266: Is it OK to Have Children in a Climate Crisis?

Tom: [00:00:41] That's true, yeah.

Paul: [00:00:42] That's what you do is you get together in a podcast studio and you can't, I'm choking up.

Tom: [00:00:47] So we're in an Airbnb in central London, same as when we. 

Paul: [00:00:50] Why don't we just get, like, everyone here, like 9 billion people. And then we'll all be.

Christiana: [00:00:55] All our listeners are invited. 

Tom: [00:00:55] You're all welcome, it's [xxxx] Street. Anyway, we're no longer here, Clay, we might need to remove that bit.

Paul: [00:01:00] What do you mean we're no longer here? What do you mean?

Tom: [00:01:01] And today we're carrying on our series, and we're going to be addressing one of the issues that I personally find I am asked about most when I go around and give talks on climate, and maybe we should just start by getting reflections from you. Certainly it feels like the listeners are the same. Is it okay to have children in the midst of what appears to be significant climate breakdown? And there are questions around that. Is it morally okay to bring children into a world that, from some points of view, is collapsing? And we can get into that. And given where we are with emissions, is it immoral? Because if you have a child, will that child therefore lead to more emissions, to more consumption and make the problem worse? So we should acknowledge this is a very real and painful issue for many people. And there's such a range of perspectives. I mean, the truth is that most people probably don't ever think about climate change when they're having children, you know, we know from the data that that's that many people don't think about climate change at all. And so that would be true in this area as well. And right at the other end of the spectrum, there are those who are part of this birthstrike movement where they have committed not to have children because of the world those kids would be brought up in, and because of the requirement of resources that that child would represent.

Christiana: [00:02:11] And there are people who are aware of climate change and take the decision to have children for other reasons that we will also go into.

Tom: [00:02:19] That's the complex route. 

Paul: [00:02:20] And we will dog into that in this episode.

Tom: [00:02:22] Absolutely. So which of you would like to kick off with any reflections from our listeners or your own perspectives on where we are with this issue?

Christiana: [00:02:29] Well, I wanted to come in, first of all, to say that the question of whether to have children or not is not only a climate change question, right. There is also lifestyle questions that some people have. There are also.

Tom: [00:02:41] A couple of economic questions.

Christiana: [00:02:42] Economic questions. There is actually fertility questions. Not everyone who wants to have a child can have a child. There's also the question, especially in developing countries, of not having the option of not having children because birth control is not, is not available. So, you know, there are quite a few factors that play in and of all of those factors, we're just going to take one slice today.

Tom: [00:03:12] But one slice that I think is particularly pertinent for our listeners.

Christiana: [00:03:16] Yes. The slice that is most pertinent to our listeners. And you know, what I think is actually, I'm frankly quite surprised that in the survey that we did of our listeners, 77% of our listeners that we polled said they have considered not having children because of the climate crisis. 77%. Honestly, I am surprised that it is that high.

Tom: [00:03:47] Nearly 4 in 5, yeah.

Christiana: [00:03:48] Yeah. So I think that we should talk about that because obviously there there will be those who are quite adamant under no circumstance given climate change, under no circumstance will they consider having children. There are others that are on the other spectrum that say yes, precisely because we have such difficulty, that's why we should bring in young people, you know, to to take this on, and then there will be many people in the middle. So I think we should discuss all of this, but also be very, very clear that our conversation today is not a judgmental conversation, it's not about telling people what to do. It's not about standing in judgment for any decisions that anyone has taken. It's actually more unpacking the complexity of the issue, the complexity of the question, and perhaps giving listeners different ways of looking at it. But no one should expect that we're going to lift the responsibility of answering that question from their shoulders.

Tom: [00:04:56] Oh my god, there's so much into it, right yeah.

Paul: [00:04:58] And we're all coming from different perspectives. So we could talk about that a little bit. But also I just want to add like another layer of complexity because that'll really help won't it. You said, Tom, that we're in a time of significant climate breakdown. I think we're probably not in a certain sense right now. I mean, some people would say they definitely are suffering, you know, terrible droughts and floods and crop failures and, you know, millions, hundreds of millions of people in terrible stress. But actually, you know, large parts of the world, this world today still looks pretty similar to the world of the last 5000 years. So I think what we're talking about is significantly more climate breakdown in the future on a trajectory that we're all we're all estimating and imagining. And so that's a factor. It's not all about like now. It's also about like, well, what is coming.

Christiana: [00:05:46] Yes. What would the life be like for those children or or is it responsible to add to population. That's the other part.

Paul: [00:05:53] Which is another whole issue.

Tom: [00:05:54] So we'll get into both those things. And I think what we should do is we should look at both arguments, the argument against having children and the argument why actually we can't necessarily allow the moment that we're in to dictate those kinds of choices for the future of humanity. But before we do.

Christiana: [00:06:07] And the middle ground.

Tom: [00:06:09] And the middle ground, exactly. Yeah. But before we do, maybe we should just start with our own stories about our own, because we're all quite different. I think it's true to say that probably none of us are going to have any more children in our lives. Would you say that's true of you Christiana?.

Christiana: [00:06:21] I am biologically impeded.

Tom: [00:06:22] Okay, yeah. Paul?

Paul: [00:06:23] I think it's a, I decided not to have children about 25 years ago, and I'm not going to change my mind, I don't think.

Tom: [00:06:29] Okay. And I've had two and they're wonderful, but it's plenty. And I'm really enjoying having two children. But I wonder if we should just start off with our own perspectives on this question.

Christiana: [00:06:37] Yeah, no, for sure, for sure.

Tom: [00:06:38] Yeah, yeah, Paul?

Christiana: [00:06:38] Because, yeah, Paul you start.

Tom: [00:06:40] Yeah, you've got an interesting story.

Paul: [00:06:40] Odd. It's odd that it would start with me, but when we get to you, I'd love to hear about any dilemmas that you had when you were thinking about having children. Great to get your personal stories. For me personally, it was kind of climate related that I decided not to have children, but not in the way you think.

