Letters to my grandchildren

Dear Ashleigh
I hope you have a wonderful 5th Birthday. This is an unusual Birthday Present. I expect that Mum and Dad will put it away for you so that you will be able to dig it out and read it numerous times when you are older. There will be others to follow that will spell out an evolving story. A story that is to many unbelievable but it is true. One that I sincerely believe that will help you to make good decisions to guide you through changing times. I aim to give you this series of letters as a legacy. I expect that later in life you will feel like saying ‘Thanks, Grandpa’ because they have given you understanding of how the world operates so how best to work within the biophysical limits that apply.

I am making this into a pretend game. We will pretend that I am talking to Laprin, a wise ET who understands much more about how Mother Earth operates than we humans. ET stands for Extra Terrestrial – some wise creature from another planet. What Laprin has to say will be in bold while my comments will be in normal typeface. Let us start.

Laprin, this letter is for Ashleigh. She is turning five, today. How are you going to start telling her about the reality of the world we live in?

Hullo, Ashleigh. You live on a big globe called Earth. I expect you have seen it on TV. A big round ball. It has a bewildering array of interesting things. But there is a limit to these. There is just so much you can put on this ball. I have no doubt that you have seen waves down on the beach and clouds in the sky. They are two examples of nature operating. There are just so many others that we just take for granted. The clouds bring rain. That is the way we get most of the water we use. What would we do without water? We would not be here if there were no rain. It is one of the fundamental operations of nature we take for granted. We believe that we have a right to use water without care. Without even thinking about how it is that water is provided. People are complaining because there are water restrictions in Victoria so they cannot water their gardens as much as they would like. They just do not think in terms of just how essential water is to our living.

We have had a cool summer, Ashleigh. But we know that another summer will come around next year and it may be hotter so you can go down to the beach for a swim more often. That is just another natural phenomenon that we take for granted. We do complain, however, if it is too hot or too cold. That is our way of viewing natural operations.

DA has just given you one example of the operation of the biosphere. Some we know will occur reliably like summer or day then night. Others, we know, will happen quite unexpectedly, like thunderstorms. Even rain can be very variable. Australia is in the midst of a drought – lack of rain. It has been going on for eight years in some parts but it does not seem like it here in Melbourne because we have just had an extraordinary amount of rain.

Laprin will be telling you things that cannot be called general knowledge. But they are true. It is just that most people do not look realistically at what human activities are doing to nature.

That is so, Ashleigh. It is my hope that these talks will over the years enable you to see the way things really are, not how most people would like them to be.
Humans are not the only creatures around, as you well know. Cats, horses, birds, insects are just some of a bewildering array of creatures around us all the time. We are so used to most of the operations of the biosphere that some call Mother Earth that we tend to take them for granted. In fact, some informed people think in terms of what happens here on Earth as being like a giant organism. Organism. That is probably a new word to you. You are an organism. A living thing. Extremely complex. You do not and never will know how your body and mind operate in detail. But you do not need to know to be able to operate. You know that you need to breathe, to eat, to sleep, to go to the toilet and to generally look after your body. You can take for granted that the many complex activities going on continually will do so without you having to think about them. Your heart, lungs, kidneys will all keep doing their important jobs. Well the world is like a giant organism. It has many complex activities going on continuously and even the best of our scientists know very little about these activities. Some call this super organism Gaia. I will use this term because it makes it easier to understand.

I suggest you adopt Gaia as an imaginary pet, Ashleigh. A most unusual pet but one that will be rewarding, so long as you look after it.

That is a good idea. It will make it easier to talk about how things actually work by thinking in terms of what Gaia is doing and what is good for Gaia. We must look after our pet, mustn’t we, Ashleigh? And then Gaia will be good to us, if only most people behaved that way. It is really quite funny. People talk in terms of natural wonders. Then set about doing their utmost to destroy these natural wonders. You might think that people are strange for doing this. It is just that they do not understand what they are doing. They are too engrossed in their own affairs to worry about what they are doing to Gaia.
Right, we have Gaia, a huge organism that has been operating satifactorarily for many years. When I say many I really mean many. Billions of years in fact. Billions. That is a lot. When you go down to the beach, Ashleigh, you can pick up handfuls of sand. Many, many grains of sand. There are billions of sand grains on the beach. There are six billion people on Earth. So Gaia has been living for a long time. Its bewildering array of complex activities has continued to operate satisfactorily for a long time. There have been major changes in that time but they have evolved in a manner that has enabled many creatures, including humans, to be born and live out their lives.

One of the most fascinating of these activities of Gaia is how plants and animals live together. Each supports the life of the other. Plants breathe in carbon dioxide and expel oxygen. Animals breathe in oxygen and expel carbon dioxide.

I am glad you brought this up, DA. It is truly incredible. We do not know how it came about this is the most fundamental aspect of the life of plants and animals. One cannot live without the other. But that is only one part of the incredible relationship between plants and animals. Energy is the other. Gaia gets energy from the Sun. Sunshine is its only source of energy. We cannot create it. Remember that. It is very important. It is common for people to use misleading terms that give the impression that we can create or produce energy. That is not true. We do get energy from sources like petrol but that is only because nature has stored this energy for billions of years in crude oil.

Ashleigh is probably wondering about the relation between energy and what you were saying about plants and animals.

Yes, I am getting around to that. Plants get energy from the Sun. That energy together with water, carbon dioxide from the air and nutrients from the soil enable the plants to grow. You probably have vegetables growing in your garden. That is just one example. A lot of wheat is grown in Victoria. That is another example. These plants are food for animals. You eat food so you will grow but also to give you energy. So you get your energy from the Sun because plants convert the sunshine into the chemical energy your body needs. Isn’t that truly remarkable?

You might say there is nothing remarkable about what Laprin has being saying. That it is all common knowledge. That is true but the implications are not commonly appreciated. I am sure this is what Laprin is leading up to.

Yes. Gaia has a marvelous system to provide animals with the energy essential to their operation. You need energy. You get it from food. That is, you get it from plants either directly or indirectly. When you get energy by eating meat you are still getting energy from plants because the animals that provided the meat got their energy from the plants they ate. The bottom line is that we get all our energy from the Sun with the essential help of plants. But the plants need the carbon dioxide the animals expel. Plants and animals form an essential couple. Mum and Dad are a couple. Plants and animals are couples that cannot live without each other.

That is a truly remarkable feature of our pet, Gaia. There is no way that we can work out how this came about but the reality is that it is part of the basis of life on Earth. Only part. Back to you Laprin.

As DA points out, that is only part. We have been talking about the role of air (carbon dioxide and oxygen) in processing the energy in sunshine through to giving you, and all living creatures, the energy necessary to be able to do things, like go for a swim. But water is also essential. So let’s get back to water. It is another truly marvelous natural cycle that provides us with water. It is called the hydrological cycle. Many understand the various processes involved. Sunshine evaporates water from the ground and seas. This vapor rises in the atmosphere until it reaches cold air when it condenses into water droplets that we see as clouds. Eventually, these droplets fall down as what we call rain. This rain fills our water catchment areas as well as giving plants the water they require. This water after serving its useful purpose will probably be evaporated again. This is why we call it a cycle. It goes round and round, providing a useful service each cycle. We know how the cycle operates but we do not know how it came into existence. It is, simply, one of the wonders of nature that we take for granted – most of the time.
We have looked at three of the wonders of nature that enable Gaia, and you, to live. They are taken for granted by most people. But Ashleigh, I ask you to keep them in mind because it has been a great mistake of humans to take these fundamentals for granted. It has led to untold misery in the past and is leading to even more misery in the future. You will most likely be able to avoid this misery if you learn the lessons from putting these fundamentals into perspective.

