Editor's pick: Polluter pays – but pays to whom?
Fred Pearce reports how lawsuits over climate change might bring justice along the lines of “polluter pays” (18 August, p 38). But from where might the payee raise the fines? From taxes or from energy charges, no doubt. There is thus a risk of sending money in circles, unless the fines are all spent on preventative or at least remedial works. This could make the exercise of suing nearly pointless, and could even bring into question the whole idea of the value of money.
There will be little progress until some system can be devised in which economies aren't pitted against each other. Until then, the environment will always be the loser because it has not been costed or is a common resource, as in the case of the atmosphere and the oceans, with their capacity as a heat-sink. When a truer cost-benefit analysis of our lifestyle is calculated, we will all have to admit we are out of our depth. Fatalism based on religion will have to be tackled, since humans are the only agency that could solve this. So bring on the court cases – but realise this is but the opening shot in a massive upheaval.
I bring good news and bad news on methane
Ilkka Savolainen points to the importance of reducing methane emissions to combat climate change (Letters, 18 August). I have good and bad news.
Much methane is emitted by ruminant livestock. The good news is the success of tests on the methane-reducing effect of adding the seaweed Asparagopsis taxiformis to livestock food (Letters, 18 November 2017).
The bad news is that there are signs of massive methane releases from previously frozen deposits (27 July 2013, p 16). These could easily outweigh any reductions in emissions from human activities.
I suspect the current mess is due to three major blunders. The first was the emphasis on setting targets to cut emissions instead of controlling levels of greenhouse gases. Second, many measures that are essential if conventional wisdom is correct – from reducing waste and developing alternatives to fossil fuels to cutting livestock's impact – are sensible regardless of the effect of human activities on climate change, and would be even if the world were cooling. Instead of pursuing such win-win options, effort was wasted bickering about whether human activities mattered. Third, and predictably, nobody wanted to pay to address these concerns or to have their consumer convenience affected.
First class post 鈥� 08 September 2018
Being wrong should be on the curriculum: what holds people back is fear of it
Kate Shaw MA, MS, PsyD to a report that we can train ourselves to better know when we are wrong (1 September, p 14).
Neoliberal capitalism is a Ponzi scheme (1)
Whatever value Earth Overshoot Day may have as a measure of the rate at which we are thrashing the planet, Mathis Wackernagel is on the money in describing typical economic activity as the largest “Ponzi scheme” (4 August, p 20).
The dominant global economic paradigm in the developed world is neoliberal capitalism. It ticks four boxes recognised as defining a Ponzi scheme: it is predicated on infinite growth, which is an impossibility in a finite world; when growth stops it falls over; there is no way to a soft landing; and the precise point of collapse can't be predicted. The reason this description hasn't registered in mass consciousness is the longish time span to collapse.
Neoliberal capitalism is a Ponzi scheme (2)
Our society determines actions based on cost-effectiveness and profit potential at all scales, from the household up to government level. This should work, but these actions are based on an economic system that draws down capital assets and counts them as profits. It assumes that continual growth is possible in a finite system and takes no account for cleaning up the consequences of actions.
Our descendants will be at a loss to know how a society capable of exploring other planets and editing the genome could possibly have done so with an accounting system that encourages two plus two to equal seven.
When glaciers have gone it's too late to use valleys
Erik Foxcroft suggests using vacant glacial valleys as water reservoirs for pumped storage hydropower (Letters, 18 August). By the time the glaciers have retreated enough to make this viable I think it will be a bit too late to think about such storage.
Renewable energy thwarted by appliances
Paul Whiteley suggests that instead of funding large-scale energy projects we should spend the money putting solar hot water panels on people's roofs (Letters, 4 August). We have solar hot water panels on our roof, and they have saved us money for some years.
But our predominant use of warm water is to wash clothes. Needing a new washing machine, we couldn't find one that took warm water from the system, only ones that took cold water that was then heated. The rise in our electric bills has been significant. Meanwhile we have excess hot water (and it can get very hot).
Energy generation must be accompanied by appliances that enable the resulting heat to be used in the most practical way.
What is the role of stress in producing allergies? (1)
Thank you for the interesting article on allergies (11 August, p 28). I was amazed, though, to find no discussion of whether stress levels can have a role, either as a precursor of allergic reactions or in exacerbating them.
What is the role of stress in producing allergies? (2)
Penny Sarchet doesn't mention a factor that, I am sure, contributes to allergies: stress. I refer to unrelenting mental stress to which there is no conceivable ending or solution. I am sure, for example, that at least some children who develop an allergy after starting school are the targets of bullying.
In Australia, they keep cats under curfew
Hugh Boyd complains that farming is blamed for wildlife woes and mentions that domestic cats kill vast numbers of birds (Letters, 4 August). In some areas of Australia there are curfews for cats, in contrast to the strange UK policy of allowing them to roam anywhere at any time. Aboriginal communities that feral cats, for driving up to 30 species into extinction, are a great source of food.
Terraforming Mars in the style of science fiction
I was surprised to read that “we” (whoever that might be) have ever dreamed of converting Mars into an Earth-like world (4 August, p 6). No one – surely – has ever really proposed this as a practical possibility, outside the realms of science fiction. Have they?
Future geologists will define the Anthropocene
While the International Union of Geological Sciences (IUGS) has declared that we are still in the Holocene epoch (28 July, p 24), I believe the “Anthropocene” is functionally and stratigraphically different to the Holocene. But when did it start and what evidence is appropriate to distinguish the two?
The idea of a layer of plastic rubbish as a marker is unlikely to be appropriate, because over many millennia rock strata are reworked vertically and laterally. Perhaps, though, the result will be a band of “plastiglomerate” lithic material that could serve as a new worldwide marker. Maybe the growth of radionuclides in sediments accumulated since the 20th century will provide a uniform marker. The priority of the IUGS may be nomenclature – defining eras, periods, epochs and ages. But it needs to acknowledge the impact of a species on the geological record and not, as Mark Maslin and Simon Lewis intimate, go out of its way to confuse members of the public.
My job has already fallen to digital technology
Your article on rules that robots should follow contains the platitude “We must be careful it isn't only employers that benefit from robots” (4 August, p 38). As one of many whose profession has already been digitally destroyed, I am tired of this feeble plea.
For 30 years I painted backdrops for theatre. Now all middle-skilled work in this field is done by large-scale digital printing. There isn't enough high-skilled work to support the infrastructure of training and career progression, so we see the end of a profession that dates back to the Renaissance. The owners of this technology now have all our jobs, but “progress” is both incremental and accidental. There is no way I or my colleagues can get the originators or the owners of this technology to share its benefits – nor those who should perhaps be described as “unemployers”.
Nor will this change. (How can it?) All benefits accrue to those who control the technology.
Digital technology tends to promote the most rapacious form of capitalism yet seen.
Relying on votes from unsustainable farmers
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Chris Milligan warns that much of the world is in for a rough ride from climate change (Letters, 4 August). This is timely, given the drought gripping New South Wales as I write. What isn't timely is the response of the Australian government. As usual it is dispensing vast amounts of “drought relief” cash without consideration of whether the changing climate is making this largesse misplaced.
How many farms are really viable in this new climate world? Has any research been done to establish the viability of raising hoofed animals on soils that are drying and deteriorating? Of course, the current government depends on the farmers' party to stay in office.
For the record 鈥� 08 September 2018
鈥� Paul Jackson was not involved with the refurbishment of the bridge that collapsed in Genoa (25 August, p 4).