Although most of us worry about other things, climate scientists have become increasingly worried about the survival of civilization. For example, Lonnie Thompson, who received the U.S. National Medal of Science in 2010, said that virtually all climatologists “are now convinced that global warming poses a clear and present danger to civilization.”
Informed journalists share this concern. The climate crisis “threatens the survival of our civilization,” said Pulitzer Prize-winner Ross Gelbspan. Mark Hertsgaard agrees, saying that the continuation of global warming “would create planetary conditions all but certain to end civilization as we know it.”
These scientists and journalists, moreover, are worried not only about the distant future but about the condition of the planet for their own children and grandchildren. James Hansen, often considered the world’s leading climate scientist, entitled his book “Storms of My Grandchildren.”
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What can be done then? Given the failure of political leaders to deal with the CO2 problem, it is now too late to prevent terrible developments.
But it may — just may — be possible to keep global warming from bringing about the destruction of civilization. To have a chance, we must, as Hansen says, do everything possible to “keep climate close to the Holocene range” — which means, mobilize the whole world to replace dirty energy with clean as soon as possible.
