Titanic's sinking as a modern parable for climate change

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Titanic: The Final Word with James Cameron

The 100th anniversary of the Titanic's sinking is nearly upon us. James Cameron, one of the world's leading experts on the subject, recently went back to the site of the sinking, and with new information and research gathered since his movie was released in 1997, correct any errors for the 2012 theatrical re-release. One of the more intriguing segments on the panel, was a "what could you have done differently that could have saved more lives?" [ Video will not embed, but will open in a new browser window.]



The only thing I thought of instantly was, well I know a lot of the life boats were nearly half empty; and one has a few as 15 people in it (they could hold 65), but since the ocean was completely calm (one contributing factor to the disaster in fact), the boats could have easily held even more people. Maybe 100. But that wouldn't have saved everyone.

Director James Cameron came up with at least two to three alternative solutions: some good and some not so good. Cameron boasted "You could have saved everyone, including their dogs." But the most viable and easiest to do that the panel of experts agreed upon, threw me. That kind of thinking-out-of the box was amazing to see unfold. The panel wasn't doing this in a vindictive way either. Considering the nature of the emergency, everyone agreed that the crew and officers did the best they could under the circumstances. But they were all in a state of shock. The architect of the ship, Thomas Andrews was last seen staring at a painting in a first class smoking room, not wearing a life preserver. The Captain of the ship was described in testimony to have been in a daze during Titanic's last hours. Essentially he knew on some level: we stop the ship, launch life boats, and let most of the passengers die. That was that. He couldn't think outside of the box.

It was the builders and officers unbridled pride that nothing could go wrong that stunned them when in fact, it went very wrong. James Cameron sees this as the take-away for us now.

SPIEGEL: What does that still mean for you today, and for us?

Cameron: The catastrophe showed those people who they were, whether they rose up to the tragedy, or whether they ran away or tried to camouflage themselves with women's clothes. Being separated from the event by a century, we have it easier. But everyone can ask themselves: Who am I? How would I react? The Titanic is a huge story because of this sort of thing.

SPIEGEL: But there have been plenty of catastrophes throughout history with far more casualties.

Cameron: It's not about numbers. It's about the hubris of the shipowners, for example; it's about society at that time. It was a very optimistic time: Technology was advancing; people built aircrafts; they enjoyed electric light; everything looked like there would be a great future. And the Titanic stood for that. And then, suddenly, the unthinkable happened, as if all of this went down with the Titanic. This was a huge blow. And, today, there are unthinkable topics as well, such as a nuclear war. And the Titanic shows that the unthinkable can happen.

SPIEGEL: Other disasters show that as well. So why does the Titanic have such a strong impact?

Cameron: Because she is and will remain a metaphor. There was the first class, second class, third class and the crew. So you have the rich and mighty, the middle class, the lower class and, let's say, the government. And the government is influenced by the wealthy -- in this case, Bruce Ismay (the chairman and director of the White Star Line of steamships, the owner of the Titanic, who also died on its maiden voyage). And they are driving this ship way too fast, quite deliberately playing with the lives and the future of the other people. And when they see the iceberg, it's too late. That's how it is with climate change. I am in Guam right now, and I want to dive to the Marianas Trench, the deepest place on Earth. I spoke with the president of Micronesia a few days ago, and he told me how his country is literally shrinking. The atolls here are very low.¹

I certainly remember the shock of the WTC attacks here in Brooklyn ( I could see the smoke and smell it, never mind the glaring hole in the skyline that appeared literally overnight.) How could the buildings have collapsed when they were designed to absorb an airplane collision. Quite a few commentators at the time mentioned the similarities to the reactions of the Titanic's sinking. As a species we are either very optimistic or in great denial. Our collective brushes with death, but surviving them makes us believe nothing can go wrong. Just like the passengers on Titanic.

The United States hasn't done anything significant on climate change, and the recent world meeting in Denmark didn't offer much in the way of a concrete path of solutions. Can we think out of the box? Can we do anything to prevent the collision? Our future looms.




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1. Der Spiegel:"'The 'Titanic' Shows That the Unthinkable Can Happen"

Other resources:

About the Titanic sinking:

Bob Ballard: Save the Titanic Mr. Ballard was the man who discovered the Titanic wreck (as well as the two Navy nuclear subs U.S.S. Thresher and U.S.S. Scorpion.) Mr. Ballard wants an international treaty to set the Titanic wreck off limits to underwater scavengers who sell artifacts on the black market, and prevent damage to the wreck.)

