Comments on: What’s Better? Climate Change OR Climate Disruption

By: Save the World or Beat China? How to Sell Cleantech Investment to America — The Green Light Distrikt

Mon, 14 Jun 2010 09:26:21 +0000

[...] can learn a lot of lessons about framing from our reaction to the crisis in Haiti, and the change in terminology from global warming to climate change, both worthless terms. These may seem like tiny, trivial issues but they’re not. Something I always hear from [...]

By: What Would It Take For Governments to Ban CO2? — The Green Light Distrikt

What Would It Take For Governments to Ban CO2? — The Green Light Distrikt — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 09:19:41 +0000

[...] So, its not like serious consequence are already not happening from climate disruption (note: notice I use the climate disruption and not change) it just seems like they’re not big enough [...]

By: Chris Williams

Chris Williams — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 01:19:19 +0000

I completely agree. People hate change, but anyone will change if their current situation stinks!

By: Brian Hayden

Brian Hayden — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 03:35:31 +0000

I attended the Northeast Sustainable Energy Association’s Tuesday night public forum before the Building Energy show last week. The topic was climate change and my favorite quote from the evening was: “Change happens when present circumstances are no longer acceptable.”

I’m not sure who gets the credit for the original statement, but it was John Abrams of South Mountain Company who said it on Tuesday. And I think it really gets to the heart of the matter. Different people have different definitions of ‘unacceptable’, and most people think things are OK the way they are.

By: Chris Williams

Chris Williams — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 22:43:23 +0000

Eddie,

Thank you for your comment. On some level I agree about your statement.

But we should remember that what is important is what people hear, NOT what we say. I’ve started to realize more and more that we need to be more thoughtful in framing the issue to our advantage and can’t really on the fact that it is politically correct and backed by science and that that alone will be good enough and people will figure out the rest.

Chris

By: Eddie

Eddie — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 19:35:54 +0000

You may have seen the recent exchange between Thomas Friedman and Joseph Romm over the correct naming. I guess it’s difficult to name emergent phenomena. Romm sums up his position: “Frankly, I don’t care what term you use as long as you talk about what’s happening and the science behind it.” Makes sense to me.

And I guess that’s the whole point of this blog and the work you’re doing. Keep it up. I’ll be following your work.

By: steve

steve — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 20:38:28 +0000

People used to be proactive and emotionless. We have devolved to the state we are in now largely because of greed and stupidity and a desire to view ourselves as somehow separate from and better than the rest of creation.

The difference between us and ants is that ants work together to accomplish things within the paradigm of the living matrix, whereas we humans compete against each other to amass wealth and resources beyond our needs and largely disregard the impact that this behavior has on the rest of the world.

And when an anteater comes along and wipes out the colony, ants don’t respond by dropping bombs on all the anteaters in the world.

Humans are the only species on the planet that think they are not subject to the laws of nature. We’ll see how our emotions and pain avoidance strategies work when there in no more oxygen left to breathe.

By: Chris Williams

Chris Williams — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 14:10:52 +0000

Steve, thank you for your comment. You’ve brought up so many points I don’t know if I have time to get to all of them!

“so you think that we should scare people into action” I guess, I do. The one thing I learned from our reaction to Haiti is that we need to understand how people react and frame our messages accordingly and not try to change how people think (http://thegreenlightdistrikt.com/2010/01/26/how-helping-haiti-now-shows-us-the-planet-is-doomed/) I think that from Haiti most people thought ‘we need to make people more reactive instead of proactive’ which is true but too hard. What I learned is that we need to realize that people are reactive and then frame issues so that they can react to something. What do you think?

And many on the right would say, is there really a problem with species going extinct? In 10 million years humans will only be a blip. However, the difference between us and say ants are, is that we have emotions. It’s painful for us to think about other humans dying, whereas, as far as we can tell ants and other animals don’t seem to care too much.

By: steve

steve — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 15:12:52 +0000

So you think that we should scare people into action? Do we see people making their best decisions when they are afraid? I think you are still looking for a “current-system” solution to the “problem” of climate change/disruption. The problem is not climate change. Climate change is the solution. The problem is too many people living unsustainably. There will never be a top-down, global solution. The world is not ending. The human race is ending. The world still has several billion years to go until the sun swells and engulfs it. The human race, however, is going to change profoundly. There is no going back. There is only going forward. Adapt, migrate or perish are the choices.