I write about many of the same issues you do. I published a book in 2016, How Soon Is Now, that had introductions from Sting and Russell Brand. In that book, I looked at the ecological crisis from a systems-design viewpoint (Buckminster Fuller) and proposed how we would have to address the three main areas of technical infrastructure, social system, and collective consciousness if we wanted to survive as a civilization. I just wrote a piece for my newsletter here on substack, where I noted that we only have 50 years of natural gas and roughly 50 years of oil reserves left globally. It is stunning this isn't discussed more. As Fuller said in the 60s, we should use the remaining fossil fuels to build the renewable energy systems. Now we are perhaps too late to make anything but a haphazard transition. I would love to interview you for my podcast and I think you might be interested in my approach to these topics. My first book, Breaking Open the Head (Random House, 2002), helped launch the new psychedelic movement, which I hoped would be more focused on system redesign but got hijacked by Capitalism. Anyway would love to have an interview / conversation - my email Daniel.pinchbeck@gmail.com . Thanks for your great work.
Thank you, Bill. for what you have done and are doing, for being you, for sharing this perspective. Even in my blue bubble, so few really get it, or if they do, they just don't think about it. I read your posts and don't feel so alone. Onward...next projects: creating a community garden, and protesting Chase!
Bill, I have never seen you comment on the role of population in climate change. Use the basically true, if grossly oversimplified "equation" that P(population) x S (services/person) X E (energy per service) X C (CO2 per unit of service) = CO2 produced worldwide. I know the reasons people avoid it, but we can reduce human population, by voluntary, humane, sensible incentivization, or we can do it by failed states, war, disease, starvation, and violent societal collapse. Population reduction is the third rail of climate change efforts because of our history of eugenics, genocides, and other inhumane ways of using population reduction as a rationale for crimes against humanity. History is not destiny. It seem likely climate change will be the most genocidal force in the world within a decade, and may be now.
It is amazing how simply giving women access to reproductive health services has a dramatic effect, reversing population growth in areas around the clinics when established where population growth is high,, when combined with education of men. Check with Population Connection on their experience with that.
There are many challenges to reducing world population humanely, and with incentives, without coercion. In fact, we are currently still incentivizing population growth, and resource depletion - our economic system is built on a foundation of growth being necessary for prosperity, which is an arbitrary economic model, not a fact of life.
The ecological role of our species at present, is that we are the most successful , and therefore the most destructive, invasive species, perhaps ever, and we have not slowed down yet. The challenge is, can we voluntarily move closer to our prehistoric niche ( 3 million) , but our technology has done some good for the planet that is sustainable, I have seen an estimate that we could be non-destructive at 2-4 billon, with 2 being more likely. Non-destructive means not just equilibrium of atmospheric CO2, it means returning groundwater to prehistoric levels, and sustaining them there. It means saving as many species as we can, and letting the earth regrow itself an ecosystem that sustains us, in a "niche", 2 billion, or whatever it is, so that we are not the cause of the 6th extinction, whenever it does occur. It means sustainable is possible, not just managed depletion.
Thank You Mr. McKibben. What a wonderful source of information you share. Enjoyed your book as well. The Flag, The Cross, the the Station Wagon. You pulled everything together explaining why we're where are in this sometimes confusing world. Job well done. Thomas Mason. Johnson, Vermont.
Wonderful place we have. Unlike other places. Watched 2 bear cubs brawling. Still laughing. Maybe they won't soon? Time to change Stuff? Thomas Mason. Ober Hill. Johnson.
As someone also fighting the climate fight for many years, I some years back refined my goal as leaving our kids a world with which they can cope. To do what we can to give them a fighting chance.
Hoping that we will have won the human fight and will be responding fully, and that the struggle will be to adapt to an inevitably changing world. If we have achieved a level of human solidarity out of this, we may even in many ways build a profoundly better world. That’s where I wound up in my latest substack post. A two-parter starting here. https://theraven.substack.com/p/ocean-city-cities-in-the-ocean?r=36q38&s=w&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web As always, thanks for your recommendation to my blog. It’s bringing a lot of people my way.
