Climate change could mean the extinction of our species

[fivekatz]

Yeah, I was discussing that crucial point with my cousin a coupla weeks ago. Naomi Klein used the apt term climate chaos.... And that's what it amounts to. By pumping all this carbon -- via oil, coal and natural gas -- into the atmosphere, well, we're creating a lot of chaos....
And, too, as Noam Chomsky pointed out: say the scientists are wrong about climate change. OK, then you've done a few things and spent a bit of money. But say they're right. Then the species is down the drain.
I mean, we're literally gambling on our own fate.
And, again, as Chomsky points out: we don't have to do this. I mean, there are alternatives.... Why don't we explore those alternatives? I mean, even from the standpoint of pollution. By switching to other forms of energy you reduce pollution. That's a benefit to us. And, too, to future generations.
But a market system doesn't take into account a cost to us, to people. I mean, when there's a traffic accident, well, the GNP goes up. So, that's a benefit to the market system. That gives you an indication of how warped GNP measuring is.

David Suzuki: the economy is not science

You make good points. It seems so obvious in the abstract. Use less fossil fuel and even if there is no relation to the climate, you render the strategic importance of the Middle East declines greatly. The entire region at that point can go on about dealing with its issues and outside of nuclear prolifiration who cares? And the even if burning oil and coal does not men the end of mankind it is unhealthy.

Much of the problem is political will in the face of both enormously powerful players and a bad economy. For the powerful players, the Haliburton's and Exxon's of the world are likely to spend whatever it takes to slow the move to alternatives and move to those alternatives on parallel tracks. But in the face of economic downturn some of the remedies like cap and trade do lose public support.

Looking forward we can only hope that while we will be getting started late, that when mankind finally does take this seriously that we can avoid the most catastrophic possibilities.

[Stavros]

As Trish has tried to explain, we have a situation on which science is being hi-jacked by politics, those partisan actors whose primary anxiety is about government introducing carbon taxes or other measures to combat climate change which they see as either expensive, or unnecessary or in the case of subsidies for alternative energy programmes, as a racket filling the pockets of organised tree-huggers. The result is this astonishing attack on science per se, as if since the Rio summit science had got it all wrong. There may be a conversion here of the anti-science lobby withe the the fundamentalists who don't believe in Evolution but creationism, and the few who are uncomfortable with the moral dimensions of stem-cell research and its applications; yet the anti-science lobby that repeatedly pours scorn on climate science does not ridicule the science of computing, or theoretical physics, or the Curiosity on Mars. This is a tail wagging the dog: they don't like taxes or subsidies (unless its for agriculture) therefore the science must be wrong...

[Stavros]

Much of the problem is political will in the face of both enormously powerful players and a bad economy. For the powerful players, the Haliburton's and Exxon's of the world are likely to spend whatever it takes to slow the move to alternatives and move to those alternatives on parallel tracks. But in the face of economic downturn some of the remedies like cap and trade do lose public support.

Just from a business point of view, if Exxon cannot make a profit in renewables, why should it stay in the business? The major independent oil companies have never been major players in R&D, if you look at which industrial corporations spend most on the R&D that benefits their business, you will find it is in Chemicals and computing; oil companies rely on other people's research in computing for example, but don't contribute much in the way of R&D capital. They can afford to buy what they don't make themselves. Renewables has problems of storage, and the technological innovations that will substantially increase production, but attracts less research funding than other industries, and until those innovations make renewables profitable, for the major oil corporations it is just window dressing -and why can't someone else do it anyway? Exxon is good at what it does, and it may have to reform itself into a broader energy company in the future to survive -and may just buy up any profitable renewables company, but right now it has enough hydrocarbons to keep it going.

[fivekatz]

Just from a business point of view, if Exxon cannot make a profit in renewables, why should it stay in the business? The major independent oil companies have never been major players in R&D, if you look at which industrial corporations spend most on the R&D that benefits their business, you will find it is in Chemicals and computing; oil companies rely on other people's research in computing for example, but don't contribute much in the way of R&D capital. They can afford to buy what they don't make themselves. Renewables has problems of storage, and the technological innovations that will substantially increase production, but attracts less research funding than other industries, and until those innovations make renewables profitable, for the major oil corporations it is just window dressing -and why can't someone else do it anyway? Exxon is good at what it does, and it may have to reform itself into a broader energy company in the future to survive -and may just buy up any profitable renewables company, but right now it has enough hydrocarbons to keep it going.

I agree with everything you say. But as they see the threat to the current business model more serious they will spend more on acquisition and R&D into renewables. Just like Microsoft did not take the internet seriously and then threw everything legal and quasi-legal they had at IE so will the major energy producers once they see an emerging market.

Now IMHO that market's emergence is either accelerated by government policy like or similar to cap and trade or it comes in the face of a great catastrophe. Given the recent history of capitalistic markets over the last the
two centuries we should all hope that the government give guidance and incentive to these markets.

Just my Take

[trish]

Krugman has a nice take on the GOP's anti-science, anti-reason epistemology.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/11/op...?smid=pl-share

[Prospero]

You can count on Krugman to get to the heart of things. He's a good political thinker and writer.

[Ben]

Secret funding helped build vast network of climate denial thinktanks

Anonymous billionaires donated $120m to more than 100 anti-climate groups working to discredit climate change science:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environmen...ktanks-network

[trish]

Newest evidence from ice cores demonstrates there is little or no gap in the time between carbon level increase in the atmosphere and past warming episodes. Deniers always presumed these gaps existed and were large, hinting at their belief that carbon levels never contributed to past warnings.

http://nyti.ms/15U2SRW

[martin48]

http://conscious.com.au/docs/new/CSIROh_20130201a.pdf

This all looks impressive until you attempt to read it. As Ben Cubby, environment editor at the Sydney Morning Herlad said "how does one critically analyse a pile of horse shit?"

Enjoy

[Prospero]

That report has no substance at all - merely unsupported slur after unsupported slur. It makes for unpleasant and disturbing reading.