This blog may help people explore some of the 'hidden' issues involved in certain media treatments of environmental and scientific issues. Using personal digital images, it's also intended to emphasise seasonal (and other) changes in natural history of the Swansea (South Wales) area. The material should help participants in field-based modules and people generally interested in the natural world. The views are wholly those of the author.
Monday 15 November 2021
Mass Extinction Rather Than Life Extinction?
George Monbiot obviously thinks that Cop26 has failed to deliver but puts some faith in the change in public opinion. He feels that direct action even by substantial minorities will change the political 'weather' (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/nov/14/cop26-last-hope-survival-climate-civil-disobedience). I agree with most of what Monbiot says but I have a (some will see it as 'hair-splitting') problem with his last sentence. Monbiot writes "We do not consent to the destruction of life on Earth". I think he actually means "We do not consent to the destruction of the human way of life on Earth". If the climate crisis is not controlled, there would inevitably be mass extinctions. Many humans would also die. Those that remained (if they did remain) would be unable to live as they do now in all the places they currently occupy. Actual life, however, is much more resilient than that. Living organisms would still be present on the Earth, even if humans engineered a mass extinction of themselves along with many other current species.
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