Many have bent my ear over the last few months about global warming skepticism. So I’ve just done some moderate digging, and conclude: In the last half billion years, CO2 has at times been 15 times denser, but not more than 10C warmer. So that is about as bad as warming could get.
The graph just shows that people have used more aerosols since the 1960s. Without comparing that to other factors involved in the climate, that really means *very* little for the case in favour of AGW.
Because of the human desire to attribute blame and administer punishment. It makes a better story for the environmental activists if industrial humans are evil sinners, and they can charge in on a white knight and SAVE THE WORLD from the evil industrialist forces.
Right - but why would one think that the warming risks weigh more heavily than the risk of reglaciation - which seems to be both obviously an enormous catastrophe - and *highly* likely - unless we actively warm the planet up.
Your quote from Steve Dutch got me interested enough to go to his site and read some of it. He may, for all I know, be correct in his views in his field. But despite his stated intention to limit himself to his areas of technical competence, he is making arguments that depend on economics as well--in particular the bit you quoted about how conservatives should treat fossil fuels. Judging by that--and my subsequent correspondence with him--he had never heard of Harold Hotelling's classic analysis of the economics of depletable resources, done seventy years ago. When pointed at an explanation of it he reacted with scorn and incomprehension.
The incomprehension was signaled by his lumping together the peak oil controversy, which is relevant to the issue of depletable resources and the economics thereof, with the global warming controversy, which (from the economic point of view) depends on a public good problem that has nothing to do with depletable resources. Earlier he seemed to think that the extinction of the passenger pigeons--a standard tragedy of the commons--somehow invalidated Hotelling's analysis.
One of the ways in which I judge sources of expert information is by finding some area that overlaps with things I know something about and seeing whether they get that right. Judged by that standard, I wouldn't rely very heavily on Dutch's analysis. He not only doesn't understand the relevant economics, which isn't that surprising, he is also confident that he does.
I'm not entirely sure I agree with the link. To the extent that it says "You should debate the *strongest* argument/opponent", sure.
But what about the case (As in climate denial) where there *are* no strong arguments/opponents. The fact is, that yes, the combination of a large quantity of opponents, but no opponents of quality, *does* indicate a substantial weakness in the position they're defending.
I am also relatively sceptical, but less so now that I have plotted a simple chart of temperature and atmospheric co2 in my blog. I was quite surprised by the fit.
As several posters have written, most "skeptics" agree with what you write in this article, and only disagree with the political choices that follow from it. In essence, you buried one of the most important parts of the debate:
"This uncertainty alone justifies substantial CO2 mitigation (emission cuts or geoengineering), if we are risk-averse enough and if mitigation risks are weaker."
The second if is huge, but you listed it as an if within an if within a random bullet in the middle of the list. The Kyoto protocol has huge costs but minimal effect on CO2, and therefore minimal effect on CO2-based global warming. Even if CO2 is really harmful, how is this a helpful response?
to loqi who cited that reversed stupidity is not intelligence, recall also this post:http://lesswrong.com/lw/ih/...
Please re-read the paragraph containing the bolded passage I was responding to, and note that it was not phrased in terms of missing good arguments. Rather, it was a generalization of the quality of the "comments put out", and a litany of complaints about specific arguments. To open a statement with "What convinces me of the reality of climate change, despite the uncertainties" and conclude with the above is indefensible.
If there were legitimate technical arguments against global warming, we would very likely expect at least one intellectual conservative to have dug them up and presented them, instead of providing an argument that is pure bunk.
I agree that someone would have presented them, otherwise they're not really arguments, are they? As you claim there's no such thing as an intellectual conservative, they won't present them, the scientists will. Back in reality, I agree more completely. Please provide me with convincing evidence that this hasn't happened. Note that my personal lack of exposure to such arguments counts as roughly zero evidence to me, because I haven't looked particularly hard for them. How confident are you in the thoroughness of your search?
Tied into this core concept is the idea that there are no intellectual conservatives
So, I really hope by "intellectual" you mean some specific culture of academics, and not "a genuinely intelligent person who shares valuable insights with the public". Because if you mean something like the latter, you seem to be claiming that there is no such thing as an intelligent human being with conservative values.
There are a few possible theories to explain this (science has been overtaken by liberals, conservative results are squished by “big science,” studying science somehow brainwashes you) the most popular one seems to me the least far fetched: the truth tends to match up with more progressive beliefs, therefore people who care more about the truth tend to be more progressive.
As someone with values that could easily be described as "progressive", I'd like to emphasize that there is no such thing as progressive or conservative beliefs. If you label your state of belief about the world as "progressive", just because it correlates with the states of belief of other people you also label "progressive", you run the risk of catastrophic stupidity.
