In 2016, we published an original, hopeful article on our climate change future and evolution. Many of the ideas in our original article are now being mirrored in a new article by the MIT Press Reader.
Our article is below, and you will find a link to the new MIT article below our article.
Our article might even make you think about your whole life in a unique, more positive, and adaptive way.
Prologue
This page presents the essential “Big Picture” evolutionary benefits and perspectives that are critical to offset the ongoing, alarming news about the global warming extinction threat and an impending widespread global collapse of many of our social and ecological systems. (If you have not read the 13 biggest global crises driving the global collapse process, please do so now so you understand what humanity is facing.
This page will also help you see the eventual longer-term evolutionary benefits, possibilities, and framework for a Great Global Rebirth, but only if we fail to manage the accelerating global warming emergency and bring a great Global Collapse.
This page will also help demonstrate that we have not given up hope on fixing climate change at Job One by any means. We remain hopeful that together we can rise to these very challenging and real emergencies.
Introduction
It is crucial to one’s mental and emotional well-being to view the global warming extinction emergency and these other key global crises from the broadest possible evolutionary perspective. Doing so will help prevent us from becoming wholly demoralized by the near-overwhelming size of the many challenges before us.
To understand our global warming emergency from this bigger-picture evolutionary perspective, it is necessary to present a short overview of the evolutionary history of Earth and a few relevant “success principles” from this amazingly successful evolution process. At first, this may seem a little nerdy. Still, you should glean enough insight from it to find significant emotional relief and a new, broader perspective on balancing the many challenges of our current 13 global crises.
Earth’s History of Successful Evolution
14.2 billion years of previous evolutionary success on Earth suggests we should be able to survive the global warming extinction emergency and our other key global crises. Through Earth’s five previous Great Extinctions events and our First Evolutionary Bottleneck (both described below), life has somehow managed to survive.
When one sees our current pathway toward extinction-level global warming from the perspective of 14.2 billion years of successful universe evolution, 4.5 billion years of successful planetary evolution, 3.5 billion years of successful biological evolution, and 10,000 years of successful human civilization, it once again puts things into perspective. From this long-term evolutionary perspective, encouraging facts, trends, and patterns emerge for addressing the steep adaptive challenges of the global warming extinction emergency and other key global crises.
In the five previous Great Extinction Events, 50-90% of all species that existed at the time became extinct. Yet, life and evolution continued by giving rise to new species, and some of these new species became the next dominant species.
Some of these five previous Great Extinction Events occurred slowly, taking many, many thousands of years. The recovery of species density and population after the Five Great Extinction Events took an average of 10 million years.
Retrogression, collapse, extinction, and renewal are all inherent to the evolutionary process. They are a natural and healthy part of our normal evolutionary process.
Looking at the broad time sweep of our whole evolutionary history, we do have a few other valid big-picture reasons to offer hope that we can rise to overcome humanity’s greatest adaptive challenge and evolutionary adventure:
a. What is unique today that did not exist in any of the previously mentioned Five Great Extinction Events is that our species can intelligently and rationally reflect upon its behavior and the principles of the evolutionary processes of the planet and universe it lives within. This species effectively gathers new knowledge and valuable feedback from its environment and is highly adaptable in modifying its behavior once it perceives a real threat.
Throughout history, this species has also organized cooperation on larger and larger scales. It has evolved from small hunter-gatherer groups to agrarian villages, warrior city-states, great nations, and international cooperative alliances of multiple countries, such as the European Union. This unique species, namely us, truly does have the best evolutionary advantage in resolving the current global warming emergency.
b. When one also looks at the evolution of the universe as a whole system, from its very beginning to the present, one sees recurring natural processes, principles, and patterns, which are also supportive of the idea that we as a species should be able to overcome our current global warming challenge. Two of those reassuring deep evolutionary patterns are:
i. Evolution seems to most often work first for the good of the evolving whole and
ii. Despite how it looks right now from smaller perspectives, the progress of evolution on Earth is currently the best it’s ever been! (At least from what we know and have seen from our little corner of the universe.)
This suggests that alignment with natural evolutionary processes should also help preserve at least enough of humanity and other species on the planet so that Earth’s evolutionary process can continue and we can learn from our current challenges.
Because evolution has progressed to “the best it’s ever been” and produced an amazingly adaptable and intelligent species—humanity—we really do still have the best chance of any species in Earth’s evolutionary history to meet the challenge of our worsening 12 global crises and cooperate in new ways to resolve them.
“Evolution is science’s greatest discovery, the most trial-and-error tested, time-proven sustainable success system that has ever existed, and it is the best-documented ‘theory of everything’ that currently exists.” — Lawrence Wollersheim.
