Today I encountered a new perspective on climate change in the form of James Lovelock. I was once again at the RSA listening to the infamously pessimistic scientist talk about his new book and theories surrounding “The Vanishing Face of Gaia”, chaired by Guardian favourite Tim Radford. The lecture read more like an interview with Radford having to prompt the aging Lovelock into focusing on relevant topics. After hearing a brief summary of the (can you believe?) 90 year olds early career and his first job as a lab assistant in Brixton, he went on to tell us about working with US geologists and spoke of their “we can fix this!” approach to most things, calling it the “American way.” Next up was question round from the audience and the discussion was kicked off by front rower Dame Vivienne Westwood who simply asked, “What should we be doing next?” Lovelock answered staying true to his rather extreme theory (which basically states that we’ve done too much damage to reverse the path we’re already on our way down, i.e. we’re screwed either way) saying our worries should lie within the developing world countries, “Africa and India will be where the real trouble is.” The environmentalist went on to explain that there’s very little point in the UK or anyone for that matter trying to lower their carbon footprint as it will do no good for the world, other than make you feel better perhaps. Lovelock believes all our time should be dedicated to the economically challenged parts of the world that will be hit the worst by global warming consequences such as a rise in sea level. Although he acknowledges that we will be affected, predicting that “Britain will become one big city and may attract refugees.” The way I understand it is that Lovelock see’s the West as the problem starter (and should be solver) yet the affects of global warming will be small scale compared to the droughts and famine that will overwhelm Africa. Therefore, almost like some kind of sacrifice, he proposes we help the needier before considering ourselves, but if we can’t even get some people to believe there is a problem to begin with, how will we persuade them to help others?
Perhaps the answer lies in Lovelock’s book, “The Vanishing Face of Gaia”. From what I’ve gathered “Gaia” is a metaphor for the Earth and from reading a few reviews I think the basic gist is that we should stop caring for the environment because the damage we’ve caused is irreversible and start thinking of ways how to protect the human race when disaster strikes. An extremely severe point of view to say the least, so what kind of response is he getting?
There was definitely no Love lost between the Telegraph and the theorist judging by a recent review by a very head strong blogger who ended his rant with “Do not purchase The Vanishing Face of Gaia. Do not read it. Do not tell your friends about it.” So there’s one side of the argument, but what do others think? The Times recent input on the subject was a fairly boring review (if you can call it that) which was missing the rather important element of opinion. The avid fan of fence-sitting went on to explain what the book was about and ended with a “Buy the book” link, so I guess he liked it, or he just did it to be nice. I guess we’ll never know. What do you think of Mr. Lovelock? Barmy or brilliant?
