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The Best Science Writing Online 2012
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With this final column I will transition Sustainable Developments from Scientific American to the home page of the Earth Institute (www.earth.columbia.edu). Although I will continue to contribute occasional essays to the magazine, I will use this last regular column to say thank you and take stock of the deepening crisis of sustainable development.
During the four years of this column, the world’s inability to face up to the reality of the growing environmental crisis has become even more palpable. Every major goal that international bodies have established for global environmental policy as of 2010 has been postponed, ignored or defeated. Sadly, this year will quite possibly become the warmest on record, yet another testimony to human-induced environmental catastrophes running out of control.
This was to be the year of biodiversity. In 2002 nations pledged, under the auspices of the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity, to slow significantly the planetary loss of biodiversity by 2010. This goal was not even remotely achieved. Indeed, it was barely even noticed by Americans: the U.S. signed the convention in 1992 but never ratified it. Ratification fell victim to the uniquely American delusion that virtually all of nature should be subdivided into parcels of private property, within which owners should have their way.
This year was also to be the start of a new post-Kyoto treaty, but that effort was stillborn by the continuing paralysis of U.S. policy making. President Barack Obama came empty-handed to the Copenhagen climate change negotiations, and the U.S., China and other powers settled for a nonbinding declaration of sentiments and goals rather than an operational strategy and process of implementation.
According to Obama’s 2008 election campaign, this was to be the first year of a new climate and energy policy for the U.S., too, and the second year of a “green recovery.” We’ve had neither. The recovery has sputtered: Obama bet on “stimulating” exhausted consumers rather than on a long-term program of public investments in sustainable infrastructure. The Senate, true to form, sustained its 18th year of inaction on global warming since ratifying the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change in 1992.
This year was ushered in by the phony “Climategate” controversy, which involved leaked e-mails of a British climate research unit; the political right wing depicted some ill-considered language in the messages as proof of a vast global plot. Independent reviews have since rejected the charges of scientific conspiracy, but the damage is done: the U.S. public once again swings toward disbelief in the basic science of human-induced climate change.
We are losing not just time but the margin of planetary safety, as the world approaches or trespasses on various thresholds of environmental risk. With the human population continuing to rise by 75 million or more per year and with torrid economic growth in much of the developing world, the burdens of deforestation, pollution, greenhouse gas emissions, species extinction, ocean acidification and other massive threats intensify.
What deep features of our national and global socioeconomic processes cause these repeated failures? First, the risks to sustainability are truly unprecedented in their global scale and have come upon society rather suddenly in the past two generations. Second, the problems are scientifically complex and involve enormous uncertainties. Not only must public opinion catch up with reality, but key sciences must also scramble to measure, assess and address the new challenges.
Third, although the problems are global, politics is notoriously local, which impairs timely, coordinated international action. Fourth, the problems are unfolding over decades, whereas politicians’ attention spans reach only to the next election and much of the public’s to the next meal or paycheck. Fifth, vested corporate interests have mastered the dark arts of propaganda, and they can use their deep pockets to purchase a sea of deliberate misinformation to deceive the public.
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52 Comments
Add CommentDear Jeffrey,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThanks for all your insightful and prescient articles over the years, and I will certainly continue to follow your work at the Earth Institute. From what I understand you are saying, we need to abrogate local political rights (households, or nations) in favour of a single global village, give this political executive a tenure that is outside electoral cycles, and prosecute corporations for treasonable public deception. Its a big ask. Ill see what I can do (!) While Al Gore believes it will be Our Choice , the choice is looking more likely to be what Clive Hamilton has called a Requiem for a Species , a species that was not that smart after all.
Rowan
avicia dot org
The Deepening Crisis by Jeffrey D. Sachs, (September issue, p 32). Is a typical bombast from the promulgators of Climate Change. It relies on baseless forecasts of future gloomy, but imagined, events that are laid at the door-step of carbon-caused global warming and are cast as proof of an impending climate crisis. It refers to the Climategate crisis as phony and cites as proof the independent reviews that have exonerated the e-mail miscreants of their obvious data manipulation and conspiracy to prevent publication of contravening views. The problem with those reviews is that none were actually independent. All published reviews to date have been by organizations already deeply involved in promoting carbon-caused global warming and will suffer extreme embarrassment when the anthropogenic-global-warming house-of-cards is inevitably blown away. Too many competent atmospheric scientists have revealed too many glaring errors and inconsistencies in the justification of man-caused global warming for it to continue as the conventional wisdom of future climate.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSachs proclaims that Scientific American and Earth Institute are committed to bring objective science to the public sphere. Their best start on that mission of objectivity would be to acknowledge the unimpeachable condemnations of the science behind man-caused global warming.