Why We're Still Learning the Lessons of Titanic - Popular Mechanics article on how bad decisions can overwhelm the best technology. Thanks to sandwichwarrior for bringing this to my attention.

Top ten list of things everyone can do to help reduce global warming.

Real Climate, RealClimate is a commentary site on climate science by working climate scientists for the interested public and journalists.

CO2 Science. The Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change was created to disseminate factual reports and sound commentary on new developments in the world-wide scientific quest to determine the climatic and biological consequences of the ongoing rise in the air's CO2 content. It meets this objective through weekly online publication of its CO2 Science magazine, which contains editorials on topics of current concern and mini-reviews of recently published peer-reviewed scientific journal articles, books, and other educational materials.

The Planet Under Pressure International Conference. Based on the latest scientific evidence, the London Planet Under Pressure conference will provide a comprehensive update of our knowledge of the Earth system and the pressure our planet is now under.

Comments

[drblasphlemy.livejournal.com]

What would you have the U.S. do? Mandate that everyone buy a smart car? More green job? Another Solyndra perhaps? And even if the U.S. did anything you can bet that China and India and the rest of modern world would not do anything (significant) to constrict their industrial progress.

[rowsdowerisms.livejournal.com]

Whether we or China or India want to admit it, industrial progress and economic growth are going to come to a halt by climate change and the bursting of the carbon bubble.

[drblasphlemy.livejournal.com]

How is that?

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

Abandon your posts! Flee, flee for your lives!

Denethor - my role model.

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

Reduce our dependence on foreign oil through different modes of energy production.

Such as nuclear.

[chron-job.livejournal.com]

> What would you have the U.S. do?

Stop subsidizing oil companies so other forms of energy become more competitive.

Include the costs of environmental damage within the product itself. i.e. a carbon tax.

Engage in treaties with other nations to do the same.

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

You know that's exact attitude China has, that if they did anything the Untied States would do nothing... so why bother?

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

Climate Change! is ther anything it can't do?


Seriously though, I think that this article was better...

Why We're Still Learning the Lessons of Titanic - Popular Mechanics

(http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/engineering/extreme-machines/why-were-still-learning-the-lessons-of-titanic-6705764)

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Thanks for that link ;)

[harry-beast.livejournal.com]

There are parallels between unquestioning faith in climate change theories and the belief that the Titanic was unsinkable.

[darksumomo.livejournal.com]

In The Titanic 100 years later (http://crazyeddiethemotie.blogspot.com/2012/04/titanic-100-years-later.html), I wrote:

The sinking of the Titanic also serves as both an example of and a metaphor for the catastrophic failure of technology. The "unsinkable ship of dreams" encounters a known hazard, an iceberg, and sinks to the immediate horror of all involved and the lingering fascination of people for at least five generations afterward. Would a failure of our own society and its technological support look like this? That's worth contemplating.

Looks like I'm not the only person in this comm who is thinking about the sinking of the Titanic as a metaphor for our current predicament.

As for the video not embedding, keep an eye on National Geographic's YouTube channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/NationalGeographic). This looks like the kind of clip they might post there.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Thanks, the irony is, the longer we wait to do anything substantial about climate change, the worse things get (in terms of how much needs to be done and the expense). Just like the Titanic, the closer the ship got to the iceberg, the fewer options for avoiding it narrowed.

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

As in the PM article I link I think it says a lot about people and the "Safety Culture". No amount of engineering will overcome poor decision making.

[hikarugenji.livejournal.com]

I've posted this before here, but I think we're basically fucked on climate change -- our only hope is that it won't be as bad as some scientists think it will be.

As long as the Republican Party sees climate change as a liberal, anti-American, "job killing" thing, no serious legislation will ever get passed on it in the US. Beyond that, though, it's very hard to say to people that they need to pay more or give up something in order to forestall a disaster that might be decades down the road and might not even affect them personally to a great degree.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

I've posted this before here, but I think we're basically fucked on climate change

Yeah, we're getting pretty close to the methane tipping point.

[mrbogey.livejournal.com]

Stop making climate change a vehicle for such.

