wilderness issues lecture series
Considering the Ethics of Climate Change Solutions
By Kyle Lehman, 3-12-08
“Almost all of the solutions to climate change have potential drawbacks,” said Donald Brown via live videoconference at the University of Montana Tuesday night.
Brown, speaking as part of the ongoing Wilderness Issues Lecture Series, urged his audience to consider the ethical implications posed by climate change solutions.
Among these drawbacks are the possibility of future CO2 leaks from poorly planned carbon sequestration projects, deforestation and rising food prices driven by biofuel production, and bird migrations being disrupted by wind power farms.
Brown, an associate professor of environmental ethics and program director for Ethical Dimensions of Climate Change at Penn State University, acknowledged that these concerns are important, but insisted that it would be unethical for them to limit action if the technology could lessen the environmental degradation and human suffering associated with climate change.
Brown said that taking a comparative, ethical perspective is necessary to wade through a debate that is largely scientific in nature. Thinking in terms of morality and ethics is vital given the grave implications of the issue, he said.
“The ethical dimensions should be obvious because the consequences are so huge.”
Chief among the ethical implications for climate change is the global nature of the problem. Brown noted how the actions of one person in Montana could affect people in sub-Saharan Africa or Bangladesh, and it is these people that are at the greatest risk, but have little control over how those in developed countries respond to protect their wellbeing. Society must take into consideration these perspectives and accept moral responsibility, he said.
“Those people that admit there are greenhouse gases are usually not those affected by climate change,” Brown said.
And Brown urged that the long-term, worldwide gains of climate change solutions not be compromised by factors such as cost and convenience. He offered the example of environmental groups fighting wind power development because of the potential harm to avian populations, a stance that overlooks the greater reality that entire species face extinction from rising global temperatures.
The process of carbon sequestration in geologic formations offers another complex ethical dilemma, Brown said. In the short-term, carbon storage provides a reduction in atmospheric CO2 emissions that would likely slow global warming and ease the transition to renewable energy, but he takes issue with a total reliance on sequestration because of the possibility that unstable geology and unproven methods could cause leaks in the future.
“If it leaks back into the atmosphere slowly, it’s a failure,” he said.
Brown foresees another danger in the reliance on sequestration instead of weaning our society from fossil fuels: “We will take pressure off of our responsibility to reduce our carbon footprint as soon as possible.”
Brown classified his plea for an ethical look at climate change as one that is both morally and practically urgent. He acknowledged that there is still a lack of scientific consensus on how we should react to the problem, but made it clear that this could not impede the movement as a whole.
“If we wait until the uncertainties are resolved, its too late,” he said.
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The reason I have repeated reference to the media coverage in Google, is due to the unsupported statement of this column's title and what the statement of what the media should do in the first paragraph. Both are judgments by like kind thinking people without reflection on the facts. Mere opinion.
As far as I know there is now no known "solutions," as this column suggests as believed by the panel, to interdict climate change that has repeated itself since animals roamed this earth. Therefore, I don't see how the media can report on non-existent solutions. IN my opinion, the earth will never reach a point of controllable climate stasis.
What we can solve on a regional basis is to address clean water, clean air, energy, and land use.
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Dr. Nir Shaviv points to the ethics of deceit practiced by those that will not engage honestly on the science. See: http://www.sciencebits.com/RealClimateSlurs
I agree with Craig, we need to concentrate on ample food, clean water, adequate energy resources. Keeping third world countries poverty stricken and living without clean water, adequate housing, adequate food is unconscionable, especially if it is to have pristine views for the rich to visit.
You can't jump on Fri. and say, "See, everything is back to normal!" You have to look at the overall pattern.
The problem with developing countries is that there simply are not enough resources on this planet for everyone to live like we do. That is an unfortunate fact. Either alternative resources are going to have to be discovered (soon) and developed, people are going to have to stop breeding or we are all going to have to figure out how to get along with a lot less. There is another possibility; but that involves a future for our children and grandchildren that is too ugly to comprehend.