Tom: [00:06:53] Okay. 

Paul: [00:06:54] So I was probably about 35, and I thought to myself, I'm actually going to have to spend the rest of my life working on climate change, and I'm going to work really hard on that, and that is going to take up a lot of my time. And to be honest, I'm wondering if I want to spend all of that time and devote the time required to being a parent. I thought that those two would be incompatible, basically with having any kind of leisure in my life. I have I have actually two sisters and a brother, and they have children themselves. So I'm an uncle to eight humans. And so I kind of thought, okay, I'm not going to have children, I'm going to work on climate change with a lot of time. And that was the decision I took. If for other reasons, well, actually, the the dilemmas that maybe you faced, I never faced. So I'm not going to talk about what I never faced.

Tom: [00:07:44] Interesting.

Christiana: [00:07:47] So, I had children in a very, very different moment than you. 

Tom: [00:07:55] Tell us how old your children are.

Christiana: [00:07:56] Yeah. So my, I wouldn't call them children. My daughters, my daughters are in their early 30s and they were both born at the end of the 80s. So that's a very different moment, right, than when you had to make your decision, Tom. So, honestly, at the end of the 80s, A, there was very little known on climate change that wasn't scientific. We had scientific information, but we hadn't really begun to apply it to, what does it mean for me as a citizen? What does it mean for me as a human being? It was still somewhat, let me say, esoteric.

Paul: [00:08:37] Extreme weather wasn't really showing up.

Christiana: [00:08:39] No, extreme weather wasn't showing up. We had scientific information, but it was all sort of very much in our heads and hadn't really come down to our hearts. We hadn't really understood the consequences of that. So that's the first thing. And so I had two daughters, one right after the other in the late 80s. And am I glad that I did? Oh, yes. I am so glad that I had two daughters. First, because honestly, they're the greatest joy in my life, for sure. And we no longer have a mother daughter relationship. We now have, we're best friends relationship, which is which is fantastic, but also because they have grown up and I hope that we'll get to this conversation. They have grown up in a family context that has been very aware of climate change. And they have, I think, on their own maybe they would say through parental.

Tom: [00:09:39] I'm sure it's totally disconnected who their mother is.

Christiana: [00:09:41] Totally disconnected.

Tom: [00:09:43] Purely, no correlation, purely coincidence, I'm sure. Yeah, exactly.

Christiana: [00:09:47] Purely coincidental. But, but they have both decided to devote their lives to figuring out in two separate ways, how do they contribute to the creation and the development of a better world? And so I feel very happy about that, because there used to be just one of me, but I will be gone very soon. And how those two of them.

Paul: [00:10:07] Cloning, cloning. 

Tom: [00:10:08] Nice, yeah.

Christiana: [00:10:08] And and for sure they're going to do it much better than I, they're smarter. They have better, better tools in their tool set. And and they're growing up in a world that has much more advanced technologies. Et cetera. Et cetera. So I'm glad that there's the two of them, doing the great work that they are doing. But, but but even if and I'm sure that there are people out there who took decisions in the 80s and 90s about having children, I don't stand in judgment of those who decided not to. It just was my personal decision, and I'm thrilled that I did.

Paul: [00:10:51] Not standing in judgment being probably a good theme. Tom?

Tom: [00:10:53] Yeah. So, yeah, so I can be I can be, I suppose I faced a slightly different challenge to both of you. My children were born in 2011 and 2013, so I'd been working on climate change for a number of years by then, and it was very clear, you know, what we were facing. And so we did talk about it, my wife and I, Natasha, and we talked about, you know, whether it was moral, whether what the world was going to be like when they were when they were growing up. And it's and we'll probably get into some of this. But what's so challenging about this is that at the end of the day, you take everything you know about both sides and you make a kind of binary choice on your life and on the future. And I think a couple of things fed into that. One of my most formative memories I remember growing up, I grew up partly in the Channel Islands, and I remember when I was in school one day and an alarm went off, and that alarm meant that the nuclear power plant six miles away on the coast of France, was about to explode, and we all had to be rushed to a nearby shelter. And we went into the shelter. And, you know, we grew up with other risks that were kind of emerging.

Tom: [00:11:56] And I thought about that, and I thought if my life had ended when I'd been six years old because there'd been a massive nuclear explosion, would it be better if I had never existed. And that's a sort of very strange thing to say, but I sort of feel like actually life is of value and joyful and wonderful whatever is happening in the world. And if you look back at history, there's been many dark times, right. You look at Bob Dylan's language in Masters of War, you have thrown the greatest fear that can ever be thrown, the fear to bring children into the world from that amazing piece of music. And I sort of thought, well, climate change is different, but there have always been fears, and you always have to have a cast of vote for hope in the future, that you can actually raise someone who can contribute to something positive, and that climate change isn't all about just giving things up. It's about the positive side too. So that's what we thought about. And then at the end, to be honest, we just kind of leapt because you can never reach pure conclusion on that thing. We leapt in a conflicted way. And then once the child is there, they're there. And then you do everything you can to make a better future.

Paul: [00:12:58] A dear friend of mine said that having a child is too big a decision to be taken rationally, and I quite like that.

Tom: [00:13:02] I think that's true. Yeah, exactly. At the end of the day, you just take everything, you know, and then you take take a leap.

Paul: [00:13:07] You just have to do lists, you know, infinity, this and infinity that.

Christiana: [00:13:09] Or, or you can choose to make that decision a rational decision right. That's also an option.

Paul: [00:13:15] Yeah, that's well put.

Tom: [00:13:15] Now I think we should try and unpack some of these arguments on both sides. And first of all, there's been some really interesting comments from our listeners. So we did reach out to people and explained that we were going to be running this episode. And Richard Fulford, for example, wrote to us and said, my partner and I have decided not to bring children into a dying world, and I do think that that's fairly prevalent. I mean, we do now know, as you said earlier, Christiana, 77% of listeners say they're considering not having children, but a certain number do go beyond that, including Richard saying, we're actually not going to do it and we're going to live differently because we feel the world is dying. It's a big thing for people to make so.

