The Challenge of Hope in the Anthropocene

"The most obvious, ubiquitous, important realities are often the ones that are the hardest to see and to talk about." - David Foster Wallace

The answer to the climate problem is deceptively simple: reach net zero emission. But the deeper into the problem you look, the more impossible it seems. The structures that glue western life together are intertwined with emission producing practices, and this simple answer branches into thousands of questions of politics, philosophy, and culture. I have family friends who worked, or are working, in the mining industry and setting their lives up amazingly. On the day I write this, I used my car, eat processed food from my fridge, typed on my laptop, watched TV, used my Ipad and Iphone — and I'd take the bet to say you did too. Yet, at our current rate, by 2080 the earth's average temperature could rise by 4 degrees Celsius, which is the same average temperature that the dinosaurs experienced, when crocodiles roamed above the Arctic Circle (Gates, 2021). If we're lucky, and act fast, the temperature could only rise by 2 degrees, where worldwide 'the coral reefs could vanish completely (IPCC, 2021). The predictions are so dire they're comical. Bill Gates explains the suffering we could face like this: "If you want to understand the the kind of damage that climate change will inflict, look at COVID-19 and then imagine spreading the pain out over a much longer period of time," and that, "By mid-century, climate change could be just as deadly as COVID-19, and by 2100 it could be five times as deadly," (Gates, 2021, p34), (Gates, 2021, p32). Gates also points out that as the global population increase and worldwide poverty decreases, there's going to be compounding numbers of people looking to enjoy the same qualities of life I mentioned before (Gates, 2021). And on top of this, I'm not aware of any expert that is confident humanity will be able to respond to the climate crisis in time to stop. Yet, as I read through their articles, talk to them in person, and ask them for advice, they all demand that I write optimistically about the future? Why?

Climate Scientist Joelle Gergis is an Australian involved in the "Sixth Assessment Report" for the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and, in an article published in the Monthly, she described her eco-anxiety that she grapples with due to recent research that suggests previous climate models have seriously underestimated the sensitivity of the Earth's ecosystems (Gergis, 2020). Because it seems that it is increasingly likely that large events, such as Australia's 2020 bushfires, which released “more carbon dioxide in a single bushfire season then the whole country emits in a year,” could become more common, and raise the temperature faster than predicted. The IPCC predicts that at worst Australia could see a 7-degree hike, but that on average, between 2.7 to 6.2 degree increase (IPCC, 2021). On top of this, recent predictions show that “2 degrees of warming is likely to be reached by 2040.” Gergis believes that this would mean “complete ecological collapse,” and therefore also the likely collapse of human civilisation (Gergis, 2020). She corroborates her belief with Professor Terry Hughes, the director of the Australian Research Council and the Director for the Excellence for Coral Reef Studies at James Cook University, who described his research experience as 'being an art lover wandering through the Louvre as it burns to the ground,' (a comment made on his twitter). Gergis' writes that: “How could we not understand that life as we know it is unravelling before our eyes? That we have unleashed intergenerational warming that will be with us for millennia?” (Gergis, 2020).

With a similar point to Gergis, an article published in nature journal argues that "a global tipping point cannot be ruled out... this is an existential threat to civilization. No amount of economic cost–benefit analysis is going to help us. We need to change our approach to the climate problem," (Lenton et al., 2019) In 2017-2018 an Australian Senate Inquiry found that climate change "threatens the premature extinction of Earth- originating intelligent life or the permanent and drastic destruction of its potential for desirable future development," (Commonwealth-of-Australia, 2018). Admiral Chris Barrie, previous Chief of the Australian Defence Force, believes that climate change has dire implications for human behaviour and "outweigh any conventional geopolitical threat.”

Greta Thunburg published a memoir that includes a chapter about the publication of the book itself. She says that publishers often pestered her, telling her that people needed more hope and optimism, which she refused to do every time. She argues that the topic is too important to ‘sugar coat’ and that it should be taken as literally as the science demands, because everyone in the first world is a climate denier.

Zachary King, a Phd student in sociology, found the same thing when he conducted interviews of experts in climate change, and he called the way they thought about it as 'unconventional optimism' (King, 2020). He framed it as they way these experts maintained the motivation to continue to be active in their field, because why else would you dedicate your life to something that seems in many regards a lost cause? He separated their coping mechanisms into four groups:

1. to focus on what can be won, not what can't

2. by finding hope in uncertainty

3. to reject predictions

4. to nurturing visions of best possible futures

Do you remember the 2000s? I do, even though I was young. Eminem's Marshall Mathers LP was released in the year 2000, the first Ipod was released in 2001, the last Lord of the Rings movie in 2003, the final Happy Potter Book was released in 2007, Katie Perry was on the radio in 2008; I remember carrying my flip phone around school, talking on corded home phones, the sound of dial up internet. I'm not old, by any means, my parents grew up in the 80s. Yet, as I'm writing this it's 2022, 20 years from now it will be 2042.

References

Commonwealth-of-Australia. (2018). Implications of Climate Change For Australia’s National Security. Australia Retrieved from https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Foreign_Affairs_Defence_and_Trade/Nationalsecurity/Final_Report

Gates, B. (2021). How to Avoid a Climate Disaster. Penguin.

Gergis, G. (2020). Witnessing the Unthinkable. The Monthly. https://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2020/july/1593525600/jo-lle-gergis/witnessing-unthinkable#mtr

IPCC. (2021). Climate Change 2021. Retrieved from https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg1/

King, Z. (2020). Unconventional Optimism: Lessons from Climate Change Scholars and Activists. Resilience.org. https://www.resilience.org/stories/2020-05-01/unconventional-optimism-lessons-from-climate-change-scholars-and-activists/

Lenton, T., Rockström, J., Gaffney, O., Rahmstorf, S., Richardson, K., Steffen, W., & Schellnhuber, H. (2019). Climate Tipping Points - Too Tisky to Bet Against. Nature. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-03595-0