Echapters
Climate, Health and Courage
The courage to set ambitious goals
Graham Hunter
“Setting goals is part of leadership. They are used to guide, coordinate, collaborate and inspire. They can create a common purpose, help set priorities and measure progress. They are fundamental to any plan. They can be applied at any scale from the world and to the individual …”
A reckoning with climate distress:
Restoring hope and igniting meaningful actions
Katie Hayes
“Climate change affects our emotional wellbeing. With increasing exposures to climate-related hazards, dire projections by climate scientists, and the news media highlighting our impending doom in epic proportions, it is no wonder so many of us are feeling worried, anxious and hopeless about climate change …”
The science of climate change
Julian Burnside
“Climate change represents the greatest challenge to human existence we have ever experienced …”
Human rights and the environment
Ian Lowe
“The Human Rights Commission notes that there are rights protected by international treaties for which it has local responsibility, as well as a broader range of human rights as understood by the community …”
Climate change anxiety and our mental health
Susie Burke and Grant Blashki
“The phrase inconvenient truth, made famous by Al Gore’s movie, has unfortunately for humanity turned out to be not only inconvenient and true, but quite prophetic about the climate …”
How climate change exacerbates pollution
and threatens human health
Molly Hoak
“Pollution of our environment has been recognised as a problem for eons. Early humans knew that separating waste from consumables was essential to health, even if they did not understand the true reasons why …”
Young people, climate change and COVID-19
Emily Serle and Grant Blashki
“Two thousand and twenty has been a surprising and challenging year for many young people, with the unimaginable emergence of a global pandemic and dramatic changes to our day-to-day lives …”
Courage or just plain sensible?
Some courageous ideas to prevent today’s
wicked problems for our children as yet unborn
Fiona Stanley and Kate Lycett
“As we move from the devastation of the COVID-19 pandemic into a ‘post-Covid’ world, it gives us an incredible opportunity to move to a more equitable and sustainable world, one that is courageous in making decisions to address climate change …”
Climate change and parenting
Mary Ryan and Niels Wouters
“As many authors argue in this book, 2020 has been a shockingly unique year. The bushfires have scarred environments and communities in Australia to an unprecedented scale. Decades of recovery lie ahead of us as communities grasp the extent of the new climate normal …”
Imagination, bravery and action:
The Great Energy Transition of the 21st century
John Wiseman
“Writing this chapter in the shadows of the COVID-19 pandemic provides a stark warning against over confident predictions about the ways in which human societies and ecologies will evolve …”