original: John Newton (1725-1807)
revised: danny bloom (1949-2032)
SUNG TO THE OLD TUNE OF ''AMAZING GRACE''
Amazing Race
-- new lyrics for an old song --
Amazing race, how cool we are
A long-lived family tree.
We are one on Earth unbound
Once born, we breathe, we see.
O human race there's naught to fear
life's one sweet journey true
How precious is each day we live
You! and you! and you!
Though many dangers, toils and snares
Lurk behind the doors of fear
Yes, we ARE one amazing race
and science brings us nearer.
There is no God and that's okay
We just must stand up tall
And fight injustice where'er it lies.
We're connected, one and all
But when our flesh and hearts do fail,
As mortal life does end,
The human race goes on and on
and love wil last, my friend.
We've been here tens of millions of years
And more, till the end of time.
So wipe away those silly tears
Be strong, be good, be kind.
Saturday, October 29, 2011
Israel and climate change in the future: will there even be an Israel there? Most likely not. Wake up, o ye of little vision! COMMENTS WELCOME TOO! ALL POV WELCOME
http://www.sdjewishworld.com/2011/10/29/beware-the-globally-warmed-future/
excerpt
In two important news articles about climate change (“How much more proof is needed for people to act” and “Ignoring the future — the psychology of denial”), the importance of facing major issues that will confront the future of the Jewish people were emphasized. Not only is the state of Israel threatened by climate change and rising sea levels, but the descendants of Jews around the world — wherever they live: North America, Europe, New Zealand, South Africa, Australia, Latin America — will be under threat.
Climate change is indeed an issue that is on everyone’s mind today, and Jewish scientists and Jewish thinkers will be on the front line of
these issues in the future, too.
The world as we know it today may very well not be the world of tomorrow, and the very survival of the Jewish people, as a people, will be at stake. And more: the very existence of the human species, our kind, homosapiens, will be on alert.
Despite most observers thinking that solutions lie in mitigation ideas, there are a growing number of Jewish climatologists and scientists who believe that the A-word — adaptation — must be confronted head-on, too. The fact is, despite the head-in-the-sand protestations of climate denialists, we cannot stop climate change or global warming.
Friday, October 28, 2011
The Jewish people must face scenario of 'climate change' chaos in future times
The Jewish people must face the very real scenario of millions of 'climate change
refugees' in dire peril in future times
In two important news articles about climate
change ("How much more proof is needed for people to act" and
"Ignoring the future -- the psychology of denial"), the importance of
facing major issues that will confront the future of the Jiewsh people
were emphasized. Not only is the state of Israel threatened by climate
change and rising sea levels, but the descendants of Jews around
the world -- wherever they live: North America, Europe, New Zealand,
South Africa, Australia -- will be under threat.
Climate change is indeed an issue that is on everyone's mind today,
and Jewish scientists and Jewish thinkers will be on the front line of
these issues in the future, too.
The world as we know it today may very well not be the world of
tomorrow, and the very survival of the Jewish people, as a people,
will be at stake. And more: the very
existence of the human species, our kind, homosapiens, will be on alert.
Despite most observers thinking that solutions lie in mitigation
ideas, there are a growing number of Jeiwsh climatologists and
scientists who believe that the A-word -- adaptation -- must be
confronted head-on, too. The fact is, despite the head-in-the-sand
protestations of climate denialists -- which some observers compare
Holcaust deniers as well -- we cannot stop climate change or global
warming.
The Earth's atmosphere has already passed the tipping point, and in
the next 100 to 300 years, temperatures will rise considerably, sea
levels will rise considerably and millions, even billions, of people
from the tropical and temperate zones of the Earth will be forced to
migrate north in search of food, fuel and shelter. This is where Jews
in particular, will play central roles.
By the year 2200, Israel could be no more. The entire Middle East will
have been abandonned for polar cities up north in Scandanavia, Russia
and Canada. Alaska, too.
Alaska and New Zealand and Tasmania could be home to millions, even
billions, of climate refugees from India and China and other Asia
nations who will have migrated north and south, seeking safe harbor
from the devastating impact of global warming in those future times.
Are the Jewish people, in Israel and in the Diaspora, ready for this?
Many parts of the world's coastlines will be under water, and many
northern countries will find themselves home to new kinds of visitors
from Asia and Europe. Just ask
Laurence C. Smith at UCLA; he wrote a book about this, setting his
story in 2050. These climate refugees won't be coming on cruise ships
or airplanes, since there will be no fuel for such services. They will
be coming by rudimentary sailing vessels and barges. Prepare
yourselves. It could be Noah's Ark all over again. It could be God's
Judgement all over again, if you
believe in such things.
Jews must be prepared for the worst-case scenario. By 2500, millions,
billions of people will have been forced to leave their home countries
in the tropical and temperate zones and migrate south en masse to
faraway southern regions to find shelter in United Nations-funded
climate refuges in northern places. Lifeboat Israel? Forget it.
Israel will be no more, if
climate chaos gets as bad as British scientist James Lovelock says it
well. Lovelock is 90, and he says he's ''an optimist''. Say that
again? Is he using Jewish humor there
It won't be a pretty picture -- what's coming, that is. Am I a
prophet? No. Am I a visionary? No. I am just a Jewish realist looking
directly at what's most likely coming our way in the distant
future. I'm prepared. My Jewish upbringing and Jewish education has
prepared me to face reality. I realize not everyone agrees with me on
these ideas, but that's par for the course when you
go out on a limb and try to sound the alarm. And I am not talking
about a posh golf course here. Enough of that! I am talking about the
future of our people Israel! Is anyone concerned about that?
Humans cannot engineer our way out of global warming, although
scientists who believe in geo-engineering have offered their theories
on how to do it. There are no easy fixes.
Humankind has put too many greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, the
result of the industrial revolution that gave us trains, plans and
automobiles - and much more to live comfortable and trendy lives - and
now there is so much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere that the Earth
cannot recover. Forget trying to be more "green" in our daily lives.
Israel and the Jewish people is doomed, like the rest of the world, to
a very bleak future. The Bible does not even come close to what is in
store for us all.
What we need to focus on now is preparing future generations for what
our world will become in the next 100 to 300 years and how best to
survive it. The national legislatures of all countires need to start
thinking about these issues. Now. In many ways, it's already too late?
How's that for optimism? And I am an optimist, yes!
For the next 100 years or so, life will go on as normal in Israel and
North America, so don't worry too much. There is nothing to worry
about now. For the next 100 years, posh department stores will
continue to hawk their trendy items, international computer firms will
continue to launch their latest cell phones and tech gadgets, and
airline companies will continue to offer passengers quick passage here
and there, to the Maldives and to Manhattan, for business and for
pleasure.
But in the next 500 years, according to Lovelock and other scientists
-- many of whom are Jewish -- who are not afraid to think outside the
box, things are going to get bad. Unspeakably bad. Those of us who are
alive today won't suffer, and the next few generations of humans will
be fine, too. The big troubles will probably start around 2200 -
Lovelock says sooner - and last for some 300 years or so. By 2200,
Israel and the entire Middle East will be uninhabitable and
uninhabited. Mark my words. I am not joking here.
Prepare yourselves, o ye who think this is all science fiction. In
fact, this is science fact!
We are entering uncharted waters, and as the waters rise and the
temperatures go up as well, future generations of the Jewish people
will have some important choices to make: where to live, how to live,
how to grow food, how to power their climate refugee settlements, how
to plan and how to pray. Alaska will be on the front lines of this new
world. Canada and Russia, too. The question is: will the human race be
ready for what is going to be the most trying time of our very
existence on this Earth?
NOTE:
This blog is the founder of the Polar Cities Project, (http://pcillu101.blogspot.com/
). It would be nice to say the author here is kidding,
but apparently he's not.
refugees' in dire peril in future times
In two important news articles about climate
change ("How much more proof is needed for people to act" and
"Ignoring the future -- the psychology of denial"), the importance of
facing major issues that will confront the future of the Jiewsh people
were emphasized. Not only is the state of Israel threatened by climate
change and rising sea levels, but the descendants of Jews around
the world -- wherever they live: North America, Europe, New Zealand,
South Africa, Australia -- will be under threat.
Climate change is indeed an issue that is on everyone's mind today,
and Jewish scientists and Jewish thinkers will be on the front line of
these issues in the future, too.
