| Summary: | 6 OPINION theconcordian.org • Mar. 12, 2014 Nanny position opening for full or part time work beginning April 1st. Position includes in-home care for a 3 year old boy in Osgood area of Fargo, Monday-Friday mornings and afternoons. Pay is $10-$12 per hour DOE. Please contact Matthew at 701-371-3028 or email at matthew@brookstoneproperty.com Classifi eds It is no mystery that our planet is get-ting warmer. Collapsing of ice sheets in the Arctic, catastrophic storms, massive droughts creates scarcity of food, and our biodiversity rapidly depleting due to our anthropocentric greed is becoming all to common. When will we realize the implications of our actions? We have ex-ceeded four hundred parts per million of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, which is far greater than what the Intergovern-mental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) does not recommend exceeding which is three hundred fifty ppm. How much damage can our Earth take? Ultimately, what’s our role? In order to protect the environment and foster sustainable communities cur-rent and future, citizens worldwide need to become climate literate. By under-standing these the complexity behind climate change, citizens are able to im-prove their choices and reduce further degradation onto the environment. So what is climate change? First I should ask, how do you define it? When we refer to climate, realize it can be describe on a regional, national or global level. Climate can be defined as average weather conditions measured over an extended period of time and the variations that occur within. From stud-ies, scientists can see patterns of change from the past and present as well as project future fluctuations. Through ex-periments, observations, and hypothesis scientists have done extensive research on the subject of climate change. Their peer-reviewed data, highly assures con-sensus amongst scientists that our hu-man actions contribute enormously to-wards these critical issues. Greenhouse gases are being trapped in the atmosphere, primarily through water vapor, and warming the Earth sur-face. These gases may remain in the at-mosphere for decades, centuries, to even thousand of years. The 20th century Industrial Revolution increased concen-trations of greenhouse gases into the at-mosphere by burning fossil fuels. Inter-esting enough, without any greenhouse gases in our atmosphere, planet Earth would be an ice age. The challenge, is that we are currently pushing the limits now of our planet. The levels of green-house gases are too high and as a whole, we need to transform our lifestyles as well as consumption habits in order to reduce them. Additionally, we need to realize that carbon dioxide is not the only greenhouse gas in the atmosphere. Nitrous oxide, methane, water vapor and ozone also largely contribute. Methane is supposedly a worse green-house gas than carbon dioxide with twenty-three per units and typically is emitted via cow feces. With high de-mands for supply within the beef indus-try, natural habitats are being cleared to raise cattle and soybeans so that our hungry mouths can be satisfied. Imagine all the beef, that is consumed worldwide yearly. Think of all the cows on this plan-et to meet these demands and how much fecal matter they produce. Excess dung left from cows, releases methane into the atmosphere and greatly contributes to rise in warming climates. There are more negative correlations to climate change than positive ones. With temperatures rising, access to the necessities of living such as food, water, energy etc. are being greatly altered due to our actions. Additionally, the health of the planet, well-being of biodiversity, and the economy are also affected by climate change. We, however, can make changes to ensure balance between hu-man health and ecological well-being to which we are connected with remain sta-ble or flourish. These changes must oc-cur with our own as well as in societies values, the infrastructure of the econ-omy, and policies that regulate future implications. As a whole, we not only have to understand the physical and bio-logical functions of the Earth, but also be able to grasp the consequences onto various cultures, the social implications that arise, and the numerous economic factors. Focus on carbon-intensive energy sources, many that today we heavily rely on, such as coal, oil, and gas must be conserved and strategies that center on renewable energy sources should be more developed. This paradigm shift in use of resources isn’t an easy task. It requires radical changes in the way hu-mans consume and use energy as well as investment into further research, technologies, and sustainable business structures. Action, however, can be im-plemented by all of us. Each individual influences climate change, but we can make positive contributions to reduce our own footprint. Climate change is ev-erybody’s issue. Parallels can be made into every major and field of study. Don’t underestimate your power. Vote respon-sibly, move towards a plant-based diet or towards eating lower on the food chain, consume less, and support alternative renewable energy. With every dollar you spend, you choose what kind of world you want to live in. No one talks about stopping climate change, however, many of us agree on getting below a two de-grees temperature increase. We don’t want to wait until it is too late to take action. Massive disaster is only counting down to occur. Climate has always been changing, but never at this rate. Again, it is important to remember that climate varies by region. Here in the Midwest, the extremes of climate change are not as visible, yet we are still vulner-able towards its effects. Massive flood-ing and droughts greatly alter the way we structure our lives. In recent years, we see the likelihood of these events in-creasing. Polar vortices, a.k.a. the differ-ence between the arctic and the equator, are where we are located. Cold air is thus sent to our region and gives rise to the climate in which we live in. Typically, environments are desig-nated hardiness based on likelihood to adapt due to rising temperatures. When climate heavily alters environments, species and ecosystems either adapt or perish. These factors also determine whether our society flourishes or fal-ters. Everything is connected, and every action has a cause and effect to some or-ganisms out there. Even if environments and their species within are resilient to fluctuations via climate change, this doesn’t mean we should further test the limits of their adaptability. Water, which covers seventy percent of the planet, become more acidic, espe-cially oceans, as they absorb more car-bon dioxide. The mixture of water and carbon dioxide creates carbonic acid, which threatens the survival rate of nu-merous species and causes great fluctua-tions in the food web of life. Both oceanic and land ice, serves as re-flectors to sunlight, otherwise known as albedo. As we lose ice, due to increasing temperatures albedo decreases causing less reflection back into the atmosphere. Heat, thus is absorbed into the ocean causing unstable temperatures