Bryce W. Johnson PhD, PE
18583 Woodbank Way
Saratoga, CA 95070
408 872 0233
“The Deepening Crisis” by Jeffrey D. Sachs, (September issue, p 32). Is a typical bombast from the promulgators of “Climate Change.” It relies on baseless forecasts of future gloomy, but imagined, events that are laid at the door-step of carbon-caused global warming and are cast as “proof” of an impending climate crisis. It refers to the “Climategate” crisis as phony and cites as proof the independent reviews that have exonerated the e-mail miscreants of their obvious data manipulation and conspiracy to prevent publication of contravening views. The problem with those “reviews” is that none were actually independent. All published reviews to date have been by organizations already deeply involved in promoting carbon-caused global warming and will suffer extreme embarrassment when the anthropogenic-global-warming house-of-cards is inevitably blown away. Too many competent atmospheric scientists have revealed too many glaring errors and inconsistencies in the justification of man-caused global warming for it to continue as the “conventional wisdom” of future climate.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSachs proclaims that Scientific American and Earth Institute are committed to bring objective science to the public sphere. Their best start on that mission of objectivity would be to acknowledge the unimpeachable condemnations of the “science” behind man-caused global warming.
Bryce W. Johnson PhD, PE
18583 Woodbank Way
Saratoga, CA 95070
408 872 0233
Dr. Johnson has a bright future teaching the Russians to breath smoke, and the Pakistanis to grow gills.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisColorado Bob, I think Dr. Johnson has stopped evolving. But I will grant that he knows something about bombast.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDr. Johnson, we've been waiting with bated breath for "the anthropogenic-global-warming house-of-cards" to be dismantled by one of your "competent atmospheric scientists."
That's never going to happen. Because when you examine any of their alternative explanations, it falls apart like tissue paper.
With regard to Swifthack (a better name for the trumped-up crisis than "ClimateGate"), a little research would show that no primary data had been deleted. Most of it wasn't CRU's to begin with.
Also, as even you should know, there are many lines of evidence pointing out the reality of climate change, and few of them are under the control of CRU.
Anyone who can read the East Anglia emails and conclude that there was no breach of the scientific method by the correspondents (which inluded the very people who derived the thoroughly discredited "hockey stick" graph on which the AGW computer codes have been based) has a very serious cognition problem. The evidence of mass deletion of primary data goes well beyond "climategate." Does anyone believe that all the deletions "just happened" to be the ones that would have disproved the global warming hypothesis.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere are no "lines of evidence," merely concoctions of imagined horrors from global warming.
Global climatologists have lost their credibility when they chose to squelch anyone who pointed out any errors in their political agenda. Saying that CO2 is the cause of global warming and ignoring the real energy path of the Solar energy spectrum has done nothing to solve the excess global warming problem.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisImplying that two narrow bands in the low energy infrared portion of the Solar energy spectrum far exceeds the effect of the wide absorption in the high energy ultraviolet portion of the Solar energy spectrum is scientifically unfounded.
And "factoring out" the huge effect of surface absorption on excess global warming makes no sense either. Any kid walking across blacktop bare foot can attest to that.
The way to change things for the better is to preserve and encourage more perennial forests and grasslands to cool things off and fix excess CO2 in the most efficient way possible. In fact, nothing can be accomplished without doing this first.
Ignoring this and taxing carbon credits do nothing for the environment except make rich men's pockets greener. Reverse the deforestation and desertification of our planet and we will get the climate we want and long for once again.