The world as we know it today may very well not be the world of
tomorrow, and the very survival of the Jewish people, as a people,
will be at stake. And more: the very
existence of the human species, our kind, homosapiens, will be on alert.
Despite most observers thinking that solutions lie in mitigation
ideas, there are a growing number of Jeiwsh climatologists and
scientists who believe that the A-word -- adaptation -- must be
confronted head-on, too. The fact is, despite the head-in-the-sand
protestations of climate denialists -- which some observers compare
Holcaust deniers as well -- we cannot stop climate change or global
warming.
The Earth's atmosphere has already passed the tipping point, and in
the next 100 to 300 years, temperatures will rise considerably, sea
levels will rise considerably and millions, even billions, of people
from the tropical and temperate zones of the Earth will be forced to
migrate north in search of food, fuel and shelter. This is where Jews
in particular, will play central roles.
By the year 2200, Israel could be no more. The entire Middle East will
have been abandonned for polar cities up north in Scandanavia, Russia
and Canada. Alaska, too.
Alaska and New Zealand and Tasmania could be home to millions, even
billions, of climate refugees from India and China and other Asia
nations who will have migrated north and south, seeking safe harbor
from the devastating impact of global warming in those future times.
Are the Jewish people, in Israel and in the Diaspora, ready for this?
Many parts of the world's coastlines will be under water, and many
northern countries will find themselves home to new kinds of visitors
from Asia and Europe. Just ask
Laurence C. Smith at UCLA; he wrote a book about this, setting his
story in 2050. These climate refugees won't be coming on cruise ships
or airplanes, since there will be no fuel for such services. They will
be coming by rudimentary sailing vessels and barges. Prepare
yourselves. It could be Noah's Ark all over again. It could be God's
Judgement all over again, if you
believe in such things.
Jews must be prepared for the worst-case scenario. By 2500, millions,
billions of people will have been forced to leave their home countries
in the tropical and temperate zones and migrate south en masse to
faraway southern regions to find shelter in United Nations-funded
climate refuges in northern places. Lifeboat Israel? Forget it.
Israel will be no more, if
climate chaos gets as bad as British scientist James Lovelock says it
well. Lovelock is 90, and he says he's ''an optimist''. Say that
again? Is he using Jewish humor there
It won't be a pretty picture -- what's coming, that is. Am I a
prophet? No. Am I a visionary? No. I am just a Jewish realist looking
directly at what's most likely coming our way in the distant
future. I'm prepared. My Jewish upbringing and Jewish education has
prepared me to face reality. I realize not everyone agrees with me on
these ideas, but that's par for the course when you
go out on a limb and try to sound the alarm. And I am not talking
about a posh golf course here. Enough of that! I am talking about the
future of our people Israel! Is anyone concerned about that?
Humans cannot engineer our way out of global warming, although
scientists who believe in geo-engineering have offered their theories
on how to do it. There are no easy fixes.
Humankind has put too many greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, the
result of the industrial revolution that gave us trains, plans and
automobiles - and much more to live comfortable and trendy lives - and
now there is so much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere that the Earth
cannot recover. Forget trying to be more "green" in our daily lives.
Israel and the Jewish people is doomed, like the rest of the world, to
a very bleak future. The Bible does not even come close to what is in
store for us all.
What we need to focus on now is preparing future generations for what
our world will become in the next 100 to 300 years and how best to
survive it. The national legislatures of all countires need to start
thinking about these issues. Now. In many ways, it's already too late?
How's that for optimism? And I am an optimist, yes!
For the next 100 years or so, life will go on as normal in Israel and
North America, so don't worry too much. There is nothing to worry
about now. For the next 100 years, posh department stores will
continue to hawk their trendy items, international computer firms will
continue to launch their latest cell phones and tech gadgets, and
airline companies will continue to offer passengers quick passage here
and there, to the Maldives and to Manhattan, for business and for
pleasure.
But in the next 500 years, according to Lovelock and other scientists
-- many of whom are Jewish -- who are not afraid to think outside the
box, things are going to get bad. Unspeakably bad. Those of us who are
alive today won't suffer, and the next few generations of humans will
be fine, too. The big troubles will probably start around 2200 -
Lovelock says sooner - and last for some 300 years or so. By 2200,
Israel and the entire Middle East will be uninhabitable and
uninhabited. Mark my words. I am not joking here.
Prepare yourselves, o ye who think this is all science fiction. In
fact, this is science fact!
We are entering uncharted waters, and as the waters rise and the
temperatures go up as well, future generations of the Jewish people
will have some important choices to make: where to live, how to live,
how to grow food, how to power their climate refugee settlements, how
to plan and how to pray. Alaska will be on the front lines of this new
world. Canada and Russia, too. The question is: will the human race be
ready for what is going to be the most trying time of our very
existence on this Earth?
NOTE:
This blog is the founder of the Polar Cities Project, (http://pcillu101.blogspot.com/
). It would be nice to say the author here is kidding,
but apparently he's not.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
DRAFT COVER book, files PRIVATE VIEWING ONLY, ..db, april 14, 2012
A Vision of Polar Cities in Oxford, Oxfordshire by "James Lovelock's accidental studnet"
OXFORD -- A pioneering yet mostly unheralded American climate activist
told an audience in a pub last night in Oxford, Oxfordshire that the
age of ''polar cities'' is fast coming upon us. The bloke, who often
introduces himself and did last night as "James Lovelock's accidental
student" -- since his ideas of polar cities for survivors of global
warming where residents
will serve as "breeding pairs in the Arctic" -- was speaking to an
audience at Scibar, a monthly scientific moot, at the Port Mahon pub
here.
The 62 year old climate activist was presenting
ideas from his book, ''A Vision of Polar Cities'', which will come out in
paperback in March next year.
He said: “There will come a time when billions of humans will die
in a massive human die off, and the world
will be reduced to just 200,000 souls trying desperately to survive in
about 100 isolated polar cities scattered around the northern
regions."
He said that
these ideas are not original and that they are not his, and that he
owes everything to the ideas of Dr Lovelock in Cornwall, who was in
the audience last night, too. Well,
his spirit was. The good scientist was resting comfortably at his home up north.
told an audience in a pub last night in Oxford, Oxfordshire that the
age of ''polar cities'' is fast coming upon us. The bloke, who often
introduces himself and did last night as "James Lovelock's accidental
student" -- since his ideas of polar cities for survivors of global
warming where residents
will serve as "breeding pairs in the Arctic" -- was speaking to an
audience at Scibar, a monthly scientific moot, at the Port Mahon pub
here.
The 62 year old climate activist was presenting
ideas from his book, ''A Vision of Polar Cities'', which will come out in
paperback in March next year.
He said: “There will come a time when billions of humans will die
in a massive human die off, and the world
will be reduced to just 200,000 souls trying desperately to survive in
about 100 isolated polar cities scattered around the northern
regions."
He said that
these ideas are not original and that they are not his, and that he
owes everything to the ideas of Dr Lovelock in Cornwall, who was in
the audience last night, too. Well,
his spirit was. The good scientist was resting comfortably at his home up north.
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
COULD THIS BE START OF REAL COLD WAR?
The US, Canada, Norway and Russia have all beefed up their naval presence in Arctic waters
Sunday October 23, 2080 AD
By Will Stewart
http://pcillu101.blogspot.com/
RUSSIA is to build an ultra-modern polar city on a frozen island inside the Arctic Circle in the Kremlin’s latest bid to back its claims to vast oil and gas reserves under the polar ice cap.
Named Umka after a popular Soviet-era cartoon polar bear cub, the city’s 5,000 residents will live under a vast dome to protect them from winter temperatures of well below -30C.
Architect Valery Rzhevskiy, who has shown the designs to Kremlin strongman Vladimir Putin, said: “This city will be of strategic importance as Russia’s northern outpost.”
Sources say it will house soldiers, border guards and secret service officers, as well as scientists and explorers, as Moscow gets serious about its claims to Arctic mineral riches.
All will enjoy a luxury lifestyle in the cocooned city, which will have its own specially regulated climate as well as a variety of other attractive features.
Mr Rzhevskiy added: “We aim to have laboratories, houses, but also parks, an Aqua complex, hotels and a cathedral. Naturally there will be schools, kindergartens, recreation zones, a hospital and sport facilities.
