Impulsive Thinking and what E-scooters and Wolves Teach us to Cope with it

Martin Bartels

19 May 2023

It is both exciting and instructive to see how a modern society that sees itself as open and agile reacts when material changes make it necessary to adjust the existing social consensus. Yet the path to a new state of equilibrium does not always follow logical rules. Deep-rooted habits of thought and emotional processes can hinder consensus formation especially with the emergence of different camps of opinion that inevitably confront each other with increasing animosity. Both the press and social media tend to exacerbate the polarity by pouring what amounts to jet fuel on the fire of public opinion.

To explore this phenomenon, I have chosen two controversial topics in Germany, the spread of rentable electric scooters in big cities and the return of wolves. In the first case, emotional responses have not won out and solutions are emerging. The second case is more challenging.

E-scooters

Since 2019, there has been a plentiful supply of e-scooters that you can rent via your mobile phone. Young people in particular like to take advantage of the offer and praise the possibility of being able to move around urban areas independently of public transport timetables and traffic jams, without causing emissions.

On the other hand, another segment of the population have taken issue with the e-scooters, as they encroach on the pavement at high speed. Furthermore, e-scooters are in many cases not parked properly, but simply left on the pavement, colonising much pedestrian space and being especially dangerous for elderly and visually impaired pedestrians who can easily trip over the unexpected obstacle. Another problem relates to the way that bikes are both visual and physical pollutants, and in quite a few cases, users of e-scooters have thrown them into bodies of water after use.

On 2 April 2023, the city of Paris held a legally non-binding referendum on whether to renew the licences it has granted to providers of rentable e-scooters. Following a broad majority against e-scooters, the city council agreed to let the licences expire on 31 August. This example has impressed e-scooter opponents in Germany.

However the debate is not over yet. For a rational assessment, we still need to know

• The ecological cost of e-scooters. While they certainly emit less direct emissions, a true reckoning of their environmental cost would need to take into account the impact of their manufacturing including components, battery charging, maintenance, the average lifetime of the means of transport (less than 2 years) and how such devices are disposed of at end of life.

• The direct damages (death, injuries, treatment costs) and consequential damages (loss of working hours, rehabilitation costs) caused by accidents. There are statistical evaluations for this. The age groups of road accident victims (one third is under 25) and the most common causes of accidents (often alcohol) must also be taken into account.

Factual evaluation of e-scooters and decision-making, no yelling

Decisions on issuing licences like in Paris are made by city councils, not by groups of citizens who are hostile to each other. The public administration is held to assess, according to objective criteria, under which conditions a business such as the rental of e-scooters can be operated. For example, a license can be granted so that the city can charge rental companies a flat fee for each incorrectly parked device, fees that these companies can pass on to their customers. Regulation can also involve police imposing spot fines for driving on the pavement or driving while inebriated. Municipalities can thus set effective impulses for civilised behaviour. If such measures are not sufficient, then short of outright banning, there is the possibility of making licences so expensive that the financial incentive for e-scooter rental companies is removed.

The bottom line is that at the technical level, administrations have a good chance of disempowering groups of citizens who are bent on disputes among themselves. They can analyse issues in a balanced way and establish a common denominator. And they can change their decisions later when relevant or new aspects to an issue are discovered. In this case, resistance to administrative decisions will not be massive because the group of enthusiastic e-scooter riders is manageable and has not mobilised a strong lobby politically.

Wolves returning

Wolves were a part of Europe’s natural landscapes until the 19^th century when industrialisation, agricultural innovations and increases in population led to the consensus that wolves were a disturbance. In 1879, a forester in the Hunsrück region killed the last wolf living in Germany.

Since the end of the Cold War, there has been a growing migration of wolves from the east of the continent, beginning with loners and eventually packs. As of 28 November 2022, 161 packs, 43 pairs and 21 individuals were officially reported in the country. This does not include the number of pups. There will also be a number of unreported cases. The population is growing rapidly.

Much yelling

Debates on the topic of "wolves" in personal circles and in public heat up quickly. They can be amazingly upsetting. Usually they follow this pattern

The unfortunate thing is that after such debate heats up, it can be difficult to simmer things back down again. Confirmation bias, the tendency to only seek out information that backs up pre-existing beliefs, rules supreme and quarrels become ever more bitter. Rising adrenaline levels on all sides are the worst preconditions for finding reasonable solutions with the media, fuelled by controversy, encouraging the argument.

