While cycling today, I was thinking about moral orders. Specifically, if one was given the chance to take any moral formulation that human beings have dreamt up and ascribed divine status to and make it real (give it ontological status), which would you choose and why?
Category: Politics
All posts on what Bismarck called “the art of the possible”
Sulfate injection to stop global warming?
Apparently, Paul Crutzen, an environmental scientist who shared a Nobel Prize in 1995 for his work on the role of CFCs in ozone layer depletion, thinks we should correct for global warming by injecting two million tonnes per year of sulphate particles into the upper atmosphere. According to Wikipedia: “sulfates occur as microscopic particles (aerosols) resulting from fossil fuel and biomass combustion. They increase the acidity of the atmosphere and form acid rain.” He predicts that the process of injecting them into the upper atmosphere using balloons or artillery would cost between $25 and $50 billion a year, but would save more by mitigating the effects of global warming.
While I am no environmental scientist, what strikes me as most interesting about this is the ‘technical fix’ mindset that it embodies: a bit like those who decided to stabilize dune formation on parts of the Oregon coast by importing Spanish beach grass, or those who have sought to kill off one accidentally imported pest with an intentionally imported predator. Often, such schemes don’t work at all. When they do, they risk working much too well. Thanks to Spanish beach grass, the Oregon dunes will be a thing of the past in a few decades. The point is simply that, at a stage when we really don’t know the consequences of climate change or their magnitude, it seems awfully bold to predict that such a scheme will both work and do more good than harm.
As is so often the case, the most trenchant criticism of such schemes was expressed humorously on The Simpsons:
SKINNER: Well, I was wrong. The lizards are a godsend.
LISA: But isn’t that a bit short-sighted? What happens when we’re overrun by lizards?
SKINNER: No problem. We simply unleash wave after wave of Chinese needle snakes. They’ll wipe out the lizards.
LISA: But aren’t the snakes even worse?
SKINNER: Yes, but we’re prepared for that. We’ve lined up a fabulous type of gorilla that thrives on snake meat.
LISA: But then we’re stuck with gorillas!
SKINNER: No, that’s the beautiful part. When wintertime rolls around, the gorillas simply freeze to death.
The comparison between atmospheric science and ecology is less dubious than one might think. Both systems are complex and dynamic – they feed back upon themselves in ways which are both powerful and difficult to predict. Furthermore, both atmospheric and ecological systems both affect and are affected by other complex systems with which they are integrated. Consider, for instance, how the construction of the Aswan High Dam (the product of political and economic changes, above all) altered the salinity in the eastern Mediterranean, allowing for the migration of species from the Red Sea.
What would the consequences of blasting artillery shells full of sulfates into the upper atmosphere? Far be it for me to speculate. The intentional modification of atmospheric chemistry and physics is something we have never done as a species, though we have done a lot of unintentional tinkering. What I would venture is that it is likely to have unpredictable effects and that it is a particularly curious way of trying to deal with the problem of global warming.
George Monbiot, who I met at a short conference at the Environmental Change Centre, has his own objections.
New Green Party leader
Canada’s Green Party elected a new leader today: Elizabeth May, who is described by The Globe and Mail as a “[l]ong-time activist.” The Greens have been around since 1983, usually polling about 5% of the national vote, but they have never had a seat in Parliament.
The electoral situation facing the Greens is not unlike many of the environmental problems about which they are concerned. It is one of the broad distribution of a phenomenon that would have political relevance if concentrated, but fails to do so when diffuse. Because the Greens do not have enough support to achieve a plurality of votes in a federal riding, they will probably never win seats in the House of Commons – not even enough to be a viable coalition partner for a minority government.
Barring a change in the electoral system – which I would welcome, largely because of how it would benefit parties like the Greens – the best hope the party has is to become an especially effective critic of government. If they can assemble the winning combination of good policies, strong supporting evidence and arguments for them, and media attention, they have a chance of swaying the policy development of whoever is in power. The fact that this leadership election is the first I have heard about the Greens in months suggests that the last of those, at least, is somewhat lacking at the moment.
In a governmental system like Canada’s, where enormous power is vested in the Prime Minister, it seems especially important to have innovative and effective criticism generated by other parties in Parliament. They, along with the media, provide one of two essential planks of oversight, along with the Supreme Court. I hope that the Greens, under Ms. May, prove capable at generating accomplishments from such a position.
PS. Almost by chance, I had a most interesting dinner with Edwina today. I hadn’t known that she spent nine months in Afghanistan a few years ago. It’s astonishing to learn what kind of life experiences your fellow students here have had.
