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Today, from LiveScience, we have an article that might verge on the political. Climate change is real. It's happening. And it's time to make it personal.  We found the psychological impetus people need to take action on climate change — realizing it will affect them and their way of life personally. Oh, you don't say? You mean people don't care about things until it affects them personally? Why, I never noticed that! Except I did. "That disease is affecting those people, so, so what?" / "That disease killed my child! I'm going to start a crusade!" "That country is being invaded? Sucks to be them." / "My country is being invaded! Send help!" It's human nature, and a well-documented aspect of human nature. Thing is, there's lots of things that are human nature that we try to rise above, like punching someone who looks at you funny, and this should be one of them. That said, please keep in mind that the tag on this article is "Opinion." Recognizing that climate change is immediate, close, and affecting people's way of life is one of the key messages we need to communicate to spur them to act. I believe that there are people who will sit on their low-lying island until it's inundated by rising sea levels, convinced that it couldn't possibly be due to anthropogenic climate change, because their favorite echo chamber said it's not. But in order to meaningfully limit warming, we need to enact policies that will alter the lives of billions of people. That always goes over so well. Besides, it would take a dictator. A benevolent dictator, not the one we've got. And this needs to begin with individual action — getting people to care enough to alter their behavior around climate change. And with that, you've lost me. There are times for individual action, sure. But this is one of those times when the levers are moved by much bigger entities. Also... I remember when Wonder Woman 1984 came out. Big letdown after the first WW movie, but that's not my point here. It released at the depths of the COVID crisis, when smart people were like "Masks and social distancing" and the toddlers were like *stomp* "NO!" So the central plot point of that movie (which I am now spoiling, but you weren't going to watch it anyway), that everything can be fixed if everyone would just, you know, listen to Diana, and think a certain thought at a certain time, like in Horton Hears a Who, then the problem could be solved. It's a nice thought. But by the time the movie was released, it was plain as the screen in front of you right now that it would never, ever, happen, for any reason, not even if the chick suggesting it was incredibly hot. And in this case, if you can't get everyone on board, and you also can't get the people in power to move their levers, then there's no fucking point in me switching to paper straws or otherwise inconveniencing myself in the slightest. We recruited more than 3,000 participants across six countries to see what would make them more or less motivated to help climate causes. Pro-environmental actions are often costly — incurring financial, time and physical effort. Then there's my inherent laziness. The findings confirm some things that we know to be true about human behavior. It's the same reason why people have a greater connection to news that is local to their area, or to their interests. When it's personal, when it's close, when it affects our usual way of life, it lands. Like I said. When rising water levels increase the risk that our property is going to be flooded — because events that were previously likely to happen once in 100 years are increasingly common — to protect our way of life requires us to take action, rather than do nothing. I'm not going to get into the math here, but that's not what a 100-year flood is. I get that the name is confusing, leading people to think it is. A 100-year event is one that, based on prior observations, has a 1 in 100 chance of occurring in any given year. To understand the difference requires some knowledge of probability and statistics, which I'd expect any scientist to have. But it also means you have to have learned some basic hydrology lingo, which, in fairness, neuroscientists rarely do. Which is not to say that extreme storm events aren't increasing in frequency and intensity, as generally predicted by climate models, but it's rare that I get to be pedantic about something I've actually gotten a degree in. We know addressing climate change will require systemic change from governments and business. But we need to start somewhere, and getting people to see the changes happening around them may just be a small step that leads to major shifts. So in general, I'm in agreement with the article on that. What we seem to disagree on (and I admit I'm probably the one in the wrong here) is that it's psychologically possible to get enough people on the sinking boat to start baling. Honestly, I hope I'm wrong. |
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