Inhuman Swill

So, over on Facebook I opined that it's now time for Mr. Obama to get his ass in gear about global warming. I further opined that it was time to stop referring to it by the namby-pamby term "climate change" and get back to calling it "global warming." Boy, did that incite some strong responses!

As I said there and will reiterate here, "climate change" may be a descriptive term in a bland way, but it's way too soft and weaselly. "Climate" as a scientific term is just not understood well enough (or at all) by most of us, and "change" is just, well, change. It says nothing about the degree or direction of the change, about whether it's good or bad, and it even leaves some dangerously stupid pundits enough wiggle room to say, "Hey, change is no problem. We'll just adapt."

"Global warming," on the other hand, is direct and scary, and we need to be scared by it. We need to be shitting our pants because of it. "Global"—it affects all of us, everywhere. "Warming"—this identifies the most direct effect of the most critical element of the climate-change equation, to wit that if we keep dumping more and more carbon into the atmosphere, the average global temperature will keep going up faster and faster, leading to every other bad outcome, like increased sea levels, decreased permafrost, increased ocean acidity, increased extreme weather events, and so on. The most important thing we can and must do to stop climate change is to stop that temperature rise.

Now let's all change our underwear and call Congress (202-224-3121) and the White House (202-456-1111) and tell them now is the time to get very serious about halting global warming.

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Don't believe me? You cannot possibly be informed about the urgency of this matter unless you're reading journalists like Elizabeth Kolbert and Bill McKibben. Go back and read Kolbert's "The Climate of Man" series from The New Yorker seven and a half years ago, then read McKibben's recent Rolling Stone article "Global Warming's Terrifying New Math" and reflect on how damn fast climate change is changing for the worse, and how little time we have to ameliorate its effects. And then change your underwear again.


Crossposted from Inhuman Swill

Okay, okay, God, we get it. We'll curtail our greenhouse gas emissions a lot. We'll pour all our research dollars into alternative fuels. We'll stop fucking around with oil, not to mention fighting over access to that poison. Just, for Christs's sake, turn down the heat!

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It looks like something out of an old animated cartoon. There are police vans with huge ranks of loudspeakers puttering around Manhattan, exhorting citizens to conserve electricity. I wouldn't be surprised to hear that affectless, amplified voice declaring that the end is nigh.

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When I arrived at my office building today, I was alone in the elevator up. The elevator was cooler than the lobby, but not by a lot. The lobby in turn was cooler than out on the street by some.

I pressed the button for 12. It was the only button lit. The elevator started up.

It stopped at 3.

And didn't open.

I punched the button for 3. Nothing.

After fifteen or twenty seconds, the elevator seemed to gather its wits. It rose a short distance and stopped again, or that's what it felt like.

I punched the button for 4. Nothing.

Then I looked at the floor indicator. We were at 5, 6, 7.

I held my breath.

At 12, the elevator stopped and the door opened. I resolved that when I leave, I will leave by the stairs.

I began thinking about global warming again today, sparked by a posting by Christopher Bigelow—or rather, by a couple of the complacent jackasses who responded to the post. (Sorry if they're friends of yours, Chris.)

While I think it's nice that Time did finally get around to covering the story in a big way, I think the three-part New Yorker series by Elizabeth Kolbert that ran a year ago was much better and should be required reading. Before I lose them again, here are the links to the Kolbert stories:

• "The Climate of Man—I"
  
• "The Climate of Man—II"
  
• "The Climate of Man—III"

These stories are remarkable not just for the way they build from a few telling anecdotes to inevitable conclusions of frightening scope, but for the fact that they address what realistic solutions to the problem would consist of. And those solutions are harder now than they were a year ago, and harder a year ago than they would have been a decade ago. These stories should be required reading blah blah blah, but how many people do you know who would be willing to read the equivalent of a small depresssing book about a problem that will change life on Earth in our short spans of time?

Me neither.

A "Talk of the Town" piece by Kolbert from the March 20th New Yorker continues the saga. She details the findings gleaned from two satellites nicknamed Tom and Jerry that measure changes in the earth's gravitational field, and these measurements tell us that Antarctica is losing water at an alarming rate—more than anyone suspected. She concludes:

A project like Tom and Jerry demonstrates all the strengths of American science: technological sophistication, restless curiosity, and monumental budgets. But, at the same time, it points to the fundamental disconnect in our culture. Why spend tens of millions of dollars to produce such an elegant set of measurements only to ignore them? With knowledge comes responsibility, and so it is that we turn from the knowledge we have gone to such lengths to acquire.

This is the biggest story of our time, friends. Bigger, yes, than the possibility of nuclear war with Iran, or anything else you can think of. And what are we going to do about it except watch it happen while continuing to deny it's anything to worry about?

Hell, I don't blame you for not wanting to think about it. I sure don't want to think about it.