Christopher Nolan's "Oppenheimer": "That'll preach ...."

Christopher Nolan's film
Oppenheimer is based
on the Pulitzer-prize
winning book American
Prometheus by Kai Bird
and Martin J. Sherwin.

I've been sharing with colleagues the suggestion that the release of the new film about the leader of the atomic bomb project, J. Robert Oppenheimer -- Oppenheimer, directed by Christopher Nolan -- is an opportunity for preaching and faith discussions on vital issues. (See full announcement below.) 

What am I hoping for? This morning it dawned on me: the reason I think this is such an important opportunity is, "Maybe the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand when everybody has a conscience and stops being a gadget."

The story of Oppenheimer is the battle within J. Robert Oppenheimer between what he felt he wanted -- to do an amazing thing, to have glory, to have power -- and what his conscience told him was important: to lead people away from their destructive impulses. Oppenheimer was responsible, more than any other person, for the successful creation of nuclear weapons. But he also was the most stubborn voice calling for the renunciation of those weapons. And he paid the price for it.

What might happen if people come away from Oppenheimer saying, "This is not about somebody else, and some other time -- this is about me, this is about now!" -- ??

A few years ago I wrote a post about how often we surrender ourselves to the agenda or program or ambition set by others, and before we know it our only choice is to keep "going along" -- "In Whose Machine Will YOU Be a Cog?" In a way, Oppenheimer is about the battle against just being a cog in the machine, just being a "gadget." The call to action in the title of Jaron Lanier's book, You Are Not a Gadget, comes to mind -- as does the irony that the nickname of the first bomb developed in the Manhattan Project was "the gadget."

There's no telling exactly what will be in the film ... or how people will react to it. But one thing is certain. Oppenheimer: "That'll preach ...."

Oppenheimer: A Summer Blockbuster Offers an Opportunity

What will you be preaching about this summer? What will you be discussing in small groups? There will be an opportunity to “preach into the moment” when a unique cultural event occurs this summer with the release on July 21 of a major motion picture: Oppenheimer. The film is based on the choice to develop and use nuclear weapons as told in the book about the Manhattan Project leader entitled, American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer.

The $100 million production promises to deal issues of faith and conscience, and to stimulate a national conversation on dangerous technologies and social practices – nuclear weapons, but also AI and all environment-threatening behavior. “We imagine a future, and our imaginings horrify us. … I don’t know if we can be trusted with such a weapon. But we have no choice. Is anyone ever going to tell the truth about what’s happening here?” says Oppenheimer in the film’s trailer.

The mid-summer release is timed to coincide with the anniversary of the first atomic bomb test (“Trinity” – July 16, 1945) and the use by the United States of atomic weapons against Japan weeks later (Hiroshima on August 6 and Nagasaki on August 9).

For more on the United Church of Christ (UCC) commitment to preventing the danger presented by nuclear weapons, see “Synod calls U.S. to pull back from brink of nuclear war.”

Coming Soon to the Great Lakes Region . . .

The Great Lakes from space

 

The topic of climate migration is very much on my mind. What might this portend for the Great Lakes region?

Here are a few of the posts from the past that have set my thinking in motion:

NJ Sense and Wising Up to the Climate Crisis

NYC + H2O = Uh-oh!

California and Climate Crisis: The End?

Climate: We All Need to Be Futurists Now. 

. . . as well as many more posts on the climate crisis. 

Additional resources

"Responding to Climate Change in Great Lakes Cities" by Angela Larsen, Alliance for the Great Lakes

"These will be the best places to live in America in 2100 A.D." by Peter Hess in Popular Science

"Here’s The Best Place To Move If You’re Worried About Climate Change" by Maggie Koerth onFiveThirtyEight

"Want to Escape Global Warming? These Cities Promise Cool Relief" by Kendra Pierre-Louis in The New York Times

"Every Place Has Its Own Climate Risk. What Is It Where You Live?" by Stuart A. Thompson and Yaryna Serkez in The New York Times

Human Flow -- a film by Ai Weiwei

The Age of COVID: Are public perceptions changing?

What a difference a day makes.

One day the problem seems very distant. "It couldn't possibly have anything to do with me."

Then the next day everything has changed, and you see the situation with utter clarity.

I think, for myself, of the difference between Friday, March 6, and Saturday, March 7.

We don't like to contemplate that there can be massive breakdown in the fabric of our lives. Public health experts and scientists have been warning loud and clear about what we face (in terms of infectious disease, in terms of climate, in terms of nuclear weapons) -- and yet we just can't seem to bring ourselves to prepare, and to change our risky behaviors. And then suddenly -- when we come right up to the brink of dying -- we realize, "Oh! I guess I am willing to make the effort. I guess it really is possible to behave differently. We can do this!"


Add your thoughts to these Twitter threads:

Will #COVID19 open people's eyes to other #publichealth threats like #ClimateCrisis and #Nuclear #War?

Now that people are interested in the #fifthrisk, I hope they'll connect the dots to numbers 1, 2, 3, and 4. #nuclear weapons


Related posts:

RISK: We Are Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad at Talking About the One That Matters Most

What's YOUR "appetite for risk"? (Eliminate nuclear weapons NOW!)

On the Need to Slow Down

I'm listening!

I wondered yesterday: is it possible that the world -- the environment, the climate, Nature -- has sensed that we need to slow down, and that it has been sending us a message?

In other words, the challenge here is not to save the Earth from being "damaged," but to rescue human lived experience from becoming hopelessly sped up and commodified?

I was on a phone call with a group of environmental activists, and someone shared a reflection entitled, "What Can the Trees Teach Us" by Nichola Torrbett. "As far as I could make it out," she wrote, "the immediate message is SLOW DOWN."

We remarked on the irony that humans have had a very hard time listening to other humans suggest that we need to slow down; the message from the atmosphere has not been able to quite register, either; but now a microscopic bug has seems to be getting through to us.