You might be wondering what these lessons are. I am sure Laprin will be able to satisfy your curiosity and that of Mum and Dad shortly.

I expect so. We have looked at some of the fundamental operations of Gaia. But these are just some. There are countless others, many of which are beyond human understanding even to day with much insight garnered by modern science. We understand how fertile soil built up over eons – another new term that means many millions of years. Australia is not blessed with much fertile soil while many other countries are. So we have to rely upon artificial fertilizers to grow our wheat and other foods. But more of that anon. We know that there is a marvelous marine food chain in the oceans. It goes from minute plankton through to gigantic whales. Each member of the chain is dependent on a lower member for food. Seals eat fish but whales eat seals. And so it goes. It is a process that has evolved and works our quite well – until humans spoil it, as we will see shortly. The eruption of volcanoes causes us appreciable concern. But the reality is that it seems to be one of nature’s ways of providing fertile soil. I say seems to be because past eruptions have provided much fertile soil. That is a fact. I believe the best way to look at it is that it is just one of Gaia’s many complex operations. It is similar to your body having a fever to fight off an infection. It is something that happens. We do not need to understand the mechanism to appreciate that it occurs, and serves a useful purpose. I will go no further in to the many marvelous operations carried out by Gaia at this stage.

I will now turn to what humans have done. I will not attempt at this stage to speculate on why we have done so much damage to Gaia. I will just concentrate on what we have done. Humans have been blessed with the ability to devise things, to communicate them to their fellows and do things with their hands. Other creatures can do some of these things but not as well as humans. That is the reality. No one would seriously question that assertion but how well we have used these advantages is very questionable. I would like to think that in years to come you will be able to look objectively at this question, largely because these letters have encouraged you to look realistically at our ‘achievements’.

We have been devising means of using natural resources for our purposes for millennia – another new word: a millennium is a thousand years. Human society has existed for only a few millennia. Gaia got on very well without our influence for many, many millennia. Most of that time we had no more impact of Gaia’s operations than gorillas or other mammals. But human civilizations emerged a few millennia back. They started agriculture to produce more food that nature provided. They started to build cities using the natural resources like stone. Some of these old structures like pyramids still exist: a testimony to how much even our early ancestors had learnt about using natural resources. They learnt how to excavate channels so that they could use scarce water to irrigate their fields. Some civilizations used up the natural resources too quickly – and paid a terrible price as a consequence. The Easter Islanders chopped down the trees on their remote island so quickly that they ran out of wood to build the canoes they needed for fishing. So they died off, largely due to starvation. That is a very sad tale, but there are a number of civilizations that suffered a similar fate. Yet we have not learnt the lesson. That is unbelievable, but true. For all out cleverness, we still believe we have the right to use up the limited natural resources without taking into account the limitations.

Can you imagine Dad (or Mum) taking you for a long drive without making sure there is enough petrol in the tank, especially if there is no petrol station on the way?

That is a good example. To move on, humans built up their civilizations for millennia without doing too much damage to Gaia, apart from the odd exceptions I have mentioned. We hear a lot about Iraq. We know it is largely desert away from the two big rivers that flow through it. Only centuries ago, it was one of the most fertile areas on Planet Earth. But the inhabitants were greedy. They abused the bountiful natural resources available to them. So now they have a lot of desert. China is now doing the same at a horrendous rate but there are so many Chinese that there seems to be no way of stopping them. But we sure of one thing, Gaia will show the way because it is not possible for the Chinese to keep on doing what they are doing; there are just not sufficient natural resources.

The fuel tank is emptying and there is nowhere to fill up.

Quite so, DA. I expect that here are many informed Chinese who are wondering what will happen in the years ahead. Let us now return to how human societies developed. Along came the industrial revolution in Europe. Humans became very proud of how some of them had been clever enough to devise means of extracting, refining and using the resources that Gaia had built up over eons in crustal stores. Coalmines were soon yielding vast amounts of energy to run the many factories that opened up. Little regard was given to the smoke that started to pollute the air. The newly devised machines enabled the manufacture of many items that had not been available to previous generations. A whole new world opened up. The attitude was that we should make use of the resources that Gaia has bestowed on us. Never mind that they are exhaustible. That is for future generations to worry about.

And now the future is here.

True, DA. But let us follow the thread. The most significant feature of this revolution was that coal and the oil and natural gas gave us the energy to do many things that had been impossible without these ‘energy slaves’. The car is probably the best example. This revolution has provided the fuel to drive the car but it also enabled many cars to be made relatively easily. The same applies to the airliners your Mum flies in. But what about things having a big impact on your own life. The fridge is very useful for keeping food, milk etc cool and fresh. Air conditioning is good when it is hot outside. We have not had a lot is this summer but it still occurs. And come winter, you will appreciate the heater keeping you warm. Recent past generations did not have a lot of these things that we now take for granted. And future generation will not have a lot of these things because the natural resources required for their manufacture will have been used up.

I used to have to take a tram to school because we did not have a car. Very few people had cars at that time.
And there was no TV.

Yes, times have changed very rapidly. There have been many benefits for humans arising from the industrial revolution. Perhaps the most profound has been the improved methods of agriculture which has meant that only a few farmers have been needed to produce the vast amount of food required. This has enabled the global population to grow rapidly even as their consumption of things has also increased. But we have a system that enables us to use up the natural resources for these purposes without paying the true cost.

Many people curse the waste of petrol when they are stuck in a traffic jam. None think in terms of destroying a resource that it took nature eons to create. The petrol they burn up is gone forever. It cannot be replaced. But they have not been taught that this is so. So they do not even think about it.