Who are the stakeholders

(a) The “pro-camp”

• There are dedicated nature conservationists who are firmly committed to the restoration of what they see as the natural state of things. Their basic premise is that humans must learn to live together with wolves in a harmonious way. They are professionally organised in the “Nature Conservation Union” .
• There are many people who react enthusiastically and romantically to the return of wolves to Western Europe. This emotional and sentimental association of modern Europeans with wolves may be a re-emerging remnant from vanished Indo-European shamanistic imaginaries. They celebrate 13 August as the “International Wolf Day”. Perhaps Sergei Prokofiev contributed a little to creating the image of the placid relationship between humans and wolves.

(b) The “anti-camp”

• Shepherds are the most affected stakeholders, because wolves have a preference for sheep. As a rule, wolves do not kill only one animal to consume the meat, thus Shepherds typically find a large number of dead or dying animals in the morning after the wolves have lived out a bloodlust. Low-income shepherds are urged to protect their flocks with tall electric fences and trained livestock guardian dogs or Kangal dogs. These are expensive. Compensation paid by the state for animals killed does not cover the damage because the surviving animals are persistently traumatised. The recommended protective measures are heavy financial burdens for them and may be unaffordable. Shepherds may also become mentally affected by attacks on their sheep and end up giving up their flocks. 
• Horse and pony holders: There have been attacks by wolves on horses in the pasture or when riding out with the rider. A wolf killed a pony belonging to the President of the EU Commission, Ursula von der Leyen.
• Cattle farmers
• Dog owners
• Cyclists: Recently, three wolves chased a young woman who was on her way to work on her e-bike. She was able to escape danger with the help of the turbo gear.
• Even though there has not yet been an attack, it’s hard to reason with parents whose children have to be calmed down when their children encounter a wolf on the way to school. Parents do not accept arguments like "low probability" when a wolf appears in front of a primary school. There is a correlation between wolf attacks and rabies.
• The search for wolf attacks on e-scooter drivers was unsuccessful, even though the first wolves have been seen in suburbs. However, there are e-scooters that have included the term "wolf" in their brand name. May they all travel safely!

(c) The public sector: European Union, federation, federal states, judiciary

• The European "Habitats Directive" is the basis for the legislation of the member states. The Federal State in its capacity as legislator has adopted the concept of wolves as a healthy part of nature and placed the wolf under conservation at the national level . This means that wolves may only be shot in extremely exceptional cases. The state ensures enforcement through hunting authorities and forestry authorities. Unauthorised shooting results in criminal prosecution and the rules are strictly applied.

Towards a more comprehensive set of facts

In the middle of the 19th century, the privilege of the aristocracy to hunt in the forests ended. At the same time, state-controlled management of the forests without wolves began. It had and still has the goal of preserving the total area of the forests and maintaining them while satisfying the needs of the timber and agricultural industries. The exception are smaller national parks that correspond to the landscapes before nature was cultivated.

The state administration and hunters, on instruction of the authorities, have successfully developed a managed minimally invasive ecosystem which is sometimes designated as a "cultural landscape". Hunters are only allowed to operate during set seasons, and they may only shoot with prior permission of the local hunting authority. They are a reliable pillar of landscape management.

Wolves are predators and their dispositions have not changed since the last time they inhabited western Europe. Attacks on humans are not likely, but not entirely out of the question. There is careful French documentation of human casualties in the past centuries. And there is a global list of reported incidents extending to the present time.  

The incidents mentioned above do not meet the requirements of comprehensive statistics. We have to qualify them as not more than "anecdotal evidence". However, when it comes to issues of safety, especially for humans, such incidents cannot be dismissed as irrelevant.

Nonetheless it is fair to conclude that a freely reproducing wolf population is:

• an interference with the hitherto well-performing management of “cultural landscapes”.
• a risk factor for humans and their animals.

Looking ahead

The serious question we need to address is whether wolves make a valuable contribution to maintaining the ecological balance in the “cultural landscapes” where deer and other ungulates would otherwise destroy forests through overgrazing. Included in this question is the hypothesis that hunting authorities, which have been responsible for managing ecosystems for more than 150 years and issue shooting permits to hunters and foresters according to their observations and calculations based on experience, contribute less to the environment and society than wolves.

