The answer to chaotic climate change is to make the planet better for children, not to stop having them, says Mark Gongloff for Bloomberg Opinion.
Activists walk through lower Manhattan for the Global Climate Strike protests, Sep 23, 2022, in New York. NEW YORK: In the fictional world of the PD James novel Children of Men and its movie adaptation, humanity has lost the ability to reproduce and thus faces certain extinction.One such person is a YouTuber named Sam Mitchell, who identifies as an “Eco-Nazi”, an “unapologetic doomer” and an “unrepentant collapsitarian”.
The climate scientist took issue. “This is utterly untrue ,” Hausfather tweeted, correctly. “It assumes we fail at decarbonising our economies within our children’s lifetimes. In reality, someone in the UK today emits half the emissions in a year that their grandparents did. In the US we emit about a third less than our parents did.”
That is an extraordinary human accomplishment. And our political leaders have promised to do much more by eradicating emissions altogether in another generation. They aren’t on track to achieve that yet. But little humans are growing less polluting and wasteful by the year. As my Bloomberg Opinion colleague Lara Williams has written, babies born today could see unimaginable economic and physical destruction in their lifetimes if we don’t get global heating under control.
Or 1313, when the Black Plague was around the corner. Or 513, not long before what historians agree was the worst year to be alive. Or 30,013 BCE, when just turning 30 was an accomplishment.
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Commentary: Even if TikTok is banned in the US, its users will find alternativesThe uncertainty over a possible TikTok ban in the lucrative US market could extend to multiple years, says NTU associate dean Mark Cenite.
Read more »
Commentary: Don’t let Singapore’s record low workplace fatality rate be a ‘one-hit wonder’Fear of retaliation can hinder the willingness of workers to voice concerns regarding safety, say SUSS’ Victor Seah and Angela Tan.
Read more »
Commentary: New ‘cold war’ grows ever warmer as prospects of a nuclear arms race heat upLeaders from Russian president Vladimir Putin to former US president Donald Trump have carelessly returned nuclear warfare to the table as a viable strategy, says a University of Bradford academic.
Read more »
Commentary: Why Malaysia PM Anwar’s PKR does not talk about successionA post-Anwar world might be different, but it will not erase his quarter-of-a-century imprint on the party, says political analyst James Chai.
Read more »
Commentary: How breakdancing became the latest Olympic sportIn an effort to bring the Olympics to a wider and younger audience, breaking is the latest sport to make its debut at Paris 2024. But how will it work as a scored sport? Sport Management lecturer Mikhail Batuev gives his take.
Read more »
Commentary: As a small country, soft power is particularly important for SingaporeSingapore is already widely known and admired abroad, but its soft power can be significantly enhanced, says the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy’s Terence Ho.
Read more »