Nice balanced essay Bill. I believe in divine intervention. Hear me out folks - Not a Global Warming denier freak - just the opposite - my father was a brilliant engineer/ecologist and was preaching these same arguments about the dangers of global Warming back in the late 1960s. As usual USA is finally taking action after the shit has already hit the fan 50 years later. (#ExxonKNew)
But we have already seen all over the world proof that nature can come back even after humans mess it up - not saying sea level rise is not going to get worse - but that the good news is the playing field of federal government subsidies has been leveled because of the IRA legislation recently passed by President Biden's administration - for the first time in our nation's short history!
The only real way to beat the huge evil fossil fuel corporations is in the market place - as in a Pocketbook Revolution which I have been writing about for years in my books, blogs, Substack account etc. Renewables was already winning in the free market (not so free until we get rid of Wall Street Casino system which creates huge monopolies based on BS speculation etc - read my Organic old school Trade/Capitalism solution) and now the explosion of green investments and race to build EVs etc is on for real! Granted - we must not repeat the same mistakes of destructive energy business practices and hopefully new mining techniques (lithium/cobalt/silicon etc for EVs/Solar Panels etc) that are less damaging to ecosystems will prevail, but as I explain to my students - lesser of evils is a given reality equation in a world of 8 billion human consumers who want the basic modern conveniences.
It says in the Bible that God can keep track of the hairs on our heads - and if you consider the cosmic fine tuned universe that we occupy and all the hyper complexity and super symmetry etc. that God has created - then I think this is true. So if we humans make the serious effort it will take to slow down global warming - one good foot in front of the other - God will hold off Mother Nature from wiping us out and maybe even nudge the process along as I believe God does on occasion - if and only if we make a solid effort! After all - actions do speak louder than words! Every little action and every big action counts! Everything is interconnected and we are truly one as the brilliant scientists James Lovelock and Lynn Margulis put forward 60 years ago - Gaia principle. All modern physics and simulations have proven this concept beyond the shadow of a doubt - to earned theory level status! God bless this human made mess! Let's show God that we mean business as far as cleaning up the huge mess we have created through our daily actions/lifestyles/voting choices and spending habits/investments! Let's do this like we knew this!
The shift in language must integrate with a shift in mind set: towards psychological resilience, towards being/becoming a version of the best of what human life might look like .. and a culture/social structure that supports such a life. Techological contributions will emerge and get applied more smoothly and effectively as the mental picture gets clearer. It's scarey, of course. And anxiety constricts thinking. But all who speak or write or bake cookies for activists or care for their grandchildren make a contribution to the growing voice. Silence, being silenced, becoming an "inactivist" is the deep darkness that calls out for a candled response. Gratitude to you, Bill, and to all who have kept and continue to keep the fire going.
Thank you, Bill, for your unrelenting efforts to shake us awake and to keep pressing those in power to do what must be done before it’s too little too late.