Hypotheses can be confirmed or refuted by facts. If they cannot be supported by facts, then we should look towards the potential outcomes we can ascertain and whether the risk is worth it. The political options available, from taking no action to reducing the number of wolves or to eliminating the population thus should be weighed up as to what we believe would cause the least damage.

There are signs that some German federal states have begun to study facts and conduct deeper empirical research. They may decide to facilitate the shooting of wolves identified as dangerous by means of ordinances. This would mean a soft intervention. The federal state of Bavaria has recently decided to go this route.

A sudden and most unfortunate impulse to action would be felt by all European states if there were a fatal wolf attack on a human. Think of the poor 26-year-old jogger who was horribly killed by a bear in Trentino-Alto Adige a few weeks ago. The bears had been introduced to the area about 20 years ago with the aim of strengthening biodiversity.

So how does this all relate to e-scooters? We could say that e-scooters and wolves are both invasive species. The impulse to simply welcome them is as understandable as it is hasty. The two issues allow us to reflect on how much damage society must suffer before a serious decision-making process is set in motion. However, reason has a hard time making its way through powerful collective feelings.

The public sector is bound to the common good. Feelings are to be taken into account, but these must not override the necessity to protect the citizens’ health and lives. E-scooters pose a manageable threat. But the public sector will need to carefully review its current pro-wolf legislation in light of aggregated and ascertained data.

Authorship disclosure:

Fully human generated

To set the stage

“There is nothing in the world more soft and weak than water, and yet for attacking things that are firm and strong there is nothing that can take precedence of it.”

Lao Tzu’s words sum up a dramatic contemporary scenario: While in some parts of the world people are increasingly affected by water scarcity, others face the growing threat of too much water due to extremely heavy rainfall and rising sea levels.

While the poem captures the ambivalence of water perfectly, the words "soft and weak" also seem to describe the way modern civilisations have responded to it. Their foggy perception and sluggish action is just as dangerous as the threats themselves.

Why Water?

The focus of this essay is to use the prominent example of water to help identify concrete approaches for dealing rationally with the issue of climate change. Climate change affects us in many ways, including the expansion of deserts, forest fires, the salinisation of soils, landslides, extreme weather events, agricultural crop losses, loss of biodiversity, spread of disease and human and wildlife migration.

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Scientists and engineers have laid the foundations for our prosperity. And only these elites can show us the way to overcome the harmful externalities of these very engines of our wealth. This article supports the thesis that we are technologically and organisationally in a position to successfully meet these challenges, step by step.

One obstacle to the mobilisation of existing resources lies in the fact that the general public has only a vague understanding of the issue. They do not realise that, unless we make controlled sacrifices, nature will impose uncontrollable sacrifices on us.

We urgently need to overcome the human tendency to trivialise and understand with our minds and hearts what will happen if we do not listen to the guidance of our scientists and engineers. However, while these experts hold the keys to the right strategies, they are only trained to communicate with other scientists. This leads to a situation of misunderstanding and therefore a lack of adequate action.

Blurred perception of facts

Every day, we are all exposed to an overdose of reports about minor and major disasters in all forms of media. We more or less defend ourselves against this by ignoring some news, i.e. reducing the strain on our nerves by filtering information. It is human nature to rely on the mostly correct assumption that unpleasant developments will eventually end and change for the better. In the case of climate change, however, looking away and hoping things resolve themselves doesn’t appear to be a winning strategy.

A wealth of scientific analyses on climate change is available to everyone, but these are mostly comprehensible only for other scientists.

We should openly acknowledge that most people in the northern hemisphere have a sense of empathy for people "in the south" who are plagued by overpowering rains, flooded lowlands, islands disappearing into the water, eroding coastlines or droughts. However, the geographical distance and lack of awareness of the frequency of such disasters dilute solidarity. Collective psychological repression can set in quickly.

Most people in the northern hemisphere do not consider an increase in average temperatures of a few degrees to be alarming. Many even express relief that the winter is often milder than in the past. Loud protests by campaigners are experienced and understood by most citizens as a disturbance or perhaps exaggerated fearmongering.

