No Impact Man

Try

We need a peaceful revolution in thinking and living.

The problem is that the revolutionaries are otherwise engaged. They're delivering Fedex packages, waiting tables, driving taxis, entering data and countless other tasks--including, yes, writing books and blogs--for 12 hours a day.

They're working their butts off to afford the gas and the car payments and the Christmas presents. They're worried about whether their kids are safe, whether they'll be able to afford the mortgage, how they'll pay if they break a leg.

So when the news comes on and some newscaster starts droning on about the climate, they care, yes. And they think we ought to take care of it. Just as soon as we take care of the health care system and the economy and national security.

It's not that we don't care. It's that we're more scared of today than we are of tomorrow.

The way modern life is set up in these United States, so many of us feel like we could fall off the tightrope at any moment and there's no safety net. What happens to an American who loses a job and gets sick? Without some sense of security, how can we risk taking our eyes off our daily tightrope long enough to worry about the problems of the future?

It's not selfishness. It's not apathy. It's not mindlessness.

It's busyness.

We're too busy to think.

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But however we define the problem, the question stays the same:

How can we help?

A really big man with a really small ukulele

I'm kind of a musical dunce. Name just about any band and I have no idea who you're talking about. I mean, I dig music, I like to dance (especially with my little girl Isabella), and we sing together loads as a family.

Mostly we sing songs we make up. Sometimes we sing our conversations.

Anyway, because I am such a musical illiterate, I cycle through a grand total of three songs at Isabella's bedtime: "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," James Taylor's "You Can Close Your Eyes," and Peter Yarrow's "Puff the Magic Dragon."

It's pathetic to know only three songs, but it's also comforting. The songs have become like a favorite baseball hat or old slippers.

So last night, Isabella, who is feeling a bit under the weather, sat on the couch next to me and asked if we could watch Dorothy on YouTube. By this, she means, can we watch Judy Garland singing Somewhere Over the Rainbow, because, hell, it's just about the only song we know.

Next comes a shout from the bedroom where Michelle is reading: "Can you play the version I like?" What Michelle wants is to hear is a version of Rainbow by the Hawaiian singer and ukulele player, the late Israel Kamakawiwo'ole (see above or click here if you can't see the video).

Now it's true that Isabella does not like this version as much. She says about Israel, "He doesn't know how to do it right."

But as for me, I watch this incredibly obese man (he weighed 758 pounds at one stage, apparently) playing this incredibly tiny instrument, and he sings the most beautiful version of one of our three bedtime songs and--sue me for being corny--I suddenly feel incredibly sentimental about being part of the human race.

And Isabella starts to sing. With her lisp. "Thumbwhere" over the Rainbow. And she sits on the couch and, despite her objections to Israel instead of Dorothy, she belts it out.

What this has to do with saving the planet? It's hard to say. But it says something. Because as F'ed up as we all are, as much as it sometimes seems that we're more destructive than anything else, as few songs as we know, I'm proud to say we all still sing.

We need more than good "energy policy"

Michael Pollan, in Sunday's New York Times Magazine's green issue, had an excellent article called "Why Bother?"--about whether individual lifestyle change is worthwhile (there is also, by the way, a little snippet in the issue about yours truly). Pollan writes (with my emphasis):

"It’s hard to argue with Michael Specter, in a recent New Yorker piece on carbon footprints, when he says: 'Personal choices, no matter how virtuous [N.B.!], cannot do enough. It will also take laws and money.' So it will. Yet it is no less accurate or hardheaded to say that laws and money cannot do enough, either; that it will also take profound changes in the way we live. Why? Because the climate-change crisis is at its very bottom a crisis of lifestyle — of character, even. The Big Problem is nothing more or less than the sum total of countless little everyday choices, most of them made by us (consumer spending represents 70 percent of our economy), and most of the rest of them made in the name of our needs and desires and preferences."

And he's (mostly) right of course, but I'd like to add a little something, too, and then make a small correction.

As for what I'd like to add: At the moment, the public and political discourse, when it comes to climate change, is all about "energy policy." Should we charge industry for their emissions? Should we invest hugely in solar? Can we find a way to store (or sequester) the carbon dioxide emitted from fossil-fuel-burning power plants?

Suppose that we come up with a solution to these problems. Suppose we figure out a way to power the entire planet while reducing our carbon emissions 80% by 2050 (the goal suggested by the International Panel on Climate Change). Suppose that we get to carry on with business as usual except that we do it with clean energy. What will happen?

