Old MySpace Blogpost:
“Gore warns that “what is at stake [is] our ability to live on planet Earth, to have a future as a civilization.” Let’s take a look at some of the evidence that he presents to justify this dire conclusion. He begins by insisting that nothing he has to say is scientifically controversial. Gore claims to be presenting the “scientific consensus” on global warming. But is that so?”
Read more of this illuminating article at ReasonOnline.
I don’t agree with all of the claims the author makes, but it is for the most part a healthy rebutal of Gore’s alarmist documentary. I don’t deny that some degree of global warming is occurring, but statist environmentalists would be just as up-in-arms about global cooling. There are in fact both positive and negative consequences to both. Such climate change is natural, however, and I’m not absolutely convinced that humans are making a significant contribution to global warming (see here for example). Moreover, there is no consensus on what effects global warming is having or will have. One recent study suggests it could cause a mini-ice age in Europe, another suggests it is responsible for increased vegetation (a positive for environmentalists!). As for the negative consequences, we don’t know whether they will outweigh the positive. More importantly, we don’t know if the alleged positive consequences (if any) of the statist public policies recommended by Gore and his alarmist ilk will outweigh by their negative consequences. A sound understanding of political and economic theory and history provides little reason to suspect they will come even close to doing so. Certainly the shaky and highly exaggerated “evidence” provided by the alarmists does not justify them. Finally, Gore and his ilk rarely consider the largely unseen negative consequences of their proposed policies, fail to consider the general superiority of free market solutions, and, as the article indicates toward the end, fail to consider how we can cope with the negative consequences of global warming with existing and possible future technologies, practices, and entrepreneurial innovations.
Consider this: If humans aren’t the primary and/or a significant cause of global warming, then statist policies will not only have their usual predictable negative consequences, but will leave us (especially the poor) less able to cope with the negative consequences of a global warming we didn’t cause and can’t stop. And if we are the primary and/or significant cause, statist policies are still the wrong way to go because they will inevitably hinder economic progress (again harming the poor the most) not only making us less well off materially than we otherwise would have been but also, actually, at the same time and for the same reasons, hindering the advance toward more environmentally-friendly technologies, personal lifestyles, and business strategies. Not to mention the fact that the statist route will serve to perpetuate the plutocracy in this country and the world, as it has always done and will ever do, contrary to the professed wishes of leftists yet perfectly in keeping with their actual actions.
Political Science PhD
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
A comment on my original post made by a friend of mine by the name of Ben:
First, the planet is coming out of the last ice age still. Global warming would be occurring naturally to begin with. The question is how much are humans accelerating that process? For the past 300 years we’ve been dumping tons of carbon dioxide in the air, while at the same reducing more forests that would act as a carbon dioxide sink. I’d say we are at least aggravating the situation considerably. The two biggest problems with carbon dioxide in the air are this:
1) The ocean absorbs far more carbon dioxide than anything else on this planet. There is a saturation point that is quickly being reached, and we are the main culprit in this. The more dissolved CO2 in the water, the more acidic it becomes. Reach a certain point and many species cannot survive in the water. Most vulnerable are smaller critters and plants: plankton and algae. Take these out of the ocean and the entire food web collapses. Correspondingly if the oceans go down, the land falls down with it. Can we as a species survive? Yes without a doubt, but a significant portion of the population would not.
2) Global warming means hotter summers, milder winters. Ice caps melt. Sea levels rise significantly. Most humans live along coastal regions. Most humans live in dirt-poor poverty. Rising of sea level by even a few feet will screw over most humans who live along coastal regions and a impoverished.
Lastly, the free marketplace is capable of figuring out a solution to just about anything. At the last possible minute. When it no longer is profitable to do something, then the market will change. Are there exceptions to this rule? Yes, of course. But for the most part some form of regulation (or at the very least incentive) is needed to steer the market away from one product or method towards another while said product or method is still extremely profitable.
In other words, the free marketplace is the last chance to effect change, it should not be the first.
I don’t buy it, Ben. Regarding forestation, you should have a look at the actual data.
1) What is the saturation point? Tell me, O’Wise One. Can you tell me with a reasonable degree of certainty that we will reach it? And when?
2) It’s not like the ice caps will melt all at once and dump all of their water into the oceans suddenly causing sea levels to rise in a matter of minutes, hours, days, years, or even a decade or three. Also, global warming means longer growing seasons.
Of course, it’s difficult to tell whether you actually believe any of what you wrote, Ben, given your predilection for bullshitting and aggravation.
Here’s another interesting article on the exaggeration by alarmist environmentalists and here is another on Michael Crichton’s novel State of Fear that looks at the actual scientific evidence underlying the fictional tale he tells.
And here’s an article that, while it promulgates the usual environmentalist line that humans are the cause of global warming, buries evidence to the contrary deep at the bottom of the article where it will receive less notice. The relevant passages:
“The authors note, however, that the records for MIS 13 and 15 are not as clear as they are for MIS 11. One complicating factor is that the ice core records do not exactly match records from marine sediments that are used to help date the ice core data.
New insights important for understanding the impact early human activities such as land clearing and rice culture had on atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations, the topic of several recent studies, are also now available, thanks to the methane and carbon dioxide records from the EPICA Dome C ice core. The new record shows that natural variability can result in significant oscillations in greenhouse gasses during some interglacial periods and raises the possibility that early human activities may not be responsible for the greenhouse gas variability seen as early as 10,000 years ago, writes Ed Brook from Oregon State University in Corvallis, Oregon in a related Perspective article.
The greenhouse gas record from EPICA Dome C during past ice ages also provides indirect evidence for abrupt climate change in the past, the authors found. This suggests that abrupt climatic events on time scales relevant to societies may be common features of the last climatic cycles.”
Though it would more reasonably read ‘decreases the possibility that human beings are responsible’ for global warming rather than the misleading ‘raises the possibility that early human activities may not be responsible’. Another article actually admits that it will take centuries…centuries!…for temperatures to rise, ice caps to melt, and sea levels to rise to the degree that alarmists imply is imminent. Of course, the article maintains an alarmist tone and the model unrealistically assumes that humans will continue to use the the same fossil fuels in a ‘business-as-usual manner’.
You must log in to post a comment.