Scientist can’t fix climate change

 I recently visited Coventry on business. While there I thought I’d see the sights before making my way home. Coventry has a cathedral. I visited the ruined cathedral because I find history interesting and I find ruins have aesthetic appeal. I did not plan, however, to visit the extant modern Cathedral. I’m not a Christian, so the appeal is minor to me.

I have an active interest in sustainability and finding technological solutions to combat climate change. I believe that scientists are the wrong people to motivate hearts and minds as necessary for the transformational change that is truly needed if we are not to suffer worse consequences of global warming than we have already seen. Scientist and engineers should certainly deliver the technological solutions. But the change that is needed is cultural and spiritual. The problems of greed and apathy have proven to have greater inertia than those of fossil fuel dependence and the decimation of nature.  

A large sign close to the ruins persuaded me to go into the modern Cathedral. I guessed I could manage a few minutes to complete my Coventry experience. And then I entered the most beautiful and the most uplifting place I have ever seen. There was great joy and affinity with my life within these stained glass walls. The font was a boulder from Bethlehem, which is one of the most interesting places I have ever visited. The organ was from Norway which I feel a spiritual link to as I am named for the Norwegian God of Thunder.

So the problem that I want to find a solution to Is how to deliver spiritual and cultural change to the many who, like me, are unlikely to make the choice to enter a place full of peace and wholeness. How do we bring that joy to people? How do we take water to the horse?

Climate change is real. It’s bad. And we can fix it. The solutions needed remain Alternative energy sources, Reduced dependence on energy, Protection of nature, Protection and reverse all of the decline of biodiversity, Recognition of the importance of the ecosystem And structural support for that ecosystem up upon which we rely. Willingness To implement those solutions is not a technological problem. The solution to that lies in humans valuing those things enough to make those changes. And that requires the sort of spiritual uplift that I found in Coventry that day. That story must be told by artists and writers, Storytellers, Dancers, Painters, Architects, Singers, Actors, Comedians, Poets.