Al Gore Doesn't Exhale or: How The Elitists Should Stop Worrying and Be the Change
So, as promised to a co-worker I watched An Inconvenient Truth tonight (what a way to spend a Friday night!). Since I didn't feel like paying for the priviledge I managed to optain a copy of Al Gore's movie thanks to another one of Al Gore's creations - the Interweb!
Because this ended up being a long blog I'm putting my feeling on climate change at the top rather than buried at the back. I'm skeptical about global warming, which doesn't mean I deny it exists, it means I'm a skeptic. Both about the consequences and the solutions. The earth is heating up and, for the most part, has been for thousands of years. Is this a result of greenhoue gases? I'm waiting to be convinced. Are we facing an armageddon than requires trillions of (tax) dollars to fix? I think not. My main objection is that most people who profess to be deeply concerned by global warming suggest solutions involving a high degree of central planning. Should we reduce our emissions, not just of CO2, but of everything? Yes, and we are in terms of using more efficient applicances, driving more efficient cars, and generaly polluting less. All without any help from the government. If you think the 1 Tonne Challenge is the reason I bought a Civic instead of a Malibu think again, it was the $1,000 a year in gas money I saved.
And in case you're wondering about the title of this post, just watch the credits of the movie. Apparently, you can decrease your CO2 emissions to 0. Personally, I'm not holding breath.
And so, largely because I want to have notes for the Monday morning water cooler conversation, here are my thoughts:
- Around the 20 min mark Gore presents a graph comparing CO2 and global temperature over the last 650,000 years. The two lines follow each other for most of that time, then the CO2 emissions jump dramatically so naturally the temperature... actually, he never shows what happened to temperature at the time the CO2 content jumped. Probably an editing error.
- Around 54 mins in Gore lists diseases which are increasing, suggesting this is a result of climate change. Among those listed, Multi-drug Resistant TB. Huh. All this time I thought drug resistant diseases were caused by diseases adapting to the drugs we used to fight them. He also mentions the rapid spread of West Nile. A disease the seems to be causing about 100 deaths annually in the US. Pretty close to the number of people killed by lightning in the US each year. Surely there's a better example of our imminent doom out there.
- Many people who argue the threat of climate change respond to my point that earth has been warming since the last ice age with "it's never happened this fast before." Gore helps me out here by pointing out that when an inland glacial sea spilled into the Atlantic the earth went from present day temperatures to an ice age in ten years. I owe you one Al.
- Gore also brings up many times when the scientific models predicting effects of climate change turned out to be wrong. His examples are always of underestimation. But if the scientists are wrong so often, how do we know which parts they're right about?
- Gore also tells the story of a scientist that NASA tried to silence about global warming. I guess big brother doesn't always know best.
- Gore tells a lot of stories about areas that will be flooded, animals that will be killed by rising sea leves. Where's the law of averages here? What about the deserts that will become arable? The species that will flourish. My point is that significant change will have negative and positive consequences, who are we to dictate that things should never change.
- At another point Gore mentions that out of 900+ scientific articles on global warming not a single one disputes it. First of all, this seems pretty fishy, surely there's someone out there with a dissenting opinion. If I asked 900 peole if they liked chocolate I doubt everyone would be on the same page. My suspicion is that included in the 900+ are those who said "Yes, the earth is warming up, but..." And, to quote Dennis Miller, dissent is good the last time 60 million people were all on the same page was Germany in 1935 and the results weren't pretty."
- Finally, the movie waits right until the end and uses the credits to offer a few suggestions. According to ClimateChange.net my carbon footprint is average, according to the Competitive Entreprise Institute my friend Al's carbon footprint is about 180 times mine.
