Wednesday, 1 July 2020

James Hansen - Sophie’s Planet #14: Chapters 21&22 (Congress and Elephants)

30 June 2020

James Hansen
Testimony to Congress may be a pinnacle for communication with lawmakers and the public, but Congress is hardly a citadel of wisdom.  A witness has a hard time competing with preconceived opinions affected by political and special interest considerations.

That is why the public itself must understand the climate situation.  When a Congressperson says that we have six years, seven months and three days (or some such number) to solve the climate matter, it is time to keep a very tight grip on your wallet.

We need to flatten and bend the curves, a task that is limited by nature, with nature’s important time scales being mainly decades and centuries.  Those time lags have been our bete noire (just as the 1-3 week lag has been for dealing with Covid-19), but if we understand the lags well, we can make effective use of them to avoid disastrous outcomes.

Sorry that I am slow in finishing this book, but I will finish it this year – it is important to be careful with fact checking.  Here, for that purpose, are Chapters 21 & 22.

http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/SophiePlanet/Planet.Chapters21+22.pdf

Side comment: those people favoring a specific carbon-free energy who focus on criticizing other carbon-free energies are enemies of young people and nature.  I try to help young people understand the situation in coming chapters.

I opened a Twitter account @DrJamesEHansen, (https://twitter.com/drjamesehansen), but I am focusing mainly on finishing the book.

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