A Good and Happy Year 2012

CO₂ emissions will matter in 2012 and beyond: Carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels increased last year by a record high of 5.9%. For comparison, the average increase since 1990, the reference year, is 3.1% annually. This increase of 5.9% is very alarming and must activate all sirens in every place and city of the world, as chances that the 2°C temperature increase above pre-industrial level will be largely surpassed, causing catastrophic and irreversible consequences for our planet and our civilization. 2012 is not a year to rest.

Meaning, Cause and Purpose: in changing into a new economic paradigm, it is important to build a common understanding and sharing of what we value as important. Simon Mainwaring emphasizes in his book “We First” that produces and consumers strongly value meaning, purpose in consuming, producing, promoting. That is consume and produce, at the same time support an important cause.

Education: It is important that education needs to reach everyone. Also young people need to discipline themselves for learning and consciousness development, they must stay away from alcohols and drugs that can strongly impact their mental and physical condition, being the sources of depression. It is all right to celebrate successes or for a break, not abusing of what we consume.

Erich Fromm in “Haben oder Sein” attributes the increasing consumption of drugs (alcohol inclusive) on the “Haben” or having. Rather than being self, young people satisfy or, according to my theory, substitute their materialist instincts through drug consumption. It is a high risks substitution that can end with the loss of the self or “Sein” through drug dependency and eventually a fatal outcome.

I also believe that education for leadership requires more than just good business administration. Today we are mainly facing challenges related to humanities, our natural environment and economics. Leaders need to learn and reach a deep level of insight into the anthropogenic and industrial causes and processes, responsible of climate change, and the consequences and risk for our entire civilization.

It is not only shareholder value which is at stake. Downsizing, strategic divestitures or mergers and takeovers are not the only agenda items where strategic leadership is required. The question is more, whether we can save humanity from climate and environmental disruption, how the collapse of our civilization can be prevented in time.

Business Valuation: in neo-classical economics, cost of business does not take into account the costs related to the use of the natural commons, the natural resources and the environment. We all agree that no longer we can proceed with this path. Aware of the difficulty to valuate and attribute these costs, we no longer can ignore them. There can be several reasons for internalizing environmental costs. Natural and vital resources have become scarce. If we continue to deplete rainforest and pollute the atmosphere we destroy the vital resources which allow us to breathe, which are the condition for life on Earth.

A New Game: let’s use the game of chess, its board and pieces for comparison. Right, we are more than two players. But most important, the game board itself changes during the course of the game. Also rather than taking the opponents’ pieces, they players need to negotiate, trade and coordinate, who takes what, where and how much. We also need to bring new players into the game, to assure, that we can continue the game 20 years from now.

Goal Setting for Sustainability: What goals do we need to pursue to secure resources, peace, quality and justice today and for future generations across all cultures and societies? Our goals might differ, but here are 3 goals, which need to have highest attention and priority:

• Protect the tropical rainforests, as a major source of oxygen and biodiversity;
• Cut CO₂ emissions, rather than betting on geo-engineering or carbon capture and sequestration;
• Work intensely with producers and consumers to achieve the goals of sustainability under the triple bottom line of society, our planet and the global economy.

Getting prepared and ready in heading into a Great Recession, Great Depression: We should not be afraid for an evolution, which is systemic and which we cannot control ourselves on an individual level. If we have achieved high standards of living through continued growth in production and consumption in the industrialized countries, we have to understand that on our planet, resources are limited. We also have to understand, that with population growth from today 7 bn to 9 bn in 2050, we have to change our way of life, our material aspirations. That means we have to step away from resource waste towards a way of life based on sufficiency or just enough for everyone. We should not fear to adopt this new lifestyle, one that is fair and just. There is immense hardship in the Global South, where entire populations suffer most from climate change already today. Intergenerational justice is mandatory. Emerging economies and countries see hope for a better future. As industrialized nations we see opportunities. For both, industrialized and emerging economies, these opportunities must be realized under the premises of sustainability and the safeguard of planet Earth. Urban expansion and development – 70% of world’s population is forecasted to live in urban areas by 2050 –relates to the construction industry, the heaviest industries with regards to CO₂ emissions. These developments mainly occur in emerging economies, increasing climate change pressures and impacts in the developing world. What industrialized nations have achieved up to date, emerging economies are repeating, and they cannot be blamed for doing so. We have to support and help these nations to grow in a sustainable way.