Christiana: [00:13:54] And then we have someone who goes by two nerds abroad who said, it's actually too frightening, and we have someone who signs in as eco spiritual saying totally irresponsible to procreate nowadays. 84% of young people ages 16 to 25 years old suffer from eco anxiety. So quite a few very clear statements from our listeners.

Tom: [00:14:23] So, so what we're going to do now is we're just going to delve into the questions, why would somebody reach that conclusion. And many people have right. And we have a lot of respect for that. Why would someone decide to make such a significant lifestyle choice that they're not going to have children?

Christiana: [00:14:34] Or why or why is it even such a difficult question to grapple with right. So what are what are the arguments, what are the arguments against having children? That's what we want to deal with.

Tom: [00:14:46] Well I think there's two parts to it right. One is the moral case that actually we are creating this problem with our overconsumption, and an additional child will increase consumption. And the other is the question of the kind of world that that child will live in. So which one should we take first?

Paul: [00:15:01] Right, I'm going to put those as the responsibility you have to the child and then the responsibility you have to society.

Christiana: [00:15:07] Yes. That's the way I was thinking about it. Exactly.

Tom: [00:15:10] That's great, okay.

Christiana: [00:15:11] The experience of the child and how increasing population affects right.

Paul: [00:15:15] And we don't need to go into this, so to say scientific details. But Al Gore, for example, but also separately, a brilliant scientist Corina Heri, brilliant scientist. They both start their climate change presentations with population numbers. Because you will say, population numbers have been basically the primary driver of human induced climate change. Now we can dig into that. But it's a fact, right?

Christiana: [00:15:34] It is a fact. More people, more resources.

Tom: [00:15:37] Yeah.

Paul: [00:15:37] As we currently operate our society.

Christiana: [00:15:40] As we currently operate. Exactly.

Tom: [00:15:42] So let's ask, let's ask the first question about the responsibility to society. What is your responsibility to society in terms of having children?

Paul: [00:15:51] I think personally, I think you split it in two halves. I think as a human. I'm a human, by the way. We have an obligation to kind of replicate ourselves because it's marvellous. I have somebody I admire who says the purpose of humanity is to is to have children. Now, I don't think that's the purpose of humanity. I think that's a bit like breathing or your heart beating. It's a necessary precondition for the human purpose, but it is a necessary precondition. So at the basic case, I think humans should reproduce in balance with nature. Now the question is, should they reproduce in 2024 in the industrialized world, when we're in this particular spot. So there's there's not this kind of like absolute question. It's more kind of like right here, right now. To quote Fatboy Slim.

Tom: [00:16:31] So we're continuing to refine the question, which is good.

Christiana: [00:16:33] Well, right here, right now. And I want to pick up what you mentioned before, Paul, which is right here, right now, we have established a ratio of per capita resource use ratio that is very intense, right. Every no, not every human being. Let me correct myself on that one, because some human beings are using many less resources, which is in itself unjust.

Paul: [00:16:59] Most even.

Christiana: [00:17:01] And very few human beings are using many resources, so that already is an injustice itself. But if you take the average on average, each of us is using way too many resources with respect to the future of the planet. So that's the right here, right now situation. That does not mean that we can or that we will continue that ratio. If we do our job, we ought to be able to improve that ratio substantially, so that per capita we would be using less metals, less, certainly less fossil fuel.

Tom: [00:17:38] Don't forget, this is the case against this is the case against having children. Don't forget. 

Christiana: [00:17:42] Yes. But the case against assumes, that's my point, the case against assumes that we are going to have a permanent, you know, a permanent ratio between capita per capita and resource use. That is not necessarily the case, but that's a difficult argument to make.

Tom: [00:18:03] Yes. Yeah, yeah. But if you do make that assumption, then the argument is clear, right. People are responsible for a vast amount of consumption. Plastics, emissions. Plastics are one thing. Emissions are another. There's a clear correlation between growing population and increased resource use. We're in a climate emergency, so therefore we should not be adding any more children to the planet at this moment. And that is.

Christiana: [00:18:26] Because more children is more pressure.

Tom: [00:18:27] More children is more pressure. The world had, what, 5 billion people when I was young. Now it's eight and a bit.

Paul: [00:18:31] Well hold on, let's talk about, let's talk about numbers of children, you know, like 4 children, bad idea, six children, terrible idea. You know, one child may be really quite a good idea. I mean, I'm sure Richard Fulford is is, you know, a big hearted, kind, thoughtful person who's thinking about other people. But I kind of reject the idea that it's a dying world. I think that that's a wrong presumption. I mean, it might be very ill and it might be getting iller, but I will not say this is a dying world because there is so much capacity for us to to change that, and we just haven't dug into that capacity.

Christiana: [00:19:04] Well, can I, can I push you on the numbers, Paul. Because you said eight children, bad idea. One child, good idea. Not if you live in a developing country. If you live in a developing country and you are under the poverty line, the only hope that you can have for your old age is your children. And so you will have 16, 12, ten children, half of whom may die, and the other half of whom you hope are going to take care of you in your old age. So it's a very different question. I mean, those those people honestly, A they haven't contributed to climate change, and and they're in a very different position with respect to the question of not just should I have children, but how many children.

Paul: [00:19:52] But almost everybody in that circumstance has actually got such a low carbon footprint per person. The problem is much more here in the OECD countries than it is. 

Christiana: [00:19:59] Yes, good point.

Tom: [00:19:59] Yeah. Well, I mean, someone said to me a while ago that in those countries children are an asset, but in the, in the global north they're a liability, financially to many people, right.

Christiana: [00:20:05] Exactly. That's exactly right.

Tom: [00:20:07] Okay. So we, just don't forget we're making the case kind of against having children.

