Thursday, 15 October 2009

Post for 'Blog action day' on climate change

What can I say to contribute to Blog Action Day on the subject of climate change?

I want to be part of it, because, as I said in an earlier post, I think climate change is THE big issues at the moment, but I'm not sure I have anything new to add. Mind you, equally, there is loads I could say about it.

So, here's just a couple of very brief things, pretty much at random.

1 A technical comment. My field is ICT, and it seems to me that ICT generally is part of the problem but could be part of the solution. This was one of the few comments I made via Writetoreply on Stephen Carter's Digital Britain report. The report as far I could see made no reference at all to climate change, which was ignoring the elephant in the room.

2 A personal thought on why I think it is real. Basically, I read the New Scientist, and I believe it. Not everything in there, of course, but the overwhelming message : Climate change is real, and if we don't do anything about we're in a mess. And more, the first people to suffer - are suffering already - are the poorest, the least powerful in the world. This is why the likes of Christian Aid now make it a priority.

To me, the message of Easter Island speaks very loudly. I think many people still have a vague belief that the environment is somehow out there independent of us, a sort of limitless resources that is so much bigger than us and that it'll absorb everything we do to it. But the message of Easter Island is that we can cause an environmental disaster. Easter Island was small-scale and local. Now we are talking about the whole earth.

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