Fall Hiking # 1

One of the aspects of living in the mountains that I really, really like is the ability to get up in the morning, see what the weather is like and then make the decision to go hiking or not.

This Friday looked OK so in an hour we were at the Gibson Lake trail head to Kokanee Glacier Provincial Park.  In less than hour, we were near tree-line where the sub-alpine meadows are in their fall colors of yellows and reds.  

The weather was the usual mountain variety - cloud, a couple of showers, blue skies and cool temperatures.  It was a great day for hiking.

Last Tree of the Season

It's always a bit nerve-wracking to cut down some of the trees around our place.  Some of them are very tall and some are close enough to the house that if things didn't go just right... well, you get the picture.

The other day I felled the last one for this season, a 90-100 ft fir with a slightly worrisome lean.  I always use some ropes to put some tension on the tree in the right direction.  Once those are in place, it's really just the work of a few minutes with the chainsaw and the wedges and it's over.  This one came down in exactly the right place.  It will become firewood for some future winter but it won't need to be cut up or split until next spring.

Exchanges with a Climate Changer Denier

I'm certainly aware that there are many out there who don't accept the human-caused climate-change scenario, variously known as AGW (anthropogenic global warming), ACC (anthropogenic climate change), climate change, global warming.  But until recently, I don't think I'd ever had an extended conversation with anyone from that camp.  In my mind, it was almost like meeting someone who didn't believe in the germ theory of disease but was convinced that the evil spirit theory of illness was a valid explanation or still insisted that the earth was flat.  I had to remind myself quite often that in the final analysis, neither his beliefs nor mine will really make much difference.  Events that are predicted to unfold over the next decades will drive our responses.  So why did I find the exchanges frustrating, exasperating and discouraging?

Responses to anything related to climate change or global warming were reduced to some or all of the following:  "the earth hasn't warmed for 17 years"; "it's all a hoax perpetuated by scientists who are looking for grant money"; "there is NO overwhelming evidence for climate change"; "it's all political"; "bigger fish to fry for humanity than climate change"; "the climate has always been changing - this is nothing new"; "it's solar cycles"; "the glaciers aren't melting"; "arctic (or antarctic) ice is expanding" ....  There are many more, but the most common ones have been listed and discussed on Skeptical Science, a website I visit occasionally.  I haven't heard anything that hasn't been mentioned on that site.

For some reason, sites like the so-called "Real Science" seem to spend all of their time attacking (and I use that term because I believe that's what it is) the whole global warming evidence (or non-evidence, as they put it).  I don't know if most people bother to notice, but the graph featured at the top of that post is supposedly of US Winter Temperatures.  I don't see a source mentioned either.  Since when did the variations in US winter temperatures equal global temperature averages or climate trends?

The near-unanimity among climate scientists is dismissed as not overwhelming, not unanimity, a hoax, relying on fudged numbers... etc.

The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) has issued several reports.  They are all dismissed out of hand, claiming they have been completely discredited.  The real truth, according to some, is that the IPCC has been, if anything, too conservative in it's predictions.

Here in Canada, our Prime Minister (sorry - he's not really MY Prime Minister nor the PM of almost 66% of Canadians, but there you are...) seems keen to discover the final resting place of the Franklin Expedition but refuses to take any action on climate change because it would "kill the economy", despite studies that have shown economic opportunities in that direction.  And then there's the dinosaur who is currently the PM of Australia....

Anyhow, this whole thing has helped convince me that there is really no hope.  As a species, we seem incapable of recognizing crises that are further ahead than the next election cycle.  We are conducting a global experiment and don't seem to understand that there are always consequences to our actions.  I guess that's what I find so unsettling.