Tyler Cowen blogs about global warming:
Policy recommendations are extremely sensitive to the choice of discount rate, and economists do not agree on this issue. Furthermore most economists do not even know enough moral philosophy to understand the issues involved (and the philosophers don't understand enough economics), so there is no coherent consensus one way or the other.
I think this is key. Actually, I think there are four groups who need to be involved:
- Climatologists and associated scientists, to tell us what is likely to happen.
- Engineers, to tell us how me might abate what is likely to happen.
- Philosophers, to tell us how to handle issues of intergenerational equity. (Although to be sure, when I talk to my friends who are relatively expert in the philosophy of intergenerational equity, I don't emerge with any very clear answers on the topic.)
- Economists, to tell us what the likely effects of various actions will be on the lives of people in various generations.
To which we might add, "Political scientists, to tell us how to get everyone to agree to any solution the others work out."
No one understands very well the work of the others, which means everyone tends to overweight the urgency of their particular problem: the philosophers focus on justice, the engineers on feasibility, the climatologists and biologists on the various physical and biological changes, and the economists on the growth reduction; there's no very good system for weighting all of these considerations, except the political one, which everyone, including the politicians, seems to agree is doing a terrible job.
If we can solve the problem of letting China and India get rich without making the planet unbearably warm, or the industrialized countries unbearably poor, we will have this fundamental problem resolved. But the best the experts seem to have on that one is a sick look and a wan, "Well, we'd better find a way, hadn't we?"
You forgot the most important group who needs to be involved: the rest of us who need to listen to the best-informed of the other groups, and then make the decisions about what kind of life we want to live in the future. (i.e., developed, healthy, and globally -warmed, or impoverished, natural, and climatically neutral).
"everyone, including the politicians, seems to agree [the political system] is doing a terrible job"
This is only true if one thinks that the "there is no global warming problem" cohort thinks that it's terrible that the political system allows "there is a global warming problem" to be a topic of discussion.
But the best the experts seem to have on that one is a sick look and a wan, "Well, we'd better find a way, hadn't we?"
Really?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide_sink
^ Chester, Bronwyn (20 April 2000). The case of the missing sink. McGill Reporter. Retrieved on 2007-02-23.
^ Duncan Graham-Rowe (24 February 2005). Hydroelectric power's dirty secret revealed. New Scientist. Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ Raven, J. A.; P. G. Falkowski (1999). "Oceanic sinks for atmospheric CO2". Plant Cell & Environment 22: 741-755.
^ Takahashi, T.; S. C. Sutherland, C. Sweeney, A. Poisson, N. Metzl, B. Tilbrook, N. Bates, R. Wanninkhof, R. A. Feely, C. Sabine, J. Olafsson and Y. C. Nojiri (2002). "Global sea-air CO2 flux based on climatological surface ocean pCO2, and seasonal biological and temperature effects". Deep Sea Research II 49: 1601-1622.
^ Swift, Roger S. (November 2001). Soil Science - Abstract: Volume 166(11) November 2001 p 858-871 SEQUESTRATION OF CARBON BY SOIL.. Retrieved on 2007-02-23.
^ Jonathan Amos. Care needed with carbon offsets. BBC. Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ Models show growing more forests in temperate regions could contribute to global warming. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (5 December 2005). Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ S. Gibbard, K. Caldeira, G. Bala, T. J. Phillips, and M. Wickett (December 2005). "Climate effects of global land cover change". Geophysical Research Letters 32.
^ Y. Malhi, P. Meir, and S. Brown (15 August 2002). Forests, carbon and global climate. Institute of Ecology and Resource Management. Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ U.S. Greenhouse Gas Inventory Reports. EPA. Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ a b c d Land Use, Land-Use Change, and Forestry. EPA. Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ a b Executive Summary. EPA. Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ About Us: Global Cooling™ Center. Trees for the Future.
^ Michael Markels, Jr and Richard T. Barber (May 14-17, 2001). Sequestration of CO2 by ocean fertilization. NETL Conference on Carbon Sequestration. Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ Questions and Concerns. GreenSea Venture. Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ Simon M. Mitrovica, Monica Fernández Amandia, Lincoln McKenzieb, Ambrose Fureya and Kevin J. James (30 December 2004). "Effects of selenium, iron and cobalt addition to growth and yessotoxin production of the toxic marine dinoflagellate Protoceratium reticulatum in culture". Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology 313 (2): 337-351. Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ Susan S. Lang (13 July 2005). Organic farming produces same corn and soybean yields as conventional farms, but consumes less energy and no pesticides, study finds. Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ Pimentel, David, et al, Bioscience: 55:7, July 2005
^ Lal, R; et al (April 2004). "Managing Soil Carbon". Science 304: 393.
^ Johannes Lehmann. Biochar: the new frontier. Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ Climate Change, Global Warming, and the Built Environment - Architecture 2030. Retrieved on 2007-02-23.
^ Robert H. Socolow (July 2005). "Can We Bury Global Warming?". Scientific American.
^ Norman Baker and Ben Bradshaw (4 July 2005). Carbon Sequestration. Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
^ "Carbon-capture Technology To Help UK Tackle Global Warming", ScienceDaily July 27, 2007, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/07/070727091001.htm
^ Karen Palmer and Dallas Burtraw. Electricity, Renewables, and Climate Change: Searching for a Cost-Effective Policy. Resources for the Future.
