COP26 – a heady melange of triumphant world leaders, angry dissatisfied sign hoisting activists, fat-cat-petro-lobbyists, back room meeting system changers, groupies and real working diplomats and scientists who know that this should be much easier than this, considering that the house is on fire.
It’s enough to give you the worst hangover of your life in exchange for a party that never really seems to get started.
The 26th edition of the UN Climate Change Conference is an ongoing global exercise in cognitive bias. For 26 years scientists have been giving us accurate models of the impact of climate change and how to avoid the most catastrophic of those impacts – CUT CARBON AND METHANE NOW! It’s dead simple, still we get timelines and commitments from leaders that kick the can down the road in terms of making hard choices and getting humanity on the road to regeneration. Politicians and diplomats “do what they can” never diverging from the limited scope of actions. If their hands aren’t tied then they act as if they are.
Every year the conference has laid bare the brutal politics of tribalism. Each country represented works to get the best deal it can. It’s like negotiating where to put your chair on the deck of the Titanic to get the best view of the sea. And worse yet it’s a slow rolled stage play, scripted months before the actual event. We learned this week that the US and China are going to “ramp up cooperation tackling climate change”. This surprise announcement came at the end of ten months of negotiating. No commitments to targets or policies or well anything but the afore mentioned ramping up of cooperation. Ten months to agree to announce that they had an agreement to cooperate, something that any rational person might have assumed given wide scale distraction the climate crisis is bringing to us all.
It’s both clear that the UN and the Climate Change Conference are inadequate tools to help us deal with the climate crisis, and that the UN and the Climate Change Conference are the only global tools that we have to do the job. It’s enough to have you running stark naked and mad over the Scottish Highlands looking for way out of the hall of mirrors.
This editorial is being released a few days before the closing of the conference and I hope that I will be proved wrong and lambasted for my lack of belief in the process. But none of that really matters. We have no choice but to get this right and take the clear steps that must be taken. The only question is what will the cost of inaction or inadequate coordinated global action be? The answer to that ranges from human extinction to a rough hundred years on the planet.
Now that that is cleared up, I want to acknowledge the scientists, diplomats, bureaucrats, activists, indigenous youth leaders, press agents, celebrities, CEOs and anyone who has had a hand in creating policy, targets or actions that lead us to achieving the agreed upon 2016 Paris Agreement goal of limiting global warming to 1.5° C. Thank you for your work and service on behalf of the rest of us who are trying to figure it all out.
This issue is dedicated to helping you do just that, figure it out. You will get an idea of what is needed, what is being done and what might help us bridge the gap. We are very excited by our podcast interview with Kim Stanley Robinson who lays out a futuristic vision of a UN based agency that is responsible for the rights of future generations in regards to global climate policy, The Ministry for the Future.
We hope that in our new PROOF in ACTION feature will help you to move beyond understanding into action in your own life, oriented to ending the climate crisis and generating a thriving future for humanity.
We believe it’s the only game in town, and the best ever cure for a COP26 hangover.
P.S. I would love you to follow our Podcast, subscribe to us on Youtube, sign up for the PROOF email and subscribe if you love reading PROOF
Letter From the Editors:
Welcome to the new home of PROOF at proofzine.com. PROOF of a Thriving Future started one year ago as an email update on news that provided proof that there are people and projects that are taking action that are generating a thriving future. At Issue number 16 we moved the newsletter onto the internet as Bold.ly NOW’s blog. By issue 34 it was clear that you, our readers wanted more, so we set about building PROOF as a standalone magazine – hence proofzine.com.
Over the coming months we will be adding more content areas and guest writers. We are very excited about our new column PROOF in ACTION where in every issue we give you a concise list of actions you can take to align with and bring about a thriving future.
The Bold.ly NOW Show, our podcast series has also grown both in audience and ambition. We now have three sub-brands to the show so you can tune into the conversations that matter most to you. The Bold.ly NOW Show name will continue with conversations with thought leaders, businesses and organizations that contribute to a thriving future.
Generative Futures Initiative (GFI) conversations is a series of conversations that directly relate to Generative Futurism. We will be hosting fellow futurists and those who are leading long-term to multi-generational impact projects. Look for our second episode of this series with Sci-Fi author and futurist Kim Stanley Robinson. We will be digging deep into his new book The Ministry for the Future.