Let’s change together now, tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, it is never too late to start: Why together? It is easier to change together. Start in your family, with your neighbors. Start small, little actions of give and take. Exchange, ideas, goods you crafted, created. You will learn that both, sharing and your community will grow naturally.

The entire global community has to go through this process. Building strong communities, we can help each other out, where hardship is present or even dominant. It is not “someone’s” task, an anonymous body, the very rich. It is the task of each of us. And it will not resolve on its own. Don’t wait, it will not come alone. We all have to take our lives in our own hands to build a carbon free society. We all have our vision of a healthy planet, with beautiful wilderness, magnificent valleys and mountains, wild rivers, beautiful redwood forests, tropical rainforest with immense biodiversity, oceans where under the sea surface fascinating and wonderful living creatures unfold. Let’s imagine we are artists, painters and in our imagination we paint the vision of our planet, of today and tomorrow. Yes we can, and yes we “are”. We have strong senses, and we should not forget about them.

So what is material in all that? Nothing. The “Being”, being ourselves together in a strong community, it is by all means something essentially natural. And this is our foundation. We have all the ingredients we need to build our future, to preserve all the natural resources and the beauty of our planet.

Together we can build resilience, which allows us to adapt to climate change. It involves all aspects, green technology, local organic farming, sustainable fisheries, rainforest conservation to just mention a few. The overall goal is to bring drastically down our CO₂ emissions and to build a carbon-free society as fast as possible.

We have to cut our path through strong opposing forces: It want go easily or smoothly. Just think about the oil lobby? Do you think they invest their fortune into green technology if they don’t have to, if cash flows into their pockets as oil flows into ours? Be aware of “green-washing”. What about businesses who strongly rely upon fossil fuels in transportation and shipping? What about the airline business? They want to keep the stream of money flowing freely into their pockets to grow their businesses. The very wealthy don’t want to abandon or renounce to luxury. There are huge interests from resource rich countries and their wealthy people, as well as the luxury industry, to maintain the legacy and run business as usual. Nonetheless we know, that such behavior can be catastrophic for our planet and our civilization. It is very important to bring all stakeholders together, to work and communicate together.

Yes, we have to accept that we will be deceived, denigrated and that we have to deal with a lot of frustration. Recently during a guest lecture at the university, where I am taking classes in corporate sustainability, a friend of mine to which I gave highly consideration, gave this guest lecture. In front of all my student peers, he denigrated me, accused me out of the blue. Yes I was very deceived and disappointed about that person. Thinking the situation over I believe that it was fear, that caused this person to act in such a bad way, perhaps fear that the content of his lecture was not at the university level? In fact his lecture was well structured, and very interactive. The lesson is that we have to accept fear, in the process of transforming our society and ourselves. Fear is as natural as any other emotion, such as love. The lesson I took with me was to always stay tolerant, accept the feelings of the other, who eventually have to deal with hardship at that right moment.

Yes, there will be many obstacles we have to come over, and our path will be stony. And yes, we have no choice but to move forward, step-by-step, in being smart, using our skills and intelligence. Lobbies are huge and powerful, so are criminal organizations acting internationally, e.g. drug cartels. And sometimes criminal organizations are tangled up with international businesses, where illegal practice and corruption are common practice. We are powerful and strong, too. And we can make use of our social networks to get even more powerful. And we have the strength of our hearts, our strong vision and values which leads us to the preservation and the safeguard of our planet. Global competition is fierce under tough global economic conditions and strong financial pressures. In working towards the safeguard of planet Earth, we are riding the waves of the Blue Ocean (Chan Kim & Mauborgne) in which creativity and innovation is dominant, making competition obsolete.

The Great Transformation: Governments, Business Corporations, NGOs and all stakeholders have to work hand in hand. We need good government, good business practices, good in the sense of ethics, with regards to the respect of fundamental human rights, climate ethics, good in the sense of sustainability of economics, people, nature and our natural commons to develop a culture of mutual trust and strong relationships. Rather than talking about recession or depression, we should use for the era we unknowingly entered decades ago the term “Transformation”. Recession and Depression are associated to financial and economic crisis. In the era we are living today, we could reuse this terminology again. But the situation is different. It is not only the economy, it is a triple crisis (in reference to Jeremy Leggett) of climate change, energy and economics. Therefore it make sense to rather use the term “The Great Transformation”, which implies change, governance, strategy and action for the sake and to meet the resource and livelihood needs of the world’s population today and in the future.