“We want people who will be living and working here not to realise they are in some closed space with an aggressive Arctic climate outside.”
Nicknamed “wonder city”, it will be built at a cost of up to £4billion on the remote island of Kotelny, in the Novosibirsk archipelago, 1,000 miles from the North Pole.
Strong winds make it one of the most inhospitable places on the planet. Even in July the temperature barely climbs above freezing.
The Umka designs are based on the International Space Station, but it is vast by comparison, just short of a mile long and 800 yards wide.
“So far it is the only project in the world with an artificial climate and integral life support, just like on the space station,” Mr Rzhevskiy said.
“Not only is it a new word in architecture but in human living too. We have used aero and space technologies while creating it.”
Electricity will be supplied by a floating nuclear power station. It will be totally self-sufficient with fish and poultry farms, greenhouses, a wheat processing factory and bakeries.
“There will not be any rubbish at all, as the city will have two factories converting it into all kinds of ashes.”
It will house workers for mines and oil platforms which should pay the costs of the development, it is claimed.
“This project is designed to work on any surface, even on the Moon if needed,” added Mr Rzhevskiy.
Although it has no fixed timetable for opening, the ice city plans come as all countries with territory touching Arctic waters are gearing up to submit competing demands to the United Nations for underwater mineral exploitation rights. Western countries were stung when, in 2007, Russian polar explorer Artur Chilingarov planted his country’s flag in the Arctic sea bed.
“We must prove the North Pole is an extension of the Russian land mass,” he said at the time.
A Canadian think-tank this year voiced fears of a risk of conflict over the area, saying “an arms race may be beginning”.
The US, Canada, Norway and Russia have all beefed up their naval presence in Arctic waters amid warnings of a new Cold War that really could turn out to be cold, except perhaps at Umka.
Sunday October 23, 2080 AD
By Will Stewart
http://pcillu101.blogspot.com/
RUSSIA is to build an ultra-modern polar city on a frozen island inside the Arctic Circle in the Kremlin’s latest bid to back its claims to vast oil and gas reserves under the polar ice cap.
Named Umka after a popular Soviet-era cartoon polar bear cub, the city’s 5,000 residents will live under a vast dome to protect them from winter temperatures of well below -30C.
Architect Valery Rzhevskiy, who has shown the designs to Kremlin strongman Vladimir Putin, said: “This city will be of strategic importance as Russia’s northern outpost.”
Sources say it will house soldiers, border guards and secret service officers, as well as scientists and explorers, as Moscow gets serious about its claims to Arctic mineral riches.
All will enjoy a luxury lifestyle in the cocooned city, which will have its own specially regulated climate as well as a variety of other attractive features.
Mr Rzhevskiy added: “We aim to have laboratories, houses, but also parks, an Aqua complex, hotels and a cathedral. Naturally there will be schools, kindergartens, recreation zones, a hospital and sport facilities.
“We want people who will be living and working here not to realise they are in some closed space with an aggressive Arctic climate outside.”
Nicknamed “wonder city”, it will be built at a cost of up to £4billion on the remote island of Kotelny, in the Novosibirsk archipelago, 1,000 miles from the North Pole.
Strong winds make it one of the most inhospitable places on the planet. Even in July the temperature barely climbs above freezing.
The Umka designs are based on the International Space Station, but it is vast by comparison, just short of a mile long and 800 yards wide.
“So far it is the only project in the world with an artificial climate and integral life support, just like on the space station,” Mr Rzhevskiy said.
“Not only is it a new word in architecture but in human living too. We have used aero and space technologies while creating it.”
Electricity will be supplied by a floating nuclear power station. It will be totally self-sufficient with fish and poultry farms, greenhouses, a wheat processing factory and bakeries.
“There will not be any rubbish at all, as the city will have two factories converting it into all kinds of ashes.”
It will house workers for mines and oil platforms which should pay the costs of the development, it is claimed.
“This project is designed to work on any surface, even on the Moon if needed,” added Mr Rzhevskiy.
Although it has no fixed timetable for opening, the ice city plans come as all countries with territory touching Arctic waters are gearing up to submit competing demands to the United Nations for underwater mineral exploitation rights. Western countries were stung when, in 2007, Russian polar explorer Artur Chilingarov planted his country’s flag in the Arctic sea bed.
“We must prove the North Pole is an extension of the Russian land mass,” he said at the time.
A Canadian think-tank this year voiced fears of a risk of conflict over the area, saying “an arms race may be beginning”.
The US, Canada, Norway and Russia have all beefed up their naval presence in Arctic waters amid warnings of a new Cold War that really could turn out to be cold, except perhaps at Umka.
UMKA follows the Polar Cities meme with a nice illustration of the future of a polar city design in Russia in 2080 AD
Umla is a bold vision and bravo for this kind of foward thinking. Readers might want to google "polar cities" as a theme and topic to my designs for 144 polar cities located in
northern climes within the next 500 years, possibly as early as 2080 AD! Deng Cheng-hong, google him, did the illustrations for me, and they point in the same direction as Umka. Thing is, life in a polar city, where as James Lovellock has said, survivors of climate chaos will live in rugged tragedy as breeding pairs in the Arctic, life in these polar cities will be technicolor and grooby as these designs show, but rather life will be mean, cruel and tragic. Out of 16 billion humans, only 200,000 will survive the coming climate catatrophes headed out way. Don't bury your head in the sand. wake up. Umka is another good wake up call. Larry Smith at UCLA will love this work too. Go go go......and go visit my polar cities pages online at
http://pcillu101.blogspot.com/
http://www.businessinsider.com/umka-russia-arctic-2011-10#comment-4ea6acee69bedd9246000032#ixzz1bnUYgSHV
ADAM TAYLOR at BusinessInsider.com touches on the polar city meme: hat tip to Torch Pratt in Taipei for the heads up!
A Look At 'Umka', The Domed Russian City Planned For Sub-Zero Arctic Temperatures
Adam Taylor
Oct. 24, 2080 A.D
.
Russia is planning to further it's reach in the Arctic circle, according to a statement from Vladimir Putin's website. The country has already made a bold appeal to the UN to annex some 380,000 square miles of Arctic seabed due to the existence of oil and gas in the area.
One plan for the region will involve special Arctic cities, or what Dany Bloom has been calling POLAR CITIES since he founded the Polar Cities Research Institute in 2006. GOOGLE. The first Russian polar city is proposed for a frozen Siberian island will be known as "Umka", housing 5,000 residents underneath a huge dome. The polar city will be spared from the harsh weather — -30 degrees Celsius in the winter with strong winds — by the dome, living instead in a sealed environment.
"Researchers could live there permanently rather than for short expeditions only," the developers said. "It is modeled after an imaginary Moon city or a completely isolated space station."
According to The Sunday Express in the UK, the polar city is expected to cost around US$6 billion, and will provide workers with a luxury environment.
“We aim to have laboratories, houses, but also parks, an Aqua complex, hotels and a cathedral. Naturally there will be schools, kindergartens, recreation zones, a hospital and sport facilities," one architect told the British paper.
So, Russians, how about it — a domed polar city in the Arctic circle?
http://i.nona.net/locmap_UMKA_20.1367222X44.5580556X20.4727222X44.7980556.png
Read more:
http://www.businessinsider.com/umka-russia-arctic-2011-10#ixzz1bnUmTIQ4
COULD THIS BE START OF REAL COLD WAR?
The US, Canada, Norway and Russia have all beefed up their naval presence in Arctic waters
October 23,2080 AD
By Will Stewart
RUSSIA is to build an ultra-modern polar city on a frozen island inside the Arctic Circle in the Kremlin’s latest bid to back its claims to vast oil and gas reserves under the polar ice cap.
Named Umka after a popular Soviet-era cartoon polar bear cub, the polar city’s 5,000 residents will live under a vast dome to protect them from winter temperatures of well below -30C.
Architect Valery Rzhevskiy, who has shown the designs to Kremlin strongman Vladimir Putin, said: “This city will be of strategic importance as Russia’s northern outpost.”
Sources say it will house soldiers, border guards and secret service officers, as well as scientists and explorers, as Moscow gets serious about its claims to Arctic mineral riches.
