Posted by
Carl Tollander on
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/When-did-earth-day-get-so-lame-tp7585288p7585290.html
It got more lame about the time it got more real for more people.
It is one thing to appreciate watersheds, biodiversity, save the
rainforests, preserve the wolves and so on. These are good things, yes.
It is quite another thing to understand that we are not merely
interconnected in an abstract sense, but that we participate in and are
intimately bound to, deeply regulated networks of many kinds. Indeed
they are very the stuff of our being. As our understanding of
regulation in all spheres grows, our notion of the commons and thus our
responsibilities grows and deepens with it.
This notion of a continuously expanding commons and associated
responsibilities is pretty hard for a lot of folks to deal with, given
deeply held notions of liberty, justice and individuality. So they tend
to pretend its not happening. Or throw up their hands in despair and
mumble some platitudes. Or think, say, that adapting to something like
climate change will mean stocking up on canned goods.
It is so weird to me that people would stop at saying, social or
government regulation historically sucks (no it doesn't), so we should
not (some would even say never) respect the attempt. On the contrary,
we need to get better at it. Much better. We need to excel at
understanding and adapting to regulatory processes. It is what we are
made of.
A nice summary and discussion of the key points of the IPCC report by
Steve Easterbrook is here:
http://johncarlosbaez.wordpress.com/2014/04/07/what-does-the-new-ipcc-report-say-about-climate-change-part-1/We need more of this kind of explanation so more people can wrap their
minds around it and squeeze.
We need to get more real about this stuff every day and if that means
Earth Day gets more lame, then ok. It's like only planting trees on
Arbor Day.
Carl
On 4/22/14, 8:02 PM, Leigh Fanning wrote:
> I thought this might be of general interest, the author is an
> environmental philosopher.
>
>
http://enviroethics.org/2014/04/22/blog-when-did-earth-day-get-so-lame/>
> "Today is Earth Day, April 22, 2014. Like most Earth Days these days, a
> few grey-haired environmentalists may take note of the event,
> celebrities will tweet meaningless platitudes like Daryl Hannah?s
> exhortation that we should all ?love your mother,? and college students
> will have celebrations at their campuses emphasizing individual consumer
> choice and the pursuit of sustainability through better technology. When
> did Earth Day become so lame?"
>
> ...
>
> Leigh
>
>
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