Separate Climate Steps

Itchy feet. Diane Reardon

I just googled “personal climate change actions” and came up with 332,000,000 results. Three hundred thirty-two million!

Too Many Options. You can see by my Itchy Feet piece, I’ve explored with art how complex it can be to have lots of steps facing you at the same time. This trouble of too many options has been described as Analysis Paralysis. I can feel it, for example, in the shampoo aisle of my local Rite Aid store. You probably can think of other situations where too many options are paralyzing. Climate change choices is a common one.

Comparing Options. Even once you have tools to reduce your choices, there’s the complexity of how different the options are. I’ve always suspected that shampoos aren’t all that different, but climate options vary way pretty widely; comparing recycling plastic to getting an electric car is not simple. Here are a few hints I got from decision-making guru Danny Kahneman and his colleagues.

 His latest book (Noise) looks at what most of us do naturally when we try to compare many widely different options. We focus on the qualities of the options we care about. For shampoo, say, they might be a wish-list of shininess, cruelty free, a peachy scent. For climate actions, you might care about the elements of fun, slowing the warming, use of skills you already have.

 He gives examples of how keeping these elements separate keeps you from paralysis and from being unduly swayed by any one of them. For example, in hiring decisions, companies can reduce noise by having a different teams look at each element of a candidate separately (experience, fit for the company culture, salary range, creativity, independent action) before combining their information in a group meeting. He calls it “decision hygiene”.

Since you have only yourself to please with your climate choices, you can separate the qualities you’re considering, each one in turn. They become the steps you take one at a time, noting each analysis in some sequence that makes sense to you. In this way you’re following Kahneman’s advice of finishing one analysis before moving on to the next. For shampoo, don’t get sidetracked into researching animal testing when what you first want is to save money. If you’re looking for a bargain, don’t get all political at the same time. Separate analyzing electric car ranges from their costs.

Because climate options are changing all the time, it still may not be easy to use your guidelines for shampoos. I have an idea that some logical way to find your first step would help. Stay tuned for the next blogpost about First Steps.

#climatechangechoices

Scroll down to for readers’ comments. To add your thoughts below, type “Comment” and click '“Comment as guest”. No password login needed.

Follow all monthly blogposts with the Subscribe button or your RSS feed. Thanks for using “Share” to your like-minded friends.