Evolution tends to do everything simultaneously!
The many simultaneous actions of evolution:
Evolution tends to do everything simultaneously. In one place, it will move progressively forward; in another, it will be in a retrogression phase. In other areas, it will appear to meander seemingly without aim.
In another place, it will be moving into a state of destructive creation. Destructive creation is the breakdown and recycling of non-learning, non-adaptive, or “non-cooperating” parts or wholes.
Nothing is wasted in the universe’s evolution. This core meta-pattern of continuous breakdown and recycling allows evolutionary “failed experiments,” regressions, or other failed adaptations, collapses, and extinctions to be reused later in some other new evolutionary creativity and experiments—hence the term destructive creation.
In other places, evolution will appear to be holding a somewhat steady state. Elsewhere, it will appear to stop, stall, or fail (go extinct) in that line of evolutionary development.
Even though evolution is doing all of these things simultaneously, as a whole system, a general and natural progression is still occurring within the entire universe. Looking back over evolutionary history, evolution also appears to be naturally progressing in the direction of increased complexity, adaptability, learning, intelligence, cooperation, etc.
All this leads to the following bit of good news. In what can initially appear to be failing or stalling activities within the natural progression of any of evolution’s processes, silver linings also exist. Here are some of those silver linings as they emerge from the different processes of evolution, as it concerns global warming:
a. The destructive creation process of ongoing global warming can hasten and facilitate major structural and systemic changes that may not be possible by any means other than the complete destruction of non-adaptive parts or wholes!
b. The natural evolutionary compression and regression phases of escalating global warming can also facilitate or catalyze positive outcomes.
“Every adversity…carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit.” Author Unknown
The destructive creation process of global warming can hasten and facilitate necessary structural and systemic changes for a Great Rebirth that may not be possible by any other means.
Destructive creation is one of the key processes of evolution. Once all “non-learning,” non-adaptive, and “non-cooperating” parts or wholes involved in the global warming emergency are recycled by natural evolutionary processes, their resources can be reused and “reborn” later in new, more sustainable evolutionary experiments.
The following may seem complex and harsh, but this time-tested evolutionary principle has practical applications and sound reasons. For example, many individuals who have survived great catastrophes and collapses in their lives (periods of destructive creation) have said that the catastrophe or collapse gave them the chance to see aspects of their lives or their world that had been hidden behind veils of denial. They also said that their life catastrophe or collapse was essential at that time, as it finally gave them the opportunity to change, restructure, and take more responsibility for what they had discovered behind the veils of denial.
Historically, great catastrophes or collapses (destructive creations) have often also preceded a period of great renewal, advancement, growth, and rebirth. In the last Five Great Extinction Events that have occurred over the last 3 billion years on Earth, when 50-90% of all species died, some species have always adapted and survived. The world was reborn, and a new apex species, better equipped to deal with the new environment, always evolved.
As a simple cultural example of this idea, consider the Dark Ages and the Black Death—a combined millennium period that ended in the 14th century. The great destructive creation of this bleak period was eventually followed by the great advances and rebirth of the Enlightenment, a pivotal era in human history, during which modern science was born, among other remarkable developments.
If global warming continues to escalate unchecked, it will bring about its own natural period of evolutionary destructive creation. This destructive creation may manifest as a cleansing or realigning collection of superstorms, droughts, flooding, wildfires, soil degradation, changing growing seasons, and other global warming-related or interdependent catastrophes. Maybe we will even enter into a new kind of temporary “Dark Ages” period.
After this destructive creation phase, it will be far more likely that whatever remains of humanity will finally be ready to pay attention and learn the hard lessons about global warming that humanity currently seems reluctant to face and learn. To say the least, these new lessons would include building green energy generation, good atmospheric stewardship, sustainability, and better global cooperation.
If we have to go through this “necessary” but painful, destructive creation phase to resolve the global warming emergency, humanity will experience a simultaneous collective Holocaust-like “never again” trauma, but at a scale larger than any other in our history. This deep, excruciating collective trauma and memory would also help prevent such global warming-caused climate destabilization from ever occurring again and set the stage for the eventual Great Global Rebirth.
Viewing life and evolution from a broad perspective is poignantly helpful in this situation. If our planetary civilization has become so fossilized in protecting the status quo that it has lost its ability to adapt and effectively resolve global warming and our other global crises, there is little doubt that a global catastrophe and meltdown of unprecedented scale will eventually occur, including the widespread ecological, social, economic, and political and biological collapses described in the later phases of the Climageddon Scenario and as described on this page.