Now I know the discourse on this has been quite technical, but it is hard for me to believe that any possibility is more likely than the last few intellectual conservatives assigning extra importance to an issue for political reasons so they don’t have to give up on their original beliefs.
With this, you are rendered incoherent. There are no intellectual conservatives, but the last few are responsible for the best technical rebuttals of AGW? Even if you're right, what will that actually tell you about the arguments at hand?
Heyas. I posted a comment a few hours ago and I guess it violated some rule of moderation. Anyone have a link to the rules so I can avoid problems with moderation in the future?
Global warming skepticism is a trap which the Right predictably fell into. Predictable, because the Left has done this over and over; most damagingly over evolution and eugenics. Back in the early 20th century, the Left claimed that the truth of Darwinian evolutionary theory morally required eugenic policies. The Right, appalled by the immorality of eugenics, fought back not by challenging the Left's derivation of "ought from is", but by denying the "is". This worked well enough, given the politics of the day, until Hitler made eugenics a dirty word and the Left abandoned it as a policy. (The vestigial creationism on the Right is focused mainly on the perception that Darwinism justifies what they see as sexual immorality, even though the left doesn't actually push that line anymore, either.)
There are still some uncertainties in the science of global warming, and there are a lot of people pushing certain policy proposals by exaggerating what the science actually does say, but the case against a carbon tax does not depend on disproving any aspect of currently-accepted climate science. The sooner the Right realizes that, the better.
The really important question with respect to global warming is not whether it is occurring, or even whether it is significantly human-caused, but "what is to be done". That question does depend on the answers to the first two questions, but also on other factors. The green-left consensus proposals can be easily shown to be bad ideas while still assuming that AGW exists and will likely continue. (See, for example, Bjorn Lomborg's "Cool It", in which he supports the claims for GW being A, but disagrees with pretty much every one of the green-left policy proposals.)
ES asks whether it matters whether GW is A, and the answer is "yes", because if the cause is certain human actions, it may be possible to change or reverse those human actions. If, on the other hand, GW is entirely caused by solar variability, no amount of CO2 emission reduction will help. (Actually, it matters more than that, as reduction of CO2 emission is effectively the *only* policy proposal to address GW.)
Aaaaand five years later, I'd be curious to know how Robin (and others) have adjusted their beliefs on AGW in this time?
The graph just shows that people have used more aerosols since the 1960s. Without comparing that to other factors involved in the climate, that really means *very* little for the case in favour of AGW.
Because of the human desire to attribute blame and administer punishment. It makes a better story for the environmental activists if industrial humans are evil sinners, and they can charge in on a white knight and SAVE THE WORLD from the evil industrialist forces.
Right - but why would one think that the warming risks weigh more heavily than the risk of reglaciation - which seems to be both obviously an enormous catastrophe - and *highly* likely - unless we actively warm the planet up.
It seems like a paywall to me.
Your quote from Steve Dutch got me interested enough to go to his site and read some of it. He may, for all I know, be correct in his views in his field. But despite his stated intention to limit himself to his areas of technical competence, he is making arguments that depend on economics as well--in particular the bit you quoted about how conservatives should treat fossil fuels. Judging by that--and my subsequent correspondence with him--he had never heard of Harold Hotelling's classic analysis of the economics of depletable resources, done seventy years ago. When pointed at an explanation of it he reacted with scorn and incomprehension.
The incomprehension was signaled by his lumping together the peak oil controversy, which is relevant to the issue of depletable resources and the economics thereof, with the global warming controversy, which (from the economic point of view) depends on a public good problem that has nothing to do with depletable resources. Earlier he seemed to think that the extinction of the passenger pigeons--a standard tragedy of the commons--somehow invalidated Hotelling's analysis.
One of the ways in which I judge sources of expert information is by finding some area that overlaps with things I know something about and seeing whether they get that right. Judged by that standard, I wouldn't rely very heavily on Dutch's analysis. He not only doesn't understand the relevant economics, which isn't that surprising, he is also confident that he does.
I'm not entirely sure I agree with the link. To the extent that it says "You should debate the *strongest* argument/opponent", sure.
But what about the case (As in climate denial) where there *are* no strong arguments/opponents. The fact is, that yes, the combination of a large quantity of opponents, but no opponents of quality, *does* indicate a substantial weakness in the position they're defending.
Jonnan
I am also relatively sceptical, but less so now that I have plotted a simple chart of temperature and atmospheric co2 in my blog. I was quite surprised by the fit.
