As this brilliant cartoon points out, we've had 128 years of warnings about human-induced climate change, and over all those years, humanity did not change cour

As this brilliant cartoon points out, we've had 128 years of warnings about human-induced climate change, and over all those years, humanity did not change course. That's because warnings and exhortations rarely accomplish anything. Things tend to change only after there's no other choice, i.e., when there's a crisis. There's an insightful quote from Milton Friedman on this: "Only a crisis -- actual or perceived -- produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around. That, I believe, is our basic function: to develop alternatives to existing policies, to keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes the politically inevitable."[a] I disagree with Friedman on many things, but on this, I think he was right. It is only now, when we find outselves in the early stages of crisis (unprecedented heat waves, perpetual giant fires, etc.), that the work of all those scientists and engineers who have been documenting, predicting, and warning about climate change for the past 128 years is finally being put to good practical use. Hopefully it's not too late. --- [a] https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/110844-only-a-crisis---actual-or-perceived---produces-real https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/110844-only-a-crisis---actu...