I am gifted in having friends who have diverse opinions regarding things political. I say this because it has allowed me a broad viewpoint from which to see how terribly polarized the political situation in North America really is. What once might have been issues that could have been tackled by united efforts on the part of a nation's politicians and peoples have instead largely been afflicted by labels which shove them off into some pocket interest of what is leftist or rightist. Take abortion, for example. What was once considered almost universally abhorrent from a human rights and social development standpoint (Jesse Jackson and Hillary Clinton were vigorously opposed to it back in the seventies) has since become politicized into an issue of freedom from government interference, ironically something that the right in Canada and the United States would otherwise support freedom of. I mention this example because it seems to be one of the most potent to use, and to better help explain my opinions regarding the political seizure of concern over climate change. What would otherwise be a rather straight-forward concern of society has instead been seized by interest groups and politicians (who, let's be honest, have a career to worry about) and turned into a "you don't have the right to tell me what to believe" battle. In this battle, some otherwise diverse issues get lumped together in odd ways, seemingly precluding the possibility that a liberal person could disdain abortion or a conservative person could support conservation efforts. This is a sad battle that is harming our society, in my opinion.
Well, we can leave that battle where it stands; if you want to argue about who has what rights (which we should all be concerned about), go find a political blog somewhere. If you want to read on here, you will find this entry largely devoted to seeing what climate change is, exactly, and, secondarily, what I think some of the issues are regarding why this is such a sticky political topic. To begin with, a disclaimer: I am not, officially, a scientist. I am currently on the path to becoming one, namely in the field of botany, which has interests in climatology in the sphere of biome-related biology. Essentially, in order to know more about plants, I need to know more about what they require for existence, a part of which is their surroundings (climate, soil, etc.). Still, I am not, and never will be, a full-fledged climatologist. Second, and this is the key to understanding the concept of knowledge and argument in general, I admit that the starting point for figuring things out is "I don't know". As such, I acknowledge that I am but one of many sources of information on the topic of climate change, or anything else for that matter. This is not to say that I accept a concept of intellectual relativism, because truth does very much exist (that darn philosophical academic background just has to pop its head in now and then), but that I also admit to my intellectual limitations. Simply put, I don't know everything, and no one really does. This entry is but one of many entries in our world of knowledge on the topic of climate change, and we do ourselves a disservice by ignoring opinions to the contrary. Google them if you want to find out more about them!
That said, I think human-induced climate change is real. I don't think some of the extreme horror stories are true, namely that according to some proponents of global warming that were waxing poetically back in the 70's and 80's, we should have seen global sea levels rise by 50 feet by now. Mind you, things were ugly, pollution wise, back in those days. There is indeed a hole in the ozone layer, and back then, it was larger than Antarctica. These days, it has shrunk by quite a bit, a sign of the progress we have been making in adapting industrial and commercial usage of chemicals to the needs of our atmosphere, as much as ourselves. Of course, this example of shifting concern is also one of the biggest groaners regarding climate change in general. Global warming is only part of climate change theories; universal warming will most likely not happen. Instead, we will see a ton of extremes of heat and cold associated with climate change, as we have in the last decade or so. Snow in Miami, F-3 and higher tornadoes in January, droughts interspersed by floods? These have been quite common lately, to the point where they are no longer considered freak occurrences. Perhaps most disturbingly, our glaciers and ice fields are indeed melting. Greenland is being melted from the bottom up! Yes, ice comes and goes, but the cycle of ice ages tends to take place over more time than just mere decades. Take a look at what is left of the glaciers in Rocky Mountain National Park:
While this alone ought to be alarming, what is perhaps more concerning is the rate at which these extremes have started to happen. Why is this happening?
Well, the most popular thing to do around the world is to blame the United States for everything. I mean come on, as a Canadian, I am honor-bound to at least sneer at American imperialism, right? Well, it turns out that the rapid acceleration of climate extremes and change in the past decade has to do with increased human activity on the global scale, which is indeed accelerating the rate at which things like solar cycles, and natural climate cycles would have already affected the global climate. Let's start with the human activity side of things. In the past decade, really more the past twenty years or so, the western world, and especially the United States, has become better at cutting down on things like fuel emissions, energy use, etc. True, population increases have meant that consumption is balancing this out a bit, but on average, we are getting better at using less to produce more, especially where agriculture is concerned. Now, about those population increases raising the roof on consumption rates? Well, the second and third worlds are starting to get more developed. More and more people in China, India, Mexico, Brazil, and other emerging economies are owning vehicles and homes with modern technology. As such, to support the burgeoning world economy, even the poorest of nations are consuming natural resources at a faster than normal rate. While there may be less use of the internal combustion engine in, say, Nigeria, than there is in Argentina, the forests there are rapidly disappearing, grasslands are being grazed into deserts, oil is being released from ancient wells like crazy, and things are accelerating quite a bit. Sure, its easy to blame the United States for everything, but let's face it, EVERYBODY is responsible for what is going on.
This is probably the source of contention for the conservation movement getting dumped into the furthest reaches of all things leftist. Take the Kyoto accords, for example. On paper, and in sound bites, the accords look fantastic. In reality, they might have been an effort by European and allied governments to economically compete with the United States by introducing different emission standards than have thus far utilized in American industry. As a result, suspicions have arisen among the American right, wherein climate change or any conservation efforts are linked to E.U. political meddling, and similar efforts at home must have been the result of the left trying to undermine the right either intentionally, or unwittingly, by crippling American industry. Never mind that much of Europe has long since been transformed away from its natural setting, and the United States, even with its incredible agricultural productivity, still retains much of its "default setting". Environment controls are, furthermore, supposedly extremely advanced in Europe, financed in part by extreme taxes on fuel. Oddly enough, North American vehicles often have better emission ratings than their European counterparts, without such brutal taxes. What I know is that I have lived in London, spent time in Paris and Rome, and my nasal mucous turned blacker than black in all of those cities (actually worse than in Los Angeles). On the other hand, Europe beats the tar out of North America, particularly the United States, when it comes to widespread use of mass transit. As we can see, the issues are not as they often get represented by, well, many sides. What it comes down to is argument over rights, rather than truly over environmental quality, which instead becomes the victim or gets ignored. The United States, or any country for that matter, fortunately, does not need political things like the Kyoto accords to be environmentally responsible. Believe it or not, while they have other failings, both the Bush and Obama administrations have remained transparent and active on this front.
The probably truth of the situation is that even while the political landscape gets messed up, we humans have had an impact on our naturally changing climate cycles. Water, species, and just plain old comfort levels are impacted by this, and I refuse to deny the reality of this situation in American Voyages. At the same time, I will never turn down an opportunity to further research this phenomenon. If you want to bring politics here, by all means, do so, left and right, because informed opinion is a blessed thing. Tomorrow we can again step away from the politics and see more of our wonderful treasures.
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