Maybe if he chose to set an example instead of pumping out more CO2 in a year than I will in my life I'd take Al Gore more serially. Until then, I'll be busy keeping a watch out for Manbearpig!
posted by Matt at 10:51 PM
5 Comments:
"most people who profess to be deeply concerned by global warming suggest solutions involving a high degree of central planning"
-If you mean the kind of central planning that regulates we have seat belts in cars, don't use leaded gasoline or leaded paint and don't sell tobacco and alcohol to 12 year olds, then yes, that's what we mean. Our 'free' market isn't free of regulation, nor should it be. Is there a time to use regulation as a last resort when there is an important issue to be dealt with?
-The graph doesn't show the corresponding increase in temperature (when the CO2 goes 'off the chart') because on a 600,000 year time line you don't notice that there's a 50-100 year lag between an increase in CO2 and temperature. Is the point of that graph to show what is happening now or what is projected to happen but hasn't happened yet? What is the use of a warning if people wait to see what is happening? (think Katrina?)
-Typically dry areas become drier and wet areas become wetter. In the face of a major disruption I don't think its rational to assume just as many dry areas become arable. Yes, it might happen, but what does the science say? And do we trust the science or chance?
-The 900 reports are the kind that you have to have credentials to write, and in order to get credentials you have to do lots of peer-reviewed research. Of course, this leads to the idea of a scientific hoax being pulled by the 'in' group of scientists on an unsuspecting public. Is there a historical precedent for scientists all banding together to fool the public, and doing so flawlessly? Is there a precedent for big-money political interests using dis-information campgaigns to make you think that? (tobacco, racism, WMD in Iraq?)
Yes, I'm asking rather smug and impudent questions, in response to a rather smug post. Of course this means that my questions to you should not be taken seriously. After all, I'm not a scientist or policy maker, so what do I know about being a skeptic.
January 06, 2007 1:08 AM
Mog-maar is absolutly right when he says that you cannot see the lag between the rise of CO2 and temperature rise at the beginning of an interglacial period on a six hundred thousand year chart. This is why global warming supporters never show a chart where you can see the lag. The temperature rises before the CO2 level rises. It is quite unusual for the result to proceed the cause. But this time reversal of cause and effect does not bother global warming theorists.
If rising levels of CO2 cause the temperature to rise, then falling temperatures should be caused by falling CO2 levels. Even on a 600,000 year chart, it is obvious that the temperature falls much faster than CO2 levels. Another example of the result preceding the cause.
I prefer the old fashioned way of having the cause occuring before the result, wich is why I don't believe in Al Gore's theories. By the way, how many peer reviewed papers did you say Al Gore has published?
January 06, 2007 3:05 AM
Wait, can you give me some sort of supporting evidence that says temperature change causes CO2 levels to change? If you can, this would be news to me.
And I don't think you need to publish scientific reports to cite them and agree with them. But you do need some credibility if you want to disagree wtih them, don't you?
January 06, 2007 2:18 PM
I watched an inconvenient truth and the message I got from it was if we dont' change our ways, the result may not be pretty. I'm not sold that we are completely to blame, but additionally one cannot simply dispute that global temperatures are increasing.
I'm with Matt on combatting greenhouse gases however.
An alternative to central planning is consumer driven. May not be popular but really the only way to curb consumer driven pollution. For example paying the true cost (which includes infrastructure costs) of hydro-electricity, gasoline, and the like to reduce demand and spur private investments in alternative energies.
But of course that would take government leadership to de-regulate and face the wrath of voters who would object to buying their SUV in their suburban palace and paying the true cost of gasoline/infrastructure cost, hydro. Industry, as well would not be exempt from this.
If this was done, private and public consumption would decrease as they would respond by seeking less expensive alternatives.
But until fossil fuel consumption remains the cheapest alternative, don't expect emissions to decrease voluntarily.
January 08, 2007 9:17 AM
Chris, great point regarding subsidies. It's sheer lunacy that our Ontario government i) spends tax money on ads asking us to use less electricity, ii) subsidizes the electricity rate (therefore encouraging consumption) and iii) shut down a clean coal plant with the result that we now buy more energy from American coal plants with higher levels of pollution.
January 08, 2007 10:14 AM
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