If we do not pay attention and resolve the escalating global warming emergency soon, as a last resort to save the future, it may be necessary for human civilization to undergo a Great Global Collapse under the weight of these unfolding, unresolved global challenges. This, then, may finally allow a new and better civilization to be reborn in a Great Global Rebirth with more adaptable, equitable, and sustainable political, economic, and social systems and values to emerge in the post-collapse, particularly with remaining survivors now very willing to change to something new, less painful, and less dysfunctional.
Maybe only through a new and massive destructive creation Great Global Collapse episode in what is already being called the Sixth Great Extinction will we be able to bring about the Great Global Rebirth, which is a more equitably restructured, realigned, and more sustainable global political, social, and economic order, as well as a new, more just, and appropriate way of living for ALL of Earth’s inhabitants.
It is reasonable to believe that the destructive creation consequences portended by our currently escalating global warming emergency will eventually force us to address the deepest underlying structural and systemic causes of global warming. To prevent extinction-level global warming in time, we will eventually have to confront the structural and systemic roots that support fossil fuel burning and our unsustainable paradigm of infinite economic growth.
A few of the deeply-rooted problems that continue to support the fossil fuel energy-generating current world paradigm are:
1. Rapidly rising population and overpopulation. We have far too many people for the Earth’s carrying capacity. As our population escalates, so do our energy generation needs.
2. Unsustainable development in all its forms. As part of the long-term structural solution to global warming (as well as our other 12 major current global challenges), we will eventually be forced to evolve sustainable development—more sustainable and equitable lifestyles, livelihoods, communities, and nations. We have already waited too long and need to activate a global warming emergency mobilization (GWEM) to enact solutions far beyond those of the Manhattan Project, moving rapidly from dirty fossil fuel energy generation to clean, green energy generation. Simultaneously, we will also need to quickly move away from our current unsustainable carbon- and methane-polluting practices associated with big agribusiness.
3. A lack of an empowered global government backed by verifiable and enforceable international law that can effectively manage and regulate cross-border meta-challenges like global warming as well as our other 12 major current global challenges. The lack of a truly effective global government represents a deep structural and most serious threat to the health, stability, and future of Earth’s inhabitants and future generations.
4. An inequitable global economic system and economic rules that do not work to support and sustain our critical human life-supporting ecosystems or humanity itself. The Job One for Humanity Plan and its principles of sustainable prosperity already contain many specifics of what changes need to be made to the world’s current lifestyle and livelihood systems to make the resolution of global warming permanent. We can still get ourselves out of this emergency, but eventually, we must also change the deepest structural causes of this emergency. Luckily we don’t have to change all of these deep structural issues first to solve the global warming emergency.
5. many other problems and inequalities are described in the description of humanity’s 12 worsening global crises that will also be resolved as society’s non-adaptive systems collapse in a Great Global Collapse.
To make these changes and adapt successfully, eventually, we will be forced to engage in a massive restructuring and realignment of our economic, social, and political systems. (Maybe even some of our religious systems as well to deal with overpopulation and the moral duties of environmental stewardship.) In their current state of evolutionary development, some of the conditions, rules, assumptions, and values of these economic, social, and political systems are key fundamental underlying causes that have fueled global warming, sustain it, and allow it to expand without resolution.
The silver lining here is that even if we continue to ignore or move too slowly to stabilize the climate and mitigate the worsening of our other global crises, eventually, the natural evolutionary process of destructive creation (also known as Mother Nature) will come to our aid and force us to change or perish.
Cause-and-effect consequences and unbearable calamities will eventually force better evolutionary adaptation upon those individuals or groups that fail to address problems in their environment. It does this wonderfully and naturally by increasing the levels of painful consequences until the pain of the escalating calamity finally draws the individual’s or group’s attention back to the previously denied, ignored, or unaddressed problem.
This helps individuals or groups begin resolving their denied or deferred problems. Evolution has wisely discovered that many individuals and groups will not evolve and resolve what is challenging them until they deeply feel that the pain of going forward is less than the pain of staying where they are.
Welcome to The Great Retrogression, a key part of the Great Global Collapse and Creating the Great Global Rebirth
Evolution has natural “compression and retrogression” periods. Compression and retrogression periods are those times when things get pushed together tightly, creating increased tension. Sometimes, those tensions do not resolve, and the inaction causes a temporary centralizing effect, a compression, or a retrogression.
Whether you are aware of it or not, we are in one of those natural evolutionary compression and retrogression periods. This particular natural evolutionary compression/retrogression period is being fueled by our many worsening current global challenges such as resource depletion, global warming, economic inequality and instability, poverty, overpopulation, other environmental pollution, and ecological degradation not caused by global warming, terrorism conflicts and wars leading to political and social instability, and even growing pandemic risks like COVID-19.
