I understand the need to walk cautiously around the edges of spoilt-brat culture, but really, is it doing the public any favours to feed them soothing lies about maintaining the yankiindustrial way of life and a human-friendly biosphere and climate? apart from that I was pleased with the film.
the depressing thing is that Gore's film is a baby step, and yet it is received as a big radical controversial document.
meanwhile, Filthy Lucre lets loose lawyers and money, if not (yet) guns, to force the citizens of Kansas to adopt coal plants whether they want 'em or not:
Six weeks ago Kansas Secretary of Health and Environment Rod Bremby made Kansas the first U.S. state to reject a coal-fired power plant solely because of health risks associated with carbon dioxide emissions. Since then, the state has become ground zero for a nationwide battle pitting environmental concerns against powerful economic and political interests. Kansas is now facing lawsuits from Sunflower Electric Power Corp and industry groups while angry state lawmakers are determined to overturn the denial of the $3.6 billion power plant project, with some even threatening to dismantle the state department of health and environment. The energy industry also is pouring money into the state to try to overturn the October 18 ruling, which killed Sunflower's plan to add two 700-megawatt units to its operations in western Kansas, a cash-strapped rural area. "Everybody agrees that motherhood, apple pie and caring about the environment are fantastic," said Bob Kreutzer, head of the newly formed Kansans for Affordable Energy. "But we've got to make sure we always have electricity and that is why we need big power plants."
Kansas is now facing lawsuits from Sunflower Electric Power Corp and industry groups while angry state lawmakers are determined to overturn the denial of the $3.6 billion power plant project, with some even threatening to dismantle the state department of health and environment.
The energy industry also is pouring money into the state to try to overturn the October 18 ruling, which killed Sunflower's plan to add two 700-megawatt units to its operations in western Kansas, a cash-strapped rural area.
"Everybody agrees that motherhood, apple pie and caring about the environment are fantastic," said Bob Kreutzer, head of the newly formed Kansans for Affordable Energy. "But we've got to make sure we always have electricity and that is why we need big power plants."
the stunning inanity of that last statement is enough to stop one's heart for a moment. how we are going to "always" have electricity if we no longer have food or water -- or what kind of monster of selfishness one has to be to consider the two threats even remotely comparable -- is a question that doesn't seem to bother this paid mouthpiece.
[notice the clever relegation of environmental issues to "motherhood and apple pie" -- not only framing them with feminine/domestic (therefore trivial and unmanly) memes, but also -- via the stock trope -- with formulaic/rote rhetoric or window-dressing as opposed to sincere, practical or "real" concerns. once again we see not-so-subtly gendered filth-industry meme warfare: wussy politicians fuss and fret like a bunch of old women, all sentimental over The Environment, reciting a bunch of maudlin platitudes -- but Real Men roll up their sleeves, get real, and build coal plants.] The difference between theory and practise in practise ...
Regarding coal plants in Kansas, can one imagine how many jobs are created building and servicing the many thousands of megawatts of windpower available in Kansas? The logic of that solution defies opposition. Nearly all of western Kansas is class 3 - class 5 wind resource at 50m, meaning at modern hub height most of the western state is 400 - 650 Wm2.
