"Raymond Arritt" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>...
>
> Alastair McDonald wrote:
>
> > The point is that for
> > every winner from change there is a loser.
>
> Why so? Is there any reason to expect, a priori, that all persons who
> are positively affected by change must have an equal (or greater) number
> of counterparts who are negatively affected?
This seems like a good place to insert a point I might have made in a reply
to the OP if not coming so late.
There is a danger of talking at cross purposes here. James seems to be
talking about "change" as impacts to human habits, society, infrastructure
etc. As such I would agree with him that change is not necessarily bad at
all, it could even be a great oppurtunity. But when I hear people bemoaning
the catastrophic consequences of climate change (often my own voice echoing
back to me!) I always take it to mean damage and destruction of ecosystems,
loss of biodiversity, droughts and floods.
I think it is kind of shallow to take reassurance in the adaptability of
humans to all kinds of climates. After all, humans live all over the globe,
from the Kalihari Desert to Greenland to Amazonian jungles. So, cleary no
matter what happens to the climate, humans could in theory adapt and live.
And I don't mean that as returning to a life style of the Bushman or Inuit,
we can keep our technology.
But the danger to humans is not a direct one, it comes indirectly from our
reliance, often hidden between so many layers of infrastructure or
manufacture, on the very same biosphere that definately is in direct danger.
Even here, change is indeed a part of natural evolution but it is not simply
a change that is cause for worry, it is the fact the the change we are
setting in motion is potentially very large and more critically very rapid.
If the biosphere suffers greatly human kind will be changed, and it will be
a change that can only be a struggle to adapt to, there are no winners to
compensate for the thousands of extinctions.
I often hear people say that all we need are the few dozen species of plants
we eat, some cattle and pigs, maybe a few species of flowers just for fun,
the rest of the biosphere be damned. My strongest negative reaction to that
vision of the future is an emotional and personal one and I have trouble
knowing for sure whether or not I have any particular right to force my
love, fascination and respect for the natural world on others. But the next
reaction is a more practical one, in that I think this would be a truly
difficult feat of bioengineering technology to create and live in such a
world. I just think the unforeseen difficulties and consequences would be
enormous.
Back to does "change = bad". I think "rapid change = bad for biosphere" is
unarguble. Now, how exactly that effects people is a bit more murky, but I
see no reason to think it will be anything but hard to extremely difficult.
Coby
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