THE SPINE NOVEMBER 18, 2007
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The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued areport integrating its three previous ones and drawing deeper conclusions on what its scientists say will be, according to Elisabeth Rosenthal in Saturday's New York Times, inevitable meltdown of ice sheets and the elimination of many species. This news from the U.N. is marked "urgent."One would have thought that conservatives who are always hysterical about eroding phenomena would instinctively grasp the significance of these disappearances. But, since this connotes government intervention in the economies of nations and in acquired habits of advanced human communities, they dig in their heels and "just say no." The Bush administration is one of these recalcitrants. Another is China. What a pair!
Anyway, don't expect any urgent action on anything from the U.N.Warren Hoge has another important article in this morning's Timesabout the General Assembly muddling a resolution against rape "used by government and armed groups to achieve political and military objectives." We know that this is a widespread phenomena in parts of Africa, even an epidemic, and common in other parts of the world. But it was left to South Africa and Angola, "acting on behalf of the African Group, a 43-nation coalition" making its power felt in international organizations, to blunt the sharpness of the initial resolution. Of course, it was South Africa's ambassador to the U.N. who did the dirty work: "The original U.S. draft appeared to concentrate on condemning rape when perpetrated for political and military purposes only. We felt strongly that this would have created two categories of rape, that is, rape by military and rape by civilians." He wanted to make "certain that there was no politicization of rape."The fact is that South Africa, drawing on and besmirching its moral capital of having defeated apartheid, is now the ally of tyrannies even more cruel, if less efficient, than the old regime. The behavior of South Africa is a moral scandal. This hypocritical act is just a sign, but a noxious sign, that it cares not for the suffering of its fellow Africans.
5 comments
A simple question:
Ask any meteorologist what the weather forecast is for next week, next month, and six months from now. Then ask for a measure of probability that the forecast actually will turn out as predicted. If the meteorologist is honest, the probability that the forecast will be accurate drops precipitously with time. Now please explain why the dire forecasts of melting ice sheets and other dire climatic predictions for 5, 10, 15, and 20a years from now should be viewed as inherently more reliable.
hg
- ginzy
November 18, 2007 at 7:14am
Because there's a difference between climate and weather.
I'm not as sure as Al Gore that humans are responsible for what's happening, but things are happening, and there is an undeniable climate change.
You can predict it once you detect the components of a process. A process is continuous, gradual, and goes in a certain direction. You can identify this direction once you've collected enough data over a long enough period of time.
Long before industrialization and modernity such huge changes had taken place. Earth froze over and then thawed down already in the past.
The problem is not prediction, but the source of the change. Although I agree that prediction can only be done in general terms. It can't be all that accurate.
- babigail
November 18, 2007 at 8:43am
Rape as policy? Um, I always thought of rape as pure beastliness. As revolted as I am by South Africa's regime (and by the hypocrisy of sanctimonious American élites, in using the anti-apartheid campaign to pander to domestic black constituencies), the S.A. ambassador does have a point. Rape as politics? As in "We want you to go out and rape the women, to advance our military/politcal objectives." Give me a break! Rape is an act of impulse, not of policy. So, the U.S., whose record in this department is not sterling (Okinawa), seeks to make condoning -- i.e. not disapproving -- of rape by soldiers -- whose primary function, by the way, is killing -- into "government-sponsored rape." Who was the asshole who dreamed this up?
By the way, how does one with Harvard on his résumé not know how to use the word "phenomenon"? Intellectual poseur comes to mind.
- jm_rice
November 18, 2007 at 6:12pm
Ginzy,
Do you do any long-term financial planning? How can you do that, when you don't even know how much pocket change you will have next week?
- WillPastor
November 18, 2007 at 8:16pm
If the climate isn't changing, how come there are still leaves clinging to trees here in Massachusetts a week shy of December?
- Runciman
November 22, 2007 at 10:59am