I’ve been busy working on a big writing project around climate change for the past few months. Today while doing research, I stumbled upon a very intriguing talk given by a green venture capitalist. Dan Miller is not a climate scientist, his talk was more about the psychology of why we continue to deny climate change and why we can’t seem to wrap our heads about doing anything meaningful about it.
We spend lots of time and money worrying about things like terrorism, AIDs and nuclear meltdowns. All of these have a pretty darn low probability of directly affecting you. Climate change is different, our warmer future has catastrophic effects for everyone.
Here are 6 reasons why we don’t take the issue of climate change as seriously as we should.
#1 Its not visible. We are visual creatures. Its in our DNA to react quickly to a visible threat. A lion or bear charging at you. Climate change isn’t visible like that so it doesn’t set our adrenal glands on notice.
#2 There is no historical precedent. Nothing like this has happened in recent memory. Of course you can always go back 55 million years ago to the Paleocene-Eocene thermal maximum (PETM), when the planet suffered a global warming increase as a direct result of a rise in carbon dioxide levels.
#3 There is no immediate threat. The EPA doesn’t have a color coded system of threat levels like Homeland Security does. Like smoking a cigarette, the lung cancer isn’t going to happen today or tomorrow. But it will the day after tomorrow.
#4 Climate change is complex. Its not as simple as warmer winters. Remember just last year when we had record snows? Or when climate denying Senator Jim Inhofe (R- Okla) built an igloo for Al Gore? Climate change has complexities, like ocean acidification, permafrost liberating methane and much much more. Senator Inhofe can’t fully understand these complexities, so he continues to deny that climate change is real. He also continues to take money from big oil and votes against the wishes of his constituents.
#5 No direct personal impact So far, most of us have been lucky. Unless you live in VT and had to deal with Hurricane Irene, or if you lived in Joplin Missouri and of course who could forget New Orleans?
#6 Not caused by an enemy. There is no big bad al Qaeda like boogeyman out there when it comes to climate change. Its hard for us to rally together to fight when there isn’t a clear cut enemy. Although I would have to say that the oil companies and people like the Koch Brothers certainly seem like enemies to me.
