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November 2009 
What has your response been to climate change?
Ted
I guess I first started reading about climate change in 1973 - John Gribben (then a writer for the british weekly science magazine New Scientist) published a book called "Our Changing Earth".
About 14 years ago it got to the point that my wife and I bought 35 acres of low quality farmland and planted it in plantation forestry. Thinking that would more than offset our carbon footprint (which it is).
I have spoken at many meetings since on the topic, and been engaged in many online fora. I have twice travelled to our capital city to speak to parliamentary select committees on the topic. I will discuss the topic with anyone interested almost any time.
It seems to me that most of the international response is counter productive, as is most of the public response.
It seems that most people and politicians think that passing laws can solve any problem.
It appears to me that we have got to the point that we have far more laws than are necessary - so much so that it has become completely counter productive, and far from incentivising people to exercise their judgement and creativity responsibly, we are forcing people to follow rules even when it is obvious to them that the rules are inappropriate to the situation.
John Taylor Gatto wrote a beautiful ittle book "Dumbing us down" which describes this malaise in the US Education system.
It is far wider than that.
It is everywhere - all systems, all societies.
It seems to me that there really is a problem with the amount of CO2 we are releasing into the atmosphere from buring fossil fuels - but our responses thus far are far from sensible or appropriate.
Ray Kurzweil has demonstrated that solar photovoltaics have been doubling their installed capacity every 2 years, for several decades - getting cheaper all the while. Currently they provide 0.1% of humanity's energy needs. 1/1000th. 1000 is ten doublings. On current trends, if we do nothing other than business as usual, we will completely replace fossil fuels with clean solar power in 20 years.
If we decided to invest some government money in the area, by fully funding students into science and technology degrees as one way, we could considerably shorten that time.
Another way of shortening it would be to prevent anyone from exercising patent rights unless they could demonstrate a substantial investment and a doubling of production at least every 2 years.
The imposition of carbon trading systems only supports the existing fossil fuel industry by creating yet another set of vested interests in retaining fossil fuels.
It seems that most of our legal system is in place to protect the money making capacity of vested interests, rather than any sort of unbiased "public good", though public good is often the excuse cited for any new legislation.
We heat our house from wood grown on our own half acre section, and try to use energy wisely. And that is a personal choice.
Enough rant for one evening.
I hope I got someone thinking.
Access: Public
great post! - one person at a time can and does make a difference.
Ted - This is a great post – thank you. I so appreciate your perspective on this topic.
Thank you for such an informative and inspiring post. The whole topic is quite overwhelming if you don't break it down into manageable steps that each person can achieve. I agree that education is the key. Sometimes I feel that humanity have become a cancer on the planet. We must relearn how to live in harmony with our environment. It is the only one we have.
Thank you all.
Gil - I don't see us as a cancer, just as a new form of life emerging and becoming aware. In part that becoming aware happens at a personal level, and in part it has a cultural element.
We are learning how to trancend our environment and to become creators in the larger perspective, and like all journeys it is full of twists and turns, mistakes and lessons.
Ted,
Wow, yes, time to simplify the legal structure. I'm for that - and the tax structure too. More and more complicated does not yield better and better results. Time to wipe the slate clean and start over. Of course, that's not productive because it isn't going to happen, at least not under the current political “necessities”.
And your statement, if true, and I have no reason not to want it to be, “On current trends, if we do nothing other than business as usual, we will completely replace fossil fuels with clean solar power in 20 years.” is certainly a reason for overall optimism - which I actually have. I simply believe it will all work out, and I do believe that ordinary people (doing what's best for their own selves) will be the driving force and not special interest laws put into place, that may not even make any kind of sense to enforce. To what effect? If there isn't, why bother.
Of course, money always is THE effect, yep, it is. I don't believe, it has ever not been so - “most of our legal system is in place to protect the money making capacity of vested interests”.
Fortunately, you are not alone in your kind of thinking.
Lead me ever into decreasing
dependence on “old” energy sources -
Deb
Got another one thinking…more. And it certainly didn't seem as a rant to me. Written the way one who lives what he talks, can write. Thanks Ted. It's an honor to have you in the community….which my status will shortly point to.