^ Manguiat, M. S. Z., Verheyen, R., Mackensen, J. & Scholz, G. (2005), Legal aspects in the implementation of CDM forestry projects, number 59 in ‘IUCN Environmental Policy and Law Papers’, IUCN. Available from: http://www.iucn.org/themes/law/pdfdocuments/EPLP59EN.pdf
^ Rosenbaum, K. L., Schoene, D. & Mekouar, A. (2004), Climate change and the forest sector. Possible national and subnational legislation, number 144 in ‘FAO Forestry Papers’, FAO. Available from: http://www.fao.org/docrep/007/y5647e/y5647e00.HTM
And before you say "I was just referering to China and India", this is perhaps the best hope for mitigating the "new coal power station every week" problem. The following article, as you might see if you read it, mentions both countries explicitly. It's in a little-known magazine called "Scientific American". I think it was on the cover or something.
http://carbonsequestration.us/Papers-presentations/htm/Socolow-ScientificAmerican-0705049.pdf
referering = referring
I fear that Gerry Stanhill, Veerhabhadran Ramanathan, and Peter Cox have figured out why CO2 build-up hasn't caused much warming: particulates pollution has caused global dimming whose cooling effects have cancelled some of the CO2 effects.
On the bright side, if this is the case then proposals by Gregory Benford et. al. to cool the Earth by releasing cooling gases into the air at the poles wouldn't really be a new experiment. We are already doing this by accident.
The biggest problem I can see from the CO2 build-up is acidification of the oceans. I wonder whether iron salting could increase conversion of dissolved CO2 into plant hydrocarbons in the oceans and thereby reduce ocean acidity.
If we can somehow slow or stop ocean acidification then we could use cheap abatement strategies to delay warming while we develop technology to make it cheap to shift over to an electric economy based on batteries in cars and nukes, solar, and wind to generate the electricity.
All of those questions are being and have been struggled with, by those people, for years. All they all in one big room? No, but I think there's substantial communication across disciplines. Additionally, I think you're approaching this too much as one thing that needs a solid solution. It's not--it's dozens of things, and they don't have to all be done at one time. We can sort this out as we go along. But throwing up your hands and saying "Wait Wait! We don't know the correct parameters for intergenerational equity yet!" stops us from even doing the minimum, which ultimately is going to make cuts even more painful.
You seek the involvement of a philosopher...
Philosophers, to tell us how to handle issues of intergenerational equity. (Although to be sure, when I talk to my friends who are relatively expert in the philosophy of intergenerational equity, I don't emerge with any very clear answers on the topic.)
I am here, at your disposal. I am offering to try and answer and clarify any series of questions you might think to ask that require the application of a thorough understanding of metaphysics. This might sound audacious, but I think I can do it. I know I can try. So, use me, if you will. I offer my services, humbly.
My credentials are that I am alive and over forty. And while these may not seem like much to speak of, given all that I have seen, it is quite a lot, I assure you. My motives are that if attempts at constructive communication can really make a difference in the quality of life for some person or persons, I would like to see it.
So, what would you like to know?
So, what would you like to know?
I think she wanted you to tell us how to handle intergenerational equity (it's right at the top of what you quoted).
All this sturm und drang about CO2--thus, AGW.
Noone wonders why their local Electric Utility isn't in the Thermometer business (see: Hg).
The idea of Efficiency, more Utilization, less Waste, should be one able to find ready agreement(amongst Self-interested parties). Kelso gives good leads-- Many Engineers/Scientists have, some for a long time, seen, and proven, many of the technologies necessary to lighten the depth of our footprints.
We should focus on what is readily observable, possibly be more concerned about our depleted Fisheries then the hand-waving over the results of, more, spurious mathematic (Climatalogical/Econometric) equations.
If only Hazel O'Leary at Energy and John Kerry in the Senate hadn't killed the Integral Fast Reactor in 1994, we'd have a technology that could replace coal with a low marginal increase in cost -- and, incidentally, a huge reduction in energy-production fatalities, non-warming environmental damage, and even nuclear waste storage costs.
But to implement the solution would still require an environmental movement willing to admit that the choices are nuclear or carbon.
Mark E Hoffer,
Actually, to quote what she wrote (and what I quoted) - "...to tell us how to handle issues of intergenerational equity." - she states she thinks that "clear answers on the topic" would help the cause some.
So, I offer answers to questions, not a dissertation.
One part of the cost-benefit analysis that I'd like to see more solid work on would be the actual ecological effects (good and bad) of higher mean temperatures. It usually seems like hand-waving and worst case analysis. From a Canadian perspective, it's hard not to think that the poential benefits have been under-researched.
I'd like to see a lot more experimental projects, especially solar powered air conditioning.
In So. Cal, but maybe even in Iraq -- with some millions per month on different technologies (competitively bid) and open info on real costs and real results.
Philosophers, to tell us how to handle issues of intergenerational equity.
Do philosophers really have any special insight into this issue?
Pithlord - I can tell you that higher CO2 would improve the efficiency of photosynthesis and thus presumably increase plant growth, especially in areas with other sufficient nutrients.
