Floods: Postscript and Prelude

Hurricane Irma. Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2017/09/05/florida-declares-state-of-emergency-as-hurricane-irma-intensifies-to-a-category-5-storm/

If you want to read the whole series, click these links.

Floods

More Floods

As Houston begins to return to some degree of recovery, any local will tell you that there's more weather to come. Usually, you would get one big storm, but during hurricane season, there would still be heavy rains now and again. These are not normal times.

As I write this, a category five behometh named Irma is on her way to Carribbean. From the radar captures, she looks to be headed directly to Cuba and the Dominican Republic, to Haiti, to Puerto Rico, to the Virgin Islands, to the Florida Keys, and the Lesser Antilles. Or maybe Miami. Or she may miss everything and just go up the east coast?

Irma has registered on seismometers. These are not normal times. Or is it more accurate to say that this is the new normal?

On the other side of the world, the one I currently occupy, we've seen devasting floods in Nepal and India. 1200 people dead and $9 billion in damage in the Terai. For the U.S., this would be negligible. For Nepal, it is devastating. The Terai is the bread-basket and an estimate of up to 80% has been suggested in terms of crop damage which will translate as food shortages for at least a year.

In my second home in South Asia (at least, this time around), India, floods have hit not just Bihar (a state that borders Nepal) but Mumbai, as well. And it's not just India and the U.S.; we're seeing extreme flooding across Africa, in Bangladesh, in Pakistan. Oh, and yes, in South America.

Some say the world will end in fire

Nor is it just flooding; we also have wild fires threatening Los Angeles and Montana, southern France, Portugal, and Canada.

So far, these "extreme weather events" are playing out according to global warming models. More frequent, more intense, and I don't think they're one-offs any longer (this is a decent article, but it's missing the mark; it's not a "strange future" we're going to encounter - it's wretched). There will be intense storms that will drop tons of water on different areas; conversely, there will be extreme droughts that will render the landscape barren and inhabitable and give rise to conflagrations that will slash and burn their way across mountain, brush, and suburb.

It's been said that Houston and Mumbai could have been better prepared. Perhaps. Maybe for the present levels of hurricanes, monsoons, and storms. But as we move forward into a world where Mother Nature is going to correct imbalances, because this is what She does, will we be able to prepare for more severe climatic and local weather events?

As Irma approaches, I realize this is only now. Then, there's later, the next time, and the next time. Now, it's the Carribbean and Florida, next it might be the Indian Ocean, or later or at the same time, the South China Sea. The patterns may actually grow to be relatively predictable in terms of mass and direction. Low-lying areas may well be at risk for complete destruction and funds may dry up because as these events become more frequent, either people will have to desert these areas or frankly, they will become unsustainable.

What happens if the Houston Ship Channel goes under? The U.S. GDP will take a hit, but supply chains for petroleum based products will be strongly affected. You might say, not without reason, that then the U.S. will have to move operations to another port. But to what end and for how long? Let's say Houston dies and it will, if the Ship Channel were to overflow in the worst case scenario, the entire city would have to evacuate. Once the refineries and processing plants are compromised, the levels of toxicity will render much of the area uninhabitable. Sure, the region could rebuild, but it would be over decades and in the face of increasing intense weather events. Would it be worth investing in? Doubtful.

Let's say, then, that Los Angeles is an option. But then, we still see rises in sea levels, although these may not be as intense as those areas affected by rises in levels related to the Atlantic Ocean. But given more frequent and intense drought/fire-related events, what will these mean for economic stability across the Southwestern United States?

And this is just the United States. I've been saying for years to friends that conditions that affect the U.S. are going to huge orders of magnitude greater for more marginalized, fragile economies. I mentioned earlier that the estimate for flood damage in Nepal is around $9 billion. Adjusted for economics of scale, this is huge for Nepal; and because it's Nepal, they'll be batted around like a ping-pong ball between India and China. This sets up another interesting thought experiment.

As we've seen, India, too, has been hit with devastating flooding; they have a far more robust economy than Nepal, but are beset by a number of other crises; on-going conflict with Pakistan, border and policy issues with China, internal matters of corruption, the demonetization debacle, and in general, a remarkable lack of direction. Yet, they are the major power in South Asia. They would love to have more influence in SARC countries and ASEAN countries, but what happens when - not if - India is hit with similar circumstances as are occurring in the U.S.? This could spell greater disaster for their 1.25 billion and growing population.

I really don't want to contemplate the consequences of impending disasters for Southeast Asia, for South America, or indeed, for any of us. Nature doesn't recognize boundaries. She's going to do what she needs to do to achieve balance. What we call disasters are just Momma Earth's shifting to a more comfortable position.