Of all our current global challenges, escalating global warming should be seen as the keystone challenge humanity must overcome first to survive. While there is much to be deeply concerned about in all of our other global challenges, accelerating global warming consequences and crossing more tipping points is the largest immediate threat multiplier for almost all of the other global challenges mentioned.
It is also important to grasp that these natural evolutionary compressions and retrogressions can serve to produce silver linings. When things are not adapting well, natural evolutionary compression and retrogression periods intensify the adaptive challenge’s pain or loss.
Evolution does this “instinctively” so that the building pressure and pent-up “energy” of the compression period can be released (like releasing a compressed spring) to help break the existing change-resistant inertia and “energize” the needed critical change and adaptation. Again, an example of this normally recurring evolutionary compression and retrogression cycle in history would be how, after the previously mentioned painful compression and retrogression period of the European Dark Ages, humanity once again surged forward into the great European Renaissance period.
Our current natural evolutionary compression and retrogression period is defined by:
i. How our global warming and the other global challenges are still escalating and colliding with each other and potentially moving ever faster toward a catastrophic mega-convergence.
ii. How we still appear functionally unable to evolve the necessary effective global governance mechanisms with appropriate enforcement and verification powers to resolve our escalating cross-border global challenges.
If left unresolved, this natural, intensifying evolutionary compression and retrogression process acting upon all of our current converging global challenges will catastrophically destabilize and regress most, if not all, of the planet to some less developed state, hence the Great Retrogression.
The silver linings in all this seemingly bad news are:
i. This, hopefully, should be a temporary compressive destabilization and retrogression period.
ii. After the collapse and a likely transitional “dark age” period, it should also eventually lead to a great surge forward of positive growth for humanity, a great reboot, a new Renaissance period, and a Great Global Rebirth.
iii. It’s just another natural adaptive challenge in the great transformational, evolutionary adventure and progress of evolving life on this planet and in the universe.
iv. Everything we must do to stabilize the global climate on an urgent, first-things-first basis also directly or indirectly supports building more sustainable lifestyles and livelihoods, as well as sustainable prosperity for all, and helps lessen many of our other 12 global crises. So none of our efforts in resolving global warming will ever be wasted! And,
v. The natural compression and retrogression periods of the worsening of global warming and our other global crises will also facilitate (eventually force) us to move toward positive outcomes.
There’s a bit more helpful knowledge about evolutionary compressions and retrogressions. Sometimes, after a sudden or strong growth state, a natural evolutionary compression and retrogression will take place. If this compression/retrogression state is successfully adapted to, the compression lessens or stabilizes, or even reverses itself into a new growth state. If the compression and retrogression state is not successfully adapted to, it usually results in a deeper secondary compression and retrogression period that may then finally have enough compressed and pent-up energy “coiled” within itself to spring forward out of the secondary deeper compression/retrogression to some new, more optimal state.
How the cycles and phases of evolution relate to the current global crises compression/retrogression potentiality is telling for the future of humanity. If we do not adapt sufficiently, it is reasonable and probable that our various social, economic, and political systems will compress upon themselves and collapse, regressing to a prior, less stable developmental state in an effort to re-establish a lower-level order for survival. Failing to resolve this natural evolutionary compression and retrogression and continuing on the current global warming trajectory leads to a global evolutionary compression and retrogression outcome that no rational human being would ever want to allow or experience. It would be similar to taking society into a dystopian Mad Max-like world.
Now that you have a better understanding of evolution’s natural compression, regression, and rebirth cycles, the following quote should bring additional hope to how you view the future.
“Well over 200 major civilizations have risen and collapsed in the 10,000 years of modern human evolution. This fact suggests that past major civilizations seem to rise naturally and then just as naturally collapse. Currently, there are many strong warning signals that our global civilization has entered a collapse cycle.
Logically, this does not mean our current global civilization will collapse entirely or forever. Instead, the history and natural rise and fall of major civilizations would more rationally suggest that, once again, a new major civilization will emerge after the collapse.
The natural collapse process and cycle imply that, rather than giving up all hope and doing nothing, humanity should be getting very busy preparing for this collapse, but even more busy preparing for the next rise of human civilization. It would be far more logical to embrace all the possibilities that the rise of a new global civilization could embody from the best lessons learned over the 10,000 years of modern human evolution.” Lawrence Wollersheim
Humanity’s Greatest Crises are also Humanity’s Greatest Opportunities and Set the Stage for an Eventual Great Global Rebirth
To many of society’s thoughtful individuals, it appears our national and global cultures are entering one of those exciting and opportunity-rich destabilizing and retrogressing evolutionary periods—one that is also hopefully transitory. This period may develop into one, several, or all of the following:
a. Several consecutive worsening natural compression and retrogression periods,
b. A second great evolutionary bottleneck (where most of humanity dies off)
c. A massive cataclysmic adaptive readjustment, or even possibly
d. A massive global systems collapse, an unfortunate and extreme act of self-induced destructive creation, resulting in an extinction-level event for most, if not nearly all, of humanity.
