Book Excerpts

Children

1. It's easy to understand why we favor downstream over upstream interventions
10. Upstream work means systems thinking
11. A Model for Center Green - The Land Trust Movement in America
11. Climate change is the perfect storm when it comes to failing to trigger a brain response
12. One reason we focus on "climate urgency" is because we're trying to take advantage of how we think
13. There are big barriers to being able to focus on "the world avoided."
14. Gaming is a huge challenge in designing systems
15. To avoid gaming, ask these 4 questions
16. We need to focus less on symptoms, and more on the problems
17. We don't know a lot about scaling successful programs
18. Donella Meadows on "dancing with systems."
2. The brain has adapted to downstream thinking over millions of years
3. The need for upstream thinking is very new evolutionarily
4. Both downstream and upstream thinking are necessary
5. Upstream thinking definitely doesn't come naturally to us
6. Inattentional blindness contributes to a downstream focus
7. "Scarcity" is a big motivator of downstream thinking
8. A perceived lack of ownership contributes to a downstream focus
9. The benefits of upstream thinking are not always easy to measure
A comprehensive Center Green approach would include
A cost-benefit approach to climate change is morally monstrous
A cost-benefit approach to climate change is morally monstrous
A crack in the wedge emerged in 2003 and continued
A lot of money could be raised for the fight
A Methane Catastrophe May Not Be Likely
Addressing climate change is the best hope many people have for a better life
Addressing climate change means the end of the unregulated economy - which is why conservatives are in such "denial'
Addressing climate change requires a revolution in worldviews
Advanced Life on Earth has Almost Ended Before
Advocacy of "hi-tech" solutions is intended to buy off conservatives
After the 2010 failure on cap and trade, little focus on the root causes of the failure
Agroecology is a solution to climate change
All of the problems stem from a failure to communicate
Americans say they support the environment, but do they CARE?
An elite-driven counter-movement developed to combat environmentalism
Antiregulation has become a plank of the antienvironmental orthodoxy
Anyone can come up with a scenario - whether for a good outcome or bad outcome
Anyone can forecast, but most decarbonization forecasts are little more than guesses
Best utilitarian argument is that without a healthy environment, neither people nor economy can flourish
Blockadia activists need to be presented with better economic opportunities
Blockadia as the Solution to Climate Change
Blockadia has moved past risk assessment - to the precautionary principle
Blockadia is a response to energy companies' venturing into ever more unconventional fuels
Brannen - The Ends of the World
Branson has demonstrated that capitalism isn't going to save the world
But the Great Estrangement came back and is as strong as ever
By insisting on a holistic solution, we've achieved almost nothing
Catastrophists have a terrible track record, and always under-estimate human ingenuity
Center Greens are pragmatic, and figure out what steps are possible.
Climate change can pull together the pieces to reform a savagely unjust economic system
Conservative principles align with environmental goals
Conservatives and libertarians believe in personal responsibility
Conservatives are right to fear climate action - it will change everything
Corporate acknowledgement of climate change doesn't suggest at all a readiness to address the problem
Decarbonization to date has been incidental, and not the result of policy action
Disaster struck environmental movement in 1994
Divestment is challenging the social license of the fossil fuel industry
Divestment is the first stage of delegitimization - like the tobacco companies
Divestment isn't about hurting companies economically - it's about hurting their reputations and taking their power
Energy success stories like Denmark happened before trade agreements could stop them
Environmental movement has become closely tied to Democratic Party
Environmentalists fear the real solutions, and focus on magical solutions
Even strong mitigation efforts won’t deliver a clear signal of success for decades
Even the UNFCCC has surrendered to the supremacy of trade agreements
Everyone agrees we need to cross the partisan divide, but Greens haven't
Everyone needs to embrace the intent of past treaties
Existential threats can be less effective than visible threats
Few NGOs other than sportsmen groups have tried to engage conservatives in green causes
Forecasts of electric vehicle growth have generally missed the mark by a lot
Free trade agreements are a real threat to the political acceptability of climate policies
Geoengineering presents an insurmountable ethical problem
Global growth in auto and air-conditioner numbers will be much larger than assumed in rapid decarbonization scenarios
Green hostility to economic growth is a self-imposed double whammy
Green Movement is at a standstill, partially due to focusing entirely on climate change
Green movement tends to ignore the shallowness of support
Greens must get comfortable with moral arguments on behalf of nature
Growing SUV numbers have more than offset the impact of electric vehicles
Heath - Upstream
Huge advances are being made in legitimizing native claims
Hyperpartisanship is a huge problem since environmental policy has been dependent on bipartisanship
If we give voters the right candidates, they'll vote for them
Incrementalism is no longer an option - we have to change everything about the economy
Individuals in affluent countries consume energy equivalent to 200 people working 24 hours a day
Individuals with strong hierarchical and individualistic views reject climate change consensus