All will enjoy a luxury lifestyle in the cocooned city, which will have its own specially regulated climate as well as a variety of other attractive features.
Mr Rzhevskiy added: “We aim to have laboratories, houses, but also parks, an Aqua complex, hotels and a cathedral. Naturally there will be schools, kindergartens, recreation zones, a hospital and sport facilities.
“We want people who will be living and working here not to realise they are in some closed space with an aggressive Arctic climate outside.”
Nicknamed “wonder city”, it will be built at a cost of up to £4billion on the remote island of Kotelny, in the Novosibirsk archipelago, 1,000 miles from the North Pole.
Strong winds make it one of the most inhospitable places on the planet. Even in July the temperature barely climbs above freezing.
The Umka designs are based on the International Space Station, but it is vast by comparison, just short of a mile long and 800 yards wide.
“So far it is the only project in the world with an artificial climate and integral life support, just like on the space station,” Mr Rzhevskiy said.
SEARCH WORLD NEWS for:
“Not only is it a new word in architecture but in human living too. We have used aero and space technologies while creating it.”
Electricity will be supplied by a floating nuclear power station. It will be totally self-sufficient with fish and poultry farms, greenhouses, a wheat processing factory and bakeries.
“There will not be any rubbish at all, as the city will have two factories converting it into all kinds of ashes.”
It will house workers for mines and oil platforms which should pay the costs of the development, it is claimed.
“This project is designed to work on any surface, even on the Moon if needed,” added Mr Rzhevskiy.
Although it has no fixed timetable for opening, the ice city plans come as all countries with territory touching Arctic waters are gearing up to submit competing demands to the United Nations for underwater mineral exploitation rights. Western countries were stung when, in 2007, Russian polar explorer Artur Chilingarov planted his country’s flag in the Arctic sea bed.
“We must prove the North Pole is an extension of the Russian land mass,” he said at the time.
A Canadian think-tank this year voiced fears of a risk of conflict over the area, saying “an arms race may be beginning”.
The US, Canada, Norway and Russia have all beefed up their naval presence in Arctic waters amid warnings of a new Cold War that really could turn out to be cold, except perhaps at Umka.
Friday, October 21, 2011
Polar City Dreaming (iamges of our future)
These photos and pics dovetail nicely with our " polar cities" ideas, which come directly from Dr James Lovelock in the UK, We almost called them Lovelock Cities in honor of the great man, but he asked us not to, so polar cities they are for now....google the term and see what my artist has come up with..... polar cities are for survivors of climate chaos in the coming centuries, around 2100 to 2500 AD, if there is an A.D. then, sigh, and these photos above are perfect for polar city dwellers will need to survive. I envision 144 polar cities all over the northlands, and some in New Zealand, Tasmania and Antartctica too. and get ready: a friend is writing a sci fi, .....cli-fi .......novel, now, as we speak, ttiled "Polar City Life" and it's a fictional exploration of life in these polar cities.....circa the distant future. Much of the action will take place, if you use your imagination, is residential buildings like this. SIGH.
http://pcillu101.blogspot.com/
Open Buildings - OpenBuildings is a community-driven encyclopedia of buildings from around the world. It is a database of historic, contemporary, and conceptual architecture that exists as a website
Close Sub-Zero Structures: Designing for Extreme Polar City Locations and Climate Chaos
http://www.theatlantic.com/life/archive/2011/10/sub-zero-structures-designing-for-extreme-locations-and-climates/246924/
From the Arctic Drifter to the Princess Elisabeth Antarctica Station, these buildings were made to provide comfort in the harshest of conditions. They will also be part of life during the POLAR CITY era, from 2100 to 3500 AD, when climate chaos threatens humankind with extinction. These lifeboats will save the day!
Designed to endure the extreme weather of the polar city era, these structures -- almost alien in appearance -- are like nothing we have seen before. Their unique aesthetic, however, is nothing more, and nothing less, than an honest response to the specific locations and climates in which they've been constructed. Their shells, as you can see, are completely stripped of the unnecessary or decorative, adornments that might be unfit for the harsh conditions of polar city life. Recent climate changes have presented extreme design with an even greater impetus to address adaptability and mobility, and it is a fact worth noting that these fascinating buildings have gradually grown more and more capable of providing their inhabitants with comfort and protection from the elements.
http://pcillu101.blogspot.com/
Close Sub-Zero Structures: Designing for Extreme Polar City Locations and Climate Chaos
http://www.theatlantic.com/life/archive/2011/10/sub-zero-structures-designing-for-extreme-locations-and-climates/246924/
From the Arctic Drifter to the Princess Elisabeth Antarctica Station, these buildings were made to provide comfort in the harshest of conditions. They will also be part of life during the POLAR CITY era, from 2100 to 3500 AD, when climate chaos threatens humankind with extinction. These lifeboats will save the day!
Designed to endure the extreme weather of the polar city era, these structures -- almost alien in appearance -- are like nothing we have seen before. Their unique aesthetic, however, is nothing more, and nothing less, than an honest response to the specific locations and climates in which they've been constructed. Their shells, as you can see, are completely stripped of the unnecessary or decorative, adornments that might be unfit for the harsh conditions of polar city life. Recent climate changes have presented extreme design with an even greater impetus to address adaptability and mobility, and it is a fact worth noting that these fascinating buildings have gradually grown more and more capable of providing their inhabitants with comfort and protection from the elements.
Thursday, October 20, 2011
filed under ''secret manuscript''
Fragments of a Story Interrupted - FICTION, repeat FICTION!
REPORT:
A Fragment of a Short Story Interrupted: Year 2516 A.D.
(c) 2008 Leinad Moolb
It has been a long ten years here in Fairbanks and I am glad I made it here in time. I have a lot to be thankful for, despite the dire straits dear humanity seems to have found itself in.
How did it come to this? We are still trying to connect the dots, to understand...
I heard that many people did not make to any of the existing polar cities on Earth, and that millions, perhaps billions perished. Oh dear God, dear God, the terror!
From what I understand the Universal GlobalGovernment now administers 50 polar cities in the north, and there isword that there are a few in the extreme south, too, but we lostcontact long ago. Each SPR, as we call them, for "sustainablepopulation retreat", has about 10,000 residents, young and old,butmostly young and middle aged, as we must allow the old people to dienatural deaths without medical assistance to prolong their lives. Wecannot afford to use the precious warehouses of food that we have tofeed the old and the sick. It is best to let them die, but we takepains to make their passing as painless as possible. Yes, it'shorrible, but we must survive. This is the only way that we know now.
We have locally grown food here and medical services, schools for the children, a library of sorts, a picture and photo center, and lots of boredom. I mean, how many ways can you spell b o r e d o m? Backwards, moderob, forwards, a few amusing anagrams, there are just seven letters you know. This is a bit what life is like here . There just isn't very much to do. Our main mission is to survive, breed, prepare for the eventual return down south. But nobody has any idea when that will be, if ever.
Still, believe me, I'm not complaining. I'm glad to be alive, I am sure we all are, to have survived the great cull. Some wags are calling The Great Cull with capital letters for each word, as if it was some pre-ordained cosmic event. I don't know, I don't know. Of course, it wasn't. It was just fate -- "fate working overtime", as my father used to tell me.
Dad's gone now. Mom, too, We don't live a long time here, and anyone who makes it to 50 is considered elderly. We just can't afford to keep everyone alive. Things are different now. We have had to learn to play by different rules, different mores.
So many things have happened here in the last 10 years that I hardly know where to begin. First of all, I got married, to a beautiful Inuit girl, Iris Waputik, of the few surviving Inuits, as far as anyone can tell, Iris included. And Iris and I now have three children, our own little brood -- Jace, Rennard and Kobo. Our gifts to the future. If there is a future. You know, if there's one thing that we've learned in the last ten years it's that there is a future, there must be a future, we must live for that future, and yet, in my introspective moments, in my private time, I often wonder if there really will be a future very far on down the road. It's really not easy being here.
But it's true, as our teachers told us and still tell us, we must believe in the future, against all the odds, because -- because without a future, nothing makes much sense anymore. We've lost so much. An entire global civilization crumbled. An entire world went mad. It's not something I want to dwell on in this report, so I won't. But I just want whoever is reading this report, where ever, when ever, I just want you to know that those of us who are called survivors now, we are grateful. We are grateful to be alive, to be carriers of the next generation, of being the caretakers of humanity.
