Robert Manne - using his voice to help people better understand climate change

When Robert Manne was diagnosed with throat cancer he faced a stark choice: have his voice box removed, or die. 

Robert Manne - using his voice to help
people better understand climate change.

A leading public intellectual, he thought at first he’d rather die than spend his life unable to speak. 

But now he’s back in the public domain - and still has plenty to say.

And speaking up he certainly is - Professor Manne has declared that his task from now is to do all he can to help Australian’s understand the realities of climate change.

Robert Manne is an Emeritus Professor of politics and Vice-Chancellor's Fellow at La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia and is considered by many as leading Australian public intellectual.

He was interviewed on the ABC’s “One Plus One” program by Jane Hutcheon.

Consumption does not, cannot, bring meaning or even ordinary happiness

Writing about Pope Francis 2015 Encyclical entitled, "On Care For Our Common Home”, Robert Manne said, in his latest book, “On Borrowed Time”  - 

“Consumption does not, cannot, bring meaning or even ordinary happiness. In the consumer society, the ills of isolation, depression and anxiety are growing, the ties of family and community are weakening, because of what the encyclical calls ‘the silent rupture of the bonds of integration and social cohesion’.”

A determination not to notice the looming catastrophe has taken hold

Writing in his new book, “On Borrowed Time”, Robert Manne said: 

“As greenhouse gas emissions have continued to rise, as evidence of global warming has continued to grow, as the unwillingness of the world to act to curb emissions has become increasingly clear, a determination not to notice the looming catastrophe has taken hold of large parts of the population.”

Climate change champion muffled, but still talking

Robert Manne has much to say about climate change.

Robert Manne on Radio National.

He stepped away from an academic role at LaTrobe University, where he is an emeritus professor, to use his vast intellect to help people better understand climate change.

However, not all has gone smoothly as a throat cancer was first diagnosed in 2008 reappeared last year and an operation late in the year saw him lose his ability to smell and talk without the aid of a device.

Today (March 24) he was on Radio National talking with Geraldine Doogue about many things, among them his new book, “On Borrowed Time.”

Listen to Robert Manne on Saturday Extra. 

If a fiendish problem needs a beautiful solution, then it will come from people like these

Clive Hamilton answers a
question during Thursday
night's Melbourne forum.

More than a decade spent listening to conversations about climate change has illustrated many things, among them that those who care most are beautiful people.

The evidence of that was on show again in Melbourne just last Thursday night (March 17) when Robert Manne and Clive Hamilton sat down for a conversation – “Hope, at last? Prospects for the planet after Paris”.

Australian author and a Professor of Public Ethics at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics, a joint centre of Charles Sturt University and the University of Melbourne, Clive Hamilton, fielded questions from an Emeritus Professor of politics and Vice-Chancellor's Fellow at La Trobe University, Robert Manne.

Both Manne and Hamilton have powerful reputations as public intellectuals, but came to Thursday night’s conversation for that purpose, to simply exchange thoughts and ideas, and not be confrontational or combative.

Both men, along with the crowd of about 140 people and the MC for the evening a Future Fellow from La Trobe University, Dr. Liz Connor, were, it seemed, on the “same page”.

The essence of the evening was illustrative of what is needed if humanity is to ever rise to the challenge of understanding and addressing climate change; everyone needs to be on that “same page”.

Robert Manne at Thursday
night's conversation.

Thursday night’s conversation liberated from the madness and confrontation that prevails in our market-driven world, was informative and illustrated again, again, that any resolution to climate change cannot be arrived at through the application of existing ideas, reminding us that ideas that created a problem are absolutely ineffectual for resolving it – we need something new.

Hamilton was in Paris and sat through many of the discussions, but not being “official” he was not actually in the room when the final gavel came down signifying the end of the conference and initiating the celebration, the euphoria that followed the signing of an agreement that would see more than 190 or the world’s nations give the thumbs-up to the idea that global warming should be kept at or below 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial temperatures.

That goal is already under threat and in the view of some has been surpassed in 2016, just months after the Paris talks and decisions taken there have been criticized by some, among them leading international climate scientists.

Hamilton acknowledges the brilliance of at least two who were critical of the Paris conclusions pointing out that although the science may demand certain actions there are political considerations that impact on the process, relegating those urgencies.

The complexities of the climate change conversation have long been evident and is was reassuring to hear Hamilton, one of Australia’s most respected, penetrating and courageous commentators on climate change, that he frequently has confusing thoughts.



MC Dr Liz Connor
asks a question

Thursday night’s conversation was wrapped up with a rush of questions  from the floor that reflected the mood if the evening in that they were not combative or necessarily controversial but simply seeking further information or confirmation.

Such conversations end with a sense that yes, climate change will be resolved, but through collaboration and cooperation and, importantly, the embrace of beauty.

Finally, is there hope, at last, and what are the prospects for the planet after Paris?

Hamilton appeared convinced there is hope and having hitherto unseen “men in suits” at the Paris conference, he was convinced that there is something afoot and that the moneyed class is beginning to understand the risks associated with ignoring climate change.

American exceptionalism a threat: Robert Manne

Robert Manne.

“American exceptionalism is now a threat to both the earth and the future of humankind. No nation is more important in the struggle against global warming than the United States.”

“However,” Australia’s Robert Manne reports in the Guardian, “because of its self-conception, no nation is less likely than the US to subordinate itself to the international community”.

Manne, in his reporter headed: "Climate change: some reasons for our failures" says that nations of earth are doing very little to avert a foreseeable catastrophe.

“There are many reasons why”, he points out, “some obvious, some less so.”

 

'Maverick' resigns to concentrate on climate change

James Hansen - "Storms of My
 Grandchildren" brought
 increased recognition.
 

James Hansen’s recognition expanded significantly after he published “Storms of My Grandchildren” in 2010.

At the time, Hansen was the head of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York City and the Adjunct Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Columbia University.

Today (April 2) it was announced in the New York Times that “Climate Maverick to Quit NASA” with Hansen arguing resignation would give him more freedom to pursue political and legal efforts to limit greenhouse gases.

Hansen’s resignation follows the earlier announcement by the Professor Politics at La Trobe, Robert that in retirement he would be able to devote all his time to helping Australians understand the unfolding and damning realities of climate change.

We talk and the world's health wastes away

Our world’s wellbeing is sadly being subjected to a debate; a debate we should not be having.

Robeert Manne.

Humans have changed the earth’s climate through its voracious appetite for all things that emit carbon dioxide and that has, unquestionably, impacted on our atmosphere resulting in global warming.

Extreme weather events our now commonplace all around the earth and yet many still boldly declare the peer reviewed science of most of the world’s best climatologists is wrong.

Australian intellectual and thinker, Robert Manne, has written in the current edition of The Monthly about A Dark Victory: How Vested Interests Have Defeated Climate Science.

Climate change denialists and the media

Interesting piece by Robert Manne in The Monthly entitled “Lord Monckton and the Future of Australian Media” that tells about the intrigue between one of the most extreme climate change denialists, Monckton, and the Australian coal and iron ore billionaire, Gina Rinehart.

Christopher Monckton

Rinehart, now one of the wealthiest people on the globe and the devoted daughter of the Western Australian mining magnate, the late Lang Hancock, one of the most right-wing Australians of the postwar era, has bought her way into Fairfax Media (14 per cent) and television’s, Channel 10 (10 per cent).

Robert Manne is a professor of politics at La Trobe University and has twice been voted Australia's leading public intellectual. He is the author of Left, Right, Left: Political Essays, 1977-2005 and Making Trouble.