Things are bad, as Bill makes clear, but, frankly, and maybe to Bill's credit (not sure about this), as a scientist schooled in physics, geology and hydrology, it has been clear to me that what Bill presents is SEVERELY understated. Reality check folks, the things that concern Bill are likely 10 - 100 times worse than Bill states. I think Bill knows, but understates this reality so that we as human society don't give up hope. That may be a good approach to Bill, but I fear that doing so allows us, our governments, corporations and the mainstream environmental organizations the room they need to justify building more metal, glass and plastic crap ("renewable" energy technologies) across the planet in a desperate hope that we can continue our consumptive lifestyles and at the same time, placate the capitalist system and the corporations that run our free market world. Renewable energy technologies manufactured through the further exploitation and destruction of the planet Earth environment and many of its poorest, rural cultures are a feel good, fool's errand that allow us not to address the true drivers of the planetary environmental crisis, of which catastrophic global warming is BUT ONE symptom. I think all of us know what the root causes of the environmental collapse we are witnessing are , that being OVER POPULATION (shhhhh.., the mainstream enviros have sworn an oath not to talk about this), CONSUMPTION and the waste generation created by our consumption. Atmospheric CO2 is a waste product from burning fossil fuels. Man-made PFOS/ PFAS contamination, plastics contamination, chemical contamination, heavy metals contamination (all of which can be found in the bodies of every living thing on Earth) are also waste products, products which are generated in massive quantities and dumped into our air and water in an effort to sustain our consumptive lifestyles. All of these wastes are also created by the highly polluting manufacture of renewable energy technologies and EVs. These magical solutions, brought to us by the same industries that got us here in the first place, are in reality more of the same and will do nothing to correct us out of the death spiral our living planet is in, a spiral 100% caused by humankind procreation and consumption. Our beautiful and amazing planetary environment has been thrown out of balance and torn apart and we are now experiencing the repercussions of our massive population's demand for natural resources and production of highly toxic wastes, waste's that the planet's environment is not tooled up to address. This is the reality folks. Bill has been relentless in bringing his concerns to us all and I thank him for that, but like a kind grandfather, he does not tell his children how REALLY BAD things are, to protect us from falling into despair and giving up. Bill, I remember clearly an interview you had with Amy Goodman many years ago where you (of course) were discussing the climate crisis and what we needed to do. Amy said to you Bill, something like, 'Bill, the world's climate scientists that agree with you that climate change is real also are saying that we have but a 3% chance of turning this around, and if so, what good will the measures you propose really do?' Your response Bill was something like, 'I don't disagree, but if I were on death row and I were given the choice of no chance or a 3% chance, I would take the 3% which is better than no chance at all....' . I was blown away as I agreed totally with this reality and your approach. That said, I had hoped that you would present this stark reality as you campaigned for societal change. The struggle I continue to have is our misleading those who trust in us to believe that we can correct out of the situation by continuing to consume and exploit our natural resources, expanding into and clear cutting new forests for mining, agriculture, manufacturing development, etc. to meet the demands of our growing population, just by switching to new "renewable" technologies. We cannot turn the corner simply by manufacturing and installing glass, metal, and plastic energy production equipment across planet Earth, just so we can continue to live as we do. This I consider so very dangerous and I really feel that it is past time for us to face reality; its time to stop blaming the greedy oil companies (like most all corporations) and governments running the planet, and take responsibility for our own actions. It is each one of us that choose to consume and waste massive amounts of natural resources, including fossil fuels and if we, the market, continue to demand STUFF to keep ourselves comfortable, companies such as XOM, Shell, BP, Monsanto, 3M, GE, Goldwind, Seimans and the auto industry will continue to be more than happy to meet our needs. It is past time we dealt with these realities and addressed them head on if we truly care about our children's and the future of all life on our planet. It is really past time we all faced the enemy and it is each one of us. Let's begin the (brutally) honest conversation before it truly is too late. Keep faith Bill.
I'd like to add that humans themselves are a contributing factor in the round-up of CO2 culprits: every breath we take must come back out. 8-9-10 billion people? And we count the cattle. lol. Human detritus is easily as prevalent as dust in the upper atmosphere as any other particulate source for a raindrop to form, dwindling to electrically charged particles that attract the water vapor being created by excess CO2. The feedback loops are already in place-and we cannot say we were not warned.
A crucial part of the discussion about diminishing water resources is the waste of billions of clean water used daily to flush feces down pipes to treatment plants. The development of compost systems that use no water is a doable, if psychological challenging , necessity. Check out Jenkins’ Compost Toilet Handbook.
Jordan Peterson is definitely a bad influence and perhaps also an idiot or a very clever charlatan; however, I think a great deal of the blame for his popularity lies not with Joe Rogan or social media, but with mainstream media and their dogmatically liberal bias which has pushed so many people to alternative news. I think liberals and scientists have also lost a great deal of credibility, and thus hampered their ability to communicate to the general public, for blindly supporting scientists who have acted rather unscientifically, for example Dr. Anthony Fauci. This man once said, "To criticize me is to criticize science itself." Never has a more unscientific thing been said, yet most liberals still refuse to listen to any criticism of his policy stances and worship him as some kind of scientific deity.
