If you want to influence people around to your way of thinking then firstly you have to make some sort of empathetic connection with them. Bjorn Lomberg knows that. He also knows if he talks common sense he will get a favourable response.
For example ask an impoverished mother struggling to survive whether she would rather have food for her children this week or go without for the sake of climate change the answer is obvious. Bjorn Lomberg is right, our current needs take preference over the future.
Talk about how no one wants to give up creature comforts like heated houses, cars and air travel if they can help it and you’ll them nodding their heads. Again Lomberg is right.
But tell a room of environmentalists and activists that you believe like they do that we are responsible however for global warming and we should be investing full speed ahead in sustainable energy like geo-engineering – in fact anything effective and that’s when people get very angry with him. In fact walk out of meetings as they did last night at the RSA event chaired by the Duke of Edinburgh – stormed out without even a backward glance at the Prince.
Why? Because he causes the same sort of irritation as someone who damns with faint praise. 'Global warming is a problem but it is not that much of an issue,' is his view. There, there. Which is probably worse than the declaring himself a global warming sceptic. He sounds so plausible he can actually upset people more.
For example, how their hard earned taxes are being squandered on inefficiencies and green schemes that are useless. And how they are being manipulated and duped into thinking they are doing the right thing.
There is even some common sense in his vision that if people want to do ‘the right thing’ more people in the developing countries could be helped today by doing the opposite to what everyone is banging on about; reducing emissions. Maybe, just maybe he is right and that we are obsessed with this one panacea. Cut carbon, save the world. As he says quite correctly more people may die from heat as a result of global warming, but less perish from cold. So there could be some positive spin to our warming planet. All stuff which is perfectly plausible.
However, it is at that point where he becomes offensive by suggesting that all efforts on carbon reduction are futile and that public relations movements like Kyoto agreements are no more than hypocritical and costly gestures. As he goes on to elaborate, if we were interested in saving mankind then we would do so the way he suggests. If we want to stop people dying from heat, we can give them air conditioning. Concerned about malaria, pay for drugs.
But the problem is that he avoids the central issue. That empathising with people’s immediate concerns will only work so far. How no one can accurately foretell the tipping point, when our greed for natural resources drives us too far. How none of us will ultimately benefit from our continued use of irreplaceable natural resources. And if it hadn’t been for these dramatic scenarios – possibly a little overdone - we would not have begun the good trend of environmental concern that is genuinely underway. People the world over are now are aware that we need energy sources other than fossil fuels. The world population is aware that our rainforests are precious, that our coral reefs are poisoned and that sea levels will rise as glaciers melt.
And whatever personal preferences we hold for helping out those in need it should not veer from our focus of stemming climate change.
Hopefully we can continue discussing the way forward with an open mind and an optimistic attitude.
