It’s Global Warming, Stupid – Perceiving Climate Change
Global warming itself is almost impossible for us to sense. On any day the temperature might vary by up to 20°C. From winter minima to summer maxima the range is at least twice that. Over the last 100 years the mean global temperature has risen by only about 1°C. Even though our lives may be too short for us to feel global warming, it is not too short for us to see the consequences. Yet learning to perceive these changes may not be as easy as it seems.
Tony Eggleton
The Ethical Considerations of Climate Change
A stated moral consideration is contained within article 4.2 of the Kyoto Protocol. It claims that developed countries have been responsible for the greatest increase in GHG in the atmosphere and therefore should take the lead in reducing emissions. Yet countries ethical considerations are overshadowed by detached cost-benefit analysis and economic rationalism; we are failing to prioritise moral and social implications alongside economic and political concerns to manage climate change. Are we not ‘global citizens’ with responsibilities not only to our own country but to the world in which we live?
Laura D’Olimpio and Michael J O’Leary
7 years ago / 7 years on
Looking back over the last seven tumultuous years of Australian politics, Peter McMahon offers comparative analysis of where the debate on climate change was in 2006 and now in 2013. Have the Greens cemented their place as the third power in Australian politics? Is our national political system showing its cracks under the twin pressures of the global financial crisis and the climate threat? And in the last seven has anything actually changed at all?
Peter McMahon
Ignorance: There’s a lot of it about
When it comes to ignorance, it is clear that our grasp exceeds our reach. We all command far more ignorance than we need, just as we mostly possess less knowledge than we could use. For as long as there has been consciousness there has been ignorance and we are all guilty of it. Be it unconscious or conscious, ignorance can used as a weapon or as a bastion against that with which we disagree. From Plato to climate change, Oliver Mayo delves into the many facets of not-knowing.
Oliver Mayo