I have been trying for the last few days to discover a coherent logic towards my feelings on man’s relationship with his environment. This is proving not to be simple.
The process started when I heard on World Service radio a gentleman from the International Panel on Climate Change discussing their latest report. As you know, I tend to accept the established opinion on climate change, and rather take the view that if all our industrial activity were not affecting the atmosphere, that would be strange.
But what struck me was that the gentleman said that a pause in warming for the last fifteen years was not significant, as fifteen years was a blip in processes that last over millennia.
Well, that would certainly be very true if you are considering natural climate change. But we are not – we are considering man-made climate change. In terms of the period in which the scale of man’s industrial activity has been having a significant impact on the environment, surely fifteen years is a pretty important percentage of that period? Especially as you might naturally imagine the process to be cumulative – fifteen years at the start when nothing much happened would be more explicable.
Having tucked away that doubt, I started to try to think deeper. Man is, of course, himself a part of nature. Anything man does on this planet is natural to this planet. I do not take the view man should not change his environment – otherwise I should not be sitting in a house. The question is rather, are we inadvertently making changes to the environment to our own long term detriment?
That rejection of what you might call the Gaia principle – that the environmental status quo is an end in itself – has ramifications. It is hard to conceptualise our relationship with gases or soil, but easier in terms of animals. I am not a vegetarian – I am quite happy that we farm and eat cattle, for example – and you might argue that the cattle are pretty successful themselves, symbiotic survivors of a kind. Do I think other species have a value in themselves? Is there any harm in killing off a species of insect, other than the fact that biodiversity may be reduced in ways that remove potential future advantages to man, or there may be knock on consequences we know not of that damage man somehow? I am not quite sure, but in general I seem in practice to take the view that exploitation of other species and substantial distortion of prior ecological balance to suit men’s needs is fine, so presumably the odd extinction is fine too, unless it damages man long term.
I strongly disapprove of hurting animals for sport, and want to see them have the best quality of life possible, preferably wild. But I like to eat and wear them. I am not quite sure why it is OK to wear animal skin on our feet or carry it as a bag, but not to wear “fur”. What is the difference, other than that leather has had the hair systematically rubbed off as part of the process of making it? A trivial issue, but one that obviously relates to the deeper questions.
Yes I draw a distinction between animals which are intelligent and those which are not. I would not eat whale or dolphin. But this does not seem entirely logical – animal intelligence and sensibility is evidently a continuum. Many animals mourn, for example. The BBC World Service radio (my main contact with the outside world at present – I have just today found my very, very weak internet connection just about works if I try it at 5am) informed me a couple of days ago that orang-utans have the ability to think forward and tell others where they will be the next day. Why cattle and fish are daft enough to eat is hard to justify.
I quite appreciate the disbenefits to man of radically changing his environment, even if it could be done without long term risk to his existence – the loss of beauty, of connection to seasons and forms of behaviour with which we evolved. But I regard those as important only as losses to man, not because nature is important intrinsically. In short, if I thought higher seas, no polar bears and no glaciers would not hurt man particularly, I don’t suppose I would have much to say against it. I fear the potential repercussions are too dangerous to man. At base, I don’t actually care about a polar bear.
Craig,
Given that the significant differences between animal species are the products of thousands and millions of years of evolution, the loss of any animal or plant species is effectively a permanent one as far as human experience is concerned. So long as billions of useless eaters ravage the biosphere to feed its survive-and-breed existence, there will be no chance that new species will outnumber extinctions.
Our descendents can look forward to a world of limited animal and plant species – a small catalogue of those that feed, entertain, comfort and work for us. And those that stubbornly refuse to die off despite great efforts to eradicate them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biodiversity
@Moniker:
“How could we be anything but natural?”
You’ve answered your own question very clearly, Moniker:
“Trouble is, we’ve got an intra-species battle going on because a small group within us (homo very richius) are doing their level best to mislead the rest of us into harming ourselves and all the other branches with a wonky idea of what seems right, and why.”
Yes. But it’s a bit more complex than this, I reckon. It’s not just that a few rich people are messing things up. The industrial SYSTEM colonises us all in various ways, so that our ways of thinking, needs, emotions, and language are all infected to some degree. Indeed, most education, media, and propaganda has precisely this objective . . .