Well said, DA. That is really the crux of the matter. Society is exuberantly using up this natural capital without even thinking about it. Wars have been and continue to be fought about access to oil.
If these people were as clever as they deem themselves to be, they would be devising means of getting over their addiction to using oil. But they don’t. In fact, the Chinese and Indians are just starting their love affairs with cars, just as the oil supply is getting short. They are bound to be disappointed in the not too distant future. I might well see what happens when they realize they are going to have to do without something that people in other countries, like here in Australia, have taken for granted. You may be able to have a car when you are old enough. But it is most unlikely that it will be a big, ‘gas guzzling’ car like most on the road today.
But the consumption of exhaustible natural resources like oil is only one aspect of the problem that humans have created by their unknowing abuse of the operation of Gaia. Natural processes do not produce waste material. Human processes do produce waste material. A big difference. When creatures die, their bodies decay and the constituents provide nutrients that nourish plants and other creatures. Bushfires actually help the plant life to rejuvenate. They are a natural process that has helped the replenishment of vegetation for eons. Now, however, they also damage houses we build and destroy human life. But that is not Gaia’s fault. We presumed we could live in bushland without being prepared to take the risk of this natural process. These are natural processes that do not produce waste.
On the other hand, we generate a lot of waste from our production of stuff for consumers, that is all people. You have rubbish bins to put waste in. That is collected and put into waste dumps. They are gradually taking up a lot of land for no good purpose. Most of this waste does not naturally recycle. The food scraps do add nutrients to the soil but they may not be used for anything better than to encourage weeds in the dump. But there are other wastes that do nothing other than damage. Plastic bags are a very good example. People are being encouraged to use fewer of these bags. Partly because they are made by using up natural gas and partly because they are extremely hard to get rid of. Few, however, realize that it is such a big problem that it is affecting marine life. There are billions (there is that word again) of plastic bags in the oceans. They are killing many , fish and other marine creatures.
But the human activity that affects the operation of Gaia the most, according to current views, is the release of greenhouse gases through the burning of fossil fuels. You know that when Mum or Dad drives their car, foul smelling fumes come out of the exhaust pipe. These fumes contain the greenhouse gas (carbon dioxide) they talk about. This is believed by the many scientists examining the problem to be causing a change in the climate. The very bad storms we have had in Melbourne in recent years could well be largely due to what we have done in recent decades. By driving cars too much or having the Latrobe Valley power stations produce so much electricity. They give off a tremendous amount of greenhouse gases.
I think that is enough to start off with, Ashleigh. Humans have unthinkingly used up a lot of Gaia’s natural resources in order to meet their needs and wants. As a consequence, they have produced vast amounts of wastes that have devastated the environment. This cannot continue, whatever our ‘leaders’ may say. Gaia is in control, not humans. This way of operating is not sustainable. It cannot continue. Think about that Ashleigh when you are old enough. I will tell you more next year. Have a Happy Birthday. There is much to enjoy without disturbing Gaia too much.

And thank you, Laprin, for providing that insight. I understand you will be doing the same for Benjamin, Luke, Liam and Jordan. You will be able to swap views with your sister and your cousins for many years to come.

Have a Happy Birthday

Grandpa

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Dear Benjamin
I hope you have a wonderful 12th Birthday. As you already know, this is an unusual Birthday Present. I hope you will put it away so that you will be able to dig it out and read it numerous times in the future. There will be others to follow that will spell out an evolving story. A story that is unbelievable to most but it is true. One that I sincerely believe that will help you to make good decisions to guide you through changing times. I aim to give you this series of letters as a legacy. I expect that later in life you will feel like saying ‘Thanks, Grandpa’ because they have given you understanding of how the world operates so how best to live and work within the biophysical limits that apply. Do not worry about the word ‘biophysical’ as its meaning will become clear as we go on. It is like a combination of biology, which is the study of living things, and physics, which deals with how things work. In combination, they represent our knowledge of what happens and how in our biosphere, Planet Earth.

We will pretend that I am talking to Laprin, a wise ET who understands much more about how Mother Earth operates than we humans. ET stands for Extra Terrestrial – some wise creature from another planet. What Laprin has to say will be in bold while my comments will be in normal typeface. Let us start.

Laprin, this letter is for Benjamin. He is turning twelve, today. How are you going to start telling him about the reality of the world we live in?

Hullo, Benjamin. You are much older than Luke and your cousins. I will take that into account in what I have to say. You will understand so much more. You live on a big globe called Earth. It has a bewildering array of interesting features, like mountains and oceans, and natural resources, like forests and supplies of water. But there is a limit to these resources. There is just so much you can put on this globe. You will have seen waves down on the beach and clouds in the sky. They are two examples of nature operating. There are just so many others that we just take for granted. The clouds bring rain. That is the way we get most of the water we use. What would we do without water? We would not be here if there were no rain. It is one of the fundamental operations of nature we take for granted. We believe that we have a right to use water without care. Without even thinking about how it is that water is provided. People are complaining because there are water restrictions in Victoria so they cannot water their gardens as much as they would like. They just do not think in terms of just how essential water is to our living.

We have had a mild winter, Benjamin. But we know that another winter will come around next year and it may be a lot colder. That is just another natural phenomenon that we take for granted. We do complain, however, if it is too hot or too cold. That is our way of viewing natural operations.

DA has just given you one example of the operation of the biosphere. Some we know will occur reliably like summer following winter or day then night. Others, we know, will happen quite unexpectedly, like Hurricane Katrina. Even rain can be very variable. Australia is in the midst of a drought – lack of rain. It has been going on for eight years in some parts but it does not seem like it here in Melbourne because we have just had an extraordinary amount of rain.

Laprin will be telling you things that cannot be called general knowledge. But they are true. It is just that
most people do not look realistically at what human activities are doing to nature.

That is so, Benjamin. It is my hope that these talks will over the years enable you to see the way things really are, not how most people would like them to be.

Humans are not the only creatures around, as you well know. Cats, horses, birds, insects are just some of a bewildering array of creatures around us all the time. We are so used to most of the operations of the biosphere that some call Mother Earth that we tend to take them for granted. In fact, some informed people think in terms of what happens here on Earth as being like a giant organism. Organism. You are an organism. A living thing. Extremely complex. You do not and never will know how your body and mind operate in detail. But you do not need to know to be able to operate. You know that you need to breathe, to eat, to sleep, to go to the toilet and to generally look after your body. You can take for granted that the many complex activities going on continually will do so without you having to think about them. Your heart, lungs, kidneys will all keep doing their important jobs. Well the world is like a giant organism. It has many complex activities going on continuously and even the best of our scientists know little about these activities.

We often read about scientific advances, but that is just the tip of the iceberg. Scientists are also finding out a lot that they did not know about things like climate change but that does not receive as much media attention.

To continue, some call this super organism Gaia. I will use this term because it makes it easier to understand what is happening.

I suggest you adopt Gaia as an imaginary pet, Benjamin. A most unusual pet but one that will be rewarding, so long as you look after it.

That is a good idea. It will make it easier to talk about how things actually work by thinking in terms of what Gaia is doing and what is good for Gaia. We must look after our pet, mustn’t we, Benjamin? And then Gaia will be good to us, if only most people behaved that way. It is really quite funny. People talk in terms of natural wonders. Then set about doing their utmost to destroy these natural wonders. You might think that people are strange for doing this. It is just that they do not understand what they are doing. They are too engrossed in their own affairs to worry about what they are doing to Gaia.
Right, we have Gaia, a huge organism that has been operating satifactorarily for many years. When I say many I really mean many. Billions of years in fact. Billions. That is a lot. There are six billion people on Earth. So Gaia has been living for a long time. Its bewildering array of complex activities has continued to operate satisfactorily for a long time. There have been major changes in that time but they have evolved in a manner that has enabled many creatures, including humans, to be born and live out their lives. It provides the basics, energy (in food), air and water.

One of the most fascinating of these activities of Gaia is how plants and animals live together. Each supports the life of the other. Plants breathe in carbon dioxide and expel oxygen. Animals breathe in oxygen and expel carbon dioxide.