I guess there are about 200,000 of us, maybe 500,000, scattered across these polar cities. There's no real census and communication with most of the other polar cities is chaotic at times. But those of us who made it this far, yes, we are indeed grateful. I think you could call it a community feeling. In fact, gratitude and acts of gratitude have become a large part of our lives here.
But I can't even begin to tell you the truth. It's not a pretty picture. The old world we hear about in stories seems to be a thing of a past we cannot comprehend.
DIARY NOTES:
Sometimes at night, I find myself talking to myself, while my wife and the child are asleep in the room. What do I say? Here:
How did it come to this?
I honestly don't know.
Was it the CO2, the coal, what?
I have no idea.
Maybe it was peak oil.
So many things went wrong.
Some many people were in denial.
They didn't know what hit them.
They weren't ready.
Nobody helped them to get ready.
There was no way to know.
I'm still not sure what hit us.
Who knew? Who knows?
I'm banking on hope. I remain hopeful.
For what? It's an impossible future now.
I think we can undo what we've done.
How?
I'm still thinking about it.
Are you?
Yes, I am.
Keep thinking.
I am.
I will.
Are you an optimist or a pessimist?
Hope is that things with wings.
Emily Dickinson.
Who was that?
A poet.
When? Where?
Long ago.
In another place.
Before polar cities?
Before this, yes.
Saturday, October 8, 2011
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Hamish MacDonald, author of FINITUDE, a novel about future climate chaos in an un-named country, talks about climate change, media awareness and fiction writing
Hamish MacDonald, the Canadian author of FINITUDE who is now based in Scotland, has written a powerful novel that depicts people trying to survive in dystopian post-apocalypse times, and the book makes it clear that we humans are very implicit in our own human-made disasters. Human-made global warming is at the top of our radar screens now, with James
Lovelock and Mark Lynas and George Monbiot and James Hansen, not to
mention, Al Gore, making sure we don't ignore the issues.
When MacDonald was asked what his take is on global warming and what can we do -- if anything -- to try to stop
it from causing devastating climate chaos in the distant future, he replied: "I think we're just starting to see the effects of our [human] impact on the
ecosystem. In 500 years, we'll be well-settled into whatever's next,
what comes after this. The big concern is the adjustment to the new
'normal' - and from this vantage-point, I don't think anyone can say
what that'll be. This is a chaotic system we're talking about, so
there are no simple "A+B=C" conclusions we can make.
Of course, some people naturally jump straight from that to "Oh, then
it's all just made up. Let's ignore it then." That's just stupid. All
the arguments for doing nothing fail the very simple test of Pascal's
Wager. The changes that leading environmental thinkers are asking us
to make would have so many long-run social and economic benefits that
the only defence against them is intellectual laziness and
intransigence, like sticking your fingers in your ears and singing La
la la.
It's also difficult to separate our personal feelings from this issue.
I find much of consumer culture nauseating, so it's easy to secretly
wish for our society to get a spanking from the universe for our
excesses. This kind of moralising is probably what 'deniers' really
object to, and I can't blame them for that.
In the end, this is all a bit like our reaction when a young person
dies: yes, it's a tragedy, but that tragedy is usually set against a
make-believe story of the world in which that person would never have
died if it weren't for this accident, disease, or choice.
Likewise, I've heard it said that we're the lucky couple of
generations going through an "Anthropocene Era", when conditions on
life happen to be ideal for us. But it hasn't always been this way,
and, with the Earth being a system in constant flux, Gaia might
transition into something hostile anyway. Fast-forward far enough into
the future and total entropy will make the entire universe
uninhabitable, and all evidence of us will be erased in a sea of
energy-less ash.
Hardly the kind of thing anyone wants to imagine over their morning
bowl of cereal.
Still, the changes being asked of us aren't really that big in the
grand scheme of things - if only we could stop getting distracted by
economic crises and wars, both of which are complete fabrications over
which we have total control. At this point in history, we have every
chance to make this short-term period turn out well, but my fear is
that we might just be too stupid to take it."
When asked why the mainstream media, even book reviewers, are staying clear of discussing the real possibility of climate chaos in the future and even mocking those who go out on a limb and push the proverbial envelope, MacDonald said: "I suppose they're reacting unconsciously to an outcome that they
either can't imagine or don't want to imagine as a possibility. The
easiest way to save oneself from having to engage with an idea is to
ridicule the source."
Whena asked by this blogger what kind of feedback he received from readers and reviewers on his
''Finitude'' book, he replied: ''This is why I set ''Finitude'' in an alternate, yet very similar, world: I
didn't want to come across as a finger-wagging moralist, but to tell a
fun story that just happened to contemplate this huge, important
issue.
I think you've chosen well here by giving people an unrecognisable
world with the warm familiarity of a Western. That trope helps readers
understand how the world works, but will also underscore the
differences between that world and ours. These books sound like
they'll be a lot of fun.
My recommendation to anyone writing about a Big Issue like this is to
keep coming back to the characters and let the message and the
importance drift back into a subconscious place while writing. Nobody
likes getting a lecture in their fiction like a rock at the bottom of
their popcorn. As someone once said to me, "Where there is contention
there is never understanding."
What makes a good novel about climate change and global warming? MacDonald noted: "People will accept anything if it's presented with its own coherent
logic, contains vivid imagery, moves ahead at a good clip, and
features compelling personalities whom we care about."
MacDonald added: "I guess it depends what a fiction writer's agenda is. If he wants to make people
take action on climate issues, is fiction the way to do it? Maybe a writer can plant the seed
of an idea and really make people feel the issue in their bones. That
is really important right now, and we're not getting that deeply -
especially now that the news is doing its level best to make us all
scared witless about our day-to-day survival, as if we're all
permanently locked into an abusive relationship with this sociopathic
banking system.''
And how have readers reacted to FINIUDE? The author said: "The CEO of an environmental group in Scotland told me a few weeks ago
that he'd read Finitude and loved it. That meant a lot to me. I think
we could really use good entertainment about issues that matter,
rather than re-re-reworked plots about dinosaurs, robots, and aliens.
Not that I'm dissing science fiction; I just think it's capable of so
much more than it's being asked to do lately.''
When this blogger told MacDonald that he really enjoyed reading FINITUDE and has re-read it ten times since he received in the mail a year ago: "Thanks very much. I'm really happy you liked "Finitude" so much.
I think you're onto great territory for fiction when you start asking
questions like "What if?" and "Why not?"
As for the reaction or the effect, that's not really something we have
much say over as writers. People will react how they react, and it's
not really our business. Our business is to write what's true to our
hearts, and if others like it, more's the good. If they don't… well,
better we should be true than try to produce something just to be
popular or to try to manipulate others' minds without taking care or
responsibility.''
When asked why the MSM has not done a good job covering climate change
and the real possibility of major disasters befalling humankind, and not just with Hollywood disasgter movies, MacDonald said: "The mass media are stupid, that's why. Someone once said, "The
evening news is the bad news so the commercials can be the good news."
The media, like politicians, will rarely lead. They follow because
that's what pays most securely; they're a barometer for what people
are already doing and thinking - which begins with the work of
visionaries, few of whom are ever recognised in their lifetimes.
I'm not trying to aggrandise you and me here, but I do share the general
perplexity that so many people and institutions are so steadfastly
ignoring this giant, obvious thing right in front of us. It's great
that you hold this hope that we'll do something and survive. Myself, I
don't know. Maybe we'll come together in a beautiful period of
cooperation and vision. Or maybe we'll simply shop ourselves to death.
We imagine it'll be this huge blow to our quality of life to make the
changes being asked of us - in spite of endless evidence about human
happiness says that owning a lot of stuff doesn't contribute to
happiness at all, and probably diminishes it because it distracts us
from ourselves, each other, and the world around us.
In a cosmic sense, it doesn't matter. None of this will ultimately
survive. So it's simply up to us to choose what we want our experience
to be right now. But such a choice involves first becoming conscious
of the issue before us. In this case, it isn't whether or not "global
warming" is real, but about whether we want to keep living in violent
opposition to the system of life that supports our existence. The
particulars of this or that bit of science are irrelevant. It's about
the choice. Unfortunately, in the context of a two-minute news piece,
that choice doesn't matter. It only matters when you lift your head,
look around, and think.''
