Discuss: Snap into Action for the Climate

I understand that Julianne is “appalled” by Tidwell’s article, “horrified” that Orion would publish it, and wonders aloud whether Tidwell is “nuts.” Unfortunately I didn’t catch her notion of just how she would “mobilize the population faster than yesterday.”

But I also understand her failure to show us the way out of the dilemma that we all face. I confess that my own crystal ball does not reveal any shining solution that will spare us decades or centuries of mayhem and despair. The only thing I do see that gives me any hope, frankly, is that some transformative vision may be emerging from the present and future wreckage, an entirely new vision around which humanity may be able to gather. But I do not see any way of avoiding the wreckage. The question is can we mitigate the damage at all?

Anyone who has the courage to try to grasp our situation in its entire global complexity, face the tragedies that are befalling us and our earth-brethren, and grope for solutions that have even a shred of compassion in them, is doing good work. Thank you, Mr. Tidwell. You did well.

I found your article bracing, especially the theme of the “snapping” pace of climate change. It’s the kind of image and language we need to introduce into the debate to counteract the slumber-inducing tone of so many articles that project certain “possible” effects into the future—by 2050, say, or by “the end of the twenty-first century.”

Shooting sulphur into space, of course, should show us how tragic our situation has become, and is one more symptom of the hubris that brought us to this point. If there is any “Rah! Rah!” cheering in Tidwell’s article, it is not about the joys of engineering a climate-fix for the entire planet, it is the idea that we are even capable, at this late date, of snapping awake from our suicidal, ecocidal sleep-walk.

I hope he’s right. Meanwhile, Julianne, I am truly interested in what your mobilizing vision would be, because I believe each of us carries, somewhere within us, a piece of the puzzle.

Paco and others, thanks very much for your additional responses, thoughts and insights re: Mr. Tidwell’s article, which if nothing else, has certainly been stimulating for discussion.

And I do have thoughts about a number of things I perceive as being important to pursue in the face of what is truly the catastrophe of climate change, *and* I’m also on a time crunch for dashing off to work.  >;-)  I look forward to responding more fully later today.

I am always amazed by the people who clamor about the environment in one breath, then talk about the effects on their offspring in the next. Do they see no correlation? In nature, a given population of organisms will mate and breed and increase in numbers until such time as they outstrip resources and habitat; then the rate of breeding drops off and the population reduces until such time as adequate resources and habitat would support growth. For some reason, otherwise rational human beings think this does not apply to them. In no population of organisms should every individual of the population reproduce, and yet even now humans are worried about birth rates (that great good green Europe) and infertility (at least according to my health insurance policy which does not have true parity for mental health which may soon be epidemic, perhaps as a new diagnosis, say Climate Panic Disorder).  The planet will survive. Perhaps as a barren rock, perhaps as a rock in a ball of vapor, perhaps as a habitat for “lesser” species, say invertebrates on “down.” I can envision any number of outcomes that do not include a future for humanity. And I do not think this is a bad thing. The planet has survived other extinctions and new habitats and life forms emerged. I am comfortable going the way of the dinosaurs. It saddens me that we’re hell-bent on disregarding and destroying the other beings on this planet as we struggle to sustain the world we’ve created.

There are two ways this discussion can go. One is the mitigation route, and we should check out everything there is in that file cabinet, yes.

The other way is the adaptation route, and we need to seriously shift gears and go down that road, too. But most people are interesting in mitigation, or, conversely, end of the world who cares?

But are there so few comments about polar cities as an adaptation strategy? Why is it that nobody wants to see future generations survive, even if they have to live in northern refuges for 100 or 1000 years? Why is nobody looking at this route, too?

Denial? Fear?

Hi Danny,

I apologize for not having responded to your “polar cities as adaptation” strategy. I had some problems with it. First, look at a globe. The broadest portion is at the equator, the narrowest portion is at the poles. Do you propose transporting the population, say, of Sâo Paolo, Brazil, to the North Pole, and to hell with Mexico City, Shanghai, Los Angeles, Tokyo, etc.? Or do you propose to elect representatives from each major urban megatropolis, with concessions to the suffering rural areas, to occupy these polar cities? Or is it, as the French say, “sauve-qui-peut”?

Assuming the entire equatorial belt is on fire, so to speak, and the temperate areas of the globe are devastated by drought, flood, insect infestations, etc., etc., who will support and feed the lucky few who inhabit your polar cities? Serfs? Slaves? On what basis, in other words, will those cities survive? Fishing? The ocean is dying. Hunting? The animals are practically gone. Agriculture? By that time will there be enough order to permit the placid cultivation of those northern “soils”?

There may well be polar cities in the not-too-distant future, but I fear they may come about not as a result of a grand, planned adaptation to a global “rough patch,” but out of sheer desperation. The pre-conditions for your polar cities are too grim to behold for any extended period.

In The Revenge of Gaia, James Lovelock speculates that we may be able to support half a billion souls in those polar cities, or better, refugee camps. This was his estimate of the number of people a climate ravaged planet could support. In other words, no matter which way you measure it, it’s not a pretty picture. Which is why I appreciated Mr. Tidwell’s effort to inject a little “juice” into his readers.

Many thanks for your concern. Something may yet come of all this palavering.

Paco

Hello Paco,
Thanks for your good comments and feedback. I agree with you that the so-called polar cities scenario won’t be a pretty picture in year 2500 or so, maybe sooner, maybe later. Lovelock says sooner. I say 2500 just to give people “time” to think about this.

