DISQUS

well spoken sir.

Fair enough, I don't disagree with the conclusion at all. My personal feeling is that the arguments are a lot more complex and nuanced than are being presented, perhaps that's because I've been studying atmospheric science for the last 5 years. From what I've learned, there is little room for any scientific doubt that the climate is warming due to anthropogenic activity. Even most of the (scientific) skeptics are changing their argument from "it's not happening" to "it's not going to be that bad." Which in and of itself should tell people something.

So yes, I agree with the sentiment of the video, but being a scientist, I see to many problems in the simplified arguments in the video for the argument to stand up to any sort of scrutiny, but that's no excuse for inaction.

My point was simply that if you spend money to counteract climate change and it turns out to be false (which is very likely not true), his consequence is Cost + global recession (worst case). If we spend money to counteract climate change and climate change is real then we are still stuck with the cost, but we avoid a global recession??? This is where his argument breaks down. If we spend the same amount of money in both cases and the only difference is that climate change was or was not human caused, how exactly did he avoid having the global recession he had for the box in the upper left?

This argument is a variation of Pascal's wager (although there is actually scientific evidence that man made climate change is real). While I personally believe in Climate Change being man made climate change and the dire need for action, I think the argument made in the video is not logically sound...

First, column A in his little chart should have the same economic consequences associated with them. If we do something about Global Climate Change (GCC) then we have to assume that we'll spend equal amounts of money whether or not GCC is man made or not. This would logically lead to the same economic consequences, the only difference being whether we fixed (or controlled) the problem, or there wasn't a problem. That's just one flaw in the argument.

The truth is we don't know what the economic consequences are of combating global climate change, and we WILL experience the some of the consequences, the question is the magnitude of Climate Change we should expect. Voluntary emission reductions and waiting for the next US president to do something isn't helping matters. What does tend to push towards solutions is money and funding. I'm sure if we spent Iraq War sums of money on clean energy technology we'd be a lot closer to fixing the problem.

I'm thinking that you may be interested in the book: Nonviolence by Mark Kurlansky. My Dad gave it to me, I just read it, and its very thought provoking. One thing that you learn right away is that there is no active word for "nonviolence" in any language that is not the negation of "violence". Pacifism is not active, nonviolence is. I highly recommend the book if you've got some spare reading time.

Is that the type of computer I think it is? Is it yours?

Hey Mike, regarding offsets here is an interesting article about them.
http://environmentalresearchweb.org/cws/article...

At a recent geophysical science meeting there was discussion of the carbon footprint of scientists going to conferences. People thought that the conference should offset this carbon, and the above article was born from that.

My personal view on offsets is that while offsets can be a satisfying solution to our carbon intensive lifestyle, the best place to focus our efforts should be on conservation and elimination of carbon intensive activities.

You should get real bikes...it's a thrill when you are providing the power that makes you go 30 mph. I topped out at 37 on my ride this morning...of course real bikes means wearing spandex and real bikers shave their legs, so it's understandable if fossil fuel propelled vehicles are more appealing...

That's great news, congratulations to you both.

You should refer to the Chili Cheese Burrito by it's original name: the Chilito.
http://www.chilicheese.org/cc/serious.asp

You should make the archive more accessible. Yeah, I know how to get to it...but links would be nice too.

You should make the archive more accessible. Yeah, I know how to get to it...but links would be nice too.