Policy proportionality
I know it’s a theme I have raised many times, but it remains puzzling to me: why are democratic societies so uniquely incapable of accepting the costs associated with terrorism? If you try to circumscribe any kind of dangerous activity, from smoking to extreme sports, you will find plenty of people ready to wave the banner of liberty and claim that the deaths and injuries are worth the costs of the freedom.
If you add up the casualties of all the terrorist attacks worldwide since the end of the Cold War, you arrive at a number that is a small fraction of the number of deaths from alcohol poisoning, from AIDS, from obesity related illness, or from automobile accidents. Heart disease killed 696,947 Americans in 2002, while cancer killed 557,271. About 400,000 died from tobacco usage, while alcohol killed 100,000. And yet there is no call to reorganize society to deal with these horrific threats. We make that choice not because societal re-organization could not eliminate these problems, but because the costs of doing so (or trying to do so) exceed those we are collectively willing to bear to achieve these ends.
In response to a failed two-man terrorist plot in Germany, The Economist claimed that Germany is “immune no more” and that terrorism is sure to “leap up the list” of people’s concerns. Even if the attack had succeeded, it would still be only a blip in the passing into and out of life of the mass of people who we describe as Germany. The same is true of every terrorist plot in history. Yet they have, by contrast, generated shifts in law and power out of all proportion to their lethality or the amount of harm they cause.
Just as terrorists are adept at exploiting the physical infrastructure of modernity to generate and amplify their attacks – coordinating attacks on aircraft over the internet – they exploit the psychology of modernity to generate an emotional impact out of all proportion to the harm caused. The sane response, it seems, is to accept the hundreds or thousands of deaths as a cost we may have to pay in order to continue to live in a free society – just as we accept the deaths from automobile accidents or fatty foods. The point isn’t that we cannot or shouldn’t take precautions (whether we are discussing terrorism or car crashes), but that we should consider them sensibly and in keeping with the actual seriousness and scope of both the threats that exist, and the entities that we may choose to create or empower to deal with them.
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the night’s Plutonian shore
For an interesting example of the connections between science and public policy, look at the recent efforts to re-categorize the planets, a word that derives from the Ancient Greek term for ‘wanderer.’ The International Astronomical Union met in Prague recently to try and do so. Since 1919, they have been the scientific body charged with astronomical naming. At least two competing options were advanced: one was basically to grant planet status to any object in the solar system that has sufficient gravity to have become spherical. This would expand the ranks of planets to twelve, adding Charon – the moon of Pluto – Ceres – a large asteroid – and a distant object called 2003 UB313. (Mythology appreciators may recall that Ceres is the mother of Persephone, who Pluto kidnapped to the underworld and made his queen.)
The alternative, based on different considerations, strips Pluto of its status as a planet. Along with the other objects listed above, barring Charon which is to remain a moon, it will join the ambiguous category of ‘dwarf planet.’ Unsurprisingly, the director of a NASA robotic mission of Pluto is irked by the change. Naturally, funding and attention find themselves tied to terms and definitions that are often arbitrary. Note the scramble to brand all manner of research ‘nanotechnology’ in hopes of capturing the interest, and cash, that is attaching itself to that branch of science. The connection between attention paid to scientific developments and arbitrary phenomenon seems especially important in terms of the way in which the general public is exposed to scientific developments. Remember all the media flurry about the race of ‘hobbit’ proto-humans (Homo floresiensis)? How much less attention would there have been if a certain series of films hadn’t been recently made? Consider also the increased attention paid to climate change in the United States after Hurricane Katrina: an event that it is essentially impossible to definitively attribute to changes in the composition of the atmosphere and attendant climatic shifts.
For all the kerfuffle, there is obviously nothing about the solar system itself that has changed. Why, then, do people care so much? Partly, I suspect it has to do with simple familiarity. Just as it famously discomfited Einstein to be presented with the possibility that the universe is governed by chance at small scales, the idea that the millions of wall-charts in science classrooms everywhere depicting the nine planet solar system are, in some sense, ‘wrong’ may upset others. The solar system, as portrayed in everything from Scientific American to the Magic School Bus series, was a familiar model. That is not, in and of itself, a reason for preserving it. At the same time, I fail to see why this change is being granted such attention.