At the level of policy, scientifically informed decision-makers attend international conferences on climate change, where they negotiate with other decision-makers on action plans that have no teeth but are presented as hard-won progress. And they are increasingly supporting “green” sectors of the economy. However, they are often reluctant to share the full extent of their knowledge about the problem because they do not want to jeopardise their recognition by “rocking the boat”.

The factual impact level is decisive for citizens

There is controversy about the interplay of causes of climate warming (industrial emissions, volcanic activity, ocean currents, etc.). We don't want to debate that here. What is more relevant are the changes in global average temperatures and their trends, as determined by scientific methods.

• Uniqueness: The most important fact is that a warming of 1.5%, 2% or even more is highly unusual in geological terms. If we are looking for a comparable global warming of this magnitude, we have to go back to the Pliocene: "Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum". This period was 5.3 to 1.8 million years before our era. The causes back then were different and the temperature rise did not occur at the same speed as today. A comparison with the more imaginable “Medieval Warm Period” in the years from 750 to 1350 CE may appear plausible at first sight. However, this consideration cannot reassure us, because the temperatures were lower than today, and it was not a global phenomenon.
  
  
• Causality: Increasing global warming is causing glaciers and polar ice sheets to melt. At the same time, the increased temperatures in the oceans are causing the mass of water to expand. The combination of both factors has an impact on islands and the coastlines of the continents. These include the rising of sea levels and temporary or long lasting floods inland. The number of extreme rainfall events inland with destructive power has increased significantly in recent decades, with regional differences. East Asia is most affected. An additional knock-on effect results from the release of the greenhouse gas methane, much of which has been previously locked up in frozen land and is now being released as it thaws.
  
  
• Dimension: The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (“IPCC”) has concluded  that there has been a 1% increase of average temperatures since preindustrial times until 2017. The IPCC projects another 0.5% increase over the next 20 years. This assumes what is not certain, namely that greenhouse gas emissions will be reduced immediately, quickly and on a large scale. However, the latest "sclerosponge thermometry" research results suggest that the rise in average temperature is 0.5°C higher than the IPCC consensus. This means that by the end of this decade, almost 20 years earlier than expected, global warming could already be 2°C above pre-industrial levels. . In the following, however, we continue to refer to the lower IPCC estimates. According to IPCC calculations, it is to be expected that water levels will rise between 0.65 and 1.1 metres by the year 2100. Other models project between 1 and 3 metres by the year 2100. Not all coastal areas will be exposed in the same way. Ocean currents, tidal range and the topography of the coastal areas will make major differences. Through simulations, readers are given a vivid idea of how water will change our living conditions. It is important to note that the northern hemisphere does not enjoy a privilege, meaning that torrential rain, flooding and storm surges are increasing and will continue to do so there too. It should be noted that sea level rises of up to 30 metres are not unusual in geological history.
  
  
• Other causes:
  There have been dramatic rises in sea levels in history that were linked to the melting of ice at the end of an ice age, i.e. not to the CO2 content of the atmosphere. At the end of the last ice age, around 10,000 years ago, there was a rise of up to 120 metres, albeit through a slower process than the change caused by climate gases today. The result was a significant retreat of coastlines.

Instantaneous interruption or reversal of a climatic process?

Changes to the climate are not new in human history, and certain events have triggered reductions in temperature. A striking example of a break in climatic developments is the eruption of an Icelandic volcano in the year 536 CE, whose dust made the atmosphere in the northern hemisphere so opaque to sunlight over a period of more than 20 years that temperatures fell drastically ("Little Ice Age"). 

Recently, it has been hypothesised that ice ages were triggered by asteroids.

It may be tempting to pin our hopes on the possibility of such events helping us to mitigate climate change, but while we cannot rule them out, events of this kind are rare and unpredictable, we must not include them in projections. It would be absurd to hope for random external causes that could interrupt or stop the progress of global warming. While hope is a human propensity, it is not suitable for contingency planning.

Our real bottleneck

What is preventing us from taking appropriate action to minimise and reverse the rise in average temperatures?

Citizen perception of the nature and dimension of the threat is inevitably blurred, because the daily reports from the media are mostly unstructured and not comprehensible to non-scientists. The reports do not allow us to recognise the essentials.

Citizens need an overview that is communicated in an honest, understandable and clearly structured way. Only when citizens have realised the nature and scale of the problem will decision-makers have the courage to take action with determination. In essence, it is about legitimising protection strategies that are considered unpopular today.