While it is in our hands and in each ones responsibility, as consumers and producers, governments, national and local, together with business corporations need to stimulate, support and give directions and roadmaps to achieve this transformation. Each of us is a genius. Each of us holds a plenitude of ideas, of creativity. Bringing all this energy and ideas together, we can foster ideas, turn them into innovation for transforming our society, together with government, business enablers, entrepreneurs, eventually also venture finance.

A Good and Happy Year 2012: Let’s change together. Let’s build and become part of strong communities. Let’s exchange ideas and goods for a better world. Let’s be responsible in what we produce and what we consume. Let’s protect and care about our planet, being aware that we are many and that our planet’s resources are scarce. We want to wish all of you and to all the people on our planet a good and happy New Year 2012.

Women, Mothers and Planet Earth

The hypothesis that woman must lead to safe Planet Earth is very tempting. Who are women and how can they lead?

As a man trying to describe women is daring, and I am ready to take the challenge, being open for negative and positive critiques from both sexes.

It is my opinion that all women are beautiful by nature. Women are patient, caring. They incorporate Mother Earth. From the men’s seeds planted in the woman’s body, new and marvelous life is created. Women carrying and giving birth to our children, in a repeating and alternate cycle between death and rebirth.

I know little about women. They are wonderful by nature, with their beautiful and attractive bodies, sensual eyes and lips, their wonderful hair, the way they move and express tenderness, love and sensuality.

Is there a side of their selves, which women abject (Julia Kristeva)? Is it because women are victimized through the dominating, possessive and repressive behavior of men? Men used and abused women, using violence, humiliation. Systematic rape is used by men at war and against religion, causing women to become subject of social exclusion and carrying diseases such as HIV. Is this the reason why women feel abjection?

Violence generates violence. Violent men cause violent men. If through women, this element of violence can be substituted, there is a chance that our world can improve. Women need to be encouraged, supported and promoted. They have all the virtues and characteristics that all human beings should acknowledge and appreciate.

It is time for women to stand up, fully in confidence of their mother body, their beauty and intelligence and lead the world’s population and our planet to salvation.

Women have the potential to give love to men, who show respect and give in return their love and appreciation for what women stand for. Women procreate, love and take care of our children and our future generations.

Man in my view has a crucial role, unless women contradict this view, in giving the seed to new life. I see man as the gardener, who takes care of his woman and loved one and carefully cultivates all aspects of that relationship, love and woman, cultivating her senses and feelings, fully using his potential for love and empathy.

I heard that women compete against women. Which is from my view a perfectly comprehensible behavior and process: women need to attract, they need to show-off, to signalize that they are receptive towards men. Women need to attract, looking for potent and strong men, they can rely on for at least to give birth to and care for their children. There is a man for each woman, still competition for attraction and selection can be quite fierce. Therefore women should not feel guilty of their competitive behavior. This behavior is perfectly natural and legitimate. And as a man, it is very pleasing to become part of this “game” of seduction.

It is part of life. There is no abjection to it, it is pure, not sin, it is complex, it is love. Should there be limitations or taboos? I am quite liberal in that regard, yet emphasizing the precautionary measures that need to be taken to prevent infection through fatal diseases such as HIV.

Love is healing, it is necessary, it strengthens our bodies and immune system. Love is full of positive energy, sensual and sexual aura. Love is not more and not less than the most intimate fusion of man and woman, healing force reinforcing the confidence of self and the other, the highest art for creating enduring joy and happiness.

Whatever stage of your relationship, love is legitimate at any stage, since it has this strong healing due to the fact, that man and woman come again together in fusion of their bodies, feeling the other’s skin, the intimate areas and the love of the other, in penetrating and exploring each other’s most intimate, sensitive and erotic belongings of one’s own.

In doing so, women, all embodying mother Earth, nourish their fertile ovum to give birth to new life. Women can be proud of their bearing, of creating new life, they can be proud of what nature has provided them.

What about the women who are hunted, raped, destroyed, their children taken away and killed. Give them the arms and power they need to fight for their legitimate self-defense.

To come back to our hypothesis: why are women better placed to care about and safe Planet Earth?