You're a libertarian. Stop pretending you give a shit.
Why exactly is it crucial for us to have input from experts on intergenerational equity before making decisions related to global warming, when we don't require such input before every other decision we make which has long-term effects? Viz., most of them?
Megan,
Since you're on the bandwagon of 'Humans are killing the earth by causing Global Warming,' you may not get this, but let me try. As a geologist who has worked in ancient clmates of the Paleocene, and as a current engineer dealing with environmental cleanup, I do have a fairly valid point from which to speak.
First, The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is quite small, taken as a relative size of all molecules in 'air' (0.038% of total air- an incredibly small amount). Yet, even though this amount is minute, this is where the proponents of global warming have hung their hat. As people get more knowledgeable, watch them start changing their emphasis to something else that 'causes global warming.'
Second, the raise in CO2 in the last 200 years (rough industrial revolution period), is quite small, less than 0.2% of total CO2, and since the total is only 0.038% in the first place, this riase is incredibly infinitesimal.
Third, the earth has cycled through hundreds of warming and cooling cycles in the last few million years. It has been both much hotter and much cooler than it is right now. What the true reasons for this may be, no one has nailed it down; certainly its not the industrialization of man on the planet. Best guess at this point is the consistent data that shows solar activity having the greatest impact on not only the earth, but the other inner planets, also.
Fourth, in just the last 12,000 years (when man wasn't creating 1/1000th of the CO2 people point to now), the climate was quite a bit cooler. Nevada and the dry mountain west was full of fresh water lakes and was quite a pleasant place. However, since we were coming out of a glacial period, and WARMING UP OVER THE LAST 20-25,000 years, this drying of this part of our continent has continued.
Continue your folly towards placing the blame of all Global Warming on industrialization, then get slapped in the face, later, when the data shouts out otherwise.
Oh, as for letting China become rich...well, there are many other reasons not to want that to happen, at least as long as melagomaniacal leaders want to, literally, control the world. At least they don't change their goals over a period of thousands of years.
I am willing to accept, on authority, that the Earth's warming is due in part to human influence, but that alone isn't enough to know what to do about it.
Any policy meant to address the problem ought to be subjected to a rigorous cost-benefit analysis. By this measure, we were right to reject the Kyoto treaty, since its benefits would have been minimal (given that it didn't affect China, India and other developing countries), while the costs would have been large.
A much better policy would be a carbon emissions tax. We could use the revenue from that tax to fund further reductions in taxes on work, saving and investment. If the tax were only an American policy, its influence on global climate would be small, but, if coupled with tax cuts, it would be economically beneficial. It would also reduce other forms of pollution.
So it's a policy that makes a lot of sense, which probably explains why few if any politicians are considering it. They would rather fool around with CAFE standards.
But to implement the solution would still require an environmental movement willing to admit that the choices are nuclear or carbon.
There isn't a homogeneous "environmental movement". Many environmentalists have come out in favor of nuclear energy over coal and oil.
Hi -
What is really needed in the whole discussion is for those who believe in global warming stop treating those who are skeptical about it as heretics that properly deserve to be shipped off to a modern-day concentration camp for daring to disagree.
There are all sorts of problems to be sorted out in the world. The attempt to monopolize the available monies and to force everyone to change their life styles is not the way to achieve consensus, not on the science - only really bad science, like creationism, needs a consensus - but on the implications and what can be done.
Instead we get hysterics and scare-mongers. If there really was a challenge that would require all of humanity to unite to meet, we'd be doomed...
The problem with the particulate matter to cool the earth idea....particulate matter falls to the ground a lot faster than the CO2 can be re-absorbed into plant matter. So for now, as long as we continue to pour more and more particulate matter into the aptmosphere, we could theoretically cool certain parts of the Earth (evidence as I understand it is that this cooling effect is best felt in extremely polluted cities such as Beijing, where the haze helps block out the heat producing sun rays).
So if and when we find an alternative source of energy, all those particulates will eventually disppear. and viola, we will really start to heat up.
As for the very first poster...how you can equate health with a planet deteriorating biologically seems a bit out of sorts. So increased droughts, floods, plagues etc will make us healthy? You clearly assume I guess you will be living in the one place on earth not impacted by global warming as well as having the resources to artificially mitigate the effect in your own little area (i.e. - air conditioning - something most of the world still cannot afford).
""everyone, including the politicians, seems to agree [the political system] is doing a terrible job"
This is only true if one thinks that the "there is no global warming problem" cohort thinks that it's terrible that the political system allows "there is a global warming problem" to be a topic of discussion."
It seems to me that that political system is doing a terrible job from the perspective of the likes of Al Gore. There has been no significant progress in reducing the amount of CO2 production in the West. The prospects of reducing CO2 in the indefinate future seem dim as the production of CO2 in India and China will far more than offset the modest improvements in the West. There is no political consensus among all the major players (i.e. the West and the developing countries) as to how global warming should be addressed. Finally, although we may develop a technological solution to the problem, and there are some promosing ideas being bandied about, there is no obvious technological solution that has widespread support. So where exactly has the political system been successful in addressing global warming?
melagomaniacal leaders - falkoyn
China's leaders are among the least "megalomaniacal" in the world. China has a system of collective leadership, in which the top two or three individual leaders (currently Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao) all have decisive influence on major policies, as well as, usually, the most recently retired former top leader. Policies have not been presented in the name of a single top leader since the end of the Mao era and the reaction against the cult of personality. This stands in sharp contrast to the leaders of Western democracies, who claim personal credit for policies which are actually devised by their cabinet members and advisers, enacted by legislators, and executed by bureaucrats. Democracies and populist-fascist movements breed "megalomaniacal leaders"; corporate states like China (and the late-period USSR) breed colorless, consensus-driven functionary leaders.