It seems fairly elementary to me. Humans continue to reproduce at alarming rates ; as a species we are enormously wasteful; global commerce has severe negative consequences as it further accelerates the use of natural resources much more quickly than they can be replenished. Even without global warming, these factors alone, if not slowed, efficiently managed, or reversed, will destroy not only the human race, but most of sustainable life on earth. Without strict laws and mandates that force us change our behavior in concert, the earth is doomed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhen a climate change denier makes grand claims about the facts or the literature that go against majority opinion among scientists, and neglect to give refereed citations supporting each claim, I assume they are intellectually bankrupt. So far I have yet to encounter a denier who made me do any real work to convince myself he was wrong. I am not saying that the UN consensus has it all right, but I am saying that the disloyal opposition isn't obeying the procedures of science you have to follow to be taken seriously.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDavid Burress
www.adastrainstitute.org
"brycejohnson", for a claimed PhD., PE., you're kinda dumb. You would have to be blind and stupid, which you seem to place yourself in that category nicely, not to see that our over-use and misuse of fossil fuels is quickly damaging our environment to the point it is becoming more and more difficult to sustain ourselves in a living environment.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJohnson, why didn't you offer suggestions on how we can clean up our environment so we can have more rich land to grow crops on and feed our over population? Like: quickly converting to all electric vehicles, geothermal power, hydro power, solar, and wind. If we did that, based on the two days of no fly restrictions Bush placed on America after 911, in less than a year, the Earth will start cleaning up its air and land and giving us better health.
To some extent you are right - you want scarce grant money, you hype up the scare factor. On the other hand, and not being an academic meteorologist, I'm finding it harder to no believe the data - there is global warming. As to it's cause, I believe that data show that industrial society has been a contributing factor and one that is subject to human intervention. The other attributes that contribute apparently are not. So I vote for doing contaminant activities.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJust to get an idea of how population growth stresses resources, check out this video. Then extrapolate that to the world. And please understand it deals only with our excessive LEGAL immigration policies. If you're inclined for any reason to take exception to the data, just cut it in half, and you will see we still have a serious problem:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4094926727128068265&q=number
I'm willing to accept that the climate is in general significantly warming in response to 150 years of environmental absorption of industrial waste products.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI doubt that anyone can reasonably predict the effects in progress or the effectiveness of any proposed corrective actions. I do expect that no corrective actions can halt the thermal momentum of the Earth's mass.
IMO, carbon credits, electric cars and clean living in general are moot. Humanity's best option for survival is to prepare for a destabilized environment by reducing population requirements for land, water and food production, expecting that these resources will be reduced.
"Anyone who can read the East Anglia emails and conclude that there was no breach of the scientific method by the correspondents (which inluded the very people who derived the thoroughly discredited "hockey stick" graph on which the AGW computer codes have been based) has a very serious cognition problem. "
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEr....nice idea, but none of this is actually true. The hockey stick to which I assume you refer, or in deed any of them (there are very many) aren't the basis of "AGW computer codes". It is almost impossible to know something about climate and make a mistake as basic as yours. Thanks for spreading your ignorance and fear so widely though - maybe you should stop talking and start learning before you write much more about other people's supposed "cognition problems". LOL!
arguing ad hominem is not an argument. data is data. put up ur own or shut up.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"heretic" I was going to point out the dozens of factual and logical errors you pack in to one post, but then I notice you manage to even disagree with yourself.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAt the beginning of your post CO2 isn't a problem at all.
Then, after an observation that will be a revelation to climate scientists all over the world (blacktop gets hot in the sun) you say that we need to fix CO2 by growing trees.
I am in awe.
One fact that Mr. Johnson fails to note is that there are powerful corporate entities whose interests are not served by any organized efforts whatsoever to address ecological issues -- and that they have been orchestrating a lot of the negative responses aimed at influencing public opinion. One very well-researched article is available here: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/08/30/100830fa_fact_mayer?currentPage=all#ixzz0y1Zo3KbO.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe debates over whether climate change is a result of natural or human causes, or to what extent it can be moderated, are secondary. At issue is whether our relationship with our natural and international environments will continue to be based on greed, egoic self-interest and organized predation, or whether we want to create a more conscious way of being for ourselves and our descendants in future.
Is the "scientific conspiracy" good news or bad news? Do you wish it's true or not?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThumbs up James . Totally agree with you
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisthis is a strong possibility!If industry and corporate america ,and captains of industry around the world don't act people just may say enough is enough and start destroying industries and the like so the choice is made for them !either get with the program or rebuild!!!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have no idea what the climate change naysayers are basing their questions on, as it is obvious that they haven't read the science behind the man-generated CO2 concept. Read the book, "The Two Mile Time Machine", by Dr. Richard Alley and then tell me its all nonsense.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJesse M Townsley Jr
I find it interesting that the people arguing both for and against man-made climate change tend to argue it in a non-scientific manner and claim the other side is the one who "doesn't understand the science".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisScience is objective. Jeffrey Sachs provides a non-objective discussion of the issue. He glosses over the "Climategate" e-mails by dismissing comments that an objective observer would classify as "conspiratorial" by calling them "ill-considered language". Presumption of innocence is not objec tive.
