dialogue that we need to start having at all levels – social, governmental, commercial.

But, as with most things human, it may not matter one whit what we discuss and enact.

Perhaps there is a direct linkage between ecological systems and economic ones. And a self-rectifying chain of events is already occurring that will make the 2008 meltdown look like very small potatoes.

Missing the point

" what about mining the uranium? you can only make these claims if you externalize all costs (money and co2 and fossil fuels) "

All costs are covered. Wind power uses 60 times the steel and concrete of nuclear in construction per gigawatt. Uranium mining is uses such an small amount of materials compared to building windmills that it is negligible. With 3 year lead times on mass produced reactors and public power, and less than three year paybacks over fossils money is not an issue. There is a mountain of evidence from the past proving my case. The contrary is typically some biased oil company funded greenie study - all of them debunked. One such study made headlines on the front page of Novembers Scientific American. It assumed nuclear power leads to nuclear bombs which leads to nuclear war which burns a bunch of cities and assigns a carbon footprint to nuclear on that basis.

Nukes are built all over the world except in today's US without government subsidies on time and on budget - recent builds at $1.5B/Gw and in the US less than $1B/Gw ($2009) when the very efficient AEC was regulating. Today's Wall Street street pirates with their 15% interest rates would rather put their money into putting honest working Americans out of their houses and on to the street than financing nuclear plants for one reason one word Shoreham. Greenpeace with its legions of Big Oil/Coal financed attorneys and politicians can trick investors into building a nuclear plant then use their homeys on the Nuclear Rejection Commission to refuse the final license because some local politician (Big oil funded) in a village 20 miles away withdraws his support. Today the US is crippled by inefficient private power companies, that biased Nuclear Rejection Commission and corrupt and litigious political and legal systems, quadrupling nuclear costs and time frames.Much the same set of problems exist in Western Europe.

Canada and Mexico could sell the US nuclear power though.

Read Steve Kirsch's blogs on Huffington Post and follow the numerous commentaries as Kirsch shreds anti nuclear blarney.

You of course utterly miss the point. We are less than ten years from a climate/peak oil civilization ending crisis and only nuclear can save us. Greenie zealots maddened with their not so "renewable" religion are actively working to ensure nothing gets done hoping to kill billions.

Emergency measdures and changing the governance meme

We are where we are due to the system of governance that has resulted in the legislative, regulatory, executive and judicial branches of governance being captured by the corporate sector. We need emergency regulation by a strengthened state to hold carbon at or below 360 ppm and concurrently we need a huge change in our governance institutions - moving towards collaborative/deliberative ecological governance models where the corporation is disempowered and where citizens and the local public sphere are empowered by such concepts as subsidiarity.

Emergency measures means such things as commerce, airline and shipping free sundays at the very least, this means a 5 year plan to stop generation of electricity from coal in China and USA and else and employment of 'leap frog' technology asap (solar, wind, hydro, geothermal, 3rd & 4th generation nuclear - -all options; this means going substantially vegetarian thereby curtailing demand for meat products and the methane GHG produced from industrial agriculture, this means recognizing that capitalism and its actors, especially the coal and oil/gas & military sectors are waging war on the planet, this means reglating a reversal of militarism and military spending, this means challenging the constituted power of the state and corporations by the democratic, non-violent constituent power of citizens to create a new meme of governance guided not by economic growth values...but by 'genuine progress index' (GPI) or 'genuine wealth production' values. Essentially, the accelerating reproduction of the existing dominant meme of governance and capitalist economic production must be substantially stoppped and re-oriented according to GPI. Practically, looking at Canada/BC we need a vehicle from which will come a roadmap. That vehicle is a citizens constituent assembly, whose terms of reference are not set by the existing corupted corporaatist state, but by citizens and First Nations elected to that assembly by pro-rep, deliberating together, to first identity the guiding values of the new 'meme', then getting electoral approval thereof, and then writing a new constitution of laws to reorder society towards ecological governance. Otherwise the banks will do derivative based carbon tradng, and non of the 3Es of strong sustainability or steady state economics will be achieved, and all will go to hell and war in a handbasket so the saying goes. We need to act globally and locally, not dualistically and we need emergency short-tertm measures, mid term and long term goals. ...and we need a participative democracy, not authoritatrian top-down models.

