Live Earth Singapore: Some Responses from Singaporeans
The big day is fast approaching, and there has been a lot of comments and discussions about Live Earth.
Not everyone supports the concert. The Today newspaper helpfully published letters from both sides of the debate.
Tan Chee Sean questions:
Beamed across eight cities, this concert will be watched by more than 2 billion people. At the same time, millions of television sets will be turned on for up to 24 hours, so viewers can watch their favourite artistes. Ironically, wouldn’t this contribute to even more global warming?
In an attention grabbing-ly titled letter, Eugene Tay (pdf link) asks us to:
Give up hope. Because when hope dies, action begins.
What he actually meant was that saving the environment starts with personal action and responsibility. We shouldn’t hang on to the wishful thinking that someone else will do the job for us.
The blogosphere is buzzing too. Below are just some of the varied responses from Singaporeans I came across:
Scott Thong is more annoyed at MediaCorp’s Live Earth “We are not exaggerating” advertising campaign than the event itself. I haven’t seen the TV advertisements myself, but hey Scott, don’t mistake the messenger for the message. 
Ordie helpfully points out that Mediacorp is encouraging Singaporeans to wear green to show how much we love hugging trees. Not very imaginative but definitely easy enough.
Sharp-eyed Liang Cai noted that the language one gets on the Live Earth official web site when clicking on the Singapore flag is… Malay. Well yes, it is our national language but not many of the non-Malays here actually speak it. One of the little ironies of Singapore.
No matter your personal sentiments about it, Live Earth is indeed going ahead. So why not make the most of it and see how we can use this unique opportunity to raise awareness about climate change?
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Scott Thong said,
July 6, 2007 at 12:44 pm
I would’t half be as annoyed if I didn’t feel so strongly about the global warming issue. Hold a concert to raise awareness about clean water for developing nations or press freedom, fine. But it is my opinion the current global warming hysteria is based on very shoddy (or intentionally misleading) information and tight manipulation of the media.
And quite frankly, I dread the very probable scenario of millions of concert-goers/watchers who will begin advocating the cause to us in a very tut-tut manner. “What, you aren’t trying to stop global warming? How can you be so shamefully uncaring about the Earth?” This attempt to reach deep and pull my heart strings would work if it were for a genuinely true cause.
Call me a skeptic (I am), but I do not advocate letting any one source tell us what is true and what is propaganda… Me as a soource included. Look into both sides of the debate for yourself. To balance out Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth:
http://scottthong.wordpress.com/2007/07/04/a-skeptical-laymans-guide-to-anthropogenic-global-warming/
That said, I’m all in favour of other environmental concerns. Bamboo grows faster than any other plant and is not a food crop, if we could find an efficient way to turn it into bio-fuel that’d be one big environmental problem solved!
Hun Boon said,
July 6, 2007 at 1:02 pm
Hi Scott, thanks for the comment. I think you have 2 concerns which I would like to separate out first for a more coherent discussion:
1) You don’t think global warming is a real concern.
2) You don’t wish to be preached to by holier-than-thou advocates in a condescending manner.
I don’t think anyone likes (2), so let’s just focus on (1) – is global warming real?
Or as your link points out, is global warming caused by humans?
I have come across material that concludes that current global warming is part of a natural cycle, and not due to human industrial activity. It could very well be “normal” to experience such rising temperatures.
However, I do believe that releasing such unprecedented amounts of CO2 and other greenhouse gases must have some sort of impact.
Now, it would be near impossible to come to a definite conclusion just how much of an impact is caused by us. But surely we can agree that we must have some sort of negative effect?
The suggested solutions of cutting down on waste, conserving our natural resources, adapting a more sustainable personal lifestyle – I’m all for that. And if the global warming alarmists can galvanise more people to make that change, I’m in favour of erring on the side of caution.
Heh bamboo isn’t the fastest growing plant (I think grass is the champion), but it is about the hardest and most versatile fast-growing plant out there.
Scott Thong said,
July 6, 2007 at 2:04 pm
If you discount cows getting fat on grass (which they don’t eat anyway in industrial meat farming), bamboo is also much more useful. Then again, bamboo IS a type of grass…
CO2 is a prickly issue. Some might say it’s at the core of the whole debate. I’m intrigued by the claims that even tiny amount of CO2 increase will cause a large increase in temperature, due to CO2 absorbing a certain spectrum of infrared that would otherwise be cast off into space.
On the other hand, it is argued that once the small band of radiation has been absorbed by the CO2, that’s it – all the radiation of that wavelength is gone, and no extra amount of CO2 will cause a meaningful temperature increase. Besides, other greenhouse gases including water vapour absorb the same wavelengths that CO2 does. Page 13 of the PDF at this link: http://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2007/07/a-skeptical-lay.html
(Note that CO2 forms only 0.0383% of the entire atmosphere http://scottthong.wordpress.com/2007/02/26/carbon-dioxide-and-global-warming-5-reasons-why-im-not-alarmed/ and it isn’t getting much more http://scottthong.wordpress.com/2007/06/13/carbon-emissions-and-percentage-of-atmosphere/ )
The problem with erring on the side of ‘caution’ is that, far from being cautious, the steps advocated by the IPCC are quite radical.
I myself advocate a balanced solution – one that appeases the demands of industry, makes its way towards reducing greenhouse gas output, and not incidentally improves the environment as well. (Badawi happens to agree with me) http://scottthong.wordpress.com/2007/06/11/the-sun-the-star-green-carrot-compromise/
Give me an affordable hybrid car and extensive solar or nuclear generated electricity, and I’ll gladly switch to them. If we could make green tech economically advatageous, we wouldn’t need concerts or films or even any messages abotu global warmign at all – the naturally thrifty Singaporeans (and other world citizens) would make the switch quickly.
Hun Boon said,
July 6, 2007 at 6:12 pm
Hi Scott, I would agree that the balanced approach is the way forward.
Of course, we would expect activists to take a more radical and extreme position just so that people would pay attention to them. Moderates don’t get much air time.
Regarding your comment on CO2 release, you could very well be right. I would use the analogy of rising temperatures: Why is there such a fuss over an increase of 1-2 degrees in average temperatures? Don’t temperatures vary a lot more from day to day? So what’s the big deal about 1 or 2 degrees?
Apparently every 1 degree increase in temperature contributes to a significant increase in sea level due to melting of the ice caps (sorry I can’t remember the exact figures).
My point is that CO2 quantities that might seem insignificant could have a huge impact down the road. The eco-system is too finely balanced to withstand any huge changes.