Editor:
In your Jan. 15 front-page story, James Pawley states that the recent Paris Climate Summit is more important than the 1919 Treaty of Versailles. It is no such thing. As with most events connected with the UN, it was an opportunity for a lot of self-important politicians to enjoy an all-expenses-paid trip in order to spout meaningless platitudes on a topic about which most know absolutely nothing. If indeed carbon emissions have any impact at all on climate change, then how can one possibly justify the tonnes of carbon spewed into the atmosphere by the planes used to make the trip and the gas-guzzling limousines used to provide transportation?
Mr. Pawley claims that scientific testing and analysis has shown that human activity is having an impact on shifts in climate. I can equally claim that such research has shown no such thing, as the jury is still very much out on the question. Of course, to disagree with Mr. Pawley’s official party line is considered to be heresy of the worst kind to be punished by vilification in the media.
The fact is that climate changes – always has and always will – and to talk of fighting climate change is irresponsible at best and arrant nonsense at worst. This is akin to King Canute commanding the tides to stop.
What we can do is to accept the fact that the climate is changing due to causes about which we know very little and then figure out how best to adapt to those changes and alter our behaviour in order to create less waste and less pollution.
Instead of spending billions of dollars in a pointless exercise of “fighting climate change,” use that money to assist in adapting to that inevitable change.
I should also point out that there is a school of thought that considers one aspect of climate change – that of global warming, if indeed there is such a phenomenon – to be a positive thing.
It is arrogant of humankind to think that today’s climate should remain as it is. Nothing on earth is unchanging, and we must accept this, adapt and move on.
Buzz Bennett, Gibsons
