So, if one becomes indifferent to truth and therefore reality, one will also become indifferent to the meaning of those things that identify reality--concepts and their symbols, words. Words then become nothing more than tools that one uses to get what one wants in a social context. Sometimes all one might want is to do is observe a problem, like a lady's splitting grocery bag dumping its contents onto the floor, and write an essay on the need for double-bagging.
This article at the Times of India (h/t Benny Peiser) is about:
The UN Human Development Report's core message is that climate change could cause reversal of human development inIt continues with my comments in brackets:
the 21st century, particularly in developing countries. Lead author Kevin
Watkins tells Narayani Ganesh that rich countries ought to take drastic,
mandatory action to prevent global catastrophe:
Q: Should India set hard targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions (GHGe)?And:
A: No. I said rich countries ought to undertake mandatory, binding emissions
cuts to stabilise GHGe during 2012-2050. It is unrealistic to expect developing countries to do so. The aim should be to gradually reduce emissions from
developing countries after 2020 [This sounds like a marketing ploy: sign up now and you won't have to make any payments-sacrifices-till 2020.] but at a rate which is consistent with expanding
access to electricity [what is that rate? How is it determined? Who determines it?] for the 1.6 billion who don't have access and in improving [how?]
energy services for the five million people who manage their energy needs
through collecting firewood and dung.
For this to happen we need to transfer financial and technological resources [whose?] through multilateral ways [multilateral means ganging-up-on the owners and producers of those resources], expanding access to energy and improving efficiencyWhat does 'made available' mean? Notice how all the problems are only problems because of a lack of access? Evidently people don't have energy, technology and riches because they don't have access to them. Presumably, rich people are rich because they have access to riches. In Mr. Watkins mind, it is access that the haves have, and access that the have nots have not. The obvious solution then is to 'transfer' the resources of the haves so that the have nots have access to them. Have you ever heard of a more simplistic view of reality?
through low carbon technology. Funds [whose?] should also be made available for adaptation. This mechanism should be part of whatever replaces the present Kyoto Protocol (KP) that culminates in 2012.
(Nowhere is there any recognition of the fact that prosperity, energy and technology are things that have a specific nature and very specific requirements to bring them into existence. If the have nots are ever to have, it is these requirements they need to discover then have, capitalism, individual rights, reason, freedom.)
The words and concepts for solving GW problems are slung together by the Gores and Watkins of the world in such a concrete bound, obvious, but-of-course, simplistic kind of way, one gets the impression that intellectual cavemen would be able to understand them. Alas, it's not an impression, that's to whom that essay is appealing.
Update: edited last sentence for clarity.
1 comment:
You said:
"This sounds like a marketing ploy: sign up now and you won't have to make any payments-sacrifices-till 2020."
Thank you for the my morning laugh, that was good!
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