I don't know if Krugman is right or wrong about climate change but one thing is pretty clear to me: If you're arguing about science using words like treason and betrayal is out of line.
I'd be interested to know if someone who believes that global warming is something that requires our immediate attention can explain why arguing against it so dangerous.
Let's say you are a pilot in an airplane at 30,000 feet and the fuel gage reads 20 minutes from empty. For how long are you willing to debate with your copilot that we need to declare an emergency and land right now? What if the gage is just broken and you think you have 20 minutes of fuel left?
At some point people that feel there is a problem will want to act. And the global worming debate is 20+ years old.
PS: "IPCC First Assessment Report 1990" The panel was established in 1988. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is a scientific intergovernmental body[1][2] tasked to evaluate the risk of climate change caused by human activity. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPCC_First_Assessment_Report
If that were actually the situation, you'd land at the airport 10 minutes away. If you don't, I'd wonder about what you're telling me about the gauge.
If the folks who claim to be so concerned and informed about climate change were serious, we'd be breaking ground on a new nuclear power plant every week or so and we'd be completing them in 2 years.
Instead, we're thinking about breaking ground for some several years from now and the way the regs are set up, those won't get approved when they reach the decision point. The planned construction time also exceeds what could easily be achieved by someone who wanted power soon.
The US gets 20% of its electricity from nuclear. France gets over 70%. Moreover, if we had a huge surplus of electricity, we could start using it for more things.
Instead, we're passing out subsidies to the politically connected.
If you want people to think that climate change is a serious problem, you have to act as if it is. The AGW folks aren't and never have.
Debates just make both sides seem reasonable. Witness how many people in the U.S. take creationism seriously, for instance.
ETA: Robin Hanson once wrote about this effect: http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/04/why-refuse-to-debate.h...
Sure, if you're just arguing about science. Once words like "hoax" and "conspiracy" are thrown about, however, we're not talking about the science anymore.
For example I felt it was sad when all new books by evolution researchers stared to be 50% arguing against the same old tired creationist arguments. I felt the energy would have been better spent advancing the science.
Because the global warming hysteria is an ideology, not Science. You can't argue against über-dogmatic fanatics who know nothing about Science.
If they knew about Science, they would know that "global warming" is a meaningless, stupid name. Understanding the global climate is an infinite-dimensional problem, and one just can't reduce all that complexity to one single bit.
Moreover, "climate change" is also retarded. Call it "global climate crisis" or something.
About the naming though, I wouldn't say that 'climate change' is a retarded way of putting it, because it describes what is happening quite accurately, but I do like your way of putting it. 'Global climate crisis' seems to capture the problem much better.
Seems to me that either the temperature is rising or it is not. Perfectly suitable for one bit of information.
The reasoning for determining the value of said bit is another matter, but I think your argument does not make sense. Unless the climate is stuck in some sort of weird quantum entanglement.
Virtually complete predictive failure over the better part of the last decade. How can anyone justify acting?
The truth is the United States had been steadily making progress on reducing our impact on the planet all the way through the Clinton administration. It was only when the Global Warming nuts popped up that the Conservative side felt the need to throw on the brakes.
Now we have two irrational extreme's competing against each other.
http://www.nimonik.ca/2009/05/global-warming-models-are-inhe...
thanks in advance.
But if you watched the debate on Friday, you didn’t see
people who’ve thought hard about a crucial issue, and are
trying to do the right thing. What you saw, instead, were
people who show no sign of being interested in the truth.
They don’t like the political and policy implications of
climate change, so they’ve decided not to believe in it —
and they’ll grab any argument, no matter how disreputable,
that feeds their denial.
Has the free-market taken us to multiple wars over the past 20-years with countries that have large oil reserves so oil can keep flowing in our direction? Has the free-market kept interest rates far below reality, allowing us to go on a massive consumption binge?
Does the free-market regulate agriculture, discouraging small farms in favor of massive CAFOs? Does the free-market subsidize huge agri-business to produce more corn than we can possibly use?
It's these unchanging economic and foreign policies that encourage waste, consumption, and addiction to fossil fuels, which, in turn, have a negative effect on our planet.
I heard the hysterical arguments in college back in the early seventies about global cooling. This group is no more legimate, but much savvier politically.
Contrary to popular belief, the ice caps are not shriking all the time. Sure, they were shrinking really fast some years ago, and everyone went hysterical because of the rising sea levels and drowning polar bears. But when the ice caps started growing again, no one said a thing. If that isn't cherry-picking, I don't know what is.
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/arctic_thinice.htm...
"Until recently, the majority of Arctic sea ice survived at least one summer and often several. But things have changed dramatically, according to a team of University of Colorado, Boulder, scientists led by Charles Fowler. Thin seasonal ice -- ice that melts and re-freezes every year -- makes up about 70 percent of the Arctic sea ice in wintertime, up from 40 to 50 percent in the 1980s and 1990s. Thicker ice, which survives two or more years, now comprises just 10 percent of wintertime ice cover, down from 30 to 40 percent.
According to researchers from the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo., the maximum sea ice extent for 2008-09, reached on Feb. 28, was 5.85 million square miles. That is 278,000 square miles less than the average extent for 1979 to 2000."
And yep, parts (but only parts) of the Antarctic ice cap are growing -- but guess why? Warmer air creating more snowfall.
You people are hopeless. Data, facts, evidence -- none of it sways you. It's like some religion.
Could warming have caused ice to melt in the northern hemisphere and grow in the Antartic? It's possible, but the explanation starts smelling like a "just so story". The explanation by NASA that the loss of Artic Ice is caused by cyclical changes in global wind patterns seems to better fit the facts. (see http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/lookingatearth/quikscat-200... and http://wattsupwiththat.com/2007/10/03/nh-sea-ice-loss-its-th... )
You people are hopeless. Data, facts, evidence -- none of it sways you. It's like some religion.
Please, let's stop with the personal attacks.
"None of it sways you" -> please spare me of your attacks. They don't add anything to the discussion and they only weaken your point.