I am glad you brought this up, DA. It is truly incredible. We do not know how it came about but this is the most fundamental aspect of the life of plants and animals. One cannot live without the other. But that is only one part of the incredible relationship between plants and animals. Energy is the other. Gaia gets energy from the Sun. Sunshine is just about its only source of energy. We cannot create it. Remember that. It is very important. It is common for people to use misleading terms that give the impression that we can create or produce energy. That is not true. We do get energy from sources like petrol but that is only because nature has stored this energy for billions of years in crude oil and that oil is refined into petrol and many other products that are deemed indispensable.

Benjamin is probably wondering about the relation between energy and what you were saying about plants and animals.

Yes, I am getting around to that. Plants get energy from the Sun. That energy together with water, carbon dioxide from the air and nutrients from the soil enable the plants to grow. You probably have vegetables growing in your garden. That is just one example. A lot of wheat is grown in Victoria. That is another example. These plants are food for animals. You eat food so you will grow but also to give you energy for your cricket and football. So you get your energy from the Sun because plants convert the sunshine into the chemical energy your body needs.

You might say there is nothing remarkable about what Laprin has being saying. That it is all common knowledge. That is true but the implications are not commonly appreciated. I am sure this is what Laprin is leading up to.

Yes. Gaia has a marvelous system to provide animals with the energy essential to their operation. You need energy. You get it from food. That is, you get it from plants either directly or indirectly. When you get energy by eating meat you are still getting energy from plants because the animals that provided the meat got their energy from the plants they ate. The bottom line is that we get all our energy from the Sun with the essential help of plants. But the plants need the carbon dioxide the animals expel. Plants and animals form an essential couple. Plants and animals are couples that cannot live without each other.

That is a truly remarkable feature of our pet, Gaia. There is no way that we can work out how this came about but the reality is that it is part of the basis of life on Earth. Only part. Back to you Laprin.

As DA points out, that is only part. We have been talking about the role of air (carbon dioxide and oxygen) in processing the energy in sunshine through to giving you, and all living creatures, the energy necessary to be able to do things, like go for a swim. But water is also essential. So let’s get back to water. Another truly marvelous natural cycle provides us with water. It is called the hydrological cycle. Many understand the various processes involved. Sunshine evaporates water from the ground and seas. This vapor rises in the atmosphere until it reaches cold air when it condenses into water droplets that we see as clouds. Eventually, these droplets fall down as rain or hail or snow. These falls fill our water catchment areas as well as giving plants the water they require. This water will probably be evaporated again after serving its useful purpose. This is why we call it a cycle. It goes round and round, providing a useful service each cycle. We know how the cycle operates but we do not know how it came into existence. It is, simply, one of the wonders of nature that we take for granted – most of the time.
We have looked at three of the wonders of nature that enable Gaia, and you, to live. They are taken for granted by most people. But Benjamin, I ask you to keep them in mind because it has been a great mistake of humans to take these fundamentals for granted. It has led to untold misery in the past and is leading to even more misery in the future. You will most likely be able to avoid some of this misery if you learn the lessons from putting these fundamentals into perspective.

You might be wondering what these lessons are. I am sure Laprin will be able to satisfy your curiosity in due course.

I expect so. We have looked at some of the fundamental operations of Gaia. But these are just some. There are countless others, many of which are beyond human understanding even to day with much insight gained by modern science. We understand how fertile soil built up over eons – another term for many millions of years. Australia is not blessed with much fertile soil while many other countries are. So we have to rely upon artificial fertilizers to grow our wheat and other foods. It is a misnomer to call them ‘fertilizers’, as they do not make the soil fertile. We know that there is a marvelous marine food chain in the oceans. It goes from minute plankton through to gigantic whales. Each member of the chain is dependent on a lower member for food. Seals eat fish but whales eat seals. And so it goes. It is a process that has evolved and worked our quite well – until humans spoil it. The eruption of volcanoes causes us appreciable concern. But the reality is that it seems to be one of nature’s ways of providing fertile soil. I say seems to be because past eruptions have provided much fertile soil. That is a fact. I believe the best way to look at it is that it is just one of Gaia’s many complex operations. It is similar to your body having a fever to fight off an infection. It is something that happens. We do not need to understand the mechanism to appreciate that it occurs, and serves a useful purpose. I will go no further in to the many marvelous operations carried out by Gaia at this stage.

I will now turn to what humans have done. I will not speculate on why we have done so much damage to Gaia. I will just concentrate on what we have done. Humans have been blessed with the ability to devise machines, to communicate this knowledge to their fellows and do things with their hands. Other creatures can do some of these things but not nearly as well as humans. That is the reality. No one would seriously question that assertion but how well we have used these advantages is very questionable. I would like to think that in years to come you will be able to look objectively at this question, largely because these letters have encouraged you to look realistically at our ‘achievements’.

We have been devising means of using natural resources for our purposes for millennia – a millennium is a thousand years. Human society as we know it has existed for only a few millennia. Gaia got on very well without our influence for many, many millennia. Most of that time we had no more impact of Gaia’s operations than gorillas or other mammals. But human civilizations emerged a few millennia back. They started agriculture to produce more food that nature provided. They started to build cities using the natural resources like stone. Some of these old structures like pyramids still exist: a testimony to how much even our early ancestors had learnt about using natural resources. They learnt how to excavate channels so that they could use scarce water to irrigate their fields. Some civilizations used up the natural resources too quickly – and paid a terrible price as a consequence. The Easter Islanders chopped down the trees on their remote island so quickly that they ran out of wood to build the canoes they needed for fishing. So they died off, largely due to starvation. That is a very sad tale, but there are a number of civilizations that suffered a similar fate. Yet we have not learnt the lesson. That is unbelievable, but true. For all out cleverness, we still believe we have the right to use up the limited natural resources without taking into account the limitations.

Can you imagine Dad (or Mum) taking you for a long drive without making sure there is enough petrol in the tank, especially if there is no petrol station on the way?

That is a good example. To move on, humans built up their civilizations for millennia without doing too much damage to Gaia, apart from the odd exceptions I have mentioned. We hear a lot about Iraq. We know it is largely desert away from the two big rivers that flow through it. Only centuries ago, it was one of the most fertile areas on Planet Earth. But the inhabitants were greedy. They abused the bountiful natural resources available to them. So now they have a lot of desert. China is now doing the same at a horrendous rate but there are so many Chinese that there seems to be no way of stopping them. But we sure of one thing, Gaia will show the way because it is not possible for the Chinese to keep on doing what they are doing; there are just not sufficient natural resources.

The fuel tank is emptying and there is nowhere to fill up.

Quite so, DA. I expect that here are many informed Chinese who are wondering what will happen in the years ahead. Let us now return to how human societies developed. Along came the industrial revolution in Europe. Humans became very proud of how some of them had been clever enough to devise means of extracting, refining and using the resources that Gaia had built up over eons in crustal stores. Coalmines were soon yielding vast amounts of energy to run the many factories that opened up. Little regard was given to the smoke that started to pollute the air. The newly devised machines enabled the manufacture of many items that had not been available to previous generations. A whole new world opened up. The attitude was that we should make use of the resources that Gaia has bestowed on us. Never mind that they are exhaustible. That is for future generations to worry about.

And now the future is here.

