Indeed, the international development teacher, Jeff Waage and the hydrogeologist Sophie Paul found frustrating politicians by intransigence or the short term.
Silo
Waage had sat on scientific advisory bodies of the British government departments and the United Nations programs, but concludes in its test that the community commitment of the base is a more effective force for change. And Paul discovered the power of localism to help set up a community of community charitable in order to design and install a hydroelectric plant in Caversham.
Likewise, the play of the theoretical physicist Yaz Ashmawi is on the importance of citizens’ assemblies to generate tilting points “ Positive ” in the consciousness of the public: “… essentially the same science of systems that I thought I have left Cambridge, except rather than collapse, these positive tilting points offer the promise of an alternative horizon.”
Just as frustrated by political indifference, immunologist Brian Jones suggests that the government has learned nothing since its inaction during the severe epidemic of 2003 acute respiratory syndrome and is still not prepared for new species of viruses, bacteria and parasites induced by the emerging climate of an environment in danger.
The scientist of the Shana Sullivan space sums up the challenge “that the power to change the world was in the hands of someone else. Someone more powerful than me. And therefore, the only solution was to convince them to change. »»
The contributors also underline the need to make their voice heard above the denial din, or beyond the scientific silo.
Agricultural
Jen Murphy, professor of science, faces a dichotomy on how to fight against the crisis in school. On the one hand, climate science is cynically qualified as political policy by those of the denial wing of the media, supposedly a non-Go region for teachers, but if it knows that it is its professional duty to safeguard and empower its students.
The conservationist of fauna Nikki Tagg describes the obstacles to which she was confronted by trying to communicate the urgency. “For many years,” she writes, “the world decision -makers have told me that my interests are not more than admirable, and that development and economic growth at the cost of the existence of many incredible species around the world – wolves and doves of salamanders and rare Crocodilian Gharias – is given.”
The Environment Scientist Neal Haddaway finds his favorite persuasion vehicle in photography – “stories” are an important tool and the images are worth a thousand. The zoologist Tristram Wyatt recounts his trip beyond his comfort zone as a stand-up actor in climate science.
Citing their various epiphanies, the contributors testify to the difficulty of breaking life habits, whether food choices, travel or work in his own silo without realizing that, as the engineer Kara Laing concludes, the climate is the objective through which all efforts should be viewed.
Biologist Caroline Vincent opened her eyes to the pieces on the part of food in planet’s disease in the face of a vegan guest for the first time, especially.
She found that: “Meat and dairy products alone represent 14% of global greenhouse gas emissions (and are not) an effective way to use our land for food. Their production uses three -quarters of all agricultural land, but it takes almost 100 times more land to produce a gram of beef or lamb protein than peas or tofu. »»
Exhaust
Activists are often confronted with severe criticism at the slightest suggestion of hypocrisy, as inevitable. In his play, the science-science of Social Laura Thomas Walters sums up the dilemma.
“My heart flows when people evoke diets because I really don’t want to be considered to judge others. But I also felt like I was hypocritical if I was trying to persuade other people to do what I was not willing to do myself. »»
However, of course, real hypocrisy lies in airlines, oil companies, banks and a host of other greenwashers, including the science museum, which, as a cognitive psychologist Alison Green, was subjected to a campaign in progress by XR scientists to cancel the sponsorship of the carbon baron Gautam Adani.
Pete Knapp, who holds a doctorate in air quality, had to face Humbug under another point of view: “I did not find any space to challenge hypocrisy in academic flight: the attempts I made to do it were welcomed with hostility and in the last stages of my studies, I had prohibited on the university campus.”
Regarding trips, the battery chemist Isabella Stephens found that the solution was not as simple as the development of electric cars, it is consumerism that would continue to exhaust the planet even with the new green technology.
Burning
The conservation biologist, Ryan Walker, has witnessed the disastrous effects of global consumerism, even in his quest for a better balance with the “out-of-network” nature in Papua New Guinea-the exploitation of extended gold, copper and other metal reserves. And the dilemma of modest labor: work for polluters or starve.
Naturally, the book ends with a powerful section on protest, highlighting the courage of contributors who place themselves directly on the front line, even at a personal price.
Smart’s appeal to a hunger strike put him in great physical danger and Alison Green considered the “killing” her own career in the academic world (she was previously dean at the open university and professional vice-chancer at Arden University) a necessary compromise.
The astrophysicist Lucy Hogarth also abandoned his career for the greatest good: “I looked at the stars, while the earth was burning under my feet.” By discussing her transition to activism, she echoes the warning of Kurt Vonnegut: “If people insist to live as if there was no tomorrow, there will really be.”
Warned
After his arrest, the scientist of life Abi Perrin found his courage in “the little human moments of support, connection, compassion and humor”.
She remembers: “I always find myself hearing the sweet drum and the song of one of our supporters, feeling the warmth of the relative foreigners who have made their work to take care of the stops.”
She says she is conducted on the place of Parliament at the back of a police van and finding inspiration in the awareness that at least three of the statues honor people who have reached change by protest: “An essential reminder of what we can achieve if we hold together, challenge damage and injustice, and demand or create better alternatives.”
The environmentalist Aaron Thierry also found the courage of the direct action scholarship. Version of his right to remain silent, he clearly explained his motivations to his officers who stop. Even police have the right to be warned of what awaits their families.
Transformation
And it is not only science that must be the accent but also the underlying forces which stimulate environmental collapse: consumerism and implacable pursuit of “growth”, which will lead us to rupture as certainly as bacteria in Petri dishes die once its environment can no longer maintain it.
In his essay, Science Community Viola Ross Smith Avows: “I must continue to hope, so that I can continue as long as I have the power to do so and continue to put pressure for the changes necessary for a better world. So, I can look in the beautiful brown eyes of my son as the realization of what is at stake continues to put himself on him, and say honestly: “I did my best. I tried. ‘”
So let’s finish with a more optimistic perspective than that of Sagan. Karl Popper offers a counterpoint: “In fact, the history of science is, on the whole, a story of progress.”
As this book demonstrates powerfully, even in the midst of fear, there is hope in transformation. The aspiration of the chemist Chris Jones to be “a good ancestor” reminds us that neither science nor history can exist on a dead planet.
This author
Tom Hardy Frsa has over 40 years of experience in education, as a literary editor for the International Journal of Art and Design Educationa columnist for the Time educational supplementsand author / editor -in -chief of several academic works on educational practice. He worked as an education consultant for Prince’s Teaching Institute and the subject of the subject for the Qualifications and Development Agency for Curriculum Programs which is the Department of Education. Since 2018, he has been part of the media team and messaging of the extinction rebellion.
You can buy a copy of Scientists on survival: personal stories of climate action directly from the publisher now. (This is not an affiliation link).