http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/09/24/brans鈥?/a>
Humans have done it for millennia. Now we have to do it again.
Do you agree with Branson? Do you think we can meet the challenge without radical change? Will you ignore the premise of the question and insist we don't have a serious problem?
Is it really such a radical idea that we have to re-invent ourselves to meet the challenge of a changing world?
It is not a radical idea really, I think it is an old chinese proverb that says you can't get out of a problem with the same mindset that got you into it.
Branson is a one off, if we were all as dynamic, empowered and able as he (no I don't like him) then he would be right. Humans as a whole will need a serious change of heart, society and government to come out of this as most sane people would like to. That means being radical (by today's standards) even if it is just the sensible, logical and obvious thing to do.
Is it really such a radical idea that we have to re-invent ourselves to meet the challenge of a changing world?
I can from just reading the article and its content hear the jack boots of the green shirted shock troops as they march past the the reviewing stand where Herr Branson awaits them to salute him with Seig Heils! This sounds almost exactly like the pogrom of every potential and real tyrant of the last 4,000 years.
There is a difference between %26quot;reinventing ourselves%26quot; and some of us reinventing the rest of us.
Darfur has a lot more to do with religion than with water:
http://www.wadinet.de/news/iraq/newsarti鈥?/a>
As for the midwest US, yes, with further warming, it will have dust storms and droughts far worse than the 1930s - - how do we know this? Because it happened in the 1100s-1200s. Naturally. And without any runaway warming.
I'll go ahead and translate the article into Denierese:
%26lt;%26lt;This revolution will reinvent our economic system, to ensure the sustainability of life on our planet by developing a world of prosperity for all in a low carbon economy.%26gt;%26gt;
They want to destroy capitalism!!! They want to steal from the rich and give to the poor!!! Stalin and Engels and Marx, oh my!
%26lt;%26lt;More businesses must join with governments...%26gt;%26gt;
Join with governments?? Blasphemy!
%26lt;%26lt;the new %26quot;Green Generation%26quot; includes ordinary people engaged in individual and collective activities to improve urgent national and global issues, such as climate change or the world's water crises.%26gt;%26gt;
..Green? Or Red??
%26lt;%26lt;Increasingly, members of the Green Generation will be bound together in a movement that must radically eclipse other monumental changes in social and industrial history.%26gt;%26gt;
...I think they're trying to bring down the white man!
%26lt;%26lt;Social innovators like Ashoka organization founder Bill Drayton...%26gt;%26gt;
%26quot;Social innovators%26quot;? Isn't that what Hitler was?
%26lt;%26lt;The same unconventional approaches that enabled icons like Steve Jobs and Bill Gates to revolutionize personal computing, or Pierre Omidyar and Jeff Skoll to develop an ingenious online marketplace can help alleviate the tremendous suffering that persists in the world and combat the threats posed by climate change.%26gt;%26gt;
...well I don't know what's wrong with that logic, but I'm sure there's something!!!
I don't think it's radical. As you note, humans have adapted to change our way of living in the past many times. Reducing our dependence on fossil fuels will certainly be a big change, but it's an inevitable and obviously necessary change.
As Branson realizes, it's actually a great opportunity for those businesses which embrace it. There are all kinds of opportunities from reducing energy use, increasing efficiency, developing new technologies, implementing renewable energy, etc. An intelligent company can be very successful as we reduce our fossil fuel consumption, especially if we implement a carbon cap and trade system (since businesses can trade and sell carbon credits).
Deniers view this change with fear, but entrepreneurs like Brason realize it's a great opportunity.
As a side note, nice translation, Dawei!
yes we need to change, but all we need to change is our mind set, and that starts with and idea to change our day to day choices, not verry hard on a personal level, the hard part is changing the minds of the rest of the world. its starts by teaching your kids the importance of recycling, inovating away from fossel fuels, hunting the meat god gave us instead of buying it.wastenotwantnot!
I like the question, but isn't by not changing, we're having the current crises?We had the opportunity in the past to wean ourselves from fossil fuel. It would have been a less radical change compared to contemporary perspectives. Branson ignored some very large past indicators. I guess it would depend on ones definition of radical.
it really is rather radical. consider Darfur. that's what happens when rain patterns change such that you can no longer grow enough food to eat. you go somewhere else. and maybe you're not welcome there.
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200704/da鈥?/a>
http://oldsite.globalsolutions.org/progr鈥?/a>
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/con鈥?/a>
consider, if there is enough warming, the midwest grain belt could again be subject to dust storms, far more severe than happened in the '30s.
what do you think would be the Canadian response if 100m or 200m of us all tried to move up into Canada? What's our response when just a few million from south of our border come to get jobs?
the infrastructure of our industrial civilization is pretty well fixed.
any climate disruption, warm, cold, wet, or dry, is not likely to be beneficial.
consider the Irish potato famine, and the millions that starved.
and the more millions that up and left.
that's what climate change really does.
