Comments 5

باريس ومصير الأرض

Nov 11, 2015 Peter Singer

برنستون- ان حياة مليارات الناس لقرون قادمة سوف تكون على المحك عندما يلتقي قادة العالم ومفاوضو الحكوماتفي مؤتمر الامم المتحدة للتغير المناخي في باريس في نهاية الشهر. ان مصير عدد غير محدد من انواع النباتات والحيوانات المهددة بالانقراض على المحك كذلك.

لقد وقعت 189 دولة من بينها الولايات المتحدة الامريكية والصين والهند وجميع الدول الاوروبية خلال "قمة الأرض" في ريو دي جانيرو سنة 1992 على معاهدة الامم المتحدة الاطارية للتغير المناخي ووافقت على الابقاء على انبعاثات غاز الدفيئة " في مستوى منخفض لدرجة تمنع التدخل البشري الخطير بالنظام المناخي ".

لكن لغاية الان لم يتم تحقيق مثل ذلك الاستقرار وبدونه فإن العمليات التي تؤثر سلبا على المناخ يمكن ان ترفع درجات حرارة الارض بشكل اكبر. ان التناقص الحاصل في جليد القطب الشمالي يعني انه يوجد جليد اقل ليعكس اشعة الشمس مما يعني ان المحيطات سوف تمتص المزيد من الحرارة . ان ذوبان طبقة الجليد الدائمة السيبيريه سوف يطلق كميات كبيرة من الميثان وكنتيجة لذلك فإن مناطق واسعة من كوكبنا والتي تضم حاليا مليارات البشر يمكن ان تصبح غير صالحة للسكن.

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Peter Singer

Writing for PS since 2001
164 Commentaries

Peter Singer is Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University, Laureate Professor in the School of Historical and Philosophical Studies at the University of Melbourne, and founder of the non-profit organization The Life You Can Save. His books include Animal Liberation, Practical Ethics, The Ethics of What We Eat (with Jim Mason), Rethinking Life and Death, The Point of View of the Universe, co-authored with Katarzyna de Lazari-Radek, The Most Good You Can Do, Famine, Affluence, and Morality, One World Now, Ethics in the Real World, and Utilitarianism: A Very Short Introduction, also with Katarzyna de Lazari-Radek. In 2013, he was named the world's third "most influential contemporary thinker" by the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute.

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William Pu Nov 15, 2015

Stop anyone in the street and ask "Would you eat right, exercise, stop smoking,... so that you will live better and longer?" With so many people overweight and obese, the answer is obvious.
Now ask "Will you sacrifice your life style to benefit future generations?"
The self proclaimed smartest species on earth is also the only one that will make our earth unfit for our survival.
Chernobyl is do fine, sans human.
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M M Nov 14, 2015

Meccano just released a very affordable robot, a very good substitute to all these very expensive conferences, lunches/ dinners, seminars, lectures, etc.
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dan baur Nov 12, 2015

The short-lived insect is worried about "the Fate of the Earth".
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Rick Puglisi Nov 11, 2015

Organizing countries to commit to responsible behavior and insure we are good stewards of our planet is a noble cause. Calling it a crime against humanity if someone eats meat or doesn't agree with you about something that is a multi-variable nonlinear statistical forecast is not acceptable. You can call it a tragedy (e.g. tragedy of the commons) but not a crime. People who are opposed to climate change are so as much because of the intolerant language and totalitarian innuendo as their uncertainty about the models and data.
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Odyssios Redux Nov 11, 2015

It's been crystal clear to me for quite a while that humans will be reactive, rather than proactive, on this issue. How can I tell? I've lived through the Story so far - from being slightly involved with first nuclear winter studies, then climate change investigations, on the purely technical side. By the mid-1980s, I was sure the cause was lost. Nothing I've seen in the past 30 years has led me to change my mind. For whatever set of reasons, which really are irrelevant since nothing will change them in time, it will be 'business as usual'. The species will survive. Hundreds of millions, at least, won't. The tragedy is that events are unfolding on a timescale comparable to a human lifetime. Those with the resources will just move their deck chairs a few feet along the Titanic's deck. The rate of change is so far just slow enough to ignore if all you're interested in is the next quarterly report or election cycle. Possibly China is in a far better place to do something than 'the rest' (for practical purposes, the US). If it truly has a technocratic government which appreciates both the challenges and the scale of change needed, and can produce/enforce that change, it may mitigate its own situation.But as it's a global problem we all swim - or sink - together. No single 'virtuous' state, however economically powerful, can save the plot. US positioning itself as a 'leader' in trying to do anything constructive, is breath-taking chutzpah. Just look at its record. We live in interesting, indeed fascinating, times. All senses of that.
- Diego Orlandi Nov 11, 2015
  
  it is our obsession for proactivity that is causing this, in my view.
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