On Saturday January 29th, 2012 Dr. Andrew Dessler, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at Texas A&M University was invited to speak about climate change to the community. He was well received and was very informing.

There were two sessions. The first session discussed the science of climate change. Find out what drives climate changes and atmospheric conditions with a degree in meteorology. The second session was concentrated more on policies and solutions. One can only hope that more educational sessions like these are held to ensure our citizens are informed with valid information as opposed to corporate spin that negatively affects us all.

The event was suggested by Dr. Ron Spross. The lay leadership of the church got behind it and made it happen. Presbyterian churches like Atascocita Presbyterian are run by a group of ordained lay leaders called elders.  They refer to this governing group as the “Session”. They were very supportive of this event, its controversial nature notwithstanding.  Kingwood Area Democrats Bruce and Karen Menke were instrumental in publicizing and facilitating the event.

One cannot help but be thankful to them for bringing these types of events to our community to increase awareness. Our local and mainstream media have been lacking in providing real, prescient, and essential information to the citizens in this area in order to have them support appropriate policies.

After the event Dr. Ron Spross told me the following:

The publicity from Karen & Bruce and KADs, among a number of others outside APC who enthusiastically supported it and got the word out, was and is deeply appreciated.  ……

Something that should be discussed more, I think, is the unfortunate politicization of this topic.  Those of us who have chosen our political affiliations have probably done so for many reasons other than or in addition to our party’s views on climate change. It is therefore unlikely that the most effective path to real action on the problem of climate change will be through trying to convert enough people to the party that “believes” in it.  Rather, we are much more likely to succeed by appealing to all our fellow citizens, regardless of party affiliation, to consider the science, as we did with this event.  In fact, …… I believe that the path to optimal effective action on climate change lies through both parties recognizing the problem and acting together on it, rather than through one party gaining sufficient power to dictate the solution to the remainder of us.  Such a dictated solution would not bring the best of America to the problem, and might only be in place while the dictating party held power.  But we will not meet this problem head on until Americans of all political persuasions can agree that it is real and that it is a threat to us all, independent of our economic status or political beliefs.

It would be great, say, if our service organizations like the C of C, Lions, and Kiwanis, were to start talking seriously about this topic, perhaps sponsoring events like this.

The event was held at Atascocita Presbyterian Church, 19426 Atasca Oaks Drive, Humble, TX 77346

Sessions Including Questions & Answers

Dr. Andrew Dessler Interviewed

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