Elephants

I proffer that while finding a way to ammend GHGs and taming the "herd of baby elephants" are worthwhile endeavours, the biggest elephant not in the room is the ever increasing human population. You can't have more humans without more food and more humans require more resources. Humans that believe they are the apex of evolution do not live within the means of those resources. Enough humans believe in this to make it a problem. If humans are unwilling to remove themselves from the self-appointed apex of evolution, the elephant will stamp us out!

and ...futhermore

if you think ANY of the existing political parties are up to this task, well, that ain't on, they all love the authoritarian meme that centralizes political and fiscal power in the Premier/PMs office, that disempowers the legislatures, they essentially want to hollow out the state and give Capital & the market a freeer hand, or, become state capitalists and maximize rents from resource extraction to pay for public services.

The tide has turned.

"Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo and brought it to New Guinea (or fill in the blank with the developing nation of choice), but we black people had little cargo of our own?"

In view of our present dilemma, when Jared Diamond answers Yali’s question with, “Guns, Germs and Steel, he is going to have a tough time avoiding choking on the obvious irony.

And when water levels rise, Yali will be asking, What happened to all your cargo?

Consumption

M'Gonigle's thesis:

"Economic growth isn't going to fix these trends but make them worse."

Unfortunately, true. Even the centrist enviro orgs like the World Wildlife Fund are raising hard questions about the detrimental impact of "going green" - saying we've made a critical error in thinking we can consume our way out of this climate change mess by purchasing special light bulbs and other such green consumer products. Capitalism, especially "green" capitalism only cares about one, maybe two of the 3-R's, neglecting the most important of the three: REDUCE!

Green consumerism is aimed at two things: pacifying our fears as consumers, and making us feel good, warm and fuzzy about consuming when all the data suggests it's wrong to so.

I'm with M'Gonigle all the way to near dystopian doom on this issue. I no longer think it's if we are fucked, but when and by how much our grandchildren will be. The exercise now is not to stop human-made global warming (and this elephant's often overlooked cousin, peak oil), but to find ways to minimize its results so as to spare our next few generations a Cormac McCarthy-type conclusion to the human race.

The issue of arrogance sometimes get's leveled by deniers at scientists in the know. But is there anything more arrogant than a status quo consumption and fossil fuel-based belief that human existence is somehow an entitlement? Conversely, it is the humility of people like Michael M'Gonigle, and scientists like Andrew Weaver, that might help spare us a few extra generations and make our eventual extinction somewhat gentler than predicted, but only if we listen to them and act accordingly.

The late George Carlin, on his last legs, did a hilarious, but very revelatory stand-up bit on "saving the planet" - in which he rightly said, the planet ain't what needs saving; the planet is just fine, it's not going anywhere; it's US who are fucked, us who are going away.

The moral question for me is what we do in the face of that reality. Climate warming denial represents just another form of escapism and opportunism, flight from our addiction to fossil fuel and consumption; the climate science represents that small window of opportunity, a fight for a little bit longer of our relative survival as a species. You can dress it up as a pissing match, an act of arrogance, a PR exercise, a debate, but this is the real dilemma we face.

M'Gonigle's thesis points to the complexities involved in our exit strategies. There are those who fully understand the climate science, but who still believe we can consume or economically grow our way out of the mess. I'm not one of those persons. But at least if the dialogue is based on real, sound science, we can have a dialogue. There is no dialogue to be had with deniers who want only to slam the window shut with ridiculous talk about sun spots, volcanoes and hacked e-mail accounts.

the truth will set you free

The capitalist have much to loose, much to fight for and will not give up and roll over.
I guess them stoned out hippies in the 60s understood more than some.
I love this planet and all it's diversity and to those that fight the good fight, I honour and thank you.

Notice all the focus and furor over Copenhagen and climate

change!

Copenhagen and all of the warm fuzzy composting and recycling your widgets is just a misdirection.

Earth needs fewer villagers who consume less and who find the 'equilibrium' or 'stasis' or steady state (of being!)!

As George Carlin noted; the Earth will remain, its the humans who are f...ed!

Population takes care of itself when people reach a certain

level of affluence. As Dr. Alexander points out, Canadians don't reproduce themselves, neither do Europeans.Urbanization has led to smaller families in the Third World. Healthy happy people solve their problems when they have enough food and money
and their politicians aren't stealing too much to build sanitation infrastructure.

AGW, as a government and Bankster sponsored scam will make sure people don't have enough of either.

Copenhagen startsd small with $10 Billion but ultimately plans a 2% tax on national GDP. Do you really think this money will be spent on what's needed?

