I am going to resolve not to exhale. That should keep several thousand pounds of carbon out of the atmosphere. On a less sarcastic note, two of the most interesting things I’ve read on the subject are Freman Dyson’s Global Warming Heresies. As a scientist I have tremendous respect for him, and it’s an interesting and different point of view. Equally interesting is the response from Alun Anderson the editor of New Scientist. Both are worth reading so I won’t bother to summarize here.
The aspect of this debate on Global Warming that I find the most tedious is the focus on whether humans are the cause or not. I mean it’s an interesting question, but it’s sure as hell not the question. Even worse, I am not sure what possible evidence could demonstrate this with any degree of certainty. The questions that matter are
- Is global warming happening? If so,
- How will it impact us, and
- What should we do about it?
There seems to be general agreement, at least among the non-faith-based community, about number one. There seem to be many dire movie plot predictions about the second from lots of people with some sort of axe to gride. As for the third, there seem to be two mainstream positions, both of which are bullshit:
- We need to stop using carbon NOW or else we are DOOMED! DOOMED! and
- Heck, one volcano puts out more carbon than all of us measly humans do in CENTURIES, so let’s go drilling for more oil
Personally, I think there are tons of really good reasons to diversify our energy sources that have nothing to do with catastrophe-mongering. We have far too many eggs in the fossil-fuels basket, and far too much of our fossil fuels are in the hands of crazy people. Our society and our position in the world would benefit greatly by diverse and decentralized means of energy production and less need for consumption. So while I agree with the cause of consuming fewer non-renewable resources, I am annoyed at the demagoguery in the motives of the climate people.
And what is really stupid about the whole discussion is that it takes attention away from the pressing questions about what to do about the things that will happen. There are all kinds of things that might happen and some of them would be pretty catastrophic if they did, but I can’t predict the future, and I’d rather eliminate them as decision-making factors – since they also might not happen, they cancel themselves out as variables in the decision making equation.
Unless something radical happens to reverse what is well underway, lots of arctic ice will melt. That will totally destroy the livelihoods of hundereds of thousands of people up north. So are we going to let them die, are we going to proactively give them the tools they need to find another livelihood, or are we going to do nothing until it’s too late and then pay billions of dollars to move their cities farther inland and let them live on welfare for the rest of their lives?
As lots of this ice melts, a lot of cold water is going to come into play that will be prime fishing waters. It will contain some of the world’s best oil reserves. Unless something else radical happens, world oil production will continue to steadily decline, so these waters, north of Alaska, Russia, Norway, etc. will become super valuable. What does this mean for foreign policy, and should we be starting to work out some of these almost inevitable issues via diplomacy now?
On a lighter note: step by step instructions to make your own bacon – Yum!