Christiana: [00:20:10] I know, it's so difficult.

Tom: [00:20:10] Okay, come on. We're making the case against having children from a moral perspective. So maybe we should now look at it from a what will that child's life be like perspective, right.

Paul: [00:20:18] That's that's very interesting. 

Tom: [00:20:20] And I think there, there is clear evidence that actually we are heading into a situation where, what is it, 2.7 degrees, it was of course, 4 or 5 before the Paris Agreement now coming down to 2.7. We're seeing increased storms and all kinds of extreme weather around the world. There was a piece of media that came out a few days ago in the UK, saying the UK could have endless rain as a result of climate change. Now, I'm not trying to be flippant, but these are big changes that will affect farm yields, that will affect price of living, that will carrying capacity. Is that a world that it's really moral to bring a child into.

Christiana: [00:20:52] Much more migration across borders.

Tom: [00:20:54] Much more migration.

Christiana: [00:20:55] With all the conflict that that brings and and with all of the, frankly, the defence and military, protectionist measures that will be put in place. So, so there's no doubt that if we don't do our job properly, that this is going to be a world of much more pain, of much more strife, of much more conflict, of less natural resources, because we would have affected this cascading demise of different ecosystems, which means much more pressure to produce food and all of this, so so those are the questions that you say, like, really, do we want to bring children into a context like that. Innocent children, because they haven't produced it at all. They haven't caused it at all. So do we want to bring innocent children to bear the brunt of what we have done.

Tom: [00:21:54] Yeah.

Paul: [00:21:56] Look, I get very stuck here. I think about this child, you know, born in 2025 or something. Who's then going to be, what, 25 in 2050 and all the rest of it, 75 and 2100. I think that we can't be sure what the future is. I mean, a lot of climate change is baked in, you know, this extreme heat in the summers in 2050, you know, so you can't work outdoors or play football in London, Paris, New York. That's going to happen under all circumstances. But that's a world you could have a good life in. It's really whether kind of, you know, things go completely crazy. My instinct is that you probably could and should have children if you really want to, as long as you really commit a significant amount of your time and energy to redirecting our economy. So I think what would be wrong would be just a passenger say, well, somebody else is going to fix this and I'll have a kid and what will happen to them. 

Christiana: [00:22:51] To the point.

Tom: [00:22:51] I agree with that. But I also sort of react a little bit against that. So is the is the moral case for having children only there if you do something about climate. I mean, that's a dangerous path isn't it?

Christiana: [00:23:01] Why?

Paul: [00:23:02] Why?

Christiana: [00:23:02] Why is that a dangerous path?

Paul: [00:23:03] We're both turning on you Tom.

Tom: [00:23:05] Who decides what you do? Who decides how much is enough?

Christiana: [00:23:08] You do.

Tom: [00:23:09] Okay, so so so I see. So I was I was imagining some external force that's applying judgment on people. But what you're talking about here is to accompany having children with an intrinsic sense of motivation. 

Christiana: [00:23:20] And responsibility. 

Tom: [00:23:21] To actually try and do something. Okay, that I get. 

Paul: [00:23:23] And get angry, I mean, sorry, you know.

Tom: [00:23:25] I was imagining Paul setting up a world government and issuing breeding licenses.

Paul: [00:23:28] I'm desperate to be head of an interim world government, but that's, I'm available by the way, if anybody is setting one up, looking for a leader that doesn't have to completely abide by the rule of law. I'm available. But my point would be that and this is this is, I think, the critical point, the real thing here is to transmute this incredible dilemma into effective frustration and force on our governments, on our societies, on our corporations, on whoever you want to.

Christiana: [00:23:53] And on ourselves.

Paul: [00:23:54] And on ourselves. How did we end up here? I mean, that's really the question, like a species saying, oh, I don't think we should reproduce. You know, aliens in flying saucers would be saying, kind of like, how did they get themselves in that mess? 

Tom: [00:24:05] Yeah. So should we move on to the argument for having children? Anything you want to say any further about the argument against, I mean?

Christiana: [00:24:13] As as long as we can put that sort of with three little dots behind it. Because I want to pick it up when we go into how do you talk, if you have had children, if you decided to have, how do you talk to children.

Tom: [00:24:27] How do you talk to them about it. The only thing I would say is we leave that topic is if you are somebody who is really grappling with the issue of whether it's right to have children, we really hear you. You know, this is not easy. This is really not easy and.

Christiana: [00:24:39] Absolutely. And you know what makes it so difficult Tom, I was I was struck by the fact that just a little while ago, you said it's a binary decision. There are very few truly binary decisions in our life. Very few. This is one.

Tom: [00:24:54] And the wonderful quote from Oscar Wilde, which is actually about getting married, is someone should get married either when they know everything or they know nothing right. And actually, you're in that situation where you can know as much as you can, and in the end, you have to either do it or not, which is what makes it so difficult. 

Christiana: [00:25:07] Yeah. Except as I know you can get married and then unmarried, right.

Tom: [00:25:10] That's true. You can't get unparented.

Christiana: [00:25:12] So it's not, you can't get unparented.

Tom: [00:25:13] That's true. Yeah.

Christiana: [00:25:14] So it truly is a binary decision. Of course, you know, disqualifying or not, not taking into account those people who want to have children and cannot. Et cetera, et cetera. But if you can, and you have a child, then, then you are a parent the rest of your life. My my daughters are in their 30s, and I am still a parent and loving it.

Tom: [00:25:39] Okay.

Paul: [00:25:40] And soon to be a grandparent, but. 

Christiana: [00:25:42] Yes.

Tom: [00:25:42] And soon to be a grandparent.

Paul: [00:25:43] But what I heard you saying is just like a big heart out to those people with those dilemma now, because as the climate change impacts become more real, something maybe we're all predicting, but it's really coming home and yeah big heart out.