We have entered an era of potentially destructive creation, a natural evolutionary compression and retrogression period, and a global mega-emergency that far exceeds the management capabilities of our fragmented national interests and governments.
This is a dangerous place. Hopefully, we will adapt by evolving.
A final but key big-picture evolutionary perspective for success from our past on the challenges before us
The escalating global warming crisis has become human history’s greatest adaptive challenge and evolutionary adventure. Paradoxically, while it is the greatest current challenge, if you step back and look at this crisis from the long evolutionary sweep of human history, it is just another evolutionary challenge like the many we have overcome.
The following Great Bottleneck story should help you better frame the challenging task ahead of us.
The human species has almost gone extinct at least once before. This occurred about 72,000 years ago. This incident has been referred to as the Great Evolutionary Bottleneck.
A supervolcano called Toba erupted and blocked the sun for about six years. It also covered the Earth with 6 inches of ash. The global temperature was dramatically lowered due to this supervolcano eruption and the resultant volcanic ash that blocked sunlight. This volcano-related temperature lowering occurred on top of an already existing Ice Age.
Under the cold and darkened skies, humanity as a whole was reduced to as few as 1,000 mating pairs. Some research suggests even fewer survivors. Maybe as few as 200 mating pairs were all that survived of humanity.
This supervolcano eruption has been described as an evolutionary bottleneck because, during this time, the total early global human population declined from an estimated 18,000 to 26,000 individuals with reproductive capabilities to 1,000 or fewer reproducing pairs. That was roughly a 90% reduction in the total global population. If another catastrophe had occurred simultaneously, humanity itself might have gone extinct.
Up until now, the Toba eruption has been the single greatest adaptive challenge to the survival of the entire human species. Unfortunately, we are facing a new and far greater adaptive challenge today.
This second great bottleneck is different yet, in some ways, similar to the first great evolutionary bottleneck. This second bottleneck poses a global warming threat opposite to that of the colder temperatures experienced during the first great evolutionary bottleneck. Unlike the first great bottleneck caused by nature, the second is human-caused due to increasing carbon and methane atmospheric pollution and the steadily rising average global temperature.
This increasing global warming is causing a destabilization of our climate from its previously fairly stable temperature range level. This increasing destabilization will lead to some higher temperature ranges that may not be suitable for the survival of most of the seven billion-plus people alive today. It may not be suitable for preserving any of the human species over time.
This means that together as a single human species, we are facing a new great adaptive challenge in the form of the second great evolutionary bottleneck, namely the world’s 12 critical systemic challenges. If we are to emerge successfully from this second evolutionary bottleneck, more will need to be done faster, with more people cooperating on a greater scale than has ever been achieved in human history.
Whenever you feel overwhelmed by the global warming challenge in front of us, never forget that humanity made it through the first great evolutionary bottleneck with far less cooperation, technology, and resources. Yes, today’s challenge will still be more difficult than any humanity has previously overcome. But, in the process of overcoming it, we will not only ensure our own future, but our effort will also provide each of us, both young and old, the opportunity to participate in the greatest evolutionary adventure in human history. Participating in such a challenge and adventure will also create a meaningful, purpose-filled life.
“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.”
— Martin Luther King, Jr., an American civil rights leader
Humanity has entered a temporary period of evolutionary regression, as it has done many times in the past. During this temporary regression, life as we usually know it will deteriorate for a while before it improves.
In this period of temporary regression, humanity will learn the necessary hard new lessons about the real price of fossil fuel pollution, poor international cooperation, and the importance of maintaining healthy ecological systems. The great news here during this temporary regression is that, if we are smart and work together, we can still lead full, meaningful, and enjoyable lives. In contrast, we work to restore the critical climate balance to our life-supporting Earth systems and build a better world for when we emerge from this challenge.
If you are also of a spiritual nature, your faith can provide a unique opportunity to help manage global warming
Your strong spiritual faith will help you endure the many severe hardships and sacrifices as the global warming process escalates until it is finally resolved.
There are other benefits of bringing the strength of your faith into this emergency:
i. There is a personal spiritual growth benefit in the evolutionary process itself whenever you overcome significant obstacles and challenges. You grow in both character and spirit.
ii. Restabilizing our climate and environment will give you a powerful opportunity to live and grow your faith with what many refer to as the Great Mystery of Ultimate Reality (God, Buddha, Allah, etc.).
iii. You can demonstrate that managing global warming and being a good steward of the Earth is fully compatible with your best understanding of the Great Mystery and its intentions to sustain life on the planet (as believed in many faiths). As this happens, you will be demonstrating the power and influence of your faith and the world’s religions.
