So what’s the problem

I only really started thinking about this after I retired in 2014. I started reading-about the climate debate and then found a book called Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari- If you have not read it I would strongly recommend. This got me thinking about where we are in human development and how we got here. I researched the scientists who were analysing the problem and then researched the ‘deniers’ to understand their arguments as to why it was a hoax and why we should just carry on the way we are. The things I found came as quite a shock and I started wandering why I wasn’t aware of these things before- why it wasn’t headline news and why our governments around the world were seemingly not reacting. Sure pollution air quality cropped up now and then and of course recycling but the real cause? So I started reading more about climate change and also found some really strong books on denial so I read them too- not knowing who was right or more importantly why there was such a conflict of views. Then I slowly began to see the stark reality of the science and the vested interests in keeping things very much as they are for the benefit of the few and the detriment of future generations. Are humans really that selfish?

I have to confess here that something started to make sense. I had always wondered in school about compound interest- Not the theory which is sound (I am an engineer) – but the blind belief that it would always work and baked into our economic system- That is without considering the obvious that at some stage infinite growth would come into conflict with our finite resources on a small planet we call earth I also remember much later in life when doing my business studies – a similar debate with my lecturer about growth and the insatiable appetite for market/business/sales growth at virtually any cost- which clearly not sustainable So is anybody looking beyond their own personal short term gain?

I now understand a great deal more and regret that I didn’t really have time or inclination to dwell on these things when I was trying to pay a mortgage, keep a wife and children fed and happy and have some future until they could fend for themselves.

Now as I come to the end I realise that however unwittingly the last few generations, including my own have presided over a period of history that well prove to be our downfall. I will explore some of these issues and why we need to do something quite urgently.