Addressing climate change is within our control

By Letter to the Editor on March 23, 2019.

Re: Don’t fight climate change (March 11)

Paul McLennan recently lamented a lack of common sense in discussions of current issues. As evidence he points to people and ideas he does not accept. They, I submit, are not the problem.

Common sense is out there. But, as English writer John Heywood proposed in 1546, “There are none so blind as those who will not see.”

We have centuries of accumulated common sense at our disposal. Writers, thinkers, poets and just plain folks offer us a plethora of practical, tested guidelines for living. Some of it applies to ideas expressed in McLennan’s most recent column.

Consider our position in the natural world. McLennan reminds us of the obvious fact that humanity is subject to natural laws. Does this mean that, as he argues, we are helpless to address our contribution to climate change and other environmental challenges?

Famed advice columnist Ann Landers thought differently. Her Golden Rules for Living included, “If you make a mess, clean it up.” No question that industrial civilization is messing up the natural world through uncontrolled greenhouse gas emissions, plastic accumulation in the oceans, and a whole sad list of our negative impacts on the planet. Common sense says start cleaning up the mess and changing our way of living.

Consider carbon dioxide. As McLennan says, carbon dioxide is necessary for life on this planet. But does that justify his argument that increasing carbon dioxide levels can be ignored and might even be a good thing?

Grandma thought differently. She said, “You can have too much of a good thing.” Look to our neighbouring planet, Venus. Its atmosphere contains four times as much carbon dioxide as Earth.

If more carbon dioxide is good, Venus should be excellent. In fact, it has a surface temperature of over 460 degrees Celsius and no evidence of life. An extreme example, of course, but instructive to those who, in McLennan’s words, “care to see.”

Consider Canada’s place in all this. On our own, as McLennan points out, we can’t solve a global problem. But does that mean we are excused from doing what we can?

Gandhi thought differently. He counselled, “Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it.”

Consider death and extinction. McLennan asserts that like the dodo bird, humanity may be doomed. No point in fighting – all we can do is accept that we are not in control.

Welsh poet Dylan Thomas thought differently. He urged, “Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”

Of course we must adapt to natural cycles that humans cannot change. But that is no excuse for passively accepting human actions that interfere with those cycles. Uncontrolled extraction and combustion of fossil fuels is within our control. We can and must reduce the resulting emissions of greenhouse gases, whether or not Mr. McLennan chooses to call them “pollution.”

I think Ann Landers, Gandhi, Dylan Thomas, and Grandma would come to the same common sense conclusion.