He then accuses "vested corporate interests" of spreading a "sea of deliverate misinformation to deceive the public". Presumption of guilt is not objective.
The most disappointing thing to me is that an issue that has such wide-reaching implications regardless of which side the decision ends up on, will NOT be decided based on science, but based on political manipulation and fear-mongering.
A lot of idiots seem to have Doctorates. The ones most useless seem to advertise the fact sticking Dr. in front of their name or more blatantly sticking Ph.D behind their name. Notice this bloke has no other degrees before his Ph.D.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisReminds me of this Dr. when I just started work after my first stint in college, I had qualified to apply for a job in chemistry. I got a job working as a lab assistant. I was assigned the task of modifying an ink, without increasing its cost, to make it dry faster. This Dr character walks up to me and tells me who he is then suggests I use glycerine. Dumb me I immediately pointed out glycerine was hygroscopic.
Modern science is often frowned upon by the rich and powerful political wings.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYet if these people really believed in God and not Darwin, they would fear divine retribution for enriching themselves using modern technology just for personal profit in an unsustainable manner.
A small research group has developed Biomass Pyrolyis which will reduce the excess CO2 in the air as investments increase. The technique will convert any hydrocarbons or organic material into biochar, producing vast quantities of hydrogen which can be used to generate electricity, or be converted into biofuels or biogas. The biochar can then be stored in landfill sites in case of future needs. This therefore eliminates the need of costly CO2 capture and storage.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor details, see www.eprida.com or look for biochar on your search engine.
For Jeffrey D. Sachs a question:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWho died and put *you* in charge of Planetary Crises Manager?
Earth has done okay for 6 billion years without your MBA in charge. Get over yourself.
It's not like you don't need a flush toilet, too.
I agree with you.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBy all indications the world of 2050 will be wealthier, happier, better fed (using less acreage than is used to grow food today), less violent, more interconnected, and more urban than today. Because it will be more urban and therefore denser, it will use less land.
I know, I know, I'm naive. Edward Abbey wrote, "[W]e can see that the religion of endless growth--like any religion based on blind faith rather than reason--is a kind of mania, a form of lunacy, indeed a disease&Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell."
People are less than worthless, in Abbey's curmudgeonly view, they are an invading virus.
Sach's pessimistic assessment, "the worlds inability to face up to the reality of the growing environmental crisis has become even more palpable...We are losing not just time but the margin of planetary safety, as the world approaches or trespasses on various thresholds of environmental risk.," apparently mirrors Abbey's, Lester Brown's, Tertullian's, Thomas Malthus's, Paul Ehrlich's and others. The world careens toward a Tertullian/Malthusian catastrophe. Brothers and sisters the end is near and we stand upon banana peels between vipers and the abyss. We stand on the brink of droughts and mass starvation; forests reduced to stumps, no oil, foul air, frozen earth [scratch that frozen bit, put in scorched due to global warming instead] and polluted water. Our high prophet of doom, Paul R. Ehrlich summed it up for us in 1968: The battle to feed all humanity is over. In the 1970s the world will undergo famines--hundreds of millions of people are going to starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. Why? Ehrlich sprinkled scientific dust on his Malthusian catastrophe with what is now called the IPAT formula: I = P � A � T (where I = Environmental Impact, P = Population, A = Affluence, T = Technology). There you have with mathematical clarity, we're the seven hundred pound gorilla playing with china plates.
I have noticed Ehrlich miscalculated by 40 years and counting. Humans are still here. Though the worlds population has almost doubled since his prediction, yet things are better. Instead of cleaning off every whit of resource and the world being poorer, sicker, and hungrier, we find that since 1970: we are three times richer (in real terms), the percentage of people in abject poverty has dropped by over two-thirds, a greater percentage of people are better fed, the average person in a developing country eats more, the worlds forests cover 98% of what they did in 1970, and the known oil reserves have nearly doubled.
Why? Because, IPAT is Malthus dressed up as mathematical empiricism and empirical evidence points otherwise. For instance, the development of agriculture reduced the acreage needed to support one person thereby freeing up land for wildlife. The development of oil meant kerosene lighting which meant that whales were preserved and not hunted to extinction. The use of petroleum products to power plows and conveyances freed up 1/3 of agricultural acreage needed to feed the animals so that it could be available for wildlife. Technological advances have generally meant lowered impact on land not more.