An experiment in evolution psychology at Florida State University (Elaine Hatfield & Russell Clark, 1989) included young male and female students who asked students on the campus of their opposite sex whether they want to go to bed that same evening. Male students replied to their female counterpart 75% with yes, 25% asked whether it is possible to do it another evening. Female students replied 100% with no.

What can these results, spontaneous and instinctive behaviors tell us? We could argue that the neoclassical economic model is a male model, mainly focused on the immediate and short term, matching the male instinct. This short-term rational of men is disastrous for our planet.

According to John Gray, women have tried one-night-stands, but they know that one-night-stands want make women happy. According to an American study, women in general refuse offers for one-night-stands, because women consider themselves more intelligent and sexually smarter than men.

Not having one-night-stands does not affect women’s self-confidence. According to the American psychology professor Marta Meana, men base their self-confidence on how fast and with how many different women they can have sex. Women build their self-confidence in being admired by men, in clubs and lounges. Women dress smart and sexy, let men invite them, adore, admire, flirt with them. While men have to show-off, smart-talk, impress with money and luxury, women can leave at the end of an evening alone or with a female friend, being strongly reinforced in their self-confidence.

Women have patience, they do not have this primitive ego instinct, drive and need for immediate sex and satisfaction. Women can wait, choose those men, that give them comfort and love. Women thus have a sustainable approach. Women have a long-term view and focus of procreation. Women’s instinct is to give life, to care and to safeguard the environment for the new life, they have created. Women are fundamentally long-term and sustainable in their instinct and behavior. Therefore the hypothesis that women must lead humanity to safe planet Earth might well hold true.

It will be challenging for women, to take the lead, since of the dominating, destructive and short-term nature of men. The good news is that there are men, who are convinced about and who want to go the sustainable path, too.

Wirtschaft und Ethik

Philosophie, Kultur und Kunst sind Themen, welche jetzt und in Zukunft erhöhte Beachtung geschenkt werden müssen. Sie werden uns bei der Lösungsfindung helfen.

Die Debatte zu Themen wie Klimawandel und GMO (Genetically Modified Organisms) sind äusserst stimulierend und werden in meiner Website „slow4earth“ adressiert: https://sites.google.com/site/slow4earth/

Wobei wir unser Denken und unsere Meinungsbildung auch auf einer wissenschaftlich fundierten Basis und Publikationen stützen müssen.

Unser Hauptproblem ist das Fundament unserer Wirtschaft und unseres Wirtschaftens. MNCs agieren „nachhaltig“ zu oft noch unter dem Deckmantel des „Greenwashings“ und der Demokratie, anstatt in neue nachhaltige Unternehmungen und Lösungen zu investieren. Die Davids (Wüstenhagen) müssen kämpfen, um nicht im Sog der globalen Wirtschaftskrise und den global agierenden Goliaths unterzugehen.

Die schlechte Seite ist die Abhängigkeit zwischen Arbeit-/Auftraggeber und Arbeit-/Auftragnehmer, welche unsere Gesellschaft von der kritischem und unabhängigen Denkweise abbringt. Diese Abhängigkeit führt zu Konformismus und verunmöglicht, reale Probleme kreativ und konstruktiv zu lösen.

GMO stossen in den Entwicklungs- und Schwellenländer auf wachsenden Widerstand. Die Einführung von GMO Auberginen, Schöpfung einer Monsato-Tochter, wurde aufgrund des wachsenden Drucks der Bevölkerung in Indien ein Moratorium auferlegt. Das sind schlechte Vorzeichen für die Einführung von Golden Rice in Asien in den kommenden Jahren.

Weshalb führen die grössten Welt-Probleme vermehrt zu polarisierenden Positionen? Ich denke es ist die wachsende Kluft zwischen Nord und Süd, arm und reich, Macht und Ohnmacht.

Welches sind die Probleme unserer Zivilisation? Globaler Klimawandel, globale Wirtschaftskrise, Ressourcenknappheit, fehlende Wasser- und Nahrungssicherheit, Energie- und Atomkrise (Arendt) und mit diesen globalen und komplexen Problemen eine wachsende Verunsicherung unserer Gesellschaft und die Gefährdung unserer Zivilisation.