Also, I thought you'd all like to know that the lecture was done utilizing teleconferencing hardware. No need for Green Tags in this case, I suppose.
Don Brown provided a few interesting links for us to check out:
first, the white paper on ethics: http://www.ndsciencehumanitiespolicy.org/resources/climate_change_white_paper.pdf
and then the Penn State Rock Ethics Center site:
http://rockethics.psu.edu/
Have a look at both of these sites. The white paper lists 8 ethical dilemmas which are particularly interesting.
Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) helps account for energy used in all aspects of the growing, cultivation, mining, drilling, extraction, production, refining, transportation in all phases, manufacturing, storage, use, and final fate of a solution (including batteries, metals, plastics, etc) that are involved in any manufactured product. All this energy should be accounted for--it is a resource that costs money and in many cases causes all sorts of pollution.
For instance, and as a single example only in this current discussion of energy alternatives (there are many more!) it makes no sense to make hydrogen from natural gas in steam-catalysis reformers when natural gas has 3-4 times more energy per standard cubic foot, is more easily and currently transported/stored/delivered to vehicles currently available to use it. (and then in this comparison, the CNG needs to be compared to liquid products like gasoline).
We must start THINKING like this--NOT because CO2 causes (or does not cause) global warming, but because CO2 is a primary indicator of how much energy we use and how (in)efficient we are in using that energy.
In the realm of the subject matter here, I think it is unethical to not present the entire picture of climate change and the proposed solutions. The media thinks that everything needs to be presented in simple blurbs. Despite my prior comments, I do think that the science can be presented in such a way to laymen that will communicate the basic concepts. This topic of climate change, along with the solutions, are complex multi-variable concerns. Without knowing that big picture, you get people who do not understand the simplest concepts--you know, like this one: "it takes energy to make energy". Or this one: "where does that come from?" or "how is that made?". Science teaches us to question everything, and just when you think that science theory becomes science fact, question it again. Refine the thought, understand a process, "know more".
As far as the continuing commentary along the lines of "it was cold at my house" this year--so warming must not be occurring... The current global warming models predict shifting patterns of hot and cold--so just because one region has a colder, or longer, or wetter winter it means nothing--this is the weather, not the climate. (Or more snowfall, which in the warming models, indicates increased global warming).
As Frank has pointed out, there is a difference between "weather" and "climate". Weather is a shifting variable in long term climate models. I encourage those who continue to confuse weather with climate to take a look at the standard wiki reference.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weather
In lieu of applying the judgment of ethics to particular action or inaction, how about we stay in the realm of accuracy and scientific exploration and discovery without bludgeoning one another with self-serving ethics clubs that reveal more about the politics of the clubbers than anything else?
I use the following formula to attempt to understand climate change, up or down:
Climate Change [ CC 100%] = Natural Processes [NP ??%] + Human Processes [HP ??%]
Keep in mind that NP and HP may be moving in the same direction or in opposite direction.
What are the relative %'s of both NP and HP at this moment in time? Is it scientifically demonstrable beyond mere opinion?
If the so called Climate Change Solutions only address a fraction of the HP contribution, why are these efforts even called Solutions since they do not solve CC?
Until realistic and demonstrable values are assigned to the formula, I find it rather dishonest to label any measure or group of measures as a solution. To do so raises false hopes.
There is a long list of factors that can account for variations in climate and are in many multi-variable models for climate trending. Glaciers, ocean temperatures, reflectivity, solar temperatures, CO2 concentration, water concentration, orbital variations, atmospheric aerosols, livestock, bug population, humans replacing forests with parking lots..... Again, to state that a single variable --like the average temperature during the winter in North America -- indicates some trend up or down in the average temperature of the world is not the way any of the complex models that would indicate warming or cooling trends work. And, with that, we have a problem with models--because multi-variable models take certain variables and weight them for effect. Models may not take into account all variables. Models may not weight those variables correctly. Models may take variables into account that mean nothing. Models may take variables into account that have opposite effects, or interact with other variables.