We will also begin a series of transformational/educational conversations with the name Bold.ly YOU, reflecting on how to see and realize a future. Tune into these conversations if you are looking to discover your purpose, design a thriving future project or get into action on an area of life that is important to you.
With all these projects we are looking into reliable ways to financially support the work. You can become a subscriber to PROOF by clicking on subscribe in the menu or scrolling to the bottom of this page. As practitioners of the Gift Economy, PROOF is our gift to you. If you are moved to give a gift to us, a subscription or one time donation would be greatly appreciated. By the way, you can become a subscriber with a $0 gift to us. Your time to connect with us by subscribing at this level is appreciated and keeps us going.
Our transformational and educational courses are available for members of Bold.ly YOU, our app. Be sure and check out our three-course program, Do What You Love Change the World. The three courses are: Burning Desire, Big Idea and Bold Action. Each course features 9 hours of highly interactive content designed to move you in action from one level to the next. These programs are all unlocked for a monthly membership of $17.
We value you no matter how you choose to connect with the Bold.ly NOW Movement. If you have ideas or input, you can email us at bebold@bold.ly.
Proof 35 – What’s Up COP26?
In the News:
Organizations Generating a Thriving Future: The Gambia
The Gambia is a small West African country, bounded by Senegal, with a narrow Atlantic coastline. It’s known for its diverse ecosystems around the central Gambia River. It is the only one of the 39 countries being tracked by the climate action tracker whose policies, targets and actions are fully in alignment with the Paris Agreement of limiting warming to 1.5° C
See the the climate action tracker click here.
What We’re Watching: David Attenborough: A Life on Our Planet
In his 93 years, Attenborough has visited every continent on the globe, exploring the wild places of the planet and documenting the living world in all its variety and wonder. But during his lifetime, Attenborough has also seen first-hand the monumental scale of humanity’s impact on nature. With stunning cinematography and a story that exposes the impact that man has had on the natural world, this is a must watch film for anyone who cares about the planet.
What We’re Reading: ReGeneration
Paul Hawken’s Regeneration is a radical new approach to the climate crisis, one that weaves justice, climate, biodiversity, and human dignity into a seamless tapestry of action, policy, and transformation that can end the climate crisis in one generation. It is the first book to describe and define the burgeoning regeneration movement spreading rapidly throughout the world.
The purpose of the book and the project is to end the climate crisis in one generation. Ending the crisis does not complete the challenge of global warming. That is a century-long commitment. Ending the crisis means that by 2030 collective action by humanity will have reduced total greenhouse gas emissions by 45 to 50 percent. At this time, we are going backward and increasing emissions. Regeneration is an inclusive and effective strategy compared to combating, fighting, or mitigating climate change. Regeneration creates, builds, and heals. Regeneration is what life has always done, we are life, and that is our focus. It includes how we live and what we do—everywhere. We have a common interest and that interest can only be served when we come together.
What We’re Listening to – The Bold.ly NOW Show with Kim Stanley Robinson
Tune in to the Boldy Now Show featuring Kim Stanley Robinson, the Hugo and Nebula-winning author of the Mars Trilogy. He is known as a realistic, science-based highly-literary science fiction author with over 20 books published. Stan’s work often focuses on themes like sustainability, economic & social justice, climate change, and speculative futures.
In this podcast, we discuss these themes covered in Stan’s atypical sci-fi novel, The Ministry for the Future. Stan uses the book to demonstrate a vision of a new future for humanity and investigates what it might take to survive and transcend the climate crisis.
PROOF in ACTION 35
This issue we have been looking in on COP26. That this UN led conference deals at the level of nations can leave you wondering what is there to do at the personal level. We’re going to break that down into two parts, the political and the practical.
At the political level here’s what you can do:
At the practical level we can all make an impact on reaching our targets. Here are a few simple steps:
If you have additional thoughts on actions we can all take, please post them in the conversation below.
May this information inspire you to generate a thriving future for humanity and a thriving life for yourself. For more resources please check out our Podcast and Youtube channel.
-The Bold.ly Now Team
BOLD.LY NOW is a movement of co-creative up-levelers who have a burning desire to step free of our collapsing world & take the most daring leap forward to a thriving world.
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