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beliefs rarely change when confronted with facts (Björnberg et al. 2017). This is
especially true when there is a perceived potential for immediate or short-term
financial loss. There is no better illustration of this dysfunctional dynamic between
ideology and facts than the variety of politically motivated COVID-19 global pandemic responses and the results playing out in 2019, 2020, and probably well into
2021 even as life-saving vaccinations are made widely available.
World views, immune to evidence-based arguments, are built over a lifetime
shaped by experience that supports counterfactual reasoning (Van Hoeck et al.
2015). While fact-based approaches offer limited success in prompting a change in
the behavior of the most strident climate and environmental science denialists, they,
nevertheless, provide a foundation to support rational action. The LCA framework
provides a stable structure to present detailed evidence of the environmental effects
attached to any product system. Framed by the formally established goal and scope
phase, subsequent LCA phases provide more detail and reach qualified conclusions
about the impacts of the assessed goods and services.
The parallels between LCA and design praxis in establishing a well-defined project goal and scope don’t hold for the critical LCI and LCIA phases. Designers presenting evidence-based sustainable options to clients are not typically involved in
these detailed technical phases but, as discussed in the next three chapters, can
employ tools and techniques supported by the mounting evidence and growing dataset continuously generated by experienced LCA practitioners and the industries
they study closely.
Deliberative thought, predicated on trustworthy facts, requires time. The practices and language we have developed for thinking, reasoning, and collectively
deciding are methodical and thorough. In a post-fact media landscape, however, we
are encouraged to do nothing. But, as established in Chap. 1, that is an impossibility.
While we allow business to go on as usual, each living breathing human being on
the planet continues to take in and give back, and our technologically amplified
actions are increasingly unsustainable.
6.4.1 Impossible to Do Nothing
With that in mind, it is worth noting that there are two meanings to the phrase
“impossible to do nothing.” The first is a biological fact of being alive here and now.
The second is a call to act, to first understand the scope and consequences of our
thoughts and actions, and then to make the necessary and appropriate changes that
will ensure our own and future generations’ ability to thrive. Effective changes take
place at different rates through individual daily decisions on what and how we will
consume and also through collective political action.
It is also a fact that, whatever the causes, inaction at the individual and collective
level is a decision with consequences. The status quo has inertia on its side to maintain deeply engrained habits and practices just as they are. Any change in direction
to the system, even a small one, requires a force to move it. Therefore, before we
6 Addressing Resistance to a Fact-Based Approach
beliefs rarely change when confronted with facts (Björnberg et al. 2017). This is
especially true when there is a perceived potential for immediate or short-term
financial loss. There is no better illustration of this dysfunctional dynamic between
ideology and facts than the variety of politically motivated COVID-19 global pandemic responses and the results playing out in 2019, 2020, and probably well into
2021 even as life-saving vaccinations are made widely available.
World views, immune to evidence-based arguments, are built over a lifetime
shaped by experience that supports counterfactual reasoning (Van Hoeck et al.
2015). While fact-based approaches offer limited success in prompting a change in
the behavior of the most strident climate and environmental science denialists, they,
nevertheless, provide a foundation to support rational action. The LCA framework
provides a stable structure to present detailed evidence of the environmental effects
attached to any product system. Framed by the formally established goal and scope
phase, subsequent LCA phases provide more detail and reach qualified conclusions
about the impacts of the assessed goods and services.
The parallels between LCA and design praxis in establishing a well-defined project goal and scope don’t hold for the critical LCI and LCIA phases. Designers presenting evidence-based sustainable options to clients are not typically involved in
these detailed technical phases but, as discussed in the next three chapters, can
employ tools and techniques supported by the mounting evidence and growing dataset continuously generated by experienced LCA practitioners and the industries
they study closely.
Deliberative thought, predicated on trustworthy facts, requires time. The practices and language we have developed for thinking, reasoning, and collectively
deciding are methodical and thorough. In a post-fact media landscape, however, we
are encouraged to do nothing. But, as established in Chap. 1, that is an impossibility.
While we allow business to go on as usual, each living breathing human being on
the planet continues to take in and give back, and our technologically amplified
actions are increasingly unsustainable.
6.4.1 Impossible to Do Nothing
With that in mind, it is worth noting that there are two meanings to the phrase
“impossible to do nothing.” The first is a biological fact of being alive here and now.
The second is a call to act, to first understand the scope and consequences of our
thoughts and actions, and then to make the necessary and appropriate changes that
will ensure our own and future generations’ ability to thrive. Effective changes take
place at different rates through individual daily decisions on what and how we will
consume and also through collective political action.
It is also a fact that, whatever the causes, inaction at the individual and collective
level is a decision with consequences. The status quo has inertia on its side to maintain deeply engrained habits and practices just as they are. Any change in direction
to the system, even a small one, requires a force to move it. Therefore, before we
6 Addressing Resistance to a Fact-Based Approach