One other explanation that comes to mind has to do with the way in which many people relate to science: as a set of particular facts in which they have been educated and which they are to remember. All the discussion of having to change mnemonic devices by which the names and sequence of planets are remembered relates to that. Such a stripped-down conception of science doesn’t leave people with much scope for critical inquiry – though such an activity may not be of interest. It is troublesome, I suppose, in an age when it is increasingly vital to have a grasp of scientific ideas and developments in order to be an effective participant in a democratic society. The category into which we file one particular lump of rock orbiting the sun every 250 years doesn’t have such importance.
The way people have been anthropomorphizing the issue strikes me as really odd. People stepping up to ‘defend’ Pluto from cruel astronomers who are ‘demoting’ it suggests that there is some emotional motivation behind the classification. Of course, there is no reason why it is ‘better’ or ‘worse’ for a lump of rock to be one thing or another, in and of itself. It may change of behaviour towards the object in question – think of discussions about whether humans are ‘animals’ or not – but it is quite nonsensical to think of the lump itself having a preference. Owen Gingerich, the head of the committee that came up with the new definition, had a much more comprehensible comment: “We are an expensive science, and if we don’t have public support, we are not going to be able to do our work.” Ah, the politics of science.
Something New Under the Sun
Happy Birthday Zandara Kennedy
Extensively footnoted and balanced in its claims, John McNeill’s Something New Under the Sun is an engaging and worthwhile study of the environmental history of the twentieth century. It covers atmospheric, hydrospheric, and biospheric concerns – focusing on those human actions and technologies that have had the greatest impact on the world, particularly in terms of those parts of the world human beings rely upon. People concerned with the dynamic that exists between human beings and the natural world would do well to read this volume. As McNeill demonstrates with ample figures and examples, that impact has been dramatic, though not confined to the twentieth century. What has changed most is the rate of change, in almost all environmentally relevant areas.
The drama of some documented changes is incredible. McNeill describes the accidental near-elimination of the American chestnut, the phenomenal global success of rabbits, and the intentional elimination of 99.8% of the world’s blue whales in clear and well-attributed sections. From global atmospheric lead concentrations to the depletion of the Ogallala Aquifer, he also covers a number of huge changes that are not directly biological. I found his discussion of the human modification of the planet’s hydrological systems to be the most interesting, quite probably because it was the least familiar thing he discussed.
Also interesting to note is that, published in 2000, this book utterly dismisses nuclear power as a failed technology. In less than three pages it is cast aside as economically non-sensical (forever dependent on subsidies), inherently hazardous, and without compensating merit. Interesting how quickly things can change. The book looks far more to the past than to the future, making fewer bold predictions about the future consequences of human activity than many volumes of this sort do.
Maybe the greatest lesson of this book is that the old dichotomy between the ‘human’ and the ‘natural’ world is increasingly nonsensical. The construction of the Aswan High Dam has fundamentally altered the chemistry of the Mediterranean at the same time as new crops have altered insect population dynamics worldwide and human health initiatives have changed the biological tableau for bacteria and viruses. To see the human world as riding on top of the natural world, and able to extract some set ‘sustainable’ amount from it, may therefore be unjustified. One world, indeed.
On risk and decision making
In a complex world, understanding risk and responding to it properly is an essential human skill. Every kind of important decision involves it: from making choices about where to get electrical power to deciding whether to walk home through a dark city or let your children use the internet.
The manipulation of risk-related thinking is an increasingly obvious trend, with two major facets. The first is manipulation of the data upon which people base their decisions. The media, for instance, grossly exaggerates many risks. Rare phenomena, by definition, are news. Things that happen all the time (car crashes, domestic abuse) are not. As such, we worry about serial killers and terrorist attacks, when there is a vanishingly small chance either will ever harm us. Even worse, some campaigns actively deceive so as to try and achieve political ends; one particularly harmful example is education systems that misrepresent the effectiveness of contraceptives in hopes of encouraging teenagers to refrain from sex. Such campaigns are both unacceptably patronizing and quite obviously harmful. Another obvious example is the cultivation and exploitation of fear, on the part of governments, as a mechanism for securing increased power and freedom from oversight and criticism.
Such campaigns blend into the second trend: a denial that risk-related decisions must be made at the level of individuals. A natural trend of those in charge is to strip people of their ability to choose, for any of a number of reasons. There are times at which it is reasonable to force people to take certain precautions. Requiring people to have car insurance is a good example. Such cases, however, must be evaluated through public legal and political scrutiny, and justified on the basis of arguments that are critiqued and data that are legitimate and verified.
The intelligent solution is to teach good risk-related thinking. That means learning how to identify the agendas of those providing information. It means having tools to make reasonable assessments of logical arguments, as well as supporting data. That means not keeping people ignorant or keeping essential information secret. And it means teaching a perspective of individual empowerment, where the reality of trade-offs between different risks is acknowledged. Alas, it seems unlikely that such an approach is likely to be widely adopted.