Later, I reflected on how this has operated in my own life. I remembered a moment, sitting in a train car as it zoomed through the state of New Jersey, realizing that no matter what was happening in my life I always felt better when I was moving.

I remembered an essay in a collection on my shelf, and pulled it down to read again. In 1906, Henry Adams wrote about how life seems always to be getting faster and faster. Looking back on his own time, he observed "[b]efore the boy was six years old, he had seen four impossibilities made actual, -- the ocean-steamer, the railway, the electric telegraph, and the Daguerreotype; nor could he ever learn which of the four had most hurried others to come." (From "A Law of Acceleration")

And today that seems quaint.

When I was a teenager, the big bestseller was Future Shock by Alvin Toffler. I was amused to discover that twenty years later, it became a bestseller in Chinese translation in the bookstores of Beijing and Shanghai. The book is, in a way, an extended updating on Henry Adams' observations: the biggest change is the accelerating pace of change itself.

There was a wonderful show at the Guggenheim Museum in New York a few years ago, about the Futurist movement of the early 20th century. The Futurists sought to make a virtue of this acceleration of society -- with consequences that were partly entertaining and partly terrifying. (See What Kind of Future Comes From Worshiping Speed, Machines, Flight, War?)

I wrote once before about the need to slow down in a slightly different context: talking about the concept that George Orwell wrote about in 1984, "ownlife." That was when I began to see what a huge effort is needed to slow down and choose where to put one's own attention.

For the rest of this year (at least), the pace of our lives will be changed for us. What will we learn from the experience?

A Note on Groupthink (and COVID-19, Economic Bubbles, Climate Devastation, World War and Even Bigger Threats)

from the Kristof and Thompson article

We're all trying to wrap our heads around COVID-19 and the mathematics of epidemics.

There was a very good piece by Nick Kristof and Stuart A. Thompson in The New York Times that uses an interactive graph to help one understand how the numbers behave: "How Much Worse the Coronavirus Could Get, in Charts."

I've noticed that all of us have a difficult time sorting out the risk we face individually from the risk to society in aggregate. The problem seems to be that our minds have trouble holding different categories of numbers at the same time.

A related problem is what we are willing to think, and what we feel comfortable saying in conversation with other people.

I made a note of another article that appeared in The New York Times - "Why Did the Coronavirus Outbreak Start in China?" by Yi-Zheng Lian. Lian argues that things got out of hand because of a cultural tendency in China to defer to "the official line" -- or, more to the point, the fear of punishment meted out to anyone who contradicts the official line. Lian writes, "Punishing people who speak the truth has been a standard practice of China’s ruling elite for more than two millenniums and is an established means of coercing stability. It is not an invention of modern China under the Communists — although the party, true to form, has perfected the practice. And now, muzzling the messenger has helped spread the deadly COVID-19, which has infected some 75,000 people."

I have become very wary of broad brush characterizations of peoples and nations. (I come by this wariness honestly, as a recovering Orientalist.) But I was struck by echoes I found in Lian's article of a post I wrote about a decade ago about how the Chinese context sets up a "prisoner's dilemma" that squelches independent voices and independent action: "Merry Christmas, Mr. Liu: The Prisoner's Dilemma in China."

Coincidentally, a few weeks ago I watched an online lecture about the years leading up to World War II in the Pacific. Prof. Mark Ravina makes the case in "War Without a Master Plan: Japan, 1931-1945" (Lecture 19 in Understanding Japan: A Cultural History) that something similar was operating in Japan at the time: the facts showed plainly that Japan was embarking on a path that was doomed, but there was a cultural tendency to acquiesce to what was believed to be the group's overall view. No one wanted to dissent.

Groupthink: the same phenomenon that we see in Florida today, where no one dares utter the words "climate change."

Which brings me to the problem I spend the most time puzzling over: our inability to cope with the risk inherent in the current nuclear weapons regime, and our acquiescence in this state of affairs.

We are all huddled in our homes now. We have a lot of time to think. We have grown tired of watching the same talking heads on the TV news shows. We have begun to reflect, and to have heart-to-heart talks with people we can really level with. And some of us are even beginning to think that maybe we really can live our lives differently.

To do so will require us to think.

And to say what we think.

For Christian Activists: "Faith in the Face of Empire"

Mitri Raheb, Faith in the Face of Empire:
The Bible Through Palestinian Eyes

During Lent 2020, as I am looking for ways to understand what the way of Jesus might tell us about how to save the planet, I have returned to Mitri Raheb's book, Faith in the Face of Empire: The Bible Through Palestinian Eyes. I've previously written about Mitri's book -- see: How Shall We Live in the Face of Empire? (Reading Mitri Raheb). I am reminded once more what a vital resource it is for Christian activists.

I've boiled down six takeaways from the book:

(1) The lure of Empire: Faith in the Face of Empire is a wake-up call that today -- as in the days of Jesus -- it is practically a full-time job to keep from getting sucked in to a life defined in terms of the world's empires of power. Some of the ways that happens is through collaboration and accommodation, but it can also happen when we think we are meaningfully resisting or rebelling.

(2) Community: Note to self! Pay attention to the distinction between getting wrapped up in politics and contributing to a new, better way of doing community (polis).

(3) The margins: What might happen if, instead of devoting my time and attention to people with the most power, I devoted my time and attention to people who are sometimes considered "marginal"?

(4) Diversity: Renew my commitment to seeing diversity as a source of strength. (Beware of the temptation to think being strong comes from presenting a monolithic front!)

(5) Live in tension: Can I respond to the call to live in the tension between "the world as it is" and "the world as it should be"?

(6) What's the job? Mitri suggests that the real job for me (and for all of us) is to be an "ambassador of the kingdom" -- i.e. what Jesus was talking about when he said, "The Kingdom of God is at hand."

