Righteousness won’t solve global warming

Loading up the global warming argument with righteousness is harming the cause, says a blogger at the Philospher’s Beard.

“The moralisation approach undermines itself since it frames climate change narrowly in terms of righteousness. Inevitably deliberation about action gets bogged down in an interminable blame-game about what justice requires – who had their industrial revolution first, etc.”

The writers, who believe global warming is a real problem that demands action, prefers that world leaders find more practical approaches to the problem, taking account of consequences and effects, costs and benefits.

“This is an essentially pragmatic approach – breaking the ‘end of the world’ into human-sized and human-relevant problems and solutions and ordering them by their importance, feasibility and (opportunity) costs.

“The pragmatic approach does not depend on reaching an impossible global agreement on a perfect solution requiring moral or political coercion. Instead it offers feasible paths through the moral storm while respecting the existing interests and values of the human beings concerned.”