Ka-Boom!
A few minutes ago, something happened above me that was exceptionally loud. I was wearing my Etymotic ER6i headphones with the foam eartips, which boast a 35 decibel reduction in ambient sound. In spite of them, the noise was painfully loud for several seconds.
I assume it was a supersonic patrol of figher aircraft, maintaining some defence of London, nearby, and other potential targets. Definitely unnerving.
More security, less freedom
While we can all be very glad this alleged plot was foiled, the new rules on carry-on baggage are going to make travelling long distances by plane truly hellish. Without more information, it is impossible to evaluate how justified they are, but they certainly appear to be quite onerous. No water; no books, magazines, or newspapers; no portable electronics of any kind. Of course, either the restrictions or all duty-free shopping will eventually have to go.
It also seems that all EasyJet flights out of all London airports are cancelled. With my EasyJet flight to Dublin in six days, I wonder what is going to happen. They seem to be offering refunds on tickets. Maybe I should take it, then pay the cancellation fee from the hostel.
Such is the power of terrorism: even when we win, we lose.
[Update: 6:52pm] Both of my current roommates have had to re-schedule flights over this: one to Austria and one to Barcelona. It seems likely that another friend’s trip to Madrid will not be happening, and that yet another friend’s flight to Canada tomorrow will be boring and uncomfortable.
[Update: 11 August] Flights from London to Dublin are back on schedule, according to EasyJet. My friend also made it to Madrid today, after all.
Climate change and nuclear power
Among environmentalists these days, the mark that you are a hard-headed realist committed to stopping climate change is that you have come to support nuclear power. (See Patrick Moore, one founder of Greenpeace, in the Washington Post.) While appealing in principle, the argument goes, renewable sources of energy just can’t generate the oomph we need as an advanced industrial society – at least, not quickly enough to get us out of the hole we’ve been digging ourselves into through fossil fuel dependence.
I am sympathetic to the argument. A good case can be made for employing considerable caution when dealing with something as essential and imperfectly understood as the Earth’s climatic system. Nuclear power is strategically appealing – it could reduce the levels of geopolitical influence of some really nasty governments like Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Russia. It is appealing insofar as carbon emissions are concerned, though it is not quite as zero-emission as some zealots claim, once you take into account things like fuel mining and refining, transport, and construction. It is appealing insofar as it can generate really huge amounts of power, provided we can find people who are willing to have reactors in their vicinities.
The big problem, obviously, is nuclear waste. Nuclear reactors produce high level radioactive waste, as well as becoming radioactive themselves over the course of time. The scales across which such waste is dangerous dwarf recorded human history. Wastes like Plutonium-239 will remain extremely dangerous for tens of millennia. As The Economist effectively explains it:
In Britain only a few ancient henges and barrows have endured for anything like the amount of time that a nuclear waste dump will be expected to last—Stonehenge, the most famous, is “only” 4,300 years old. How best, for example, to convey the concept of dangerous radiation to people who may be exploring the site ten thousand years from now? By that time English (or any other modern language) could be as dead as Parthian or Linear A, and the British government as dim a memory as the pharaohs are today.
In fairness, we have some reason to believe that future generations will be more capable of dealing with high level radioactive waste than we are. There is likewise some reason to believe that we can bury the stuff such that it will never trouble us again. Much of it has, after all, been dumped in far less secure conditions. Chernobyl remains entombed in a block of degrading concrete, and substantial portions of the Soviet nuclear fleet have sank or been scuttled with nuclear waste aboard. (See: One, two, three) Off the coast of the Kola Peninsula near Norway, 135 nuclear reactors from 71 decommissioned Soviet submarines were scuttled in the Berrents Sea during the Cold War. In addition, the Soviet Union dumped nuclear waste at 10 sites in the Sea of Japan between 1966 and 1991.
In the end, I don’t find the argument for long-term geological storage to be adequate. We cannot make vessels that will endure the period across which these materials will be dangerous. As such, I do not think we can live up to our obligations towards members of future generations if we continue to generate such wastes – though that is unlikely to matter much to politicians facing US$100 a barrel oil. Pressed to do so, I am confident that a combination of reduction in the usage of energy and the development of renewable sources could deal with the twin problems of climate change and the depletion of oil resources. The short term cost might be a lot higher than that associated with nuclear energy, but it seems the more prudent course to take.
All that said, I very much encourage someone to argue the contrary position.