Acceptance AND Action

Last night I read this article, which resulted in a very restless night for me. If you'd rather get my summary than read that link, here it is: We no longer have a six-year window to turn CO2 emissions around. As I've mentioned before, the science of climate change is generally accurate, but the part about when events will occur seem to be unable to keep up with the pace of change: it is all happening faster than predicted. The near-consensus of the the 2000+ scientist who met in Copenhagen earlier this month is that we have passed the point of being able to prevent a 2-degree C rise. If you're up to date on what this means, you see why I had trouble sleeping.

So the tiny sliver of hope I had allowed myself that we might be able to save 2/3 of the Earth's species if just enough people would pressure their governments to set truly sane climate policy in the next year or two has now been bashed. Even if, miracle of miracles, it did happen, the probability that most of the life on this planet will perish within a couple hundred years (or less) is painfully high. I do recommend reading this article from George Monbiot, as he states clearly, that despite this knowledge, our work remains the same.

Instead of trying to avoid the "2-degree world" now we have to try to avoid the "2.5-degree world." Instead of hanging on to the false hope that we might be able to save most species of life, it is time to accept that our fight is now for only the most adaptive of life forms. Fighting for sane climate policy is really fighting for the chance that a small percentage of existing species will be able to survive to the point at which the climate again stabilizes (in a thousand or more years, so the scientists say).

And so, I again begin the path of accepting that this culture is killing the planet and that there is almost nothing I can do about it. This acceptance has nothing to do with the idea of giving up, however. If anything, the more dire the predictions, the more urgent the work becomes. And honestly, the more real it must become as well. Real, as in grounded in the natural world. We have to accept that our species has outstripped the carrying capacity of this planet, that we have been in overshoot for decades now, and that ecological collapse is happening. Accelerated global warming could easily be interpreted as the final message the Earth is sending us to wake up, to reconnect with her before all is lost. So, I may revisit some of my "solutions" and weed out those that really don't belong, like biochar for example.

I do still believe we have a choice in the kind of world we want to pass on. Getting there will require the dedication of tens of millions of people. And I will be honest enough to say that it seems that our parameters for what that world looks like just got narrower. It will be a hotter world, with more desert areas, fewer intact biotic communities and more intense storms. But we can still have clean rivers, vibrant local communities, and a high quality of life (less stuff, more time) if we just look at our situation openly and honestly, and then behave as if all life really matters. But how do we get the governments, and the corporate heads that so control them, to transform overnight?

We have to become a huge and unwavering movement demanding negative economic growth, negative population growth, and a plan for phasing-out most industrial-scale activity. That sounds terribly radical to most folks, I know, but I just can't beat around the bush any longer. I cannot see a more humane approach to this ultimate challenge.

I highly recommend checking in regularly with Climate Ark, as this is a great source of abundant current news on climate change. Maybe even donate to them if you feel the urge.

As overwhelming as the news is, I believe we have to keep fighting for what we can. At some point, we may be fighting for a 3-degree world, which saddens me tremendously, but isn't life worth it?