Given that citizens do not have access to graspable knowledge, we have a transformation problem. And this can be overcome if science presents the overall scenario from a certain distance. Figuratively speaking: It is not about describing every pixel point of an image, but about showing the image as a whole. The holistic representation deviates from the usual approach of scientists, because each of them is professionally held to focus on "pixel points" in their respective area of specialisation. This is the only way science makes progress, but that's not what is needed here.

The contours of the hologram can be communicated in an understandable way using e.g. the key points mentioned above:

1. uniqueness: there has never been a rise in atmospheric temperatures as fast as now
2. causality: the most important trigger is industrial emissions
3. dimension: a rise in atmospheric temperatures of 1.5 or 2° Celsius or more above pre-industrialisation levels will massively weaken our civilisations
4. other causes: additional factors can further exacerbate the process

If the effect of a detail is not legible, the presentation of the measurement can be improved. In particular, the exponential impact of very small changes in average temperatures in the atmosphere goes very much against human intuition. We can compensate for this disadvantage in perspective: Instead of referring to changes in temperature in degrees Celsius, we should consistently communicate changes in basis points, i.e. in hundredths of a degree Celsius. For example, labelling a temperature rise as "32 basis points" would be correct and would make the difference easier to comprehend than "0.32 °C". This method is a common practice in the financial industry. There, too, this method of representation is helpful in raising awareness that a small change can have massive implications.

Comparing our planet with human bodies helps us to comprehend the effect of changes in temperature: If your body temperature rises by 1° Celsius, you have a fever and are not feeling well. If the temperature rises by 1.5 or even 2° Celsius, you are very ill and hardly able to work. It is similar with our planet: If it experiences increases in average temperatures of this magnitude, it shows the symptoms of a "serious illness". However, this "fever" does not go away after a few days.Truthful and comprehensible holographic description will work like a call to action as sensible citizens will refuse to accept the idea that their lives, that of their children or that of their grandchildren, will be exposed to significant and unparalleled danger.

Here is a simple example of a call to action: It is true that the onset of toothache does not necessarily trigger a reaction in us straight away. We are perhaps still hoping that it will go away on its own. But at some point we turn to the dentist for help. We may later find the dentist's bill stressful, but the relief of finding a solution to the problem outweighs this. It is necessary that we anticipate, that we sense the expected greater pain, in order to take the initiative.

Governments will only act vigorously when informed citizens demand it vigorously. There has been pressure from sections of the population for a long time, but its direction has always been vague and therefore not sufficiently effective.

And like a dentist, a government cannot act for free, but will send bills to taxpayers. The later the comprehensive strategy is implemented, the higher the bill.

Defensive and offensive measures

The necessary government action plans are not the subject of this article. It should only be mentioned that defensive measures are necessary first, e.g., improved meteorological warning systems, raising and strengthening of dams and dykes on the sea coast and rivers, preparation for the abandonment of non-defensible areas. In addition, measures are needed to halt the dangerous trend and then slowly reverse it. These essentially consist of avoiding emissions and removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere.

Desperate measures?

The keyword for desperate actions is "geoengineering". This could imply approaches such as making either the atmosphere or our oceans absorb less sunlight or bind more CO2. While these approaches sound exciting, they are not fully developed and run the risk of causing irreversible damage. As such it is unlikely they will be used.

Sabotage of the communication of scientific work

There are two groups working against open and fair communication between science and the citizens.

Refuseniks who are not interested in facts work against this. They are used to believing their own feelings and those of their friends from social networks. There should be no discussion with them, because deviations from their assumptions act as fuel for them. Science will not lead them out of their dream worlds.

Then there are the sceptics, who may have expert knowledge but only select those parts of it for their thinking and communication that seem to support their rejection of action. This is a dangerous species, because “expert” sceptics can claim some credibility and can disrupt societal communication successfully. The only way to weaken these people is to persistently ask them for better and well-founded alternatives. Then they have to provide verifiable answers or quietly hoist the white flag.

Acknowledgements:
My heartfelt thanks go to Professor Reinhard Gast. As a practising geologist and experienced researcher, he has helped me to grasp the exponential impact of seemingly minimal changes in the temperature of our atmosphere, similar to our own bodies, and the uniqueness of the current situation.

Authorship disclosure:
Fully human generated