It's personal

Climate change is not an act of God; it is, in previous geologic eras, the result of cosmic, geologic, and physical processes. Climate change is now, most assuredly, significantly altered by humankind's massive population expansion and influence since the Industrial Revolution. It doesn't baffle or surprise or me. I've been well aware of our affect on the environment since I was a kid. I used to look at a yellowish sky before going to school in the morning as the refineries from Beaumont pumped effluents into the air. The sky would be bluish later in the day owing to Earth's rotation and the consequent atmospheric adjustments as she rotated, but that didn't remove the particulate matter in the air.

Once regulations were enforced, incidences of repiratory diseases decreased and the sky was actually blue. This changed when regulations were weakened in the earlier oughts of the new millenium and people I'd known who were lifelong East Texans were now dealing with asthma and respiratory condistions they'd never experienced before. Coincidence? Yeah, I'm a cheeky bastard.

The Issue?

Here's the issue: human beings driven by profit don't seem to understand that absent concern and care for one another, we are doom ourselves.

It's not just in the United States. Some humans' drives for "MORE" are greater than their capacity for forward thinking or foresight. Their greed outstrips their compassion. They may be fine parents. Maybe they really do want a better world for everyone as their dozing off in church. But as I've learned, through very many difficult years, we are quite frankly, mad.

We are. We know that we should be kind but we hate each other beautifully. We know that skin color is superficial but we use that to convince ourselves of our racial superiority (I'm in Asia and the prejudice works in reverse; people think I'm rich! Woohoo! So very wrong...) We claim that we abide by tenets of our religions but slaughter the Other in outright genocide and numbers so vast that they defy comprehension. Muslims kill Christians, Buddhists kill Muslims, Christians kill...well, everybody. But all in the name of their books, their gods, their buddhas. This is madness.

We are mad.

No. I don't accept your book. I don't accept explanations of karma or God or anything but "yes, we are mad; human beings are utterly incapable as a group, as a worldwide population, to genuinely care for each other." I will never hear those words spoken.

The Nebulous "They"

I will hear that "they're to blame", "they started it all", "they're the ones who do heinous things, so we just do more heinous things to stop them"; this hurts my heart so much.

There are those who argue that humanity has no effect on climate change or that our presence has had negligible effect. Have they ever looked at a satellite photo of the side of the Earth where it is night? The lights that are visible are testimony to our ongoing presence and how many resources we are using at that very moment when the photo was taken.

It's not just the lights you see. It's the hydroelectric dams, the processors, the transformers, the generators (in some areas, back-ups) that keep the lights on. It's the round-the-clock IT departments that ensure servers are up to drive keep the software running so switches can automatically cycle through their on-off/binary actions to maintain that your lights are on. It's not just a beautiful picture of some jewel-like nightscape. It is you.

We/You Are Multitudes

You get up in the morning and what a lovely morning it is! You take your shower and brush your teeth; you put on your clothes, head to the kitchen and make some toast and grind some coffee. So far, so good. Until you pour your coffee and a couple drops splash on your nicely pressed shirt. "Fuck!" You get up and as you do, you jostle the coffee. It spills over into the saucer, but too much for your liking: "FUCK!" You change shirts, but took too long; now you're cutting it too close. You sip your now-cold coffee and run to the car to drive to the park and ride.

You regain a little composure. But then, some asshole cuts you off as you're making that all-important right to turn into the parking lot. More invective. But then again, you pull into the lot and you realize you have ten minutes. You're good! You feel calm.

But then, after ten minutes, the train isn't there. There's discontent. You get nervous. You have that presentation first thing in the morning. You're fearful. Even though you know the material, the VP is going to be there.

Look! There's the train! It's so late! No, it's not! It's two minutes behind schedule. You get on and take your seat next to a beautiful woman. She smiles at you; you chat her up. You are in heaven. Fifteen minutes later, you exit the train walking on air until you remember; you didn't get her name and she didn't ask you for yours and the train departs and she's still on it. The hell with it.

You go to the office. You're actually early and can prep for your presentation. You don't care. You berate yourself; why didn't you ask her for her name? or what she liked? or...God almighty, you realize you're a preposterous loser! You go to the kitchen in to get some coffee. Liz is talking to Brad. Christ, they're insufferable. They ask you how you're doing and you all make small talk. Oh, they're not so bad; actually, quite likable.

This entire emotional rollercoaster takes place in, what? Forty-five minutes? And in those forty-five minutes, how many brain states have been traversed? How many emotions? How divided has the attention been? It's not a matter of how many times "you" have changed. It's a matter of how many "yous" have inhabited each successive moment. This. This is madness. We didn't even look at the fantasies that occupy each rise and fall of crisis and joy. But just reading this, all those should be familiar and easy to suss out. Or make up your own.

What has this to do with floods, wildfires and climate change?

Everything.

Multiply your chaotic state seven billion fold. More or less. Give or take maybe only a few million, at best. Almost everyone on this planet is designed, wired, systematically and systemically programmed, to look out only for their own dreams, the fulfillment of their own desires. Now, put those people into office. Give them powers over budgets, over lives.