But let me explain a few things, which many people seem to get confused about when discussing the idea of polar cities:

Your post above inspired me:

1. Polar cities will not be at the poles per se, it’s just a name that has a certain punch to it, but these polar cities will not be at the North Pole. But in a warmed world, say 2500 or so, most of the tropical, subtropical and temperate zones will be uninhabitable, not only because of the temperatures, but mostly because of lack of food and fuel. And rising sea levels.

So as people migrate north en masse, they will leave Africa and Mexico and USA and France and Germany and Asia, and move up slowly to northern areas along the Arctic Circle dotted line on our maps. Some of these polar cities, perhaps administered by the IPCC or another UN agency, or by individual countries, will be in Juneau, Alaska, or Fairbanks, or Churchill Canada or Whitehorse or Yellowknife and Ellesmere Island, Baffin Island, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, even Oslo and Longyearbyen, Sweden Finland, Russia.

But not at the poles, just in northern regions. They won’t be called polar cities then. Who knows what they will finally be called, but they will be safe refuges for survivors of global warming’s disaster events. There might be 200,000 people only, as Lovelock has suggesteed, or maybe 10 million people, we have no idea. But certainly all 10 billion people of 2500 cannot survive what will happen.

The thing is this: whatever we call these safe refuges, and whenever we need them for “breeding pairs” (in Lovelock’s famous words) to continue the human species in northern retreats until they can come back down to repopulate the Earth .... should not some agencies start talking about this possibility now, and planning and designing and siting them now? That is all I am calling for, with my proposal?

That a certain amount of time and energy, maybe just one percent, go into planning worst case scenario ideas for ADAPTATION retreats, so that we can rationally discuss how these “polar cities” will be governed, administered, defended, guarded, protected, fed, fueled, powered, educated, given medical care and mostly importantly: WHO will be allowed in?

I don’t have the answers. My entire project is set up to ask questions, and allow people around the world to answer them. Do you think we should spend any time at all discussing so-called polar cities, or “human population retreats”, now, so as to avert the Mad Max Meets The Road scenarios that many think they see coming down the road?

Mitigation won’t work, IMHO. Giving up is senseless IMHO. So why don’t we put more time now into thinking about various adaptation strategies, while there is still time, and there is still plenty of time.

What worries me, ever since news of my polar cities idea hit the blogosphere and MSM over a year ago, with a New York Times blogpost on March 29, is how few people have responded to my call for airing this issue in public.

There seems to be denial and fear and depression about the very idea of polar cities. Why? It’s just an idea. Nothing to be afraid of. But it seems most people DO NOT want to talk about this at all.

So the two paths now seem MITIGATION IDEAS (fixes) so we can continue our wonderful consumer lifestyles in our SUVS and second homes at Cape Cod, and exotic vacations in Nepal and Patagonia ....or END OF THE WORLD DIE-OFF IT’S ALL OVER scenarios.

But a third way is : ADAPTATION strategies, no? Shouldn’t we at least be talking about them, in a soft, rational tone of voice, even as a mere thought exercise?

It’s the amazing “silence” about polar cities that baffles me. I’ve had people write some very nasty emails about the idea. Some very top people in the scientific field have told me shut up. WHY?

Paco,
A few notes:

1. “Do you propose transporting the population, say, of Sâo Paolo, Brazil, to the North Pole, and to hell with Mexico City, Shanghai, Los Angeles, Tokyo, etc.?

ANSWER: I think there will be mass migrations north, so shouldn’t governments be planning and talking aboht them now? Just as a plan, so as to avoid the Max Max scenario and the sauve qui peux result? [Maybe some agencies like CIA are already planning all this, secretly? Did you read the AGE OF CONSEQUENCES report last year?]

2. “Assuming the entire equatorial belt [AND USA LOWER 48] is on fire, so to speak, and the temperate areas of the globe are devastated by drought, flood, insect infestations, etc., etc., who will support and feed the lucky few who inhabit your polar cities? Serfs? Slaves? On what basis, in other words, will those cities survive? Fishing? The ocean is dying. Hunting? The animals are practically gone. Agriculture? By that time will there be enough order to permit the placid cultivation of those northern “soils”?”

ANSWER: GOOD QUESTIONS!!!!!! WE NEED TO THINK ABOUT THEM NOW AND PLAN REACTIONS…

3. “There may well be polar cities in the not-too-distant future, but I fear they may come about not as a result of a grand, planned adaptation to a global “rough patch,” but out of sheer desperation. The pre-conditions for your polar cities are too grim to behold for any extended period.”

ANSWER: WHY ARE THE PRE-CONDITIONS SO ‘‘GRIM’’ TO BEHOLD? Please answer this…. or explain to me, thanks

4. “Many thanks for your concern. Something may yet come of all this palavering.”

ANSWER: I hope so. I am doing this polar cities project out of a concern for the future, and I don’t even have any children of my own. I just care. I can accept that many people will die in some scary future scenario, but I cannot accept that all will die. So even if only 10,000 hardy lucky souls survive in polar cities in the north and maybe Antarctica too, even if only 5000 people survive, it’s better than no survivors. So I remain optimistic and hopeful. I see people coming out of these polar cities, after 1000 years or so, and re-populating the Earth again. Albeit under very different “circumstances”—no SUVs, no computers, no printing presses, no civilization: just huts and campfires and crops and animals for food and transportation.

Paco
I learned a new word today: ‘‘palavering’‘. Thanks.