IPATs pseudo-formula leaves out a resource that weighs heavily in earths favor and ours: the ingenuity of humans to solve problems is inexhaustible. That means it's not a zero-sum game.
I suspect I won't change anyone's mind here. As the late Julian Simon said, First, humanity's condition will improve in just about every material way. Second, humans will continue to sit around complaining about everything getting worse. ����
Malthusian die-hards, cheer up. Things may yet grow worse. As Bullwinkle J. Moose used to say, This time for sure.
Sachs (and some of his supporters here) come across as being red rather than green.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSorry, it just got too scientific and I got confused... was it the oil companies that made Johnson a doctor in the first place?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm with Timberati.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere is one thing everyone has forgotten about: exponential growth in human ingenuity. It always will double every couple years, like Moore's Law. So we should consume an amount based on what our projected ingenuity should provide.
Whale blubber - hydrocarbons - then what? Just wait, ingenuity provided the first two, of course it will provide the next. I don't need to be told that the sun will rise tomorrow to know that it, too, is provided for.
After all, in 40 years, only 2% of America's forests have faced deforestation. I extrapolate this to mean that the world has only lost .5% of its forests every decade. My fingers tell me that at this rate it would take millions of years for us to lose all of our forests. And ingenuity would do something by then. Always has.
An even more urgent problem than climate change is the response of vegetation to the "other" greenhouse gases - ozone created when volatile organic compounds react to UV radiation. Decades of research have proven that ozone is toxic to plants. Cumulative, long-term exposure to inexorably rising levels in the tropospheric atmosphere is killing trees at a rapidly accelerating rate. All you have to do is look at them to see their thin crowns, damaged leaves, loss of chlorophyll and early autumn senescence to understand that their root systems are even more impaired. They are falling over not just from wind but they have lost their anchoring roots. Branches and trunks are breaking because they are brittle.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisResearch using controlled plots has also shown that fungus, insects, and disease proliferate in higher levels of ozone so when foresters or nurserymen claim trees are dying from those causes without recognizing the underlying reason it is the same as saying someone with AIDS died of pneumonia. And when it is blamed on drought remember that young trees being watered in pots, and aquatic plants in ponds have the identical degree of foliar symptoms as trees and shrubs of whatever age planted in the ground.
This is a worldwide phenomena as it has been demonstrated that the precursors to ozone spread intercontinentally. More recently, two alarming trends are occurring simultaneously: 1. the rate of tree decline is rapidly accelerating and 2. annual plants, including food crops, are stunted.
We must demand that fuel use be rationed on a per person basis and restricted to only the most essential purposes. The choice is drastic conservation as we transition on an emergency basis to clean energy, or mass starvation.
I prefer to eat, but then, that's just me...
www.witsendnj.blogspot.com, photographs and links to research
Bryce Johnson is an attention-seeking Denialist out to troll yet another important article. Learn the physics Bryce! Also mate, google peak coal and peak oil and youll soon be SCREAMING for the USA to do something about its fossil fuel dependency. Fortunately GenIV reactors that EAT nuclear waste are on the way. Its the only way to get affordable baseload power. And the USA has enough nuclear waste (now fuel!) for 500 years.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTime to put away the denialism, and do something to prepare for peak oil, coal, and gas. Use nukes and electric cars and America will not only save $600 billion a year on imported oil costs, not only save money by driving EVs which are half the price of oil to fill, but youll have cleaner and healthier cities as well, and reduce the public health costs of air pollution.
(Its win win win& whether you believe in global warming or not. (Accept the hard physics or not).
Hi Squish,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thiswhy on earth would you extrapolate USA forest loss to the rest of the planet? That just does not make any scientific sense! Try the wiki on deforestation, which says:
***
Global deforestation sharply accelerated around 1852.[75][76] It has been estimated that about half of the Earth’s mature tropical forests—between 7.5 million and 8 million km2 (2.9 million to 3 million sq mi) of the original 15 million to 16 million km2 (5.8 million to 6.2 million sq mi) that until 1947 covered the planet[77]—have now been cleared.[78][79] Some scientists have predicted that unless significant measures (such as seeking out and protecting old growth forests that have not been disturbed)[77] are taken on a worldwide basis, by 2030 there will only be ten percent remaining,[75][78] with another ten percent in a degraded condition.[75] 80% will have been lost, and with them hundreds of thousands of irreplaceable species.[75]
This is simplistic, but I think you can fill in the details yourself:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this1. The principle of good stewardship is wise whether global warming is happening or not. The earth is finite, and we'll eventually run out of resources no matter what--sooner rather than later at the present rate. Let's don't waste.
