The rhetoric of climate change

From Scientific American - sciam.com

http://blog.sciam.com/index.php?title=note_to_inhofe_and_morano_climate_change&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1
March 16, 2007

---

11:14:19 am, Categories: Environment, Global Warming and Climate Change, Politics and Science, Public Policy, Education, 203 words

Note to Inhofe and Morano: Climate Change is No Hoax

I should have known it would happen. I have now been quoted in a press release from the inimitable Marc Morano (of Swift Boat and Limbaugh fame) on behalf of the deluded senator from Oklahoma, James Inhofe, thanks to my post on climate contrarians winning the day in a debate to be broadcast shortly. (Note: all adjectives are mine.)

However, the core point of my post--not surprisingly--seems to have eluded them: the contrarians won through charm, picking on amusing soft targets like private jets, and not any perceivable scientific grounding.

They also largely agreed with their "alarmist" foes. This can't be emphasized enough. In point of fact, the debate over climate change seems to have moved--even on the contrarian side--from whether it is happening to what should be done about it. Crichton made his position clear: we should all stop flying on private jets and work to get our homes off the grid. Or would that be selective quotation?

Read the post for yourself, fully, if you don't believe me. Read the transcript (pdf). Or listen to the debate when it's broadcast on March 23. In the interim, I feel like some kind of third-rate superhero whose identity has been stolen by his nemesis.

Posted by David Biello 26 comments

*************************************************

Choppa's response (after reading the comments):

The problem here is in getting people to line up their desires with their needs. It's a very general thing, and in the US it's a very difficult matter since most needs are kept invisible these days, dealt with by faceless institutions and carefully screened from public view - like the sewers and the food supply. Also, the intrusive rhetoric of marketing has leeched on basic needs (love and security and beauty and fun) to create desires warped for commercial exploitation. It's intrusive cos it's everywhere - it occupies our public spaces with billboards and our private spaces with branded personal items and ubiquitous TV outpourings. It's all around us, wraps our bodies, and fills our heads.

So serious needs, like the survival of humanity and the generalization of civilization and culture to every human being, find it hard to force themselves into public consciousness as realities on a par with zits and bad hair. And since most of the faceless (but branded and logoed) institutions that run our lives are private corporations, their vested interest in continued secret private decision-making militates against open and public policy debate and decision-making. Which is why the US political system looks the way it does.

However, the remaining democratic and public elements of our political setup have allowed the investigation of world climate behaviour and the scientific and popular presentation of its results. These have been so startling that influential opinion leaders have reacted and not only opened up a breach in the mindlessness of consumer hedonism but actually succeeded in creating a bridgehead and fortifying it into a stronghold. Add to this the recognition by certain of the corporations that they stand to profit from investment in renewable energy production and equipment, because of the Good Energy pulsing out of this stronghold and persuading millions of ordinary citizens, and you get today's situation.

What we're seeing is a move towards the rhetoric of action. The rhetoric of factual and logical foundations for the case ("recognize climate change and try to make it pro-human") is in place and has been for a long time. The rhetoric of persuasion has more or less done its job - some last-ditch troglodytes are squealing very loud but not frightening many people away from alternative sources of energy any more. So much so that corporations are jumping on the bandwagon hoping for emerging market profits. What remains is the organization and assimilation of low-carbon energy into our everyday lives, individually but more importantly collectively, until it too melts into the background, and can be taken for granted like the sewers. And the awareness that free, informed public debate and action has taken us there.

I remember reading that in the old days, when sewers were being planned and threatening to encroach on private property interests, some scum opposed them claiming that infected water tastes sweeter. But the real issue was whose lives would the sweet water destroy, and whose lives would clean water make sweeter?