As a result of his wide understanding of most of the scientific disciplines he is able to think in a way that is very rare.
The repeat of "Beautiful Minds" has just taken place on Channel Four. However it will still be on iPlayer for 11 days.
I fully believe what he predicts :
That the majority of humans will die in the foreseeable future. Could be 20 years, more likely 50 to 100 years. Thus most young people will experience this prediction.
Watch this one hour long program. Lovelock is a cheerful positive kind of guy - you'll enjoy getting to know him and appreciate why most scientists have been won over to his theories.
Most people can't face up to this and take a defensive view that this will never happen.
However if you want to help young people you will grapple with the information in this program which is on iPlayer for a week or so.
This will help them come to terms with a very disastrous future so that they can at least enjoy understanding what is happening to the planet Earth and act to make the most of a bleak future.
Avoiding this issue will only lead to even great grief when the reality of the situation suddenly dawns and world panic results.
Talking this through with those that will experience it will help them enormously.
We are already experiencing the mild effects of what is to come as the weather will become increasingly erratic as the world's control systems cease to be able to cope.
9 comments:
Hi Geoff,
Hope you don't mind me being critical....
If people really read James Lovelocks work - they would see he is not the sweet old guy he purports to be- as the native americans say - he speaks with forked tongue. I thought that when I read Gaia in the 1970s where he rebrands Mother Earth into a false Greek Goddess with a taste for pollution. It was Rachel Carson who inspired a fledging environmental movement - James Lovelock put it back into a dystopian groove all with clever doublespeak.
In 1970's he berated environmentalists for delaying the oil pipelines - an industry which has exacerbated climate change.
now he is berating native americans for opposing uranium mining - the nuclear industry was the first to blow a hole in the ozone layer and is at the very top of the industrial polluting food chain.
James Lovelock is certainly influential - he has a lot to answer for.
Thanks for joining in,
I'm sure everyone has feet of clay .
Why focus on it.
The guy has the advantage of having a wide view of science.
I understand his point that the earth has stabilised itself over millennia and that human activity is causing sever problems.
I also understand that we are in an explosive situation regarding global warming which even now be irreversible.
Why are you raising issues that distract from the main issue.
To keep the earth habitable for humans we have to take drastic action.
Raising issues of the kind you do only encourages the uninformed into thinking that action can be delayed. You appear to be missing the important point.
Personally I am persuaded that there isn't a cat in hells chance of reversing Global Warming.
The point of my post is to get people dealing with young people to first understand the science and second to help the young to deal with the implications.
They will need to be able to think very clearly and dispassionately if they are going to survive the next fifty years - if that far. At some point they may well decide to end their life because they realise that life has become intolerable.
Lets be wise for them and help them be able to cope with the future.
Another thing - can we stop using the phrases like "destroying the planet"
The planet is very happy thank you. It's just mutating to new conditions where ruddy arrogant humans don't exist. If it could say something it might be "Thanks God"
Mmmmm......James Lovelock is promoting a nihilistic viewpoint isn't he?!
His promotion of nuclear is dangerous and a distraction from the fair energy, fair trade, fair society that is the key to sustainable living
- promoting nuclear as a solution to climate change is like promoting arsenic in beer to cure binge drinking.
Business as usual ie technological fixes from top polluters is James Lovelocks stock in trade now -as it was in 1979.
Business as usual is not an option if as you quite rightly say the world is to remain habitable for us human beings.
I'm all for him promoting nuclear energy and this would be entirely consistent.
Burning Carbon fuels is totally disastrous so anything is better than this - hence nuclear.
There is no doubt and order of preferred options. Nuclear though unhealthy at least gives us a chance of survival.
Totally Green policies are by far the best but as it is all hands to the pump then everything that stops carbon emissions is welcome.
We're in a disastrous situation.
If you think we've got time to be choosy, then you clearly haven't got the message and i suggest watching the program again!
It surprising that it's still in our culture and thinking to talk about what humans will be doing in a thousand years. It happened only tonight on a serious program on Hereford Mappa Mundi.
The problem is that well educated people are so blinkered and only focus on their own discipline - ths reflects badly on our education system which allows a warped collection of knowledge.
This is where Lovelock excels.
We will not exist in three generations.
Repeat again and again "We will not exist ....
How should scientists get their message across so that it registers?
It's like people living on the edge of a dormant volcano, everything appears normal until "pop" the volcano goes off again.
There's an inherent tendency to ignore bad news if it isn't essential.
I wonder what it will take for the public to take this in board.
Of course it's in a lot of big business interests to lull us into a false sense of security.
Why do the nutters like Geoff Dellow keep going on about it?
Good to hear you are still stirring things up!
My son (14) and I watched the programme last week. What a bomb shell! Joe was really affected by it - after showing Lovelock's optimistic take on life and its problems, the documentary waited till the very end to go dark. Very effective. But no offer of salvation? Think I'll join the Quakers with last week's scientific beautiful mind.
From a friend of Geoff's
Nuclear is already exacerbating climate change - the industry has put the kaibosh on renewable projects for the last 10 years. Sellafield spent £30m on gas last year - stopped producing electricity in 2003
James Lovelock is an environmental scientist but not an environmentalist, there are very few prominent environmentalists who are pro-nuclear precisely because it is a dangerous distraction.
Water is essential to life - and will become increasingly threatened. The nuclear industry uses and abuses resources (including humans) like there is no tomorrow. 4 million gallons from Wastwater every day. Radioactive waste is already being put into water logged landfill at Lillyhall as a result of industry and government colluding to pervert the planning laws. This will increase accross Cumbria and progress into incineration of radioactive waste - which will no doubt be promoted as a 'good thing'- the logic of Lovelock is relentless and nasty.
Saying a strong NO to nuclear and YES to Life is the only sustainable and ethical option.
I don't find your arument to be logical.
If life is represented by the need to cut carbon emissions quickly, why aren't you focusing on that.
You don't seem to accept ovelocks prediction that we humans are in deep trouble and that a quick (within five years) solution is needed to get things going.
I can't see any likelihood of humans coming up with a solution that requires agreement on a monumental scale.
So I'm joining Lovelock, determined to enjoy myslef while humans are here and that involves community activities that will make the end more palatable!
I have just finished watching the programme.
Indeed a far-sighted man with an interesting upbringing.
Strongly independent of mind.
I like his thoughts on the world's natural equilibria.
After I studied equilibria in chemical and biological systems at college I
would often seek to explain things in this way.
Nature's attempt to compensate for mans by-products involves multiple
equilibria. Some can buffer the changes, but there is often a point where
the equilibrium has to 'flip' and establish a new position.
Once the ice caps have melted they cant easily reform again because there is
no white surface left to reflect the heat. You get thermal runaway.
This requires another part of the system to benefit - which can often
re-establish a new equilibrium position, e.g. algae in the sea blossoms and
absorbs the CO2 faster - which reduces the C02 layer and allows the earth to
cool faster.
All that's happened is that the new equilibrium is 4-5 degrees warmer than
the last one. Unfortunately this kills off some humans because they have no
crops to eat and water to drink in the parts of the world where they are.
But we are part of the system too. We aren't impervious to the changes -
some of which we ourselves cause.
Interesting stuff.
The previous comment originally had the preamble which got lost 'in translation':
A friend of mine, Mike Bostock, has just sent me the following email. It provides helpful insights from someone who understands these things.
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