A Conversation

I was fortunate enough to have my conversation with my Dad, who is not a climate change skeptic and fully supports any legislation that benefits the planet; however he does like to play devil’s advocate to my environmentalist rants. We had a really great conversation about an Op-ed in the Washington Post about wind and solar energy as a solution to fossil fuel dependency. The article, written by James Schlesinger and Robert L. Hurst essentially argues that while wind and solar energy are seen as the primary answer to solving our electricity needs, they aren’t the only solution, and possibly not even the most feasible.

So of course, after my Dad said all this I immediately jumped the gun and tried to say as much as I could about the benefits to solar and wind energy – job creation, sustainability, etc. Hence the first lesson I learned from trying to present an issue to another person: it’s best to stay calm and rational, and to hear the full opinion of the opposing side before making any conclusions. But in all seriousness, my Dad brought up a lot of good points, things that I've never really considered when talking or thinking about how to tackle the environmental problems we face. I definitely don't want to be the kind of person that converses without listening, and so I've learned that its really important to talk about your issues truthfully. In the case of a conversation about the environment, you have to be honest about the fact that the challenges we face are huge, and they are very real, but there isn't just ONE right solution.

I think that is the biggest lesson I took from my conversation with my dad - "generating constructive change" definitely does not come from conversations where your ideas are shot down. You can make a really good point and be provocative, and learn something that you might not have known before. Finally, conversation is a great catalyst for constructive change, but it isn't the only way to attain it. We have to seriously reflect on what we know and what we've heard, and from there decide what is achievable.


This is the link for the piece in the Post:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/23/AR2009042303809.html