A Proposal Modest

Would they actually buy and sell it if it were on the market? How would you react if you were told that global warming will cause the death of untold numbers of people, but there was a way to utilize all the corpses by making a new Exxon oil product? What better idea than transforming dead people into oil and calling the new product Vinoleum. Is this not another brilliant example of the market-economy at its best?

Two individuals posing as representatives of Exxon-Mobil and the National Petroleum Council were the keynote speakers at a conference in Calgary, Alberta, where they introduced their "new" product. The attendees listened politely until the two imposters passed out "commemorative candles" to the audience. The candles were supposedly made from the flesh of an Exxon janitor, who had died as a result of cleaning up a toxic spill.

If you like guerrilla theater, you'll love The Yes Men But what might it say about us? How easy is it to get us to suspend disbelief under the right circumstances? Of course Exxon over the years has spent millions of dollars supporting various front groups that called global warming a hoax.

If our capacity to imagine doesn't go much beyond the exploitation of Alberta's oil sands and the development of liquid coal, a worldwide environmental disaster will likely increase significantly. Perhaps we could chat with Lee Raymond, the former CEO of Exxon and now the head of the National Petroleum Council.

Hm-m. But just possibly Mr. Raymond would be willing to volunteer himself for the betterment of humanity ... and he is a large man. Would he be a good test case for VINOLEUM?

Making Smarter Love

We don't choose to talk about it in the industrialized world when listing all the individual to-do things for the environment, like changing to CFL lighting or turning up the A/C a couple of degrees. Governments don't talk about it when debating cap-and-trade schemes, carbon taxes, and renewable energy, all directed toward reducing greenhouse gases, global warming and lessening the negative impact of climate change.

In the poorest nations on the planet it's frequently considered a meaningless abstraction--and distraction--from the "real" problems. Occasionally it rears its unwanted head and then disappears just as quickly. The lurking monster in the room is of course human population increase.

According to Population Connection, some 13 million additional humans will appear on planet Earth from July 1 of this year to early September. Depending on United Nations' population projections in 2006, we could go from the current 6.5 billion people to a low of 7.8 billion or as high as 10.8 billion by 2050. Only the most naive, blind or willfully ignorant (a vast number) will continue to harbor the delusion that the pressures on our finite natural resources will not be enormous, with a greater number of people chasing after those shrinking resources, from water to fertile land to a secure place to live.

A number of scientists and economists believe that even if we were actually committed enough worldwide to cut carbon emissions 40% by 2050, a 40% increase in human population (to 9.1 billion) would likely cancel out the corresponding CO2 reductions.

There have been projections that suggest our planet could sustain a population as high as 12 billion people. Of course these forecasts point out that some drastic changes are required in how we humans think and live, as well as some striking technological breakthroughs not yet discovered. We ought not to hold our breath for the 'reptilian" brain to wither away anytime soon.

Population pressure is not going away just because we don't want to bring it into climate change discussions. We are the one species that needs to talk about it openly and consistently and demonstrate some intestinal fortitude by doing so.