So the crucial distinction is not between the (evil, greedy, etc) wealthy, and the (eco-minded, sustainable, pure) mr/ms average; it’s between the natural order and the industrial system, and all of us are, to varying degrees, caught up in the latter, thereby losing touch with the former . . .
Hi Craig. Some inteeresting thoughts there. Your concluding remarks highlight the tactical errors of many in the Green movements, in that they focus on “conservation” of “Nature” as if conservation (ie prevention of change)were an end in itself, and as if “Nature” and “the Environment” were something outside of the human species.
This second error allows “skeptics” and the sheer bloodyminded to retort that they don’t care about “the environment” as they prefer watching TV to walking in the countryside, so can do without the latter. What they need to understand is that “the environment” is what we live in (including the air we breathe, the water we drink, the soil which produces almost all our food directly or indirectly), and that we have nowhere else to go for the foreseeable future. Look at it that way and it feels a bit more relevant. And certainly not a “middle class fad” or a luxury for the wealtheir countries- the USA and northern Europe would probably survvie even catastrophic global temp increases, whereas Bangladesh would be inundated.
AS to “conservation”, the fact is that the vast majority of all species that have ever existed, became extinct long before humans existed. Our stone age ancestors wiped out a good few more- they weren’t all like Cheif Seattle! However, in recent years the rate of extinction has massively increased, and is now comparable only with the rate during immense natural catastrophes such as the Ice Ages, large meteor strikes, etc. Thing about the environment is that it’s very, very complicated- randomly removing bits of it is like randomly deleting programmes from your computer- some won’t make much difference, others will.
As regards climate change, there often seems to be a false dichotomy being argued, ie either its man made so we must stop it, or else it’s natural in which case we needn’t do anything. Which is a catastrophically stupid position, because if climate change continues (for whatever reason) we could see the biggest social upheavals since the fall of the Roman Empire. And BTW, in the long run, natural climate change- far in excess of predicted manmade change- will continue as it always has done. Humanity, with its petty squabbles, religious dogmatism, and short-term outlook, is nowhere near ready to deal with another Ice Age.
Finally, as regards the alleged “climate change conspiracy” beloved of American libertarians (whom BTW I respect regarding many of their other ideas). Because the inner workings of conspiracies are by definition hidden, one has to consider (a) who would benefit from the purported conspiracy? and (b) do those people/person have the power and lack of ethics to effect the said conspiracy?
Now the most powerful lobby in the world today is surely the oil/gas industry (just look at the West’s involvement in the Muslim world, or the Bilderberg guest list!) So if there’s any massive, well-funded conspiracy going on, it would surely be more likely against the carbon-emissions-related global warming theory, not in favour of it? To be sure, the nuclear industry benefits from the latter, and they’re a powerful lobby, but not as powerful as oil.
Conspiracies get more believable the fewer conspirators they require to be involved. Thus, a small team of dedicated hit men killing JFK, David Kelly, or Diana, is believable. Whereas 100,000 NASA employees faking the Apollo moon landings, or millions of Jews faking the holocaust, is not beleivable. The idea of a “climate change conspiracy” falls between these two extremes, but nearer the latter than the former.
BTW, the reason people get more worked up about fur than about leather or meat, is because animals caught in leg traps take a very long time to die, and also because in the Chinese fur farming industry it is thought acceptable to skin animals while still alive and conscious. Search for “live animal skinning” on Youtube if you want the evidence.
Craig
I have no problem with scientific theories being subject to scrutiny and challenge as that is all part of good scientific practice – “doubt” in itself is not a bad thing, and has been at the root of many scientific discoveries. Perhaps what is more important is how that “doubt” is used and whether or not scientific method is then abandoned in favour of some pre-existing prejudice. You could of course take your position on scientific matters as being one which is diametrically opposed to that of Tony Blair or by some connection to Julian Assange by 4 degrees of association (Swedish Govt.to Karl Rove to Billy McCormac Jr to Billy McCormac Sr – who we are gratuitously told is a Freemason and therefore probably in thrall to the Rothschilds) – alternatively might I suggest that some challenge be made to the view that there has been a pause in the global warming for the last 15 years – it certainly doesn’t tie in with the vast bulk of the evidence I have seen. There has been a slowdown in the rate of accelaration in global warming in recent years – but that is not the same thing.
