According to Krakoff, Why Do the Temporal and Spatial Dispersion

question 165

Multiple Choice

According to Krakoff, why do the temporal and spatial dispersion of the effects of carbon dioxide make climate change an especially difficult challenge?

• A) Because they lead to a situation in which each generation in each country has a self-interested reason to continue emitting carbon dioxide, although those emissions will harm other countries and future generations.
• B) Because they force us to make choices about climate change without complete certainty about what the effects of our emissions will be and who will suffer from those emissions.
• C) Because they cancel each other out from the perspective of self-interested countries, with the temporal lag giving each country a reason to stop emitting carbon dioxide but the spatial dispersion giving each country a reason to continue emitting.
• D) Because they provide us with an excuse to claim that we are not really causing climate change, thereby undermining the motivation to respond to it.

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Definitions:

Chemiosmosis

The movement of ions across a semipermeable membrane, down their concentration gradient, which is used to generate ATP in cells.

Membrane

A selective barrier that encloses the cell or organelles within a cell, controlling the movement of substances in and out.

Mitochondria

Organelles responsible for generating most of the cell's supply of adenosine triphosphate (ATP), playing a key role in energy metabolism.

Gradient Formation

The process by which a concentration gradient of a particular molecule or ion is established, often across a biological membrane.