Andrew Blackman

Just read the January/February issue of the New Internationalist, and was depressed at first to see the title “The population panic” on the cover. But it turned out to be a very well-researched series of articles, showing that a lot of the popular assumptions about population growth are false.

For example,the following graph shows that the link between population growth and global warming is weak: the majority of the population growth is in poor countries that do not contribute greatly to global warming, while the countries with low population growth are the ones emitting COs. Basically, global warming is caused by more industry, more flights, more waste, more consumption, and that’s taking place mostly in rich countries with static populations: “So unequal are the consumption levels that one European or North American or Australian may be responsible for more emissions than an entire village of Africans.”

Clearly population growth creates other problems, especially for poor countries where resources are scarce – but again, the articles showed how improved education and social programmes help a lot more than coercive measures. Iran achieved the fastest fertility decline in the world, from 6.6 children per woman in 1970 to 1.9 today, due to widespread public education campaigns about family planning.

I particularly liked the “7 Myths about Ageing”, in which a lot of the scary talk about ageing populations is debunked. Overall I felt not that the problems of population are not as catastrophic as they are sometimes presented. It’s not that nothing needs to be done, but that the problems need to be tackled differently. Poverty and inequality are the main issues, and we need to focus on rich-country consumption levels more than poor-country population levels.

Andrew Blackman Political comment climate change, global warming, population

A Youtube rarity – a professionally shot, high definition, one and a half hour video. It’s about the planet Earth and our place in it. Some quite amazing cinematography, and an important message. If the version on this site doesn’t work, try going direct to Youtube.

Andrew Blackman Inspiration climate change, environment, home, planet earth, video

Do you ever have that experience where something you’ve known for a long time suddenly hits you as it’s never hit you before? That happened to me this weekend. Here’s what set it off.

Every few days another huge chunk of ice seems to break off from Antarctica. Last week, for example, the Wilkins Ice Shelf broke off on Monday. That’s a lump of ice the size of Jamaica. Then on Thursday came news that the Wordie Ice Shelf had disappeared.

Normally I read this stuff and feel generally concerned, but in a vague, unfocused way. This time, somehow, it was different. I just had this image of the Earth seen from afar, with time sped up so that you see the whole of Antarctica just breaking up and melting into the sea in a few seconds. And meanwhile I’m scurrying around writing my blog posts and plugging my book as if nothing bad is happening, and the whole world is focusing on what colour dress Michelle Obama is wearing. It just struck me that we are all absolutely insane.

Then the moment passed, and I went back to the normal ‘vague generic anxiety but nothing much I can do’ mode, and once again I felt able to participate in daily life. I have a sneaking feeling, though, that the brief feeling of utter insanity might be closer to reality.

Andrew Blackman Political comment Antarctic ice shelf, climate change, cognitive dissonance, global warming, momentary insanity