A new word to help with the climate debate

The climate change debate in this country is messy and surprisingly inconclusive. Maybe we need new words to help us meet the challenge of discussing it more rationally. Can I suggest the following? –

plimering (verb) – The wilful misrepresentation and obfuscation of facts (espec. scientific) particularly when undertaken in a bellicose and bullying manner.

Environmentalists have lost their way

The Ecologist of 9 December 2009 published an interview with Paul Kingsnorth, former deputy editor of the Ecologist, who “tells Matilda Lee why an obsession with CO2 has distracted environmentalists, and why we may already be beyond the point of no return…” (http://www.theecologist.org/Interviews/378231/paul_kingsnorth_environmentalists_have_lost_their_way.html )

I totally agree with most of what Paul Kingsnorth has to say. I’ve been ranting on about the same thing to the few people I know who’ll listen and, oh yes, I’ve written a book about it ( http://www.springer.com/life+sci/ecology/book/978-1-4020-8495-9 ).

In the world of architecture and planning it’s worse – nobody seems to understand the simple idea that we are part of a living system and need to do whatever we must to keep it alive! Zero carbon, urban agriculturalised ’sustainable’ boxes just won’t cut it.

CO2 emissions are a symptom of a much bigger and deeper problem and Kingsnorth has almost put his finger on it. ‘Almost’? Well, I looked at his Dark Mountain website ( http://www.dark-mountain.net/ ) and it’s good, but ‘uncivilisation’ is off the point – we need more civilisation, an advanced and ecologically literate civilisation. We’ve industrialised and urbanised the planet and the idea we can simply go into reverse and ‘uncivilise’ is a recipe for disaster – one that will disadvantage the disadvantaged most of all.

Kingsnorth’s dream is too English and nostalgic – any serious attempt to map a path to a viable future has to be tested against the reality of, say, China, where any suggestion of ‘uncivilisation’ won’t last long enough for even the smartest of cultural mechanics to try and explain the idea.