Are you tired of trying to understand the 600-page Stern Review (eg. this perplexing graph showing a 13.8% loss of GDP in 193 years from now!)? Luckily, the government’s finest minds are rumoured to be preparing a simplified version in limerick form. Here’s my effort:
Warming will cost twenty per cent
But stopping it will barely dent
The world’s GDP
Or its security
So it must be money well spent
As must be obvious, poetry was never a strength – and that probably isn’t even a limerick. So I’m sure others can do better… Please submit entries as comments to this blog posting and forward to any talented colleagues. If we get enough, I’ll ask the great man himself to judge. Haiku also accepted.
There was a wise fellow called Stern
Who said, “Look, this planet will burn!
Worldwide consultation
And more insulation
Will give a financial return!”
hi sorry to be off topic but how can i contact you, i want to ask that you comment on mr hansen from nasa take on ice sheet melting times – http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2007/2007_Hansen_etal_2.pdf
please feel free to delete this post
Kbilly72, thanks for bringing this up… it’s a really important paper… active link here.
I think this should be simplified and read by every decision-maker because it paints a picture with great credibility that is far worse than the IPCC Summary for Policymakers, which I and others have criticised for having so much caution it is basically misleading in the direction of complacency – see posting.
This paper deals with ‘feedbacks’ ie. where warming triggers more greenhouse gas emissions from natural sources – something we cannot control once it starts and processes that are unstoppable…
“Recent greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions place the Earth perilously close to dramatic climate change that could run out of our control, with great dangers for humans and other creatures”
Yikes…