ABSTRACT
In her excellent chapter Sally Weintrobe describes one of the basic conflicts of human beings in our attitudes to climate change: that between our realistic part, concerned not only about ourselves but also about those we feel related to, and our narcissistic part, concerned about nothing but ourselves and the fulfilment of our egocentric wishes. In the example of little Katie, Weintrobe shows us vividly the basic anxieties that can arise within us when we have to face unwanted, frightening changes in our lives: the fear of the narcissistic part that it will not survive if it accepts the reality of those changes and adapts itself towards them in a reasonable way, and the anxiety of the realistic part that what and whom we depend upon in life might have been damaged by our narcissistic rage and will therefore cut benevolent connection with us.