All six takeaways directly contradict mainstream habits prevalent in US society today. Notably, a common thread in many of these is the importance of not getting seduced by the appeal of force. In certain ways, these takeaways can also feel counter-intuitive to people who consider themselves "activists," and who are struggling for effectiveness and success in struggles for in social justice, liberation, and change.

Maybe these six takeaways could be the basis for generative discussion about, for example, how the faith community might participate in the "Back From the Brink" campaign.

More: See Want to "Save the Planet"? What Might We Learn from the Way of Jesus?


(Here's a link to posts about the time I spent at Mitri's center in Bethlehem in 2015: Faith in the Face of Empire: A journey in search of hope in the land of conflicting narratives. There is a good bio of Mitri Raheb on Wikipedia.) 

What Will Our "Salvation Story" Look Like?

Joe and Rachel at the "Fiery Furnace" formation in Arches National Park, Fall 2017.

If we get out of this mess, will it be through our own doing? Or will it be through salvation by God?

Each year, on the day before Easter Sunday, many churches hold an Easter Vigil which includes stories of people's salvation throughout the ages with the help of God.

My favorite of those stories is always the one about the "the fiery furnace" -- and God's protection of the faithful Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego from the wrath of King Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 3:1-68). Of course, I also like the one about the Noah finally finding dry land after the flood; and I like the one about Jonah getting spit up by that whale after three days; and I like the one about the Jewish people escaping across the Red Sea with the Egyptians in hot pursuit.

But I think the reason I like the fiery furnace story so much is that it is simultaneously so surreal and so direct. It's a story of unbelievable horror -- and also of a horror that we have all faced every day since August 6, 1945.

I went through a different sort of fiery furnace experience, myself, during the summer of 2017. I was diagnosed with lymphoma and had to start immediate chemotherapy. I kept telling myself that it might feel like they were putting fire in my body, but I was going to come out the other end alive. 

Baptism by fire: first night of R-CHOP, June 2017.

Within six months, the lymphoma was under control and I was able to go to a reduced treatment regime. We even managed to go on some trips. I was struck by how far I had come in a short time when we we posed happily in front of a rock formation called the "Fiery Furnace" in Arches National Park, in Utah.

And I wondered: did I owe my salvation in that time of trial to God? Or to people? Or to both?

World nuclear arsenals are currently estimated at over 14,000 warheads. Will we achieve salvation from this existential threat? Are we waiting for God to do it for us? Can we do it without God? How are we imagining this story of salvation -- if there is one -- will go?

These are some questions that I will be thinking about on Easter Eve, April 11, 2020.


More: See Want to "Save the Planet"? What Might We Learn from the Way of Jesus?

The Woman at the Well: Important Conversations to Save the Planet

Conference for defense contractors

As an opponent of nuclear weapons, and as a proponent of nuclear disarmament, I am inclined to seek out people who think like me: other opponents of nuclear weapons, other proponents of nuclear disarmament.

Given an opportunity to travel to a meeting or conference or rally, my first question tends to be, "Am I likely to run into 'my people' there?"

It's a reasonable enough impulse. This is hard work. We all need to draw strength from others who are committed to the same cause. And, as a practical matter, it's important to be together in the same place from time to time, in order to make plans and coordinate efforts.

Recently, though, I've been thinking a lot about the story of the woman at the well (John 4:5-42). It's a story about what happens when people who are not very much alike have an encounter with each other. It's based on particular conditions that existed 2,000 years ago; but it's also about what's happening right here - now, today.

I notice three important things happening in the story:

* Jesus is talking to -- gasp! -- a Samaritan

* Jesus "tells her everything she's ever done"

* the two of them eventually get around to the main thing: the desire for "living water"

From this story, and from the Good Samaritan, I've heard many times that Samaritans were a group of people that Jesus' Jewish audience would have considered "off limits." I'm finally beginning to admit to myself that I probably haven't really understood this in the past. I thought, "Well, Samaritans did things like eat pork and Jews don't eat pork, so, yeah, they would have been considered outsiders." But since I don't really have strong feelings about eating pork, this is a pretty weak characterization.

It's beginning to occur to me that, to understand the depth of feeling about "Samaritans" that is intended in this story, I would need to think about a group that is devoted to living a life that is antithetical to the one I value. For instance - instead of opponents of nuclear weapons and proponents of nuclear disarmament, I should think about proponents of nuclear weapons and opponents of nuclear disarmament. I should imagine a conversation around the counter at the diner in Amarillo, TX, near the Pantex nuclear weapons plant.

Okay, but what does the "tells her everything she's ever done" mean? I used to think that it had something to do with psychic powers or the ability to read minds -- or, anyway, at least profound powers of deduction, like Sherlock Holmes.

I have now come to believe that it has a much simpler meaning. It refers to two people having a conversation, and one of them reflecting back to the other person what he heard her say. Is that so remarkable? Does that explain the joy with which the Samaritan woman reported to her neighbors about Jesus?

When you think about it, we are seldom such good listeners. When was the last time somebody listened -- really listened -- to what you were trying to say? Most of the time, most of us are two busy thinking about what we are going to say next to be able to listen to the other person. Sure, we listen -- but we're really just listening for the pause that will be our signal to talk.

I imagine the Samaritan Woman expected to be talked at -- and instead discovered to her surprise that she had been listened to.

The climax of the story, though, is the part about "living water." It comes at the wrap-up of the conversation -- it's sort of like the end of a meeting, where someone says, "Okay, so where did we end up?" The Samaritan Woman says to Jesus, in essence, Okay, I think we're done talking, so let's do what we need to do. You take your water and then I'll take mine. This is sort of the 1st century version of, Well, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree.

