Dan Gilbert is a professor of Happiness at Harvard who is very worried about global warming. He notes that humans are particularly ill suited to meeting the climate change threat.
Human brains uniquely UN-suited to detecting long term threats.
Most all threats have:
1. Face-reading in other people. Not climate change
2. Intentional acts provoke reactions. (not climate change)
3. Moral outrage.. visceral emotions lacking (atmospheric chemistry, antisocial, murdered puppies)
4. Clear and present dangers. Humans have very little brain capacity for pondering the future.
5. Humans sensitive to relative changes, not absolute (boil the frog) hard to accept slow changes
AGW not happening fast enough.
“I think good things are happening to me and will continue. I am not optimistic about the rest of the species, but I’m so blessed, it’s almost scary. I’m sorry to
disappoint you, but I have a wildly sunny disposition. I love to laugh. My book is full of jokes.”
Gilbert is the happiness science guru.. offers a wake up warning:
http://poptech.org/popcasts/?viewcastid=163
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/9/27/12312/0380
http://www.global-catastrophic-risks.com/docs/Chap01.pdf
http://plausiblefutures.wordpress.com/category/existential-threats/
http://www.global-catastrophic-risks.com/
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/9/27/12312/0380
http://www.randomhouse.com/kvpa/gilbert/excerpts.html
http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2007/05.17/08-royal.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/22/science/22conv.html
http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/~dtg/gilbert.htm