Basic conceptual problems due to being in a state of alarm
International efforts against climate change historically focused on the mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere as this is the origin of the problem. This is analogous to the moral obligation of conserving cultural heritage or natural parks as human activities have an adverse effect on our thin and already fragile atmosphere. The moral maxim of the land ethic defined by Callicott as “A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.”11Callicott, J. Baird (2014). Thinking Like a Planet: The Land Ethic and the Earth Ethic . Oup Usa. pp. 3. provides us a reference for using virtues such as humility and wonder towards nature and respecting our climate as a life supporting and regulating system.
However, there are many actions that still threaten the integrity and stability of nature and contradicts the findings of climate scientists. Imagine a family taking a ferry in the Bosphorus Strait enjoying the winds blowing the wings of seagulls and watching them diving in the surface waters preying on fish. Independently of their orientation of values which could be egoistic, hedonistic or biospheric, there is an aesthetic value in their experience that contributes to their utility.
One might argue that seagulls are higher-level animals with their beautiful feathers and athletic maneuvering capability which could be considered for extension of the intrinsic value of humans. But science shows that seagulls are at the top level of a complex web of relations between the atmosphere and the oceans which all depend on tiny phytoplanktons as the source of primary production. We can only notice these phytoplanktons when their populations artificially bloom from additional nutrient inputs to the oceans. However, they are also affected by oceanic currents forming their habitat for production which can be damaged as a result of human actions resulting in reduced primary production.
When we take into consideration the temporal dimension of humans and seagulls, scientific evidence presents different tracks for their evolution. We know that birds as we know them evolved from their ancestor theropod dinosaurs which struggled to survive the Cretaceous mass extinction 60 million years ago. Humans along with other mammals took this mass extinction event as an opportunity and evolved throughout the oceans and lands of earth growing in their population and their skills for adaptation. Although the ancestors of humans and seagulls were rivals during their geological history, their destiny during the Holocene epoch both depend on the extents of a future climate change22References to the information in this section on continental reconstructions, mass extinctions and biodiversity are included in the EarthViewer educational software which can be accessed fromhttps://www.biointeractive.org/classroom-resources/earthviewer..
Including the abiotic systems to this relationship spatially focusing on the Bosphorus Strait reduces the temporal scale to approximately 7000 years before present with the formation of the dynamic system between the Black Sea and the Sea of Marmara after the retreat of glacials towards higher latitudes. Long before our human civilizations emerged and flourished, nature was both the source and the locus of value through the relationships providing homage to humans and their communities with nature. The earth has already faced five mass extinction events during its geological history each time recovering with a higher number of biodiversity. However, the earth is entering a new geological epoch after the Holocene while preventing climate change focuses on utilizing the welfare for mitigating and adapting to climate change.
The family taking the ferry boat knowing themselves, nature and their geological history would be aware of the requirement to conserve the integrity, stability and beauty of these relationships. As humans are only a temporal agent in the complex web of geological and biological relations we have no other option but to respect nature with humility and wonder towards the magnificence of life which originated long before our evolution. Our communities have extended to include the biogeochemical interactions of the earth as we have evolved to become on of the main radiative forcing on our earth. As humans struggle to survive during the geological epochs of our earth, our moral responsibility is towards our own species whereas our survival depends on our relationship with nature.
Yet our efforts for the protection of the climate are ineffective as surface temperatures on land systems have risen nearly twice as much 33IPCC, 2019: Summary for Policymakers. In: Climate Change and Land: an IPCC special report on climate change, desertification, land degradation, sustainable land management, food security, and greenhouse gas fluxes in terrestrial ecosystems [P.R. Shukla et al. (eds.)]. In press. and oceans have taken up 90% of the excess heat 44IPCC, 2019: Summary for Policymakers. In: IPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate [H.-O. Portner et al. (eds.)]. In press. from our warming climate system since the pre-industrial period. As a result, climate science focuses both on mitigative efforts for the protection of the unknown future but also on adaptative efforts for protection of the immediate posterity. However, the adaptation choices range from socially acceptable planting of mangroves in shallow coasts to prevent tsunamis to socially controversial geoengineering methods for balancing the radiative energy budget of the earth (Gifford, 2011). But our efforts to mitigate the impacts of climate change require international collaboration based on individual preferences to reduce carbon emissions.
The scenario development for climate change is criticized for neglecting the feed-backs from nature to human socio-economic development (Rosaet al. , 2017). These feed-backs could be positive on a utilitarian scale in case nature services contribute to the development or negative in case of irreversible damage such as the collapse of fisheries or landscape changes turn fertile into non-arable land. Also, these pathways still resemble the continuation of human history whereas the history of nature already moved from taming the non-human wilderness into protecting our human environment in the 20th century.