If liberals want to communicate the dangers of climate change to people to don't share their political views, you have to put down your copy of the NY Times, stop reading The Guardian, turn off MSNBC and start listening to people who do not write news from an entirely liberal perspective. You have to try and understand how conservative Americans think, why they are so angry, and why they distrust our institutions, experts and scientists. I think in doing so, liberals would learn a great deal and help heal our political divides. But listening to ideas or people we don't already agree with is quite difficult for any human, our cognitive biases run deep, so I don't hold out much hope for this actually happening.
Bill, I'm sure that you have addressed this question many times. Apologies if so. What is your position on nuclear energy? I've been hearing much about the fact that solar panels aren't biodegradable and nuclear waste can be repackaged to leave a small footprint. Is this accurate or disinformation? Should we be talking more about nuclear energy or do the cons outweigh the benefits? Cheers.
Bill, thank you for sharing. This is, without question, the best overview of the crisis, options, lost opportunities, and potential hopeful futures that I have ever read.
Good article Bill. The magnitude of the Pakistani crisis defies comprehension and it also moves people into crisis fatigue and even despair over time. We must combat this. However, I always thought that it would take something major to happen, like the collapse of the Thwaites ice shelf, to create a crisis that will force a hard tipping point where humanity realizes its "all hands on deck". Unfortunately, we are not there yet and things need to get worse before this happens. For us older folks, it's forget about "retirement". We will need all able bodied people to contribute to this effort, no matter what their age.
Hi Bill,
I write about many of the same issues you do. I published a book in 2016, How Soon Is Now, that had introductions from Sting and Russell Brand. In that book, I looked at the ecological crisis from a systems-design viewpoint (Buckminster Fuller) and proposed how we would have to address the three main areas of technical infrastructure, social system, and collective consciousness if we wanted to survive as a civilization. I just wrote a piece for my newsletter here on substack, where I noted that we only have 50 years of natural gas and roughly 50 years of oil reserves left globally. It is stunning this isn't discussed more. As Fuller said in the 60s, we should use the remaining fossil fuels to build the renewable energy systems. Now we are perhaps too late to make anything but a haphazard transition. I would love to interview you for my podcast and I think you might be interested in my approach to these topics. My first book, Breaking Open the Head (Random House, 2002), helped launch the new psychedelic movement, which I hoped would be more focused on system redesign but got hijacked by Capitalism. Anyway would love to have an interview / conversation - my email Daniel.pinchbeck@gmail.com . Thanks for your great work.
Thank you, Bill. for what you have done and are doing, for being you, for sharing this perspective. Even in my blue bubble, so few really get it, or if they do, they just don't think about it. I read your posts and don't feel so alone. Onward...next projects: creating a community garden, and protesting Chase!
two excellent projects!
Bill, I have never seen you comment on the role of population in climate change. Use the basically true, if grossly oversimplified "equation" that P(population) x S (services/person) X E (energy per service) X C (CO2 per unit of service) = CO2 produced worldwide. I know the reasons people avoid it, but we can reduce human population, by voluntary, humane, sensible incentivization, or we can do it by failed states, war, disease, starvation, and violent societal collapse. Population reduction is the third rail of climate change efforts because of our history of eugenics, genocides, and other inhumane ways of using population reduction as a rationale for crimes against humanity. History is not destiny. It seem likely climate change will be the most genocidal force in the world within a decade, and may be now.
It is amazing how simply giving women access to reproductive health services has a dramatic effect, reversing population growth in areas around the clinics when established where population growth is high,, when combined with education of men. Check with Population Connection on their experience with that.
There are many challenges to reducing world population humanely, and with incentives, without coercion. In fact, we are currently still incentivizing population growth, and resource depletion - our economic system is built on a foundation of growth being necessary for prosperity, which is an arbitrary economic model, not a fact of life.