The prospects of reducing CO2 in the indefinate future seem dim as the production of CO2 in India and China will far more than offset the modest improvements in the West.
And I really doubt that the West will slack off. There's a poem ("Julian and the People of Antioch") by C.P.Cavafy about the conflict between Hellenistic sensibility and Christianity. The lures of the flesh and the pleasures of art were too strong to lure people to the dour strictures of Christianity. A/C from April to October. 4 cars in the drive way. Computers and TVs constantly on. (The list is comically not the fleshpots of Egypt, but it's enough. It seems to be what people want.)
" A goal without a plan is just a wish.", Antoine de St. Exupery
The open questions regarding AGW are very significant. 1) What is the ultimate percentage reduction required to "solve the problem"? 2) What is the time frame over which these reductions must be achieved? 3) What is the plan to achieve these reductions within this time frame? 4) What is the expected cost of achieving these reductions within this time frame? 5) How will this cost impact the economies of the affected nations?
Former US vice president A. A. Gore, Jr. "testified" regarding "1" & "2" above in the US before Congress in April. There is a conceptual plan for achieving these reductions in the US, along with a cost estimate, here: (http://www.utilitiesproject.com/documents.asp?grID=111&d_ID=4296) [registration required, but free]
However, I doubt the former vice president would be particularly supportive of it. The "Stern Report" purports to address 5 above.
If AGW is a problem, it is a global problem; and, it requires a global solution. Anything less is doomed to failure.
Falkoyn, your statistics are at best deeply misleading. Where are you getting this idea that "Second, the raise in CO2 in the last 200 years (rough industrial revolution period), is quite small, less than 0.2% of total CO2"? Pre-industrial levels were approximately 280 parts per million; the current level is 360 ppm, an increase of 80/280=29%. And, of course, that number continues to rise. See here and here for citations.
In Ascending Order of Unlikeliness
1. The planet is getting warmer.
2. The planet is getting warmer in a way that is dangerous or undesirable.
3. The planet is getting warmer in a way that is dangerous or undesirable because of theoretically manageable factors, including human activity.
4. The benefits of managing those theoretically manageable factors will outweigh the costs of doing so, including such costs as rent-seeking and corruption on the part of the managers, delaying or inhibiting economic development in both poor and rich countries, &c.
5. The benefits of managing those theoretically manageable factors will outweigh the costs of doing so and will provide a desirable tradeoff for the costs of global warming, whatever those may be.
6. The benefits of managing those theoretically manageable factors will outweigh the costs of doing so and will provide a desirable tradeoff for the costs of global warming, whatever those may be, and also the benefits of global warming, whatever those may be.
7. The UN or some comparable international body is going to manage an intergenerational global temperature-management program with climatological, economic, agricultural, and moral components in an efficacious manner.
In ascending order of unlikeliness:
1. Something is bad
2. Something is bad in a fashion about which anything can be done
3. The something which can be done about the something that is bad is something that some people are capable of doing
4. You, personally, are among the people who are capable of doing something about the something that is bad
5. Out of all the infinite possible strategies for doing something about the something that is bad, you will select one of the very few that could actually work
6. Having selected one of the very few strategies that could actually work, you will in fact carry it out successfully
7. Having carried out the strategy successfully and made the bad thing better and the world a better place, you will not have to deal with a bunch of libertarians arguing that the bad thing disappeared naturally through the magic of the marketplace, as soon as the Reagan/Bush tax cuts were implemented
Thank you, Dan Miller, for saving me from having to do the work I was about to get started on. I knew those numbers didn’t sound right. How people, even self-proclaimed experts like falkyon, can suffer under the belief that their facts are the facts is discouraging and frustrating. But with regard to this question of human causation of global warming, isn’t the greater question not what part does human activity play in global warming, which is certainly an important question, but isn’t the greater question what to try and do in anticipation of the predicable consequences of the worst case scenario?
Not that anyone should necessarily spend every resource on an unlikely event. But if you can tell that a giant tsunami is a possibility for the east coast of America, and you don’t spend any resources on figuring out what might possibly help the millions of potential victims, that would seem pretty foolish, no? And if you know that there is a possibility that virtually the whole of the Greenland ice sheet might actually just slide into the ocean, and you can’t even start to think of any kind of plans for relocating, again, the millions of people that would certainly be affected (in a way very like what happened in New Orleans), well, what does that say, other than that those millions would be truly lost if and when one of these types of events occurs?