We will leapfrog to the next planetary crisis.

Because first of all, no one is really sure how much more carbon dioxide the climate can handle. Some think we've already reached it. A group of energy scientists recently published an article in Nature saying that 80% by 2050 is far too modest a goal. NASA chief climate scientis James Hansen recently announced that the EC's goal of 550 parts per million of carbon dioxide must be slashed to 350.

A lot of people think that we are actually going to need a 100% reduction in emissions--a completely carbon neutral economy. It's hard to imagine how that can be accomplished by energy policy without cultural-level lifestyle change.

But furthermore, even if we could stop climate emissions cold, we still have to deal with the facts that we are soon to run out of fresh water (see Wired's May issue article "Peak Water," for example), our oceans are nearly fished out, our forests are being decimated at an alarming rate, food prices are spiraling out of control so that people can no longer afford to eat and on and on.

These looming crises, like climate change, are a direct result of how we much energy and material we in the developed world consume, but there are no techno-fixes. Energy policy alone will not fix them [adding this later in case it isn't obvious: of course we do need good energy policy]. Only consuming less will fix them. And these are other reasons why, to add to Pollan's reasoning, we should bother to change our lifestyle, both at the individual and cultural levels.

As for my small correction, Pollan suggests, both in the paragraph I cite above and at other points in his article, that "climate-change crisis is at its very bottom a crisis... of character." This implies that we--that is the human race--somehow don't have the backbone to deny ourselves in order to live sustainably. But I have and always will argue that we are neither selfish nor slovenly nor that deprivation is required.

No one I know wants to throw a plastic cup away every time they drink a coffee. Or to toss a plastic bag. Or to feel like their living comfortably will cost the earth. Everybody I know feels bad about the way things are going. It's not that they don't want to change. It's that they don't know how to change, not least because much of what makes individual lifestyle unsustainable are the choices that the culture presents us (think, for example, of suburbs built for cars instead of villages interconnected by rail).

Our institutions and systems were all built on the assumption that the planet's resources were limitless, which has been proved, of late, not to be true. What our culture is in the grip of is not bad character but bad systemic habits, some of which will be very hard to break. But that does not make us or our culture bad. It just makes us mistaken.

The good news is that we don't have to change our human characters--which some would argue is impossible. We simply have to correct our societal mistakes and change our systems. We simply have to change the way we live in a way that will make the planet happier but, as I so often argue, will also make the people happier. This brings me to my second correction.

We will not have to deprive ourselves--at least not of happiness. I would argue, in fact, that when people are working two jobs and twelve hour days so they can keep up with Jones when it comes to the number of Christmas presents they buy their kids, they are already deprived. Who wants to live in Stressville?

Instead, what is on offer, when it comes to individual and cultural lifestyle change is a shift of emphasis from stuff to people, from material throughput to potential for meaningful relationships and community. This blog is full of discussion of the opportunities for the improvement in our lives that will come with living more sustainably. I won't go into all of them here. Noodle around.

What I will say though is that I don't look forward to the lifestyle changes will we have to make with anything like dread. Yes, we may have to have less stuff. But I believe that we are finally being forced to change the cultural priorities that most of us know in our guts are wrong anyway. The result I envision, if we approach the coming times in the right way, is a kinder, friendlier, more equitable, more satisfying way of life.

PS For a humorous take on why we need to use less, not just use better, watch the video below.

A reason to be optimistic

So the coolest thing in the world is happening to me, this week which is that I get to attend this conference of about 30 international thinkers on the questions of sustainability and consumption and cultural happiness (who let me in?). The title of the conference is "Do good lives have to cost the earth."

In other words, we're talking about whether the level of damage that we do to human health, happiness and security as it depends on our planetary habitat is a necessary evil in creating the good life. Or, is it possible that we can actually use fewer of our planetary resources and improve lives all at the same time?

If you've read this blog for any time at all, you know I believe the later--happier planet, happier people.

But what I wanted to share with you is a slide from a presentation by Nic Marks of the New Economics Foundation (a British think tank with the motto "we believe in economics as if people and the planet mattered), who are sponsoring the conference.

Basically, the data in red shows the subjective life satisfaction of individuals at different levels of resource consumption, which is shown in blue. As you can see, people tend to be just as happy whether they have a six or a one planet footprint.

