Thanks Der, good comment. A lot of people will be thinking something similar. Sue C is telling us to be a bit more charitable? Which is fair enough, I'd agree. But I think it's like this.

7th October, Did hundreds of people deserve to die, be maimed or kidnapped by Hamas operatives in Gaza. Of course not, no-one deserves to die a violent horrible death however inflicted, by fellow man or by act of God

But did the state of Israel deserve its comeuppance that day? Of course it did. .

Do any of those rich folks losing their lives, property, memories, ease, deserve what's happening to them? Of course not. Can we and should we feel aghast and full of sympathy for them, Of course we should

But you know, when Fort McMurray burnt to a crisp along with hundreds of people or Paradise, I did have this horrible guilty and disturbing thought, I thought, well, maybe if enough people lose their lives in such a ghastly way, when they lose their property and comfort and ease, perhaps that would be a sufficient warning to humanity, to our leaders, our businesses, and our ordinary citizenry, enough is enough, we have to stop pretending, we have to take note, we have to change our ways. Perhaps a horrible event if sufficiently large and damaging would actually be something useful and yet save us all. .

Pious thought, though, wasn't it John Monro? If the world can stand by and watch in real time tens of thousands being slaughtered in Gaza, which we could actually do something very easily to stop, like, for instance, a single phone call from Biden to Netenyahu, how are we going to deal with global warming, which requires a total reset of the way we now run our lives, a total reset of humanity's hubris and inexhaustible wants and desires, and a full retreat from its it's ultimately fatal irrational optimism and addiction to technological progress, it's emotional immaturity and retreat to violence.

And in Los Angeles, in that burning ghetto of unimaginable wealth, we see the rich suffer what the poor suffer all over the world all the time, I have this horrible distressing inhuman feeling of some sort of fate taking charge. I hate myself for it, but it's like a one of those musical brain worms, I can't easily rid myself of it. . Those folk, whose carbon emissions probably outweigh those of most poor people by a hundred or a thousand to one, well, that is something that anyone with a philosophical bent might wish to ponder.

https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/WO2501/S00073/hell-of-a-year-greenpeace-comments-on-hottest-year-on-record-the-first-to-exceed-15c.htm

Yep, 1.5 deg C rise attained this year. As I wrote in 2015 after Paris, that agreement was another pious promise. That was the promise of keeping temperature rise below 1.5deg by 2100, We are there already, and we have 75yrs further to go. Hansen says global warming is accelerating, I concur, other scientist say no proof. Current rate of rise is three times what it was in the first part of last century, now 0.2 deg / decade = 1.4 deg more by 2100 = 2.9 deg by 2100 only if no further acceleration. But that's nonsense, if it's accelerating now, it'lll accelerate even more, that's the nature of the exponential function.





Add in that the landmasses of the northern hemisphere are increasing in temperature at nearly twice the global rate,, you're looking at 5+ deg C rise affecting 80% of the world's population. This will be unsurvivable to hundreds of millions, perhaps billions of people.

Sorry to say this, but we're stuffed.

Dr Martin Luther King had some wise words on this. In his speech, describing the "Fierce urgency of Now" You will all know these words, but they're worth remembering, although it is too late to do so. .

" This is no time for apathy or complacency. This is a time for vigorous and positive action.”

"We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time. Life often leaves us standing bare, naked and dejected with a lost opportunity. The “tide in the affairs of men” does not remain at the flood; it ebbs. We may cry out desperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is deaf to every plea and rushes on. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residue of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words: “Too late.” There is an invisible book of life that faithfully records our vigilance or our neglect. “The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on…” We still have a choice today; nonviolent coexistence or violent co-annihilation."

And all I can add, now I've just passed by 78th birthday are these final verses of Edward Fitzgerald's first (and best) edition of his free translation of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam (from where "the moving finger writes" - where it continues "and having writ, moves on. Nor all thy piety nor wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line , nor all they tears wash out a word of it" (I used to know and recite the whole Rubaiyat off by heart and can still quote most of it)

Ah, with the Grape my fading Life provide,
And wash my Body whence the Life has died,
And in a Windingsheet of Vine-leaf wrapt,
So bury me by some sweet Garden-side.

That ev'n my buried Ashes such a Snare
Of Perfume shall fling up into the Air,
As not a True Believer passing by
But shall be overtaken unaware.

Indeed the Idols I have loved so long
Have done my Credit in Men's Eye much wrong;
Have drown'd my Honour in a shallow Cup,
And sold my Reputation for a Song.

Indeed, indeed, Repentance oft before
I swore - but was I sober when I swore ?
And then and then came Spring, and Rose-in-hand
My thread-bare Penitence apieces tore.

And much as Wine has play'd the Infidel,
And robb'd me of my Robe of Honour - well,
I often wonder what the Vintners buy
One half so precious as the Goods they sell.

Alas, that Spring should vanish with the Rose
That Youth's sweet-scented Manuscript should close !
The Nightingale that in the Branches sang,
Ah, whence, and whither flown again, who knows !

Ah Love ! could thou and I with Fate conspire
To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire,
Would not we shatter it to bits - and then
Re-mould it nearer to the Heart's Desire !

Ah, Moon of my Delight who know'st no wane,
The Moon of Heav'n is rising once again:
How oft hereafter rising shall she look
Through this same Garden after me - in vain!

And when Thyself with shining Foot shall pass
Among the Guests Star-scatter'd on the Grass,
And in thy joyous Errand reach the Spot
Where I made one - turn down an empty Glass !

So lads and lasses fill a cup for me, and yourselves, just for the sake of it, though I don't intend to go just yet. I will go at some indeterminate but approaching future time to be buried in the first cresting wave of us baby boomers as human flotsam washing in to shore, and more sadly indeed as the first cresting wave of humanity's fate in a simmering planet.