The word hacking comes from the world of computers, which are as different from the natural world and the planetary system as a robot differs from a human being. A “hack”, performed on a program, can be a clever, elegant innovation, or a clumsy, kludgy workaround. Hacks are quick fix. The idea is to avoid the fundamental rethink involved when creating something from scratch. There is a definite aura of fun around many uses of the word. To get a good idea of the culture that created this usage of the word, read “The Hackers Dictionary”.
The idea that performing an emergency planet scale experiment because the consequences of climate change have become so unbearable that people have become ready to try anything as a quick fix, such as an inherently untestable until first use at full scale scheme such as any that these “geoengineers” have come up with should be cheerfully called “planet hacking”, as if there was an element of fun to it, offended me repeatedly, as the word was shoved in my face throughout the book.
Was this book actually written with no discussion of ocean acidification? I am about half way through, and I can’t believe it. What, the scientists studying geoengineering don’t talk about it?