http://kec.kansas.gov/chart_book/WindEnergyMap.pdf Skennah Kowa
On the face of it, a town council lecturing the public about conservation because of the terrible plight of Planet Earth might think twice about putting on a month-long display of conspicuous energy consumption. After all, the dazzling Christmas lights are likely, while bringing seasonal cheer to shoppers, to be sending out a secondary message: conservation is important but so is having fun. Not everything needs to change. Life and business must go on. Since this approach, a kind of fair-weather environmentalism, is a microcosm of the attitude of central government, it would be absurd to cast any blame on the council or the owners of those spectacularly illuminated houses. A Prime Minster who can boast that the UK is a world leader in combating climate change within a few days of announcing that an already vast international airport would be permitted to expand, enabling it to double its capacity in the next 25 years, has, to put it mildly, a selective view of the problem. Politicians invariably use the threat of global warming in a way that is expedient to them. Solemn promises to put public money into renewable energy and to push hard to achieve EU targets make them look responsible and earn them votes. But when it comes to the truly difficult policy decisions - those which will anger the public and lose them popularity - they take the usual line, supporting big business and pushing for growth. Those luckless people in different parts of the United Kingdom who have awoken to find, in order to save the world, that their little bit of landscape has been designated as a site for industrial wind turbines are regularly accused of self-interest when they protest - a particularly silly Labour MP dismissed them as "windbags" in the House of Commons this week - but in truth the selfishness is not there, but in the culture as a whole. We talk about climate change, but buy bigger cars every year, produce throw-away technology, build larger airports. Industrialists piously urge the need for sacrifice on their customers, and then join the unseemly scramble to make money from the biggest gold-rush since the dot-com boom. It is a human instinct, when in difficulty, to take a macho, pro-active approach - to build our way out of difficulty rather than live more moderately - and that reaction suits the politicians and the freshly green business leaders just fine. Open the financial pages these days and there will be stories about how green is the new gold and interviews with so-called eco-millionaires. Care and conservation - the more radical versions of doing without Christmas lights - not only cost politicians votes but rarely make money for business. By contrast, business expansion with an attractive green hue, what Richard Branson calls "Gaia capitalism", is both profitable and a perfect, an easy way for a firm to market itself as being socially responsible and globally aware. In its turn, the government obediently plays its part - singled out for particular praise in Gordon Brown's recent speech were those great heroes of the environment, Tesco and Sky. Last week it was reported that the head of one of the world's most famous oil dynasties, George Bush Snr, had erected a wind turbine over his ranch. Journalists, as usual, were suitably impressed. The convenient myth of the moment, that money-making and ecological responsibility can go hand in hand to lead us to a better, cooler world, without any of us changing the way we live, had found its perfect symbol.
Since this approach, a kind of fair-weather environmentalism, is a microcosm of the attitude of central government, it would be absurd to cast any blame on the council or the owners of those spectacularly illuminated houses. A Prime Minster who can boast that the UK is a world leader in combating climate change within a few days of announcing that an already vast international airport would be permitted to expand, enabling it to double its capacity in the next 25 years, has, to put it mildly, a selective view of the problem.
Politicians invariably use the threat of global warming in a way that is expedient to them. Solemn promises to put public money into renewable energy and to push hard to achieve EU targets make them look responsible and earn them votes. But when it comes to the truly difficult policy decisions - those which will anger the public and lose them popularity - they take the usual line, supporting big business and pushing for growth.
Those luckless people in different parts of the United Kingdom who have awoken to find, in order to save the world, that their little bit of landscape has been designated as a site for industrial wind turbines are regularly accused of self-interest when they protest - a particularly silly Labour MP dismissed them as "windbags" in the House of Commons this week - but in truth the selfishness is not there, but in the culture as a whole.
We talk about climate change, but buy bigger cars every year, produce throw-away technology, build larger airports. Industrialists piously urge the need for sacrifice on their customers, and then join the unseemly scramble to make money from the biggest gold-rush since the dot-com boom.
It is a human instinct, when in difficulty, to take a macho, pro-active approach - to build our way out of difficulty rather than live more moderately - and that reaction suits the politicians and the freshly green business leaders just fine. Open the financial pages these days and there will be stories about how green is the new gold and interviews with so-called eco-millionaires.
Care and conservation - the more radical versions of doing without Christmas lights - not only cost politicians votes but rarely make money for business. By contrast, business expansion with an attractive green hue, what Richard Branson calls "Gaia capitalism", is both profitable and a perfect, an easy way for a firm to market itself as being socially responsible and globally aware. In its turn, the government obediently plays its part - singled out for particular praise in Gordon Brown's recent speech were those great heroes of the environment, Tesco and Sky.
