From a comment on the previous post:
"The problem with Climate change is; It is real and people discount it to prolong profits unimpeded by research costs, etc. If we are wrong and it is not real, whats the worst thing that can happen? Everyone gets solar panels and doesn't have to pay for electricity? On the other hand if we are right and do nothing because people distract us or mislead us what will all the deniers do to fix their mistake? After society collapses into rich vs poor and disease and hunger spread with the changing climate. I don't think "I told you so" would cut it..."This comment encompasses so many ideas that are (1) well within the mainstream of center-left ideology and (2) quite mistaken that I simply must respond point by point.
The problem with Climate change is;So far, we are in agreement. There is indeed a problem here.
It is realYes indeed. The climate does indeed change. There are many reasons for the climate to change. First of all, there is a very big bright ball in the sky which is the source of all our energy, which might have something to do with things. Every time there is a big coronal mass ejection we get aurorae and blackouts in the electrical grids - do you think those are the only effects of millions of tons of solar plasma hitting the earth's magnetic field at a million miles an hour?
The Earth's orbit around the sun isn't a perfect, continuously-repeating-exactly-the-same-forever ellipse, either: there are other objects besides the Earth and Sun which tug gravitationally on both objects, such as Jupiter and Saturn, which cause minor orbital variations. And a relativistic effect causes the Earth's orbital precession over a period of roughly 21 thousand years:

In this diagram, the area of each quadrant is proportional to the time, and right now the northern hemisphere's spring and summer are longer than the fall and winter, whereas 2500 years ago the northern hemisphere's summer and winter were about equal length, but spring was much longer than autumn. That has a little something to do with the climate changing, too. There is not a darn thing that humankind can do to affect the Earth's orbit one iota.
Volcanic eruptions can change the climate as well: the eruption of Mount Tambora in 1815 caused the "Year Without A Summer" in 1816.
I suppose that mankind might be able to cause some sort of nuclear winter if we were so foolish as to have an all-out nuclear war. However, consider this Google Maps image of part of the Nevada Nuclear Test Site, with the biggest craters I could find there:
Note the scale at the bottom left of that image. The Nevada test site was one of the most active nuclear test sites in history. Compare that image to this Google Maps satellite image, of an area just a few humdred miles away, at the same scale:
This is Meteor Crater in Arizona. It was formed when a meteor about 50 meters wide moving somewhere around 12-20 km/s collided with the Earth about 50 thousand years ago; about half of the meteor vaporized in the atmosphere and most of the rest vaporized on impact. Or how about this image, again at the same scale:
This is Mount St. Helens, which as you may recall caused some climate havoc. I include these three pictures to show how man's influence is absolutely dwarfed by nature.
And that brings us to the central questions of the whole climate change debate. Does man have an impact on the environment? Unquestionably, yes. But by how much does mankind affect the environment? Is it enough to actually change the climate? And what would the effects of that climate change be? Would such effects be, on the whole, positive or negative? And the answers to all these questions, if we are being honest, is that we don't know.
Getting back to the comment:
and people discount it to prolong profitsThere is so much that is staggeringly wrong with this statement that the mind boggles. Is climate change real? Yes. Does mankind have a statistically-significant effect on climate change? We don't know. Is the net effect detrimental or beneficial? We don't know.
That is not discounting anthropoegenic global warming, but it is a million miles away from "the science is settled". And being honest that we don't know is held as some sort of dastardly trick in order to allow something even more heinous: "prolonging profit". Without profit, no business can survive; if the income exactly balances expenditures then the business is on the knife edge of failure, and if the income drops below that level for even a short time the business can go under. What is bad about profit?
unimpeded by research costs, etcAre you freakin' kidding me. Who do you think pays for the vast majority of research worldwide? How ironic that someone could write that comment on a computer and transmit it over a network of fiber optic cables and satellite links and coaxial cables, completely oblivious to the contributions of Bell Labs or General Electric or a million other businesses' research departments to his ability to make that comment. Is it possible that this person thinks that without the global warming scare there would be no research done by business?
If we are wrong and it is not real, whats the worst thing that can happen?The person asking this obviously did not ask this of themselves. The short answer is if the world economy is destroyed then billions of people will die of starvation. That's what happens one one third of agricultural land is no longer producing food, but is instead making biofuel - worldwide the price of food has doubled. For people in the first world that might not seem like a big deal, but for the majority of the people on the planet that is a huge problem: there were food riots in over a dozen regions of the world in the last two years.