Tom: [00:25:56] And the only thing I can say from my own experience on that is it's you can't think your way out of it when you're in that. You have to just dwell with the reality, those two realities that we're facing, potentially a dark future, there's moral compromise, and you want to have a vote of hope in the future. You just have to dwell with both of those and sit with it and see what solutions arise, because otherwise you get stuck in your head going around. I see that in people and I remember it myself. So the case for having children, why would you still have children in a world that appears to be so damaged as ours? Paul, let's make you answer it first since you chose not to.

Paul: [00:26:28] Okay, well.

Christiana: [00:26:29] Since you chose not to.

Paul: [00:26:30] Well, first of all, I have to.

Christiana: [00:26:31] What would you have said to the younger Paul if you wanted to convince him to have children?

Tom: [00:26:36] Yeah, let's have a conversation with him.

Christiana: [00:26:37] What would you have said?

Paul: [00:26:38] Oh what, to convince me to have children?

Christiana: [00:26:40] Yes.

Paul: [00:26:41] Well, don't work on climate change because there are brilliant people like Christiana and Tom working on it. And you can just go and, you know.

Tom: [00:26:46] Can I say something actually, when, when Natasha got pregnant with my with my daughter Zoe, who's my eldest child, Paul sent me an email and he said, thank you for having children on behalf of humanity. It's people like you who work hard to create the future. Isn't that sweet?

Christiana: [00:27:00] Very sweet.

Paul: [00:27:01] I'd forgotten about that, but. 

Tom: [00:27:03] I haven't.

Paul: [00:27:04] Well, I'm about to, like, choke up at my own loveliness, which is very uncool, somebody pointed out.

Tom: [00:27:09] I can probably find it, actually.

Paul: [00:27:10] Somebody pointed out that, well, I'm going to mention Greta Thunberg, and, you've both said that everyone's going to think I'm mad. But more and more, I've encountered Greta Thunberg herself and other people, referring to her by the Swedish pronunciation, which is Greta Thunberg. So there you go. I've said it now. That's the correct way to pronounce her name. Now here's the point. Her parents, Malena and Svante, decided to have a child, and that child had an outside impact on the climate change movement. I mean, you know, Greta, is a little bit of a controversial character, but on balance, she has galvanized, you know, a big part of a generation. So should they have not had a child? No. It's an absolute world changing gift to the climate change movement that Greta came into this world. And so I'm going to use her as the case for having a child.

Tom: [00:28:00] Well, so the only argument I would make against that is it's not a question of if you have a child and they turn out to be Greta, then everything's great. And otherwise it was a disaster and you shouldn't have had a child. That's the only thing I would say there is actually, it needs to be a broader argument than just you're going to roll the dice and hope you have a Greta.

Paul: [00:28:15] No, I think it is actually exactly that.

Tom: [00:28:17] And everyone else should not have had children.

Paul: [00:28:19] Well the point is that there is, you know, Greta is a very particular character. But all, you know, all humans have the capacity to be brilliant in infinite different ways. And once again, I think, you know, having a lot of children in an, in an advanced economy, which is in the wrong ratio to consumption is a bad idea. But having 2 or 1 if you want to and you want to care for them, and we need to evolve and we need to evolve in the advanced economies. And I'm going back to if you want to if you feel that need, I would support it. And I use Greta as an extreme example to make a more general point.

Tom: [00:28:50] So, so just one, one comment on that is what to me you're pointing to is a is a habit of thinking that we can get stuck in in the climate movement, which is all downside risk.

Paul: [00:29:01] Exactly.

Tom: [00:29:01] We don't think about the upside possibility.

Paul: [00:29:04] Thank you, you put my case better than I did.

Tom: [00:29:05] And actually if all we do is we just try to minimize risk, minimize risk. We never embrace the chance that something can be transformative and positive. Then we actually create a.

Paul: [00:29:16] I'm getting built up by this. I'm loving it.

Tom: [00:29:18] Then we actually create, we create a movement that is totally unappealing to many people, because all you're doing is you're trying to make the impacts less.

Paul: [00:29:24] Outrage, and I'm not sure, that's a terrible name for a podcast.

Tom: [00:29:27] Yeah exactly. Christiana?

Christiana: [00:29:29] I'm not sure that I can be there with you, Paul, because first of all, as a parent, I can guarantee that children take suggestions but not commands.

Tom: [00:29:45] Oh God, that's true.

Christiana: [00:29:48] And not instructions on what to do with their life. And so the three of us, I think, are incredibly privileged that we have chosen to dedicate our life to working on climate change. But that is not something that you can impose on your child. And if you decide to have a child, then you need to do so standing in the full courage of letting that child decide for itself what they're going to do, and they could decide to go work for Exxon. Now, what are we going to do with that, okay. So that's, you know, on the good side, yes, hopefully we are all in this new world bringing up children who are very aware and who will contribute to making this a better world, whether it's because they want to work on global health or global biodiversity or inequalities or social justice or climate change. And so hopefully, you know, that is what, what children or next generation does, but there is no way that you can hold them to that and expect that of them. 

Tom: [00:31:08] And some listeners may be in that situation.

Christiana: [00:31:10] Absolutely.

Paul: [00:31:12] And can I just agree with you.

Christiana: [00:31:13] Absolutely. And, and and furthermore, some listeners may be in the situation that they have children who themselves cannot even choose what they're going to do because they are, you know, incapacitated because of X, Y, z different reasons, and they cannot choose what they're going to do with their lives. So so I think, you know, we can say, oh, well, how wonderful. You know, I'm going to, no.

Paul: [00:31:38] No no, but let me agree with you inasmuch as I was making a statement, I think about like a sort of happy outcome. But, you know, if we just go back to my particular example, I don't think it was Greta was told to be like that by her parents, I believe she told her mother, who was flying internationally as an opera singer, that she had to stop flying. It came more from the child. I was evoking the possibility. But you're absolutely right to say you can't have a child and then expect to put them in some kind of climate change army that's never going to work.

