6 ms·

"Cool It" -- Bjorn Lomborg's Skeptical Environmentalist comes to the big screen

31 points by cpr 16y ago

vietor 16y ago
Could someone who speaks Danish elaborate on the findings referenced on Wikipedia here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bj%C3%B8rn_Lomborg#DCSD_investigation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bj%C3%B8rn_Lomborg#DCSD_investi... Though he was exonerated on technicalities, it doesn't look good. However, as I don't read Danish, I can't check any of the actual source material.
mrkurt 16y ago
It's unfortunate that the book this is based on seems to be so... wrong: http://www.newsweek.com/2010/02/21/book-review-the-lomborg-deception.html http://www.newsweek.com/2010/02/21/book-review-the-lomborg-d...
- brc 16y ago
  That is a very week premise, which looks disguised as an attempt to sell one book by criticising another. You could equally apply that much scrutiny to any public profile book or movie (anything by Michael Moore, for instance). I'm sure Lomborg's book contains exaggerations and selective presentation of the truth - after all, it's a popular literature, not a scientific work. But the very same standards applied to other 'popular' works of Global Warming media, like 'The Great Global Warming Swindle' and 'An Inconvenient Truth' have also showed up outright lies, fabrications and distortion of the truth. In other words, it's unlikely that anyone can print or make something in this genre without someone else finding all sorts of facts that are wrong. But the whole thing is down to interpretation. Ultimately we should be judging these books and movies for ourselves, and realising that much of the material contains a kernel of truth, probably much embellished for the narrative.
  - ugh 16y ago
    That seems like intellectual laziness.
    - anthonyb 16y ago
      Indeed. While it's true that most things will have errors, it depends on what those errors were, why they were made and who's pointing them out. For example, a lot of climate skeptics like to point out that models are wrong. But they tend to be wrong in both directions (eg. http://www.skepticalscience.com/images/Arctic_models_obs.gif http://www.skepticalscience.com/images/Arctic_models_obs.gif, where the sea ice loss is far more than worst-case prediction)
  - jonhendry 16y ago
    "I'm sure Lomborg's book contains exaggerations and selective presentation of the truth - after all, it's a popular literature, not a scientific work." But that's all he publishes. Because he's not a scientist. You might want to ask yourself why he publishes in such low-end venues, rather than in more rigorous ways.
- berntb 16y ago
  That article referenced Lomborg's website, so I followed the link. First in the FAQ was the answer to the book -- Bjorn Lomborg has written a detailed response debunking Howard Friel’s claims in "The Lomborg Deception.”. http://www.lomborg.com/faq http://www.lomborg.com/faq Friel has also written a couple of books with Richard A. Falk, a 9/11 conspiracy "truther" etc... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_A._Falk#9.2F11_and_the_Bush_administration http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_A._Falk#9.2F11_and_the_... (Sorry for coming in so late that everyone stopped following this.)
brc 16y ago
I'm interested in seeing this, because from what I have read Bjorn is somewhat middle of the road on this debate, something that is usually missing from any mention. I haven't had time to get and/or read his book (no space in reading schedule for this type of thing) but I will be interested to see how this goes. If it manages to thread between the polarized opposites on this debate, that will be quite an accomplishment.
guelo 16y ago
Lomborg's basic position is "Global warming is real - it is man-made and it is an important problem. But it is not the end of the world."
- uriel 16y ago
  This sounds disturbingly... reasonable.
- InclinedPlane 16y ago
  It's disturbing to me how much logic, reason, and science have been bypassed in the race to global warming panic. The idea that it's necessary for human civilization to take drastic steps in order to forestall global warming is based on an entire chain of reasoning: that global warming exists, that it is unnatural and anthropogenic, that massively devastating consequences to mankind and the environment will result if AGW is allowed to continue along current trends, and that curtailing CO2 emissions will prevent those consequences and is the best way of dealing with their possibility. Of these at best only the first and perhaps the 2nd could be considered "proven" (though there is still significant debate), but the rest are just assumed, nothing even approaching a robust analysis has been done (sadly Lomborg's work is perhaps the best analysis so far).
  - philwelch 16y ago
    Remember risk management. It doesn't have to be proven "that massively devastating consequences to mankind and the environment will result if AGW is allowed to continue along current trends", it only has to be probable. Likewise for "curtailing CO2 emissions will prevent those consequences and is the best way of dealing with their possibility". It's perfectly rational to curtail CO2 emissions for fear of the consequences of AGW if curtailing CO2 emissions has a high enough EV, calculating this with, of course, the EV of catastrophic consequences to AGW. It doesn't have to be proven if catastrophic enough consequences are probable enough to dominate the EV, even if that probability is less than "certainty".
    - TomOfTTB 16y ago
bigmac 16y ago
His TED talk gives an interesting perspective on Global Warming, and how we should be thinking about it. ~17mins, worth the time. http://www.ted.com/talks/bjorn_lomborg_sets_global_priorities.html http://www.ted.com/talks/bjorn_lomborg_sets_global_prioritie... I watched it awhile ago. The argument I remember is something along these lines. The worst case scenario of global warming is that sea levels rise some level by 2100. The most pessimistic financial projections for the people living in the affected areas in 2100 is that they will be equivalent to middle-class Americans once the sea levels rise. Thus, we should consider the fact that global warming efforts right now are essentially going toward helping middle class Americans, whereas there are other far more pressing issues facing the poorest of the poor in the world right now. Since we have limited resources in the world and we aren't going to work on every issue, we need to set priorities on what we will work on. Long story short, global warming doesn't make the cut.
- anthonyb 16y ago
  Which is crap. Most of Bangladesh is only a few metres above sea level, ditto for some of India and Pakistan, the South Pacific islands, etc. Most human settlement is either near a river or the ocean.
  - InclinedPlane 16y ago
    I think you failed to grasp the argument. Most of Bangladesh may be only a few meters above sea level, but by the time that Bangladesh faces serious problems from rising sea levels they will almost assuredly be a first world nation in terms of affluence. What level of economic misery should we impose on the entire world both rich and poor, including Bangladesh, today to save affluent future Bangladeshis from dealing with a problem which the Dutch have already solved today?
    - anthonyb 16y ago
      I'm familiar with the argument. If Bangladesh and India have levels of affluence comparable to western nations, then the increased CO2 emissions will make sea levels rise faster, surely? And that's assuming that a) they'll have that level of affluence and b) that sea levels aren't going to rise more quickly. I don't think either of these things are assured at this point. Another point to note is that he's an economist, not a climate scientist. Most of the criticism directed towards him and the Copenhagen Consensus is that they underplay the level of potential global warming while overplaying the part that economics has to play. In other words, his risk to reward ratio is well out of whack. ps. "Economic misery" is a loaded term. IIRC, mitigating CO2 was estimated to be at most a couple of percent of GDP.

