Essay Questions

Why does Wallace-Wells argue that “global warming is a conspiracy”?

Wallace-Wells elucidates, "Climate change is not a discrete clue we can find at the scene of a local crime-one hurricane, one heat wave, one famine, one war. Global warming isn't a perpetrator; it's a conspiracy. We all live within climate and within all the changes we have produced I it, which enclose us all and everything we do." Wallace-Wells recognizes the challenge of establishing whether a disaster was specifically caused by climate change or not. Accordingly, a wildfire triggered 'by a cookout' spreads rapidly as a result of global warming. Climate change provides a viable ground for environmental disasters to spiral out of control. Climate change cannot be delineated from environmental disasters because it is subtle and conspiratory.

What do the “California wildfires” communicate about climate change?

Wallace-Wells writes, "In March 2018, Santa Barbara County issued mandatory evacuation orders for those living in Montecito, Goleta, Santa Barbara, Summerland, and Carpinteria- where the previous December's fire had hit the hardest." The fires, that ravage the glamorous county, are attributed to climate change. Glamour does not shield humanity from wildfires and global warming. The county's evacuation confirms that the fires are serious; hence, if individuals are reluctant to relocate from their affluence, which Santa Barbara epitomizes, they could be consumed by the fires. Although Santa Barbara is located in an affluent and developed nation, its vulnerability to wild fires renders it a dangerous place of residence.

How would climate change impact flora?

Wallace-Wells explains, " Climate change could soon mean that in the fall, all trees may simply turn brown, and so we will look differently at entire schools of painting, which stretched for generations, devoted to best capturing the oranges and reds we can no longer see ourselves…The coffee plants of Latin America will no longer produce fruit." Climate change would interfere with plant's capacity to produce chlorophyll. Moreover, the crisis would reduce plants' capacity of producing fruit. As a result, food productivity would be lessened resulting in a crisis of hunger.