2. We all like some of the things these resources bring us--refrigeration, access to locations too far to walk to; make your own list. Though we can get along fine with a lot less of civilization's luxuries than we are using.
3. In principle, though you need a bridge to cross a river, after you cross you don't need the bridge. Those resources are the bridge. I hope we figure out how to not need those resources and still have some of those benefits before we run out of the resources. For example, we need rare earths for, say, solar panels. After we get the solar panels, let's stop digging things up so we can clear the air and have soil and clean water again. We have to finish building before the resources run out.
(5. Let's don't use hydropower. It kills rivers and watersheds (Jensen, _Endgame_).)
Deforestation of the Amazon, Sumatra and Borneo - the lungs of the planet is not a fantasy, check it out on Google Earth. Over fishing of the seas is not a myth, it is real, ask any fisherman. Pollution of river systems is everywhere. Expansion of deserts and the drying of lakes (eg; Lake Chad) is also real. Which part of man's destruction of mother earth does this Johnson kook not understand?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBryce W. Johnson is a PhD, "PE". He done been certified! He's Bonified!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIts funny that he feels the need to show off that Phd on a Scientific American comment section, like its the only credible, and logical thing associated with his argument. But then again a lot of Phd's are helping train people to write a lot of highly skilled professional nonsense.
"Science is objective. Jeffrey Sachs provides a non-objective discussion of the issue. He glosses over the "Climategate" e-mails by dismissing comments that an objective observer would classify as "conspiratorial" by calling them "ill-considered language". Presumption of innocence is not objective."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAn objective observer (there have been three investigations) would call them rude, ill considered and unfortunate. And would also call them completely irrelevant to the known science of global warming. Exactly the opposite of what the media echo chamber would want you to believe.
Your lack of objectivity isn't ......objective.
"He then accuses "vested corporate interests" of spreading a "sea of deliverate misinformation to deceive the public". Presumption of guilt is not objective."
Just because you don't know the facts doesn't mean they don't exist. Presumption of the other person's error doesn't make you objective. Exxon Mobil's (don't forget to boycott both brands) funding of science-denial and the massive promotion of ignorance in American business and schools schools is so widespread even a Republican Senator called it anti-American:
http://www.ucsusa.org/publications/catalyst/exxon-exposed.html
http://snowe.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressRoom.PressReleases&ContentRecord_id=9acba744-802a-23ad-47be-2683985c724e
"Rockefeller and Snowe said that ExxonMobils extensive funding of an echo chamber of non-peer reviewed pseudo-science had unfortunately succeeded in raising questions about the legitimate scientific communitys virtually universal findings on the detrimental effects of global warming. This ongoing debate has also damaged Americas reputation as a leader in global affairs. "
Much more in their public humiliation of Exxon Mobil a few years ago - which resulted in the end of Exxon Mobil's massive funding to front groups designed to sell climate doubt over climate knowledge.
"After all, in 40 years, only 2% of America's forests have faced deforestation. I extrapolate this to mean that the world has only lost .5% of its forests every decade. My fingers tell me that at this rate it would take millions of years for us to lose all of our forests. And ingenuity would do something by then. Always has."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisInteresting idea - unfortunately the facts don't bear this out :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deforestation
We can *certainly* stop deforestation, and can re-forest. And we should, but unfortuntely that is very far from what mankind is doing today.
This debate IS human ingenuity! You are watching it happen - bright people learn something, work things out, decide on what's the correct way forwards, and act.
Ingenuity isn't something you wait for other people to do. Y make it, you find it, you get involved and you listen to, fund, vote for, work for, and otherwise support the people that are doing it right.
Sure as eggs is eggs there are people doing it right and people doing it wrong and it is everyone's role in a free-speech democracy to decide which pov to support on the points that matter. Then the innovators that are actually designing and building new stuff can do their thing - we have their backs and they know there is a market for what they're doing.
Take a side. Vote. The guy that's got it backwards certainly will.
How do I contact or correspond with Mr. Sachs. We have developed technology that addresses much of what he writes about and would enjoy and benefit greatly from his insight and council.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHope you can help me with this inquiry.