Copenhagen climate summit in disarray after 'Danish text' leak

Developing countries react furiously to leaked draft agreement that would hand more power to rich nations, sideline the UN's negotiating role and abandon the Kyoto protocol

"leaked documents that show world leaders will next week be asked to sign an agreement that hands more power to rich countries and sidelines the UN's role in all future climate change negotiations."

"The draft hands effective control of climate change finance to the World Bank; would abandon the Kyoto protocol – the only legally binding treaty that the world has on emissions reductions; and would make any money to help poor countries adapt to climate change dependent on them taking a range of actions.

The document was described last night by one senior diplomat as "a very dangerous document for developing countries. It is a fundamental reworking of the UN balance of obligations. It is to be superimposed without discussion on the talks".

A confidential analysis of the text by developing countries also seen by the Guardian shows deep unease over details of the text. In particular, it is understood to:

• Force developing countries to agree to specific emission cuts and measures that were not part of the original UN agreement;

• Divide poor countries further by creating a new category of developing countries called "the most vulnerable";

• Weaken the UN's role in handling climate finance;

• Not allow poor countries to emit more than 1.44 tonnes of carbon per person by 2050, while allowing rich countries to emit 2.67 tonnes."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/08/copenhagen-climate-summit-disarray-danish-text

The Guardian seems not to notice the effect on us

The term government has been removed, but the leaked document lays out the plans for global governance based on carbon emissions with the powers of taxation and enforcement. 2% of GDP and a standing army.

This is a bureaucratic coupe d'etat with the World Bank holding the reins of power.The Bankster Hydra triumphant.

How much can you stand?

Monckton is blogging from Copenhagen. He will have more to say about the plans tomorrow tomorrow.
http://sppiblog.org/

To Mopled - The Facts

While global economic output has surged some 18 fold between 1990 and 2000, reaching $66 trillion in 2006[Source: State of the World 2008, Worldwatch Institute] it is readily apparent that the dominant economic system of the modern era is causing great stress to the carrying capacity of the earth to sustain current levels of economic growth. While the Gross National Product (GNP) of many nations continues to grow, and while many of the world’s largest corporations continue to reap profits for majority shareholders, the poverty gap increases and global and regional environments continue to deteriorate.

As to the state of the world's ecosystem and the acceleration of non-linear change (including climate change) brought about by humans please check out the following url:

http://www.millenniumassessment.org/en/Index.aspx

Simply put, our current pathway premised on continual economic growth is not only not sustainable, it already has manifested considerable damage to ecosystems, biodiversity, and is manifestly not equitable. Population and land based activities of the dominant predator species - humans - is soaring and that of other species and their ecosystems are crashing. My apologies for typos in previous posts, in a rush and didn't use my glasses:)

Copenhagen is shaping up to

Copenhagen is shaping up to be something very ugly.

The scramble seems to be:
1. consolidate power, 2. get hands on the money and 3. screw the little countries.

A quote of some relevance:

"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populous alarmed (and hence clamourous to be led to safety) by menacing it with a series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." H. L. Mencken

As for the climate change controversy, it is astonishing to see so many people dump their faith in all science over some allegedly diddled data.

To me, this suggests that our society is ripe for a foundational shift (and likely a regressive one) where the wisdom of the past will be the first casualty.

Send in the ayatollahs! There ought to be ayatollahs. Don't bother... they're here.

incredibly insightful article

these are indeed the elephants in the room. this article is powerful.

i'm craving strategy. how do we address these elephants? perhaps i'm craving simplicity to a seemingly hopelessly entrenched problem (namely: humans like to grow; and capitalism is has an insatiable taste for it).

i'm not completely convinced that a 'green economy' can't help the world and all life, but not in the manner that it's been conceived of thus far, with its cap&trade pollution credits, market incentives, reductions in emissions based on 'intensity' targets etc.

we need a green economy that values growth that somehow does not consume more energy, or is based on an energy system that is inherently regenerative (i know this sounds awful cheesy, but 'love' is the first one that comes to mind).

strange that some of the comments on this thread have again redirected the conversation to the merits of nuclear energy -- seth, et. al, are you listening to what michael is saying? there's more to this than CO2 gases, notwithstanding the urgent need to reduce them too.

The conclusion to this 2nd

The conclusion to this 2nd installment is disappointing.

"It is time to move us past the limited promise of state treaties. To do so, you must not imprison, but must liberate, that new power of critical planetary dialogue that has brought us all to Copenhagen, and that we will need to guide us in the eco-conversion ahead."