Email exchange interview between Hamish MacDonald, author of FINITUDE, and Danny Bloom, director of the Polar Cities Research Institute
Hamish MacDonald is the Canadian author of a powerful book about future climate chaos, titled FINITUDE, and it a book well worth reading. He lives in Scotland. Dan Bloom is an American climate activist based in Taiwan.
Dan Bloom: Your novel ''Finitude'' depicts people trying to survive in
dystopian post-apocalypse times, and the book makes it clear that we
humans are very implicit in our own human-made disasters. Human-made
global warming is at the top of our radar screens now, with James
Lovelock and Mark Lynas and George Monbiot and James Hansen, not to
mention, Al Gore, making sure we don't ignore the issues. What is your
take, Hamish, on global warming and what can we do now to try to stop
it from causing devastating climate chaos in some distant future, say
500 years from now? Or do you think things will happen sooner than
that, sooner than 30 generations from now?
Hamish McDonald: I think we're just starting to see the effects of our impact on the
ecosystem. In 500 years, we'll be well settled into whatever's next,
what comes after this. The big concern is the adjustment to the new
'normal' - and from this vantage-point, I don't think anyone can say
what that'll be. This is a chaotic system we're talking about, so
there are no simple "A+B=C" conclusions we can make.
Of course, some people naturally jump straight from that to "Oh, then
it's all just made up. Let's ignore it then." That's just stupid. All
the arguments for doing nothing fail the very simple test of Pascal's
Wager. The changes that leading environmental thinkers are asking us
to make would have so many long-run social and economic benefits that
the only defence against them is intellectual laziness and
intransigence, like sticking your fingers in your ears and singing La
la la.
It's also difficult to separate our personal feelings from this issue.
I find much of consumer culture nauseating, so it's easy to secretly
wish for our society to get a spanking from the universe for our
excesses. This kind of moralising is probably what 'deniers' really
object to, and I can't blame them for that.
In the end, this is all a bit like our reaction when a young person
dies: yes, it's a tragedy, but that tragedy is usually set against a
make-believe story of the world in which that person would never have
died if it weren't for this accident, disease, or choice.
Likewise, I've heard it said that we're the lucky couple of
generations going through an "Anthropocene Era", when conditions on
life happen to be ideal for us. But it hasn't always been this way,
and, with the Earth being a system in constant flux, Gaia might
transition into something hostile anyway. Fast-forward far enough into
the future and total entropy will make the entire universe
uninhabitable, and all evidence of us will be erased in a sea of
energy-less ash.
Hardly the kind of thing anyone wants to imagine over their morning
bowl of cereal.
Still, the changes being asked of us aren't really that big in the
grand scheme of things - if only we could stop getting distracted by
economic crises and wars, both of which are complete fabrications over
which we have total control. At this point in history, we have every
chance to make this short-term period turn out well, but my fear is
that we might just be too stupid to take it.
Dan: For the past 5 years, I have been exploring the concept of
"polar cities" as climate refuges for climate refugees in some distant future, perhaps around the year 2500 AD. But for some
reason, I cannot get the mainstream media in the USA or the UK to
report on my admittedly eccentric and also admittedly "self-appointed
visionary" ideas on this. Why do you think the media is afraid to even
engage with me? Except for one small report in a blog on the New York
Times "Dot Earth" site a few years ago, which was mostly presented in
a humorous, "cute" way --which was fine with me — not one newspaper or
magazine or website in North America or Europe or Australia will talk
with me. Nobody will interview me or present my ideas for polar
cities, pro or con? Why do you think this is, this silence about
"polar cities"? Of course, I am not famous, and I have no PHD and am
not connected with any university or group, so I basically do not
exist for the mainstream media's criteria since I am not an "expert."
I accept all that. But why can't even one newspaper or magazine or
website engage with me about polar cities, as a mere idea? What are
they so afraid of?
Hamish: I suppose they're reacting unconsciously to an outcome that they
either can't imagine or don't want to imagine as a possibility. The
easiest way to save oneself from having to engage with an idea is to
ridicule the source.
Dan: I envision polar cities serving as climate refuges for
climate refugess in the northern regions of the world around 500 years
from now. James Lovelock is my teacher here, and I got the idea
indirectly from him, and he knows of my work on polar cities and has
even seen my illustrations and proposals by email. He wrote back to me
by email two years ago: "Thanks for sharing your polar cities ideas
and images with me. It may very well happen.... and soon!" But I
cannot get the mainstream media or any serious reporter anywhere in
the world to interview me on this topic. So I decided to write a novel
about polar cities, a trilogy really, with a working title now of
"Polar City Red: Arrival" -- followed by Polar City Blue: Awakening"
and finally "Polar City Green: Going Home." I am working with a
published novelist in Texas on the books, and I intend the stories to
be both entertainment and instruction. I want the books to be first of
all, a very good yarn, wonderful storytelling and pure entertainment.
The stories are set in the distant future, in 2500 AD, when the world
population has been reduced from 25 billion to just 200,000 men and women and children living desperate lives in a few
scattered "polar cities" in the north, from Alaska to Canada to
Russia. And in New Zealand and Tasmania, too. But the story I want to
tell will take place in North America. I don't
want to scare people. I want to first, entertain readers, and then
have the books also serve as an alarm bell, a warning, about global
warming, about how if we do not take action now to stop climate
change, then polar cities might become a reality.
I don't want polar cities to ever become a reality. Do you think
readers -- and reviewers -- will go for this kind of storytelling?
What kind of feedback in this regard did you get from readers on your
Finitude book?
Hamish: This is why I set ''Finitude'' in an alternate, yet very similar, world: I
didn't want to come across as a finger-wagging moralist, but to tell a
fun story that just happened to contemplate this huge, important
issue.
I think you've chosen well here by giving people an unrecognisable
world with the warm familiarity of a Western. That trope helps readers
understand how the world works, but will also underscore the
differences between that world and ours. These books sound like
they'll be a lot of fun.
My recommendation to anyone writing about a Big Issue like this is to
keep coming back to the characters and let the message and the
importance drift back into a subconscious place while writing. Nobody
likes getting a lecture in their fiction like a rock at the bottom of
their popcorn. As someone once said to me, "Where there is contention
there is never understanding."
Dan: Readers often respond to dystopian novels with the thought
of "Oh no, it can't happen here." For example, people
find it hard to believe that anyone could even imagine a novel where a
corporation send a virus through the world via sex pills. They simply
don't want to believe it. Do you think people could be drawn into a
well-told story about polar cities serving as lifeboats, as saviors of
humankind? Or is all that nonsense to people today?
Hamish: People will accept anything if it's presented with its own coherent
logic, contains vivid imagery, moves ahead at a good clip, and
features compelling personalities whom we care about.
Dan: I have envisioned polar cities for use 500 years from now,
30 human generations from now, not now. Now, life is wonderful. No
need to worry. Yet, I worry about the distant future. I feel that a
novel about polar cities just might help the media to get used to the
idea and maybe start broaching the subject with newspaper and magazine
readers. Not science fiction, but a kind of dytopia fiction, a bit of
Mad Max mixed in with Cormac McCarthy's "The Road." Do you think there
are readers out there who would go for such a book, even as mere
entertainment and fiction? How did readers react to YOUR book?
Hamish: I guess it depends what your agenda is. If you want to make people
take action, is fiction the way to do it? Maybe you can plant the seed
of an idea and really make people feel the issue in their bones. That
is really important right now, and we're not getting that deeply -
especially now that the news is doing its level best to make us all
scared witless about our day-to-day survival, as if we're all
permanently locked into an abusive relationship with this sociopathic
banking system.
The CEO of an environmental group in Scotland told me a few weeks ago
that he'd read Finitude and loved it. That meant a lot to me. I think
we could really use good entertainment about issues that matter,
rather than re-re-reworked plots about dinosaurs, robots, and aliens.
Not that I'm dissing science fiction; I just think it's capable of so
much more than it's being asked to do lately.
Dan: I sometimes call myself "James Lovelock's Accidental
Student." Because it was a remark he made in an interview in 2006 that
gave rise to my thinking about polar cities. He said that in the
future there might be "breeding pairs in the Arctic" after global
warming had caused billions of people to die off in unimagiable
disasters caused by climate chaos. He said there might
be just 200,000 people left on Earth, mostly in the north, and they
would serve as breeding pairs to keep the human species going in the
far north. I said to myself: so where will these breeding pairs live,
in what kind of homes or villages? And the image of polar cities came
into my mind, back in 2006, and I began furiously blogging about them.