31 points by cpr 16y ago

Could someone who speaks Danish elaborate on the findings referenced on Wikipedia here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bj%C3%B8rn_Lomborg#DCSD_investigation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bj%C3%B8rn_Lomborg#DCSD_investi... Though he was exonerated on technicalities, it doesn't look good. However, as I don't read Danish, I can't check any of the actual source material.

mrkurt 16y ago

It's unfortunate that the book this is based on seems to be so... wrong: http://www.newsweek.com/2010/02/21/book-review-the-lomborg-deception.html http://www.newsweek.com/2010/02/21/book-review-the-lomborg-d...

brc 16y ago
That is a very week premise, which looks disguised as an attempt to sell one book by criticising another. You could equally apply that much scrutiny to any public profile book or movie (anything by Michael Moore, for instance). I'm sure Lomborg's book contains exaggerations and selective presentation of the truth - after all, it's a popular literature, not a scientific work. But the very same standards applied to other 'popular' works of Global Warming media, like 'The Great Global Warming Swindle' and 'An Inconvenient Truth' have also showed up outright lies, fabrications and distortion of the truth. In other words, it's unlikely that anyone can print or make something in this genre without someone else finding all sorts of facts that are wrong. But the whole thing is down to interpretation. Ultimately we should be judging these books and movies for ourselves, and realising that much of the material contains a kernel of truth, probably much embellished for the narrative.
- ugh 16y ago
  That seems like intellectual laziness.
  - anthonyb 16y ago
    Indeed. While it's true that most things will have errors, it depends on what those errors were, why they were made and who's pointing them out. For example, a lot of climate skeptics like to point out that models are wrong. But they tend to be wrong in both directions (eg. http://www.skepticalscience.com/images/Arctic_models_obs.gif http://www.skepticalscience.com/images/Arctic_models_obs.gif, where the sea ice loss is far more than worst-case prediction)
- jonhendry 16y ago
  "I'm sure Lomborg's book contains exaggerations and selective presentation of the truth - after all, it's a popular literature, not a scientific work." But that's all he publishes. Because he's not a scientist. You might want to ask yourself why he publishes in such low-end venues, rather than in more rigorous ways.
berntb 16y ago
That article referenced Lomborg's website, so I followed the link. First in the FAQ was the answer to the book -- Bjorn Lomborg has written a detailed response debunking Howard Friel’s claims in "The Lomborg Deception.”. http://www.lomborg.com/faq http://www.lomborg.com/faq Friel has also written a couple of books with Richard A. Falk, a 9/11 conspiracy "truther" etc... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_A._Falk#9.2F11_and_the_Bush_administration http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_A._Falk#9.2F11_and_the_... (Sorry for coming in so late that everyone stopped following this.)