[vehemencet-t.livejournal.com]

Sorry no--it's as long as the ruling class sees climate change as just a way for them to push various social agendas and profit schemes to control people's lives even more, all the while the wealthy corporations and governments and research laboratories continue to experiment, produce, and spread dangerous, environmentally destructive, and unsustainable practices and technologies, rather than people at the individual level moving to sustainability and permaculture en masse, which doesn't seem to be encouraged.

Climate change will not be stopped through legislation or the coercive power of government. Neither the Democrats or Republicans are trustworthy for the job.

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

When the "ship" goes down I'm not going to panic, won't give all you mofos the pleasure.

I'm going to order another brandy.

[whoasksfinds.livejournal.com]

too bad we didn't invest heavily in nuclear energy 30 years ago. only real solution at this point is hydrogen, but the technology doesn't appear to be there yet.

[chron-job.livejournal.com]

Hydrogen is not an energy source. Hydrogen is a battery.


In order to use hydrogen for power, you have to obtain it. there are only 2 industrial processes for making hydrogen in large amounts.

1) Chemical Transformation and Extraction from hydrocarbons (mostly Natural Gas)

2) Electrolysis of water.

If your hydrogen comes from 1, your energy source isn't hydrogen... it's the fossile fuel you use as a feed stock. And, being a hydrocarbon, you take the 'hydro' out and what are you left with? Carbon. In the form of CO2.

If your hydrogen comes from 2, your energy source is whatever you used to make the electricity that you used to make the hydrogen. Maybe a nuke plant, maybe a coal plant, maybe wind or solar.

But in all cases,hydrogen is a way of moving energy around, and storing energy. It is an energy 'sink'. Not an energy source.

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

We can still invest in nuclear.

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

One of the freakiest solutions I have seen proposed is to pump a layer of gas into the upper atmosphere to filter out some of the incoming heat. It reminded me of a science fiction story where computers were denied solar energy.

[chron-job.livejournal.com]

I think the unintended consequences of inserting a new gas layer in the upper atmosphere would be enormous.

Better to put a thin, reflective Mylar disk between the earth and the sun to reduce insolation. You could rotate it to change its cross-section for fine control, or immediately remove it if its done its job, or has undesirable side effects.

But. better to reduce the atmospheric CO2 so we don't need to even go there.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

I'll avoid the OMG wank and simply state that the carbon bubble pop will destroy lives, just like the T.'s sinking. It is inevitable.

For that reason, any argument that equates "going to renewables" with "going 100% with renewables at the current rate of production" completely misses the point. Why? We will not be able to produce as much electricity as we produce today. Period.

The sooner one accepts that the amazing ride carbon has given us is just plain over, the sooner one can stop kicking fellow passengers in the groin and fighting for a lifeboat seat and just have a smoke and enjoy the painting. Hey, the band's still playing on, right? Enjoy the tunes.

Renewables are an answer not because they make our current lifestyle possible — they don't — but because they will work when the carbon starts running out. Our current grid is too fragile, too subject to endogenous shocks. It needs to be made more resilient, more redundant. You know, just as every ship needs more flotation than just the main hull.

Nukes, sadly, are subject to the same shocks as gas and coal. When diesel starts running low, who will truck the replacement parts to the reactor? Who will make those parts? Once renewables (for the most part) are up and running, you just need to keep the dust off the panels and the grease the bearings.

And there are low-tech ways to drastically reduce atmospheric carbon without sacrificing the GDP of most countries. No one wants to talk about them, though, because they're not techno-utopian wank. I myself have an idea for just such a device, and need to find a metal fabricator who is willing to help me draft a design without charging me half my salary.

Yes, throwing money at a problem is the way out of this. It's called "dissensus," the opposite of consensus. We need to try everything and see what sticks to the fridge. Then we need to do what works, and try not to get hung up on trying to protect a way of life that is so pre-iceberg. It's over. Enjoy the music while it plays.

[vehemencet-t.livejournal.com]

I think the underground book The Coming Insurrection had some perceptive words to say on this matter--namely that so much of the corporate/government environmentalism--world treaties, carbon taxes, global governance, etc. are about just preserving the current standards of production, industry etc., which completely misses the point of the sustainability concept. The ruling class fears that environmental problems threaten their own hegemony and dominance--this is why I believe corporations and governments whose activity most heavily contributed to the current problem are now funding and pushing that agenda--in addition to their ulterior motives of using the issue as a means to profit, world government, population control etc.