Description
Global climate change is arguably the biggest crisis we face today, yet it is also a problem of such magnitude and complexity that it is difficult to grasp and process emotionally. One way in which both the public and the academic literature have made sense of the climate crisis is by comparing it to another existential threat: all-out nuclear war. Both scenarios are not only framed as the end of civilization as we know it, but also as entirely human-made disasters that could easily be avoided if common sense prevailed. Given the prominence of the comparison, this paper explores two interrelated questions: How is the comparison analytically helpful (or not) for making sense of the climate crisis? And what does the comparison reveal about how people deal with global climate change emotionally? By drawing on insights from existentialist philosophy, this paper finds that conceptualizing global climate change as akin to nuclear holocaust paradoxically obscures the existential threat emanating from global climate change, because it misrepresents both the nature of the consequences for the planet and the complexity of moral choices required for averting them. While the comparison thus assuages people’s anxieties, it ultimately inhibits state action.