Aus ethischer Sicht (Gardiner, Jamieson) haben wir eine Verantwortung gegenüber der armen Weltbevölkerung, „the Base of the Pyramid“ (Hart) und den zukünftigen Generationen (Nelson, Wolf).

Auch die Unabhängigkeit der Wissenschaft ist gefährdet. Wir sehen es in der nuklearen Aufrüstung, in der Frage der Nuklearenergie, im Zusammenhang mit Nanotechnologien und den Risiken der Nanopartikel, dem Umgang mit dem Klimawandel, um nur ein paar wenige Beispiele zu nennen.

Der rational denkende und handelnde Mensch von heute ist dem Grössenwahn verfallen. Er masst sich an, die globalen Probleme lösen zu können, indem er seine Experimente anstelle des Labors neu auf den gesamten Erdball anwendet: Globale Ressourcenabschöpfung, globale Energiesicherung, globale CO2-Emissionen und Carbon Sequestration, Capture & Storage, globales Geoengineering, globale Einführung von GMOs, globaler Rüstungswettlauf zu geostrategischen Zwecken und globaler Hegemonieanspruch der Supermächte sind permanente und aktuelle Themen. Dank Einstein und dem rational handelnden Menschen haben wir seit Hiroshima und Nagasaki die Macht und die Mittel per Knopfdruck alles Leben auf unserem Planeten, uns selbst, unsere Kinder, unsere 7 Mia. Menschen, unsere Tiere und Pflanzen zu zerstören und zu verstrahlen.

Gerne fordere ich Sie heraus, meine Gender-Hypothese (Schiebinger), dass nur noch das weibliche Geschlecht, welche die Mutter und unseren Planeten Erde verkörpert, unsere Zivilisation retten kann. Die Männerwelt ist charakterisiert durch Dominanz, Unterdrückung der Frauenwelt, Krieg, Vergewaltigung und Zerstörung. Es besteht Hoffnung durch Frauen wie June Arunga, die in dieser polarisierenden Beziehungsfrage Transparenz aufzeigen, und die Mann-Frau Probleme offen angehen und nach Lösungen suchen.

Weshalb lassen sich globale Krisen nicht nur global lösen? Weshalb braucht es beides, einen Top-Down Governance Ansatz und Bottom-Up lokalen, partizipativen Community Ansatz? Regierungen und MNCs haben das Geld und die Macht. „The Base of the Pyramid“, d.h. heute 4 Mia., in Zukunft 7 Mia. Menschen, die nicht mit mehr als 1 USD pro Tag auskommen müssen, verfügen über das lokale Wissen und Know-How, um mit den globalen Problemen umgehen zu können: „resilience and capacity building“, zur Vermeidung einer Migrationswelle von Milliarden von Menschen, Chaos, Krieg und Vernichtung. Neo-Imperialismus, globale Dominanz, Gewalt und Kriege, genährt durch Vetternwirtschaft und Korruption ist immer möglich. Wollen wir das wirklich, oder wollen wir Frieden, würdiges Menschenleben für alle, auch für unsere Kinder? Wollen wir den Planeten jetzt und heute noch vollständig ausbeuten und unsere Atmosphäre mit Dreck und Treibhausgasen füllen, die schützende Ozonschicht vernichten, und den zukünftigen Generationen einen vollständig zerstörten und verstrahlten Planeten hinterlassen?

Gerne lasse ich Sie mit dieser Verantwortungs- und Gewissenfrage. Wir sind gefordert und müssen ständig in unserem Handeln erwägen, was ethisch und moralisch vertretbar ist, solange wir noch an den Menschen und unsere Zivilisation glauben.

Can Women Save our Planet?

Let's make the following two hypothesis:

1) mainly men or the male human species with its major dominating and destructive forces is responsible for climate change and environmental degradation

2) only women or the female human species, holding mainly "feminine" traits and characteristics, in providing them with the necessary responsibilities, leadership roles and position, are able to save our planet

An interesting source of information in that regard is the text on Environmental Ethics (cf Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy SEP), section 3.2 on Feminism and the Environment.