Clearly there are threats to our well-being that make the terrorists seem like mosquitoes. And it is going to be a long, hard fight for people everywhere to act in there long-term best interests if there can be any hope for serious problem-solving success. Personally, I think that the wealthy among the world’s population are likely going to be the ones who make the necessary changes they will undoubtedly have to make to their current lifestyles in order to merely survive. I am talking about, in the next hundred years, the development of sustainable underground habitation; an expanding space program; and the development of low-cost, small-footprint sustainable energy generation. In the mean time, it is likely that there are going to be many, many hardships.
It would seem that we should really get serious about the business of properly processing and presenting all the information our wonderful science professionals have amassed, and quick. A lot of it is hard to swallow. A lot of it has the potential to cause serious psychological challenges to many people. But the question is, are we strong enough to face these things? Or are we content to ride this party train until the rails run out, and take what’s coming to us, come hell and high water?
Megan poses interesting questions. In a specialist society – how do you reach consensus or even better: consilience? Ideally – every specialist also understands basic principles of psychology and emotions and has also a basic understanding of other important fields besides his own (Greece: “You cannot be good at sports unless you also do math and music”. We all know how modern specialist tend to jump on such a statement without thinking… but you can be good at sports without…context?). We are all humans, we all are social animals and have to work with others on a daily basis, we all want to survive, we all have a dangerous self-destructive ego, etc.
It seems to me that in modern times it is NOT the philosophers anymore who hold everything together under the umbrella (as there are no good ones but only career specialists) but rather the business men, journalists and the politicians (the only non-specialists left)? That is not necessarily a bad thing as everyone should be a philosopher. The direct Greek meaning of philo-sophia is phio = love and Sophia = the goddess of wisdom.. lovers of wisdom and truth.. anything, no matter if it is ecology or economy should be approached this way? One is never too young or too old..
We underestimate that many humans who hide behind their specialist status – are in fact fully developed universalists? The distinctions are luckily blurring again. In this respect – it is a good thing that Paul Krugman took on politics – even if I don’t like it? I hope for a 2nd renaissance?
I agree with mcnamarick
As with issues such as immigration and poverty - the environment discussion is NOT about charity to poor regions such as Bangladesh. It is a selfish discussion about you and me and our children in the (near) future. It is us, the rich, who have to lose life-style in case of drastic environmental tipping points - not the poor!
I assume that you can see the similarities between the economy and the ecology... what would happen if the government and the individual spent and consumed more than can be produced or grown? Bankruptcy or recession?
What are we quarreling about anyway? We are NOT quarreling about IF we are sliding into an ecological recession or not – we are quarreling about WHY and WHAT to do to ease it?
On the WHY side – there are two different schools. The majority of scientists (at Ivy League schools) believes that the changes are mainly man-made… a minority of scientists argue that these things have happened before without human involvement, e.g. extinction of the dinosaurs.
The ozone depletion debate of the past was similar. Many scientists have argued before and during the 1980s that the molecules that cause ozone depletion can have natural sources such as volcanoes and that the ozone whole will have no dangerous impact on humans. When they discovered a huge Antarctic whole in 1985 – the deniers where shut up and for the first and potentially the LAST TIME in history – the US reacted FASTER and BETTER than the EU on an environmental issue – banning those 4 man-made chemicals that proved to be the main risk for human survival (increased UV affected not only skin cancer in humans but also crops and plankton..) The measures have been successful – there seems to be a decrease in the Antarctic ozone whole. Let’s see if we will experience a déjà vu with climate change?
It is true that the last time we faced such rapid extinction losses has been approx. 60 million years ago. It is true that the volatility, inflation, deflation, loss of biodiversity was unpleasant to the evolutionary needs of many animal species. We all agree that climate change as it happens now and a possible tipping point would not erase human kind but definitely make her uncomfortable to say the least?
It was in the 1960s, after WWII, that we first started gathering more trustworthy, global population and agriculture data. The documented population and consumption growth was rather startling. Scientists build some models with conservative, moderate and optimistic scenarios. Nobody was exactly certain what so many ecological changes might mean to us – we were only half of today’s size in number and only 1/3 in consumption. Global cooling or warming.. storms or whathaveyou… but those warnings and research were always differently motivated than some fans of Nostradamus want to suggest. It was not hype for the sake of hype. It was naturalists and scientists witnessing and documenting the decline of our backbone – nature. But the world was discovering cars, computers and was flying to the moon and we were closer to god than ever.. we can always fix the engine
Under the conservative, scary scenario that media humped on until the 80s and beyond – we would face world-wide hunger. This turned out to be only partly true. We have reversed the growth of the growth rate but not nominal growth. Every year more people are born than have ever been born before in the history of the planet! Only 800 million humans go hungry today – twice as many as 40 years ago but a smaller percentage?
Under the moderate scenario we would double our population in only 40 years by 3 billion people by the end of the century. This would mean deforestation, biodiversity loss, water- soil- and air-pollution, etc. This has happened and this is why everybody is now talking about it one way or another.