It's not a stretch to see how we wind up here. Oh, sure, there's plenty of science to support why the individual looks out for themselves, vestiges of flight or fight, and all that. But we're a long way from those days and brain science and brain models become convenient excuses for why we act the way we do.

But that's not the whole of it.

Humans are funny. Once we know a thing, we know we can change it or change something about it. We can't change the laws of mathematics, but we can change how we use them. We can use them to build an effective electric grid. Or we can use them to build a hydrogen bomb.

The mechanistic approach to - and modeling of - human behavior needs to be discarded. We now know more about how we inter-relate, we now know more about the laws of physics and how they help us understand the world, and we now know more about each other than ever before. So why do we still continue to ignore the evidence of science right in front of our stupid faces? Because we are mad.

We're bonkers. Not all of us; just most. And there's a small economic powerful minority, who are hellbent on driving an apocalyptic, good ol' endtime agenda of their liking. There's another minority - maybe it's not that small - of people who believe in the power of wisdom and compassion, of empathy and sympathy, who live and act in accordance with these qualities. They may be considered strange or queer (in both older and modern meanings; because, God forbid, if you live by these values, you can't be heteronormative...) or quite insane by the majority of whatever society they live in. And those who hold the latter views seem to be the majority, regardless of country or culture.

However

Few things bother me more than the acceptance of selfishness as the natural order of things.

It's really not. Nature works as a lattice work or as interconnected supports and processes. People, humans, will say "well, but animals kill each other and life is a sequence of consumption and excretion, so your interpretation is bullshit." And I say, weeeellll, so you're saying that human beings are "only organisms that respond to stimuli in set patterns"?

If that's true and that's what you live by, then there's no problem! No need to get upset by anything! Get in your car, go to work, or not. Anything you do, then, is simply, programmed. You have no personal responsibility! Cool! You can go out and do whatever you want! Really! You're just a bio-chemical mass of random assembled subroutines that can willy-nilly respond to any situation however they deem fit. Hell, you could go out and buy a gun and kill people, rape a couple of people and die in a - what? - "heroic firefight against the Man"?!

But humans aren't that. We are capable of questioning "received wisdom", of not accepting what we're told simply because someone said so. However, we've grown increasingly selfish in some ways and increasingly, more knowledgable in others; in some ways, some of us are more reactive, some of us are more studied and measured in our responses to life. Yet, we find ourselves here at this moment in history which may actually result in the extreme downsizing of the human population.

There's a part of me that's really not surprised by this.

I"m not going to go through some tired diatribe about capitalism or the pluses and minuses of socialism or any kind of "ism-ism" at all. It's not interesting. Such discussions only serve to mask the underlying, sometime crippled nature of mankind.

You might ask, well, then, Mister Smartypants, how do we nurture "selflessness"? We do it everyday. Every parent, no matter how fucked-up or how lame at raising kids, at some point, is an example of "selflessness". Teachers who show up for decades and who aren't driven by anything but a motive to help kids learn are an example of that. Doctors, pro bono attorneys, the list goes on. The examples are always there.

"Selflessness" is nurtured every moment of the day. What happens is that most lose sight of that when early on, they're told that they have to look out for number one; after that, they better get married so they don't die alone, give birth to a couple (or more) kids, and save up enough for retirement. Maybe along the way, they donate a few hundred here and there, but for the most part, they're looking out for themselves and their family. Maybe in a wider purview, they look out for their neighborhood, or their city, or their state...Or their fucking football team.

Let's say an unfamiliar face moves into their neighborhood or school or whatever dimenstion of social milieu they choose. Then it's different. Maybe they're accepting; if they're white and the new neighbors are black, maybe they're cool with that. Or maybe, they're not. Maybe those new people are strange; different cultures, different customs.... They're "weird". Maybe, that's just a mild response. Or maybe it's more virulent; these new people are going to bring us down! We should make them uncomfortable and drive them out. Or if they won't go... then, we'll do something worse.

And so on.

Yeah. I think we're mad.

Back to the Climate: what now?

In the immediate context, there's so very much to deal with. Despite what I've said, it's amazing the innate goodness that reveals itself in selfless acts and neighborly support. When governments fail, the people rise up to help their neighbors. I've seen this all across the world. We may be mad, the lot of us, but we are each of us imbued with a good heart.

That might be our saving grace. Given the nightmares I've pointed to in this post, it wouldn't be a mistake to think I'm a pessimist or have little faith in humanity. But I'm not only that. I have seen remarkable changes in individuals and in societies. I can agree with David Bowie that "hope is a cheap thing" but in many cases, it proves vital.

I don't have hope that billions will not be negatively affected by climate change. And I do mean "billions". As the years move on, more and more events will transpire and even if literal billions are not directly affected by these events, they will be, in either tangential or relatively approximate contexts.