View from Walker front yard, summer 2008

I love being outside. Which makes me wonder why I spend three-quarters of my waking hours inside, at a desk, staring at a monitor, or tapping at a keyboard similar to the one within arm's reach of you.

To earn a living, you moron -- you're thinking. Yeah, yeah, I know. But it does seem odd that so much of our earning a living involves staring at a screen. Odd for me, at least.

I was led to 'look within' (and wonder what I was doing there) through reading an essay by Walter Bagehot. I remember Walter from first year politics at university, though I haven't the foggiest idea what he said. Walter was the editor of The Economist magazine for seventeen years -- this fact courtesy of Wikipedia -- and the book I'm reading is a collection of his essays.

In one essay, he quotes John Milton (1608-1674) on the need to get outside. Now I know nothing about Milton's exercise regime, but, rightly or wrongly, I think of him as being pale, housebound and studious. Anyhow, here's Milton on venturing out:

...in those vernal seasons of the year when the air is calm and pleasant, it were an injury and sullenness against nature, not to go out and see her riches and partake in her rejoicing in heaven and earth.

If like me, you're wondering, vernal means spring.

Well, how shall we venture forth, Mr Milton? And where shall we go?

...with prudent and staid guides to all quarters of the land; learning and observing all places of strength, all commoditites of buildings and soil, for towns and tillage, harbours and ports of trade. Sometimes taking sea as far as our navy [!], to learn there also what they can in the practical knowledge of sailing and sea-fight (Walter Bagehot, Literary Studies, vol. 1, pp. 119-20).

That's what us deskbound nancy-boys of the twenty-first century need -- more knowledge of sea-fight! After reading Bagehot and Milton, I need to get out.

The most shameless of plugs

I know a bloke who sells trees wholesale: flowering plums, a host of natives, lilly pillies, cottonwoods, ornamental pears, citrus trees -- you name it. The trees I bought from him are doing famously, and his prices were far, far cheaper than the nurseries'.

The guy's name is Matt Rutherford, and his business is called Treesearch. They're at 22 Wellerton St, Midland; ph: 9250 1074. Matt's got a sale starting next week, as he hasn't moved much stock over the past month (petrol prices, interest rates and all the usual things that bite household budgets). If you need a tree for your house, Matt's your man. Tell him I sent you, and you may get a good price -- perhaps even a set of steak knives ;).

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In other news, I haven't been blogging lately -- not, as I read elsewhere, becuase I've lost my "blogging mojo", rather because of the normal pressures and vicissitudes of life.

I'm preaching a sermon on Sunday night, which, more or less, is about what it does and does not mean to be 'whole' in Jesus Christ. For those who pray, please ask God to speak clearly to the people listening to me.

Conscience and context

My conscience has gotten the better of me: In my previous post, I would have been fairer to quote the rest of the paragraph from The Garnaut Report, which concludes as follows (in italics):

...there is a great deal of uncertainty about the magnitude of the effects of increased greenhouse gas emissions on science. The scientifically reputed ‘sceptics’, to the Review’s understanding without exception, accept that an increase in carbon dioxide concentrations in itself leads to warming (Lindzen 2008). The ‘sceptics’ variously contest the relationship between human-induced anthropogenic emissions and atmospheric concentrations, or the relative importance of the enhanced greenhouse effect and other factors that influence climate (ch. 3 "The Science of Climate Change", in Garnaut Climate Change Review: Draft Report, pp. 47-8)

Context
A letter to the editor in last weekend's Oz helpfully described the political (and, hence, to a large extent, public?) context for discussion about climate change:

The previous government failed in the early years of its term to promote a public scientific conversation on the issue. This created a vacuum which was dutifully filled by Labor's feverish preaching on climate change, presenting it as the great moral challenge of our time rather than a global scientific issue.
As the Rudd Government now grapples with an emmissions trading scheme ("Carbon Load to be spread", 27/6), we have the absurd situation where any suggestion of reviewing or tempering our approach is shouted down as the words of skeptics and non-believers -- as it was in federal parliament this [last] week...
James Baird
North Melbourne, Vic

If Mr Baird is hinting that science and morality occupy completely different realms -- and I'm not sure he is -- then I think that's a false dichotomy. Nevertheless, I'm sympathetic to his assessment.

Opinions?

In search of climate change science

By a strange series of events, last Monday I found myself listening to Ross Garnaut on the Perth leg of his Climate Change Roadshow. (A "strange series of events"? Let's just say at 9 am I was jogging in to the city with a friend, and soon after 10 am, having jogged from the Perth Town Hall back to Hyde Park, where my car was parked, and done a superman-like change into jeans and jumper, I found myself sitting in a room with a few-hundred suits listening to Professor G. wax lyrical -- if it's possible to wax lyrical about climate change and the global economy.)

Anyhow, the good professor impressed me. After 30 to 40 mins of his 'sell', about an hour was allocated for questions. "I wan't you to direct the discussion; take it into areas that are important to you," was, more or less, his invitation to questions from the audience.

The way he handled people's questions -- not to mention the everpresent axe-grind-thinly-disguised-as-a-question, of which there were far, far too many -- was also impressive. Here was a man who clearly had his head around the innumerable possible economic, social and political implications of this CC beast. I should also add that, as well as his answers being substantial, Garnaut was polite (perhaps even gracious).

For me, there was an elephant in the room. And, very early in his presentation, Garnaut showed us the elephant's trunk. The elephant? The science. To quote Chapter 3 of Garnaut's report:

Climate change policy must begin with the science. When people who have no
background in climate science seek to apply scientific perspectives to policy,
they are struck by the qualified and contested nature of the material with which
they have to work. Part of the uncertainty derives from the complexity of the
scientific issues. In the public discussion of the science, additional complexity
derives from the enormity of the possible consequences, which calls for a
millennial perspective. Part derives from the large effects of possible policy
responses on levels and distributions of income, inviting intense and focused
involvement in the discussion by those with vested interests.

The Review is not in a position to independently evaluate the considerable
body of scientific knowledge, and it is not the intent of this chapter to debate
the existence or extent of human-induced climate change.

In the terms introduced in Chapter 2, there is a great deal of uncertainty
about the magnitude of the effects of increased greenhouse gas emissions
on science.

I want to explore this mysterious pachyderm called the science of climate change.

Not being a scientist, I realise this will be a challenge. So, if any scientists reading this can explain the scientific issues involved, I'd be much obliged (plain English explanations preferred ;-]). Or, if anyone else, scientist or otherwise, knows of balanced and helpful stuff to read, please let the 'rest of us' know.

I have a preliminary list of hope-to-reads, which I will post soon.

PS Excuse the miniature font size of the quote!

For Radiohead fans

JJJ's Live At The Wireless program will tonight feature an hour of Radiohead in an "intimate gig held by the BBC".

The more I listen to Radiohead, the more I'm convinced they give voice to the complexities, paradoxes and pangs of modern life. The J's broadcast should be a treat for Radiohead fans.

PS More posting coming soon: I'm on semi-holidays for a couple of weeks, so I hope to have a few things to type -- including the Melbourne vignettes.