Christiana: [00:32:07] Yeah. I mean, not even into a social justice or. 

Tom: [00:32:11] Correct, yeah.

Paul: [00:32:11] No, but it's a point well made.

Christiana: [00:32:12] Any other kind of straight jacket. So, but as I say, hopefully these children grow up, you know, in the ideal of all cases, with a deep awareness of the fact that they do have the possibility if they choose to contribute to a better world. And and we're going to need more and more of those right, if if there is something that ought to change from my generation to my daughters, and I think that has changed and has to change exponentially for my daughter's generation to their children's generation, is the number of people who decide on their own to devote their lives to creating a better world. Because I am truly grateful that there are so many out there. But we need many more. We need many, many more. And the fact is, we have more tools. We have more technology. So there we should, you know, hopefully get many more who decide that. In addition to that, I also wanted to be a little bit egotistical about this, about why, to have children. I didn't know this before I had children, but honestly, the richness of the experience of being a parent is unequalled in anything else, certainly in my life. So my number one joy beyond anything else, including my work on climate change, including the fact that this wonderful world adopted the Paris Agreement, is being the mother of these two daughters, and they have given me the opportunity to experience unconditional love. Had they not been born, had they not been my daughters, I would never know what unconditional love is. And for a human being to experience on a daily basis unconditional love.

Tom: [00:34:17] Transformative.

Christiana: [00:34:18] Is transformative. And especially especially, I would say, if you're able to take that unconditional love that is not always there, because I did not have it from my parents. But if you can build that core seed, that core of unconditional love between a parent or two parents or three parents and a child or several children, and then expand the boundary of that and include every day more and more people and other living beings into that circle of unconditional love. I actually think that we might have one of the most important factors to deal with climate change, biodiversity, and certainly social injustice. If we could all turn up in life with unconditional love being the force with which we turn up, we would have a different world. 

Tom: [00:35:24] Beautiful.

Paul: [00:35:25] Undoubtedly a better one. And that's a very inspiring image. And by the way, as somebody without children, when I see a little bit of that unconditional love in a park or, you know, wherever or friends or family, it is the most delightful thing. And so, although I've not had that direct experience with a, with a child, I do kind of with envy to some degree understand the intensity of what you say. Just a, just a little quote from a listener. Jesper Dalgaard in Denmark said, you know, we've got three kids and friends of ours think it's a bit weird because we're outspoken about living a sustainable life, but actually, alongside overpopulation says, as far as I can tell, it's not overpopulation, shall we say, alone. But it's also, you know, levels of education and particularly lower levels of consuming products. So I just want to throw that into the mix as you know, part of this, that it's not just about having children in isolation, it's about it's about a broader range of issues and you add them up.

Tom: [00:36:18] Well, that's right. And I mean to build on that and your beautiful description there Christiana, thank you for that, is we are in a post Paris Agreement world. We have an implementation gap of course, people aren't doing what they said they'd do. But in a world where countries have committed to solving this problem in an agreed time frame, then that pathway is baked in. An individual child will not change that overall trajectory, if you see what I mean. If you're trying to make the case for having a child, and you're looking at the impact that child will have as one of the metrics alongside the world they're going to live in, we are on a pathway to net zero. We have a global agreement to solve the challenge. We're not fully implementing it properly. I agree, I agree, but actually the systemic the reason I made that case is the focus on the individual was a deliberate strategy of the oil and gas industry in the 1980s and 90s, and this will be solved by systemic collective action to deal with issues at the level of the economy, of global governance and of systemic intervention. It won't be solved collectively by the people who care about climate change having no kids. Actually, that will not theoretically. I mean, just I'm playing this argument out, actually solve the problem. We should focus on solutions that take into their ultimate extreme will solve the problem, and that is global government engagement. Getting lobbying out of politics, dealing with the systemic issues that will actually get us to the solutions so.

Paul: [00:37:41] Getting the right lobbying into politics.

Tom: [00:37:42] Yeah, exactly. So rather than focusing on this, we should focus on the things that will actually deliver the outcome. Do you see what I mean. Yeah.

Christiana: [00:37:48] Yes. And I don't agree okay.

Tom: [00:37:50] Okay. Go for it. Yeah.

Christiana: [00:37:50] Because I think quite unusual for you, Tom, that you're thinking in binary terms.

Tom: [00:37:57] Right.

Christiana: [00:37:57] And that is very unusual for you. I would agree with you that you either have a child or you don't. But what you have said, what you have just set out is assuming that there is that there is a binary path toward addressing climate change. It's either systemic or it's individual. I think you and I will immediately agree that it's both.

Tom: [00:38:20] Of course. 

Christiana: [00:38:21] It is both. And so we do need the system to change, but we also need and we have discussed this at nauseam and on this podcast, we also need individuals to take responsibility and change their habits and their behaviours. And this series includes some of those behaviours right. What what are we going to eat? Are we going to fly? What are we going to do about heating and cooling our homes.

Paul: [00:38:45] Our Jobs. 

Christiana: [00:38:45] Our jobs. Et cetera. Et cetera. So all of that is also important. How we vote, how you know, where we put for those of us who are who are privileged enough to have savings, where are those savings? Et cetera. So it is both. It is both. And honestly, every child who grows up and let's say, you know, children being born now in 2024, and grow up and decide that they want to work on one of the limitless possibilities that there are to ameliorate climate change. Well, welcome to the tent. 

Tom: [00:39:31] Yeah, for sure. Okay, so this I mean, thank you for that. I think this is a really interesting, I mean, we've gone around both of these different elements. There's no clear answer to this, right. So everyone has to, like, dwell with it and grapple with it. But I wonder whether.

Paul: [00:39:42] There is one clear answer, unconditional love. You called it egotistical, but isn't it just a statement of an observed fact that changed the universe for you.

Tom: [00:39:50] Nice.

Christiana: [00:39:51] Absolutely.