Even if your view is that you are not worried about the impact of global warming on polar bears – and I for one am more concerned about the impact of rising sea levels on the peoiple of Bangldesh and the Maldives – I wouldn’t be too dismissive of the impact of how ecosystems which do affect all creatures are interlinked. Because of rising sea temperatures we are already seeing changes in the distribution and sizes of fish populations which do affect human livelihoods. Yes it may be nice to grow more grapes in the UK – but what is the impact in Southern Europe and North Africa?
What Runner 77 says. This ‘man is natural so whatever man does is natural’ can of course be extended to drones, war, and torture.
It is not hard to justify eating meat, on a ‘it’s me or it’ basis. It is impossible to justify the factory farming system, unless you live in wilful ignorance of it. Sheep are slaughtered while pregnant. Cows are skinned alive. Chicks are crushed to death alive. The use of antibiotics to keep animals alive in excruciating conditions threatens us all. The research is endless, from CWIF to Fast Food Nation, to the film ‘Facing Animals’ to the undercover work done by VIVA. And with the imminent introduction of giant pig farms here, another US model, it is only going to get worse. What it does to the people working inside them is another question.
Chickens mourn too, by the way.
As for what our ‘natural’ behaviour is doing to the oceans, are people aware that the corpses of dolphins off the UK coast are officially classed as toxic waste because of the pollutants they have absorbed? And that the melting of the sea ice is releasing decades of industrial pollutants once trapped in the ice, over which they crystallised, back into the waters and atmosphere?
Hi Glenn_uk,
In answer to the previous thread:
With all due respect back I think it would be worth looking in to the people behind the recent man made global warming narrative.
On page 75 of The Club of Rome’s 1990 publication entitled The First Global Revolution, the organization outlined how they would manufacture mass ecological scares in order to manipulate the public into accepting the imposition of a dictatorial world government run by them:
“In searching for a common enemy against whom we can unite, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like would fit the bill…All these dangers are caused by human intervention… The real enemy, then, is humanity itself,”
This has largely been manifested in Agenda 21 and the Sutainable Development fetish – a non binding voluntary agreement agreed upon in 1991 that is regardless enforced by the UN and EU on us all.
Reality hasn’t backed up their increasingly fanatical and desperate predictions and public opinion is increasingly turning against them – the IPCC and government funded/sponsored scientists unfortunately simply cannot be trusted anymore. But the global sociopaths are pushing ahead anyway with the agenda to impose authoritarian control measures to regulate and tax every aspect of our existence.
And if you don’t like it, then you’re obviously a right winger and need jailing. It’s already being suggested by the United Nations to make it a ‘crime against humanity’ to question the “reality” of man-made global warming. This is very dangerous territory.
This scam is being exploited by both the corporates and the world communists-they have merged and they are one and the same. This is fascims in a green uniform.
I congratulate Craig for questioning this agenda and bringing it to peoples attention – not an easy thing for people in the public eye to do in the co- opted corporate media of today.
The term is over used but ‘join the dots’ is probably the best thing to suggest.
On another note – Polar bears are excellent swimmers and do not need to be rescued from blocks of ice …
Runner 77 said;
Although we are mostly in agreement, there are areas of divergence, this perhaps could be bridged, or we could agree to disagree. One of these points is the degrees of distaste for industrialisation. Given the almost infantile rush for “order” manifested and reflected in the last few centuries. Further, taking account of the influence of production, management thereof, and disposal of the goods produced; some useful, and others destructive and only designed to kill, dismember, mince and incinerate. We can conclude that industrialisation is a force for good, as well as a force for evil.
The good industrial practices lead humanity towards a path of enlightenment, whilst concurrently introducing Trojans of destructive nature into the mix. Clear example is the fashionable igadget, that is the sought after must have device, and cannot live without item. This clearly is not any industrial phenomena, but a conceptual construct that has been promoted, and portrayed as the most desirable state of material existence.
