Monday, December 10, 2007

Al Gore Receives Nobel Peace Prize

""We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive." -Albert Einstein


Today in Oslo, Norway, Vice President Al Gore, was given the Nobel Peace Prize along with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) "for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change."

As Gore noted in his speech (which I highly recommend checking out) "today, we dumped another 70 million tons of global-warming pollution into the thin shell of atmosphere surrounding our planet, as if it were an open sewer. And tomorrow, we will dump a slightly larger amount, with the cumulative concentrations now trapping more and more heat from the sun.

As a result, the earth has a fever. And the fever is rising. The experts have told us it is not a passing affliction that will heal by itself. We asked for a second opinion. And a third. And a fourth. And the consistent conclusion, restated with increasing alarm, is that something basic is wrong.

We are what is wrong, and we must make it right."

Now there are a lot of people who will put Gore down for his carbon credit buying, his jetplane travel, and the mansion that he lives in, all points that I think are fair but possibly not balanced. Having said that, he's put climate change on the map and done more for the sustainability movement by doing so than just about anyone out there. And the first step is to acknowledge the problem, which he now has most of us doing.

So a hail and hearty Huzzah to Mr. Gore for his past, present, and future accomplishments and for helping make this global problem one that everyone is (finally) talking about.

Live Sustainably

Dave




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