Jesus says, Why do we have to stop being in conversation? Instead of "getting down to brass tacks" -- you take your water and then I'll take mine -- he suggests something that is perhaps less easy but also more fulfilling. I believe that what he was suggesting with the words "living water" (and what she heard in those words) was relationship -- the way of staying in connection with each other (and staying in connection with God) that includes communication in both directions and growth on both sides. And I believe that is what drew her in, and what sent her  out to tell other people.

I am an opponent of nuclear weapons, and as a proponent of nuclear disarmament. I don't know if I have the courage to go to a well where people are likely to think exactly the opposite of what I think. I don't know if I will have the patience to listen. And I don't know if I even really believe (yet) it's worth it to stay in relationship with them.

But I am pretty sure that if I want to follow in the Way of Jesus I am going to have to try.


More: See Want to "Save the Planet"? What Might We Learn from the Way of Jesus?

Want to "Save the Planet"? What Might We Learn from the Way of Jesus?

When I was a teenager in New Jersey in the '70s, I played in a rock band. Among the artists we loved and emulated were Edgar Winter and his brother, Johnny. Edgar and his band performed a song called "Save the Planet":

(... and check out the live version of "Save the Planet" here.)

The lyrics go like this:

Save the planet!
Who will save our planet?
Who will volunteer?
Save the planet - don't you know we love our planet?
Judgement time is here.

Who will it be? Will it be Mr. Black?
Who will it be? Will it be Mr. White?
Who will it be?  Will it be Mr. Wrong?
Who will it be?  Will it be Mr. Right?
Will it be you? Or will it be me?
Lord knows who will be . . . .

Every time I've listened to this joyful gospel hymn over the course of the past forty years or so, I've been filled with a sense of tremendous hope. Until relatively recently, that was a hope that stood in the face of a vague sense of the possible threats to our environment. I still get hope from this song, but I now realize the challenge is right in front of us, and urgent.

And as I listen to these words with a new sense of urgency, I'm hearing an important message. I have tended to think a great deal in terms of physics and chemistry -- how to offset the dangers posed by carbon dioxide and nuclear radiation -- but perhaps what Edgar Winter is telling me is that there is a more fundamental question: "Who will volunteer?" Hmmm ... what does it look like to be a "volunteer"?

The more I think about it, the more I think that being a "volunteer" -- that is, someone who has decided for themselves what is important and has set out on a chosen path -- is central to addressing the crisis the planet is facing. And that makes me, as a Christian, wonder what I might learn about this from reflecting on how Jesus lived. After all, Jesus was the ultimate "volunteer."

I was recently challenged to take a look at some scripture passages that are used during the Lenten season -- the six weeks leading up to Easter -- and think about them in light of this question. In 2020, people in churches around the country (and around the world) will reflect in common on six stories:

* How to pray ... how to fast ... what to treasure (Matt 6:1-6, 16-21)
* Tested in Wilderness (Matt 4:1-11)
* Transfiguration (Matt 17:1-9)
* Samaritan Woman (John 4:5-42) - see: The Woman at the Well: Important Conversations to Save the Planet
* Healing a Blind Man (John 9:1-41)
* Lazarus (John 11:1-45)
* Easter Vigil - see: What Will Our "Salvation Story" Look Like?

(See: Revised Common Lectionary - Lent 2020)

In the weeks ahead, I plan to delve into these stories and offer reflections. I'm not sure where it will lead me. But I'm remembering some of my past reflections on Lent, Holy Week, and East (see "Thoughts Before Holy Week: Talk About the Passion" and reflections on the R.E.M. lyric "not everyone can carry the weight of the world") and feeling that it may lead me toward some basics that will help me on my journey.


Related post


Searching the story of Noah for insight about the situation we face, what we might do about it, and where God is in all this. (See BFtB-WWND: "Back From The Brink": What Would Noah Do? )

How a confession of faith may help us think through our response to problems like drone killing and drone surveillance. (See Awake to Drones: Confessions of Faith)

Climate: We All Need to Be Futurists Now

Image from New York Times interactive map showing flooding
(in light blue) projected from a 5 foot sea level rise - the area around
 Sacramento is vulnerable to very severe flooding from breached levees.

On a long drive from Berkeley to Los Angeles this past January, I tried to stretch my mind as broadly as possible about the future situation we face. As I left one coastal California metropolis to visit another coastal California metropolis, I spent about four hours traversing the state's Central Valley, and it was the perfect place to mediate on the interrelationships of climate, migration, economic development, political culture, and more. Those reflections jolted me to attention, and led me to write California and Climate Crisis: The End?

For the past six months or so, I have found my mind returning again and again to those issues. Each time I think I know the one most important thing that I want to share, I find that new questions overtake me.

Maybe the best thing to do is to start by sharing the questions . . . .


(1) Why aren't we talking about "retreat"? A few months ago, I read the book Extreme Cities: The Peril and Promise of Urban Life in the Age of Climate Change by Ashley Dawson. It put facts around my sense that we're kidding ourselves when all we talk about is holding the rising sea back; we need to be talking about retreat.

This has been a growing concern of mine since at least 2013, when I wrote NYC + H2O = Uh-oh! Now that I live in the Bay Area, and I have friends who are scientists here, I am hearing in real time from them that there are significant areas near where I live that are at risk.


(2) Can investors possibly be blind to the coastal inundation threat? I have been particularly mystified by the "it's all a hoax" posture on the political right. Frankly, it doesn't matter what people say on Fox or in Twitter feeds; what really matters is where smart money is going. (See The Feel-Good Folly of Fossil-Fuel Valuation.) So how can it be possible that investors aren't fleeing anything that is associated with the risk of sea level rise? Why aren't they pulling back behind a safe margin?


(3) Will poor people be left holding the bag? A simple explanation is that society at large (and particularly the investor class) is taking sea level rise in stride because it's really just a small segment of the population that will be hurt -- the poor. ("The poor will have to be satisfied with whatever relief the rest of us deign to provide them.")


