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By Jeffrey D Sachs\/New York<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
The climate crisis we now face is a reflection of a broader crisis: a global confusion of means and ends.
\nWe continue to use fossil fuels because we can (means), not because they are good for us (ends). This confusion is why Pope Francis and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew are spurring us to think deeply about what is truly good for humanity, and how to attain it.
\nEarlier this month, the Pope and patriarch each convened business, scientific, and academic leaders, in Rome and Athens, respectively, to hasten the transition from fossil fuels to safe renewable energy.
\nIn most of the world today, the purposes of politics, economics, and technology have been debased.
\nPolitics is regarded as a no-holds-barred fight for power, economics as a ruthless scramble for wealth, and technology as the magic elixir for more economic growth.
\nIn truth, according to Francis and Bartholomew, we need politics, economics, and technology to serve a far greater purpose than power, wealth, or economic growth.
\nWe need them to promote human well-being today and for future generations.<\/p>\n
America may be the most confused of all.
\nThe United States today is rich beyond imagining, with median household income and gross domestic product per capita each equal to nearly $60,000.
\nThe US could have it all.
\nInstead, what it has is widening income inequality, falling life expectancy, a rising suicide rate, and epidemics of obesity, opioid overdoses, school shootings, depressive disorders, and other grave ills.
\nThe US incurred $300bn in losses from climate-related disasters last year, including three massive hurricanes \u2013 the frequency and intensity of which has risen, owing to fossil-fuel dependence.
\nThe US has vast power, wealth, and growth, and yet diminished well-being.
\nThe US economy and politics are in the hands of corporate lobbies, including Big Oil.
\nResources are relentlessly allocated to developing more oil and gas fields not because they are good for America or the world, but because the shareholders and managers of ExxonMobil, Chevron, Conoco Philipps, and others demand it.
\nTrump and his minions work daily to undermine global agreements and domestic regulations that have been put in place to accelerate the shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy.
\nYes, we can produce more oil, coal, and gas.
\nBut for what? Not for our safety: the hazards of global warming are already upon us.
\nNot because we lack alternatives: the US has ample wind, solar, hydro, and other sources of primary energy that don\u2019t cause global warming.
\nThe US economy, alas, is an out-of-control juggernaut, chasing oil wealth and jeopardising our very survival.
\nOf course the US is not alone in the mad pursuit of wealth over well-being.
\nThe same get-rich-quick confusion of means and ends is causing Argentina, host of the G20 Summit later this year, to pursue fracking of natural gas, with all the associated climate and environmental risks, instead of tapping its bounteous potential in wind, solar, and hydro power.
\nThe same corruption of purpose is causing the Canadian government to guarantee a new pipeline to export output from its polluting and expensive oil sands to Asia, while under-investing in Canada\u2019s vast renewable energy sources.
\nIn his meeting with the CEOs of major oil and gas companies, Francis told them, \u201cOur desire to ensure energy for all must not lead to the undesired effect of a spiral of extreme climate changes due to a catastrophic rise in global temperatures, harsher environments, and increased levels of poverty.\u201d He noted that the oil companies are engaged in \u201cthe continued search for new fossil fuel reserves, whereas the Paris Agreement clearly urged keeping most fossil fuels underground.\u201d And he reminded the executives that, \u201cCivilisation requires energy, but energy use must not destroy civilisation!\u201d
\nFrancis underscored the moral dimension of the problem:
\n\u201cThe transition to accessible and clean energy is a duty that we owe toward millions of our brothers and sisters around the world, poorer countries and generations yet to come.
\nDecisive progress on this path cannot be made without an increased awareness that all of us are part of one human family, united by bonds of fraternity and solidarity.
\nOnly by thinking and acting with constant concern for this underlying unity that overrides all differences, only by cultivating a sense of universal intergenerational solidarity, can we set out really and resolutely on the road ahead.\u201d
\nAs Francis was meeting the CEOs in Rome last week, Bartholomew was similarly convening leaders of scientific institutions, UN agencies, and major faiths in Athens and the Peloponnese, to chart a path to environmental safety.
\nBartholomew also underscored the fundamental moral concern. \u201cThe identity of every society and measure of every culture are not judged by the degree of technological development, economic growth or public infrastructure,\u201d he said.\u201cOur civil life and civilisation are defined and judged primarily by our respect for the dignity of humanity and integrity of nature.\u201d
\nThe 300mn faithful of the Eastern churches led by the Ecumenical Patriarch are in lands facing extreme dangers from global warming: intense heat waves, rising sea levels, and increasingly severe droughts.
\nThe Mediterranean region is already beset by environmental distress and forced migration from conflict zones.
\nUnchecked climate change \u2013 which has already contributed to conflict \u2013 would spell disaster for the region.
\nBartholomew\u2019s conference opened at the Acropolis, the very heart of ancient Athens, where 2,300 years ago Aristotle defined ethics and politics as the quest for well-being.
\nThe political community, wrote Aristotle, should aim \u201cat the highest good,\u201d to be achieved by cultivating the virtues of the citizenry.
\nAristotle famously contrasted two types of knowledge: techne (technical know-how) and phronesis (practical wisdom). Scientists and engineers have given us the technical knowledge to move rapidly from fossil fuels to zero-carbon energy.
\nFrancis and Bartholomew urge us to find the phronesis, the practical wisdom, to redirect our politics and economies toward the common good. \u2013 Project Syndicate<\/p>\n
*Jeffrey D Sachs, Professor of Sustainable Development and Professor of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University, is Director of Columbia\u2019s Center for Sustainable Development and the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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