The ecological role of our species at present, is that we are the most successful , and therefore the most destructive, invasive species, perhaps ever, and we have not slowed down yet. The challenge is, can we voluntarily move closer to our prehistoric niche ( 3 million) , but our technology has done some good for the planet that is sustainable, I have seen an estimate that we could be non-destructive at 2-4 billon, with 2 being more likely. Non-destructive means not just equilibrium of atmospheric CO2, it means returning groundwater to prehistoric levels, and sustaining them there. It means saving as many species as we can, and letting the earth regrow itself an ecosystem that sustains us, in a "niche", 2 billion, or whatever it is, so that we are not the cause of the 6th extinction, whenever it does occur. It means sustainable is possible, not just managed depletion.
"...despair is not an option yet..."
The Greens (& Independents) are using all forms of persuasion to push the laggards into action
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/sep/08/climate-statements-take-centre-stage-at-midwinter-ball-in-protest-over-oil-and-gas-sponsorship
Peace & hope from Sydney, Australia
Thank You Mr. McKibben. What a wonderful source of information you share. Enjoyed your book as well. The Flag, The Cross, the the Station Wagon. You pulled everything together explaining why we're where are in this sometimes confusing world. Job well done. Thomas Mason. Johnson, Vermont.
many thanks--and what a lovely day in Vermont!
Wonderful place we have. Unlike other places. Watched 2 bear cubs brawling. Still laughing. Maybe they won't soon? Time to change Stuff? Thomas Mason. Ober Hill. Johnson.
As someone also fighting the climate fight for many years, I some years back refined my goal as leaving our kids a world with which they can cope. To do what we can to give them a fighting chance.
that is a good metric. keep the fight alive for the next fighters
Hoping that we will have won the human fight and will be responding fully, and that the struggle will be to adapt to an inevitably changing world. If we have achieved a level of human solidarity out of this, we may even in many ways build a profoundly better world. That’s where I wound up in my latest substack post. A two-parter starting here. https://theraven.substack.com/p/ocean-city-cities-in-the-ocean?r=36q38&s=w&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web As always, thanks for your recommendation to my blog. It’s bringing a lot of people my way.
"...you need to do what's called reframing." Molly Kawahata
https://youtu.be/Z1SmpJuuJkI
Nice balanced essay Bill. I believe in divine intervention. Hear me out folks - Not a Global Warming denier freak - just the opposite - my father was a brilliant engineer/ecologist and was preaching these same arguments about the dangers of global Warming back in the late 1960s. As usual USA is finally taking action after the shit has already hit the fan 50 years later. (#ExxonKNew)
But we have already seen all over the world proof that nature can come back even after humans mess it up - not saying sea level rise is not going to get worse - but that the good news is the playing field of federal government subsidies has been leveled because of the IRA legislation recently passed by President Biden's administration - for the first time in our nation's short history!
The only real way to beat the huge evil fossil fuel corporations is in the market place - as in a Pocketbook Revolution which I have been writing about for years in my books, blogs, Substack account etc. Renewables was already winning in the free market (not so free until we get rid of Wall Street Casino system which creates huge monopolies based on BS speculation etc - read my Organic old school Trade/Capitalism solution) and now the explosion of green investments and race to build EVs etc is on for real! Granted - we must not repeat the same mistakes of destructive energy business practices and hopefully new mining techniques (lithium/cobalt/silicon etc for EVs/Solar Panels etc) that are less damaging to ecosystems will prevail, but as I explain to my students - lesser of evils is a given reality equation in a world of 8 billion human consumers who want the basic modern conveniences.
It says in the Bible that God can keep track of the hairs on our heads - and if you consider the cosmic fine tuned universe that we occupy and all the hyper complexity and super symmetry etc. that God has created - then I think this is true. So if we humans make the serious effort it will take to slow down global warming - one good foot in front of the other - God will hold off Mother Nature from wiping us out and maybe even nudge the process along as I believe God does on occasion - if and only if we make a solid effort! After all - actions do speak louder than words! Every little action and every big action counts! Everything is interconnected and we are truly one as the brilliant scientists James Lovelock and Lynn Margulis put forward 60 years ago - Gaia principle. All modern physics and simulations have proven this concept beyond the shadow of a doubt - to earned theory level status! God bless this human made mess! Let's show God that we mean business as far as cleaning up the huge mess we have created through our daily actions/lifestyles/voting choices and spending habits/investments! Let's do this like we knew this!