R. Fred Howard
fred.evergreen.farms@gmail.com
214-236-5640
www.evergreenfarms.org
www.saladacres.net
This opinion reminds me of the all knowing professor who has packed his bags with the latest and best in learning and instrumentation, gone to the station for his trip and then... boarded the wrong train. Humans exist in the biosphere without any natural predator (okay a few bacterial and viral strains). As such we will reproduce until we run out of resources. So what. That's how evolution works. You and I may not like it but millions of years of evolution show that Jeffrey Sachs and anyone else with a penchant for teeth gnashing over sustainability have failed to learn certain Darwinian truths. Humans, and every other species along for the ride with us, will eventually evolve because of our impact on the Earth. So step aside. What comes may not be pretty or "desirable" but it is what will be. No amount of intellectual engineering can forestall the inevitable.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis opinion reminds me of the all knowing professor who has packed his bags with the latest and best in learning and instrumentation, gone to the station for his trip and then... boarded the wrong train. Humans exist in the biosphere without any natural predator (okay a few bacterial and viral strains). As such we will reproduce until we run out of resources. So what. That's how evolution works. You and I may not like it but millions of years of evolution show that Jeffrey Sachs and anyone else with a penchant for teeth gnashing over sustainability have failed to learn certain Darwinian truths. Humans, and every other species along for the ride with us, will eventually evolve because of our impact on the Earth. So step aside. What comes may not be pretty or "desirable" but it is what will be. No amount of intellectual engineering can forestall the inevitable.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGiven the nature of the human beast since we started calling ourselves "civilized" (wars following more wars, pestilence, murder, rape, child molestation, plagues, ethnic cleansing, politics {republican right wing screwballs}, our annihilation of billions of land and sea life, our total disregard for the environment, the Western world's need to consume in order to keep up with the Judeo-Christian dogma that "man shall have dominion over all other living creatures"), why worry that we are moving toward our own demise. We will be doing the Earth a service. It's too bad that a small minority of smart egomaniacs are able to over come intelligent activists by convincing the average Joe that smart is arrogant and sleaze is good.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAt the moment, the core of our discussions should be re-defining the human activities/existence in nature. It is obvious that romantic democracy system, which puts the humanity over everything has eventually failed. We need an amendmend in Constituton with following clauses:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this1- Nature has absolute sovereignty and has the right to sustain.
2- Every person has the right to defend the Rights of Nature in Courts.
3- Waste producing human activities (including urbanization) can only be allowed if waste stabilization is provided in 20 years maximum.
Ozone pollution dramatically increases because of the use of ethanol in gasoline. The WA State Dept of Ecology told me directly in 2008 that any more than 2% ethanol in the gas supply and Seattle exceeds EPA Ozone Attainment Levels. LA has the same problem, its up against the mountains.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe environmentalists in this case are actually making the environment much worse. And ozone causes respiratory illness and death according to the American Heart Association.
Thank Al Gore for the increase in pollution!
With the promotion, it looks like you have been rewarded for writing.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisClimate changes. The debate is on whether mankind can and should spend its resources in trying to control climate, or whether it is wiser to adapt to changing conditions.
Does severely restricting American freedoms warrant the shifting of power to Asia?
Do you really believe elitists should abrogate individual rights and control human development and resource use? Al Gore with his prolific use of resources is an illustration of hypocrisy.
Will the forced loss of US jobs to China and elsewhere actually improve or further harm the global environment?
Dear Jeffrey,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThanks for all your hard work. I wanted to pass along a story about two amazing elementary students who started their own nonprofit organization and are truly making a difference. Their organization is called One More Generation (OMG) and when the founders (Olivia age 7-3/4 and her brother Carter age-9) saw the first images of oiled seabirds and turtles, they started to cry and set forth trying to help. Long story short, they created a Supply Collection Program (based on conversations they had with several agencies including SOS, IBRRC and the Audubon Society) where they started to collect badly needed supplies to help out with the rescue efforts.
As they prepared to make the final arrangements so they could schedule delivery of the supplies they were told that since the Command Center has taken over the animal rescue efforts in the gulf, everything needed to be coordinated with them. As they made contact with the Command Center they were told that their assistance was no longer needed and that they were not welcome in the area. They even went as far as to tell OMG not to come to the region (that is a different story all in of its self) and that their supplies were no longer welcome.
