What does slavery have to do with climate change? Here's how Andrew Hoffman, an engineer who teaches sustainable development at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, makes the connection in an email exchange with John Broder at the NYT:
Just as few people saw a moral problem with slavery in the 18th century, few people in the 21st century see a moral problem with the burning of fossil fuels. Will people in 100 years look at us with the same incomprehension we feel toward 18th-century defenders of slavery?
I've had a running argument with Steve Bloom over this analogy, who raised it over a week ago, but his comparison was more politically oriented:
the history of abolition of slavery in this country, and in particular the U.S. Senate's role in it, is highly instructive. Our political system was designed to have a hard time producing a solution to the slavery ...