Therefore, despite your notion that destruction is part of construction, however to fall into the trap of conceptualisation of the destruction, is the most unsatisfactory outcome that could emerge. In qualifying this proposed notion, we can learn from the recycling in nature that death is in fact part of life cycle despite the termination of the life form that is not so pleasant for the life from engaged in dying.
Can we agree that bad industrialisation is correlated with excessive conceptualisation, that belies the destructive industrialisation you refer to.
Fact is as you already know the founder of the Gaia theory himself is in the dog house, and shunned by his contemporaries for daring to proffer the use of nuclear energy option. Fact is conceptualisation can cut both ways, and unfortunately the current brouhaha about “global warming” is such a construct.
It would aid the progression of the debate to identify the tertiary but a very highly influential issue of the conceptualisations that in fact are promoting confusion, disarray, waste, and above all hate and phobia.
Therefore, notwithstanding the mortality or morality of the existence of humanity; as well as considering the “homo very richius” (thanks Moniker) and its overall conceptual constructs, perhaps it is about time we re-examined the headlong rush to apportion blame and seek problems that effectively are not in need of any solutions? Ie there are far more pressing matters than “global warming” construct, designed to validate and mandate the trade in Carbon.
Has someone pointed a shotgun at Gaia though?
http://earthsky.org/earth/u-s-midwest-sees-another-bright-fireball
RD, I never mentioned the Rothschilds. “(Swedish Govt.to Karl Rove to Billy McCormac Jr to Billy McCormac Sr – who we are gratuitously told is a Freemason and therefore probably in thrall to the Rothschilds)” RD, now you’re talking! You’re beginning to understand how the system works. Congratulations!
global warming is a misnomer. When the atmosphere/seas warm, it creates anomalies in weather patterns which results in colder than normal summers. Just because there is still ice in Antarctica it’s no reason to rejoice.
As to predominant cause, I’m with Craig. Humans certainly exacerbate with carbon emissions, but the Earth’s cycles play a major role. It’s just Gaia’s way of saying it’s time to clean house. Extinction events are normal in the vast sea of time.
http://www.leadertelegram.com/news/daily_updates/article_eb688d82-27fd-11e3-9cea-001a4bcf887a.html
There is some opinion out there (http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/juancole/ymbn/~3/7obR6sqZKfc/minimum-ninas-really.html) that there have been cooling trends from mother nature to compensate for the warming trends from industrialization.
Humankind burns more fossil fuels, tending to warm the place, but the sun has produced fewer sun-spots, tending to cool the place — a stand-off. That sort of thing. If this is correct, then when the sun-spot activity returns to normal (also, if unusual La Nina cooling is reduced), then we should see renewed and vigorous warming, making the huge majority of scientists happier (at their predictive ability) and sadder (for the fdate of the world, especially the world’s poor).
@Passerby:
I think we’re getting to a stage of the debate here where it’s difficult to explain all the nuances and qualifications of our positions in a blog + comments context. However, and briefly:
While there are indeed some apparently ‘good’ outcomes of industrialism, these could also be the result of other systems so far unexplored. (My own preference would be for a form of ecosocialism, with the emphasis on the ‘eco’ bit). The problems with industrialism are, I think, systemic, in that they arise out of the nature of the beast itself – e.g. the drive to commodify everything, to view any natural species or entity as ‘raw material’ or ‘natural resources’ (or as ‘pests’ etc), and above all the imperatives of capital growth and the reduction of all qualities to monetary value. I think that we could use our technical knowledge as part of a more intelligent and ecologically sound society that eliminates these destructive core characteristics.
I also agree that conceptualisation is part of the problem – as is language. One tool in our psychological repertoire – the ability to abstract – which should exist within a wider context that also includes feeling, attachment, intuition, spirituality, cultural integrity, etc. has become overly dominant, so that ‘economic rationality’ drives out social interest and individual well-being.
