I still believe climate change is the pre-eminent threat facing our civilisation, but in 2004 there was considerable apathy.
This word is a convenient label that has been dreamed up by some governments, political analysts and the media to describe the major "Islamic threat" facing western civilisation.
Pence also issued a statement on the attack, which he said was "a horrific reminder of the threat facing western civilisation".
Comfortable life, economic growth, industrialisation, global warming, energy security and sustainable environment are burning issues facing modern civilisation.
It should never cease to amaze how conservatives like Cheney continue to view the cold war theologically, with US as the anointed messiah of civilisation facing the satanic forces of the Soviet Union.
"This book sketches some of the difficulties faced by our civilisation – a civilisation which might perhaps be described as aiming at humaneness and reasonableness, at equality and freedom; a civilisation which is still in its infancy, as it were, and which continues to grow in spite of the fact that it has been so often betrayed by so many of the intellectual leaders of mankind".
Before the inevitable backlash, Popper, an émigré intellectual determined to address "the difficulties faced by our civilisation", became a touchstone for progressive opinion.
In the kind of speaking double act beloved of the event's organisers, Al Gore, the former US vice-president, who has described climate change as "the biggest challenge our civilisation faces", will discuss the subject alongside Pharrell Williams.
Global warming is the biggest problem we've ever faced as a civilisation — certainly you want to act to slow it down, but perhaps you've been waiting for just the right moment.
