To think of the culturally dissimilar communities of Altenahr and New York City together as two deeply wounded outposts of the same fate, God knows nobody would have thought of that before this new infernal night of floods on the American east coast. But that's how it is, climate change. Everywhere and uncontrolled, sometimes here and there, like the dark mythical figures, the angels of death and black spirits who rarely mean well with the world. Only the precarious heating of the globe with its deadly acceleration of the water cycle is not a dark fable, but quite obviously the sad reality. Present and Future. The scientific empiricism is unfortunately incorruptible.
As far as the human mind is concerned, however, we cannot be so sure. The American scene of climate change deniers, for example, is still as indefatigable and active as it was during the darkest, counter-enlightenment Trump days, and one of its most distinguished empirical arguments against the reality of global warming is the occasionally murderous cold that covers the country in winter. In February of last year, the cold snap from the far north all the way down to Texas freeze people to death and caused, believe it or not, twice as high post-disaster costs as the entire hurricane season of the previous year.
Behind these increasing cold extremes, as the science magazine Science is calculating, is a fatal disturbance of the high-altitude winds and the Arctic polar vortex high up in the stratosphere, which in turn is triggered by the unprecedented warming of the Arctic below. In other words: climate change. Unfortunately, the suffering of such messages, if they ever reach the right addressees, is just as lasting as emotional contact from fabulous monsters. Not an American phenomenon. Attention to the reality of climate change in Germany also has, it may be because of the election campaign, a half-life that bodes little good for overcoming the crisis. Flash floods or record droughts.
According to a recent representative survey by the Naturschutzbund Deutschland, 59 percent of retirees and pensioners over 65 years of age do not want to base their voting decisions on the climate and nature conservation interests of young generations. After me, the flood, those who don't like the climate have always preferred other concerns. What is astonishing, however, is the result of those eligible to vote between 30 and 60 years of age: Even with them, the majority do not think much of the climate protection advances of the Greta Thunberg generation. Perhaps they are assuming that they will no longer experience climate change. Altenahr? New York? Fabulous vacation destinations again soon.