Your Last Carbon Offset

Joseph Romm  complains in Climate Progress  that Roger Pielke 's recent Nature Commentary  on the limits of  climate intervention   is "pointless", "misleading" and "embarrassing"

"Since this paper doesn’t define the word “innovation,” it is very hard to tell what precisely the authors’ point is (other than to lead us into the technology trap). ..this is characteristic of Pielke’s work —he doesn’t define terms specifically enough to make policy-relevant conclusions.'  [emphasis in the original]

...all the regular readers of this blog know why the technology trap is dangerous (it leads to delay, which is fatal to the planet’s livability)...failing to stabilize well below, say, 700 parts per million of CO2 ppm is really, really, really suicidal ....So what is the point of the piece? To convince people the situation is hopeless? [Nature actually runs a side piece on the commentary titled, “Are the IPCC scenarios ‘unachievable’?  — and people call me an alarmist!]."

While Romm neglects to define  'fatal ' or ' suicidal' in his essay, it elicited a reader response some may find  alarming .

" it might take, not only media campaigns like Al Gore’s recently announced advertising platform, but also...some climate protesters ...might... set themselves on fire with gasoline in Washington or New York, in front of the UN building.... to say to the world community: “We must stop killing the Earth now !”

Such protest-suicides...have such visual power as to make people who are not convinced do a re-think...about... the USA still being in denial about climate change realities."
                                                              [ 'Dabby Bloom ' April 3rd, 2008 at 1:49 am]

Comments

[Doug Wilken]

This "Dabby Bloom" character comes across as somewhat of a fanatic, but I read his/her post along the lines of fearing that this sort of thing might happen, rather than advocating it.

Just my two cents....

[David]

"...some climate protesters ...might... set themselves on fire with gasoline..."

Hypocrites. Just think of the carbon footprint of a burning, gasoline-soaked human body. They'd do much better to simply slit their wrists. Sure, there'd still be the "toxic" waste of their worthless carcasses to deal with, but even by their own faulty reasoning, burning themselves to death doesn't make sense.

Still, I applaud the idea in concept. Fewer folk who "think" only with their emotions wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing, especially if their exit from this world were entirely of their own doing.