Is this too much to ask to overcome the climate change threat? Yes, it is.

[barts]

Forbes online is carrying a story entitled, Eating Less Meat Is World's Best Chance For Timely Climate Change, Say Experts. A co-author of the report cited in the story concludes,

The entire goal of today’s international climate objectives can be achieved by replacing just one-fourth of today’s least eco-friendly food products with better alternatives.

According to the report,

Livestock (like automobiles) are a human invention and convenience, not part of pre-human times, and a molecule of CO₂ exhaled by livestock is no more natural than one from an auto tailpipe. Moreover, while over time an equilibrium of CO₂ may exist between the amount respired by animals and the amount photosynthesized by plants, that equilibrium has never been static. Today, tens of billions more livestock are exhaling CO₂ than in preindustrial days, while Earth’s photosynthetic capacity (its capacity to keep carbon out of the atmosphere by absorbing it in plant mass) has declined sharply as forest has been cleared. (Meanwhile, of course, we add more carbon to the air by burning fossil fuels, further overwhelming the carbon-absorption system.)

For those who follow the climate change issue, the report's conclusions are not novel.

In my view, however, I doubt that human beings or their political and economic institutions have the capacity to alter human behavior even this small amount (i.e. reducing animal products in diets by 25%) in order to stave off the effects and consequences of climate change.

I suggest it is reasonable to conclude, therefore, that any notion that human intelligence is a survival factor is unwarranted. Certainly, humans have overwhelmed many species in the short term, but in the long term, given the human animal's well-documented inability to change behavior to realize long term survival of human civilizations, we can be confident that the worst effects of climate change will occur. There is nothing in human behavior to suggest they can be avoided. Civilization, as we know it or hope it might become, cannot be achieved. To suggest otherwise is either denial or the most extreme expression of wishful thinking and hubris.

[hensatri]

We will eventualy, like overpopulating deer, reach a crisis point and have our population significantly reduced by famine. I mean we are wrecking the evironment, and probably will continue to do so, but our efforts wont make the planet unlivable, so humanity wont put itself into an extinction crisis, but I do see us butting up against famine and global resource wars before we get the jist that Earth is a finite resource.

[barts]

We will eventually, like overpopulating deer, reach a crisis point and have our population significantly reduced by famine. I mean we are wrecking the environment, and probably will continue to do so, but our efforts wont make the planet unlivable, so humanity wont put itself into an extinction crisis, but I do see us butting up against famine and global resource wars before we get the just that Earth is a finite resource.

I agree. It's unlikely human beings will become extinct, but civilization as we know it likely will.

Human beings rarely act in a rational way to stave off a crisis--even when the evidence for the crisis occurring is unequivocal. They react to it after it has wrecked havoc on individuals and cultural institutions. I suspect our future "civilization" will be essentially a warlord political economy. The civilization we enjoy now depends too much on cheap energy, political and economic stability, physical security, and a complacent, trusting populace to survive the disrupting effects of climate change.

[JimmyNic]

I agree. It's unlikely human beings will become extinct, but civilization as we know it likely will.

Human beings rarely act in a rational way to stave off a crisis--even when the evidence for the crisis occurring is unequivocal. They react to it after it has wrecked havoc on individuals and cultural institutions. I suspect our future "civilization" will be essentially a warlord political economy. The civilization we enjoy now depends too much on cheap energy, political and economic stability, physical security, and a complacent, trusting populace to survive the disrupting effects of climate change.

I suspect any attempts by the government to control the amount of meat people eat would be met with contempt, as would attempts to limit the amount being produced, which would lead to an increase in the price of meat (which is already quite expensive) and concerns of the policies being elitist. The West needs a serious re-examination of our responsibilities as individuals and as a civilisation if we are to have any hope of influencing the future for the better.

[barts]

The West needs a serious re-examination of our responsibilities as individuals and as a civilisation if we are to have any hope of influencing the future for the better.

The "West" may, indeed, "need a serious re-examination of our responsibilities as individuals", but I suggest that such a re-examination is beyond both the intellectual competency of most individual human beings (certainly not enough to matter when it comes to climate change), and the cultural competency of any civilization.

