On fear

Fear is the undercurrent at the historic meeting here in Copenhagen. It runs through the public discourse infusing all sides of the chat. What if we don't get an agreement? Are we doomed? What if we DO get an agreement? Will prosperity die? Will we be back to living in caves wearing hair shirts, painting ourselves blue?

Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams talked about fear in his sermon at the ecumenical Christian service on Sunday at Copenhagen's Lutheran cathedral. I was sitting in the front row of seats, just a few meters from the Danish Queen, her Prime Minister and many of the world's Christian leaders, including Desmond Tutu. I could easily have touched the terrifying stigmata of human damage to the natural world that church leaders brought in: scourged Pacific coral, a shrivelled cob of African maize, bare Greenlandic rocks that ought to have been fast in snow. Terrifying because they are symbols of the changes we have unwittingly wrought on the natural world that gives us life. Terrifying because these we can see while so many others are invisible.

The Archbishop made a call to move past fear, to opt for higher emotions, even as he said sometimes we are tempted to make people yet more frightened. In his view, fear is a paralyzing emotion, not a catalytic one. He pleaded for action out of love instead.

On the surface, it sounded as if he were a New Age hippy masquerading as an eminent man of the cloth. The young Parisian woman next to me, representing Greenpeace, tried in vain to stifle mocking laughter. But most of us knew exactly what he meant. As another theologian here in Copenhagen put it: You pay your taxes out of duty and fear, but you take care of your children out of devotion and love. Think of the difference in intensity of those two acts. The motivation is quite different. One you might easily be distracted from doing; the other you would risk your life to make sure you could do.

That's what the Archbishop meant, I think. With a nod to these sickeningly stagey talks down the street at the Bella Centre, he was asking: What would the climate talks look like if, instead of being motivated by fear of losing something, the negotiators (and their masters - we the citizens) were motivated instead by devotion to the health of the planet, to the generations yet to come, to love of the complex dance of creation that has evolved this way for a valid biological reason? The talks would have a different feel, that's for sure. They might even be authentic.

It's not to say that facing up to the latest information is to foster fear. A cold dose of reality can work along a parallel track to devotion and love. It can be a gesture of truth-telling. I've just been reading about predictions from the Met Office's Hadley Centre in the U.K. where they've done a study on what the world will look like at the end of the century if these posing talks this week and others to come (Mexico in 2010, anyone?) end up stalemated. It will be 5 degrees Celsius of warming at best, is the prediction. Effects on the planet's life forms, including those in the ocean on which we air-breathers depend, are unknown but generally predictable: It will be catastrophe.

What will prevent it? Will it be the $100-billion fund the Obama administration promised today to raise by 2020? Will it be the comma set in one part of the sentence rather than the other in a final document? Will it be these sleep-deprived humans at the Bella Centre red in tooth and claw over the inclusion or exclusion of a single word? Will it be Canada, the shrinking violet, resolute only in its determination to avoid inter-provincial conflict at home and preserve an economic system that is damaging the earth? No. All these strategies are destined to fail. The process itself is flawed. The catalyzing depends on love and hope rather than fear and loss.

We'll find out tomorrow - or over the weekend if the play runs over time for greater dramatic tension - whether the citizens' representatives and humanity's potential saviours, have figured this out.

Hello from Copenhagen

It feels as though we are down to the wire in Copenhagen. Frustration is high over the glacial pace of negotiations. As well, with tens of thousands of people representing non-governmental organizations kept out of the Bella Centre, where negotiations are going on, this city feels full of unspent energy searching for a place to burst. I think this will intensify as the week goes on and as access to the Bella Centre is cut down even further. And as the talks continue to look like they're faltering.

But it's fascinating to be here. There is the distinct sense that two separate events are happening. First and most obvious are the talks. It's the fifteenth yearly set since the Kyoto Protocol was framed and it's clear that what happens here politically will set the stage for life and death on the planet. I wish that were an overstatement.

Second is the sense that this is the seminal moment of our generation. Something is happening here that goes well beyond the political or scientific arena. We are witnessing the passionate engagement of the citizenry in the future of life on the planet. That makes itself clear in the touchingly careful organization the nation of Denmark has taken in the preparations for the event: the city squares, metro stations, walls and public spaces full of climate-based art. It's clear in the range of citizens from around the world who are here, vaulting well past the norm even for a large UN event. There are the carefully scruffy anarchists and anti-nuclear types, the dapper, silk-scarved fellows with shiny shoes from government offices, the impossibly young students who seem to have endless energy, the elegant suit-clad men wearing toques and scarves and speaking wonderful African French as they shiver in Copenhagen's long outdoor lineups.

The participants who really gave me a glimpse of what's going on, though, were the elderly couple who were in line as I waited on Saturday to get my accreditation through the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD), where I am an associate. He had one of those Northern European beards without a mustache, white and trimmed, sticking straight out from the end of his chin. She wore wire glasses and her hair was gray. Both were dressed in black and looked frail. Throughout the hour-long wait, outside the Bella Centre and then inside the makeshift security tent complete with airport scanners, they held hands. The look on their faces was that of excitement and hope. I had the sense that they had followed this issue for many years and were here to bear witness to its joyful, successful conclusion. They are not the only ones.

This issue has gone well beyond a political process. It has gone far past just being a scientific issue. During these two weeks in Copenhagen, the CO2 problem - of the atmosphere and to some degree the ocean - has become the central issue of our species. What remains to be seen is whether we attempt to solve it as a whole species, or whether we maintain a tribal stance, pitting rich against poor, old emitters versus new, vulnerable against the strong. That will never work, in my view. This problem is so big it needs us all to be pulling in the same direction.

Can the political leaders who are here stamp down on their own pride and fear and give birth to real hope? Stay tuned.

Alanna
Copenhagen

The Johnson Sea-Link II

Hello, everyone.

Above is a picture of me in the Johnson Sea-Link II. Below is an image of it resurfacing after being in the ocean for more than three hours. Inside this tiny submersible, I journeyed 3 000 feet under the sea. Both pictures were taken in June of 2007.

A remarkable piece of machinery, this little vehicle is able to withstand the awesome pressure of the deep ocean. With it, scientists are able to observe life forms that have literally never seen the light of day, and collect specimens for research. Unfortunately, the JSL II is soon to be made into scrap metal. The state of Florida wants to stop funding the technology of the submersible; the last dives are slated for this summer. There is currently a campaign running to save the submersibles. 5 000 signatures are needed in order to save these faithful voyagers and keep open the level of exploration and research that they offer. For more information about this issue, and to sign the petition, please click here.

This submersible was critical to the research that became an internationally bestselling book, Seasick. It is published in Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom, and will be published in the United States this coming fall.