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The world’s need to face up to the reality of Climate Change

...As the world discusses mitigating climate change at the UN climate conference in Cancun, starting today, what is really needed is for the world to face the truth, which may then foster our capacity to act……

Do we have the mindset to save the planet?UN Climate Change Conference In Cancun, The Age Lyn BenderNovember 29, 2010 Where were you when you first realised that climate change was happening? Were you caught up in the horror of the worst bushfires in Victoria’s  (Australia) history on Black Saturday 2009? Or moved by images of distraught parents in the aftermath of record monsoons that had flooded Pakistan? Or did you know sooner when Hurricane Katrina submerged 80 per cent of New Orleans?

……..As the world discusses mitigating climate change at the UN climate conference in Cancun, starting today, what is really needed is for the world to face the truth, which may then foster our capacity to act……

Avoidance is a response summoned to defend against reality. It takes a lifetime to grasp mortality. The death of the planet leaving a dead legacy to future generations is inconceivable. Perhaps that is why concern about climate change has waned since 2007

2007 was the year in which a tsunami wave of concern swept the climate sceptical party from many of its seats and installed the Rudd government — on a promise of attention to “the greatest moral challenge of our time”. Three years later no constructive action …..

How can this be when there are truckloads of evidence regarding our imperilled planet? Without radical remedies Earth is on a path to becoming uninhabitable or hostile for most species other than, ironically, jellyfish and cockroaches.

It can be difficult to imagine a different way of life. Eventually we change either because disaster strikes or we cannot dispute the facts any longer. Former US vice-president Al Gore states we risk moving from denial to despair. We mourn, rage, plead, panic and bargain; with God or science. We seek Faustian pacts with risky technological solutions, such as geo-engineering a cloud of sulphur dioxide. We propose nuclear energy, with its unresolved waste solution. We promote “clean coal” and cling to the burn, bury, extract, grow and consume paradigm. But of necessity we must reduce emissions and ultimately adapt to a new model of sustainable, renewable life on Earth.

UN Climate Change Conference In Cancun

November 30, 2010 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | general | climate change