Why are Conservationists so Miserable?
- 23 Nov 06, 03:08 PM
The Stern Review highlights the economic cost of climate change - hardly a laugh a minute. The IPCC report of 2001, with another due next year - this written by international scientists, is also tough reading. Both important - and what about the people on the ground, is their message down beat and depressing. The answer, probably, if they are talking about conservation.
I've been reading your blogs - and they are really important entries. There is such a passion out there for the living world and this series will stress, from multiple sources, how important the biodiversity around us is for the maintenance of our bioshpere. And there I go, instantly harking on about why a natural aworld around us is important. The Stern Review does that, so does the IPCC report and they both tell you the rate we are wrecking it.
A lot of conservationists are miserbale because they no doubt feel burdened by the weight of despair they feel for the trajectory we are on.
But hold on, many of you say in your blogs and much of the free-thinking world believes that taking personal care for the environment around us and being responsible about our personal impact we have on it is one of the best ways to combat the effects of climate change.
It's not just scientific and economic evidence we need to protect the natural world around us, it's a true empathy and respect for it and a desire to look after it. That sense of care can't come from misery - it surely comes from a sense of joy and and exuberance of being close to it and part of it.
Not all of us are lucky enough to get to wild places a long way from home. For some, even getting to the local park can be difficult - And a lot of us do not have gardens. Allowing people to experience the living world, whether it be near to home or far away is suely a hugely important complement to the hard messages in the above two reports and the myriad of articles and features you can find about climate change.
Natural History television - like Planet Earth, and there are many other examples - not all Ö÷²¥´óÐã of course, takes you to amazing places and engenders awe and wonder. That's good. Print media does this too, with it's lavish combination of writing and pictures. And so does radio. Radio is a most elegant format because it can link ideas with mind pictures. You can share the knowledge and experiences of world class experts with the experience of the presenter as if a friend is talking to you.
There are many conservationists who manage nature reserves who give stunning talks about the life histories of the animals and plants they care for. A positive and enthusiastic approach to conservation is much needed to stimulate care, so the messages of the Stern and IPCC reports can sink home. We need both.
The media in all its guises reach millions and we have an important role in bringing the natural world to you - And we will not always be miserable - And we'll do what we can to bring personal experiences to your lives knowing that the opportunity to travel to the far corners of the Earth has always been pretty hard to do.
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What a marvellous posting! The green lobby is so doom and gloom,that they lead to the conclusion that we may as well enjoy ourselves when we can. To instill and engender civic pride is the real way to conserve anything really valuable. To adopt a catastrophic approach to what and I will say it are mostly theories or purely natural events ( see Viscount Monckton's recent articles in both Guardian and Telegraph if you do not believe me)are only causing alarm and fear, especially in the young. What would I K Brunel have thought of this - a challenge to be overcome I should think!
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Julian,
Your blog entry is from my own heart.
Despite my scepticism, I am a member of Sustrans which has a positive attitude to protecting the environment, and is actually getting things done.
Sustainability is the key to developing a positive approach to this. All our technologies can be developed to be sustainable, in my view this is not that much of a problem. We do not have to stop advancing, I am always suspicious of people who wish to restrict our freedoms how ever well intentioned they might be.
I wish you luck with your excellent programmes and will now leave you well alone and go off and live my life.
Best Wishes
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John, please don't go. We need you all and I enjoy your blogs.
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Congratulations to everyone on an excellent first programme. It was pitched at precisely the correct level to appeal to and interest everyone and not just those with a scientific background.
I take some comfort from Julian's comments in the sixth paragraph of the above article as I have just returned somewhat guiltily from a wildlife trip to Venezuela. I intend taking appropraite steps to expiate this guilty feeling forwith by attending working parties on our local nature reserves.
All the best
Bob
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Maybe conservationist are miserable because the message about our Earth is not arriving at the people. I think we have hope and we must conserve our Earth. Without much, my best wishes for all of you this Christmas and New Year.
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Why are Conservationists so Miserable?
Because the situation is so dire.
Maybe we'll wake up in time, but it's hard to believe.
I did enjoy the programme, and I look forward to the rest of the series.
Vaya con Gaia
ed
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My friends,
Just a quick thought on understanding "positive feedback loops" - In common everyday language they're called "Vicious Circles" or "snowball effect".
Or just take a microphone and stand in front of the loudspeaker.
Sincerely
A Miserable Environmentalist
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Enormous though the threat of global warming is, it's easy for people who care about the natural world to become overwhelmed by the enormity of the perceived damage.
We should stop saying 'We are destroying the planet'. The planet has survived much hotter and much colder times than any we can induce. It will keep spinning regardless of what we do to the atmosphere.