True, DA. But let us follow the thread. The most significant feature of this revolution was that coal and the oil and natural gas gave us the energy to do many things that had been impossible without these ‘energy slaves’. The car is probably the best example. This revolution has provided the fuel to drive the car but it also enabled many cars to be made relatively easily. The same applies to airliners. But what about things having a big impact on your own life. The fridge is very useful for keeping food, milk etc cool and fresh. Air conditioning is welcome when it is hot outside. We have not had a lot is this past summer but it still occurs. Those Portuguese who have air-conditioning will have been happy during the current heat wave. And in winter, you appreciate the heater keeping you warm. Recent past generations did not have a lot of these things that we now take for granted. And future generation will not have a lot of these things because the natural resources required for their manufacture will have been used up.

I used to have to take a tram to school because we did not have a car. Very few people had cars at that time.
And there was no TV, mobile phones, computers or DVD. The airliners were few, small and noisy.

Yes, times have changed very rapidly. There have been many benefits for humans arising from the industrial revolution. Perhaps the most profound has been the ‘improved’ methods of agriculture which has meant that only a few farmers have been needed to produce the vast amount of food required. They use large amounts of fertilizers and pesticides: chemicals produced from natural resources. This food production has enabled the global population to grow rapidly even as their consumption of things has also increased. But we have a system that enables us to use up the natural resources for these purposes without paying the true cost. Many of these resources are exhaustible. They can never be replaced. Oil is one of the most important of these.

Many people curse the waste of petrol when they are stuck in a traffic jam. None think in terms of destroying a resource that it took nature eons to create. The petrol they burn up is gone forever. But they have not been taught that this is so. So they do not even think about it.

Well said, DA. That is really the crux of the matter. Society is exuberantly using up this natural capital without even thinking about it. Wars have been and continue to be fought about access to oil. Consider the irony that the American military is using up a lot of oil in Iraq to try and ensure that they can continue to get most of the remaining oil. If these people were as clever as they deem themselves to be, they would be devising means of getting over their addiction to using oil. But they don’t. In fact, the Chinese and Indians are just starting their love affairs with cars, just as the oil supply is getting short. They are bound to be disappointed in the not too distant future. I might well see what happens when they realize they are going to have to do without something that people in other countries, like here in Australia, have taken for granted. You may be able to have a car when you are old enough. But it is most unlikely that it will be a big, ‘gas guzzling’ car like most on the road today.
But the consumption of exhaustible natural resources like oil is only one aspect of the problem that humans have created by their unknowing abuse of the operation of Gaia. Natural processes do not produce waste material. Human processes do produce waste material. A big difference. When creatures die, their bodies decay and the constituents provide nutrients that nourish plants and other creatures. Bushfires actually help the plant life to rejuvenate. They are a natural process that has helped the replenishment of vegetation for eons. Now, however, they also damage houses we build and destroy human life. But that is not Gaia’s fault. We presumed we could live in bushland without being prepared to take the risk of this natural process. These are natural processes that do not produce waste.
On the other hand, we generate a lot of waste from our production of stuff for consumers, that is all people. You have rubbish bins to put waste in. That is collected and put into waste dumps. They are gradually taking up a lot of land for no good purpose. Most of this waste does not naturally recycle. The food scraps do add nutrients to the soil but they may not be used for anything better than to encourage weeds in the dump. But there are other wastes that do nothing other than damage. Plastic bags are a very good example. People are being encouraged to use fewer of these bags. Partly because they are made by using up natural gas and partly because they are extremely hard to get rid of. Few, however, realize that it is such a big problem that it is affecting marine life. There are billions of plastic bags in the oceans. They are killing many turtles, fish and other marine creatures. Many of the wastes are toxic so they can do harm to people and other animals.
But the human activity that affects the operation of Gaia the most, according to current views, is the release of greenhouse gases through the burning of fossil fuels. You know that when Mum or Dad drives their car, foul smelling fumes come out of the exhaust pipe. These fumes contain the greenhouse gas (carbon dioxide) they talk about. This is believed by the many scientists examining the problem to be causing a change in the climate. The very bad storms we have had in Melbourne in recent years could well be largely due to what humans have done in recent decades. By driving cars too much or having the Latrobe Valley power stations produce so much electricity. They give off a tremendous amount of greenhouse gases.

I find it ironical, Benjamin that most of this has occurred in my lifetime, and I was unaware of what we were doing until recently. The Internet has been a marvelous source of information for me. Unfortunately, there are very few who are willing to accept that humans are not really in control. They just presume that they can continue to use natural resources unthinkingly.

But you have woken up, DA, and you are doing your best to wake others up before the nightmare really begins. One of the reasons that humans have used up natural resources and devastated the environment is that money is the dominating factor in determining what people do. If you have money, you can do what ever you want. That is the conventional view. The politicians are forever promoting economic growth – which is really encouraging people to use more natural resources although they never say that. You are doubtless aware of the everlasting marketing of fast food, mobile phones, etc etc. Where do you think all the energy and materials required to manufacture this stuff comes from? The marketers manage to give the impression that they are the products of human cleverness. But they are all obtained from Gaia. And Gaia can replenish very little of what is being taken.

If someone should try to convince you, Benjamin, that money is the most important thing to have, ask him or her what it is like to eat dollar notes – or use them as fuel in the car.

Or build a house out of money. You might think we are being facetious, but we are not. Money enables people to buy goods and services but these goods and services all require the use of natural resources. Keep that in mind because it will enable you to cope better when these resources become scarce while money becomes almost worthless.

Germany in the 1920’s gives us some insight into what can happen to money. The inflation was so bad that people were taken wheelbarrow loads of marks (their equivalent to dollars) to do their basic food shopping.

I think that is enough to for now, Benjamin. It is more than what I said to Luke. You can tell him about it.
Humans have unthinkingly used up a lot of Gaia’s natural resources in order to meet their needs and wants. As a consequence, they have produced vast amounts of wastes that have devastated the environment. This cannot continue, whatever our ‘leaders’ may say. Gaia is in control, not humans. This way of operating is not sustainable. It cannot continue. Think about that Benjamin. You are old enough to know that people are going to have to reduce their consumption of natural resources, particularly oil. I will go into this more next year. Have a Happy Birthday. There is much to enjoy without disturbing Gaia too much.

And thank you, Laprin, for providing that insight. I understand you will be doing the same for Luke, Liam, Ashleigh and Jordan. You will be able to swap views with your brother and your cousins for many years to come. You might find that some of your friends do not readily accept this view of what humans have done to Gaia. Try and diplomatically persuade them over a period of time. Do not try and rush it. Just remember, they will be better off if they understand why the material standard of living is declining. They will be in a better position to make decisions.

Have a Happy Birthday

Grandpa

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Dear Ashleigh
This is your 6th Birthday present from me – our little game with Laprin. Make certain that it is put with last year’s letter so you can read them both later. This one follows on from the first one. Let us see what Laprin has to say this time.
Laprin, Ashleigh is now six and has had her first year at school. What are you going to tell her this year?

Hello Ashleigh. I expect you learnt a lot during your first year at school. It really is interesting learning about new things. There is just so much to know. You can keep on learning throughout your life. But some knowledge is more important to your well being than other is. I expect you know a lot about programs on TV. They can be very interesting but they are only entertainment. It is more important for you to know what is good for you to eat, the value of having plenty of sleep and what you need to do to keep clean.
I am sure Ashleigh’s parents tell about these things as well as her teachers.