The optimistic scenario of the 60s-80s is not even worth mentioning because we have waved that opportunity dance by. However – modern research follows the same modeling techniques and works with 3 scenarios. The Living Planet Report is published by the WWF every year – as a modern annual report on company earth. Our firm is not performing too well except for some business units that do not represent the core competency and backbone of our being.
http://assets.panda.org/downloads/living_planet_report.pdf
Under all 3 scenarios – the WWF only sees a better future if we managed to reduce animal agriculture and improved technology. Cars and flying are nowhere to be mentioned.. Here is why – bear in mind that animals (in contrast to cars) eat, drink, shit, fart 24/7:
1960:
Humans: 3,000,000,000
Farm animals eaten: 7,500,000,000
2000:
Humans: 6,000,000,000
Farm animals eaten: 50,000,000,000
Source: FAO.org
Here is more from E.O. Wilson on The Bottleneck.
http://physics.ius.edu/~kyle/P120/Bottleneck.html
In other words – I hope that it starts to hurt enough, or at least starts hurting? Do you need to see blood? This is time it is a bid different then when we all first started to manage our own budgets and went overboard…
If the atmosphere were likened to the population of the US, CO2 in toto would correspond to about 150,000 people. Anthropogenic CO2 amounts to 0.03% of the total CO2 partial pressure, which corresponds to ca. 4500 people - out of 300 million.
(Note also that the effect of CO2 is stoichiometric, not catalytic, as was the case for halocarbons in the now long-forgotten ozone depletion business.)
That's why skepticism is in order.
Megan, I might suggest one further specialty for your list: psychiatrists to ascertain why risible Chicken Little scenarios gain such traction.
Last, a warning (which will doubtless go unheeded) to AGW acolytes: William Thompson (Lord Kelvin), the pre-eminent physicist of his day, underestimated the age of the earth from its cooling rate (a bit of irony there) by three orders of magnitude. His calculations were correct in form, but neglected the term for heat generated from radioactive decay (which was unknown at the time). Oops.
Climatological calculations are infinitely more complex than Kelvin's simple calculation, with a zillion terms, interactions, and cross-cutting effects (water vapor traps heat, but clouds formed from it reflects sunlight, etc.), plus the likelihood of any number of as yet undiscovered effects. For this reason, a little humility is in order.
So precipitate action is, well, precipitate. Thirty years ago, when global cooling was the rage, some seriously suggested sprinkling the poles with soot to trap more heat. Good thing we ignored that idea, yes?
Bottom line: this (fad) too shall pass, and join Ricky Martin and shark summer in pop culture. Relax, and enjoy life.
Occam's Beard,
Have you not seen photos of the arctic ice melting? It's not a fad! If you have property in Miami or on Manhattan, you might want look into flood insurance (which you won't be able to get), and a row boat (just in case).
Occam's Beard apparently thinks that CO2's effect on LW radiation is related to mass. Clue: it isn't like a wool blanket.
And snark isn't science. It's rhetoric.
Check it out here:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/9/11/114645/811
Jeffrey Davis apparently thinks that my figures refer to mass percentages.
Clue: they referred to relative partial pressure.
Putting the figures on a mole fraction weighted basis - through dividing the partial pressures by the respective molecular weights - would decrease CO2's contribution even further, since its molecular weight (44 amu) is greater than that of N2 (28 amu), O2 (32 amu), or water vapor (18 amu).
So my numbers are the most favorable to your position.
As for "have you seen photos of Arctic ice melting," frankly, that argument is just too silly to warrant refutation.
Occam's Beard, you wrote:
As for "have you seen photos of Arctic ice melting," frankly, that argument is just too silly to warrant refutation.
What is there to refute? You can't refute the photos, unless you think they are faked. Maybe you think that there have been such dramatic losses of arctic ice before, but the experts say there has not been, at least not in the last few centuries. Or maybe you think it's no big deal. Frankly, it doesn't seem like you think too clearly.
mcnamarick, of course some ice melts. Every year. Obtaining a photo of ice melting should be well within even your ken. (If necessary, ask a grownup what time of year would be best.) Should I refute your argument with a photo of snow falling? Would you accept that as a counterargument? (Not sure I want to know the answer to that question.)
(And please don't give me the "polar bears are drowning" nonsense. Polar bears (Linnaean name Ursus maritimus, "bear of the sea") swim over 50 miles out to sea while hunting.)
Here's a bonus question: Minnesota has been covered in glaciers four times in the last 10,000 years (IIRC), but isn't now. Why?
In the meantime, consider well the Kelvin story. It's very apposite.
Well, I'll admit it Occam's Beard,
You are just too smart and grown-up for me to be able to keep up with you.
But just a couple of things: 1) My calling attention to the photos of abnormally rapidly melting arctic ice is not an argument. The argument is self-evident to anyone keeping up with the matter, arctic ice is melting in a previously unseen way, you know, since record-keeping began. What will happen as a result? No one knows for sure. But chances are that if the Greenland ice sheet goes into the ocean, and if there is further warming across the globe generally, then there will almost certainly be a dramatic rise in sea level, and I use the word "almost" reluctantly.
You seem pretty into the historical details, so surely you know that there have been radical differences in sea levels at different times throughout Earth's history. Are those kinds of changes not possible in time frames shorter than over centuries and centuries? It seems so. It has nothing to do with human causation, well, next to nothing, the results will be the same regardless.