But nobody has ever taken me seriously. Only Dr Lovelock has replied to me. Everyone else in the field of climate
research and climate studiea ignores me. They think I am nuts. Five
hundred years from now? They don't want to think that far ahead.
Finitude was also in a distant future. And I loved your book. What's
holding people back, do you think?
Hamish: Thanks very much. I'm really happy you liked "Finitude" so much.
I think you're onto great territory for fiction when you start asking
questions like "What if?" and "Why not?"
As for the reaction or the effect, that's not really something we have
much say over as writers. People will react how they react, and it's
not really our business. Our business is to write what's true to our
hearts, and if others like it, more's the good. If they don't… well,
better we should be true than try to produce something just to be
popular or to try to manipulate others' minds without taking care or
responsibility.
Dan: Most people only care about their present lives, their
families and loved ones and friends now, and their children and
grandchildren of course. But every few people, and especially
politicians who set policy, care about what happens beyond three
generations from now -- or the next election cycle. This is what I am
up against with my polar cities ideas. Very few people want
to go that far ahead, to 2500 AD. Why do you think that is? What holds
people back?
Hamish: You nailed it there: we don't like to think that far out, because then
we enter the realm of imagining ourselves and the people we love not
being around, which makes us feel either sad or indifferent.
Personally, I have to admit that 2500AD is unimaginable to me. To
care, I'd have to get some glimpse of who'd be there, or be given some
concrete image of life then that I could anchor my imagination to.
Dan: Someone asked me once why I care so much about human life
500 years from now. It was actually a newspaper reporter who was
interviewing for me for a big story about polar cities three years ago
-- until his editor killed the piece before publication, without any
explanation other than that I was a nobody and my ideas were pure
nonsense -- and he asked me why I was so concerned about life in the
year 2500. I told him that I cared because I am worried that the great
human experiment on Earth, our long story on Earth, might face
extinction 30 generatiosn from now if we don't take action now to stop
global warming in its tracks. That means dialing back in a big way on
our current lifestyles and changing our manufacture/consume/waste
lifestyle into something that's better for the planet as a whole. Yet,
very few people want to go down that road. I do. I already started
walking on it. I no longer fly in airplanes, haven't flown since 1983,
really. I haven't driven a car for 20 years. I own a bicycle, that's
all. And I care deeply about a future that I am not going to be here
to see. I had a heart attack two years ago and my days are numbered
now. I could go anytime. Certainly before 2030. So my polar cities
ideas and books are intended as a cri de couer. i think you understand
what I am saying here, but why do you think it is so hard to get the
mass media to pay attention to future scenarios that may not be rosy
but are at the same time anchored in a climate reality?
Hamish: The mass media are stupid, that's why. As someone once said, "The
evening news is the bad news so the commercials can be the good news."
The media, like politicians, will rarely lead. They follow because
that's what pays most securely; they're a barometer for what people
are already doing and thinking - which begins with the work of
visionaries, few of whom are ever recognised in their lifetimes.
I'm not trying to aggrandise you and me here, but I do share your
perplexity that so many people and institutions are so steadfastly
ignoring this giant, obvious thing right in front of us. It's great
that you hold this hope that we'll do something and survive. Myself, I
don't know. Maybe we'll come together in a beautiful period of
cooperation and vision. Or maybe we'll simply shop ourselves to death.
We imagine it'll be this huge blow to our quality of life to make the
changes being asked of us - in spite of endless evidence about human
happiness says that owning a lot of stuff doesn't contribute to
happiness at all, and probably diminishes it because it distracts us
from ourselves, each other, and the world around us.
In a cosmic sense, it doesn't matter. None of this will ultimately
survive. So it's simply up to us to choose what we want our experience
to be right now. But such a choice involves first becoming conscious
of the issue before us. In this case, it isn't whether or not "global
warming" is real, but about whether we want to keep living in violent
opposition to the system of life that supports our existence. The
particulars of this or that bit of science are irrelevant. It's about
the choice. Unfortunately, in the context of a two-minute news piece,
that choice doesn't matter. It only matters when you lift your head,
look around, and think.
Dan Bloom: Your novel ''Finitude'' depicts people trying to survive in
dystopian post-apocalypse times, and the book makes it clear that we
humans are very implicit in our own human-made disasters. Human-made
global warming is at the top of our radar screens now, with James
Lovelock and Mark Lynas and George Monbiot and James Hansen, not to
mention, Al Gore, making sure we don't ignore the issues. What is your
take, Hamish, on global warming and what can we do now to try to stop
it from causing devastating climate chaos in some distant future, say
500 years from now? Or do you think things will happen sooner than
that, sooner than 30 generations from now?
Hamish McDonald: I think we're just starting to see the effects of our impact on the
ecosystem. In 500 years, we'll be well settled into whatever's next,
what comes after this. The big concern is the adjustment to the new
'normal' - and from this vantage-point, I don't think anyone can say
what that'll be. This is a chaotic system we're talking about, so
there are no simple "A+B=C" conclusions we can make.
Of course, some people naturally jump straight from that to "Oh, then
it's all just made up. Let's ignore it then." That's just stupid. All
the arguments for doing nothing fail the very simple test of Pascal's
Wager. The changes that leading environmental thinkers are asking us
to make would have so many long-run social and economic benefits that
the only defence against them is intellectual laziness and
intransigence, like sticking your fingers in your ears and singing La
la la.
It's also difficult to separate our personal feelings from this issue.
I find much of consumer culture nauseating, so it's easy to secretly
wish for our society to get a spanking from the universe for our
excesses. This kind of moralising is probably what 'deniers' really
object to, and I can't blame them for that.
In the end, this is all a bit like our reaction when a young person
dies: yes, it's a tragedy, but that tragedy is usually set against a
make-believe story of the world in which that person would never have
died if it weren't for this accident, disease, or choice.
Likewise, I've heard it said that we're the lucky couple of
generations going through an "Anthropocene Era", when conditions on
life happen to be ideal for us. But it hasn't always been this way,
and, with the Earth being a system in constant flux, Gaia might
transition into something hostile anyway. Fast-forward far enough into
the future and total entropy will make the entire universe
uninhabitable, and all evidence of us will be erased in a sea of
energy-less ash.
Hardly the kind of thing anyone wants to imagine over their morning
bowl of cereal.
Still, the changes being asked of us aren't really that big in the
grand scheme of things - if only we could stop getting distracted by
economic crises and wars, both of which are complete fabrications over
which we have total control. At this point in history, we have every
chance to make this short-term period turn out well, but my fear is
that we might just be too stupid to take it.
Dan: For the past 5 years, I have been exploring the concept of
"polar cities" as climate refuges for climate refugees in some distant future, perhaps around the year 2500 AD. But for some
reason, I cannot get the mainstream media in the USA or the UK to
report on my admittedly eccentric and also admittedly "self-appointed
visionary" ideas on this. Why do you think the media is afraid to even
engage with me? Except for one small report in a blog on the New York
Times "Dot Earth" site a few years ago, which was mostly presented in
a humorous, "cute" way --which was fine with me — not one newspaper or
magazine or website in North America or Europe or Australia will talk
with me. Nobody will interview me or present my ideas for polar
cities, pro or con? Why do you think this is, this silence about
"polar cities"? Of course, I am not famous, and I have no PHD and am
not connected with any university or group, so I basically do not
exist for the mainstream media's criteria since I am not an "expert."
I accept all that. But why can't even one newspaper or magazine or
website engage with me about polar cities, as a mere idea? What are
they so afraid of?
Hamish: I suppose they're reacting unconsciously to an outcome that they
either can't imagine or don't want to imagine as a possibility. The
easiest way to save oneself from having to engage with an idea is to
ridicule the source.
