Fear and Loathing on the Carbon Footprint Trail

Well, dear readers, I’m proud to announce that about 95 percent of you believe I am not a wacko.

Thank you! I will do my best to continue acting like a sane person.

The question came up, as you may recall, about a month ago when I wrote about a seismic event in the world of charitable giving. It was a $750 million gift to the California Institute of Technology, the second largest gift to a university ever, and it was to be used to help find ways to protect us all from climate change.

You can read about it here.

I thought it was a big deal. Enough of a deal to poll readers and ask what they thought about climate change. Equally important, I wondered if readers agreed that we might be seeing a shift in charitable giving as climate change became what some would call a controlling event, akin to the imminent arrival of a large asteroid.

What I learned from reader letters

Beyond learning that most readers don’t think I’m a wacko for asking the question, here is the gist of what I learned from your many letters. If you’re wondering about the lack of percentages and decimal points, I’m not including such measures for two reasons. First, sample size dictates that any percentages would be silly. Second, there is no way to tell how the people who wrote, as a group, compare to the general population.

That said, you’re a lot more likely to find intelligent, curious and fact-seeking people among newspaper readers than you will, say, among those watching reality TV or World Wrestling Entertainment events.  In fact, the prudent concern and reasonable, informed nature of readers was so strong that I’m wondering if future polls will recognize a new group in America: the culturally homeless. (But that’s a topic for another column.)

Here’s what I found:

— A large majority believes that climate change is real.

— Many people, often with technical backgrounds in engineering, chemistry or physics, have concerns about the science behind climate change. They are particularly concerned about the shortness of the timescale compared to other historical changes in earth’s climate.

Most were quick to add that they believe it’s better to be safe than sorry. But several noted that we humans tend to think we’re a lot more important to the planet and the universe than we really are.

— Anger about the political charging of the subject was expressed quite often, from both climate change believers and skeptics. The trouble with a world in which everyone has his or her 15 minutes of fame is that their numbers suck the oxygen out of all careful discussion.

— Frustration with our paralyzed government and the behavior of both right and left was a related theme.

OK, so it’s frustration and paralysis as usual, right?

No.  Individual action was the biggest, most pervasive and most encouraging theme in the letters.

Many listed what they were doing to reduce their carbon footprint. Others wrote about organizations they were active in that promoted conservation, nature and protection of our environment.

Climate change is an action subject

Readers made it clear that climate change is an action subject, not a thumb-sucking subject. Why? Because we can ignore the politicians, the witless and the know-nothings. Readers declared that they would rather do something than waste energy being angry. They said we could take real steps in our daily life. They listed them. And that’s exactly what many readers are doing.

While there was worry that individual actions would fail to move the needle of change, the majority of readers had either already taken action or were seriously thinking about what they could do, independently, to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem.

If enough people take action, even the politicians will figure it out.

Coming soon: Two painless ways to start reducing your carbon footprint

Related columns:

Charitable Giving in a Global Warming World

This information is distributed for education purposes, and it is not to be construed as an offer, solicitation, recommendation, or endorsement of any particular security, product, or service.

Photo: by Andre Furtado from Pexels