What does that mean? That the delegates should eschew any effort to address one part of the puzzle (GHG) pending a comprehensive program to deal with all other parts of the problem?

The idea that total revolution can end evil is deeply rooted in our western culture (starting with the notion of Messiahs, perhaps). Experience with attempts at total revolution is not happy. The idea that universal dialogue will be any more successful than specific thinkers in defining a successful revolutionary program is illusory.

I agree that adjustment to the real resource limits (biological, climate, mineral wealth, etc.) is necessary -- and will happen. The only question is whether the adjustment is on terms acceptable to a majority of CURRENT humanity, or, as in all past cases, is acceptable only to descendants of the survivors of the cataclysms brought by short-sightedness.

One thing we know and and can perhaps get some agreement on: we need sharply lower GHG emissions. If Copenhagen can secure such reductions, we may buy time for resolving other parts of the puzzle.

Considere the analogy of solving crossword puzzles. Few indeed are the folks who can solve a crossword puzzle instantaneously after reading the clues once -- or even solve a soduku in one fell swoop.

And those are puzzles where the rules and constraints are well defined.

If we're lucky, Copenhagen will result in agreement on overall reductions required, and acceptance that reductions must be done equitably (which means rich countries, canada definitely included) must accept significant reductions in per capita resource use.

the elephant in the living room

The elephant in the room, is that the thesis of global warming is based on very flimsy evidence. There is no theory of climate change . Theories can be proved or disproved, but since many of the mechanisms of climate, such as the behaviour of turbulent fluids, are beyond our ability to quantify or explain, we are left with models, which are good tools to help us advance our understanding, but have no predictive value.
"Predictions of catastrophe depend on models. Models depend on assumptions about complex planetary systems -- from ocean currents to cloud formation -- that no one fully understands. Which is why the models are inherently flawed and forever changing. The doomsday scenarios posit a cascade of events, each with a certain probability. The multiple improbability of their simultaneous occurrence renders all such predictions entirely speculative.
Yet on the basis of this speculation, environmental activists, attended by compliant scientists and opportunistic politicians, are advocating radical economic and social regulation. "The largest threat to freedom, democracy, the market economy and prosperity," warns Czech President Vaclav Klaus, "is no longer socialism. It is, instead, the ambitious, arrogant, unscrupulous ideology of environmentalism."
Charles Krauthammer http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/29/AR2008052903266.html.
Valcav Havel spent years being harassed and imprisoned under a brutal and coercive communist regime,can see the threat of coercive governmental power looming better than most. M'Gonical's analysis is quite logical- continued growth is incompatible with reducing carbon emissions. But most people won't accept restraining growth, because that will lower their opportunities to fulfil their desires. Perhaps people should have different desires than they do have, but that is a matter of personal evolution. If you aren't willing to trust that that will happen in its own way and time, then imposing limits to growth means coercive government ' for your own good' of course- to quote the title of a book by Alice Miller on the hidden cruelty of child rearing practises and the roots of violence.
And social experiments with coercive socialist governments have not had happy result to date- one hundred million dead from gulags, purges and man made famine in communist regimes. It always seems like a good idea at time...

A world over-dosing on consumption and growth

These are powerful articles by M'Gonigle.

Great to read them here on The Tyee.

One thing that I think these articles highlight (though it is never said directly but it is definitely implied) is - though we may point the finger of blame (and aptly so) at the power elite, we cannot escape that two fingers point back at us.

Because one of the bigger elephants in the room is our own individual and personal responsibility to change our own life.

That's the only way anything is ever going to change for the better.

That's really the part we are uncomfortable with.

The fact that little ol' you and me must change what we want.... and the amount we want. We are largely post WW2 babies that have become addicted and comfortable with an increasingly material world - and one that is fueled by a competitive engine that also creates increasing levels of dope-like desire.....for more... and more...and more.

Kurt Vonnegut wrote this about his friend and fellow author, Joseph Heller, who had just died:

Joe Heller

True story, Word of Honor:

Joseph Heller, an important and funny writer

now dead,

and I were at a party given by a billionaire

on Shelter Island.

I said, "Joe, how does it make you feel

to know that our host only yesterday

may have made more money

than your novel 'Catch-22'

has earned in its entire history?"

And Joe said, "I've got something he can never

have."

And I said, "What on earth could that be, Joe?"

And Joe said, "The knowledge that I've got enough."

Not bad! Rest in peace!"

