The Weekly Flail — November 18, 2023

Winnowing the Media

We are moving much faster than people want in the Climate Disaster and much slower in the Gaza/Israel disaster.

Climate Emergency

October 2023 capped the hottest 12-month span in recorded history.

In 170 countries, mean temperatures over the span exceeded 30-year norms, exposing 7.8 billion people — 99% of humanity — to above-average warmth. Only Iceland and Lesotho recorded cooler-than-normal temperatures. Climate Central

Brazil: Health warnings as country gripped by ‘unbearable …

Nov 15, 2023 · Rio de Janeiro recorded 42.5C on Sunday — a record for November — and high humidity on Tuesday meant that it felt like 58.5C, municipal authorities said. BBC

Several of us are beginning to focus on the human problem of disaster denial, as illustrated in the film Don’t Look Up. There are many ideas about why this happens, but the most common idea is that it is too much for people to process, so they ignore it.

This is creating a situation that I am calling Climate Gnosticism. People prefer the dogmatism that minimizes the climate disaster rather than dealing with how to understand that knowledge personally.