Quote from Woody Allen appears on the screen: "More than any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other, to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly."
McPherson offers in his presentation a history of who knew what and when regarding industrial derived additions to the earth's atmosphere and the projected effect of such additions on average temperature. He lists various scientific reports from years to present that predict average global temperature rises and sudden non-linear effects on the ecosystem. Unfortunately, what was known to be a prudent response to the potential effect was in conflict with the dominant system, Capitalism, which requires unlimited growth in a finite space.
McPherson catalogs the "official" reports and their projections together with what is known from the geological record; the shift in the Gulf Stream, now carrying warm water into the Arctic ocean, and the relationship of Equatorial-Polar temperature differential to Jet stream formation in building his case that the warming, forecast by the official scientific reports, is not survivable by humans, even when limited solely to CO2 increases.
McPherson addresses the subject of methane and other heat trapping gases and the most recent observations of self-reinforcing feed back mechanisms which have increased in number. One of the points he notes is that it has been known by scientists and policy makers that there is a forty year time lag for the average temperature to reach equilibrium with the CO2 level. But McPherson ends on a positive note, if that can be conceived as possible, given what he is saying.
Both he and his observations are attacked and maligned by many who assert that they know better. He addresses some of those accusations.
One need only think of the lies of tobacco corporations, the pesticide industry, nuclear power, the Pentagon and their savage attacks on people who exposed their crimes. In the news today, General Motors attempting to mend the damage to it's corporate image, now that the public knows it again chose profit over public safety and in doing so destroyed lives and families. Ralph Nader discovered that truth in 1965 and GM tried to destroy him for it.
The Q&A has some interesting questions about what to do in the face of potential "despair and utter hopelessness"; "Lives of excellence" and "Lives of love"; make poetry, at a time when it seems least needed, to paraphrase Leon Staff.
System Change Not Climate Change - https://www.facebook.com/chiscncc
MultiKulti - http://mkchi.org/
Southeast Environmental Task Force - http://www.southeastenvironmental.org
Guy McPherson is Professor Emeritus of Natural Resources and Ecology & Evolutionary Biology from the University of Arizona and author of several books including "Walking Away from Empire: A Personal Journey," "The Planner's Guide to Natural Resource Conservation: The Science of Land Development Beyond the Metropolitan Fringe," and " Living with Fire: Fire Ecology and Policy for the Twenty-first Century."
McPherson maintains a website at: http://guymcpherson.com/
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