Tom: [00:39:53] Yeah, but I wonder if we should spend a few minutes on one of the other questions that is often asked of me, and I'm sure of both of you as well. Which is, if you do have children.

Christiana: [00:40:02] How do you talk to them?

Tom: [00:40:03] How do you talk to them? Right.

Christiana: [00:40:05] Well, I think you should take the lead on that one because you wrote a children's book.

Tom: [00:40:09] I did, that's true. Although it wasn't about this. It was about how we were going to remake the world after Covid, which didn't turn out quite the way I anticipated at the time.

Paul: [00:40:18] Exactly the same, I think last time I looked.

Tom: [00:40:22] So I think there are, again, I don't think there's necessarily a right and wrong way to do this, but I remember talking with my wife when my kids were really young and discussing how we were going to address climate change, and deciding that we didn't want to keep it back for a big reveal when they got older. So they kind of you have to sit them down when they're like 8 or 9 and say, listen, there's this serious thing that we've concealed from you. And it's, the fact, and it's going to it's going to affect your life. So rather than doing that, it was always around. So of course I was working on it. We'd always talk about it, but we would talk about it in a context of this is the greatest generational opportunity to have an impact on the future of the world, and I am deeply privileged to be sitting close to the heart of where you can actually make a big difference. And I'll work to be in that heart, because I see this as as a major part of my life's work. So they have always seen climate as an opportunity to change the world for the better. And we've talked about it in those terms. Now that they're getting a little bit older, you know, my son in particular will ask questions.

Tom: [00:41:25] They'll say, well, what will happen if we don't deal with the things that you're talking about? And I think there you need to be careful because you can't mislead them, and so you have to be honest about things that are painful, like inequality, like biodiversity loss, like other things they're going to experience. But I do think that you have to frame it always within the context of we're facing a great challenge, and humanity is being called to step up in a way that it's never stepped up before. And you are lucky because you are born now and you get the opportunity to live the most meaningful of lives because you're going to live through these critical years. So you need to do that in a manner that is empowering but has that edge of reality to it, right. You can't you can't conceal that. It does have an edge to it. And they're fascinated by that edge. And I'm sure at times they're worried about it, but I think honesty is the only way that you can address that. But honesty combined with that sense of determination and possibility and that they're not living in a situation that is beyond our ability to make a difference for them. So agency is the other part of it.

Christiana: [00:42:35] Paul?

Paul: [00:42:38] I have a very someone I really admire in energy efficiency told me that their 4 or 5 year old said to them that they had a dream. I think about like, you know what, if the earth stops looking after us, you know, this is a child that's very aware of climate change. You know, actually, climate change isn't very complicated. You know, kids understand it, you know, burn less coal, oil and gas, don't cut down trees, the end, you know, you don't have to be more than about five years old to understand that. And, I think that the one thing I'm going to take issue with is that we never have to stand up like we've never stood up before. Tom Steyer, we were, we were commenting on a little anecdote about his work on climate change, particular thing he did, doesn't matter. And comparing that to World War II, and, you know, the sacrifices made by American troops. And he immediately corrected us. He said, nothing any of us are doing is like that. So actually humans have before had to defend democracy from fascism and the nightmare of Hitler or something have given their lives, you know, in their youth, 20 year olds have run into machine guns, you know, Saving Private Ryan and all the rest of it. So it's not like this is a cakewalk and easy for children. But actually, we've had a lot of terrible things in the past as well. Would you not tell your children about, you know, the terrible bomb at Hiroshima or World War II or the Holocaust. You know, what are you denying your children. And this is another one of those tough things. I'm not making it trivial, but I'm just saying it's in a family of tough things that kids learn about as they get older.

Christiana: [00:44:06] So I agree with both of you, and I would like to add an additional level to that, because both of you have referred to the external world that our children will be stepping into or will be faced with, and, and I agree with that diagnosis. And for me, it's very dangerous to allow children to step into that external world without having previously or at the same time encouraged, although we can't decide it, but encouraged a particular mindset in children. And so in this world where we know that even if we are successful by 2030, of cutting down our emissions by one half, which we don't know if we will be, but even if we are, the fact is that we will still have more climate change impacts around the world than we do right now. More and deeper and wider spread. So, so we need to prepare children for that kind of a world and the encouragement of a mindset that is ready for that, I think takes at least three factors. One is, and Tom, you mentioned that one is a sense of agency, which for me goes hand in hand with resilience for children from a very early age to be exposed to the fact that it's not just that this is a changing world, it's that change happens all the time, has always happened, is happening now and will happen all the time. Change is not something that we can resist. Change is always there and we're living in a changing world.

Christiana: [00:46:19] And for children to get used to hanging on to something is unhelpful, because that's not the reality that we ever have. So to embrace change and be able to develop the capacity to adapt to that change, to be resilient, and in so doing, to develop their agency in the face of anything that might come down the pike is very critical. So for me, embracing change and encouraging resilience is number one of mindset. The second one is, and I've already touched on that, is to very overtly make it very clear that love has to be the foundation of how we engage with the world. And sometimes, you know, we adults shy away from that because we think it's, I don't know, too watery or too weak or whatever. I think the contrary. I think it is a courageous and strong, role modelling that we need to have for our children to show them that we believe and we act according to the understanding that love, in its biggest expression and biggest understanding, is the only way that we can engage with the world. And, and that our expectation of ourself is that we don't know what is going to happen. But that we do know, is that we have the capacity and frankly, the responsibility and the opportunity to pick up on Tom's point of being our highest and best self every day. The third thing that I would put in there, and I could probably go through a long list, but these are my top three.

