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flat blocking of nuclear is unreasonable. But in my opinion disagreement on the issue is a relatively marginal issue in the general sweep of tackling climate ch

flat blocking of nuclear is unreasonable. But in my opinion disagreement on the issue is a relatively marginal issue in the general sweep of tackling climate change. The new DNC platform coming out of the convention this week doesn't seem to agree with you. It focuses solely on renewable sources, sweeping nuclear under the carpet. 70-80% of people agree that anthropogenic climate change is happening I don't understand why those concerned about climate change continue to insist on putting the word "anthropogenic" in there. It's mostly irrelevant to the conversation, and comes off as little more than finger-pointing. If there's a problem that needs to be addressed, whether it's caused by humans or not isn't really the issue. If there were an asteroid heading toward the earth, we wouldn't say "we didn't throw that rock at ourselves, so we'll ignore it". Likewise, the discussion over climate change should be on the climate change; trying to make the cause of the problem part of its name just creates additional contention.

sdoering 10y ago
The point is, that if it isn't anthropomorphic, then there is (at least in some peoples' minds) nothing to do about it and we can safely ignore it. We can keep doing our stuff without second thoughts. So "finger pointing" to humanity isn't that bad of a tactic to get things done.
- CWuestefeld 10y ago
  You seem to be arguing that if there were an asteroid that's going to collide with the earth, we would all ignore it.
  - akiselev 10y ago
    And the Morning Strawman Award goes to... drum roll... CWuestefeld. If it's anthropogenic then it is a brand new phenomena in geological time and will throw many ecological systems into disarray or destroy them completely because they never evolved the adaptations. If it's not anthropogenic, then no big deal this is a regular cyclical warm period that the Earth goes through naturally. If it's a natural cycle that we're not contributing to then we have nothing to fix. What in the world does this have to do with asteroids?
    - CWuestefeld 10y ago
      If it's not anthropogenic, then no big deal this is a regular cyclical warm period that the Earth goes through naturally. Your conclusion doesn't follow. Just because man didn't create it [1] doesn't mean that it's necessarily cyclical. The earth has changed in many ways in its lifetime. Some of those changes are indeed parts of cycles. Other changes are strictly one-way. [1] hypothetically; I'm not actually making that claim, just following that line of argument
      - akiselev 10y ago
        If its neither cyclical nor anthropogenic then what can we do about it other than adapt to higher temperatures? If it's not human caused than there is nothing we can do short of geoengineering on a mind boggling scale which makes no sense. If centuries of industrialization haven't caused climate change then what's the chance that we can reverse a natural process on a planetary scale?
        CWuestefeld 10y ago
        I don't see it as a stretch to expect that we can go further in a given direction by dedicating resources to accomplish it, compared to what might happen accidentally by chance. That's not to say that such a thing is without danger. I'm particularly wary of unintended consequences. But the people that are pursuing vast reductions in emissions aren't giving very much thought to the unintended consequences of their approach, either. My point is that the arguments are being made with a huge amount of assumption on all sides. That's not the way to get to a good answer. We need to really consider what the likelihoods of possible outcomes are, in terms of lost human utility; and we might be able to do about them, including their costs and likelihood of success. I don't see a lot of real pro-vs-con debate - most of what I see is the Al Gore tactic of intentionally exaggerating claims to frighten people into acquiescence.
      - SAI_Peregrinus 10y ago
        Even if it is cyclical that doesn't matter. What matters is if the change is good for humanity. If it is, let the change happen. If it's not (evidence overwhelmingly points this way) then we should be trying to stop the change, even if it's natural.
  - pjc50 10y ago
    In the present day, if there were an asteroid that could only be prevented by permanently ending certain lucrative businesses? There would be a massive media campaign to discredit observations of the asteroid, and dismissal of concerns about it, and someone would run for president on an explicit platform of asteroid denial.
  - sdoering 10y ago
    Funny, how you (tried to) turn my argument on it's head. I never argued for ignorance. I just stated, that this is what lot's of people do, when stating, that climate change is not manmade. No, we should look at it, we should deal with it (in the best possible way) regardless of it being manmade or not. The anthropogenic part of the argument shouldn't have any weight at all in the decision to act or not to act (I am for acting). It only should play a role in understanding the causes so to better fight the effects.
Brakenshire 10y ago
Funnily enough I was thinking exactly the opposite about 'anthropogenic climate change' when I was writing that comment. To me, it is a technocratic phrase with little political or emotional resonance. I used it just to be clear what point I was making, and would much rather get rid of the jargon if I could maintain clarity. I strongly disagree that whether or not climate change is human-caused is unimportant. How can you have a consensus on the solution without consensus on the problem? A lot people who don't think humans are responsible will take the position that change is natural, therefore okay. Or, they will attribute change to other factors which would call for other solutions. If you don't think climate change is driven by the human-caused increases in greenhouse gas concentrations which we have seen, why would you try to tackle natural climate change through altering the concentrations of those gases?
vkou 10y ago
But does the new DNC platform call for a large carbon tax? Does it price energy-intensive economic activity appropriately? Subsidies for alternatives don't do that. Mainstream political thought in the US has largely self-sorted into two categories of politicians - ones that don't believe that climate change is happening, and won't do anything about it, and ones that do believe that it is happening, and won't do anything about it. Neither is of any use to us.
wccrawford 10y ago
As to the importance of the term "anthropogenic"... If we aren't causing it (or contributing significantly), then stopping what we're doing won't fix it. So yes, it's important to the conversation that we're actually causing the problem.
- CWuestefeld 10y ago
  If we aren't causing it (or contributing significantly), then stopping what we're doing won't fix it. That's not correct. If I'm sitting in my car and it starts to roll downhill, it's gravity that's causing the movement, not my car. Yet applying the brakes is still the correct course of action. Moreover, even if we assume that humans are the cause of the problem, it doesn't necessarily follow that the cessation of human activity is the optimal course of action. There may be other effective alternatives (e.g., large-scale engineered efforts to increase planetary albedo via cloud formation) that are significantly cheaper. It might be that the costs of mitigating the problem exceed the expected damage that the problem is expected to cause. To be sure, I don't know that either of those possibilities hold in this case, but it's mistaken to simply assume them away.
  - wccrawford 10y ago
    Applying the brakes is not "stopping what you're doing". It's doing a new thing. If you're "sitting in your car" and not doing anything else, the opposite is not sitting in your car, and doing that would not solve the problem at hand.
BryantD 10y ago
It focuses solely on renewable sources, sweeping nuclear under the carpet. This is not entirely accurate. First, I wish the platform mentioned nuclear explicitly; I think that would be healthy. However, while renewable energy sources get a mention, the focus is on "clean power." The platform directly endorses the Clean Power Plan, which has a significant role for nuclear power: https://www.epa.gov/cleanpowerplan/fact-sheet-clean-power-plan-opportunities-nuclear-power https://www.epa.gov/cleanpowerplan/fact-sheet-clean-power-pl... Nuclear power is part of an "all the above" energy strategy that supports economic growth and job creation, enhances our nation's energy security, and protects the planet for future generations. The Clean Power Plan (CPP) ensures that zero carbon nuclear power will continue to play a prominent and meaningful role in America’s energy mix. It's absolutely true that the platform doesn't highlight the need for nuclear energy, but it's certainly not about blocking nuclear energy either.

