Elizabeth Barrette (ysabetwordsmith) wrote,
Elizabeth Barrette
ysabetwordsmith
  • Mood: busy

Solving Things the Wrong Way

Here's an example of people trying to solve a problem the wrong way, because the necessary course of action is likely to be difficult, expensive, unpleasant, and therefore unpopular:

Andrew Glikson | Toward Climate Geoengineering?
Andrew Glickson, Truthout: "That global climate change has reached an impasse whereby the 'powers-to-be' are entertaining climate geoengineering mitigation, instead of the urgent deep reduction of carbon emissions required by science, represents the ultimate moral bankruptcy of institutions and a failure of democracy."


Geoengineering would entail large-scale purposeful manipulations of the atmosphere, oceans, etc. Yeah ... making major changes to systems we've already severely damaged by doing things we didn't realize would affect them badly because we didn't understand them fully. And we still don't. This way lies a realm of enlightening doom we should avoid.
Tags: environment, news
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  • 6 comments
maryrobinette

maryrobinette

April 19 2009, 14:11:46 UTC 12 years ago

That article is really alarmist.

If you read the original interview, Holdren talks about all the other things we can and should be doing. Even the sections quoted here, he says it's "an experimental measure [which] would only be used as a last resort" and that it's an "extreme option."

Deleted comment

ysabetwordsmith

Hmm...

ysabetwordsmith

April 20 2009, 00:53:44 UTC 12 years ago

>> But 'the ultimate moral bankruptcy of institutions and a failure of democracy' was often prelude to a call for fascism, excuses for placing government more firmly in the hands of religious, military, and industrial bullies -- in other words, into the hands of people most responsible for this mess. <<

The "solution" of fascism is a bad idea. However, that doesn't invalidate the original complaint, just means that some other solution should be found, such as...

>> We need more democracy, not less; we need science education, to recognize the relationship of modern democracy, our concepts of liberty and human rights, to science as opposed to any form of dictatorship.<<

... this one. But big business has done a lot of damage to citizen rights and education, and science; particularly in conjunction with government.
siliconshaman

siliconshaman

April 19 2009, 14:24:27 UTC 12 years ago

Moving down-under to NZ is looking better every day... not that anywhere on this planet is really all that likely to escape, but there's degree's of relative safety.
fayanora

fayanora

April 19 2009, 23:56:02 UTC 12 years ago

Maybe if we actually knew what we were doing, but I'm with Dr. Z from Galactica 1980: our attempts at weather control are primitive.
christinaathena

christinaathena

April 20 2009, 00:41:10 UTC 12 years ago

Yeah. A hundred years from now we might be able to do that sort of thing. But now? We don't know nearly enough yet.
fayanora

fayanora

April 20 2009, 00:43:46 UTC 12 years ago

Exactly. We need some powerful quote to that effect, something like "Do not meddle in the affairs of Gaia, for thou art squishy and allergic to lightning."