Maybe you think that some unanticipated climate phenomena will turn the tide and bring back the kind of yearly temperatures that will stop glacial ice from melting and even begin to rebuild the glaciers. But that quite a stretch, isn't it? Or maybe the prospects scare you so deeply that you can't accept the facts. The facts include such well-publicized events as two cat. 5 hurricanes hitting land the same day for the first time ever, and the loss of snow and ice on top of the worlds' mountains. How someone could become as smart as you obviously are and not be up on these current events is puzzling.
And 2) The polar bear thing is not about them drowning per se, as they won't have time for that. It is the fact that they need the ice in order to feed, so without it they starve. They might then drown before they succumb, but that is irrelevant.
I think you are just foolin', and well done! In any case, I am pretty sure I will not be seeing any need to respond to whatever else you may have to say. Though maybe you'll surprise me.
mcnamarick, I'm not scared at all, not of global warming, nor of killer bees, not of the population bomb (going back to the 70s), not of global cooling (another 70s blight, quite like bell bottoms), not of power lines, not cell phones, nor of Y2K.
Maybe you think that some unanticipated climate phenomena [sic] will turn the tide and bring back the kind of yearly temperatures that will stop glacial ice from melting and even begin to rebuild the glaciers.
Begs the question.
As for the polar bears, perhaps we need to raise taxes to buy them life vests, and send in delivery pizzas.
Some day you will look back on the global warming hysteria and deny you ever really believed it. Believe me. You will. (I deny I ever wore bell bottoms.) You'll say something like, "Yeah, well, you know, I always kinda wondered about it, but I figured better safe than sorry." But in your heart, you'll know: you fell for it hook, line, and sinker.
Okay, Occam's Beard, here goes: The way you list the things that you are not scared of seems to imply that you are not afraid of global warming, because like those other scares you listed, this one won't come true and go nuclear holocaust (you left that one out) on us.
I, on the other hand, am not scared of it because I have considered the possibilities and put them into proper perspective for me, which is to say that if it (tremendous sea-level rise and radical changes to climate patterns) happens, or if anything else might happen (say Yellowstone park blowing up - and it someday will) that could result in unmanageable catastrophes, I will have prepared myself as best I could for the consequences. And of course, if I should die, either alone or with millions of others, we won't know the difference, so that is not so scary.
Also, Maybe you think that some unanticipated climate phenomena [sic] will turn the tide and bring back the kind of yearly temperatures that will stop glacial ice from melting and even begin to rebuild the glaciers. Not [sic], I think. La Nina and El Nino represent just two climate phenomena, each being a climate phenomenon.
Finally, I hope you are right on this climate change thing. I really do. I wouldn't mind being ridiculed mercilessly if there is nothing to climate change. I just find it curious that someone seemingly of reasonable intelligence could think that there are not challenges to all of us, many of which that are, of course, totally beyond our control; and some of which that are easily controllable; but some which that seem very large and hard to handle, yet which might be controllable, and which are thus worthy of the potential problem-solving efforts of those capable of recognizing and understanding such challenges.
Of course the world must need cynics too. You did get me. You got me good. I am laughing.
I meant to write "You did get me, though. You got me good." Subtle, but it does seem to make a difference.
And what do you mean "I deny I ever wore bell bottoms"? Bell bottoms are still fun once in a while! Admit it.
mcnamarick, fair enough. We part friends.
I make room for the possibility that I am discounting a real threat, but before taking any drastic action I want to be pretty sure it's needed. It's kind of like saying someone may be getting a mole on his wrist, could be melanoma, let's amputate his arm. It could just be a boo boo, too.
As for cynicism, a cynic would say that Al Gore casted about for an issue to act as a vehicle for his political resurrection after coming unglued post January 2001, found resonance among various anti-capitalist/ development/ globalization/ eco fanatics, and the media picked up the story to fill column inches.
A skeptic would say that the data for anthropogenic global warming are insufficient to sustain the hypothesis, which in any case it's somewhere between difficult and impossible to falsify.
By these criteria, I'm both a cynic and a skeptic.
Occam's Beard,
This was the most fun I have had "blogging". I would have had a hard time explaining that to my grandparents. Thanks, Occam's. You seem brave, informed, and probably fun to drink with. Cheers.
And, oh yeah, I am an Al Gore fan. But I think that was truly funny, and very possibly true, what you said about him just above. Touche!
mcnamarick, thanks. I echo your sentiments exactly. Should the circumstance somehow ever arise, I'd be proud to buy you a drink, along with my friend Ymarsarkar.
The irony is that I voted for Al Gore in 2000 (true), which along with my confidently expecting the Colts to whomp the Jets in Super Bowl III (yep, I'm that old) is something I have to remind myself of periodically when I'm sure I'm right.
Gore put me off for good by challenging the result of the 2000 election (despite failing to carry his home state), thereby clearly putting his personal aggrandizement before the good of the nation. In a similar situation (the 1960 election), Nixon (to his credit) refused to do that, and took one for the team, despite widespread evidence of voting fraud. If Gore were a better man, he would have done the same.
Man I really wish I had saved it now...but I remember reading somewhere about a journalist that was going through some old newspaper archives from the early 1900s and came across some stories about glaciers melting faster than they have ever been in recorded history and unless something was done soon the glaciers would soon be gone.
I need to find that link.....it was quite interesting and the implications were pretty clear. Wind blows, rivers flow, glaciers melt. That's what they do.
