Is Environmentalism Nearing "The Tipping Point?"
It’s the birthday of best-selling author Malcolm Gladwell, for my money, among the very brightest people on the planet. His first book, The Tipping Point – How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference, was published in 2000, based on the analysis of “the moment of critical mass, the threshold, the boiling point” that cause huge sociological changes that mark everyday life. As Gladwell states, “Ideas and products and messages and behaviors spread like viruses do.” About the book, he said: “The hope with Tipping Point was it would help the reader understand that real change was possible.”
I occasionally note that it could, at some point, become “cool” to be “green.” Wouldn’t it be terrific if caring about the people and the planet around us became the next light beer, Twitter, SUVs, fast food, or texting? But exactly what and where is the tipping point for this one? How do we get there from here?
Craig,
It will never be “cool”. It is, and will always be, a sign of a rational human being that has some concern for the generations that follow.
But quite soon there will be a time when there won’t be idiotic vitriol spewed from the right whenever it’s mentioned.
The analogy to the “science” behind cigarettes is truly a great analogy. The tobacco industry fought like mad to deny the fact that cigarettes are harmful and addictive. But eventually they simply couldn’t sustain the lie, and no-one was stupid enough to believe the lie anymore. Suddenly, the entire world understood that smoking was bad for you, and that cigarettes were addictive. It happened almost overnight. As soon as the money was no longer dumped into obfuscating and confusing the science, the truth bore out, and you couldn’t find a person who would admit they hadn’t always known that smoking was bad for you…
But now, over 3 decades later, there’s still 25% of America that smokes.
I think similar trends are likely. Farmers are getting hit by the drought and heat wave. Wealthy southern landowners are getting hit by increased tropical storm activity… and everyone has to spend more to keep the air conditioning running. Within 6 years we will likely see satellite pictures of Earth with no ice in the arctic seas. It is becoming impossible even for the most uneducated people to deny global warming… and when it becomes impossible, they’ll give up the fight, and everyone will claim they knew it all along.
This is great perspective. Please see: http://2greenenergy.com/about-climate-change/31465/.
Probably we’ve all noticed that the Republican candidate for president has avoided mentioning climate change. When he was directly asked whether we are responsible for climate change, he said that he didn’t know. Obama is not much better.
Of course the economy and other issues are important, but the consequences of climate change are likely to make the economy and other issues seem trivial by comparison. Unfortunately, people do not like to hear bad news and therefore it is not in the best immediate interests of politicians, including politicians running for Congress, to tell people the bad news.
It is unclear whether people will accept our responsibility for climate change even when the effects begin to create exceedingly serious problems; it could still be claimed that the change is completely natural, that we had nothing to do with it, and that we can do nothing about it.
The risks of climate change completely dwarf any risks of nuclear power. We know that we could greatly and rapidly reduce CO2 emissions by replacing fossil fuel power plants with nuclear power plants. France, in about 20 years, went from 0% nuclear to 80% nuclear for electricity generation. Considering that wind and solar power require at least 10 times as much concrete and steel as nuclear power and far more than 10 times as much land, and considering the intermittent nature of wind and solar, we would have a much better chance of limiting climate change if we switched to nuclear power as quickly as possible while concurrently developing a much safer and more economical nuclear technology. Effort spend on renewables will delay migrating away from fossil fuels and increase the consequences of climate change.
The following link will provide more information on one better, safer, and more economical nuclear power technology:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lG1YjDdI_c8
I also highly recommend the book Super Fuel: Thorium, the Green Energy Source for the Future, by Richard Martin; it is readily avaialble from the usual sources.
Incidentally, the incidence of smoking adults in the U.S. has dropped to slightly less than 20%, which although too high, is 20% lower than 25%. Finland plans to phase out smoking completely by making it illegal to sell cigarettes to people born after a certain date.
Sorry, I meant to underscore the book title, but made a mistake and everything from there on ended up bold. Perhaps I’m overdue for a brain transplant.
Frank,
Thanks for the correction on smoking adults in the U.S.
The point is still valid, however. Long after the resistance to scientific fact gave way, and everyone acknowledged the dangers and problems… people didn’t change much, and didn’t change quickly. They started joking about cigarettes killing them as they smoked.
Once resistance breaks down you’ll see polls showing 90% of Americans being “very concerned” about AGW, but I doubt SUV sales will drop more than 1-5% YOY.