KV

There's also no dialogue to be had

with people who fly in the face of others, then get asked a few fair questions about some of their assertions, ignore these questions and then later, supposedly hoping the grass has grown over the ugly spot, burbles on as if the fair questions had never been asked. That's an underhanded behaviour not worthy of this blog.

It's good to know you consider yourself one of the right-thinking guys, but then we already knew that, and it doesn't add up to - what was it again - 'scientific argument'.

doomed

we were doomed when we all got our drivers licenses and filled our fossil fueled desire for speed, power and self esteem.
The mindlessness and ignorance that has accompanied this ubiquitous acceptance of this mode of mobility has destroyed communities, neighborhoods, towns, villages and cities.
We have built our world to serve the automobile.
They should have been parked and crushed decades ago.
Turn those two car garages into apartments and take back the streets.
Seriously.
They are our weapons of mass destruction.

rickw - there's some

rickw - there's some evidence of that with deforestation in the amazon... if trade agreements and colonial style resource extraction leave the locals to starve, they'll go cut down trees to survive (not counting the massive scale deforestation already going on). it'd be easier for us to not destroy forests if we werent forced into it by the.. zookeepers, but we have certain advantages over caged rats and tigers, we can realize whats going on at the very least.

steve: http://sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Environmentalists_for_Nuclear_Energy i think this is a smoking gun explanation, but it might not mean anything to anyone else. there is a industry funded PR drive trying to push the idea that "nuclear energy is green if not better than green and the only alternative that can be ready in time." and it needs a lot of pushing it seems. they also have to pre emptively discredit environmentalists because they oppose nuclear energy. To increase this confusion, former greenpeace person patrick moore is involved with this, and he'll mention he's from greenpeace, then say he's had a change of heart, which makes him sound like an environmentalist whos smarter than all other environmentalists cause he transcended it or something and saw the nuclear power solution

Will the real conspiracy please step forward?

I observe the climate change faithful and the climate change deniers, two armies who will give no quarter, with no neutral parties in sight. Each side accuses the other of a vast conspiracy to distort the facts and hide the truth for their own nefarious purposes. I grimly come to the unsettling conclusion that perhaps both conspiracies actually exist.

Our species has conquered everything in sight and the only enemy we have left is ourselves. If we can't learn to put the collective good ahead of individual desires, we will go down as the first species in recorded history to have achieved extinction through collective stupidity and greed. The bigger they come the harder they fall. Right now, we're the biggest, baddest species on the planet. By far. And we'll fall hard.

The Truth at Last !!

Thank Monckton! How could we have been so easily misled by those charlatans at HadCRU ? Now we have to start from scratch and discard everything they reported.

Well, except for the data for 1998. That bit was true.
http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn14527/dn14527-4_629.jpg

But certainly not the data from NASA showing a decade trend of heating:
http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn14527/dn14527-3_652.jpg

It just goes to show how nefarious they are - reporting data that contradicts other data as part of their plan for confusing non-experts. Even if we pay them to be experts it doesn't mean they can just go ahead and report contradictory data.

O.M.G. !!

Will these scientists stop at nothing ?? Unrefuted evidence being suppressed by the highest echelons of science
http://www.halos.com/faq-replies/gentry-to-nas-3-22-2000.htm

Oh for the Sake of Humanity !

- will the deceivers never stop ??
http://www.orionfdn.org/papers/aps-2005-abstract.htm

Well, never much cared for the Big Bang anyway.

ReeferMadness

"..I grimly come to the unsettling conclusion that perhaps both conspiracies actually exist."

I love it! I'm sure we're perverse and convoluted enough that it could actually be that hairy.

In the Museum of Zoology in Copenhagen (as a Dane, I really take exception to the playing around with the city's name lately), there was,just before the exit, a big sign saying:'This exhibit depicts the most dangerous species that ever walked the Earth'. over the sign was, of course, a mirror. And sure, we are both dark and dangerous. I used to tell my children when they asked: If you can think it, take for granted that somebody has done it.

But back to the name: Copenhagen is not the city's real name, of course. It is an accommodation to that dialect of Danish that we call English, so that the English-speakers can pronounce the name. The name in Danish reads 'København'. 'At købe' means 'to purchase', and 'havn' of course means 'harbour'. So, 'the harbour city where trading happens'. Simple, eh? Wonder what kind of trading goes on there right now. Maybe Horse-trading?

Excellent series so far!

I guess what everyone's counting on subconsciously is a natural or man-made crisis that will wipe half of us out and allow the math of "relative decoupling" to work for the remainder.