Occam's,
Gore put me off for good by challenging the result of the 2000 election...
Funny, Gore lost me when he abandoned his attempt to claim his popular election. And you and I voted for him too, really funny. Wouldn't it be great if any of us really knew all the answers?
And Sam, maybe you'll find the link, but everyone knows there have been no glaciers in habitable Canada and the U.S. in 10,000 years. This apparent current melting seems to be a little different. I don't want to be an alarmist. Quite the contrary, I would always favor the optimistic outlook. But, this apparent current melting seems to be a little different.
Wind blows, rivers flow, glaciers melt. That's what they do. Well, yeah, things change. The point is, if we could anticipate the changes, maybe we could do something to mitigate the consequences.
The ice is melting more than it has in, what, the last several centuries? OMG!!!!! Folks, the earth is billions of years old. At least in the last 700 million years the relative level of the ocean is reference to the land has changed a multitude of times - actually, its always changing.
Why? Because we are literally never at complete stasis between the crustal movements (including subduction and the raising of mountain ranges) of the 'light' rocks, as well as the changes in climate and temperature that fluctuate tremendously. So, that is why you will find the petrified trunks of trees in Alaska that belong to tropic and semi-tropic zones; that is why the continental shelf is, indeed, the continental shelf (the long-term level of water during the longer - greater than 50,000 year- ice ages of the past) has been the true demarcation between the 'traditional' (sounds funny using it htat way) sea level and what we have now; it is also why you have parts of the Sierra Nevada that was carved by glaciers (mountain variety, not the big sheetlike continental glaciers of the Canadian shield and midwest).
Basically, the last few hundred years is a pretty decent amount of time for us humans, but in earth time, JUST the time when we have fossil evidence for life on earth, not the much longer proto-life time, is, let's be generous and say the last 300 years since the last Little Ice Age, versus 600 million years (being conservative [horrors!] for ya'll) for higher life forms starting up, gives us a relative time difference of (finishes counting on toes) 5.0 x 10-7, or in the five ten-millionths range. This is similar to the last 600 million years being a 24 hour clock, and the human period of the last 300 years would be an unnoticeable minute movement of the second hand as it clicked onto the '12' position, to show 'today time.'
All I try to point out with this, is that the current crop of humans knows little to nothing about earth's history and its natural systems. The theory of plate techtonics, as well as climatological changes that have been going on well before humans showed up (or our first mammalian progenitors), are only two of the mega-systems mentioned, and there are many others. Histories earlier polar bear equivalents had to adjust or die, as will the species living today.
By the way, the way the continents are currently lined up (roughly linear, north-south) have given the earth the greatest number of different species in at least the last 300 million years (north-south orientation goes through many more temperature zones than one big lump of a continent, or few continents in a oval mass). So, as the Indian subcontinent continues to smash at incredible (earth-speed) into the Asian landmass, and the African-Europe landmasses continue deformation as they act on each other), many more species are going to die than be created.
But does it matter, in human-time?
So my numbers are the most favorable to your position.
Well, no.
You don't understand how CO2 and LW radiation interact. Your example is irrelevant.
a cynic would say that Al Gore casted about for an issue to act as a vehicle for his political resurrection after coming unglued post January 2001 - Occam
A cynic would have to find a way to explain why Gore has been showing the slide show which became "An Inconvenient Truth" since 1987, and wrote "Earth in the Balance" in 1992.
Occam's wrote:
Anthropogenic CO2 amounts to 0.03% of the total CO2 partial pressure,
and then wrote:
Putting the figures on a mole fraction weighted basis - through dividing the partial pressures by the respective molecular weights - would decrease CO2's contribution even further, since its molecular weight (44 amu) is greater than that of N2 (28 amu), O2 (32 amu), or water vapor (18 amu).
This doesn't seem to cohere. If you're saying anthropogenic C02 is 0.03% of the total CO2 partial pressure, then what is the relevance of the molecular weights of other, non-C02 atmospheric components? The anthropogenic C02 is a portion of the total CO2; its proportion of the total atmosphere is irrelevant. The figure either is 0.03%, or it isn't. And the percentage of anthropogenic CO2 to total CO2 will be the same whether you express it in partial pressure, moles, mass or molecules. They're all proportional.
In any case, your figures are off:
For 400,000 years prior to the industrial revolution, atmospheric CO2 concentrations remained between 200 to 280 parts per million (ppm). As a result of the industrial and agricultural activities of humans, current atmospheric CO2 concentrations are around 380 ppm, increasing at about 1% per year....The atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide is now higher than experienced on Earth for at least the last 400,000 years, and is expected to continue to rise, leading to significant temperature increases by the end of this century.
-- http://www.research.noaa.gov/spotlite/spot_gcc.html
Those that wish to douse the fervour of the Algore Humans-Cause-GlobalCatastrophe group and enjoy real studies without animus, take a gander at
http://www.ecd.bnl.gov/steve/pubs/HeatCapacity.pdf
Interesting reading.
Oh, and booksfoe, the NOAA is a hotbed of Global Warming Fervour, and isn't particularly reliable when it comes to the 'data' for HIGW (Human-Induced-Global Warming)