In this semester of Environmental Studies 160, I’ve realized that the problem of climate change in its entire concept is a much more convoluted problem than I ever imagined. The word Climate Change is so broad, it’s hard to understand what it even means, and I feel like that is a point of our first text, Why We Disagree About Climate Change. The text took what Professor Proctor would deem a “big word,” or a word so general the reader isn’t sure what it truly means, and broke it down into specific elements that different groups disagree based on. Among examples, we disagree about Climate Change because of our definitions of fear, our definitions of risk, our definitions of effective government and it’s role in socially affected environmental crises, and the most nebulous and convoluted of all, we disagree on Climate Change because we can’t agree on what climate means to us. The problem with Climate Change is that it is such a big word that one has a hard time understanding conceptually the implications of it; the problem is philosophical chaos because we can’t seem to break the umbrella term down into small concepts and goals that are tackle-able. (Hulme 2009).
I feel this situation represented in myself. Before taking this class, I felt like everyone knew what to do to help the situation; the problem was a lack of action, not a lack of direction. However, since taking this class, I’ve come to understand that there are actually a lot of activists and organizations wanting to act on the issue, but with no direction or consensus to move forward. Scientists can’t even agree what the first step to take is (Hulme 2009). In my opinion, the key to understanding, and then solving Climate Change is to stop referring to it so frequently as “Climate Change.” Instead, let’s spearhead rainforest deforestation in Central and South America. Rather than condemning “Greenhouse Gases,” another term which encompasses entire countries and the everyday activities of nearly every human on the planet, lawmakers and activists need to encourage automobile companies and airplane industries to produce models that are more efficient, as a start. Untying specific problems within the twisted net are steps to gradually undo the impossible tangle of Climate Change.
The second lesson I learned in this class was the depressing reality of our materialistic culture – the more we consume, the more we want and need to consume, and reduction attempts will never cancel out our overall material usage. In our second text, Making the Modern World, Vaclav Smil quantifies how we’ve built our way into an overconsumption crisis. Though he talks about ways that we’ve reduced waste and materialism, such as cars whose engines go farther on less gasoline, we cancel that out ultimately by putting more gadgets and systems in the car to make it more comfortable. Or, we make our car shells from Aluminum, a metal which is both time and energy intensive, rather than it’s more heavier but more sensitive alternative, steel (Smil, 2014).
Finally, my last lesson learned rather surprised me: a lot of contemporary environmental thought actually goes against what I’d originally considered “progressive” thinking on Climate Change. For example, in Austerity Ecology, Leigh Phillips argues against all the politically correct “green” stances: the small farms, locally sourced foods, organic, non-GMOs, etc. In many cases, these methods actually do no good towards the environment, such as greenhouse gas reduction in food transportation, and contribute to an elitist culture called Neo-Malthusianism (Phillips 2015). This way of considering one’s responsibility towards caring for Earth condemns people who don’t choose locally sourced and organic foods, even if being able to choose so is not in their control. Neo-Malthusians create a market where the “hot new item” is to be buying all organic products, even when that is actually not reducing any emissions (Phillips 2015). This was surprising to me because I realized I was a Neo-Malthusian; at this point, I feel like it is still important to be aware of what you buy, and where it came from, but I now understand that not everything locally sourced is good, and organic doesn’t necessarily mean better.
Bibliography
Hulme, Mike . Why We Disagree About Climate Change. Cambridge University Press, 2009.
Phillips, Leigh. Austerity ecology & the collapse-porn addicts: a defence of growth, progress, industry and stuff. Winchester, UK: Zero Books, 2015.
Smil, Vaclav. Making the modern world: materials and dematerialization. Chichester, West Sussex, United Kingdom: Wiley, 2014.