Dan: I envision polar cities serving as climate refuges for
climate refugess in the northern regions of the world around 500 years
from now. James Lovelock is my teacher here, and I got the idea
indirectly from him, and he knows of my work on polar cities and has
even seen my illustrations and proposals by email. He wrote back to me
by email two years ago: "Thanks for sharing your polar cities ideas
and images with me. It may very well happen.... and soon!" But I
cannot get the mainstream media or any serious reporter anywhere in
the world to interview me on this topic. So I decided to write a novel
about polar cities, a trilogy really, with a working title now of
"Polar City Red: Arrival" -- followed by Polar City Blue: Awakening"
and finally "Polar City Green: Going Home." I am working with a
published novelist in Texas on the books, and I intend the stories to
be both entertainment and instruction. I want the books to be first of
all, a very good yarn, wonderful storytelling and pure entertainment.
The stories are set in the distant future, in 2500 AD, when the world
population has been reduced from 25 billion to just 200,000 men and women and children living desperate lives in a few
scattered "polar cities" in the north, from Alaska to Canada to
Russia. And in New Zealand and Tasmania, too. But the story I want to
tell will take place in North America. I don't
want to scare people. I want to first, entertain readers, and then
have the books also serve as an alarm bell, a warning, about global
warming, about how if we do not take action now to stop climate
change, then polar cities might become a reality.
I don't want polar cities to ever become a reality. Do you think
readers -- and reviewers -- will go for this kind of storytelling?
What kind of feedback in this regard did you get from readers on your
Finitude book?
Hamish: This is why I set ''Finitude'' in an alternate, yet very similar, world: I
didn't want to come across as a finger-wagging moralist, but to tell a
fun story that just happened to contemplate this huge, important
issue.
I think you've chosen well here by giving people an unrecognisable
world with the warm familiarity of a Western. That trope helps readers
understand how the world works, but will also underscore the
differences between that world and ours. These books sound like
they'll be a lot of fun.
My recommendation to anyone writing about a Big Issue like this is to
keep coming back to the characters and let the message and the
importance drift back into a subconscious place while writing. Nobody
likes getting a lecture in their fiction like a rock at the bottom of
their popcorn. As someone once said to me, "Where there is contention
there is never understanding."
Dan: Readers often respond to dystopian novels with the thought
of "Oh no, it can't happen here." For example, people
find it hard to believe that anyone could even imagine a novel where a
corporation send a virus through the world via sex pills. They simply
don't want to believe it. Do you think people could be drawn into a
well-told story about polar cities serving as lifeboats, as saviors of
humankind? Or is all that nonsense to people today?
Hamish: People will accept anything if it's presented with its own coherent
logic, contains vivid imagery, moves ahead at a good clip, and
features compelling personalities whom we care about.
Dan: I have envisioned polar cities for use 500 years from now,
30 human generations from now, not now. Now, life is wonderful. No
need to worry. Yet, I worry about the distant future. I feel that a
novel about polar cities just might help the media to get used to the
idea and maybe start broaching the subject with newspaper and magazine
readers. Not science fiction, but a kind of dytopia fiction, a bit of
Mad Max mixed in with Cormac McCarthy's "The Road." Do you think there
are readers out there who would go for such a book, even as mere
entertainment and fiction? How did readers react to YOUR book?
Hamish: I guess it depends what your agenda is. If you want to make people
take action, is fiction the way to do it? Maybe you can plant the seed
of an idea and really make people feel the issue in their bones. That
is really important right now, and we're not getting that deeply -
especially now that the news is doing its level best to make us all
scared witless about our day-to-day survival, as if we're all
permanently locked into an abusive relationship with this sociopathic
banking system.
The CEO of an environmental group in Scotland told me a few weeks ago
that he'd read Finitude and loved it. That meant a lot to me. I think
we could really use good entertainment about issues that matter,
rather than re-re-reworked plots about dinosaurs, robots, and aliens.
Not that I'm dissing science fiction; I just think it's capable of so
much more than it's being asked to do lately.
Dan: I sometimes call myself "James Lovelock's Accidental
Student." Because it was a remark he made in an interview in 2006 that
gave rise to my thinking about polar cities. He said that in the
future there might be "breeding pairs in the Arctic" after global
warming had caused billions of people to die off in unimagiable
disasters caused by climate chaos. He said there might
be just 200,000 people left on Earth, mostly in the north, and they
would serve as breeding pairs to keep the human species going in the
far north. I said to myself: so where will these breeding pairs live,
in what kind of homes or villages? And the image of polar cities came
into my mind, back in 2006, and I began furiously blogging about them.
But nobody has ever taken me seriously. Only Dr Lovelock has replied to me. Everyone else in the field of climate
research and climate studiea ignores me. They think I am nuts. Five
hundred years from now? They don't want to think that far ahead.
Finitude was also in a distant future. And I loved your book. What's
holding people back, do you think?
Hamish: Thanks very much. I'm really happy you liked "Finitude" so much.
I think you're onto great territory for fiction when you start asking
questions like "What if?" and "Why not?"
As for the reaction or the effect, that's not really something we have
much say over as writers. People will react how they react, and it's
not really our business. Our business is to write what's true to our
hearts, and if others like it, more's the good. If they don't… well,
better we should be true than try to produce something just to be
popular or to try to manipulate others' minds without taking care or
responsibility.
Dan: Most people only care about their present lives, their
families and loved ones and friends now, and their children and
grandchildren of course. But every few people, and especially
politicians who set policy, care about what happens beyond three
generations from now -- or the next election cycle. This is what I am
up against with my polar cities ideas. Very few people want
to go that far ahead, to 2500 AD. Why do you think that is? What holds
people back?
Hamish: You nailed it there: we don't like to think that far out, because then
we enter the realm of imagining ourselves and the people we love not
being around, which makes us feel either sad or indifferent.
Personally, I have to admit that 2500AD is unimaginable to me. To
care, I'd have to get some glimpse of who'd be there, or be given some
concrete image of life then that I could anchor my imagination to.
Dan: Someone asked me once why I care so much about human life
500 years from now. It was actually a newspaper reporter who was
interviewing for me for a big story about polar cities three years ago
-- until his editor killed the piece before publication, without any
explanation other than that I was a nobody and my ideas were pure
nonsense -- and he asked me why I was so concerned about life in the
year 2500. I told him that I cared because I am worried that the great
human experiment on Earth, our long story on Earth, might face
extinction 30 generatiosn from now if we don't take action now to stop
global warming in its tracks. That means dialing back in a big way on
our current lifestyles and changing our manufacture/consume/waste
lifestyle into something that's better for the planet as a whole. Yet,
very few people want to go down that road. I do. I already started
walking on it. I no longer fly in airplanes, haven't flown since 1983,
really. I haven't driven a car for 20 years. I own a bicycle, that's
all. And I care deeply about a future that I am not going to be here
to see. I had a heart attack two years ago and my days are numbered
now. I could go anytime. Certainly before 2030. So my polar cities
ideas and books are intended as a cri de couer. i think you understand
what I am saying here, but why do you think it is so hard to get the
mass media to pay attention to future scenarios that may not be rosy
but are at the same time anchored in a climate reality?
Hamish: The mass media are stupid, that's why. As someone once said, "The
evening news is the bad news so the commercials can be the good news."
The media, like politicians, will rarely lead. They follow because
that's what pays most securely; they're a barometer for what people
are already doing and thinking - which begins with the work of
visionaries, few of whom are ever recognised in their lifetimes.
I'm not trying to aggrandise you and me here, but I do share your
perplexity that so many people and institutions are so steadfastly
ignoring this giant, obvious thing right in front of us. It's great
that you hold this hope that we'll do something and survive. Myself, I
don't know. Maybe we'll come together in a beautiful period of
cooperation and vision. Or maybe we'll simply shop ourselves to death.
We imagine it'll be this huge blow to our quality of life to make the
changes being asked of us - in spite of endless evidence about human
happiness says that owning a lot of stuff doesn't contribute to
happiness at all, and probably diminishes it because it distracts us
from ourselves, each other, and the world around us.
In a cosmic sense, it doesn't matter. None of this will ultimately
survive. So it's simply up to us to choose what we want our experience
to be right now. But such a choice involves first becoming conscious
of the issue before us. In this case, it isn't whether or not "global
warming" is real, but about whether we want to keep living in violent
opposition to the system of life that supports our existence. The
particulars of this or that bit of science are irrelevant. It's about
the choice. Unfortunately, in the context of a two-minute news piece,
that choice doesn't matter. It only matters when you lift your head,
look around, and think.
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