曾經婉拒布希政府要求對呼籲削減溫室氣體排放息聲的美國科學家韓森（James Hansen）博士，21日獲頒2006年愛丁堡公爵保育勳章，此獎是由全球保育組織世界自然基金會（WWF）每年頒給對環境有傑出貢獻之人士。
美國太空總署哥大德太空研究院院長韓森博士在倫敦聖詹姆士皇宮接受愛丁堡公爵所頒發的獎章。韓森博士在今年一月表示，自從他在一次演講中呼籲應儘速減少造成全球暖化之溫室效應氣體的排放，布希當局曾經試圖禁止他發表言論。
美國太空總署的官員命令公共事務人員檢視他將要舉行的演講、論文、發佈在網站上的文章內容，和記者訪問的申請。韓森博士說他會無視審查禁令的存在。美國太空總署的官員表示，科學家可以自由地討論科學，但非政治議題。
現年65歲的韓森博士是個物理學者，他於1967年進入美國太空總署。從70年代起，他就以電腦模擬地球氣候變遷，了解人類對氣候的衝擊。
1988年，他出現在國會的聽證會之前。他之後告訴記者說：「溫室效應正存在並影響我們的氣候，」這句話使得留住熱的氣體這種「溫室」的概念成為日常生活用語。韓森博士在國會的部分證詞，也成為前副總統高爾所拍攝的全球暖化的影片「不願面對的真相」的內容。
在接受獎項的同時，韓森博士重申他的警告。為避免全球暖化，現在需要緊急的行動，他並未將他的言論侷限在科學議題上。「目前科學家對於溫室效應的了解，與大眾及政策制定者對於溫室效應的所知還有一大段差距。」他說。
「我們必須拉近這個鴻溝，而且必須要在10年內將我們的能源系統整個轉移至不同的方向，不然我們會迫使地球無可避免的面臨失控的結果。」 韓森警告。
American climate scientist Dr. James Hansen, who declined to be silenced by the Bush Administration, is this year’s recipient of the Duke of Edinburgh Conservation Medal, awarded annually by the global conservation organization WWF for outstanding service to the environment.
Dr. Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, was presented with his medal by the Duke of Edinburgh in a ceremony Tuesday at St. James’s Palace, London. In January, Dr. Hansen said that the Bush administration had tried to stop him from speaking out since he gave a lecture calling for rapid reductions in the emission of greenhouse gases linked to global warming.
Officials at NASA headquarters had ordered the public affairs staff to review his upcoming lectures, papers, postings on the Goddard website and requests for interviews from journalists. Dr. Hansen said he would ignore the restrictions which amounted to censorship. NASA officials said its scientists were free to discuss science but not policy issues.
Dr. Hansen, 65, is a physicist who joined NASA in 1967. Since the 1970s he has worked on computer simulations of the Earth’s climate in a effort to understand humanity’s impact upon it.
In 1988, he appeared before committee hearings of the U.S. Congress. His remark to reporters later that "the greenhouse effect is here and is affecting our climate now" helped take the "greenhouse" concept of heat-trapping gases into popular language. Part of Dr. Hansen’s testimony to the U.S. Congress is featured in former U.S. Vice President Al Gore’s film about global warming, "An Inconvenient Truth."
In accepting his award, Dr. Hansen repeated his warning that urgent action to avert global warming is needed now, and he did not restrict his remarks to scientific topics. "There is still a huge gap between what is understood about global warming, by the scientific community, and what is known about global warming, by those who need to know, the public and policymakers,” he said.
"We must close that gap and move our energy systems in a fundamentally different direction within about a decade, or we will have pushed the planet past a tipping point beyond which it will be impossible to avoid far-ranging undesirable consequences," Hansen warned.
作者
In my healing journey and learning to attain the breath awareness, I become aware of the reality that all the creatures of the world are breathing the same breath. Take action, here and now. From my physical being to the every corner of this out of balance's planet.