Everyone gets solar panels and doesn't have to pay for electricity?Of course! Why didn't I think of that? Oh, that's right, I have a job and bills, and I know that I can't get something for nothing. I have to work to get the things I own. So where are these solar panels for everyone supposed to come from? Should the government buy them for us? And where does the government get the money? Should it be taken out of Social Security, or Medicare, or should the government just print up more money as it needs it, like Zimbabwe?
On the other hand if we are right and do nothing because people distract us or mislead us what will all the deniers do to fix their mistake?This past Saturday, the official temperature recorded at the airport ten minutes from where I live was minus 47 degrees Celcius, with a wind chill making it seem like minus 56 degrees C (minus 69 Fahrenheit) - for a short time it was the coldest place on the entire planet. I am damn glad of the modern technological conveniences that kept me from freezing to death in the dark. My great-great-grandparents didn't have those conveniences 119 years ago when they pioneered this area, and life was a lot harder for them.
If Al Gore is right (and he isn't and he knows it or he wouldn't have purchased a $4 million condo within walking distance of San Fransisco Bay, but let's just follow the hypothetical anyhow) then in the next century the sea levels will rise by some small value and the global temperature will rise by some other small value. Coincidentally over the next century our level of technology will continue to advance, so long as the economy is not held back by onerous taxation. The same technology that makes my life easier than that of my great-great-grandparents will be even more advanced as and if we encounter problems in the future - as long as we don't cripple our ability to make technological advances.
Let's turn the accusation around. In the 1960's Malaria was nearly wiped out through the widespread use of DDT, with around 50 thousand deaths a year. Then DDT was banned and the deaths skyrocketed to a million a year, for 40 years, until the UNWHO lifted its ban on the use of DDT. Rachel Carson has the blood of 40 million people - mostly children - on her hands, 40 million who died needlessly because of the ban on DDT, and where is she to answer for the carnage she caused? How does she fix her "Silent Spring" mistake?
After society collapses into rich vs poor and disease and hunger spread with the changing climate. I don't think "I told you so" would cut it..."I will answer this and end with a quote by Robert A. Heinlein:
Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded — here and there, now and then — are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty.
This is known as "bad luck."
1 comment:
Let's turn the accusation around. In the 1960's Malaria was nearly wiped out through the widespread use of DDT, with around 50 thousand deaths a year.
Malaria has not been within 900,000 deaths of 50,000 deaths a year in the last 125 years at least, and probably much, much longer. Annual malaria deaths are lower now than when DDT was at its peak use. I think, perhaps, there is not the correlation there you think there might be.
Then DDT was banned and the deaths skyrocketed to a million a year, for 40 years,
Malaria deaths have hovered just under a million a year for the past 20 years or so. That's a drop to under a million deaths per year, not a rise to it.
DDT has never been banned in most nations where malaria is common -- in fact, I don't think any such nation has ever banned it. Counter-intuitively, malaria has been eradicated in nations that ban DDT use commonly, but not in any nation where DDT use has not been banned.
. . . until the UNWHO lifted its ban on the use of DDT.
WHO never banned DDT. WHO called off their ambitious, DDT-fueled campaign to "eradicate" malaria in the mid-1960s when mosquitoes in Africa and Asia started showing strong resistance and immunity to the stuff, brought about by big ag's overuse of the stuff. But WHO never banned DDT use. DDT has been available to any nation in Africa who wanted to use it.
Rachel Carson has the blood of 40 million people - mostly children - on her hands, 40 million who died needlessly because of the ban on DDT, and where is she to answer for the carnage she caused?
Actually, Carson called for a program of integrated pest management to control mosquitoes and dramatically reduce malaria. Such programs finally caught on in much of Africa and Asia after 2001, and in those nations where the Gates Foundation has been able to implement the program with bed nets, malaria has been reduced by 50% to 85%.
The sad part is that we didn't adopt Carson's methods in 1962. The people who fought tooth and nail to keep DDT available, and those who impugn her reputation now, are those you should blame for unnecessary deaths.
How does she fix her "Silent Spring" mistake?
What mistake? The book is still there. No research cited in the book has ever been successfully, or seriously challenged. The only mistake I see is policy makers who assume science is wrong, and who failed to listen to Carson's wisdom 47 years ago. Who are those in error, who never bothered to read her book?
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