Global warming is not the real issue

I have been reviewing some of your literature on global warming and can only conclude that you really haven’t properly addressed the real issues at all.  There is a huge amount of focus on the consequences for specific areas and the potential for slightly more unpredictable weather patterns, albeit weather patterns have always been quite unpredictable and will remain so whether or not global warming happens.

I think the key point that is being missed and it actually IS very important is that a great deal of the earth’s land lies in northern latitudes.   Admittedly not nearly as much as it appears from looking at your typical rectangular map where Mercator’s projection significantly overstates the polar regions.  However any way you look at it Siberia is a large, often cold, and sparsely populated area of land.   It’s a bit too flippant to observe that if the Greenland ice cap were to melt the new land that would become available for possible habitation would be only marginally smaller than the area of Greenland.  However the overall point that there will be huge areas that are net beneficiaries of global warming simply doesn’t seem to be getting made.  Humans seem to default into all change is bad and fight it every inch of the way when the reality is that change is inevitable and you must strive to embrace it.  Another ice age would be very challenging for humanity and some people would need to move - however it's not at all clear that the current temperature of the planet is actually optimal for maximum human life.

Please understand I fully accept that climate change is happening and will continue to happen and it is largely caused by human activity.  The issues you need to address are what rate of change can you cope with and are your present structures suitable for that change. 

Let me answer the second issue quickly and emphatically – NO.  Climate change is going to place further strain on certain geographies.  Your present structures of countries and borders restricting the free movement of people around the world is the real issue you need to be picking up and raising awareness of.   The level of protectionism in the world remains enormous and while there has been significant progress on racial discrimination in the last century, the progress on national discrimination has actually been fairly limited.  Many countries still have quite strong factions looking to curtail immigration and protect what they have.  There are some pressure groups such as no-one is illegal that take the other side of the argument – however the prevalent thinking still seems to be along the lines of you weren’t born here – you have no right to live here unless you can give us a lot of money or we think we need you.  This is a major issue that needs to be debated.  Philosophically it looks very dubious as nobody gets to choose where they are born. 

However while living standards across the world remain so variable there is obviously a very valid concern that a fully open borders policy could lead to huge floods of people and an overall decline in life expectancy and quality of life.  The first step on the journey to open borders is probably to commit to minimum global living standards everywhere.  If that commitment were credible then many people some would probably prefer to stay and help develop their local communities rather than migrate far away from friends and families.  While some groups could move and bring their friends and extended families with them, just as happened in prior centuries.  This is the debate you need to be having if we are to progress to a better future quicker.