The fact is every action of human beings and their civilizations serve the immediate self-interest of some group or groups. No matter how damaging the actions might be to the civilization as a whole--or to billions of people--the groups will always resist the change--even if it means their long term suicide. The result is that human beings as a species (at the biological level) cannot make choices or change behaviors that might spare them from the dire effects of something like climate change. This, despite the fact, we know exactly how to mitigate climate change. It's not that we choose not to mitigate climate change, we, in fact, are culturally and socially, as a species, unable to do so.

Until the effects of climate change are immediate (i.e. a tornado rips a house apart, a fire raises a town to the ground, a hurricane obliterates a city, crops fail, sea levels obliterate a nation) little or no change is forthcoming.

The scientists and others who accurately warn of impending problems are tragic Cassandras. Their only reward is the dubious satisfaction of being able to say "I told you so."

Human beings, I submit, are generally biological unable to respond to an impending future event. They only relate to the immediate term, and by immediate term I suggest a few days at most. The consequences for the future of their actions in the immediate term have no relevance in decision making.

[Angry Citizen]

I can submit a precedent for widespread action being taken to effect an environmentalist goal, despite the connection not being perfectly clear for the average folk: crop rotation. The dust bowls ended when the government forced farmers to use crop rotation schemes. A similar effect could be had if the governments of the world truly wanted it. But since China and India aren't willing to participate, I can see why other countries aren't either.

[barts]

I can submit a precedent for widespread action being taken to effect an environmentalist goal, despite the connection not being perfectly clear for the average folk: crop rotation. The dust bowls ended when the government forced farmers to use crop rotation schemes. A similar effect could be had if the governments of the world truly wanted it. But since China and India aren't willing to participate, I can see why other countries aren't either.

I think you're giving excellent examples of my point. It took the immediate tragedy of the dust bowl before simple changes in agriculture occurred, and people in India, China, and other countries are unable to cooperate to fend off what they know is happening and with worse coming in order to further their immediate interests.

While some individuals are able to make changes in the present in order to achieve future gains or avoid future problems, human beings as a social and cultural species are not. There may be a few exceptions, of course. None come immediately to mind. Even when we consider extraordinary political changes like the political unification of Europe after WWII that was a direct consequence not of careful thought but of a devastating war. The EEC/EU could have been, in theory, created prior to the first world war. It wasn't, and tragedies that killed millions of people were necessary before the Europeans (acting just like all human beings) began to even consider cooperation that would benefit them all and avoid catastrophe.

[Senor Hoint]

Yes, humans don't have a great track record when it comes to preventive measures, despite the saying that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

[JimmyNic]

Human beings, I submit, are generally biological unable to respond to an impending future event. They only relate to the immediate term, and by immediate term I suggest a few days at most. The consequences for the future of their actions in the immediate term have no relevance in decision making.

And I submit that you are incorrect.

It is true that humans are terribly prone to short-term bias, which is why we eat the chocolate cake when we are trying to lose weight. To a certain extent we are programmed for short term benefit.

But we are also gifted with causal reasoning skills, and we can use these to override our more reptilian urges. Which is why we can lose weight, we can climb a mountain, we can write a book, we can send ourselves to the moon and we can beat climate change. Any opinion to the contrary is in opposition of the facts.

Whether we will is another matter. Mostly, it has to do with politics.

[Senor Hoint]

A major problem is the puny human lifespan, which doesn't equip us for long-term thinking.

Though, as JimmyNic points out, it is obviously possible in a theoretical sense for humans to think in the long term and implement preventive measures.

[barts]

Whether we will is another matter. Mostly, it has to do with politics.

Politics is human. That you've given the rationale of politics as to why things don't get done for the long term is to support my argument that humans are generally incapable of responding to long term threats like climate change. You can't separate the human animal and politics. Politics is a product of the human animal.

[barts]

...as JimmyNic points out, it is obviously possible in a theoretical sense for humans to think in the long term and implement preventive measures.

This is more a myth created by humans, I suggest, than even a theoretical likelihood. Humans are masters of self-delusion and self-deception.