By Andy Wistreich, Society Correspondent for the Happy City Initiative

My son came back from Thailand the other day, with tales of the terrible floods.  A huge area north of Bangkok is underwater, causing disruptions and suffering in countless people’s lives and economic damage estimated so far at $10bn.

It began with exceptional rains in China and Thailand causing rivers to flood.  The many dams and reservoirs on the rivers have made the rivers’ behaviour unpredictable, making effective intervention difficult. 

The government had overfilled the reservoirs in expectation of drought, and then because of the flooding had to empty them out.  In the process they made selective decisions to flood residential areas and save financial areas, causing widespread anger towards the government.

Many displaced people seek accommodation, and many leave jobs in the city to care for family homes and farms in the countryside. 

In Bangkok people wading through waters are at risk from huge water snakes and from crocodiles escaped from crocodile farms.

This story with local variations is becoming commonplace across the world, isn’t it?  Even Bristol is not fully secure from flooding, though hopefully no crocs yet!  Climate scientists generally agree that all this is due to human activity pressing on the natural geo-systems of the planet.  Some have named the period of history since 1950 as the anthropocene age to reflect this.  It means that since then we can say that the evolution of the planet is shaped by humans.

Life on our planet is endangered.  As we are all inter-connected, troubles far away affect us too.  With an attitude of universal responsibility we care about the well-being of everyone in the world.  We needn’t be obsessed by our private self-interest, personal wealth and security.  I appreciate that although for some people such an attitude comes naturally, for most it is quite a challenge.  To develop it needs much reflection and reasoning.  The point is that this attitude provides the best mental basis for helping the world.

As the Dalai Lama has said, ‘Universal responsibility is the key to human survival.’ I’d say we need such an altruistic attitude at this critical time in human history, and there is no shortage of practical ways to do something.  We don’t all need to go to Thailand – there is plenty to do here in Bristol.