Rapa Nui, Easter Island, was once covered in forest. Now it is treeless. In his book “Collapse”  Diamond Jared asked this question: “What were they thinking as they cut down the last tree?”  I suspect they probably were not thinking at all. They were certainly not thinking beyond satisfying some immediate need. This is the human condition; very few of us are capable of thinking much beyond tomorrow, or at least next year

In a functioning democracy Governments can only do what the people allow them to do. I first learned about what was then called the green house effect when I was studying at university in 1971, almost forty years ago.  In that time nothing has been done because we the people will not allow anything to be done; we will not allow our freedoms to be curtailed, or our living standards to be lowered. The legislators, and we the people, maintain the vain hope that the  ETS   will some how miraculously allow us to go on living as we always have endlessly consuming while introducing yet another commodity into the market place; the buying and selling of clean and dirty air.  Yeah Right! We don’t need an ETS; first we need a change of heart…and you cannot legislate for that.

I remain hopeful. The human race has, in its short existence on the planet, always found solutions to its problems, not without first making many mistakes, but we do get there eventually. The Astronomer Royal, Martin Rees believes it would be foolhardy to venture technological predictions for 2050. Even more so to predict social and geopolitical changes. He points out that the most important advances, the qualitative leaps, are the least predictable.

In the meantime, tread lightly on this planet as one walking on water leaving behind no footprints.

We thank you God that we are so wonderfully made



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