It is easier to deny reality than allow your worldview to be shattered
It's hard to sort out the interests of insurance companies
Klein - This Changes Everything
Learning how to inspire and motivate is a core challenge, since it's not a rational process
Libertarians very concerned about protecting the Earth becoming an overarching principle
Marrying environment and growth is a necessity
Marshall - Don't Even Think About It
Mass movements have declared crises before
Movement conservatism suddenly went on the attack
Movement has fractured into shades of green
NIMBY is no longer a bad word - it is the core of the environmental movement
Ocean Acidification is a Huge Risk
One model forecasts that the economics of rapid decarbonization don’t turn “net positive” until about 2080
Other observers like Brad Werner are suggesting that mass movements are the only answer
Per capita energy demand has risen 20% over the last 30 years - cutting it in half would be an astonishing accmoplishment
Politicians aren't the only ones who can declare a crisis
Population is a key variable for future economic social and environmental outcomes
Proponents of rapid decarbonization owe us a realistic explanation of how to get there
Rapid decarbonization of electricity is possible, at least up to a point
Reconnecting contemporary conservatives with conservative values will expose the aberration of market fundamentalism
Renewables have increased 50-fold, while the share of fossil fuels has falled from 87 to 85 percent
Rich - Getting to Green
Rise of antienvironmental rhetoric made it much harder for moderate Republicans
Scenarios tend to gravitate toward the extreme bounds of future outcomes
Simply saying "no more fossil fuels" is an anti-growth proxy, and has been disastrous
Since 1800 useful energy production production is up 3,500 fold
Talking about adaptation sows the seeds for future action
Techno-optimists have as bad a record as catastrophists
The ascendency of market fundamentalism was due to well-funded efforts
The Carbon Cycle Has Been Critical to Earth’s History
The case for environmentalism is anchored in the moral implications of our species now having god-like powers
The case of slavery shows that we've such transitions before
The challenge of a renewables transition is huge
The climate fight isn't a separate fight - it's all one big fight
The climate movement came of age in Copenhagen
The economic benefits of rapid decarbonization won’t manifest for decades, while the costs are near-term
The energy density of fossil fuels gives them a huge advantage over batteries
The energy density of liquid hydrocarbon is going to be hard to compete with
The energy industry has been shocked by the sudden emergence of Blockadia
The failure of the Green movement to make climate progress is easy to summarize
The first generation of Green issues was distinctive
The focus on market mechanisms gutted the development of an environmental agenda on climate
The geoengineering taboo has eroded
The Green movement has cried wolf on climate change too often
The legal position of native peoples is shifting in their favor
The precautionary principle should provide common ground
The principled conservative insists the profit motive be recognized and limited
The prospects for significantly reducing global meat consumption are distant
The rate of decline of fossil fuel use as a share of primary energy is far slower than the rate of increase of renewables
The reality is that oil companies have divested from renewables
The three strains of market fundamentalism pried may conservatives away from conservation
The Transition Movement is one strategy towards a low-carbon future
The transmission needed by renewables poses a big challenge
The triple bottom line and natural capitalism are an alternative Green frame
The USCAP experience shows how little companies take climate seriously
The value of slaves then was roughly equivalent to the value of fossil fuels now
Theda Skocpol has also pointed to mass movements as key to progress
There are better ways to sell climate action
There is no magical solution to tropical deforestation, soil degradation, or biodiversity loss.
There is no reason to believe we can reliably forecast the technical innovations that will determine future outcomes
There would be Republican support for a Center Green agenda
There's nothing new about Blockadia's tools - they're just being deployed at scale
There’s a lot we can do, but we won’t rapidly decarbonize
Today commonly perceived that being Green means support an entire progressive agenda
Trade agreements are being used by fossil fuel interests to fight back against Blockadia
Urban agriculture can produce a few crops, but not the big ones
We can't address climate change without levels of govt. intervention that conservatives can't accept
We can’t really know where we’ll be by 2050, and 2100 is beyond the pail
We face big uncertainties in how we’ll ultimate react to environmental deterioration
We have failed to act on climate change because it challenges deregulated capitalism
We have few alternatives to current ways of producing steel and ammonia
We Know A Lot About Earth's History
We May Be Close to Disaster
We need to use the crisis to leap to somewhere new
We often don’t recognize the fossil fuel used by the four pillars of modern civilization
We should be very skeptical of long-term forecasts
We should recognize the reality that that we’re already committed to more than 2oC
We’re likely to be consuming more than double the fossil fuel by 2030 consistent with the 1.5 degree target
What Can We Do Now?
What is most clear is that the Green movement is not configured to address climate change
Widely held values support the moral case for conservation

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