Not accepting this type of response, the founders made contact with the New Orleans Zoo which is run by the Audubon Nature Institute which also runs the Marine Mammal & Sea Turtle Rescue Center. The center had agreed to take the supplies to augment their rescue efforts. Carter and Olivia delivered the supplies on Thursday. The folks running the Rescue Center were absolutely the best group of folks to work with. They are all so passionate about what they do and were so appreciative of everything OMG had done.
I think the story of what these two kids are doing needs to be shared with everyone, and also what the Rescue Center is doing. OMG could have easily accepted the response from the Command Center and given up but they didn't. As a result, some badly needed supplies which were all donated specifically to help with the Oil Spill issue got delivered and the center now has additional supplies which will allow them to continue their efforts. You can read more about the initiative, as well as\, about the other initiatives Carter and Olivia are involved in by following this link; http://onemoregeneration.org/
I hope you will find an opportunity to tell this amazing story soon and we look forward to reading more of your valuable work in the future.
Thanks for listening.
Jim
Dear Jeffery,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThanks for your hard work. I wanted to make you aware of two amazing elementary students who started their own nonprofit organization and are truly making a difference. Their organization is called One More Generation (OMG) and when the founders (Olivia age 8 and her brother Carter age-9.5) saw the first images of oiled seabirds and turtles, they started to cry and set forth trying to help. Long story short, they created a Supply Collection Program (based on conversations they had with several agencies including SOS, IBRRC and the Audubon Society) where they started to collect badly needed supplies to help out with the rescue efforts.
As they prepared to make the final arrangements so they could schedule delivery of the supplies they were told that since the Command Center has taken over the animal rescue efforts in the gulf, everything needed to be coordinated with them. As they made contact with the Command Center they were told that their assistance was no longer needed and that they were not welcome in the area. They even went as far as to tell OMG not to come to the region (that is a different story all in of its self) and that their supplies were no longer welcome.
Not accepting this type of response, the founders made contact with the New Orleans Zoo which is run by the Audubon Nature Institute which also runs the Marine Mammal & Sea Turtle Rescue Center. The center had agreed to take the supplies to augment their rescue efforts. Carter and Olivia delivered the supplies on Thursday. The folks running the Rescue Center were absolutely the best group of folks to work with. They are all so passionate about what they do and were so appreciative of everything OMG had done.
I think the story of what these two kids are doing needs to be shared with everyone, and also what the Rescue Center is doing. OMG could have easily accepted the response from the Command Center and given up but they didn't. As a result, some badly needed supplies which were all donated specifically to help with the Oil Spill issue got delivered and the center now has additional supplies which will allow them to continue their efforts. You can read more about the initiative, as well as\, about the other initiatives Carter and Olivia are involved in by following this link; http://onemoregeneration.org/
I hope you will find an opportunity to tell this amazing story soon and we look forward to reading more of your valuable work in the future.
Thanks for listening.
Jim
Human overpopulation now linked to industrial culture powered by oil doom us. The stupid Abrahamic mass cults hold the "normal" humans in thrall, leading to US v THEM iron age mindset with modern weapons to wage endless wars. The male sex drive and the female mommy drive blessed by abrahamic pro human domination of the earth fortells a bleak future. Peak oil and a post frontier reality means there is no real way to endless expanding economic growth as the past 200-500 years allowed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlant a garden & fruit trees, get some chickens. Oh, buy a gun and lots of ammo.
Root problem is gross overpopulation of humans and 200 years of industrial growth. Sex drive of males plus baby lust by females mixed with greed and US v THEM brain wiring makes future bleak. With no more frontier to steal at gun point and peak oil looks like no more running away to new lands and booms to grow the economy. With the world wide ( excepting western Euorpe, Japan & China) in thanked by blood lust iron age Abrahamic" hate the other cults" we are in for a long hard crash. Plant a garden, fruit trees & get chickens and guns & ammo.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat is so "uniquely American" about subdividing nature into parcels of property. Are you saying America invented private property? This kind of hysteria proves once again that the only proponents of global warming legislation are crackpots and con artists. Climate Change is a fraud.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLets face the facts. As a species, mankind is stupid, and so far has been quite incapable of adopting strategies that will ensure his survival. The huge mess of archaic belief systems means there is in fact very little hope that mass media will even try to get worldwide opinion to adopt a realistic approach to the environment. Money and greed are the main drivers of society, and wisdom is a very rare commodity. Is there still really any time left for a new deal?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSince Mr. Sachs states the problems of sustainability are, "scientifically complex and involve enormous uncertainties," I'm left wondering which "reality" I need to catch up with.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this