Support of hypothesis 1) are related to men's or male traits and characteristics

- authoritarian nature

- domination and oppression

- dualistic and favoring inequality

- slavery

- arms race

- warfare

- application of atomic bombings and arms of mass destruction (Hiroshima and Nagasaki)

- application of chemical and biological weapons

- enviornmental disasters, e.g. chemical (Bhopal), nuclear (Fukushima), oil (Deepwater Horizon)

- men's attribute of coercive power, domination of women, nature

- young men enjoying destructive and warfare video games

- young men shooting and killing (e.g. Utoeya Island, Columbine)

- white-collar criminality

- etc

With regards to hypothesis 1) we would need to differentiate with regards to culture and evolution of (violent) societies. A counterargument could be, that the traits listed above would not be attributable to the buddhist culture dominated by men.

Hypothesis 2) would need to be scientifically proven. Still we could argue, the female attributes in favor of hypothesis are for example

- sustainable

- care taking

- empathetic

- emotional intelligence

- and more

In my opinion, with regards to the differentiation between men and women, we cannot use a simplistic dualistic differentiation. In that respect I also recommend to read the SEP article on Psychoanalytic Feminism. I agree that we need to look at the psychoanalytical work and findings of both, men (e.g. Freud) and women (e.g. Simone de Beauvoir, Karen Horney).

Also men can hold feminine traits and vice versa, women can hold male traits. A question to analyze is whether in "feminine" men, once in a leader position, male traits again take over to dominate a man's female traits. We would need to characterize and define, whether feminine men exist and what there major feminine traits and characteristics are.

While it is interesting to favor and assess women leadership and responsibility with regards to climate and environmental change, two areas should be analyzed

- the consequences of women leading men in our society and businesses

- how men and their experience can be used and valued in supporting women leaders

- comparing leadership of both women with little or no male traits and feminine men

If leadership of "feminine" men can be associated to the leadership of "feminine" women, in that case hypotheses 2) could be extended to include "feminine" men. In that case we could look at the notion of "feminine leadership" rather than making a difference between the two sexes.

I think one important question is related to domination and whether women can lead without falling into male domination under different circumstances (e.g. "by nature", men's instinct, men's tendency to dominate, men's coercive and destructive forces).

Global Recession - Time for New Work

In the wake of a "new" global recession - as I stated earlier, some economist believe that we have never got out of the present recession, lasting already over a decade - economist and businesses should assess Fritjhof Bergmann's "New Work" model:

1/3 job for a living, 1/3 for family and community, 1/3 for our own life and dream project

http://newworknewculture.com/

Rather than laying of thousands of people, alternative solutions should be thought for seriously. Following the principle of enough for everybody, a fairer distribution of the resources, living life for a meaning, Bergmann's model should be applied and further assessed.

If consumer demand decreases, level of production has to follow logically.

Giving work to fewer people, making them work even harder, until they physically and psychologically break down, isn't the right answer to global recession.

It is a chance for new models and opportunities worldwide. New Work will demand that all of us adapt our standard of living, lifestyles. New Work will generate a more dynamic, interacting workforce, leaving time for family, community, new ideas and innovation towards a zero carbon society, favoring participative, integrated, local and healthy solutions. It's promising and definitely worth trying!

Climate Change and The Titanic Analogy

Climate Change and The Titanic Analogy - In my opinion this is a good analogy, comparing the current course of our civilization with regards to climate change.

Climate change is represented by the Iceberg. We have strong scientific evidence that our temperatures on our planet are increasing, and that the causes are anthropogenic and explained through the growing emission of greenhouse gases. We know that the Iceberg is there, but we can’t see it.

Titanic luxury liner, supposedly unsinkable, together with its passengers and crew represents our civilization.

Rather than bringing the passengers save to the other side of the Atlantic, the ships’ captain wanted to cross the Ocean in a new record time. Again, the analogy to our production and consumption frenzy matches well. To achieve this record the Titanic crew takes the highest risks, running the ship at maximum possible speed, opting for a route further North into risky waters with very high probability of iceberg presence.

But no passenger is informed or eventually aware of what is actually happening, of the risky endeavor they have engaged on their journey. They rely on their Titanic crew, they feel trusted and embedded in full confidence, enjoying leisure and luxury. Looking back we know that this confidence has been fatal. No one was challenging the captain, its crew and their plan of a risky route to break a new record. They where blinded by the Titanic’s mightiness, beauty and luxury on its maiden voyage. At no instant any passenger could think that human failure could cause the largest ship at that time to sink.