We should stop saying 'We are eroding biodiversity for ever'. We're not. Biodiversity on earth has been shattered at least six times in the past, and each time life has returned, more gloriosly diverse than ever before. And we should note that life has thrived across the planet at levels of CO2 six times those of today.
As far as the natural world is concerned, the climate change problem is a problem of timescales. The rate at which we are changing the earth's temperature means that many species will suffer or disappear because they lack the time to respond. And the rate at which life will respond and restore itself is long when measured in human generations.
What I am trying to say is that we are destroying the world for ourselves (and our children) but not for 'the planet' or 'life on earth'.
Reducing the problem to human dimensions does not belittle it - it is still enormous - but it does bring the problem, and its resolution, within our grasp, and that should make us less miserable.
The Stern report is, in many ways, far more important than IPCC reports, because it focuses on this human scale, and define the problem of global warming in ways that should appeal to everyone, not just environmentalists. It also presents the problem as easily solvable in economic terms, although it has less to say on how politically realisable the solutions are. It is to this political sphere that all concerned parties should turn their attention.
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Very well put, Rob MacDonald.
And, as pointed out elsewhere below, we must confront the denial inherent in the Hardinian taboo.
Vaya con gaia
ed
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Hello Rob MacDonald,
I agree that it is important to keep these issues in context.
What we are doing is not going to be anywhere near as bad as the KT extinction that killed the dinosaurs. Trevor Dykes has an amusing essay on the subect entitled "Grilled Dinosaurs" here:
It is thought that in the KT extinction event massive amounts of material kicked into low-earth-orbit by an asteroid impact re-entered the atmosphere creating a pulse of heat. This grilled everything across large regions of the planet's land surface.
We may be capable of causing damage, but our abilities remain limited. Furthermore every time an extinction event occurs a new and equally wonderful world of flora and fauna evolves to take it's place.
Of course what we're doing is still stupid.
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I'm studying an Msc in business strategy, politics and the environment and it definitely encompasses the debate of ‘environmentalists Vs business society’ or within theory literature a debate between ecological economics Vs Neoclassical economics. But the very shocking message you tend to get from these blogs and particularly ‘Guardianistas’ never fails to astonish me. The levels of apathy we currently exhibit in much of England have probably never been higher.
Since the rise of environmental concern, the social science journal community has managed less than 10% publications on the environment. Basically 90% of all studies have been from an anthropocentric ideology.
The idea that all conservationists are miserable is just blind foolishness! I’m sure we should expect a more centred view and subject considering the Ö÷²¥´óÐãs position – I mean we already have a corporate media framework to dig through to find a sense out of – largely influenced by the CBI – remnants still alive from the Digby Jones era. The people just don’t like the message, because they don’t like the idea of stopping this mindless world of consumerism – at least not in their life….
To understand the argument between neo-classical self-interest perspective and limit discourse go to
For a realistic dissection of the reality of the situation try george monbiot or www.zmag.org environment section.
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Julian, you were right they are miserable.
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John - that doesn't make them wrong, certainly you haven't proved them so.
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After just a few weeks the Stern report is a faded memory which served as no more than fodder for rubbish bins, filler for file cabinets, and dust collectors for bookshelves. This is because it was neither a scientific nor an economic document, it was one more in an endless litany of political documents in disguise, useful only to those who need one more tool to bash the United States government for not agreeing to the Kyoto protocol. Had it been a thoughtful program instead of just one more alarm bell, it would have outlined a scientifically valid program for reversing the buildup of greenhouse gases that is equitable and would not trade a looming ecological disaster for an immediate economic one. Short of that, it should have called for a meeting of scientists and economists to create such a plan while there is still time to impliment it. No such luck, it will be just as ignored as all previous reports. Events have put the lie to the European concerns over global warming by demonstrating that most European signatories to Kyoto who committed to its cuts will fail to meet their promised targets miserably. Recommended remedial actions to correct the problem are meeting with strong opposition for the very same reasons the US refused to sign, an unacceptable economic impact. So much hypocricy, so little time left to change.
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Is the Ö÷²¥´óÐã causing global warming?
Re; Radio 4 "Planet Earth Under Threat"
This is a radio programme, right? No pictures, just sounds?
So why are we paying Gabrielle Walker and her pals to fly between Greenland, Fiji and Madagascar to tell us what we have all known for 10 years, that polar ice is melting faster in summer and forming later in winter? That animals adapted to cool temperatures don't like very hot ones and that corals die when sea temperatures rise above their 'comfort zone' range.
The majesty of Greenland was conveyed by the sound of dripping water! Couldn't all this have been done with phone calls to the local Ö÷²¥´óÐã stringers rather than sending two presenters and a tech team round the world on 747s at our expense?
Nice work if you can get it. Just think of the yetti-like carbon footprint that this little jolly left behind!
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