"The premise you Poirot clones keep peddling is...."

Aw, shucks, LEGO -

I'm flattered!

Lego,
When Poirot is peddling she's only making the leg movement, there aren't any actual pedals. I wonder what she'll do if she eventually realises that ?

Further to LEGO's post above:

And the scientific consensus is that the Green Revolution improved the lot of many in the underdeveloped world --but that upholder of scientific consensus, Poirot, sees it all as a huge capitalist plot to impoverish the the underdeveloped world.

Youthful idealism (I hope my assumption regarding Darcy's age/student/youth delegate status is correct and not seen as patronising) is admirable and does not deserve the nasty sneering tone that characterises much of what passes for 'comment' on these pages. But older and perhaps wiser folk like me are more likely to be sceptical that any effort to achieve complete global agreement on something as contentious and intangible (in the broad sense) as returning the globe to its pre-industrial climatic state could ever work in practice. So, instead of sniping, I want to ask Darcy and his cohort a simple and I hope constructive question. If you could indeed get 'the world' to agree totally on any matter you chose, would reducing emissions to reverse climate change be your top priority? Contextualising the issue is really important because there are many divisions in the world that are known with absolute certainty (not merely scientific projection) to lead to unbearable fear, suffering, starvation and death. The list could be quite long, but let me suggest a few contenders: war; religious divisions (which would I suppose require one agreed religion or better, none at all); the use of alcohol and other drugs that create various degrees of harm. I hasten to add that I am not suggesting that agreement regarding any of these evils could possibly work. Sadly, nor will attempts to get agreement to abandon the source of energy that created the health, wealth and, yes, wisdom through education that we in Australia take for granted. Therein lies the problem.

Still flattered, boys.

SPQR,

".....Poirot, sees it all as a huge capitalist plot to impoverish the the underdeveloped world."

No she doesn't see it as a plot to "impoverish" anything.

She does, however, recognise unsustainable practices when when she sees them.

She recognises groundwater depletion and poisoning - and soil degradation.

She recognises it when seed companies seek to exploit the peasantry and indenture them by making them pay for "special" annual seeds when in the past they saved and shared them.

She notes that peasants have been lured into unsustainable monoculture and encouraged to overuse pesticides and fertilizers by govt and corporations.

She recognises over 200,000 peasant farmer suicides.

The 'two camps' are relatively easy to define. Camp A aspires to gain money, power and prestige by spreading fear and despair: this includes 'consensus' scientists, left-wing politicians, the media, environmentalists and most third world nations. Camp B is waking up to the fact that this is all supposed to come out of their pockets and their civil liberties, and consists mainly of the Poor Bloody Taxpayers of the affluent West.