The biggest silver lining here is that when individuals of faith and the world’s great religious groups collectively demand that we take the necessary steps to stop catastrophic global warming and environmental degradation, a significant moral leverage will be in place to help ensure our success.
Your personal faith shared with others will help demonstrate that humanity is completely capable of lessening, slowing, and eventually resolving the global warming challenge if:
i. We are realistic about what is effective and what is not with the time we have left,
ii. We do the “first-things-first” on critical path effective actions,
iii. We cooperate as a unified and coordinated force.
Together, our many life-affirming faith and spirit communities can help extend the existence, stability, and quality of life for the present generation and future generations.
“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.”
— Aldo Leopold, American author, ecologist, and environmentalist
And finally, looking at the biggest evolutionary picture from the lens of your faith will give you great strength in this crisis for several additional reasons.
Your faith-in-action supports your belief in the idea of the Great Mystery, which has:
a. Originated evolution and the universe, and
b. Which has also successfully maintained and transformed the universe for billions of years in an overall progressive direction.
Therefore, in faith, it is also highly likely that the Great Mystery will continue to support, maintain, and transform the universe in one way or another until the end of time.
Therefore, it is entirely within both reason and the tenets of an enlightened faith to trust that the Great Mystery will continue supporting, maintaining, and transforming the progress of life in the universe — no matter how bad our challenges and future may look at the moment.
For a highly recommended new emotional and spiritual support video, click here.
The following are additional positive perspectives on the global warming emergency
We can still enjoy our daily lives as we work together to resolve the escalating global warming emergency
To stay motivated while doing your part to help resolve the global warming challenge, you will need to preserve your psychological resilience and emotional reserves. You can build and preserve this resilience and maintain these emotional reserves by taking time every day to do the normal things that you enjoy and that renew you.
As we face the increasingly severe consequences of global warming and climate destabilization, it is crucial to take one day at a time and make time for fun and renewing experiences. The importance of taking one day at a time and doing whatever you can each day to fully enjoy the life you have right now is that it will allow you to emotionally and physically survive and effectively contribute toward the hopeful eventual resolution of the global warming emergency.
“The art of life is to know how to enjoy a little and to endure much.”
— William Hazlitt, English writer, philosopher, and critic
Never forget that the scope of the task before us is daunting and unprecedented. If one fully understands how much has to change in the world in such a short time, in such major ways within our lifestyles, livelihoods, and within our energy, political, economic, and social systems, one can become overwhelmed quickly. This is why embracing these perspectives of “one day at a time” and enjoying your normal life right now is important.
Because of the consequences looming over us and the fact that there are no guarantees we will resolve this emergency in time, another reason to enjoy each day now is that our current lives and conditions may be the best they will ever be.
The global warming emergency will inevitably force us into new levels of local, national, and international cooperation
In the past, humanity has cooperated successfully on critical climate issues. We have successfully created international laws, treaties, and agreements regarding the pollution of the atmosphere caused by the gas/liquid refrigerant Freon®. Freon was formerly used in refrigeration and air conditioners. When it leaked out, it rapidly degraded the atmosphere’s ozone layer and created holes in it. Those rapidly widening holes in the atmosphere’s protective ozone layer would have greatly increased the incidence of skin cancer in the areas directly beneath them.
We acted quickly because of the escalating danger of a “hole in the ozone layer” that would have eventually harmed almost everyone on Earth. If we successfully addressed Freon’s pollution before, we should be able to do the same with the fossil fuel industries’ toxic carbon and methane pollution.
The solution to reversing escalating global warming depends on radical and immediate global changes in how we produce energy, pollute the atmosphere, and cooperate collectively as a human species. These needed changes are far larger and require far faster implementation than any change of this scale has ever been achieved in human history. Consequently, resolving global warming will require more of Earth’s inhabitants to mobilize and cooperatively work together than has ever occurred in the past.
The silver lining of trying to survive escalating global warming is that human global cooperation itself will have to rise to a new and higher evolutionary level that has never been seen before.
To survive the threat of escalating global warming, which transcends national interests and borders, we will be compelled to establish a new and more comprehensive international cooperative union of nations and peoples that will form enforcement- and verification-powered global governance, surpassing any existing international cooperative structures, such as the United Nations. This would also be a huge evolutionary advantage and a significant advance for humanity.
“The most powerful force ever known on this planet is human cooperation—a force for construction and destruction.”
