One person’s recycling won’t stop climate change in itself. We must act collectively

Climate change is happening now and it’s happening faster and much worse than predicted. It’s threatening to the world we know and everything in it. It’s already killing people. This is beyond doubt or argument.

 ‘School children going on strike demanding climate
 action provide a shining example of disruptive, urgent,
agenda setting activism’ 

We have just years to change course. If we manage it, we could save the world, at least the one we recognise. Realistically, the prognosis at the moment is that we won’t manage to steer the ship around in time.

So why have we, as people with everything to lose, not acted sooner?

Read the story from The Guardian by Emily Mulligan - “One person’s recycling won’t stop climate change in itself. We must act collectively.”

Carbon tax: the two most loaded words in Australian politics make a return to Canberra

A new skirmish on energy policy is pitting Malcolm Turnbull against Tony Abbott in an argument about one of the most loaded terms in Australian politics: carbon tax.

Carbon tax protesters outside Parliament House in 2011.

The Prime Minister had to tough out another challenge from his predecessor on Tuesday morning when Abbott urged a rethink of Coalition policy on energy and climate change.

It is hard to see this as anything other than a grudge match. Abbott tried to reopen old decisions about cuts to greenhouse gas emissions that were made under his own government, pinning the blame on Turnbull instead.

Read the opinion piece from The Age by David Crow - “Carbon tax: the two most loaded words in Australian politics make a return to Canberra.”

UN climate negotiations wind up in Germany

The latest round of UN climate negotiations wind up in the German city of Bonn later today with 200 nations discussing the future of the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement - after the US confirmed that it would be withdrawing from the accord in 2020.

Fran Kelly - Radio National.

The talks in Bonn have also seen a lot of argument about the future of coal as a source of fuel - with both pro and anti-coal agendas being promoted.

Listen to the Fran Kelly interview on Radio National - “UN climate negotiations wind up in Germany.”

The idea that climate scientists are in it for the cash has deep ideological roots

You’ll have heard that line of argument about cancer scientists, right?

Petrochemical billionaire Charles Koch and his
membership of the Mont Pelerin Society is a focus
 of Nancy MacLean’s book Democracy in Chains.

The one where they’re just in it for the government grant money and that they don’t really want to find a cure, because if they did they’d be out of a job?

No, of course you haven’t. That’s because it’s ridiculous and a bit, well, vomit-inducing.

To make such an argument, you would need to be deeply cynical about people’s motives for consistently putting their own pay packets above the welfare of millions of people.

You would have to think that scientists were not motivated to help their fellow human beings, but instead were driven only by self-interest.

Read Graham Readfearn’s story on The Guardian - “The idea that climate scientists are in it for the cash has deep ideological roots.”

Why you should sleep in a cool bedroom

Turn down the thermostat, crack a window, and ditch the blankets for some science-backed health benefits.

Wherever we choose to sleep or with whom with
 sleep, ideally it would be cool place.

On cold winter nights, my husband and I often have the same argument: I want the window open, he wants it closed. I think it’s because he grew up in a house where the thermostat always stayed at 21 Celsius (70 F), whereas mine had a wood-burning cookstove in the kitchen that heated downstairs but left the rest of the house feeling like an ice box.

If research turns out to be accurate, then my preference is the healthier one. Scientists are now surmising that humans’ lack of cold exposure could actually be harming us. We spend our lives in climate-controlled spaces, where the temperature doesn’t fluctuate much year-round. If it does get cool, we rush to turn up the heat or put on a sweater, so as not to experience any physical discomfort.

Read the Treehugger story by Katherine Martinko - “Why you should sleep in a cool bedroom.”

(One of the major problems associated with climate change is a steady increase in night time minimum temperatures - people need the cool evenings and nights to allow their bodies to recover. Soaring daytime temperatures exhaust people and the night, that time when the body usually uses the cooler times to recover, are steadily becoming warmer causing a general deterioration of many peoples’ health - Robert McLean)

Just who are these 300 'scientists' telling Trump to burn the climate?

Physicist William Happer stands inside the elevator
in the lobby of Trump Tower in New York,
U.S., on Friday, Jan. 13, 2017. Happer, who
is under consideration to be Trump’s science
advisor, signed a letter asking him to withdraw
from the UN Convention on Climate Change. 

If you read my articles regularly, you may have noticed multiple times I have stated that the scientific argument is over; there are no longer any reputable scientists that deny the overwhelming human influence in our climate. An open letter published last week by the anti-environmentalists proves my point. 

If you read the headlines, it might have seemed impressive: “300 Scientists Tell Trump to Leave UN Climate Agreement.” Wow, 300 scientists. That’s a lot right? Actually, it’s a pitiful list.

First of all, hardly anyone on the list was a climate scientist; many were not even natural scientists. It is almost as though anyone with a college degree (and there are about 21 million enrolled in higher education programs just in the USA) was qualified to sign that letter.

Okay but what about the signers of the letter? Surely they are experts in the field? Not so much. It was very difficult to find the list of signers online however I was able to acquire it with some help. 

See for yourself - Google “300 scientists letter climate change” in the past week. You will see many stories in the press, but try finding the actual letter or the list of names. The version I obtained was dated February 23, 2017 which helps narrow your searching. In an era of Dr. Google, it is unbelievable that the letter itself was not made more available. 

Read John Abraham’s story on The Guardian - “Just who are these 300 'scientists' telling Trump to burn the climate?”

Wind farm conversations quickly become emotional and non-productive

Most any public conversation about wind farms quickly becomes emotional to devolve into a stalled and non-productive argument.

Some people see them as corrosive to their health and refuse to accept clear medical and scientific evidence that this form of alternative energy plays no role is unsettling their health.

Arguments that the health difficulties they experience are psychosomatic pass unheeded and the benefits they bring, which exceed by a massive magnitude the proven polluting status of a fossil fuelled power plant appear, quickly vanish into the argument.

And now The Age carries a report, headed: “Wind farm health review finds no ill effects - so let's study some more” that tells us there is no consistent evidence health impairment, but at the same time it has been announced that millions of dollars will be spent on even more research.

We're beyond 'argument' and 'debate', now it is 'conversation' and 'discussion'

The time for climate change action advocates to be using such words as “argument” or “debate” is over and from here it is more important to say “conversation” or “discussion”.

Understanding the mind
will help us understand
climate change.

Psychological research clearly illustrates that the use of “argument” or “debate” serves only the purposes of the skeptics who cherry-pick facts to convince the uninformed that climate change is not really happening.

In fact the last six words in that sentence “climate change is not really happening” is of itself dangerous and immediately becomes a “truth” for those among the undecided masses with those same people almost automatically and unconsciously attributing that “fact” to whoever made that statement, even if it is an august organization such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

No longer can we discuss myths as basic research shows that within just days most people quickly forget what is and isn’t a myth and, equally become confused about the realities, the facts that were unambiguously explained to them.

People tend to hear what they want to hear and if what they are hearing does not within personal frames of reality, then they seem to mysteriously change what they heard.

Further confusing all that, the complexities and realities of climate change are so vast that it is unlikely they fit within the imagined realities of anyone and so while it is challenging and difficult to keep personal understandings in synch with what is really happening, it is doubly difficult to have another understand and accept what is unfolding.

So, be careful with your language, choose your words carefully and remember that even the most precise and accurately engineering statement can be manipulated by dedicated skeptics.