Some people reading these line might say, it is just destiny, many of them died in glory and with style. But when you have seen the Titanic movie, you remember the horrifying scenes and desperation of the over 1,400 people, dying and drowning in the ice-cold water. At that moment, they were all the same independent of the social status, age or gender, human beings, babies, children, teenagers, adults and elderly people.

And it is not glorious at all, to bring our entire civilization into such a dangerous and devastating situation, which can be caused be climate change.

With regards to climate change, we know that the “iceberg” is there. It is huge, it is global, it is everywhere. Similar to The Titanic, moments before hitting the iceberg, the night and the fog prevent us from seeing it. Today and in analogy to the Titanic catastrophe, we take the very highest risk and keep our Titanic full speed heading towards that iceberg, although we are all aware, that the iceberg is in front of us.

So where is the main difference in the analogy? Right, in the Titanic case, the crew saw the iceberg, when it was too late, to steer the Titanic around in time to prevent it from hitting the iceberg. And what about climate change? Although we can’t see it, we know it is there. We have scientific evidence and our latest temperature records confirm this evidence. We still have the time to turn the ship and our civilization around, to prevent the fatal collision.

We do not have much time left, so we should find and implement solutions to keep our planet from further warming. But why should we do this effort? Our journey has been so pleasant so far, with all the luxury. And the passengers in the 3^rd class did not bother us at all. Right, we are all in this, whether rich or poor, children or adults, men and women.

With regards to gender we could ask ourselves, if the Titanic captain would have been a women, would this accident never had happen? Some argue that today women leadership is needed to bring us out of the global climate crisis. One sound argument is that those industries which are most contributing to climate change, like the fossil fuel businesses, are controlled in majority by men. Even if such a hypotheses is difficult to prove today, since women at leadership position have been rare in the past, they might might hold true. And we must try every solution, especially of low entropy, since we have little resource, energy, money and time available to act. The destiny of our civilization will depend on whether we can steer the Titanic around in time that is now.

And you remember what happened to the 3^rd class passengers when the ship was filling with water and started to sink. The captain gave the order to lock all the doors. When resistance grew, people got shot by the officers. Those passengers in the 1^st class, rich and powerful, wanted to make sure to get into the rescue boats first. We know that The Titanic did not have rescue boats for the people in the 3^rd class.

Here we can enter into a discussion whether the lives of the rich and powerful must be higher valuated than the life of the 99% or the base of the pyramid. The debate could be expanded onto the intra-generational and intergenerational justice in the case of climate change, and what the responsibility of the rich nations towards the poor nations in the Southern hemisphere is.

To return to the Titanic, those in the 3^rd class had to run for their lives. This is why they succeeded, despite the initial attempt of the officers to hold them back, to break up the doors and get outside. And it was with the help of a woman (in the role of Kate Winslet), that this was possible. The movie also shows that love is one of the strongest elements, being above class discrimination and class warfare.

In the world today and in the climate change context, we are not talking about a few thousand people. Billions of people will be affected if climate change worsens. They will be forced to migrate and this situation can turn into chaos and out of control. It is in the interest of all leading and powerful people and corporations, to take climate change very seriously, to look after and implement peaceful solutions as fast as possible. It would be irresponsible and unjust, to let our planet and civilization deteriorate and abuse of coercive power and military weapons, to wipe out entire populations and large numbers of people to assure stability through repression.

The Titanic analogy to climate change is a disaster scenario which is very realistic and highly probable, if we do not change the course of our actions and businesses. It is high time to accept this reality and to accept and to be open to communication and discussions to find common solutions for all stakeholders, governments, corporate and business leaders, philanthropists, institutions such as the WEF, NGOs and all the people who hold the necessary means and skills to support and come up with possible solutions. No, it is not only about money, short-term benefit and shareholder value. The future of our civilization is at stake. We have to act fast, find and implement solutions as fast as possible to prevent climate change from further deteriorating the vital foundation of our existence.

If you are shocked and confused in reading these lines, I want to let you know, that the situation in which we are living today is not ok, it is very alarming. If I would keep silent and passively look how the situation deteriorates globally with natural disasters, famine, ethnic wars, and competition over vital resources, this would mean that I am not taking seriously my responsibilities for all the affected people and generations to come. We are all in this, we have to take it very seriously, we have to act now. Each and everyone has to get engaged in stopping further CO2 emissions and global warming, to take a role and act. Also and especially those who are well off materially, should engage and act to help the most needy and vulnerable.