That's great news, because it means, if this data is anything to go by, that we can substantially reduce our resource consumption and damage to our health, happiness and security as it depends on our planetary habitat, but still have a whopping good time (if, by the way, that is what you're having).

All we have to do now is convince the politicians, the corporations, the voters, and the super-elite who pull the strings of the fact.

Lifestyle change required

What with Al Gore coming out with his $300 million plan to convince politicians to take climate change seriously, and people like the New York Times' Andrew Revkin writing about the big problem in solving global warming being the "technology gap," I've been feeling like my little lifestyle experiment No Impact Man and my message of reduced resource consumption is small fry and beside the point.

Maybe what we need to do is carpet the entire planet with solar panels--problem solved. Maybe ideas about finding ways that will both create a happier planet and happier people through win/win lifestyle and cultural changes that both conserve energy and improve quality of life are irrelevant. Maybe ideas like, for example, building public-transportation-connected villages designed to make people happy instead of lonely suburbs designed to let cars drive fast are just not on the agenda.

At the same time, I can't help thinking, that for all the talk of the "technology gap," why is it that we aren't adopting the sorts of cultural and societal changes that can help right now? Like more villages instead of more suburbs. Or a materials economy based on things that last instead of things designed to be thrown away.

Why is it that we aren't moving forward with weatherizing every building in all the cities? We aren't we investing in rapid transit busing? These things could improve our situation right now. RIGHT NOW. It doesn't make sense.

Perhaps it is because the powers that be don't want to accept that our emergency is dire enough to consider lifestyle change. Which is too bad, because it is within the cultural lifestyle changes that the climate crisis offers real opportunities for human improvement.

All of which is by way of saying why I appreciated what Adil Najam, a professor of public policy at Boston University and a lead author of the I.P.C.C. report on policy options, said on Andrew Revkin's blog today:

"My worry about the some of these arguments is that they are still looking only for technology fixes … These will be necessary, but not sufficient. Ultimately it WILL require lifestyle changes too. Not just WHAT we drive but how far we drive. Not just what appliances are in our house but WHERE our house is. That, I think, is an even bigger challenge than technology."

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A few people have commented lately that they wish I would talk more about my day to day trying to live a lower impact lifestyle. That's a compliment in a way, I suppose. But this blog continues to be about my day to day experience, even if that's moved a little beyond figuring out how to not make garbage.

When I wrote about the Solar Electric Light Fund yesterday, it was because the No Impact project led me to believe that I have a responsibility to tithe some of my income. SELF is one of the organizations I gave money to.

But also, I've been turning to thinking and writing about some of the "big issues"--particularly the areas of our culture that make sustainable living difficult for so many people. The fact that, for example, some people simple couldn't live without driving 200 miles a week.

The human race is not going to accomplish what it needs to accomplish if it can't find a way for these people to drive less. And they can't do it alone. They'll need help. They'll need a lot of discussion of the "big ideas" until we all agree that it makes sense both for resource use reasons and happiness reasons to make changes.

I figure I can use this blog to teach people how to swim against the cultural current, or I can try to help change the cultural current and make it easier for everyone. My judgment is that the later is of better service, though the former is important, too (and indeed, in the future months, when my book is done and I can give the blog more attention, I plan to open forums for discussion of individual lifestyle changes and other issues).

But for now, all I have time to write about is what's on my mind and what I think is important. My hope is that some of my readers will join in and put their shoulders to changing the cultural current, too.

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About lifestyle change, happiness and sustainability:

This morning my feet were cold and I was digging through the closet for my slippers and there was just more junk to dig through than our little apartment can hold. On top of the pile lay Isabella's scooter and trike which we bought second-hand for her on her recent birthday.

And I got to thinking. Why does every three-year-old need their own trike and scooter? Why can't we share? That reminded me that some places have toy libraries where parents can go to borrow toys for their kids and return them when their kids get bored of them.

Think of it. Less crap in your closets. A lot less money spent on toys that the kids get sick of. And a lot fewer of the earth's resources for stuff that is sitting in our closets for all but about an hour or two out of every 168 hours in a week.

Pittsburgh has a toy library you can read about here and Lewiston, Maine, has one here.

And the thing about sharing is that it brings people together. You get more friends. Happier planet, in other words, happier people.

PS I'd love to hear of a toy library in Manhattan if anyone knows one.

Sustainability and the meaning of life

Cartoon by Eric Lewis courtesy of Cartoon Bank.

