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Joshua Levitt

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Al Gore Wins the ‘Nobel Peace Prize’ and Defines an Ethical Evolution

By Green Your Network on Fri, 10/12/07 - 12:47pm.

. What's this?

Former Vice President Al Gore and the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize in OSLO on Friday for their extraordinary efforts in the war against global warming.

"I am deeply honored to receive the Nobel Peace Prize," Gore said. "We face a true planetary emergency. The climate crisis is not a political issue, it is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity."

The Nobel Peace Prize is one of humanity’s highest international honors and the recent award recipient speaks volumes about the larger issues facing our collective global community. The evolution of ethics is ongoing, and seldom do we see such a clear example of our world changing with respect to the popular media.

I have blogged on this concept previously but never before has it been more relevant than with today’s announcement.
Ethics, by definition is a code of sorts, dictated by our conscience. These are laws which are defined by morality and society. They do not always require external enforcement because they are self evident.

For example, less than 200 years ago in this country, women were not given the right to vote. Today women's suffrage is considered an uncontroversial right. This change of conscience benefited our society at large. We instantly doubled the mass of mental faculties available for the higher service of humanity. The freedom and ideas of half the population produced a great effect on human development and increased our overall quality of life.

These ideas seem obvious now but looking back, they were not so clear for their time. Who knows, perhaps ethics evolved for the cavemen when they realized “stealing” was wrong, and if they all resisted the urge, their lives would all improve. There are countless examples when you trace back our history as a species things like slavery, equal employment opportunities; or now, pollution to name a few. If you think we are done evolving our ethics, you’d be kidding yourself. Who knows, in another 200 years our ethics could include almost anything you can or can’t fathom.

Just like children (hopefully) mature, we as a species are maturing. We are constantly evolving towards a better quality of life and more efficient use of our planets resources. As the global population continues to grow at an exponential rate it’s critical to learn how to make more efficient use or eliminate entirely the use of non renewable resources, for our own survival. As we become more aware of these sobering realities our ethics evolve. That is precisely what’s happening with the recent green awareness you see all around you. Today’s awarding of the “Nobel Peace Price” to an environmental initiative is perfect proof of where our ethics are headed. Someday soon, you can expect, if you don’t already, to feel badly about polluting. Where-as 100 years ago, people did not think twice about the issue.

The thing to remember is that energy is never created nor destroyed. The same energy exists on this planet as did 4.5 billion years ago when it was created. The difference now is, we have learned how to utilize that energy in a more efficient manner through the use of simple to more complex machines. When we burn something we simply release the “potential” energy from a solid and transfer it to heat and light. That energy simply transformed, but it did not disappear. Think about it, We’ve all heard about the “cycle of life.” when we pass on, our body decomposes and all the energy used to build our carbon forms are released in to the soil and ultimately become the building blocks for other plant and animal life.

Energy efficiency is the key to our species survival on this planet and it transcends any and all national and cultural boundaries on earth. That is why, the popular “Green” movement is such a big deal. Todays prestigious award is a great example of this current ethical evolution under way. This evolution of ethics NEEDS to be adopted by ALL humans for us to survive. Our population is on the rise and our resources are on the decline, do the math!

Watch a video on politics leading up to the recent “Nobel Peace Prize” committee decision: