Clutching at Straws
October 18, 2007
Doing a little market research recently has left me flabbergasted.
One of the questions was “do you think climate change is happening?” Only a third of the people replying said Yes – and these are MDs of companies.
Regardless of the vast amounts of evidence and scientific consensus, how do they explain the weather chaos we’ve seen with our own eyes this year?
On a recent Radio4 “Any Answers?” slot, person after person phoned-in to say that climate change was all a load of rubbish (“that channel 4 programme got it right…”). Did they not realise that the scientist to which they referred in the Channel 4 programme was also the last one to cling to the view that smoking doesn’t cause cancer?
The thought that some climate change is inevitable is a bit scary, so it is understandable that people are clutching at straws in this way.
But if two thirds of business leaders are still not believing that it is already starting to happen, what incentive is there for them to bring innovative products to market to help people with the problems such as flooding and travel disruption?
Can’t we use our emotional energy to do something positive, rather than stay in denial?
