Kopenhagen Farce and Self-Healing Atmosphere



Here is a jolly news from Copenhagen:

Denmark's Lars Lokke Rasmussen called late-night talks with a group of 26 influential world leaders on how to unblock negotiations.

"We discussed how we can make progress and we had a very fruitful, constructive dialogue... for almost two hours," he told reporters.


26 leaders, almost two hours. 4.5 minutes for each leader. That's more than enough time to agree on a climate deal.

I wonder whose idea it was, and if they really thought that it could work, to get heads of states together and expect them to reach an agreement. There is empirical evidence, that a committee ceases to function if it grows larger than 20 members.

I had no trust in this Copenhagen farce. What infuriates me is not the deadlock that the talks are in. It's rather this naive belief -rooted in religion, or delusion of self-importance- that the earth's atmosphere is some magical self-healing system. "Nature" would heal itself. This new-age bullshit makes me so angry.

The fact is living organisms CAN and HAVE ALREADY changed the composition of Earth's atmosphere. 3 billion years ago Earth's athmosphere was not much different than Venus'. The arrival of Cyanobacteria which could do photosynthesis 2.5 billion years ago changed the composition in a very short time -some simulations suggest within few thousand years- and the result was what is called the Great Oxygen Catastrophe[1]. It was a catastrophe for the bacteria living back then, for whom oxygen was poisonous. This catastrophe was a blessing for the descendants of the cyanobacteria -which includes us-. I am not sure for whom a possible Carbon Dioxide Catastrophe will be a blessing. It will surely be an end for the humans, but unfortunately we would take almost all the existing life on Earth down with us.

[1] The picture at the top is taken from this publication via Wikipedia. It shows the O2 level in Earth's atmosphere against geological time. Tell me about a hockey stick shape.

late edit: in the end, it all boils down to this:

Comments

e. pınar said…
Karikatur durumu tam manasiyla ozetlemis, cok takdir ettim.
8:30 PM
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