sdoering 10y ago

The point is, that if it isn't anthropomorphic, then there is (at least in some peoples' minds) nothing to do about it and we can safely ignore it. We can keep doing our stuff without second thoughts. So "finger pointing" to humanity isn't that bad of a tactic to get things done.

CWuestefeld 10y ago
You seem to be arguing that if there were an asteroid that's going to collide with the earth, we would all ignore it.
- akiselev 10y ago
  And the Morning Strawman Award goes to... drum roll... CWuestefeld. If it's anthropogenic then it is a brand new phenomena in geological time and will throw many ecological systems into disarray or destroy them completely because they never evolved the adaptations. If it's not anthropogenic, then no big deal this is a regular cyclical warm period that the Earth goes through naturally. If it's a natural cycle that we're not contributing to then we have nothing to fix. What in the world does this have to do with asteroids?
  - CWuestefeld 10y ago
    If it's not anthropogenic, then no big deal this is a regular cyclical warm period that the Earth goes through naturally. Your conclusion doesn't follow. Just because man didn't create it [1] doesn't mean that it's necessarily cyclical. The earth has changed in many ways in its lifetime. Some of those changes are indeed parts of cycles. Other changes are strictly one-way. [1] hypothetically; I'm not actually making that claim, just following that line of argument
    - akiselev 10y ago
      If its neither cyclical nor anthropogenic then what can we do about it other than adapt to higher temperatures? If it's not human caused than there is nothing we can do short of geoengineering on a mind boggling scale which makes no sense. If centuries of industrialization haven't caused climate change then what's the chance that we can reverse a natural process on a planetary scale?
      - CWuestefeld 10y ago
        I don't see it as a stretch to expect that we can go further in a given direction by dedicating resources to accomplish it, compared to what might happen accidentally by chance. That's not to say that such a thing is without danger. I'm particularly wary of unintended consequences. But the people that are pursuing vast reductions in emissions aren't giving very much thought to the unintended consequences of their approach, either. My point is that the arguments are being made with a huge amount of assumption on all sides. That's not the way to get to a good answer. We need to really consider what the likelihoods of possible outcomes are, in terms of lost human utility; and we might be able to do about them, including their costs and likelihood of success. I don't see a lot of real pro-vs-con debate - most of what I see is the Al Gore tactic of intentionally exaggerating claims to frighten people into acquiescence.
    - SAI_Peregrinus 10y ago
      Even if it is cyclical that doesn't matter. What matters is if the change is good for humanity. If it is, let the change happen. If it's not (evidence overwhelmingly points this way) then we should be trying to stop the change, even if it's natural.
- pjc50 10y ago
  In the present day, if there were an asteroid that could only be prevented by permanently ending certain lucrative businesses? There would be a massive media campaign to discredit observations of the asteroid, and dismissal of concerns about it, and someone would run for president on an explicit platform of asteroid denial.
- sdoering 10y ago
  Funny, how you (tried to) turn my argument on it's head. I never argued for ignorance. I just stated, that this is what lot's of people do, when stating, that climate change is not manmade. No, we should look at it, we should deal with it (in the best possible way) regardless of it being manmade or not. The anthropogenic part of the argument shouldn't have any weight at all in the decision to act or not to act (I am for acting). It only should play a role in understanding the causes so to better fight the effects.