The shift in language must integrate with a shift in mind set: towards psychological resilience, towards being/becoming a version of the best of what human life might look like .. and a culture/social structure that supports such a life. Techological contributions will emerge and get applied more smoothly and effectively as the mental picture gets clearer. It's scarey, of course. And anxiety constricts thinking. But all who speak or write or bake cookies for activists or care for their grandchildren make a contribution to the growing voice. Silence, being silenced, becoming an "inactivist" is the deep darkness that calls out for a candled response. Gratitude to you, Bill, and to all who have kept and continue to keep the fire going.
Thank you, Bill, for your unrelenting efforts to shake us awake and to keep pressing those in power to do what must be done before it’s too little too late.
Excellent coverage as usual.
Jordan Peterson’s denial is odd.
How do we change the minds of such searingly smart people?
Things are bad, as Bill makes clear, but, frankly, and maybe to Bill's credit (not sure about this), as a scientist schooled in physics, geology and hydrology, it has been clear to me that what Bill presents is SEVERELY understated. Reality check folks, the things that concern Bill are likely 10 - 100 times worse than Bill states. I think Bill knows, but understates this reality so that we as human society don't give up hope. That may be a good approach to Bill, but I fear that doing so allows us, our governments, corporations and the mainstream environmental organizations the room they need to justify building more metal, glass and plastic crap ("renewable" energy technologies) across the planet in a desperate hope that we can continue our consumptive lifestyles and at the same time, placate the capitalist system and the corporations that run our free market world. Renewable energy technologies manufactured through the further exploitation and destruction of the planet Earth environment and many of its poorest, rural cultures are a feel good, fool's errand that allow us not to address the true drivers of the planetary environmental crisis, of which catastrophic global warming is BUT ONE symptom. I think all of us know what the root causes of the environmental collapse we are witnessing are , that being OVER POPULATION (shhhhh.., the mainstream enviros have sworn an oath not to talk about this), CONSUMPTION and the waste generation created by our consumption. Atmospheric CO2 is a waste product from burning fossil fuels. Man-made PFOS/ PFAS contamination, plastics contamination, chemical contamination, heavy metals contamination (all of which can be found in the bodies of every living thing on Earth) are also waste products, products which are generated in massive quantities and dumped into our air and water in an effort to sustain our consumptive lifestyles. All of these wastes are also created by the highly polluting manufacture of renewable energy technologies and EVs. These magical solutions, brought to us by the same industries that got us here in the first place, are in reality more of the same and will do nothing to correct us out of the death spiral our living planet is in, a spiral 100% caused by humankind procreation and consumption. Our beautiful and amazing planetary environment has been thrown out of balance and torn apart and we are now experiencing the repercussions of our massive population's demand for natural resources and production of highly toxic wastes, waste's that the planet's environment is not tooled up to address. This is the reality folks. Bill has been relentless in bringing his concerns to us all and I thank him for that, but like a kind grandfather, he does not tell his children how REALLY BAD things are, to protect us from falling into despair and giving up. Bill, I remember clearly an interview you had with Amy Goodman many years ago where you (of course) were discussing the climate crisis and what we needed to do. Amy said to you Bill, something like, 'Bill, the world's climate scientists that agree with you that climate change is real also are saying that we have but a 3% chance of turning this around, and if so, what good will the measures you propose really do?' Your response Bill was something like, 'I don't disagree, but if I were on death row and I were given the choice of no chance or a 3% chance, I would take the 3% which is better than no chance at all....' . I was blown away as I agreed totally with this reality and your approach. That said, I had hoped that you would present this stark reality as you campaigned for societal change. The struggle I continue to have is our misleading those who trust in us to believe that we can correct out of the situation by continuing to consume and exploit our natural resources, expanding into and clear cutting new forests for mining, agriculture, manufacturing development, etc. to meet the demands of our growing population, just by switching to new "renewable" technologies. We cannot turn the corner simply by manufacturing and installing glass, metal, and plastic energy production equipment across planet Earth, just so we can continue to live as we do. This I consider so very dangerous and I really feel that it is past time for us to face reality; its time to stop blaming the greedy oil companies (like most all corporations) and governments running the planet, and take responsibility for our own actions. It is each one of us that choose to consume and waste massive amounts of natural resources, including fossil fuels and if we, the market, continue to demand STUFF to keep ourselves comfortable, companies such as XOM, Shell, BP, Monsanto, 3M, GE, Goldwind, Seimans and the auto industry will continue to be more than happy to meet our needs. It is past time we dealt with these realities and addressed them head on if we truly care about our children's and the future of all life on our planet. It is really past time we all faced the enemy and it is each one of us. Let's begin the (brutally) honest conversation before it truly is too late. Keep faith Bill.