Christiana: [00:48:10] The third thing that I think is fundamental for a mindset encouragement in children is the understanding that we do not go through life in an individualistic manner, that it is about always finding your community, always finding your allies, always finding those who can work with you, always working in unison and collectively with others. We are smarter if we work collectively, we're more efficient, we're faster. So and and I say that because I was trained in a very much of an individualistic track, and I think we have been prizing and valuing individualism way too long, and it is not what is going to get us to where we need to go in the 20th century. So I think we need to make a very, very clear change from that and say it's not just about your individualistic whatever. It's not about competing with everyone else. It's about where do we collaborate, how do we work with each other. So for me, those three are really fundamental. And they start even before we talk to them about the ecosystems that are disappearing or that are that we're destroying, or even before we talk to them about natural disasters. Because if we bring the outside world to them first, they don't have any tools to deal with it, and you don't have to talk to them about climate change to encourage these mindsets. These are mindsets that are broadly applicable to everything in life, including climate change.

Paul: [00:49:44] That's a really interesting perspective that you're actually it's not so much how you talk to your children about climate change, it's about how you talk to your children about life, and then if that.

Christiana: [00:49:54] How you show them.

Paul: [00:49:55] How you show them. Thank you, not talk to.

Tom: [00:49:56] So I love that. Thank you for sharing that, Christiana. That was beautiful. I think we should maybe do another episode at some point where we talk about parenting in general. Because what you're talking about there is less how you talk to kids specifically about this issue, but more, how do you engage in a parenting at a moment of real change. And I think from what you said there, that would actually be a really beautiful and helpful thing to go through. I wonder whether so I actually there's a little thing which I have brought to read, which I read to my children about climate change, and I found it one of the most helpful ways of framing this. So if it's all right, it'll just take a minute or two. I'll read this to you, and then maybe I think we're at the end of the episode. On the mythic day of Armageddon, when the world is destroyed and every sinner stands naked and unsupported in the void to face fate in accordance with his or her deeds. I imagine that the tribunal judging us won't consist of winged angels or horned devils, but will be a black capped chickadee, a lynx and a birch tree. They will know as clearly as you and I do that one predator species has cut down every virgin forest, killed as many plants and animals as he could get away with, spoiled every source of fresh water, and fouled every ocean on the planet.

Tom: [00:51:00] Who can you and I bring forward as our character witnesses. Right now, I'm cultivating friendships with black bears, a woodlot, and a Canadian river. I'm not saving nature. I'm letting nature save me. The redpolls who fly south from the Arctic in winter to eat thistle outside my windows. Our missionaries to the savage that I am. I'm letting them convert me. I offer them food so they will fly and sing on my behalf in a peaceful world. Whether humanity U-turns away from dysplastic growth towards peace or not, I have and you have the option to live the best possible life. This inner peace is already within you, waiting to be opened and cultivating it will make you happier, more resilient and practical, able to face the difficulties of your personal death and human communal confusion head on. It will open you to realizations that exceed the pragmatic. So you will enter the stream of that peace that is always flowing in and around you, engaged in the world most helpfully, you will then become an internal habitude of a place beyond the wind, an abode of peace. So that I found brought together those different elements.

Christiana: [00:52:10] Well, it's very beautiful Tom, thank you for sharing us, sharing that. 

Paul: [00:52:14] Where did it come from?

Christiana: [00:52:14] Yeah, who's that?

Tom: [00:52:15] It's from a guy called Paul Fleischman.

Christiana: [00:52:17] And it really points for me to to the other piece that I thought, okay, too many points, but bringing children up close to nature. There's just nothing like it right. And I've spoken about how I grew up in love with the Golden toad, and it really made a huge difference to me. And, and you don't have to live way out, you know, in nature to bring children into contact with nature. 

Tom: [00:52:43] Yeah, it can happen anywhere.

Christiana: [00:52:44] It can happen anywhere. And and it makes a huge difference as you've just read. So I would add that to my list.

Tom: [00:52:52] I love it. Okay, friends. So that is the end of the mini series we've been running on how to live a good life in a climate crisis, and it's been so wonderful to be here with the two of you in person a couple of days. We, listeners probably aren't necessarily aware of how rare this is for us to be together. And we've had two days.

Christiana: [00:53:08] It has been an example of a good life.

Paul: [00:53:10] Can we join hands?

Tom: [00:53:12] Join hands, how nice, that's very sweet. And thank you to our wonderful production team, some of whom are here with us, who did all the briefing notes and got everything ready, it's been a lot of fun. I think we will, as and when stars align, to put us in the same place again, we should do this again.

Christiana: [00:53:27] Indeed.

Paul: [00:53:27] Sooner the better.

Tom: [00:53:28] Thank you for coming with us on this journey. And listeners, really, this is in response to what you have told us you want. So let us know. Was it helpful? Did we answer your questions? Is there anything else we didn't cover? What would you like to see next? We always love to hear from you, so.

Christiana: [00:53:41] Or maybe. 

Tom: [00:53:42] Yes.

Christiana: [00:53:42] Our listeners are much more confused than where they were when we started this whole exercise.

Paul: [00:53:51] And is that the right outcome?

Christiana: [00:53:52] More confused at an even deeper level, could be possible.

Tom: [00:53:56] The deeper level. That's a new nuance. I normally say a higher level, yeah.

Christiana: [00:53:59] Yeah, I normally say a higher level, but I think this is a deeper level.

Tom: [00:54:02] More confused at a deeper level.

Paul: [00:54:03] Strands of my DNA are becoming confused. So that's what we're looking for. 

Tom: [00:54:06] Yeah, so that's possibly not what we're aiming for. But hopefully I think I do think that actually just dwelling with these issues and trying to work out your own relationship with how you manage them is, is so critical, and it's going to remain critical for all of our lives. 

Christiana: [00:54:18] Continues, the journey continues. 

Tom: [00:54:18] So we need to have compassion for each other, compassion for ourselves as we try and work through these difficult issues. But thank you to everyone. Thank you for you two. Thanks for the production team. Thanks to everyone for coming on this journey and regular programming will resume next week.

Christiana: [00:54:31] Thank you Tom.

Paul: [00:54:32] Thank you Tom, thank you Christiana. Bye. 

Tom: [00:54:34] Thanks so much. Bye. 

Christiana: [00:54:34] Bye.