The absurdity of putting humanity on trial
by OriginalSoapbox
In global news, a number of Nobel prizewinners gathered in Stockholm to pass judgment on the human race for transgressions against the Earth. While any day I am quite willing to discuss the implications of modern impieties against mother Earth, the format of this prosecution renders it ridiculous. A farce.
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
Judge:
Mario Molina, Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1995
Prosecutor:
Will Steffen, Professor and Director, Climate Change Institute, Australian National University
Defender:
Garry Peterson, Professor, Stockholm Resilience Centre at Stockholm University
Jury:
Werner Arber, Nobel Prize in Medicine 1978
Peter Doherty, Nobel Prize in Medicine 1996
Jim Mirrlees, Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 1996
Carlo Rubbia, Nobel Prize in Physics 1984
Witness:
Paul J. Crutzen, Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1995
Moderator:
Christine Loh, Co-founder and CEO, Civic Exchange, Hong Kong
I’ve never heard of a trial featuring a moderator. She was probably added to balance the otherwise all-male cast. Yet while this probably marks the first time three Nobel laureates have been on a jury together, the trial court itself has no standing. God may judge us, certainly. Nature herself may deliver judgments with all the force of her constant and unbending laws. But there is no way the human race can be indicted in a human court.
Courts and trials presuppose the existence of laws, remedies, and punishments. But law, to have authority, must carry an authority higher than what is being judged by it. Here we have a small number of self-appointed humans judging the entire human race according to their own idea of justice. Even if they were the legitimate and sole representatives of humanity, which they are not, they could not pass judgment on humanity itself for violating a law that cannot be said to be in any sense human. Nor can they prosecute humanity on behalf of the laws of nature. This would be like prosecuting a person in civil court for blasphemous statements as a violation of the law of God. A human court has no standing to adjudicate or prosecute either the law of God or the law of nature.