(4) Will the 99% be left holding the bag?  Another explanation is that, no matter what costs have to be born as coastal inundation happens, the 1% can count on the government to foot the bill. There will be a bail-out. It will be another "too big to fail" situation.


(5) Are we really that feckless? Places like New Orleans and Miami have a strange utility for people in the rest of the country, who are able to say, "Well, perhaps something bad is coming, but anyway Miami will have to deal with it long before we have to, here . . . . "


(6) Is higher ground the answer? Living in Berkeley, where I can glance up to all the elegant houses perched on the hills overlooking San Francisco Bay, it's easy to think, "Well, certainly they are in a safe place!" But I wonder if we underestimate how devastating it will be to our overall community and economy when even just a few percent of the businesses, infrastructure, and housing close to the Bay is compromised. At what point does "their problem" become "our problem"?


(7) Do we underestimate the impact of concurrent disaster? I sense there is a tendency to say, "Sure, coastal inundation is terrifying -- but we do know how to respond. Look at all the instances of hurricane recovery that we've done!" I fear people have not begun to take seriously what it means to be trying to hold back the sea in many locations at once.

Take a look at the interactive page set up by the New York Times -- "What Could Disappear" -- that let's you simulate what's in store for cities/regions like Boston, Baltimore, Charleston, Houston, Jacksonville, Los Angeles, Long Island, Miami, Mobile, New Jersey, New Orleans, New York City, Northern California, Philadelphia, Portland(both ME and OR), Providence, San Diego, Savannah, Seattle, Tampa Bay, Virginia Beach/Norfolk, Washington, Wilmington  . . . all at the same time . . . !


(8) Do we face unimaginable levels of human migration? If different parts of the US are at odds with each other over immigration today, what is it going to look like in years to come when many more millions are displaced in our immediate vicinity and worldwide due to sea level rise?


(9) Is it possible it's all going to come down on us faster than we expect? When I began reading the California reports I referenced in my January post, I noticed that much bigger, faster levels of sea level rise and inundation were projected than anything you typically hear about. I realized the full story is not reaching us. This was partly explained in Extreme Cities, which ways that scientists have become conditioned to behave "conservatively," i.e. not emphasize the direst possibilities, because if they do, people will stop listening to them.

What happens if we open our ears to the scientists' full story? A story in the East Bay Express this spring provided an epiphany for me:

Scientists predict that by 2100, global sea levels will rise 2 to 8 feet. And so far, the previous lower-end predictions of climate change have turned out to be too conservative. Some scientists also warn that a rapid disintegration of Antarctica's ice sheets could cause sea levels to jump 4 to 10 feet by century's end.

John Radke, a UC Berkeley associate professor of City and Regional Planning, has been examining models of likely impacts from sea-level rise on the Bay Area and California. He said the real threat from higher seas in the region will come from powerful storm surges during periods of heavy rain and high tides. "The storms are going to be more frequent," he said. "And the storms are going to be stronger."

Storm surge events will flood coastal areas, inflicting costly damage on shoreline homes and infrastructure. Radke said that, in the coming decades, Bay Area transportation officials will probably have to abandon Interstate 880 through Oakland, because it won't be worth repairing after it washes away repeatedly during floods. "If enough catastrophes happen, we might wake up," he said.

(See "The East Bay's Future Climate Will Be Both Dry and Wet" by Robert Gammon, East Bay Express, February 14, 2018.)

To imprint this reality on your brain, I recommend the documentary Chasing Ice. If you still think we've got all the time in the world, you'll change your mind after watching footage of a glacier edge the size of lower Manhattan disintegrate over the course of an hour.


(10) Will the US actually fall far behind the rest of the world in responding to sea level rise? The Trump Administration withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accords woke people up to something they may not have thought about before: other countries may be doing it better. I'm particularly curious about what happens in more centrally-planned economies, that may be better accustomed to long-term thinking and national infrastructure management.

About five years ago I begin thinking about the parallel situations of the US and China in dealing with the climate crisis. (See #chinaEARTHusa - Radical Change? or Planetocide?) I now wonder if China may do a much better job than the US, when all is said and done.


More to come on each of these questions . . . .


Please share this post . . . .

California and Climate Crisis: The End?

Luke Butler, The End XXIII
Exhibited as part of Way Bay show at
Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA).

A week ago, I was enjoying a beautiful drive through California's Central Valley, en route from Berkeley to Los Angeles. I had just dropped a family member at SFO, and so I had had a rare taste of Bay Area rush hour traffic in two directions. It reminded me of how overwhelming US car culture is.
 
I thought about the pessimism of a friend of mine -- an environmental engineer -- and I also thought about having heard a local pastor describe a pending building project as a "hundred year decision."

"Where are we headed -- really?" I wondered. "What would it mean to take a realistic 100-year perspective on what's likely to happen with the climate crisis?"

I spent a large part of that long drive thinking about it.

It occurred to me that there is analysis that one can learn from -- I had recently read about FEMA revising the flood plain projections for the New York City area, for instance -- and I promised myself that when I got home from my LA trip, I would look up some studies.

If I needed another nudge in that direction, I saw this the next day:

[T]he world’s diplomatic meanderings — from the ineffectual call in Toronto for a reduction in emissions to the summit meeting in Paris, where each country was allowed simply to pledge whatever it could to the global effort — suggest that the diplomats, policymakers and environmentalists trying to slow climate change still cannot cope with its unforgiving math. They are, instead, trying to ignore it. And that will definitely not work.

("Fighting Climate Change? We’re Not Even Landing a Punch" by Eduardo Porter in The New York Times, January 23, 2018.)

So I've begun to do my homework.