I am not arguing global warming is occurring or not occurring... nor do I want to have that discussion. Since I am not having that discussion, it is not up to me to support any argument on either side with data "that is measurable for the last several hundred years, and should be able to show specific effects".
I might push you to a general reference discussing the variables and let you place your own value on the quality of the data and variables. Just a general discussion....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change
I will not deal with the theoretical debates that are being employed in these comments to distract from folks like you getting as much information as you can. I'd recommend checking out the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's reports if you are looking for historical measurements; they even have a summary of their findings at this site if you are not interested in reading the entire report:
http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/syr/ar4_syr_spm.pdf
Secondly, the reason why some people may be giving you the impression that a brutally cold winter does not disprove global climate change is because climate change, and not global "warming" is the issue at stake. Since the Earth's climate is a result of dynamic processes, to say that it was just getting hotter everywhere would be, as you seemed to imply, ludicrous. The patterns of weather phenomena are changing, according to the measurements put forth by the IPCC (who may or may not be crackpots, as one other commenter suggested, but I would recommend that he contact Dr. Steve Running and have a chat about that); these changes are of ethical concern, as they will most likely serve to disadvantage those in developing nations far more than they will affect you or I, who arguably have contributed more to anthropogenic causes of global climate change as Americans than they have. As to your question about what is meaningful, I would suggest that the displaced effects of the consumption and production of developed nations on the climate and thus on human life in developing nations is meaningful, but as this is a public forum, I am sure there will be at least one person who disagrees with that statement.
A paper submitted for review prior to publication analyzes long records from western Montana. Without infringing on intellectual property issues - the trends you suggest are clearly present. As an example: at the turn of the 20th century western Montana stations averaged about 5 days above 90oF each summer; they now average three times that many. Mean annual temperature has increased by about 2oF over that time. Similarly, in a recent paper (Onset of spring starting earlier across the Northern Hemisphere, by MARK D. SCHWARTZ, REIN AHAS and ANTO AASA, Global Change Biology (2006) 12, 343–351) temperature-induced changes in botanical processes has been documented.
Two degrees may not sound like much, but that is because (according to climatologist Murray Mitchell in the 1960's and little-modified since) the largest cycles in climate are 1) the initial cooling of the Earth, 2) the annual cycle, 3) the daily cycle, 4) glaciations and interglaciations over tens of thousands of years, and 5) the passage of storms. Each of those is much greater than the trend of warming, thus id is difficult to directly observe the climate trend through the weather "noise". But that doesn't mean it isn't there or isn't significant (see above).
Finally - this cold winter is unusual for several reasons. We rejoice in the "average" snowpack for skiing and water supply as well as marvel at the cold conditions in mid-latitudes. Both of those phenomena are likely (I haven't seen - yet - a formal analysis) both results of the strongest La Nina in a decade. Just as El Nino events result in marked warming in temperate regions because of a larger-than-usual warm pool of equatorial water, La Nina results from a smaller-than-usual warm pool (thus less heat available to be transported to the temperate zone). But those are short-term (less than three years) phenomena that may interupt but do not change the long-term trends. Such events are clearly meaningful to those affected, but not to the estimation of long-term change.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23358915-7583,00.html
Weather: Meteorological conditions of the next day to month.
Climate: Long term conditions of the meteorology over years to decades.
Carbon sequesttration is one of a number of bandaids. Neither it nor any other known technology will "solve" the problem. [See the October 2007 "National Geographic" for measures of the problem.] But using and improving the technology will certainly delay and possibly decrease the intensity of the impacts. Not at least trying to mitigate the problem is irresponsible.
I also think it's important to point out that a large GDP does not equate to happiness or "freedom" as he points out. Plenty of examples exist in which industrialized nations suffered a huge loss in overall happiness, or GDH as Bhutan calls it.
Industrialization has it's own set of ethical dilemmas which must be dealt with. We must also look to the future as well.... by building an oil-based infrastructure, we doom ourselves as supply runs out and our environment becomes polluted. Where's the freedom in that?