I'd like to add that humans themselves are a contributing factor in the round-up of CO2 culprits: every breath we take must come back out. 8-9-10 billion people? And we count the cattle. lol. Human detritus is easily as prevalent as dust in the upper atmosphere as any other particulate source for a raindrop to form, dwindling to electrically charged particles that attract the water vapor being created by excess CO2. The feedback loops are already in place-and we cannot say we were not warned.
A crucial part of the discussion about diminishing water resources is the waste of billions of clean water used daily to flush feces down pipes to treatment plants. The development of compost systems that use no water is a doable, if psychological challenging , necessity. Check out Jenkins’ Compost Toilet Handbook.
Jordan Peterson is definitely a bad influence and perhaps also an idiot or a very clever charlatan; however, I think a great deal of the blame for his popularity lies not with Joe Rogan or social media, but with mainstream media and their dogmatically liberal bias which has pushed so many people to alternative news. I think liberals and scientists have also lost a great deal of credibility, and thus hampered their ability to communicate to the general public, for blindly supporting scientists who have acted rather unscientifically, for example Dr. Anthony Fauci. This man once said, "To criticize me is to criticize science itself." Never has a more unscientific thing been said, yet most liberals still refuse to listen to any criticism of his policy stances and worship him as some kind of scientific deity.
If liberals want to communicate the dangers of climate change to people to don't share their political views, you have to put down your copy of the NY Times, stop reading The Guardian, turn off MSNBC and start listening to people who do not write news from an entirely liberal perspective. You have to try and understand how conservative Americans think, why they are so angry, and why they distrust our institutions, experts and scientists. I think in doing so, liberals would learn a great deal and help heal our political divides. But listening to ideas or people we don't already agree with is quite difficult for any human, our cognitive biases run deep, so I don't hold out much hope for this actually happening.
Bill, I'm sure that you have addressed this question many times. Apologies if so. What is your position on nuclear energy? I've been hearing much about the fact that solar panels aren't biodegradable and nuclear waste can be repackaged to leave a small footprint. Is this accurate or disinformation? Should we be talking more about nuclear energy or do the cons outweigh the benefits? Cheers.
i gave it all a good shot in the new yorker earlier this year--let me know if this doesn't get at both those questions https://www.newyorker.com/news/essay/in-a-world-on-fire-stop-burning-things
Bill, thank you for sharing. This is, without question, the best overview of the crisis, options, lost opportunities, and potential hopeful futures that I have ever read.
Good article Bill. The magnitude of the Pakistani crisis defies comprehension and it also moves people into crisis fatigue and even despair over time. We must combat this. However, I always thought that it would take something major to happen, like the collapse of the Thwaites ice shelf, to create a crisis that will force a hard tipping point where humanity realizes its "all hands on deck". Unfortunately, we are not there yet and things need to get worse before this happens. For us older folks, it's forget about "retirement". We will need all able bodied people to contribute to this effort, no matter what their age.
you said it--no rest for the retired!