Brakenshire 10y ago

Funnily enough I was thinking exactly the opposite about 'anthropogenic climate change' when I was writing that comment. To me, it is a technocratic phrase with little political or emotional resonance. I used it just to be clear what point I was making, and would much rather get rid of the jargon if I could maintain clarity. I strongly disagree that whether or not climate change is human-caused is unimportant. How can you have a consensus on the solution without consensus on the problem? A lot people who don't think humans are responsible will take the position that change is natural, therefore okay. Or, they will attribute change to other factors which would call for other solutions. If you don't think climate change is driven by the human-caused increases in greenhouse gas concentrations which we have seen, why would you try to tackle natural climate change through altering the concentrations of those gases?

vkou 10y ago

But does the new DNC platform call for a large carbon tax? Does it price energy-intensive economic activity appropriately? Subsidies for alternatives don't do that. Mainstream political thought in the US has largely self-sorted into two categories of politicians - ones that don't believe that climate change is happening, and won't do anything about it, and ones that do believe that it is happening, and won't do anything about it. Neither is of any use to us.

wccrawford 10y ago

As to the importance of the term "anthropogenic"... If we aren't causing it (or contributing significantly), then stopping what we're doing won't fix it. So yes, it's important to the conversation that we're actually causing the problem.

CWuestefeld 10y ago
If we aren't causing it (or contributing significantly), then stopping what we're doing won't fix it. That's not correct. If I'm sitting in my car and it starts to roll downhill, it's gravity that's causing the movement, not my car. Yet applying the brakes is still the correct course of action. Moreover, even if we assume that humans are the cause of the problem, it doesn't necessarily follow that the cessation of human activity is the optimal course of action. There may be other effective alternatives (e.g., large-scale engineered efforts to increase planetary albedo via cloud formation) that are significantly cheaper. It might be that the costs of mitigating the problem exceed the expected damage that the problem is expected to cause. To be sure, I don't know that either of those possibilities hold in this case, but it's mistaken to simply assume them away.
- wccrawford 10y ago
  Applying the brakes is not "stopping what you're doing". It's doing a new thing. If you're "sitting in your car" and not doing anything else, the opposite is not sitting in your car, and doing that would not solve the problem at hand.

BryantD 10y ago

It focuses solely on renewable sources, sweeping nuclear under the carpet. This is not entirely accurate. First, I wish the platform mentioned nuclear explicitly; I think that would be healthy. However, while renewable energy sources get a mention, the focus is on "clean power." The platform directly endorses the Clean Power Plan, which has a significant role for nuclear power: https://www.epa.gov/cleanpowerplan/fact-sheet-clean-power-plan-opportunities-nuclear-power https://www.epa.gov/cleanpowerplan/fact-sheet-clean-power-pl... Nuclear power is part of an "all the above" energy strategy that supports economic growth and job creation, enhances our nation's energy security, and protects the planet for future generations. The Clean Power Plan (CPP) ensures that zero carbon nuclear power will continue to play a prominent and meaningful role in America’s energy mix. It's absolutely true that the platform doesn't highlight the need for nuclear energy, but it's certainly not about blocking nuclear energy either.