The Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu is reputed to have said: “If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading.”
This sums up the problem we face from human-caused climate change.
A “climate scoreboard” published by Climateinteractive.org calculates the impact of the current commitments by the world’s governments to cut carbon emissions.
It estimates that if the promised emissions cuts are carried out in full, the earth would still warm by about 4°C by 2100 — far above the maximum warming of 1.5°C needed to maintain a safe planet.
This shows the planned emissions cuts are not enough.
But in a March 27 article in The Age Chris Berg, from the right-wing Institute of Public Affairs, argued for a different approach to the climate crisis: just live with it.
He said it was a waste of time trying to cut emissions. Instead, we should plan to adapt to life in a warmer world.
“If the past is any guide to the present,” said Berg, “that's how we'll deal with further changes in climate (whether caused by human activity or not): through adaptation.”
In February, the Climate Action Centre’s David Spratt summarised the scientific knowledge of what a 4°C temperature rise would mean in a reader titled Four Degrees Warmer:
• “The world would be warmer than during any part of the period in which modern humans evolved, and the rate of climate change would be faster than any previously experienced by humans.
• “Half of the world would be uninhabitable. Likely population capacity: under one billion people.
• “The world’s sixth mass extinction would be in full swing. Iostherms (temperature bands) would be shifting towards the poles at a pace beyond the capacity of most ecosystems to keep up.
• “Ocean acidification would have rendered many calcium-shelled organisms, such as coral and many at the base of the ocean food chain, artefacts of history.
• “The last time temperatures were 4°C above pre-industrial [levels] there were no large ice-sheets on the planet and sea levels were 65–70 metres higher than today.”
Green Left Weekly recognises we need to confront climate change by decarbonising our economies fast and defeating the vested interests that stand in the way.
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