This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, Oct. 15, 2012 - You know what Missouri has too much of? Dan Burkhardt said to Peter Raven one day.
Billboards.
You know what it doesn’t have enough of? Awareness of the reality of climate change.
Maybe, they decided, they could use one to change the other.
So, for three months and $2,500, the two men purchased a billboard along Interstate 70 between Warrenton and Wright City.
It reads: “Climate change is real. Vote for candidates who will work to find solutions.”
Both men regularly champion environmental causes. Burkhardt created a land trust with his own farmland a few years ago and recently helped launch the nonprofit Magnificent Missouri, celebrating Missouri conservation efforts.
Raven, president emeritus of the Missouri Botanical Garden, is currently in Bhutan speaking about climate change. On their own, the two men bought the billboard and hope to make people think a little as they drive.
Raven took a few moments from his travels to talk about the billboard and his work via e-mail.
Beacon: How did the idea for this billboard come about?
Raven: There’s no scientific doubt at all about global climate change, and we are being misled in the U.S. by the political theater that’s been organized around the issue. We’re the only country in the world where [we pretend] that it might not be taking place and human beings might not be the main cause of climate change. That only harms our economy for the future while indulging in short-term delusion about the situation. That will only cost us a lot of money and greatly damage our economy in the medium run. Dan thought it was important to try to bring people to their senses.
What are you hoping will be the impact of it?
Raven: If people thought about the consequences of inaction, they would realize, for example, that the federal government is the ultimate insurer of coastal lands in this country, and that will pile hundreds of billions of dollars of debt on us a few decades out. In contrast, in England, private insurance companies cover the properties along the coast, and the role of the government is mainly to try to discourage people from building there, so they’re much better off.
Do you and Dan have plans for any more?
Raven: I’m going to try to keep spreading the word; Dan will do what he sees fit, but is certainly an outstanding concerned citizen.
Dan mentioned that with your travels you're speaking around the world about climate change. Can you tell me a little about that and if/how the perception of climate change is different in other countries?
Raven: We have lost leadership on the issue in the U.S. and that’s a shame, because people think that as a country basing its future economy on science and technology, we’d be rational on this issue. It’s really not a scientific question at all, and has nothing to do with “belief.” What we do about it is our choice, but we shouldn’t pretend that it isn’t a reality and thus slow down reaction. The Arctic Ocean had less ice this year than ever recorded, and scientists have no doubt about the reasons. Neither should we.
It seems like the billboard is about creating awareness and making people think about the science and reality of climate change. What needs to happen in Missouri and in St. Louis specifically to move from awareness to action?
Raven: I think mainly focusing on local effects. Over the long run, we need better understanding of the nature of science, so we wouldn’t become such outstanding doubters, on a world stage, about perfectly obvious things like evolution. Science doesn’t try to tell us what to do, or what to believe, and it doesn’t tell us whether or not to jump off a bridge – it just tells us about the lively consequences. We then have to make political and economic judgments about what we can afford to and what we decide to do. But deluding ourselves about what scientists have determined and demonstrated in the peer reviewed literature as a pretext for deciding not to take action is a truly bad idea.