Excellent Elizabeth Kolbert Interview In Wired

EDIT

Wired News: Many people seem to think that climate change is an issue involving a few scientists, not society as a whole. But your book makes it clear that climate change is more than just a science story.

Elizabeth Kolbert: I really tried to impress upon people ... how we cannot wait. Even now, as global warming is starting to be made manifest in the world, we have determined the climate now for the next half-century. We will not see the full effects of what we have done for decades. (NASA climate scientist) James Hansen said, if we continue on this path, then by the end of this century, we will have committed ourselves to a world that is so warm as to be practically a different planet.


WN: Isn't part of the problem that people associate "warm" with comfortable?

Kolbert: People think, "I won't have to go to Florida anymore. Florida will come to me." People should realize that warmth doesn't mean Florida. It means New York is underwater. It may be that certain places like Siberia are more comfy, but it also means that they have no water. If people say, "Why should I be worried about global warming?" I think the answer is, "Do you like to eat?"


WN: You talk about David Rind's work -- predicting rampant drought conditions afflicting much of the continental United States within 50 years if greenhouse gas emissions continue at business-as-usual levels.

Kolbert: (In the book) he says that, "I wouldn't be surprised if by 2100 most things are destroyed." But he's certainly a very cool guy, not a hysterical person. He's a scientist, and he's just looking at the evidence.

WN: On the other hand, sometimes societal change can happen very quickly. Hit a social tipping point, and suddenly everything's different. And that could be a very good thing. Kolbert: I think you do see out there in the world ... an increasing awareness. We here in the Northeast just barely had a winter. I think that anyone who has lived through the past winters certainly has been given pause. So we're starting to see the argument that "there's nothing going on" dissipating. Then you get to the second question, and that's what are we going to do about it? If you want to be really brutally honest, this is not a problem that can be solved. The warming that we've seen so far is estimated to be only half of what (the CO2 already in the atmosphere will cause). It's a problem that you can only say, "In order to prevent this from becoming absolutely catastrophic, perhaps we can do this." But that (is) going to take a monumental effort.


EDIT

http://www.wired.com/news/politics/lifescience/0,70393-0.html?tw=rss.index

May you live in interesting times . . .

labor under the delusion that these events are reversible on demand. Do they think that if things start to get really bad, we can all just do "X, Y and Z" and everything will be back to normal in a few years?

Your posts this morning about Tony sort of resonated with this question. Maybe he really thinks he can "demand" a solution to these problems, if and when he sees fit. "OK, I've decided it really is a problem now, so I hereby direct you all to fix it."

It's like smoking for 20 years, and then "demanding" that the doctors cure your lung cancer.