We reached out to some of the leading scholars of climate change,
conservation, and ecology, and asked them what, as the Earth begins yet
another trip around the sun, is giving them cause for hope and despair.
Below are their answers, lightly edited for length and clarity.Peter Singer, professor of bioethics at Princeton University
Reason for despair: One
thing that brings me close to despair is the fact that, just in the
West, we seemed to have turned a corner in regard to meat eating and
factory farming—both are now on the decline—the resulting reduction in
animal suffering and greenhouse gas emissions is being swamped by the
growth in meat eating in China and other parts of Asia. Nevertheless, I
don’t despair because the situation is not hopeless. As long as there is
hope of change for the better, I’m too busy trying to bring about that
change to lose myself in despair.Reason for hope: More
and more people are seeking fulfillment in their lives by turning away
from the consumer lifestyle and instead living in accord with their
values. The emerging movement known as effective altruism is one outcome
of that, and it is having an impact. I’m encouraged by the tremendous
progress made over the past 25 years in reducing extreme poverty and
improving life expectancy worldwide. Infant mortality, for example, has
been cut by more than half since 1990, despite rising population. If we
continue to put more resources—our intelligence and our skills, as well
as our money—into using reason and evidence to make the world a better
place, then I am confident that we can make even more progress over the
next 25 years.Lots of doom in this article.
I really want to read the hope bits.
tinfoilparachute 