brc 16y ago

I'm interested in seeing this, because from what I have read Bjorn is somewhat middle of the road on this debate, something that is usually missing from any mention. I haven't had time to get and/or read his book (no space in reading schedule for this type of thing) but I will be interested to see how this goes. If it manages to thread between the polarized opposites on this debate, that will be quite an accomplishment.

guelo 16y ago

Lomborg's basic position is "Global warming is real - it is man-made and it is an important problem. But it is not the end of the world."

uriel 16y ago
This sounds disturbingly... reasonable.
InclinedPlane 16y ago
It's disturbing to me how much logic, reason, and science have been bypassed in the race to global warming panic. The idea that it's necessary for human civilization to take drastic steps in order to forestall global warming is based on an entire chain of reasoning: that global warming exists, that it is unnatural and anthropogenic, that massively devastating consequences to mankind and the environment will result if AGW is allowed to continue along current trends, and that curtailing CO2 emissions will prevent those consequences and is the best way of dealing with their possibility. Of these at best only the first and perhaps the 2nd could be considered "proven" (though there is still significant debate), but the rest are just assumed, nothing even approaching a robust analysis has been done (sadly Lomborg's work is perhaps the best analysis so far).
- philwelch 16y ago
  Remember risk management. It doesn't have to be proven "that massively devastating consequences to mankind and the environment will result if AGW is allowed to continue along current trends", it only has to be probable. Likewise for "curtailing CO2 emissions will prevent those consequences and is the best way of dealing with their possibility". It's perfectly rational to curtail CO2 emissions for fear of the consequences of AGW if curtailing CO2 emissions has a high enough EV, calculating this with, of course, the EV of catastrophic consequences to AGW. It doesn't have to be proven if catastrophic enough consequences are probable enough to dominate the EV, even if that probability is less than "certainty".
  - TomOfTTB 16y ago

bigmac 16y ago

His TED talk gives an interesting perspective on Global Warming, and how we should be thinking about it. ~17mins, worth the time. http://www.ted.com/talks/bjorn_lomborg_sets_global_priorities.html http://www.ted.com/talks/bjorn_lomborg_sets_global_prioritie... I watched it awhile ago. The argument I remember is something along these lines. The worst case scenario of global warming is that sea levels rise some level by 2100. The most pessimistic financial projections for the people living in the affected areas in 2100 is that they will be equivalent to middle-class Americans once the sea levels rise. Thus, we should consider the fact that global warming efforts right now are essentially going toward helping middle class Americans, whereas there are other far more pressing issues facing the poorest of the poor in the world right now. Since we have limited resources in the world and we aren't going to work on every issue, we need to set priorities on what we will work on. Long story short, global warming doesn't make the cut.

anthonyb 16y ago
Which is crap. Most of Bangladesh is only a few metres above sea level, ditto for some of India and Pakistan, the South Pacific islands, etc. Most human settlement is either near a river or the ocean.
- InclinedPlane 16y ago
  I think you failed to grasp the argument. Most of Bangladesh may be only a few meters above sea level, but by the time that Bangladesh faces serious problems from rising sea levels they will almost assuredly be a first world nation in terms of affluence. What level of economic misery should we impose on the entire world both rich and poor, including Bangladesh, today to save affluent future Bangladeshis from dealing with a problem which the Dutch have already solved today?
  - anthonyb 16y ago
    I'm familiar with the argument. If Bangladesh and India have levels of affluence comparable to western nations, then the increased CO2 emissions will make sea levels rise faster, surely? And that's assuming that a) they'll have that level of affluence and b) that sea levels aren't going to rise more quickly. I don't think either of these things are assured at this point. Another point to note is that he's an economist, not a climate scientist. Most of the criticism directed towards him and the Copenhagen Consensus is that they underplay the level of potential global warming while overplaying the part that economics has to play. In other words, his risk to reward ratio is well out of whack. ps. "Economic misery" is a loaded term. IIRC, mitigating CO2 was estimated to be at most a couple of percent of GDP.