Last week it was reported that the head of one of the world's most famous oil dynasties, George Bush Snr, had erected a wind turbine over his ranch. Journalists, as usual, were suitably impressed. The convenient myth of the moment, that money-making and ecological responsibility can go hand in hand to lead us to a better, cooler world, without any of us changing the way we live, had found its perfect symbol.
It is a human instinct, when in difficulty, to take a macho, pro-active approach... again, a head-exploding moment of gendered rhetoric. if it is "human instinct" to take a "macho" approach, then are we to accept the implication that women -- unless they are selfconsciously macho -- are not fully human? or that being "pro-active" -- i.e. responding intelligently, strategically, and in advance to a developing situation -- is an exclusively masculine trait and can only be associated with bravado, expansionism, etc. (even if bravado and expansionism are the worst possible strategies, and patently, desperately, reactive rather than pro-active)?
the crisis of industrialism vs the biotic infrastructure seems to be throwing industrial techno-patriarchy into a full-blown gender-anxiety attack... perhaps something analogous to the "modernity shock" and subsequent vicious misogynist backlashes that have been documented in antiquarian patriarchies suddenly confronted by industrial, colonial technoforce? I mean, the Northwest Passage will finally yield to Man, what gratifying news (as Migeru sarcastically noted a few days ago) -- the cognitive dissonance is getting increasingly painful.
the callous, casual, even gleeful destructiveness and reckless bravado of industrial culture I would describe as more puerile than manly. time to grow up, regardless of gender identity: neither spoilt darling princesses nor arrogant devil-may-care princelings are going to come up with an optimal survivability path through our current resource crunch... The difference between theory and practise in practise ...
the callous, casual, even gleeful destructiveness and reckless bravado of industrial culture I would describe as more puerile than manly.
That's true enough, but the problem with a feminist analysis like this is it's obvious and easy, and is also very unlikely to lead to practical policy change.
If the Left parts company with reality it's most usually in the space between what people should do and what people are really likely to do. While we all know we 'should' cut emissions it's not going to happen without some very big changes to the political scene.
The changes will happen anyway, one way or another. The only question is whether the landing will be intelligently managed or catastrophic.
So it's possibly more practical to game out likely outcomes and see what can be done to influence them in a positive direction than to label the culprits naughty boys.
(And is it really only men who are the problem? Do women's lifestyle choices not contribute to CO2?)
All politics is about gender. Don't you know anything?
Well it IS radical to a lot of people - obviously not everybody is as aware of the problem as many people here - and it shocks them - without being so depressing that they try to dismiss it - see reply to Geezer in Paris above. Maybe it's because I'm a Londoner - that I moved to Nice. Blog - Nice Experience
With hard work, the curves go down. A difficult objective, but promising.
The corresponding problem-scenarios, however, look more like the ones on the right, showing CO2 concentrations: With hard work, the curves still rise. Not so promising.
Even the most optimistic scenario (green) represents a tripling of the anthropogenic contribution to CO2 concentration (the dotted line shows the pre-industrial level). That is to say, a problem that looks three times larger, in a favorable scenario, and omitting both cumulative effects, such as ongoing warming of the oceans, and positive feedback on greenhouse gas levels caused by thawing tundra, faster oxidation of soil organics, methane from tundra clathrates, and decreased oceanic photosynthesis, together with warming due to darkening at high latitudes caused by increased vegetation and shrinkage of Arctic sea ice. ------
My forecast is for a climate of opinion increasingly favorable to geoengineering. I regret that this is not yet a standard part of EuroTrib discussions of the politics of climate change, but then, human beings are notorious for paying too little attention to predictable developments. Words and ideas I offer here may be used freely and without attribution.
