Last Friday, January 6, I
told of the morning that was so cold that Helen’s coat got hot.
It’s very cold where I am
this morning. Wind chills are below zero, Fahrenheit. One of the first things
some folks say when it is this cold that there is no such thing as global
warming. “I’m cold, so there is no such thing as global warming, because I’m
not warm.”
One of the mistakes that
scientists make is naming things before they have consulted communications
theorists. [1] “Warming” is a word that should never be used in this context.
Scientists have now switched to “climate change,” but folks who want to deny
climate change, either because they profit from it or are simply perverse in
their ignorance, still call it “global warming” because it’s easier to deny its
existence each time they are cold. “I’m not warm, so there must not be any
warming.”
Of course, the result of
climate change, because the globe IS warming, is not that everything is warmer
all the time, but that the weather becomes extreme. The colds are colder, the
hots are hotter, the wets are wetter, the winds are windier, the droughts are
dryer.
We humans often forget
that we are part of nature. Yes, we are the part that has knowledge, but we
often fail to use that knowledge to be a good part of nature. As we erode
nature with our greed, the whole of nature is degraded, and that includes us
humans. We are becoming more extreme along with the rest of nature, extreme in
greed and division and revenge and lust for power.
If we are to survive, it’s
quite possible that nature will have to control human nature instead of the
other way around.
JRMcF
1] Disclaimer: I have a
doctorate in communication theory, so I want to be consulted.
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