Global Warming and the Holocaust

grist.org

Andy Revkin has an interesting post on Dot Earth about global warming and Holocaust analogies. On Oct. 22, climate scientist James Hansen testified before the utilities board in his home state of Iowa. He said, among 59 pages of other stuff, this:

If we cannot stop the building of more coal-fired power plants, those coal trains will be death trains -- no less gruesome than if they were boxcars headed to crematoria, loaded with uncountable irreplaceable species.

Hansen was subsequently scolded by Kraig Naasz, president of the National Mining Association, and Kenneth Jacobson, deputy national director of the Anti-Defamation League. Others, including Princeton bioethicist Peter Singer, back Hansen up.

Is the analogy "appropriate"? No doubt there will be a great deal more huffing and puffing on that question, which ultimately has no answer. To me it seems more fruitful to think carefully about what the analogy does and doesn't mean, and what's it's trying to do.

Why do we judge the Holocaust unique in history? It's not the sheer number of deaths -- there are episodes of human history in which more people died in a shorter period of time. Stalin and Mao killed more people. Wars and diseases have killed more. What gives the Holocaust its unique place in history is its origin in the deliberate intent of a single person and the chilling industrial efficiency with which that intent was carried out.

What's notable about global warming is that you get the industrial efficiency and the horrific result without the intent. You have, in effect, a holocaust with no evil. Coal miners are trying to feed their families. Utilities are trying to keep the lights on. Industries are trying to profit. Governments are trying to gain power and provide for citizens. All us developed world drivers are trying to get to and from work. Nobody intends to create a horror, but cumulatively, that's exactly what we are doing.

Human beings did not evolve to deal with situations like this. For millions of years we lived in small bands, and our nervous systems evolved to react to agents -- identifiable faces with identifiable intentions. The maximum conceivable effect of our actions would be on our tribe and neighboring tribes. That's why the Holocaust has burnt itself on our collective memory: it is a model of human action we are familiar with -- hatred of others, tribal violence -- industrialized and amplified beyond comprehension.

A holocaust with no agency behind it does not trigger our affective responses the same way. We can intellectually grasp that it's happening, but it's difficult to feel it the way we feel threats from identifiable Bad Guys. It doesn't trigger our amygdala, our fight or flight instinct.

That's unfortunate, because the biggest threats to humanity today, and for the foreseeable future, are cumulative and incremental, without deliberate agency but with the potential to generate unthinkable misery. With 9 billion people soon to swarm the globe, we are all "good Germans," standing by while horror unfolds, and we are all Jews, suffering the horror itself. We are all perpetrators, all victims.

We badly need to figure out how to grapple with such threats. We need to figure out how to apportion differential responsibility without ascribing evil intent. We need to figure out how to coordinate internationally. We need to come to terms with our place in the world, the threat we pose to ourselves and the rest of the biosphere.

Many folks believe that the first step in that process is feeling it in our gut. That's what Hansen's trying to do. Contra the mining lobbyist, he's not trying to say that coal miners are Nazis. He's trying to get us to feel the horror of a holocaust with no evil, just as we feel the horror of a holocaust carried out by a madman.

Is the analogy "appropriate"? Hell if I know. We are marching together in lockstep toward tragedy. I'll happily accept inappropriate analogies if they wake us up and change our course. If you don't think Hansen's attempts will work, don't scold him, propose a better way. Time grows short. The trains are already running.

Follow David Roberts on Twitter: www.twitter.com/david_h_roberts

Comments

[nellie]

I'm very confused by the fact that people seem to be threatened by the idea of climate change. What if we do implement policies to address global warming? How does that hurt anyone? Whom does it hurt? I'm genuinely curious. I understand why Big Oil doesn't like the idea of alternative fuels. But I'm stumped otherwise.

I start to wonder whether this same group of people believe in the ozone damage done by cloroflourocarbons. Do they believe that cigarettes cause cancer? Is there any science they trust?

It's such a paradox. People will drive a car to work but deny science. They'll talk on a cell phone but deny science. They're using the internet but denying science. Science is only political when it threatens some lifestyle or some belief system. Otherwise it's -- let's turn on the TV and put dinner in the microwave.

I really am curious about why some people find this theory so threatening. Anyone?

[RumiSouth]

All politics is local. When it comes to Global Warming, the location is Earth.

[JulieSA]

I agree with much of this post, actually. Except, I just don't think we're in a "horror" or "tragedy". I think Hansen is a fear monger whose alarmist language hurts his cause. Some other climate scientists have stated the same concerns.

Also, Peter Singer is very creepy to a lot people, including me. Singer does not help Hansen's credibility.

[kevinabt]

Can someone please explain what is so dire about a planet which is a few degrees warmer? It was several degrees warmer between 1000-1300 than it is now but the world certainly didn't end or become very bad, why would anyone think that this current warming will be such a disaster?

[Sanjong Thapa]

'man-made' global warming is the biggest crock of crap that the counter-culture has ever tried to get over on the consumer.

[peterg76]

It's application is limited - just like any other analogy.

The Holocaust is not a particularly good analogy for Global Warming; however, the phenomenon of Holocaust *denial* is quite similar to climate change denial.

[SeenItBefore]

The best possible scenario for this island, Earth, is the worst possible scenario for Homo Sapiens. Once we are gone, assuming we don't blow the place to dust, this planet will readjust and wait for the next evolving species to screw things up - again. Eventually the sun will go nova and black hole the entire system...or not!
As Lily Tomlin once commented, "We are all in this alone". My studio is solar and wind powered and has been for 16 years. All it's water needs are satisfied by rainwater harvesting. The septic is self-incinerating. The electricity is via battery to inverter. Were I there I would be posting on carbon free power, but I'm not. I'm at home, on the grid and a land based line.
My mate lauds my efforts of energy conservation and leaves all the lights on during the day, takes 30 minute showers twice a day, prefers an all electric home, sets the thermostat too low in summer and too high in winter. She never met a toilet that didn't need flushing and everytime the bathrom door closes for her, another tree falls in Oregon.
It's all personal preference and degree of commitment.

