I Wish We Could Ignore the Tech Mogul on the Environmental Emergency. But His Wealth Matters, So We Must Listen.

LWe must start with the core issue: The Microsoft founder denies political realities. Though he came to it late, he now acknowledges climate change facts. But he lives in flat, embarrassing denial about the realities of power. His recent article on climate, shared days ago, discusses the topic as though politics didn't matter. He writes as if there were no such thing as political power, and as if extreme wealth didn't exist.

Central Claim

His key position states that money is insufficient, so the representatives at the environmental conference in Brazil should shift funding from "immediate carbon reduction objectives" towards climate "adaptation" and allocating funds for economic hardship and illness.

Certainly, money for worthy projects is limited, but that's not because of some natural law, an unchangeable fact of civilization. This results from wealthy interests attacking on benign state spending, causing the dismantling of aid agencies and substantial decreases in support money of other countries. Financial restraint stems from policy choices. The selection to enforce it originates with governments bowing to the wishes of extremely wealthy individuals.

Available Resources

There are truckloads of money available. Soon after the billionaire released his essay, research showed that the total wealth of America's wealthiest ten individuals increased by nearly $700 billion over the last year. That money alone, the growth in ten individuals' fortunes, is approximately ten times the money needed each year to stop deep deprivation worldwide. What methods enabled such concentration of economic resources into private hands? And why can't we get it back through proper tax policies? The explanation involves their transformation of economic power into political power. With growing fortunes, the greater their ability to influence political and economic frameworks to their will, guaranteeing continued wealth accumulation. But Bill Gates says nothing in his essay about methods and sources for additional funds for both environmental measures and economic assistance could be identified.

'His writing appears primarily as reconciliation with Donald Trump.' Gates photographed with the former president for industry figures in Washington.

Rich-Poor Dynamic

A clear connection exists between the deprivation Gates says concerns him and the fortunes he ignores. In the US, housing insecurity is achieving unprecedented levels, and so is the share of assets owned by the top 0.1%. While this might not be Gates's own business model, by keeping pay low, racking up rents, undermining worker collectives and achieving lower taxes and diminished public funding, billionaires prosper while others experience hardship.

Investigation Conclusions

A significant investigation in academic political journals, among the very few to have penetrated this secretive world, found that extremely wealthy individuals hold vastly distinct political perspectives from the general population. The rich participants surveyed, completely unlike ordinary citizens, viewed government debt as paramount of the issues it listed, and climate breakdown as the least. They were much more inclined to demand that social welfare programs and national health services should be decreased, and far less likely to believe that the unemployed should have a "decent standard of living", or that there should be stricter rules for petroleum corporations, banking entities and medical coverage companies. They were fiercely opposed to redistribution.

Political Influence

So whose views prevail? The small elite or the vast population? Although the research occurred during the Obama administration, it found that extremely wealthy individuals enjoyed greater political access than ordinary people. What about currently? I scarcely think I need to spell it out.

Missing Elements and Presumptions

Here's another crucial exclusion from the billionaire's article: at no point in its 5,000 words does it mention Donald Trump. Should the billionaire address this, he'd have to acknowledge that the second of his major assumptions is shaky: lower prices for sustainable technology inevitably produces environmental improvement. Of course it helps that wind, solar and other green technologies are becoming radically cheaper than traditional energy sources. But Trump and similar demagogues are taking all possible actions to block the shift.

In part due to these factors, traditional energy sources stay very profitable. This might explain, even though Gates states his organization sold all direct fossil fuel investments in 2019, its fossil fuel stock and bond holdings have, actually grown.

Psychological Factors

To Gates, overthrowing the power of the ultra-wealthy may be unthinkable. It's not merely incompatible with his outlook. I mean that, judging by his remarkable silences on the issue, he might be literally incapable of thinking about it. This might indicate "wealth-induced cognitive distortion": a fundamental failure to comprehend alternative viewpoints. While the ultra-rich are notoriously hard to study, inferring from investigations about money's effect on mental processes could suggest that obtaining enormous fortunes compares to cognitive damage. Wealth seems to scramble certain cognitive functions, notably those concerning understanding and outlook.

Political Calculations

However, strategic thinking might also be involved: his writing appears primarily as reconciliation with the former president. Trump certainly took it that way: "I (WE!) just won the War on the Climate Change Hoax. Bill Gates has finally admitted that he was completely WRONG on the issue. This required bravery, and we appreciate it. MAGA!!!"

Historical Context

Gates has always been completely WRONG on climate matters, although not for Trump's stated reasons. He has repeatedly been behind current understanding, reciting fossil fuel claims (clean technology could decrease pollution only through enormous spending) well after their refutation. He has disseminated uncertainty and false information, including the unsupported claim in his recent writing that the objective of Sri Lanka's catastrophic restriction on synthetic fertilisers was "to cut emissions".

Further Difficult Realities

Gates names his article Three Challenging Environmental Facts. So here's another tough truth he studiously ignores. If, as currently expected, essential environmental mechanisms pass turning points and quickly deteriorate, the impact on humanity, not to mention the existence of other species (a topic he fails, as usual, to mention), would ruin the consistent development he anticipates. Given that climate alteration may not happen incrementally and steadily, but through rapid shifts, the potential effects on human welfare are very difficult to forecast. His argument that we should align all funding to current "data-based analysis" of improvements in human welfare, even if it seems logical, introduces in the face of systemic change a profound irrationality, {prompting us to ignore the greatest