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What Would the Phoenix Five Do?

What does it say about me that i'm reading an article about using technology to manipulate the environment in an attempt to slow climate change, and i compare it to what happened when Cyclops and Co. got the Phoenix Force and started remaking the world?

Carlson says geo-engineering comes with obvious international legal implications because no one country can implement its own geo-engineering plan without causing weather or climate changes in other countries. There's also the law of unintended consequences, because while many geo-engineering concepts have proved hopeful in the lab, nobody knows what will happen when actually put into practice.

Oh, pshaw. Was the Sub-Mariner worried about consequences when he buried Wakanda in a tidal wave?

So, here's my problem with Professor Carlson's idea:

As a model for his oversight body, Carlson suggests the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Like the IMF, his proposed organization would give all countries a place during discussions, but decisions would be made by a relatively small group of directors, each of which has a weighted vote that's based on their country's greenhouse gas production. That is, countries that produce more greenhouse gases will spend more money to combat global climate change, and so will have more votes.

Do you see the conflict of interest here? The countries producing the most greenhouse gases get the most votes and are expected to pay more. But it's more than likely that they would vote against any climate change controlling measures because they wouldn't want to have to foot the bill.

The climate talks in Doha failed and the Kyoto protocol failed because big nations didn't want to put restrictions on their ability to pollute freely. I think those countries who are the most vulnerable to climate change should get the most votes. So, everyone on an island, the Inuits, Greenland, and pretty much all of Africa get to decide what is done since they're the ones who get screwed first when shit starts melting and rain stops falling.

By min | December 20, 2012, 10:58 AM | Comics & Science