Let's Be Specific
Statement by 100 Nobel Prize Winners
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When 100 Nobel laureates agree on something and release a statement, it deserves attention. In this case, however, we get a vague warning and no specific suggestions. It's true but is it useful? Perhaps they had to water down their statement in order to gather so many signatures?
You be the judge. Here is the statement, provided by Share International Media Service http://www.simedia.org |
At the Nobel Peace Prize Centennial Symposium celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Nobel Prize, 100 Nobel Laureates from a variety of fields issued a brief but dire warning of the profound dangers facing the world, and outlined the way forward into the future.
The statement:
“The most profound danger to world peace in the coming years will stem not from the irrational acts of states or individuals but from the legitimate demands of the world’s dispossessed. Of these poor and disenfranchised, the majority live a marginal existence in equatorial climates. Global warming, not of their making but originating with the wealthy few, will affect their fragile ecologies most. Their situation will be desperate and manifestly unjust.
“It cannot be expected, therefore, that in all cases they will be content to await the beneficence of the rich. If then we permit the devastating power of modern weaponry to spread through this combustible human landscape, we invite a conflagration that can engulf both rich and poor. The only hope for the future lies in co-operative international action, legitimized by democracy.
“It is time to turn our backs on the unilateral search for security, in which we seek to shelter behind walls. Instead, we must persist in the quest for united action to counter both global warming and a weaponized world. These twin goals will constitute vital components of stability as we move toward the wider degree of social justice that alone gives hope of peace.
“Some of the needed legal instruments are already at hand, such as the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the Convention on Climate Change, the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaties and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. As concerned citizens, we urge all governments to commit to these goals that constitute steps on the way to replacement of war by law.
“To survive in the world we have transformed, we must learn to think in a new way. As never before, the future of each depends on the good of all.”
If you could add one more sentence to the Nobel laureate statement, what would it be? Can you give one or two specific recommendations? Tell your views to The Progress Report:
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