Here are two starting points -- in-depth analyses of the situation we face in California:

Rising Seas in California: An Update on Sea-Level Rise Science

California's Flood Future (November 2013): Recommendations for Managing the State's Flood Risk

(Full supporting documents relating to the latter document can be accessed via the document library on the California Department of Water Resources website.)

I encourage everyone to study them, and take seriously their "unforgiving math."

To be continued . . . . 


Please share this post . . . . 

The Coming Trump-Climate Train Wreck

Climate Science 101
1. It's warming
2. It's us           
3. We're sure   
4. It's bad         
5. We can fix it
(@billmckibben comment: "When scientists
protest, their picket signs have footnotes")

When Donald Trump and climate science and the financial markets collide, who wins?

Donald Trump is packing his cabinet with people who stand for the proposition that climate change is a hoax and we can go on ransacking our environment forever.

Capping off a week that saw him nominate a known climate skeptic to head the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and put forth a fossil fuel CEO as potential secretary of state, President-elect Donald Trump said in a Sunday interview that "nobody really knows" if climate change is real. (See "Stacking Cabinet With Deniers, Trump Says 'Nobody Really Knows' on Climate")

But what happens when he changes his mind?

All it is going to take is one briefing -- the right briefing -- to send him off in a new direction.

What will he do then? Tell them, "You're fired"? Or make a deal with them . . . ?

(And what about the federal employees who have been persecuted by that time for their conscientious efforts to combat the climate crisis?)

*   *   *   *

I'm particularly fascinated by the choice of the head of ExxonMobil to head the State Department.

Many people are focused on Rex Tillerson's role in the efforts by XOM (as ExxonMobil is referred to, after its stock symbol) to subvert the science on climate change. I'm more interested in Tillerson's handling of the company in the months since people started to realize that the jig is up with the oil companies.

XOM stock performance over past five years
(Source: Google Finance)

This is material for a more extended treatment in an upcoming blog post, but the short story is: XOM has had to figure out a way to convince people to continue holding its stock even after it became apparent that the old formula would soon become obsolete. After all, holding stock that represents the value of oil that is stuck in the ground (a "stranded asset") isn't worth much; better to unload it on someone else (quickly). From what I've been able to detect, XOM's immediate answer has been to say, in effect, we'll stop spending money on finding more oil, and start handing out bigger dividends. (Cash covers a multitude of sins, and XOM has plenty of cash.) (See, for instance, "ExxonMobil Confronts the 'Carbon Bubble'" and "Chevron, Exxon Cut Spending on Oil Price Slide")

How much is just froth?
(Image: About.com)

The imponderable question is: at what point do people stop saying, "Sure, I'll take my turn holding this asset (and collecting dividends)" and start saying, "I'm afraid no one's going to want to be the next buyer of XOM"? It has a lot to do with the uncertainty of oil holdings and the uncertainty of coming regulation of fossil fuels and carbon emissions. You can think of XOM as a big, frothy ice cream soda, with a straw running into it. A succession of people are invited to step up and pay for their turn to take a suck at the straw, and then sell their position to the next person in line. It gets harder and harder to tell just how much soda is left in the glass, and how much is just air. That means at some point the line is going to fall apart.

One thing is for sure: when XOM craters -- together with the other fossil fuel companies -- it will not be a slow, gentle ride down. The disappearance of buyers tends to be instantaneous.

*   *   *   *

Which brings me back to Rex Tillerson. If, as an ordinary "insider," he dumped his XOM holdings, the market would take it as a signal -- a very bad signal -- for XOM.  However, if he is compelled to divest his holdings, to avoid conflict of interests as Secretary of State, that's a different matter . . . .

So which will it be?


Related posts

Far more important than the historic performance of fossil fuel stocks is the future correlation of fossil fuel stocks to generalized, systemic risk in the market, and their negative correlation to the few sectors of the market that stand apart from that risk.

(See The Feel-Good Folly of Fossil-Fuel Valuation )




We need a zero-carbon USA and a zero-carbon China. Anything less is planetocide.

(See #chinaEARTHusa - Radical Change? or Planetocide? )








Oil companies are valued by the market based on their reserves. The problem with this approach is that the total reserves claimed by the oil companies is FIVE TIMES what can possibly be burned without driving up the temperature of the atmosphere up by a catastrophic amount and, as McKibben puts it, "breaking the planet." How can the value of oil companies be a function of reserves that can never be used?

(See The REALLY Big Short: The Jig is Up with Oil Companies)

Thanksgiving 2016 and #NoDAPL: 4 Questions

The Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) protests are waking people up on human rights, civil rights, immigration, land, water, and environmentalism overall.

Welcome to the land of the free . . . .(V @ UR_Ninja #NoDAPL)
(Please share this image.)

It is fortuitous that the protest against the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) is coming to a head as we enter November.

As kids across the US turn to making construction paper turkeys and learning the story of The First Thanksgiving, they will inevitably start asking questions.

Asking questions should have become part of Thanksgiving a long time ago.

To borrow a custom from another commemorative tradition, I suggest people everywhere use this time to ask 4 Questions:


(1) How does a person get to be an "American"?

Our children want to know: Is it "I was here first"? Is it "I got here at the right time"? Is it "I was stronger"?

(Is it "I was lucky enough to be born into a group that was stronger"?)

Maybe the way it works in the future can be different than the way it's worked in the past?


(2) Can we settle conflict by force?

Our children want to know: do we believe that, in the end, the way to settle conflict is for one side to overpower the other?

Is that how disagreements end?


(3) Who owns the land?

Our children want to know: what does it really mean for one person to "own" a part of the Earth? How does that get decided? What happens if someone says, "You're wrong, I own all of this?"

How could new people have come to the Americas and become owners of land if there were already people here who owned all the land?


(4) Will there always be enough water?

Our children want to know: I just go to the sink and turn on the tap and the water comes forever, right?


Make the Thanksgiving season a time of learning.