Part of the past (and continuing) ethical lapse is not energy related - it is building cities on prime agricultural land, on the seashore, in floodplains, in harsh climates demanding high energy use, causing suburban sprawl throughout the world, devaluing public transit in favor of petroleum culture (Los Angeles area "Red Car" lines demise post-WWII, for example), then now recommending vast population relocations from areas that then had and still have a high likelihood of uninhabitability due to cyclical climate changes - the same miserable combination of lassaiz faire (sic) and central planning as in the past.
“More than any other time in our history, we face a critical decision. One path leads to only despair and hopelessness; the other to total extinction. I hope we have the wisdom to choose wisely.” Woody Allen
Let's continue to work for ethical discussion and ethical solutions to this massive problem - might even find a sustainable standard of living and a degree of happiness through pursuit of timely and thoughtful solutoins, though it looks like the "doom and gloom" crowd may be dismayed by not gaining control of our lives.
Mother Earth speaks.
Those who have hearts big enough can hear.
It’s true, she says, I am sick.
I have a disease humans call Global Warming.
My sickness is caused by an imbalance within me and, just like humans, I have a fever. The purpose of fevers is to burn and cleanse impurities and toxins.
This, my children, is what I am attempting to do.
I am your Mother.
I want to give all of my children what they need for life.
I do this happily, for it is my role, a role I agreed to play.
I am honored to provide for you.
You help bring balance to me when you simply say, Thank You, Mother.
Say it aloud, when you are alone in nature, touched by my grace.
Say it silently, within your heart, when you can feel my presence.
Say it proudly in front of others, even in the face of mankind’s careless destruction.
I don’t require you to say this, for I will give generously to you anyway.
But I love to hear your gratitude. It makes my load lighter.
I am a Mother.
I can give and give and give some more.
But I do get angry.
What makes me angry? Greed. Arrogance. Disrespect. Thick-headedness.
Like humans, my anger often finds a release.
You call my releases earthquakes, tsunamis, heat waves, forest fires.
Some humans are sensitive. They can see, hear, and sense my pain.
Others are afraid, worrying about their future, their children, their home.
Some try to scare others, attempting to control what they don’t understand.
Some try to quench their fear by pretending they know what is going on
and by telling other people and groups what to do and what not to do.
Some blame themselves. Some blame others.
Lest you consume yourselves with fear, guilt, or shame, my beloveds,
I will tell you the truth.
Do not become fixated on how many batteries you recycle.
Do not agonize over paper or plastic at the grocery store.
Do not waste time debating with your neighbors whether an animal species is threatened vs. endangered.
Do not point the finger at Republicans or Democrats.
Christians or Muslims. Environmentalists or Developers.
Do not fall into this trap.
The trap is set to distract you from the truth.
For these issues are but a drop in my bucket.
The real cause of Global Warming?
Underground nuclear testing. Wars. Bombs. Weapons.
Your areosol hairspray and car exhaust is nothing compared to this.
Be wise.
If you want to help, focus on the issues that count.
Learn about peace. Learn about compassion. Learn about forgiveness.
Help create peace within yourself. Within your family. Within your neighborhoods.
Seek truth. Teach your children the truth.
This is what will heal me.
For I am your mother. What heals you will heal me.
For more information, listen to Truth Radio, http://www.Blunt.Fm
You have anger issues and need help. During one of your "fits" you killed over 30 million people with the plague during the middle ages with one of your cooling spells. The cold brought the rats inside. Lately, you killed 100's of thousands of people with one of your nasty waves. How could any loving mother do this to her children. Please seek help.
I don't think mother nature can get angry, but it sure does get even.
As far as Vaclav Klaus is concerned, he's a self-labeled anti-environmentalist, global warming critic, and endorsed the very-biased documentary, "The Great Global Warming Swindle" (even if there is enough evidence to make a movie like this, this film does a poor job presenting the facts objectively).
To be honest, I'm not quite sure of his motivations. An interesting thing to mention here is that the Czech Republic HAS ratified the Kyoto Protocol. Perhaps, since the CR has just received their independence, anti-environmentalism is a method by which they can assert that independence. Anything that will prevent them from exercising their democracy in the short-term is their enemy. Just a thought....
