Climate change stirs 'Perfect Moral Storm,' prof says

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.washington.edu/news/articles/climate-change-stirs-perfect-moral-storm-prof-says

Dec. 5, 2011

Climate change stirs 'Perfect Moral Storm,' prof says

By Nancy Wick

UW Today

The world is sailing into some killer storms and its leaders have done almost nothing to protect its boat. That’s the view of UW Professor Steve Gardiner, who likens climate change to a perfect storm — a convergence of three difficult problems that so far we’ve found ourselves unable to face, much less solve.

Gardiner is not a climate scientist but a philosopher — one who deals with matters of ethics. The book he’s written about the issue is A Perfect Moral Storm: The Ethical Tragedy of Climate Change.

…

A Perfect Moral Storm is not bedtime reading. It’s intellectually challenging, but it isn’t an obscure tome meant only for academics. In it, Gardiner lays out the three challenges that together make up the perfect storm:

• Climate change is global. What one nation does affects every other nation.
• Climate change is intergenerational. What we do today will affect people yet to be born.
• We have no adequate theory with which to tackle climate change. The ones we are using tend to obscure the problem.

…

[villager]

1. Jesus Christ! What loathsome troll actually unrecc'd this!?

Are the oil company apologists really that thick here?

[Viking12]

5. There are a number of denier trolls that frequent this forum...

Most of the time they just silently unrecc stuff but sometimes they're dumb enough to post and reveal their stupidity and it's always the same recycled anti-scientific tripe -- climate has always been changing, pics of temperature stations, e-mails, blah, blah, blah

[get the red out]

2. The truth knocks on the door

And our "leaders" pad lock it and call climate change "controversial", which means we don't need to know/think about it.

We are so propagandized here in the US that there is no way anything is ever going to be done past the pretend band-aid level. The Discovery Channel won't even air an episode of a documentary that shows the devastating truth of climate change.

[Newest Reality]

3. A focus on values,

above and beyond expertly crafted propaganda and rhetoric, could transform our world.

I mean values, not so much as moral and ethical specifically, but in the sense of what it is we actually place value on. What do we value most? How many of us pause to consider our own list of values and their hierarchical relationship?

As individual aspects of our collective, (collective being merely an abstraction that is now actually defined by mass media for many) we could begin to focus more on the relationship to being for and against to what takes precedence in our own lives and minds, first. Change can proceed from that, despite the current constrictions and incentives that seem to engulf us or cast us as insignificant.

Do we value human lives and the quality of life first and foremost? Or, have we bought into whatever value(s) our cultural imperatives convey? It is one thing to have a belief, (as beliefs tend to cluster around values and support them) or an opinion or a reaction to what is going on, it is another to know how your energy and efforts are directed and prioritized. Most times, the reaction to manipulation on a mass-scale already takes into account the potential reactions. Y

our values, the beliefs that surround and support them, and the behaviors that ensue are part of the behavioral equation. Our identity can be said to be comprised of the three, in this sense. The real "battlefield", (since the term is now increasing in scope) is there and that underscores why so much data is being collected about each one of is. Data acquisition is not merely an economic marketing tool. Actually, I would prefer the term "playing field" and only used battlefield as a jab.

With that, I invite readers to consider taking a non-judgmental of what they value in a deliberate, conscious way. That is where the personal power to change, and focus behavior, may be found directly and honestly. Beliefs can become more flexible and apparent when our values become more evident.

Look at what is valued in your culture and the results of what is dominant, also.

[jwirr]

4. That is extremely good advice. I do not even have to ask myself

twice what I value. My family and their survival. This also means the survival of those around us and for that matter as the OP said the global community because what effects them also effects the whole planet.

I think the book above may be the next one I buy. Sounds very good.

[Newest Reality]

6. It is pleasing to see that

when you inquired and found your values, you made a connection with the interrelated and interdependent relationship of our survival as lifeforms.

Of course, from that value, (which I also value highly) it is not hard to see a relationship with other lifeforms and how they exist mutually.

Despite how things may appear now and how we impact the planet's eco-system, (which can be overwhelming) it helps to continue to hold onto values like that because they are essential.

[jwirr]

7. I agree. Way back when we used to think our national parks system

was to be protected it was understood that there was a disconnect between nature and city life. As the urban areas grew the parks were seen as a way of reestablishing this link. It is also the reason that parks inside cities were established. The absence of nature inside the cities tended to allow people to forget the importance of nature. We are facing the lose of this value which would help us understand climate change more easily.

[eppur_se_muova]

8. Everyone is downwind and downstream from everyone else.

Global warming is just the most general manifestation of that fact.