As an aside, I’d also like to say that the current emphasis on climate change has itself become part of the problem, since it blinds us to the enormity of what we’re doing to the natural world – which also includes widespread extinctions, deforestation, pollution of the oceans and the land, the dissolution of ecosystems into scattered individuals, and so on. Most ‘solutions’ that are offered to these issues are in fact ways of preserving the totally unsustainable industrial system rather than of preserving the natural world. Carbon trading is a good example of this, as it has had no effect whatsoever on the tonnage of fossil fuels burned. A real solution, such as that offered by George Monbiot – ‘leave the stuff in the ground’ – would, of course, not even by considered by industry or governments . . .
AA; Those DHS/FEMA exercises in Region3 (Eastern seaboard) seem a little off the fireball mark, if they have some early warning they are keeping close to the vest. I had only heard of the one fireball over the SE US. That’s quite a few concentrated in one geographic area.
“Could you look a cow in its big brown eyes and at the same time slit its throat and watch the life drain out of those eyes? It was the question Barnes Wallace asked himself, and why he became a vegetarian.”
I slaughter and butcher my own meat, not cows, I’ve done bullocks in the past.
It’s nature’s way, half the chicks that hatch are male but only one is needed for a flock. Same with sheep, cows, pigs, only geese tend to be monogamous and I never killed one of those. A surplus is born so the best one can survive and pass on their genes to the next generation, the rest are surplus to requirements, some thing’s going to eat them, might as well be me.
Yes Fred. Temple Grandin, the autistic savant, says animals like steers are raised for their meat. If they were not there might be a few in zoos, but the vast population exists and lives for that purpose. She says we owe it to them to treat them humanely, including the manner of slaughter.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_Grandin
Fred and Ben Franklin, nature’s way is to graze freely on the plains like the buffalo used to do (and still do in some parts of the USA). Other birds seem to manage quite well without man’s intervention. I cannot criticise you for killing your own meat, though it would not be my choice of catering for myself. It’s easier and more humane to open a packet of Quorn. No fat either. Still each to his or her own. I’m not preaching, just mentioning my preference and the reasons.
Ben,
There does appear to be some chatter about possible impacts in various places. The speculation seems to be somewhere North Atlantic/NE America down possibly as far south as Puerto Rico. Some callers from Puerto Rico on a recent radio show said that the island appeared to be preparing for a tsunami and that staff at the Arecibo telescopes were all very worried right now. That could all be nonsense of course.
But see twitter chatter for puerto rico tsunami – https://twitter.com/search?q=puerto%20rico%20tsunami%20-from_japan&src=typd&f=realtime
We are ‘natural’ in the sense that cancer is natural and we are unable to change our ways of life, apparently.
Now with all the intelligence this human specie is supposed to have, what of this malevolent, almost spiritual denial to make it work for us all, this sole pursuit for ephemeral money, meaningless, a mere exchange for services and valued items, naturally produced, why adopt morals that , so we now find out have misled us for centuries, drugged us with theories of caring and supporting each other? when in reality it merely disguised class and ranking, fed differing values to poor and rich.
Cancer is natural and hence, our quixotic fight against inevitable impact, cancer was present in Egyptian mummies, but our industrial age has fed it, we have evolved it into something big, something that we can’t fight, a mechanism within that perverts our cells and their life.
Our demise will not end life on earth and a lot of species will thrive, even if we kill each other in a nuclear crescendo, a small, wry reason to raise a glass to evolution and smile.
Ben,
Also I’ve finally had a bit of success with getting the NASA Horizons telnet system to give me some close approach data on my own little curiosity. However no matter how far I widen the uncertainty limits I can’t (so far) get it to compute a possible October close approach solution. Now I am even more puzzled why its output is so different from that on the official impact risk page. The two NASA systems appear to differ by about 90 million miles or so in position at the moment.
AA; Based on FT3 size and velocity, do you see 200 hundred foot tsunami?
over a week has passed and we hear nothing of Frankfurt’s financiers pressurising Merkel and the social democrats to speed up their coalition talks.
No hectic here, so if Evan Davis of R4 want to see coalitions work to the best of voters, maybe he ought to go over there and ask how it works. But to justify the current gaggle of speed daters as a coalition is really stretching the cloak of imagination over the hard facts of reality.