and addi-tionally gives rise to thermal expansion which enforces sea level rise. Further degradation, due to sea level rise, affects the amounts of ice melting that is causes from warmer temperatures of the water below. With fifty-three percent of Americans living along coasts, sea level rise will obliterate their homes, sources of food, and region completely. We already see this occurring throughout different is-land nations, which creates climate refu-gees. Where do they go? How will their culture and history survive? For additional information, I rec-ommend checking out National Geo-graphic’s “Six Degrees Could Change the World” to see how increases average temperatures evenly slightly can have enormous implications onto the planet. The 2014 Faith, Reason and World Af-fairs Symposium “Sustainability: Lo-cal Connection/Global Impact” that is occurring on September 17, 2014 is still accepting proposals for members of the community to give concurrent sessions presentations. Although their focus isn’t on climate change, it greatly lays the foundation of developing a sustainable future. Please consider applying, as your voice and perspective matters in these is-sues. You can additionally apply to give a short presentation on April 22, Earth Day. Full descriptions on how to apply to both can be found on the colleges web-site. How do you feel called to action? The chances to become responsibly en-gaged are endless but start you becom-ing well informed, thoughtfully minded, and an active member in enhancing standards for all organisms to thrive in our society. • Climate change Why it’s real and why it matters In large measure, people don’t like reading real, deeply important news. It’s difficult, it takes time away from other more easily enjoyable activities and it of-ten makes people feel stupid. The way the news is put forth is innately targeted for an already knowledgeable group. Some-one interested in the Ukrainian crisis can-not just jump in with today’s New York Times article. To understand, he or she would have to go back to one of the first articles about the matter and read up until the present. Even beyond that, to truly grasp the situation, he or she would have to read articles on the situation of the region and have a working knowledge of histori-cal trends both in that area of the world and beyond. To be a true news junkie, an individual either has to have grown up in a household privileged enough to be im-mersed in the news, or he or she has to dedicate a substantial amount of time to getting caught up with the world’s affairs. The opaque quality of intellectualism has come to the forefront as of late, notably with Nicholas Kristof ’s New York Times op-ed, “Professors, We Need You!” Within this article, Kristof highlighted the dis-tance between journalists and academics within the process of the dissemination of information. Academic literature is dense, it’s sometimes pretty painful, and it’s usu-ally obscure. There’s certainly a time and a place for dense scholarly material, as it can convey rich ideas to those that under-stand it and who can build upon it to fur-ther the scholarly work within their field. However, it is also vitally important to connect advanced scholarship and the practicality of everyday life. Great works that have implications for everyday life ought to be shared, discussed, and debat-ed. The public sphere is only advanced through difficult debate and discussion, and those discussions can begin with truly great scholarly works. Academic literature is sometimes made to be inten-tionally difficult to access by the average individual. The high cost of academic journals keeps them from being widely dispersed, and as Kristof notes in his ar-ticle, scholars are often discouraged, and sometimes barred from writing blog posts which have the ability to serve as an acces-sible platform for summarized academic findings. The International Studies Association proposed fairly recently a policy to bar members associated with the ISA from blogging. Blogging was deemed to be un-scholarly (otherwise known as accessible), an unacceptable state of being for the ISA. Because academic material is celebrated for being unapproachable by those outside of the field, we see a great disconnect be-tween the Ivory Tower and Main Street, stagnating any true growth in American intellectualism. Kristof laments the disassociation be-tween academics and journalists able to broadcast the results of new scholarship. But the problem goes one step beyond this. Even if journalists were to dissemi-nate the knowledge created by academ-ics, a substantial portion of Americans wouldn’t pay attention. Pew polling from 2012 shows that 31 percent of Americans aged 18-24 and 22 percent of those aged 30- 34 get no news daily. Part of the problem is that dense na-tional and world news isn’t accessible to a large portion of the population, for all of the reasons mentioned above. How-ever, Ezra Klein, formerly of the Wash-ington Post’s Wonkblog, has announced the impending launch of his new project Vox. With the name originating from the Latin for “voice”, the site explains that its mission is simply to “Explain the news.” Based on its pre-launch description, it ap-pears as if the website will seek to make the news accessible by providing context and clearly laying out the issues at hand. Its mission is venerable, and it will be interesting to see how it plays out post-launch. Hopefully, by providing an outlet for individuals to seek out the news in a way that isn’t intimidating, more people will become aware of the world around them to better prepare them to be active, en-gaged, productive citizens. At the worst, it will provide an outlet for avid news junk-ies or even semi-frequent news followers to catch up on difficult issues in a manage-able and efficient manner. It will not reach as far as some would like, though. Vox is unlikely to appeal to older generations, as well as demographics that actively avoid current events. Those completely uninterested and disengaged from current events– those who could ben-efit most from clear-cut news– are unlikely to hear about the project and be interested in it. It will bring with it the cult of Ezra Klein followers, but that in and of itself is a very distinct, limited group. The creation of Vox in and of itself is reflective of a greater societal problem. News gathering is a hobby of the elites, and only a minority of Americans are making political decisions based on their own conglomeration of information and previous knowledge. The tiers of informa-tion range from the hyper-inaccessible to the demanding. If individuals are inter-ested in current events more rich and in-formative than the hyperlocal ramblings of local news, they must already be well educated. Vox is a step in the right direc-tion, but large-scale shifts in cultural atti-tudes toward intellectualism and informa-tion are necessary for America to become a truly informed nation. • Vox of the people How a new eff ort to get people reading the news refl ects a serious social concern EMMA CONNELL, POLITICAL BLOGGER
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