Related posts

"We need to first acknowledge the genocidal origins of OUR nation’s history of ethnic cleansing and occupation."

(See Native American Rights: Acknowledge the Occupation)













Having recently moved to California, I have a very strong impression that someone was living here before I "discovered" it.

(See DECOLONIZE THIS: The ELCA's Doctrine of Discovery Challenge)













More and more, people are looking to the wisdom of indigenous people to give us strength as we confront the climate crisis and other problems.

(See SDG 15 and Peace: "We are but one thread ... ")






How do you observe Indigenous Peoples Day?

(See Reflections on Indigenous Peoples Day 2015)

SOLAR PANELS: A Force for Peace in Africa?

Will the people in Africa who are starved for electricity get it via solar panels supplied from China? What impact might this have on violent conflict?

Sustainable Development Goal 9:
Industry, Innovation, Infrastructure

The UN International Day for Peace 2016 has been tied to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals. I was interested to see that an event titled World Economic Forum Africa 2016 is happening in Rwanda in the next several days. It made me curious to see what the Davos people might have to say about development (and, by extension, about peace) in Africa.

There's a big emphasis on digital and education at WEF Africa 2016. More information, more communication, more opportunity -- it's hard to argue with that as a good in general, and an essential lever in eliminating conflict in particular. Notably, WEF Africa 2016 is sponsored by a the Gates Foundation, numerous tech giants (Google, Microsoft, CISCO, Huawei, SAP), as well as the assortment of banks, consulting companies, and other corporate giants you would expect.

I'm a little curious, however, about where the power is going to come from to bring about the digital revolution in Africa.  A report on the WEF Africa 2016 website ("Africa’s digital revolution: a look at the technologies, trends and people driving it") provides this graphic:

AFRICA: Share of population without access to electricity
(Image: International Energy Agency)

Forget about electricity to power digital devices. How is it possible to talk seriously about a stable society and reversing the forces that bring about civil conflict when over 75% of a population has no access to electricity? According to the graphic, that means 60 million people in Congo, and 70 million people in Ethiopia.  In Nigeria, where somewhere between 25% and 50% of the people have access to electricity, there are still 93 million people without it.

There is a session on infrastructure at WEF Africa 2016, and I intend to watch it. I hope that it will not feature suggestions that nuclear energy is what Africa needs. (Stay tuned.)

What WEF Africa 2016 should be advocating is a massive solar energy program for Africa.

SolarGIS solar irradiation map, showing areas of highest exposure in Africa.

Trade, aid, lending, and investment between Africa and China have been growing rapidly. China is a massive supplier of solar panels. A project called Akon Lighting Africa (ALA) initiative aims to bring solar power to 600 million people in Africa -- with the help, it should be noted, of a $1 billion credit line from a Chinese solar system provider.

To get deeper into some of the underlying issues, check out this 2009 study on "China in the African Solar Energy Sector" based on the experience in Kenya.

Of course, solar power in Africa would have winners and losers. The winners would include companies in China supplying solar panels. Of course, Chinese companies could be counted on to start producing solar panels in Africa before long, so Africans would also be winners. Of course, thousands -- perhaps millions -- of local people in Africa would find employment installing and maintaining solar systems. And everyone in Africa would win from the absence of pollution.

Of course, there would be losers, too. Giant corporations like GE-Hitachi -- did I mention GE and Hitachi are sponsors of WEF Africa 2016? -- and Western engineering companies and banks will lose out if they do not get contracts to build nuclear plants in Africa.

I wonder if, when Peace Day 2016 rolls around in September, we'll be celebrating the continued progress of peaceful solar in Africa, or worrying about the creep of nuclear power across Africa?



Related posts

It will benefit us antiwar activists in the US to attend to and reflect upon the importance of these Sustainable Development Goals to achieving the goal of ending war.

(See PEACE DAY 2016: What comes first? Demilitarization? or Development?)












There's no question in my mind that Climate Action (Sustainable Development Goals #13) goes hand in hand with antiwar activity.

(See Peace Day 2016: 3 Ways Climate Action is Vital)













The U.S. could take a lesson from the "command economy" in China about government setting a bold new direction in using alternative energy.

(See #chinaEARTHusa -- Solar Panels at the Crux)








The enormous irony is that now one country -- India -- is responding to its past subjugation by the Western imperial program with this hugely self-damaging program, and another country that has struggled with its relationship to the Western imperial program -- Japan -- is doing everything it can to aid and abet.

(See INDIA: Lured into playing the "Great Power" Nuclear Game)

Peace Day 2016: 3 Ways Climate Action is Vital

The UN International Day for Peace 2016 has been tied to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Why is goal #13 -- Climate Action -- so vital to peace?

Sustainable Development Goal 13:
Climate Action

I think it is very possible to question whether many of the Sustainable Development Goals can be achieved before achieving substantial reductions in militarization, starting with the militarization of the US.

But there's no question in my mind that Climate Action (goal 13) goes hand in hand with antiwar activity.

Here are three big reasons . . .


(1) Climate Action ends the Global North's rationale for military dominance of the Middle East.

Ever wonder why the name of the US game is #permawar?

As a result of Climate Action, people have woken up to the fact that the world has far more fossil fuels than we can ever possibly burn.  People like Bill McKibben and his organization, 350.org, have made it clear that there is a carbon bubble, and the vast majority of oil, gas, and coal reserves are going to have to stay in the ground.

And once people in the US and other countries realize oil and gas will soon be a thing of the past, their very next question is "So why should we continue to try to militarily dominate the Middle East?"

Who knows? They may even begin to question whether it was just to fight for oil in the first place . . . .


(2) Our progress on Climate Action calls into question all resource-driven conflict -- the entire "race for what's left."

We need more BASES so we can get more STUFF ! ! !

Prof. Michael Klare has characterized the posture of the Global North as a "race for what's left" -- a race into which the Global South is being unwillingly dragged, and a race that is intimately tied to militarism.