As several posters have written, most "skeptics" agree with what you write in this article, and only disagree with the political choices that follow from it. In essence, you buried one of the most important parts of the debate:
"This uncertainty alone justifies substantial CO2 mitigation (emission cuts or geoengineering), if we are risk-averse enough and if mitigation risks are weaker."
The second if is huge, but you listed it as an if within an if within a random bullet in the middle of the list. The Kyoto protocol has huge costs but minimal effect on CO2, and therefore minimal effect on CO2-based global warming. Even if CO2 is really harmful, how is this a helpful response?
What's your opinion on ocean acidification?
magfrump:
to loqi who cited that reversed stupidity is not intelligence, recall also this post:http://lesswrong.com/lw/ih/...
Please re-read the paragraph containing the bolded passage I was responding to, and note that it was not phrased in terms of missing good arguments. Rather, it was a generalization of the quality of the "comments put out", and a litany of complaints about specific arguments. To open a statement with "What convinces me of the reality of climate change, despite the uncertainties" and conclude with the above is indefensible.
If there were legitimate technical arguments against global warming, we would very likely expect at least one intellectual conservative to have dug them up and presented them, instead of providing an argument that is pure bunk.
I agree that someone would have presented them, otherwise they're not really arguments, are they? As you claim there's no such thing as an intellectual conservative, they won't present them, the scientists will. Back in reality, I agree more completely. Please provide me with convincing evidence that this hasn't happened. Note that my personal lack of exposure to such arguments counts as roughly zero evidence to me, because I haven't looked particularly hard for them. How confident are you in the thoroughness of your search?
Tied into this core concept is the idea that there are no intellectual conservatives
So, I really hope by "intellectual" you mean some specific culture of academics, and not "a genuinely intelligent person who shares valuable insights with the public". Because if you mean something like the latter, you seem to be claiming that there is no such thing as an intelligent human being with conservative values.
There are a few possible theories to explain this (science has been overtaken by liberals, conservative results are squished by “big science,” studying science somehow brainwashes you) the most popular one seems to me the least far fetched: the truth tends to match up with more progressive beliefs, therefore people who care more about the truth tend to be more progressive.
As someone with values that could easily be described as "progressive", I'd like to emphasize that there is no such thing as progressive or conservative beliefs. If you label your state of belief about the world as "progressive", just because it correlates with the states of belief of other people you also label "progressive", you run the risk of catastrophic stupidity.
Now I know the discourse on this has been quite technical, but it is hard for me to believe that any possibility is more likely than the last few intellectual conservatives assigning extra importance to an issue for political reasons so they don’t have to give up on their original beliefs.
With this, you are rendered incoherent. There are no intellectual conservatives, but the last few are responsible for the best technical rebuttals of AGW? Even if you're right, what will that actually tell you about the arguments at hand?
*wipes egg off face*
I'm sorta embarrassed.
I just added to the post.
Heyas. I posted a comment a few hours ago and I guess it violated some rule of moderation. Anyone have a link to the rules so I can avoid problems with moderation in the future?
Global warming skepticism is a trap which the Right predictably fell into. Predictable, because the Left has done this over and over; most damagingly over evolution and eugenics. Back in the early 20th century, the Left claimed that the truth of Darwinian evolutionary theory morally required eugenic policies. The Right, appalled by the immorality of eugenics, fought back not by challenging the Left's derivation of "ought from is", but by denying the "is". This worked well enough, given the politics of the day, until Hitler made eugenics a dirty word and the Left abandoned it as a policy. (The vestigial creationism on the Right is focused mainly on the perception that Darwinism justifies what they see as sexual immorality, even though the left doesn't actually push that line anymore, either.)
There are still some uncertainties in the science of global warming, and there are a lot of people pushing certain policy proposals by exaggerating what the science actually does say, but the case against a carbon tax does not depend on disproving any aspect of currently-accepted climate science. The sooner the Right realizes that, the better.
The really important question with respect to global warming is not whether it is occurring, or even whether it is significantly human-caused, but "what is to be done". That question does depend on the answers to the first two questions, but also on other factors. The green-left consensus proposals can be easily shown to be bad ideas while still assuming that AGW exists and will likely continue. (See, for example, Bjorn Lomborg's "Cool It", in which he supports the claims for GW being A, but disagrees with pretty much every one of the green-left policy proposals.)
ES asks whether it matters whether GW is A, and the answer is "yes", because if the cause is certain human actions, it may be possible to change or reverse those human actions. If, on the other hand, GW is entirely caused by solar variability, no amount of CO2 emission reduction will help. (Actually, it matters more than that, as reduction of CO2 emission is effectively the *only* policy proposal to address GW.)