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How can he not mention the significant threats posed by climate change and only mention polar bears and heat-wave deaths? What about the collapse of the Gulf St

by jsmcgd 18y ago

How can he not mention the significant threats posed by climate change and only mention polar bears and heat-wave deaths? What about the collapse of the Gulf Stream? What about the world's major cities and low lying countries being submerged in water? etc etc If climate change only amounted to the things he mentioned, I'd say pollute away but it has the potential for a genuine global catastrophe. Also where does he get his amazingly precise figures from and why does he keep mentioning Al Gore?

Prrometheus 18y ago
He starts with the UN IPCC estimates for what the effects of Global Warming are likely to be in the next 100 years, and bases his recommendations on that. If he doesn't address some doomsday scenario, then it is probably because no scientist thinks it particularly likely. It is a 30 minute talk, after all.
jerf 18y ago
The alternative is not "believe the worst global warming case" or "pollute away". The alternative isn't even "mankind is adversely affecting the environment" or not, since it's pretty obvious some things are being hurt. It's "what shall we spend our money on?", and if Global Warming is being grossly oversold, let's put that money into things that will actually matter, like fixing the Pacific dead zone or researching the amelioration of other real problems. If Global Warming hysteria is wrong, than panicking and destroying our economies over it is not noble. It is not even neutral. It is destructive, because of the resources that could have been spent solving real problems that got wasted instead. If Global Warming is hysteria and not fact, the hysteria itself is the single greatest threat facing the environment today. Skeptics like myself are often painted as anti-environmental; frankly, I return the change with gusto back to those who won't even consider the question of how to best spend our resources, but assume (with varying and often low degrees of justification) that they already know the answer. First we find the truth, then we figure out the solutions. I think the order has been inverted and that's bad engineering no matter how you slice it. (Not to mention the solutions sold for global warming that won't even fix the problem even if they work perfectly....)

by jsmcgd 18y ago

Prrometheus 18y ago

He starts with the UN IPCC estimates for what the effects of Global Warming are likely to be in the next 100 years, and bases his recommendations on that. If he doesn't address some doomsday scenario, then it is probably because no scientist thinks it particularly likely. It is a 30 minute talk, after all.

jerf 18y ago

The alternative is not "believe the worst global warming case" or "pollute away". The alternative isn't even "mankind is adversely affecting the environment" or not, since it's pretty obvious some things are being hurt. It's "what shall we spend our money on?", and if Global Warming is being grossly oversold, let's put that money into things that will actually matter, like fixing the Pacific dead zone or researching the amelioration of other real problems. If Global Warming hysteria is wrong, than panicking and destroying our economies over it is not noble. It is not even neutral. It is destructive, because of the resources that could have been spent solving real problems that got wasted instead. If Global Warming is hysteria and not fact, the hysteria itself is the single greatest threat facing the environment today. Skeptics like myself are often painted as anti-environmental; frankly, I return the change with gusto back to those who won't even consider the question of how to best spend our resources, but assume (with varying and often low degrees of justification) that they already know the answer. First we find the truth, then we figure out the solutions. I think the order has been inverted and that's bad engineering no matter how you slice it. (Not to mention the solutions sold for global warming that won't even fix the problem even if they work perfectly....)