A crucial element of Climate Action is recognition of our addiction to more and more and more stuff, and our inadequate attention to the possibilities of lowering consumption and moving toward economies of conservation, sustainability, and sharing.

It is inevitable that, as we do that, we will recognize the role of militarism in feeding the vicious cycle of acquisition and consumption. We have bases, therefore we must have important interests to protect; our important interests having been protected than a steady flow of economic activity -- raw materials, finished goods, investments, travel, and more?

What happens when we recognize a strategic imperative to do less, spend less, consume less?


(3) Climate Action is essential to our movement building.

Peace and Planet 2015 - model of cross-movement organizing

One of the big lessons to me of 2015 was that the peace movement and the environmental movement have realized that they are not separate movements, and they cannot accomplish their goals as separate movements.

An excellent example of this was the Peace and Planet event in New York City in April, 2015. It brought activists together from around the world to work on peace issues (particularly nuclear disarmament) and climate action.

Another example was the World Nuclear Victims Forum, which I attended in Hiroshima in November, 2015.

Yet another example is the integrated Alternative Global Security System from World Beyond War.


The closer we get to taking serious action on the climate crisis and global warming, the clearer it becomes that it is part and parcel of putting a stop to our militaristic ways.


Other Related Posts

It will benefit us antiwar activists in the US to attend to and reflect upon the importance of these Sustainable Development Goals to achieving the goal of ending war.

(See PEACE DAY 2016: What comes first? Demilitarization? or Development?)












Far more important than the historic performance of fossil fuel stocks is the future correlation of fossil fuel stocks to generalized, systemic risk in the market, and their negative correlation to the few sectors of the market that stand apart from that risk.

(See The Feel-Good Folly of Fossil-Fuel Valuation )




What if we had a massive region in the heart of the country pushing back against the war-crazed conventional wisdom of "more weapons," "more consumption," and "more destruction of the environment"?

(See Another Modest Proposal: A Green, Demilitarized Midwest! )

Saving Our Planet: What's GOD got to do with it???

Poster designed for first Earth Day, 1970.

We're in a mess, and we might not get out of it.

Many religious people think God is part of the unfolding story of the climate crisis.

Some believers think it wouldn't happen unless it was being caused by God (for instance, as a punishment for people's wickedness).

Others don't believe in a God who exacts terrible punishments, but do believe God will save us. They may be inclined to believe that God is the answer to solving global warming and overcoming climate change.

If we pray fervently enough to God, will the climate crisis go away?


Devoted Hands

A few Sundays ago at First Congregational Church of Berkeley (FCCB), we had "Service as Worship" day. Sometimes people worship God in words, in music, in costume, via movement and graphic arts . . . . Sometimes (often? always?) our acts of service in the world are also ways that we worship God.

Wait: we're not supposed to just pray and go to church? We're supposed to do stuff?

I thought Pope Francis summed it up pretty well:

"You pray for the hungry. Then you feed them. This is how prayer works."
(Pope Francis)

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) stresses the idea "God's work, our hands."

So part of my understanding of the problem is that action in the world happens through people.

Does God "care" about the climate crisis?

God is with us

I believe God is with us . . . and that it's up to us to do what needs to be done.  (God will be with us in our success. God will be with us in our failure.)

Specifically,  I believe the meaning of God caring about the climate crisis is that humanity gets to see the future, together with God so that humanity can choose its own future.

That's not nothin' . . . .


Diverse inspirations

Bill McKibben puts it in stark
terms: we could actually end
up breaking the Earth.

It will take real motivation to bear down on this big problem.

Sometimes I think we can be motivated by a sense of justice.

Pastor Diane Weibel pointed out to the congregation at FCCB several weeks ago that those of us who have caused the problem of global warming to happen also happen to be part of the class of people who really won't suffer the worst consequences from it;  it is the people in the Global South and those with the least wealth and privilege, the ones who have done little or nothing to bring global warming about that will suffer most from it.

Can this be the basis for a global movement of conscience?

Perhaps. Sometimes, however, I think we to be jolted to our senses. Bill McKibben puts in in stark terms: we could actually end up breaking the Earth. Maybe THAT will shock people into action.

(What motivates you?)


How are we gonna DO this???

Watch Laura Burkhauser's April 17, 2016 sermon at FCCB "Promises After the Flood" below. She raises the question of whether, when things have gonna very, very wrong, there is hope of repairing the situation.  I think the way she takes us through the problem -- including stressing that the problem is very, very bad -- gives a sense of what it is genuinely going to take for us to pursue a new direction.

What do you think? Is a New Covenant possible?

Happy Earth Day 2016!


More related posts

"Although we know the end from the very beginning," says Walker, "the story is no less compelling to watch." A man, gloriously alone (except for his own reflection) on an ice-covered lake; the soothing pastel colors of the distant sky; and what seems surely to be a circle he is digging around himself with a pick-axe. A perfect parable for our headlong rush toward climate crisis?

(See How Do You Say "Suicide Narcissus" in Chinese?)







One of the really interesting things about looking at how Rachel Carson used her writing to wake the world up -- particularly with her prophetic Silent Spring -- is that we can then go back to some of the earliest parts of the Bible and see them as living and urgent. And reading Silent Spring as well as Biblical stories like the account of The Flood points to the urgency of changes that need to be made here and now in the way we all live our lives.

(See Looking at Rachel Carson (at St. Luke's "School for Prophets") )






I'm grateful to my friend, Jim Barton, for framing the problem in a way that is adequately broad, and yet contains a measure of hope.  It's about the future, and whether we have one -- or can construct one -- he said.  Young people today are asking: Do I have an economic future? Does the planet have a future? Will (nuclear) war extinguish everybody's future?

(See A FUTURE: Can we construct one? )