[Boxorox]

Anybody who believes a comparison between Global Warming and the Holocaust is completely off his or her rocker. Not only is it inappropriate (which doesn't bother me much), it is extremely unrealistic and inaccurate on scientific and human terms.

The entire premise of what is stated here can be summed up by saying that the Industrial Revolution and all that has come from it was a mistake. The advances of the past two centuries have made it possible for our society to develop and provide for a world that can sustain (to one degree or another) more than 6 billion people and who-know-how-many more in the future. We have an enormous food industry that depends on our present energy sources, medical technology that wouldn't exist otherwise and so much more that is essential to our welfare. Thinking like that expressed by david Roberts would throw all that away in heartbeat.

If we were to dispense with the trappings of our modern world which many climate-change fear-mongers wish, think of the horrors that would descend upon us in short order. Without refrigeration and transport technologies, for basic arguments, we would not have a civilization as we know it today.

I am glad at least to read that this article was not an accusation that people like myself--who know global warming is a fact but strongly know that it is not the fault of human activity--are like the Holocaust deniers. I and the many who have the courage to speak against the popular mantra are not deniers. We are not even skeptics. We are critical thinkers who do not accept the bullying and scare tactics of former scientists like James Hansen at fact-value. Without people and scientists like myself, science would die a cruel death.

[hiprogloho]

Foolish analogy. Unless and until we unleach laws against selfishness and greed like we do hate crimes, the wealthy and powerful will continue to destroy the environment and line their pockets in this life time. Hopefully, in the next they will be reincarnated into a globally warmed world they helped destroy.

[ShawnMichel]

This post is the essence of naivete.

Greed is evil, period. I don't care how you look at it. Corporations have spent millions on anti-global warming propaganda--and that is evil. Governments are the same. The intent is absolutely there.

This is a really sad post. The evil is there; no one's intending it. What crap.

[zaneblue]

Oh, and they should add footage of glaciers with ice falling into the ocean.

[zaneblue]

I've said this before and I'll say it again. The obvious, the OBVIOUS visceral analogy that must be made is Titanic. We have five years to turn this ship, otherwise we're all going down.

Leo DiCaprio is already crazy about being green. They need to get Kate Winslet and Billy Zane and do public service announcements together with footage from the movie. Everyone worldwide has seen it. It will resonate on an emotional, visceral level.

[Jonahson]

David. I hope I get you right; each individual is only interested in their own struggle for survival. Accumulative by products of hapless micro individual become a macro problem.
Your use of the Holocaust as a parable could be misleading and touch a few sensitive nerves.
However humans are follower and if a leader take the first practical step to solve the problem then the viability of such a step will lead people to follow.
All is not gloom and doom. There is a way out.
For example if a company produces an electric car which can last 200Km before the next recharge no one wil buy it. The lack of demand means a lack of competition which in turn will not reduce the price and improve the quality of the electric vehicle.
On the other hand if a practical leader comes along and insist on a pilot project whereby a small town will be tested to use electric vehicle by offering perks and incentives to electric car owners. On top of that, service station for the exchange of the vehicle battery is placed strategically across town so that each change takes less than the time to fill up a petrol tank and car parks have charging base installed. Car design must also incorporate solar charging.
Introduce it as a second car to bring children to school, ballet class, shopping all within the town. When the price of petrol increases more people will use electric car. As more energy efficient car design is introduced because electirc car manufacturers are making money and can afford R&D together with the increase of charging stations you will see a similar effect of what you mentioned but this time it will reduce the damages caused.
It is nor a far fetched idea but which so call 'caring leader' will take the first step?

[RayEvansHarrell]

Fifty years ago in Dr. Conklin's Poli Sci 101 at Tulsa University he discussed the tendency of Democracies to elect a hero that can then save their world or be blamed for any atrocity that happens. Conklin made it clear that It was not just the culture hero, aka as King, Emperor, der Fuehrer etc., who was at fault, but what lay behind the need for the “hero” that was the problem. Monsters who are not followed, rarely become capable of what you described. The real monsters here are the covert who refuse to plan, as a group, for the contingencies, blaming their problems on large institutions, whether corporate or governmental ,rather than entering the fray, shaping the institutions with their action and voting.

I don’t agree with Godwin but I do agree with Hanson. I also think the Peter principle is at work here. Contemporary Americans have become the most passive sheeplike group I've seen in my lifetime. They cry for a shepherd to herd them, are superstitious, have little knowledge of languages and other viewpoints and think the world exists as what they have in their own heads. Given the political climate in Texas and Oklahoma, it is unlikely that Dr. Conklin would have a job in either state these days.
Americans demand action but refuse to pay taxes and consistently blame others for what they themselves are doing irresponsibly at the time. It is not just Oklahoma and Texas. A large percentage of Americans are contractually untrustworthy, blindly venal, usurious and just plain dumb. Instead of being creative in the use of their taxes through action, they just want to get on with their lives. Whitney Houston and Britney Spears fascinate them because of their hopelessness in the face of plenty. Like deer in the headlights, Americans refuse to know what is behind the light yet avoid the danger through moving their feet. America has become an embarrassment to anyone who has a serious desire to responsibility in the world. I would add that I am not speaking of what Ron Paul calls responsibility either.

[SplatticusFinch]

Feh, I can pretty much guarantee that as soon as the right wing blogosphere gets ahold of this little diary entry they're going to run wild with it.

Nice one David, tsk tsk.