A coalition with the Greens is more remote than last week.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/german-press-review-on-merkel-s-search-for-a-coalition-partner-a-924432.html
O/T Our wars massively waste resources and damage the environment, apart from the killing and maiming of other humans that is.
I have just watched a review of a new film about the war (or conflict! as it is called) on Afghanistan which questions its purpose. John Reid’s false promise is quoted.
The Patrol: Film Examines Afghan War Legacy
The movie takes a piercing look at the conflict in Afghanistan through the eyes of a British Army patrol.
http://news.sky.com/story/1147447/the-patrol-film-examines-afghan-war-legacy
I will not be going to see it.
Ben,
Depends on how near you are. You can scare yourself silly or otherwise at http://impact.ese.ic.ac.uk/ImpactEffects/
For example for a 340m asteroid.
Use Diameter 340m
Density 3000kg/m3 (solid rock)
Impact Velocity 20km/sec
Impact Angle 45
You can alter distance and target type to suit. And/or up the size until you blow the planet apart.
Basically if you are near enough to worry about a 200 feet or more tsunami there’s a good chance you’ve already spontaneously combusted from the heat blast from the impact fireball.
It’s rare for me to agree with Fred, but I love meat.
In my poorer days, I helped myself to the bounty of the country, and never asked for permission of the landowner before killing and eating animals that lived on ‘his’ land.
Being a ‘Veggie’ is either a fashion statement of the rich, or a choice forced on the poor.
I love ‘meat’ too. But I don’t love it if I actually spend a second thinking about where it came from.
“Being a ‘Veggie’ is either a fashion statement of the rich, or a choice forced on the poor”
Not quite. It depends where you live. In Walthamstow you have access to a local market which will sell you 6 avocados for a pound. In Newham, you have the local shop which offers a few oranges and a freezer full of burgers. Horse meat is cheap.
Plus, many sources for this:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1370788/Fruit-vegetable-prices-rocket-putting-reach-low-income-families-warns-report.html
and it’s going to get worse because of the anti-immigration bigotry, apparently: no more cheap labour.
How crazy is this?
Back to ‘Gaia and all that’ – I think we as a species suffer from a misuse of imagination, and a refusal to use the precautionary principle. Both, of course, in the interests of corporate profits.
@Technicolour.
Unfortunately, there were no Avocado trees growing in my area.
Actually, nothing grows in winter up here.
Doesn’t the planet naturally sequestrate CO2 on a massive scale? Doesn’t it have to given the natural fluctuations of CO2: Volcano’s, hemispherical seasons, sun bursts and the relationship between the vast oceans with all those factors?
It’s chemical, pharmaceutical, biological and radiological products of mans activity that post a massively greater threat to mans livelihood than anything else like CO2. One really should be suspicious that it’s not those factors that are getting focus but CO2 instead.
I very much like most Techno’s view (28 Sep, 2013 – 7:41 am) even if I’m only tepid towards his left-right description.
Most anthropogenic global warming (AGW) skeptics – some notable scientists included, believe that AGW may be a reality but that the effects are nowhere near as significant as the careerist computer modellers (GIGO anyone?) and ‘hide the decline’ types make out.
But IF it was really a threat, then isn’t the real problem the thing that you can see on Google Map? – i.e. Deforestation without replenishment. I am often taken aback at how in a sea of green [forests and woods] there are mighty lakes of grey [cities] where green once stood.
If the a runaway CO2 related climate change scenario was actually proved beyond reasonable doubt, AND the resulting change was actually dangerous to man (instead of leading to a more fertile planet overall), then rather than these awful carbon trading units – which will always work to the favour of the pre-existing financial elite and continued exploitation and domination – isn’t the answer a massive human effort to re-forest which would of course be affordable and rapidly effective.
Great news, my rescue chickens, three of six are left, have laid their 500’s egg today, three cheers to whoever advanced our symbiosis with jungle fowl.
the other three ended up as stock.
“I love ‘meat’ too. But I don’t love it if I actually spend a second thinking about where it came from.”
Like the woman who wouldn’t have the tongue because she couldn’t bear the thought of eating something which had been in an animal’s mouth. So she had an egg instead.
If people were to see where quorn comes from they wouldn’t eat that either.