9 November 2007 CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS--Top climate scientists have cautiously endorsed the need to study schemes to reverse global warming that involve directly tinkering with Earth's climate.... The field of geoengineering has long been big on ideas but short on respect....Perhaps the best-known idea is to pump aerosols into the stratosphere to mimic the cooling effect of volcanoes. But there's been scant support from mainstream scientists, many of whom fear that even mentioning the g-word could derail discussion of carbon-emissions cuts. Others worry that technological tinkering might backfire. "I just accepted on faith as an environmental scientist that this had to be a bad idea," said Harvard's Scot Martin, who said he was reluctantly coming around.... Schrag also fears that when countries are faced with the prospect of even more drastic environmental change, they will turn to geoengineering regardless of whether the consequences are known. "We're going to be doing this if we're afraid of something really bad happening, like the Greenland ice sheet collapsing," he said. Pierrehumbert urged scientists to study the problem as a supplement to cutting greenhouse gas emissions, although he called for a 10-year moratorium on any geoengineering. "To the extent I've changed my mind a little bit," Pierrehumbert explained to Science, the reason is the ease with which countries could embark on geoengineering. Science
The field of geoengineering has long been big on ideas but short on respect....Perhaps the best-known idea is to pump aerosols into the stratosphere to mimic the cooling effect of volcanoes. But there's been scant support from mainstream scientists, many of whom fear that even mentioning the g-word could derail discussion of carbon-emissions cuts. Others worry that technological tinkering might backfire. "I just accepted on faith as an environmental scientist that this had to be a bad idea," said Harvard's Scot Martin, who said he was reluctantly coming around....
Schrag also fears that when countries are faced with the prospect of even more drastic environmental change, they will turn to geoengineering regardless of whether the consequences are known. "We're going to be doing this if we're afraid of something really bad happening, like the Greenland ice sheet collapsing," he said.
Pierrehumbert urged scientists to study the problem as a supplement to cutting greenhouse gas emissions, although he called for a 10-year moratorium on any geoengineering. "To the extent I've changed my mind a little bit," Pierrehumbert explained to Science, the reason is the ease with which countries could embark on geoengineering.
Science
There are strong positive feedback loops in this sort of politics. When the political climate starts to tip, it will be difficult to argue against doing something effective without being labeled as pro-warming by the advocates of direct action to reduce global temperatures. Many of those advocates will be unprincipled opponents on a wide range of ideological issues, and many will not. It could get messy. Words and ideas I offer here may be used freely and without attribution.
It's been 30+ years since the advent of Chaos Mathematics as applied to Complex systems and people still don't get it.
Mucking around doing "geoengineering" is as likely to cause a detrimental as beneficial outcome. A doo run-run-run, a doo run-run
Note that the sulfur dioxide proposal can reference natural experiments, in the form of several volcanic explosions and their effects on atmosphere and temperature. One can pretend that the consequences are already known, and there is more than a shred of truth to this.
And beware the argument: "Pinatubo was OK, and if they say that sort of thing is worse than global warming, then warming shouldn't be a problem." Now wrap this in hostile rhetoric, marketista ideology, etc., and repeat 10,000 times on Fox. Words and ideas I offer here may be used freely and without attribution.
People ... realized thousands of years ago that small causes can have large effects and the future is hard to predict. What is relatively new is the demonstration that for some systems, small changes of initial condition usually lead to predictions so different, after a while, that prediction becomes in effect useless. David Ruelle - Chance and Chaos
David Ruelle - Chance and Chaos
We know weather contains such systems from the Lorenz Butterfly.
Further, a change in weather patterns happens on a geologic time scale. We are now, it has been claimed, seeing the affects of CO2 put into the atmosphere in the 1970s.
Geoengineering is an attempt to change the initial conditions of a Chaotic system where the results of that change may not be observable for decades.
This does not make sense.
We know what to do about Global Warming, remove the cause of the problems by:
(1) stop pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere (2) initiate a global program to remove greenhouse gases (primarily CO2, currently) from the atmosphere to return them to Pre-GW levels A doo run-run-run, a doo run-run
My first encounter with this was in a nice little book called Response and Stability by A. B. Pippard. We have met the enemy, and he is us — Pogo