I know that. It was just my way of bringing in some very important knowledge. We are going to tell you about things you probably will not hear about in school. But it is very important. It is easy to forget that nature provides everything we use. Most people do not even think about it. They have been taught how clever humans have been to invent so many marvelous things. They are taught to believe that technology will always solve our problems. But they have not been taught that technology only uses these resources. It cannot create them. But we will tell you about this because it is so very important, as you will see.
You know, Ashleigh, that the water for your bath comes out of a tap. You turn a tap on and ‘hey presto’ out comes water. But we know, don’t we, that it is one of the wonders of nature that rain falls. Most people give that little thought when they use water because they only have to turn on a tap. Nature provides not only the water but also the metallic ores that were used to make the water pipes. It also provided all the food the workers had to eat to acquire the energy to lay the pipes and build other parts of the water supply system.

Talking about water, I find it interesting that the government has ads on TV encouraging us to save water by saying every drop counts. I can well understand their concern because Melbourne’s reservoirs have been only half full for years, partly because of the drought and partly because people have a belief that they can freely use water to their heart’s content.

We know better than that, don’t we, Ashleigh. But I think DA was going to make a point about the governments concern with water use. Was I right, DA?

Yes, Laprin. It is intriguing that the government is concerned about the use of water when nature will ensure that we will continue to get some. It is naturally recycled. Isn’t rain marvelous? The same cannot be said about petrol.

Good point, DA. Petrol is produced from crude oil, a substance that it took Gaia millions of years to produce. It does not recycle when we use it. It is like time in that it is gone forever. But the politicians cannot see this. All they can see are dollar signs. They believe money runs things. Aren’t they silly billies, Ashleigh? We know that you can’t eat money. You can’t build a house of money. You can’t use it as a fuel for a car.
I mentioned recycling. You have probably heard the term.

Do you have a bin to put recycling material in? We do. It is picked up every fortnight. We put cans and paper and the other specified items in it. That is much better than putting these things in the rubbish bin.

That recycling is very different to the way water recycles. Gaia recycles water naturally with little cost to the environment. We reprocess the sort of waste that DA mentioned, by using natural resources like the fuel for the trucks, and we call it recycling. We are led to believe we are doing something good for the environment by putting these things in the recycling bin. It would be much better if we did not buy so much stuff in the first place. Did you know, Ashleigh, that trees are cut down just so junk mail can be produced. Isn’t that silly? Trees are very important in the way they breathe in carbon dioxide. But they are also the home for many creatures. Koalas love their areas. They find it very difficult to adapt when it is logged. De-forestation is a world wide problem. Monkeys, gorillas and orangutans in Africa are losing their homes too.
Laprin keeps on about how what we do and use requires the consumption of natural resources to develop your understanding on what really happens. This is to help you develop a mindset that understands what is really happening; not what most people would like to believe.

New word, mindset. It refers to the way you think. The mental image that you have. You go to school to learn many things that help you develop your mindset. We are encouraging your mindset to include understanding of the biophysical reality of the world in which we live. Most people do not think that way, unfortunately.

Do not misunderstand what we are saying, Ashleigh. We know that money is very important in determining how much we can buy. But it is really more important to make good decisions about what we buy. You do not want to consume more natural resources than necessary, do you, Ashleigh? Yet that is what you are encouraged to do by all that TV advertising.

You are used to hearing about what things cost. That is referring to how much things cost in money. I would like you to also think in terms of what things cost in terms of using natural resources. That is, what the eco cost is. I believe it will become common to talk in terms of the eco cost in coming years as more and more people realize that we are so dependent on natural resources, as they get scarcer.

Laprin mentioned food a while back. A lot of people say how marvelous modern agriculture – food production – is. They make claims for the fertilizers produced by the chemical companies. Those fertilizers are made from natural products, often natural gas. Humans just use a range of natural resources to produce the fertilizers. And they do not fertilize the soil, as we know. That is a common misunderstanding. They help the plants to grow but soil fertility has been built up over many years by natural processes involving many microbes. Laprin explained that last year. All we do is reduce the fertility by growing plants that we can use that are not really suited to the soil.

Thank you, DA, for that important example. Your Mum’s car is another product of nature. That is an uncommon view but correct. It is common to talk about how these things are manufactured. How machinery shapes metal into the parts required. It is easy to find books that tell how iron ore is turned into steel, natural gas into plastic and sand into glass. But little is said about how dependent the manufacture of the car is on these raw materials being available. That is just taken for granted for now.

It is quite likely that will be fewer cars around when you are old enough to get a licence. Australia has a lot of iron ore but that does not mean that it will still be easy to make steel. That requires a lot of other natural resources. Coal generally provides the energy requires in the smelting process and we have a lot of coal. There are other materials that we have already just about used up. One that readily comes to mind is lead. Most car batteries are made of lead today. Some substitute will have to be found in the near future.

But that means using another natural resource. No doubt, Ashleigh, you do not like the idea that you may not be able to get your own car. I can well understand that. But people are going to have to learn to use less of the natural resources because some have just about been used up. One of the big problems is that some people are using more than their fair share of these resources so others have to go without.

I have lived through a period when little consideration was given to the way we have used up natural resources and devastated the environment. So I have been as guilty as anyone in the eco cost of what I have done. I have incurred a big eco debt. Our generation has had what they call a free lunch. Sadly, you and your generation will not be able to do the same.

Often there are articles in the papers or news items on TV that talk about poverty in Africa. This comes about partly because there are not enough natural resources to go around. Can you imagine what it would be like to not have nice clean water to drink and wash in? That is the lot for many kiddies of your age. Yet in those same African countries there are many who live luxuriant life style, complete with swimming pools full of clean water. That is not fair, is it? But it happens.

We were talking about how a car is made. But the car also needs a fuel, petrol. You will have seen Mum and Dad fill the tank at a petrol station. No doubt they have complained about how much it costs. But it took natural processes billions of years to produce the oil that petrol comes from. Yet we burn eighty four million barrels of oil every day. That means that every day there is eight four million less barrels of oil for future use. Yet TV advertisements keep trying to get people to buy more cars. And the government arranges for more freeways to be built.

I find it laughable that by the time you are old enough to like to have a car , the freeways will be relatively empty. Traffic jams will be a thing of the past. So will those smoggy days.

I mentioned oil addiction in last year’s letter. The president of the United States said in his State of the Union address that Americans would have to get over their oil addiction. See, we were ahead of the President. That is not unusual. Politicians only recognize things when they hit them in the face. They are so busy keeping their position that they have no time to think about reality.

Our politicians are no better. There is a plan called Melbourne 2030 that has been put together by our government. It is based on the proposition that our city will become a lot bigger by then. It provides detail costing (in dollar terms) for the roads etc. that will be needed. It says nothing about the eco cost although it does note the difficulty in having an adequate water supply. It presumes the necessary natural resources will be available. I am deaf. They must be too because they cannot here the loud cries of ‘Peak Oil’ and ‘Climate Change”. We should send them back to school.