Demand better

I've been thinking about how to say this all night, and finally, I realized that I'd already said it close to the way I meant to (but I added the emphasis in bold tonight):

I am not realistic. I never want to be realistic. God save us all from realism, especially if it means we have to limit our vision for the world.

Most of us love our children and want to be polite to our neighbors. Most of us, unless we are diseased by terrible living conditions or alcohol or drugs, would rather give than steal. Most of us, in our hearts, want peace and harmony for ourselves and for the rest of the world. Most of us, too, believe that we should take good care of the planet, just because it is the right thing to do. In other words, in the depths of our hearts, most of us are not “realistic.”

When I was child, and I first heard of war, I was appalled. My mother had taught me hitting was wrong. I categorically understood that people should not hurt each other. Then I grew up and I became realistic. Peace, feeding the hungry, a healthy planet, an end to war, these things just aren’t realistically possible, a mature mind understands. Well, when it comes to these things, I’ve been both an idealistic child and a realistic grownup, and I think I was a better person when I was an idealistic child.

I believe in the goodness of human nature. I believe we can get distracted by many things, but that, ultimately, we all want to do what is best. Because that is true of people, I believe we can make the planet better for all of us, that we can have peace, feed the hungry and end war.

I believe too that every action each of us takes makes a difference. Every time each of us rejects a disposable bag brings the world one step closer to being the kind of place where sea turtles don’t die from eating plastic. Every time each of us sacrifices a car ride brings us the world one step closer to being the kind of place where there is no global warming. Every time one of us tithes our income brings us one step closer to ending world poverty. Every time one of us calls a member of congress brings our representatives one step closer to caring more about voters than campaign contributors.

Perhaps people will think I’m too optimistic. But this is for certain: these things can’t be true if no one takes the chance of believing they’re true. Because if we don’t believe they are true, we won’t act as though they’re true. And if we don’t act as though they’re true, they can’t come true. That’s why realism does little but protect the status quo.

Being optimistic, on the other hand, is the most radical political act there is.

All we have to imagine something better. And then insist upon it.

Forced to face the big questions

For the longest time, for me, it was easy to live by default. To go along living like everyone else. Not to question.

But the reason I started the No Impact project was because the crisis in human safety, security and health as it relates to the grave problems of our planetary habitat forced me to begin to face the big questions.

For me the big questions are:

How shall I live? What is the truth of my relationship to you and our community? What should I do? In short, what is this short life of mine really for?

This humane society video of the treatment of beef cattle at a California slaughterhouse is like that, too. It forces me to ask the big questions. How shall I live? What should I do?

More pointedly, taking this video alongside all the environmental impacts of raising beef, how should I eat?

Don't watch it if you are queasy. If you can't see it in your email or your news reader, go here.

Why I'm fond of saying wisdom trumps science

When one group of scientists first said smoking was bad for you, the tobacco industry funded another group of researchers to say the science was inconclusive. When dietitians began saying saturated animal fats hurt your heart, the beef and dairy industry rolled out their own group of gurus saying "not so bad."

And now that we have a a whole heard of scientists saying that human activity is causing global warming, everyone from the oil industry to the libertarian think tanks are rolling out thinkers who say humans aren't causing climate change.

In other words, science gets manipulated. You'll hear one thing one day and another thing the next. Fighting it is a bit like fighting a tornado.

And to my mind, the debate over the science is pointless. All over the world, countries are going to be increasingly buying renewable energy. The question is, does the United States want to be at the forefront of the renewable energy sector or not? Do we want to be exporters of the new green tech, and create green jobs in doing so, or not?

Do we want to get caught up in a ridiculous scientific argument or do we want to just get something done? Since wisdom provides us with the capacity to make the right decisions, we might as well use it. The current scientific debate, despite its ridiculous legitimization by mainstream journalists, is designed to cause "stasis through obfuscation," as my wife Michelle calls it.

We don't have to wait until "science" clears things up. We don't have to be too confused to do anything. We already have enough wisdom to know what to do. Because even if some people think the science isn't clear, as I'm fond of saying, wisdom sometimes trumps science.

An alternative American dream

I came across a passage in Jerome M. Segal's Graceful Simplicity: Toward a Philosophy and Politics of Simple of Living that articulates, for me, the kind of real progress that I envision. It goes like this:

"The point of an economy, even a dynamic economy, is not to have more and more; it is to liberate us from the economic--to provide a material platform from which we may go on to build the good life. That's the alternative American dream."

What would you do if you were liberated from the economic?