KYOTO COP 25 is a new failure ; fatality or destiny?

Quick reminder, The question that is being presented to the world’s nations is “ how to reduce CO2 emissions level at a 20 to 30-year deadline in order to avoid a ( catastrophic) temperature increase?”

Clearly, it is not easy to find a globally agreed answer.  In those conditions, maybe the question to ask ourselves is: Is it the right question?

I dare suggest it might not be. Here is why.

In a pure anthropomorphic way (something we excel at), our ancestors had to face the unpredictability of many a phenomenon, the most important one being the climate. They were thus very interested to give a name to these phenomena, to “understand”.  They did as best they could, they deified the most frightening and dangerous ones. Doing so, giving them names ( Zeus, Poseidon, …), they thought they understood them better and it was so.. reassuring. 

Today, it looks as if we are doing the same, but with our modern ways. We have asked scientists to think about it and their output is a series of predictions on a single parameter, temperature, based on models only a select few could dare claim they understand. We have summarized extremely complex phenomena into a single parameter. We now have an objective, temperature, and a culprit, CO2. This is so simple and beautiful, anyone can understand it and embrace this now. And we feel empowered and reassured because we understand, with just the right amount of fright though, just like purgatory and hell create fear for when we can’t feel it anymore.

Just like our ancestors, we have a culprit and we and our leaders can now live with this future menace ( which will not affect anyone that can do anything about it anyway) and merrily deal with our earthly considerations of the day such as wars, jobs, the economy, our comfort, paid vacation and syndical rights, etc…

In this context, nothing can change; were we to need more proof, the multiple COP meetings outputs ( failures) are there to remind us of this sad truth.

Just like the fundamental postulates of religion, the mathematical models of our scientific community are impossible to prove / verify.

Let's remember that Science is a logical discipline that relies on three, no less end no more, basic and never-ending steps; Observation, Theory making based on observation, and Validation of theory by further Obsevation and so on.  In the case of climate change, the process is incomplete because there is no way to validate the theories.

Should we nonetheless believe these models because they provide the comfort of predictions, and should we automatically define good and bad actions as indicated by our modern druids and prophets, the climatologists? Is there a power struggle from those who think they know better than the rest of us?

Do they really know better, are they the elected ones, the only ones to know? Maybe, but also maybe not, because it is impossible to be sure.

Luckily, most of us are born with a sense of what is good or not for our survival and, call it instinct, or whatever, this might be better than what we usually think.

Let me coin two (fundamental) facts that seem to be undisputed, real facts thus:

 1-    Atmospheric CO2 levels are higher today than during the last 800 millennia

2-    Crossing this “boundary” has been achieved in a mere 200 years, about 100 times faster than the atmospheric CO2 rate of change before the year 1800.

The first fact immediately generates a question: is it bad?

A priori, transgressing a boundary, a limit, is not a good thing, but this answer is not science, it is a value / moral proposition. Indeed, were my reference time scale is longer, say hundreds or thousands of millions of years, the “transgression “ disappears and the obvious conclusion becomes that there is no problem.

The true question is, however: “ Is this bad for us?”, these two very anthropomorphic words modify deeply the question.

Unfortunately, taking the risk to sadden some, there is no scientific answer to this question since :

-       Historically ( during the same 800 thousand years) CO2 level has systematically been a consequence of natural 100 thousand years of cyclical temperature changes, not the opposite.

-       Observing nature tells us that almost nothing is reversible ( so acting on the consequence will not change the cause)

This means that even if we could reduce CO2 levels to the level, say of the year 1800, no one on earth can guarantee that climate would come back to its 1800 state, and even less how long it would take to get there.

This is not “climato-skepticism” ( a very religious-like word), it is a fact.

But let us focus on the second fact above and try to link it to our earthly and everyday experiences:

-       If I stop my car at the red light, it is ok; if I stop my car one hundred times faster, I call this an accident

-       If I slowly  get into my bath, it is a good feeling, if I dive and miss from the springboard, although I get wet in the end, the feeling is less pleasant;

-       A good log fire is nice, the same amount of matter burning 100 times (or more) faster is called an explosion

-       Energywise there is almost no difference between a massage and hitting; the result of both is, however, strikingly different.

We can all think about things we do every day and try to see the new consequences arising from doing these same things much much faster.

Usually with a significant speed increase, comes along a series of new (usually) undesired consequences.

Let's call this the natural retaliation law.

When it comes to the climate, one thing we can all observe without arguing over is the recent and increasing frequency of violent atmospheric events all over the globe.

These events are totally impossible to predict ( there is no practical model for them)  and cause damages that demonstrate how frail our human constructions are when facing a deranged Nature.

These phenomena are however typically what one would expect as an expression of a natural retaliation law; Fast response to fast aggression.

So, as any good insurer will confirm, it is not necessarily what ( we think ) we can predict we should be most worried about.

This is why it might not be without meaning to focus on slowing the CO2 level growth rate rather than achieving a given level at a later date.

However, what we witness is exactly the opposite as we struggle and clearly fail to define absolute values ( a first debate) at a given term ( a second debate); what we call the COP meetings.

Maybe this is also helped by the fact that nature acts globally but we experience things locally and we are each of us only partially affected.

Maybe this is still the case because some of us can still purchase insurance to mitigate these risks; probably because the most affected so far are not insured. However, this seems unsustainable and we have already seen years where the whole insurance sector struggled because of climate issues.  

One can find thousands of excuses this way.

Happy to have “named” things, happy to think we “understand”, happy with oversimplification, and happy with the solutions we propose to solve the problem, maybe we have overlooked the most pressing issue?

Instead of separating our societies between those “ good ones that have understood” and those “bad ones who refuse”, is there another way?

If it was all so simple, how come we can’t reach a global consensus?

What on earth is making us fail to answer this climate question? Why are there always one or two who do not agree?

We all know that naming things properly and asking the correct question are very important. We, humans, have a tendency to put all our resources, and efforts, into providing The Answer to The Question, and more often than not forgetting to ask if The Question is the right one. The actual Brexit drama is a recent example.

It seems we can conclude there is sufficient proof we won’t reach a globally accepted answer to the climate question as it is formulated today.

I dare propose a reason, or rather, because it is difficult to be sure, a conjecture.

Would it be simply our (social) subconscious understanding is much better than our pure logic acting here?

Without being able to put words on it, is our subconscious refusing to put all our efforts ( faith) into too simplistic a view? Would this subconscious of ours, acting on hundreds of thousands of years of evolution and experience refuse a consensus on the wrong question?

In other words, is our instinct for survival opposed here to our “good thinking”?

If so, we should seriously think about changing the question we are trying to answer because we are imposing a fast change to a system, and the system is already reacting back.

To conclude, actual proposals for CO2 mitigation do indeed amount to a reduced rate of CO2 increase, which, as explained above, might turn out to be the right angle for tackling the issue. However, if so, these are not the answers to the general understanding and oversimplified climate question as it is presented today. So my point stays valid, we need matching questions and answers if we hope to reach a global consensus.

Marc Noël / MGE sprl