Do you think global warming is designed to give leftists control of the global government and economy as Vaclav states? Is there a way to proceed with global warming "reform" without sacrificing individual nations' rights? How can we convince countries like the Czech Republic that, regardless of global warming, environmentally-friendly management is the best way to independence in the long-term?
On the one hand there are craigie and marian and other like minded trogledytes who are afraid of any change. On the other hand are the shamans who see mother earth as the voice of god who is out to show us a lesson.
I've always felt pretty comfortable with special responsibility--our species continues to pee in the soup yet wonders that the soup is beginning to taste of urine to all species...
I wonder if I could suggest that UM set a better example for the schools of Montana. I refer to a letter in the Missoulian on March 9 written by a 16-year girl named Carly Fuglei. She told how she had been attending the "Behind the Headlines" lectures at UM on Tuesday nights and how she was getting so disappointed in them.
The reason? They were so one-sided because the UM faculty members who spoke at them were just delivering "one-sided and obnoxiously flagrant America bashing" rants.
Fuglei wasn't objecting to the professors expressing opinions. She indicated that she didn't even necessarily disagree with them. She just felt that she was being short-changed in her educational experience because she knew there were two sides to the story, and the UM profs were giving only one.
So please, UM, set a better example.
Still, perhaps the UM should do a better job with their fairness in that series. I'm not familiar with it at all, so I can't comment.
Marion, just a reminder to stick to the point... We're not debating Global Warming right now, just the ethics.
And Jedediah, you're totally right. It's frustrating huh?
And having attended UM, I know that what Carly says is true, at least to some degree. I don't want to condemn all the teachers there, because it would not be accurate to say that all, or even most, are guilty of teaching in the manner she describes. But lets not kid ourselves--there are still quite a few who do.
And what I said still holds true. It would be nice if UM could set a good example for other MT schools as a place that tolerates all points of view and makes sure that students get a good education by providing more than half the story.
I wasn't sure if you knew or not. I just wanted to be clear for everyone's sake.
I think you make a great point. Let's say we gave equal time to folks who don't prescribe to global warming. That would be, say, a 1:1 ratio of time for/against.
Do you think that's a legit ratio? Or should it be more along the lines of the total number of "informed" folks for/against? I have no idea what those numbers are, but I'm sure it's skewed in the direction of for.... who knows really. I'm guessing.
I guess the question isn't in the numbers, it's in fair and adequate coverage. We talked about this a bit last week in the commentary on media & climate change.
I will personally attest that at every lecture there is MORE than enough opportunity to raise points in the 30 minutes after the lecture. We've even had an optional discussion on a day when there was no lecture. Unfortunately, only about 30 people showed up.
It's partially the responsibility of the students to raise hell if they feel like the wool's being pulled over their eyes. I believe (and hope) that if there were more people who felt like Carly at that lecture, they'd say something. I really glad she wrote a letter though.... despite what i just said, i recognize the apathy and/or lack of time college students have for writing letters and complaining about their education.
I think it's essential to have a forum like this so we can assure all sides of the story are being expressed.
On the one hand there are craigie and marian and other like minded trogledytes who are afraid of any change. On the other hand are the shamans who see mother earth as the voice of god who is out to show us a lesson."
You respond, "And Jedediah, you're totally right. It's frustrating huh?"
Don't say you want to have discussion on ethics specifically and climate change generally when you cheer jed's childish behavior. I can't help but noticed that neither you nor anyone else responded to my comments about ethics, the subject of this column. Nor did you respond to my answer to your question, except to cheer jed's insults. I see NO point in attempting further discussion with you.
On another note: new lecture tomorrow! 7 pm at the Urey Lecture Hall. It's on "Adapting to Climate Change: Importance of Wilderness" by Thomas DeLuca of the Wilderness Society. Should be a good one. Come check it out if you can. See ya there~!
Who's providing the balance to this guy?
If they never have any balance, I hope they aren't using my tax dollars to fund these things.
Dr. Bagaric raises some interesting points.