There is a lot of talk about climate change in knowledgeable circles and how it could affect our lives. Even some governments recognize that it will be a major problem. But that does not include the American and Australian governments. They are blinded to that reality by the dollars in their eyes. The Europeans are awake to the dangers and are even trying to do something about it. There is very good scientific reason to believe that burning what are called the fossil fuels, oil, gas and coal is causing it.

They give off a lot of carbon dioxide, which acts like a blanket around Earth. This is just one example, but a very important one, of how our activities have upset the operation of Gaia. We should not have done this to our pet, should we, Ashleigh? But we have.

But we can’t stop doing that quickly. We love our lifestyle too much to change it rapidly. So now we are going to have to live with what we have done. I expect that you have heard mention that a large number of species have become extinct. That is another major effect of our activities. We have destroyed their habitat, where they live. We have even done a very effective job of making life more difficult for ourselves. There is quite a bit of talk about pollution. I expect that many people are aware of the resulting increase in asthma and cancer. But that is only part of what is happening. I expect there will be a lot more publicity about it in the years ahead. You may have heard about bird flu. This is causing a lot of worry around the world. This is almost certainly another result of our tampering with Gaia’s operations. You might feel after reading this that we humans seem to have done a lot of harm to our pet, Gaia. What can we do about this? I will talk about that next year, if things have not changed too much by then. The twenty first century has started off at a great pace, downhill! Enjoy your Birthday, Ashleigh, with your family and friends.

Best wishes, Ashleigh. And give Jordan a hug from me.
Grandpa

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Dear Benjamin
I wonder what Laprin plans to say to you on your 13th Birthday. I hope you have recovered from your broken collarbone and are able to play cricket. Over to you Laprin.

Happy Birthday, Benjamin. We talked about many of the biophysical operations of Gaia last year. You may be wondering what more we can cover this year. Before we start on that, I will remind you that all we humans do and use requires the consumption of natural resources and the production of wastes that nature cannot handle.

I imagine Laprin is reminding you of this, Benjamin, because there are almost no signs that people know this fundamental fact.

Quite so, DA. Times are changing and it is really becoming quite fast but there are few signs that people recognize that fact. Climate change is starting to receive more attention. This is not surprising as the news comes in that more glaciers are melting, drought s are continuing and now Europe and North America have recently had heat waves, again. China has had a record cyclone season although we did not hear much about that. News from America always gains more prominence. Their hurricane season is just starting and a big one is looming.

I expect that you know, Benjamin, that these countries are further from the Equator than we are so their summers tend to be colder than ours. We feel quite uncomfortable when it gets over 40. Imagine how they feel when it is over 40 for days on end.

What made it worse in America is that most of their homes are air-conditioned. This put such a load on the electricity grid during the heat wave that there were power failures, and that made the heat a lot harder to endure.

I read that a suburb of New York was without power for four days.

Did you know that the authorities asked industry to reduce their power consumption? Many did this by running their generators to keep the air-conditioners operating. This increased the emission of pollutants, so making the heat waves a greater health hazard.

These lose-lose situations are becoming too common.

Yes DA, New York is just one example. California had a number of power failures as well. But I found the situation with nuclear power stations in France more interesting. I expect you know Benjamin, that there is talk of building nuclear power stations here in Australia. The government is having an enquiry into the matter. The French experience will be one major factor against nuclear power here. These stations use a lot of water for cooling purposes. The French stations get there water from rivers and when it is returned to the river it is, naturally, a bit hotter. In the heat wave this meant that the water got too hot for the rivers. This hot water was doing a lot of harm. So they had to turn the power down in the stations just when maximum power was needed for air-conditioning.

And France does not normally have water problems. So this was another lose-lose situation. As we know, Australia does have water problems. Those ads on TV keep reminding us. Pity they do not spell out the same for petrol. Anyway, Oz is the dry continent. Where would they put the station so it could get plenty of water reliably?
Some people advocate desalination. That would be a rum idea. Have a nuclear power station to provide the power for desalination to provide the water needed for cooling purposes.

That is a very good example of technology chasing its tail. The location of a nuclear power station is a good question, DA. Just one that will be tossed around for a long time. I do not believe that there is any likelihood that one will be built here.

What makes you say that, Laprin?

It takes years to make the decision, get approvals, draw up the plans and then actually construct the plant. I believe that things will change so rapidly in the next few years that getting more power will become a lower priority well before it could be built. The coming depression is bound to cut demand and change priorities. Droughts and the cost of fuels will cause a major change in farming with much more emphasis on local organic farming and permaculture.

I expect that the trend to have your own vegatable garden will grow rapidly. Although most people will have to learn how to do this without being too reliant on buying fertilizers and plants from supermarkets.

At least the obesity problem will disappear. I expect you know, Benjamin, that obesity comes simply from eating too much and exercising too little. In fact most people will be a lot healthier what with the gardening, walking and riding. It will be interesting to see what the most popular car will be. The big cars are certain to be on the way out.

It’s unbelievable that Holden committed themselves to the new Commodore.

No worse than what GM and Ford have done in the States. What do you think, Benjamin? Do you and your friends plan to go for small, electric cars? It is quite likely that cheap, small Chinese cars will be the most popular. Their government is already making certain that the gas-guzzlers cannot be afforded except by the very rich. But China has a lot of other big problems. There is one good aspect; the traffic congestion problems in Melbourne and Sydney will disappear.

But there are not the moves to improve public transport. How are people in the outer suburbs going to be able to get to work?

Cities worldwide are starting to work on this problem. Most Australian cities just seem to be dragging their heals. Perth appears to be the only exception. European cities are much better off than American and Asian ones. London has had the Underground for one hundred and fifty years. But there is not likely to be any solution to the transport crisis. The blame game will be interesting. I see the Federal Government is offering $2000 to covert cars to LPG. That is a typical government move. They must be seen to do something to reduce the impact of high petrol prices. They realize that most people do not understand that it is just a band-aid to cover a deep wound. They would never spell out the truth that the age of cheap fuel is over. But our government is not the only one fostering programs that do not really help. The European Union is fostering the use of biodiesel in cars to reduce global emissions so, as they say mistakenly, combat climate change. So the Malaysians are cutting down forests so they can grow palm oil to sell to the EU to make biodiesel. Their forests would do more to combat climate change than the EU use of biodiesel.

That is another example of money speaking louder than reality. Getting back to what you were saying Laprin about public transport, the other parties are no better than the government. They have missed a golden opportunity to show up the paucity of Liberal policy but they lacked the nous or the knowledge.

And it is the proletariat who will suffer. The politicians will continue to be well paid and use Commonwealth cars. The current twaddle about petrol prices is another example of how politicians and business use their position to delude the public to save their hides. We know, don’t we Benjamin, that oil is an exhaustible natural resource and it is running out quickly. That explains why petrol prices have doubled in little more than a year. But our leaders blame other factors and encourage people to believe the high prices are only temporary.

I expect, Benjamin, that in two years time we will look back at the good old days when it was less than $1 per litre with wishful thinking. There will be many people unable to afford even one car.

That is enough about cars. The trouble is that I cannot think of any bright subject.

You explained to Benjamin last year about how dependent we are on nature’s bounty, even though we take it for granted. But there is another matter that is causing a lot of worry - terrorism. Would you care to comment on that? I expect that Benjamin is as bewildered by this as I am. We have been telling him about one thing yet another is grabbing all the headlines.

