Rogue Thoughts

Working in a company obsessed with Corporate Social Responsibility and having a green profile, I recently had the good fortune of being exposed to a sparkling soft drink offered without charge at my job. Perhaps out of boredom or natural inquisitiveness, I suddenly felt compelled to study the label. I found that organic fruits had been used, but more disturbingly I found that it contained organic CO2! after recovering from the out of place conjunction of these terms, this situation made me think a bit about why we act “responsibly” and consume products that are organic and CO2 friendly.

Personally I prefer to buy organic food, and have a generally low level of energy consumption etc. But I am becoming increasingly weary of the tone and manner in which these things are communicated.
I don’t like the fact that I am expected by the community to buy a product based on some clean/unclean distinction reminiscent of religious discourse. People who eat food labeled kosher or halal do it because of a religiously constructed demand for such products. A large conglomerate of ‘civil servants’ called priests or imams, have branded their club and have a constitution embedded in a deliberately cryptic piece of literature, called the Quran or Thorah, that is, their canon. In this canon there are prescriptions about a good many things, such as how to behave responsibly and what to eat and not to eat.

These clubs have been very successful in their marketing efforts and brand positioning, because they have been able to include the brand in a narrative. As has been convincingly argued by professor of literature Mark Turner, pychologist Jerome Bruner and philosopher Daniel Dennet, the human mind is a literary mind, in the words of Turner; life is a narrative, in the words of Bruner and the self is a center of narrative gravity in the words Dennet.
The Jewish club has embedded the rules for proper food and conduct (kosher) in the narrative of the Torah, where it plays a part in the future demise of the world as we know it and the ultimate rescue of the individual club members abiding to these rules to a cooler place than here, that is heaven, at some undisclosed point in the future.
The Islamic plot is disappointingly similar: act as prescribed pray to Allah five times a day, go to Mekka plus eat halal and you will transpose your existence into a much cooler place at some undisclosed point in the future.
Religious clubs’ marketing strategy is mimicked by an emerging club of what we could call ‘climate guardians’. This club’s canon is the IPCC’s report on climate change. This canon also has a base narrative about the impending doom, and possible rescue of the members of the club to a literally ‘cooler’ place at some undisclosed point in the future, rather than the hellish prospect offered by the present prognosis (granted, this club is more democratic since it saves everyone, not just the members). In this club you also have to eat properly, that is organic or CO2 friendly, and act responsibly, fore example by turning out the lights, buying small cars etc…

Personally I will continue to buy halal, kosher, organic and CO2 friendly food and turn out the lights, I will just not be coerced into it by narrative hypnotists, such as imams or climate evangelists. I will do it because, or in so far as, there is persuasive evidence that it has beneficial economic or health effects to my family and me, or because it tastes d*** good…

That was not the case for the sparkling soft drink, so I will leave it for a dedicated club member.

What is the cause of the climate crisis?
Few would hesitate an answer to this question. Even my 10 year old daughter knows the answer: The climate crisis comes from an increase in greenhouse gasses, most notably co2, caused by the human use of fossil fuels. And therefore we should find alternative sources of energy that do not consume fossil fuels.
This reasoning is the foundation of the forthcoming COP15 international climate conference in my hometown, Copenhagen, and therefore perhaps for one of the biggest international political decisions ever.

Never the less I think the answer is wrong!
I do not doubt the physics behind it. I think that co2, methane, and other greenhouse gasses cause an increase in global temperature, although I am far from convinced about how much (there are alternative theories to the IPCC canon, such as Svensmark’s theory). I am also at peace with the reasoning that the increase in concentration of greenhouse gasses in our atmosphere is caused by fossil fuels. I even fervently believe that we should find alternative sources of energy such as wind and solar energy.

So, what is wrong with the answer and why does it make a difference?
The only reason we perceive the changing of the climate as a crisis is because our culture dictates us that the climate of some particular period is intrinsically more natural and normal than another period. The current normal period is from 1961 – 1990. Consequently, when we say and demonstrate based on precise measurements, that the climate is not normal, we are just saying that “this is not the weather our parents and grandparents remember as normal growing up and coming of age”.

The real crisis is that this imagined trans-generationally imposed normality is effectively promoting something that is really harmful for the future potential of life on earth: Nuclear energy. Sure, you may dispose of nuclear waste in a seemingly safe way, but it is there as a potential hazard for life for hundreds of thousands of generations of humans and animals. We should not forget that terrorists of all sorts would also like to get hold of it as well.
Let us compare that with the alternative, that is, immense global warming; So, what if the sea level rises 3 meters? we have time enough to move away from the shores, build dikes and even move entire population, such as the Maldives, to safer places and who gives a crap about Manhattan anyway. Only our sentimentality bars us from facing this obvious conclusion. All the while, the real effect of this imagined crisis is that nuclear energy is again on the rise endangering future life on this planet “for real”.