— Jonathan Haidt, social psychologist, professor of Ethical Leadership, New York University
We can work together and not make it a polarized battle of us versus them because we truly are all in the same sinking boat
If we hold a big-picture perspective and we are creative and smart, we really can work together and we really have to work together! We do not have to “polarize to mobilize.”
Here’s how addressing the global warming emergency can be inherently and ultimately non-polarizing:
a. Eventually, everyone will be affected in some way. Some will be affected less initially. Some will even experience a few benefits in the early stages. Still, as global warming escalates toward irreversibility or moves toward the Climageddon Scenario extinction levels, we will all suffer nearly equally, regardless of our wealth or how insulated we thought we could make ourselves. Whether we know it or not, at this moment, all of our long-term self-interests in addressing global warming are aligned.
We all win together, or we all lose together.
b. With the motive of survival ultimately aligning our self-interests, it is now just a matter of
i. Passing enforceable and verifiable laws or treaties to end global warming,
ii. Conducting widespread education, and
III. Then executing those new laws or treaties.
We do not have to play the “us vs. them” game or other win/lose games. We do not have to characterize those who do not understand the incredibly complex global warming information as bad, greedy, or evil people. We should also never forget that general ignorance of the climate system complexities is just where many people are now in their personal, corporate, or national evolution.
c. If we are tempted to adopt “us vs. them” strategies, we need to remind ourselves that every person, every organization, and every nation is at a different level of evolutionary development and maturity. Evolutionary development or maturity depends upon physical, psychological, cultural, educational, and, if you are a spiritual person, even spiritual development and maturity.
Regardless of the position a seeming adversary may hold in resisting actions to address the escalating global warming emergency, they are merely reflecting their current level of evolutionary development and maturity. Never forget that their current education, evolutionary development, and maturity level is also part of an ongoing process that is in constant change. Given the right information and circumstances, their positions can change just as your past positions on other issues may have changed.
The big silver lining here is that addressing global warming ignorance among our lawmakers and power brokers is a challenge that can actually be met if we are skillful and determined!
We can create a sustainable prosperity for all
In the process of resolving global warming, we can also create the foundation for long-term sustainable prosperity
It’s not all bad news now that we know exactly where we are in the global warming emergency. This accurate knowledge will motivate rational and mature individuals to make the needed changes toward a more sustainable future.
By being compelled toward a sustainable future, we will create tens of millions of new, high-paying jobs as we work to eliminate the carbon and methane pollution from fossil fuels that has been steadily accumulating in the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution of the 1880s.
For added motivation, consider that by 2050, sea levels may rise 6-10 feet (1.8-3 meters) or more, depending on how many tipping points we cross. This sea-level rise will, of itself, help generate the greatest single construction project in human history. We will soon need to begin relocating all coastal homes and businesses, as well as all essential water, electrical, transportation, waste, and sewage infrastructure, at least 13-20 feet (3.9-6 meters) above the current sea level. This estimation is necessary after accounting for global warming-induced sea level rise, which sometimes coincides with storm and superstorm surges occurring simultaneously with “king” high tide peaks. It also factors in an additional safety margin for crossing more known or unknown global warming tipping points.
“If there’s a sustainable job that will create sustainable value, people will hire for it.”
— David Cunliffe, New Zealand Member of Parliament
There is also considerable new construction and reconstruction work that we will need to undertake for wildfire, drought, and inland lake and river flooding mitigation. For example, the superstorms that will occur in nontraditional locations and at nontraditional times will require new infrastructure, water storage, and management facilities worldwide.
We will need to create a green Third Industrial Revolution83 that could, directly and indirectly, create millions more new green energy-related jobs worldwide. This green energy generation revolution will replace the preceding Second Industrial Revolution and the polluting fossil fuel energy generation that has powered it.
Transitioning to green energy generation as rapidly as possible also has an important additional sustainability and resilience-building effect, which is crucial for surviving the growing consequences of escalating global warming. Solar and wind energy generation is often decentralized, which allows it to be put on local homes and businesses. When climate catastrophes occur, power will be restored much faster due to this decentralization, with energy generation located precisely where the power is most needed and used.
Finally resolving the escalating issue of global warming, we will be forced to create new, better, and more sustainable lifestyles, livelihoods, and community models. They will demonstrate the validity of sustainability principles to further guide us once we end the escalating global warming emergency, and then need proven strategies to maintain our success.
“Sustainable development is the pathway to the future we want for all. It offers a framework to generate economic growth, achieve social justice, exercise environmental stewardship, and strengthen governance.”
— Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations
Working together in these new sustainable prosperity lifestyles, livelihoods, and communities, we can also make our lives as good as possible. It is not difficult to envision how these new lifestyles, livelihoods, and communities will play a crucial role in climate stabilization. They will be a new sustainable prosperity model for the world. They will also help create a long-term evolutionary future for today’s population and future generations.
“In the 21st century, I think the heroes will be the people who will improve the quality of life, fight poverty and introduce more sustainability.”
— Bertrand Piccard, Swiss psychiatrist, pioneering trans-global balloonist
There may be undiscovered positive wild cards that could help significantly slow, lessen, and eventually end global warming
The climate future is uncertain and full of both unpredictable negative and positive wild cards. We must remain open to exploring all possible natural decarbonization practices. We also need to be open to appropriate technological climate restabilization procedures and all-new green energy generation technologies that could be positive wild cards for our global warming future. (Appropriate technology is quite different from what most people envision it to be. Click here for its definition.)
Technology’s greatest hope for helping to resolve this emergency lies mainly in its ability to tap into the abundant sources of clean, green energy all around us (solar, wind, geothermal, etc.) more efficiently. Currently, solar panel efficiency is doubling approximately every three years, while solar panel costs are rapidly and dramatically decreasing. This, coupled with new storage technology, is helping us resolve the challenges of green energy battery storage and cost, which could have significantly slowed our transition away from fossil fuel energy generation.
There also could be a survival-critical point where we must be open to the possibilities of any existing or new technology, even if that technology seems improbable or far-fetched. Stating that we may have to use wise and appropriate technology solutions does not negate the serious warnings about an overly optimistic or distorted over-reliance on new technology solutions as the primary means of ending the global warming emergency, without first changing our polluting and destructive ways of consuming fossil fuels.
Among many new technological possibilities, we may even have to use distasteful or disruptive stopgap measures on the way to restabilizing the climate, provided that we have a high certainty that these temporary measures will not have even worse side effects. For example, if perfected, fourth-generation nuclear breeder reactors are intended to utilize and burn the spent nuclear waste currently being stored at great expense and risk. They will turn stored nuclear waste into a byproduct with a radioactive half-life of just 300 years instead of the average ~10,000 years for many kinds of existing nuclear reactor waste.
We can find the motivation
If a large, extinction-level asteroid were rapidly approaching the Earth, we would immediately come together as one human family to mobilize and share resources and intelligence to overcome this common global threat to our existence. It would not matter what nation we came from, what religion we held, or what race, ethnicity, or gender we were. We would immediately come together in hopes of resolving this shared extinction threat due to our mutual desire for self-preservation.
At this moment, escalating global warming is racing toward crossing more tipping points and irreversible global warming. Although global warming moves at a slower pace, it is just as big and as real of a threat as an extinction-level asteroid steadily approaching Earth.
When deeply felt and understood, our common global warming threat also offers the motivation and clarity needed to compel us to come together as one human family and mobilize to address the necessary actions to resolve it. Once we realize that:
a. This threat is imminent (if we miss the 2025 global fossil fuel reduction targets, there will be mass extinction,) and
b. No one will survive unless we utilize the remaining years of meaningful control wisely;
It will be far easier to face the painful, costly, and radical changes together.
In Summary
Never forget you are engaged in the greatest evolutionary adventure in human history! Together, we still have time to slow and lessen what we can no longer avoid.
We still have time to prevent the total extinction of humanity, but we must act effectively today, and we must act together!
Please sign the global warming extinction emergency petition by clicking here.
Please begin the Job One for Humanity Plan to deal with our global warming keystone threat and also get your friends involved before it’s too late!
Key additional reading
Please click here to see precisely how Mother Nature will eventually save us from ourselves if we miss the 2025 targets big time.
If enough survivors have learned the lessons of the Great Die-off and Great Collapse this time, when they rebuild, there’s the promise of the benefits of the Great Global Rebirth.
To read about the other “dark” benefits that will exist even if everything goes horribly wrong and we fail utterly, click here.
Be sure to also visit our members-only section on this website for information on the best and safest locations for global warming migration, if you are considering Option Two above.
For a super-powerful new video that we highly recommend for emotional and spiritual support due to global warming, environmental, or emotional upset, click here.
For the many potential benefits of becoming an Evolutioneer, building the future of humanity, and becoming a co-creator of the Great Global Rebirth, first, read this page, and then be sure to see this page!
For more benefits and positive perspectives on the global warming extinction threat and our 12 other global crises…
If you are of a spiritual nature and would like to expand your emotional and spiritual support as we navigate the challenging times ahead, please click here. It will take you to our sister website, Universe Spirit, where you can explore Evolution Spirituality, an open-source, science-grounded new form of personalizable spiritual practice.
For what you can do about the global warming and climate change emergency, click here.
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