{"id":60812,"date":"2021-12-06T16:23:26","date_gmt":"2021-12-06T21:23:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=60812"},"modified":"2021-12-06T16:23:26","modified_gmt":"2021-12-06T21:23:26","slug":"andrew-nikiforuk-on-getting-real-about-our-crises","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=60812","title":{"rendered":"Andrew Nikiforuk on Getting Real about Our Crises"},"content":{"rendered":"<header class=\"article__header\" data-dev-object-descrip=\"organisms\/article\/article__header\" data-dev-status=\"IN-PROGRESS\">\n<div class=\"container-fluid\">\n<h3 data-bind=\"title\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thetyee.ca\/Analysis\/2021\/12\/06\/Andrew-Nikiforuk-Getting-Real-About-Our-Crises\/\">Andrew Nikiforuk on Getting Real about Our Crises<\/a><\/h3>\n<p data-bind=\"teaser\"><strong>WATCH: The noted journo delivered a talk on what we\u2019re up against, and what we need to do. Warning: His prescription is bracing.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/header>\n<section class=\"featured-media\" data-dev-object-descrip=\"02-organisms\/article\/featured-media\">\n<div class=\"container-fluid\">\n<figure class=\"figure \" data-dev-object-descrip=\"01-molecules\/blocks\/figure\">\n<div class=\"responsive-embed\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/p2ePYyMvodU\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/div><figcaption class=\"caption\">WATCH: Andrew Nikiforuk\u2019s Southam Lecture. Some attendees wondered where he finds hope. His answer: Hope is using every initiative \u2018to restore the possibility of people making their own decisions.\u2019\u00a0<span class=\"caption__media--credit\">\u00a0<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<article class=\"article__body main-col-container\" data-dev-object-descrip=\"organisms\/article\/article__body\" data-dev-status=\"IN-PROGRESS\">\n<div class=\"container-fluid clearfix \">\n<p class=\"editors-note\">[Editor\u2019s note: On Nov. 17, Andrew Nikiforuk, the highly awarded journalist, author and Tyee contributing editor gave the Southam Lecture at the University of Victoria. Over 1,000 people attended in person or online. You can view the recorded video above. Below, a bonus from Nikiforuk. He addresses questions some members of the audience sent his way.]<\/p>\n<p>Two weeks ago, I gave a talk at the University of Victoria arguing that our morally bankrupt civilization is chasing dead ends when it comes to climate change and energy spending.<\/p>\n<p>I argued that by focusing on emissions, we have failed to acknowledge economic and population growth as the primary driver of those emissions along with the unrestrained consumption of natural systems that support all life.<\/p>\n<p>I added that people plus affluence plus technology make a deadly algorithm that is now paving our road to collective ruin.<\/p>\n<p>As Ronald Wright noted in his book\u00a0<em>A Short History of Progress<\/em>, civilization is a pyramid scheme that depends on cancerous rates of growth.<\/p>\n<p>I also explained that many so-called green technologies including renewables, hydrogen and carbon capture and storage are not big solutions. Because they require rare earth minerals and fossil fuels for their production and maintenance, these technologies\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/thetyee.ca\/Analysis\/2021\/11\/03\/Tech-Will-Not-Save-Us-Shrinking-Consumption-Will\/\">shift<\/a> problems around.<\/p>\n<p>In addition these green technologies\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.realclearscience.com\/articles\/2021\/11\/27\/green_technologies_have_a_glaring_problem_of_scale_805367.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">cannot be scaled up in time<\/a>\u00a0to cut emissions or require too much energy to make any difference at all.<\/p>\n<p>\u2026click on the above link to read the rest of the article\u2026<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Andrew Nikiforuk on Getting Real about Our Crises WATCH: The noted journo delivered a talk on what we\u2019re up against, and what we need to do. Warning: His prescription is bracing. WATCH: Andrew Nikiforuk\u2019s Southam Lecture. Some attendees wondered where he finds hope. His answer: Hope is using every initiative \u2018to restore the possibility of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,7],"tags":[5549,23884],"class_list":["post-60812","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","category-survival-2","tag-andrew-nikiforuk","tag-thetyee-ca"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60812","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=60812"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60812\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":60813,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60812\/revisions\/60813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=60812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=60812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=60812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}