The challenge to confronting this is humanitarian and political: how can you look at a child and deny her food, schooling and shelter today in order to save the planet for someone else tomorrow? How can you tell an unemployed forestry or mine worker desperate to feed his family to just suck it up so that our grandchildren might have a future.

There is no solution without answering these questions. And I don't see being able to answer them without a massive redistribution of wealth and strict limits on consumption. And the elites - those who control all the resources, the governments and the armies, are not going to accept that without a huge fight.

Which brings us back to my first point.

The Death of Science

Galileo rolls in his grave.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB20001424052748704107104574572091993737848.html

The Un-mentioned Elephant

Notwithstanding, the incompatibilities of capitalism and a sustainable planet we have ignored perhaps the singularly most important root cause of our planet's deterioration, a disproportionately large human population.

Simply put the planet is being stripped and damaged at a very fast and unsustainable rate. Humans, not nature and natural forces, now "run" the earth to the extent that they can irreversibly damage it and kill themselves and other forms of life in the process.

The question is how does/should the population manage itself, and how will the on-going conservation of that population be established. Less developed countries, and some organized religions, see any attempt at population management as detrimental to their interests and a plot by the developed nations to hog the wealth.

We are presently living in a world largely governed by economics. The creation and growth of capitalism required that we focus on money generating and spending activities as lightly regulated as possible. We also re-jigged our religious and social institutions to legitimize and foster capitalism and its economic approach to ordering human behaviour and organization. The discipline of capitalism seemed, also, to bring out in us a very creative and entrepreneurial side, not bad things in themselves. However, capitalism also fostered competition, which is probably a less positive and more problematic force. Gaming simulation and other methodologies have usually pointed toward cooperation as a more productive approach for humans. Maybe we should be using what we've learned. What often differentiates us from other life (that does not have the overwhelming power to wreck the planet) is that we can change our impacts and footprint. This is the outlet for creativity and optimism.

Capitalism also brought marketing which fosters the creation and sale of products which previously did not exist. Some of thes products are beneficial to mankind. However, most of them are un-nesscessary and many are merely to demonstrate wealth or differentiate us from others. If we really need this let's find a way that is harmless to the planet.

Perhaps humans can move from an economics based system of relationships and behaviour to an environmental system. We can keep that creative and entrepreneurial aspect in making the shift. Religion can also accommodate and foster environmentalism. There have already been moves by the more progressive religious faiths and bodies to incorporate the environment into what constitutes desirable behaviour and good works. The inter-relatedness of humans and nature that Suzuki and other science educators have demonstrated now for two generations has got to be a governing precept in our construct of our world. In other words we are not special. We are nature, it's not something we must try to live with. It's something we live in.

2025

Thank you, Michael M'Gonigle for these two excellent pieces.

I think that about fifteen years from now, say 2025, the AGW debate will be over, one way or the other. I believe that multiple changes - shrinking polar icecaps, dying coral reefs, ocean dead zones, dying species, droughts, heat waves and weather extremes -- will put climate warming past doubt by any but the lunatic fringe.

I hope I have to eat my words predicting warming, and, given the potential dire consequences of AGW, I'll be happy to do so. On the other hand, if the deniers/sceptics are wrong, what will they say to the rest of us and to their children? My guess is, they'll deny they ever denied. And they'll blame socialism for causing it all.

what the environmentalists won't talk about.

John Feeney article on 'elephants in the room'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7865332.stm

Save the Planet?

As the late great George Carlin once said..."pack your bags folks, we're going away." "The earth will shake us off like a bad case of fleas."

Population problem: solved

It's quite true that there are too many people in the world, and there are going to be billions more in the next several decades. This will put horrendous strain on ecosystems, many of which may collapse -- not to mention the conflicts that will be generated within and between states over land, water, and other resources.

But the population problem has largely been solved already. Reproduction rates have been falling dramatically all over the world, as living conditions have improved, more girls are educated, and basic social-safety nets are put in place. (People don't have lots of children because they want lots of children; if they have lots, it's because they need lots, given their circumstances.) We've put the engines on the global population supertanker into reverse, but it's going to take decades before the ship stops and starts going in the other direction. That why, although population poses a huge threat to human civilization, there are other, more immediate problems that ought to be given priority now. In that sense, population growth is a red herring. Making capitalism sustainable -- or, if that's not possible, ditching it and replacing it with some other economic structure, one that does not require endless material growth -- is the prime directive for Earthlings.