There is a connection. The Western world has been the leaders in using Gaia’s bounty for centuries. And they have done this by taking the resources of Third World countries. They have forcibly dominated the Middle East for centuries. This did not make them very popular but the residents were not sufficiently well organized to do much about it. But the position has now changed. Western technology has given them the tools to eke their revenge. And their oil wells have given them the necessary money. Unfortunately that means that both sides will be the losers. Think of all the resources that will be used in rebuilding the Lebanon. They could have been put to better use in so many other places. The irony is that airline travel is quite likely to plummet because of the worries about terrorist attacks just as the fuel crisis is making it very hard for the airlines to make a profit. They could do without that double whammy. I think the airline industry is in more trouble than the car industry.

Climate change is getting more media attention. Perhaps you would like to comment on moves here to combat it.

I am sure you said that with tongue in cheek. I expect that Benjamin already knows that we cannot combat it. Unfortunately, there are many so-called authorities worldwide who give the impression that cutting back on greenhouse gas emissions can stop climate change. That is a lie. Cutting back would just slow down the rate that the carbon dioxide level is increasing. That level is already high enough to cause global warming. We should recognize that the damage has already been done and get on with adapting to that.

I believe that a lot of the problem stems from the fact that most people misunderstand the term ‘emissions’. They do not realize when they read that the emissions are so many million tones that this is referring to the annual rate. The important indicator of global warming is the concentration level not the rate at which it is increasing.

I agree with you, DA. But remember that, for example, inflation is quoted as 4%. That is an annual rate. Judgment is made on the basis of that implied annual rate. So it is not surprising that the common view of global warming is based on the annual rate of emissions. It is very disconcerting, however, to see that authorities get it wrong. They are proposing quite drastic measures based on this false premise.

I am surprised at you, Laprin. There is nothing new in the authorities getting it wrong! They keeping saying how good economic growth is, even as it leads to destruction of the environment.

That’s true. The irony is that Australia contributes just 1.6% to global emissions. There is absolutely nothing that Australians can do to stop, or even slow down, global warming. Remember that, Benjamin, because it can help you make wise decisions. I see the State Government is crowing about how a large wind farm at Mount Gellibrand is going to help fight climate change. I only wish the community knew enough about the subject to throw them out at the next election for misleading them.

Getting back to Laprin’s comment about wise decisions, it would be silly, as an example, to buy a home on the Sunshine Coast because the likelihood of it being destroyed by a cyclone is increasing rapidly.

Yet, the insurance industry recognizes that but most people do not believe that it could happen to them. Sadly, the people of New Orleans learnt the hard way.

Quite a few climatologists say that it is possible Hurricane Katrina was not caused by climate change.

I know that, DA. There will always be a degree of uncertainty about cause and effect. But the general view of climatologists is that it is quite possible that hurricanes are getting stronger and more numerous due to climate change. I see Chinese climatologists have the view that their recent savage spate of cyclones is almost certainly due to climate change. And the insurance industry agrees. They are concerned that great increase in natural disasters will make insurance untenable. It is interesting that the precautionary principle is not being mentioned in these government led discussions on climate change.

I think you should explain precautionary principle to Benjamin.

Right. It is a formal statement of what most would regard as being common sense. You should not do anything unless you are reasonably certain that it will not do any harm. The European Union has adopted it because they have belatedly learnt from history. Many novel methods have been adopted in the past that have proven to have unintended consequences. One that comes to mind is the use of coal fires for heating in English homes. This led to smog and the death of thousands during the early part of last century.

I experienced that when I was in England in the late 1950s. It was terrifying. And it took a lot of knowledge, time and resources to partially remedy.

And that is just one small example. Others have been slow to learn from that. China has a similar problem now but much bigger. And it is rapidly getting worse because their economy is booming!

So they have not adopted the precautionary principle?

I do not know whether they have formally followed the European Union, but their government is quite clearly doing their utmost to ease the pollution problem. But China is very big with over a billion people. The important point is that Australian governments have not done so. They give every impression of just blundering on while ignoring fundamentals that other countries are facing up to. They just seem to be following the Americans, as usual.

To wind up, have you got any advice for Benjamin? I find it depressing that I enjoyed a free lunch that my grandchildren are going to have to pay for.

I can understand that, DA. The so-called high standard of living in countries like of Australia has devastated Gaia and greatly reduced its capability for providing civilization’s life support system. I do have a few suggestions. Australia is still the lucky country, but for reasons not generally appreciated. I suggest that you do not make any plans to leave these shores. I do not know what sort of career you may have in mind but I suggest you stay away from ones that do not really made a contribution to the basics of life. For example, advertising tries to make people buy stuff. That entails a waste of scarce natural resources. So stay out of advertising and similar careers. They have no future. Also, encourage doing rather than having. That will also help you to remain healthy in a time when medical services are bound to be declining. Localization is bound to replace globalization as the fuels run out. So get involved in community activities. Try to find people with similar views to yours so you can build up a sound knowledge base. Debate is a pleasant and sound way of sorting out your views. But you have to think through the issues. Do not just accept what you are told. There is bound to be a lot of blaming amongst politicians and in the media as things deteriorate. You need to be able to judge which way things are going without being dependent on their twaddle. And develop skills that will be useful when it is no longer possible to pay others to do the things for you. Those skills could well make a major contribution to your community. Sound knowledge of vegetable gardening without buying fertilizers and the like will help a lot. You should try and ease the transport problem by living close to work and shops. And walk or ride whenever that is possible. A small, energy efficient house would be a very good investment. It is quite amazing how much electricity use you can save by having a house that is oriented to take maximum advantage of sunshine. I have seen a number of studies of what are called zero-energy houses. They do not need an electricity connection yet they are comfortable. Also, get into the habit of dressing appropriately for the conditions. That will reduce your dependence on air-conditioning and home heating. I do not expect that I need to mention the value of eating just a little less food.

One question Benjamin could well have is things are still looking good but you are painting a bad picture. When are things likely to really go bad?

That, of course, is a question that many people have. Firstly, there are a lot of signs already, for those prepared to look. The Internet provides easy access for very many people. Google is a remarkable means of finding useful information. But I would guess that less than one percent of people have a reasonable view of what is happening. That core of smart people is small but increasing very rapidly. Even oldies like me could well see a major change in attitudes, because traumatic events could happen at any time. A new science of chaos dynamics helps scientists to understand that the complex operations of our civilization are not predictable. For example, there could be an avian flu pandemic this year. It is a possibility but even the experts cannot assess how likely it is. That is just one possible event. The Israeli Hezbollah War was quite unexpected. I could put together a list of over hundred possible traumatic events. We can be reasonably certain that some will occur in the near future. But we do not know which ones. There is little doubt that we have very interesting times ahead. Think of it as an adventure in learning how to make good despite the fact that civilization is aging rapidly. You will not be able to stop the inevitable but you can be smart enough to ease the way ahead for family and friends. I will leave it at that for now. Have a good Birthday, Benjamin and we will be back next year.

Thank you, Laprin. You know where I am, Benjamin, if you have any questions. I would welcome a chat any time, even if you have to use pen and paper to get through. All the best for your Birthday.

Grandpa