A Hoax to Raise Our Consciousness

"The science and evidence in Roland Emmerich's anticipated blockbuster Independence Day may be flawed and the posited scenario may be impossible as far as we know, but the movie has the potential to do a lot of good. It will raise awareness of the possibility that a race of hostile aliens may someday attempt to exterminate humanity. What's more, it may convince the White House to address this pressing issue."

Is there any chance that a paragraph like that would have made it onto the editorial page of a major newspaper in anticipation of Roland Emmerich's mid-nineties blockbuster? Doubtful. And yet Emmerich's The Day After Tomorrow has generated a lot of publicity and a lot of "dialogue" by positing a doomsday scenario that is only slightly more realistic than the alien invasion scenario that was the centerpiece of Independence Day (or the giant nuclear lizard that wreaked havoc in Emmerich's update of Godzilla).

Lots of people have spilled ink—including the New York Times—about the disaster flick The Day After Tomorrow (Peter Klein links to Bjorn Lomborg's review in the Blog). The NYT tells us that even though the science in the movie is seriously flawed, it has the virtue of elevating the dialogue about global warming and its impact on human civilization. Noble though it may be, should we take this claim seriously?

Presumably, the film will get us to devote more resources to research on climate change. Maybe we'll adopt the Kyoto protocol. Maybe people will make radical lifestyle changes that will reverse the trend toward a hotter planet. Unfortunately, important economic principles get in the way: specifically, nothing is free. These changes come at a cost.

What the film's more radical supporters are proposing is nothing less than the destruction of commercial society. We can dismiss them out of hand because it is easy to show that the socialist reforms they propose will spread poverty, disease, and destitution the whole world 'round. But what about well-intentioned, minor changes? Shouldn't these be implemented to insure ourselves against the remote possibility of environmental disaster?

Absolutely not. Again, there are no free lunches. Implementing Kyoto would be expensive—$150 billion annually, writes Bjorn Lomborg, all to push minor global warming back by six years. For that price, others have noted, we could provide clean water for the entire world's population. Moreover, as Brad Edmonds points out, environmental quality is a normal good. As people get richer, they demand cleaner natural environments. American Airlines' American Way magazine makes this point in an article about eco-friendly developments that are rapidly gaining popularity among the super-rich.

Do we all want to breathe clean air? Yes. Do we all want to live in places with lots of green space? A lot of us do. Do we get our jollies by dumping sewage and toxic chemicals in streams and rivers? Do any of us want to see the earth destroyed by climate-induced natural disasters? I really doubt it. The fact of the matter is, though, that the probabilities of cataclysmic disasters like those we see in movies like The Day After Tomorrow and Independence Day are very, very low.

For the sake of argument, let's suppose that we have a pile of cash that we can sacrifice for some noble cause. For concreteness, suppose it's the capitalized value of a stream of $150 billion cash flows over 100 years (the calculations are left to the reader as an exercise—it's a ton of money). Spending these resources in anticipation of global warming-induced falling skies is quite like spending resources in anticipation of an alien invasion.

To the extent that we want to change things, we have far more pressing concerns. Diarrhea—easily preventable, easily treatable—kills more children than any other disease on earth. Official injunctions against DDT brought about a resurgence of malaria in poor countries and are responsible for millions of deaths. European resistance to genetically-modified foods condemns millions in Africa, India, and elsewhere to poverty and starvation. And so on.

How can we know what threats society's resources should be used to combat and what issues should be addressed? This is not a small issue. In fact, it is the core economic problem that scarcity itself gives rise to. It can be solved only through market means. It is the market, not the state, that provides mechanisms (risk premiums, prices, profit and loss) to check ideological extremes. Political institutions are not in a position to make realistic evaluations of risk; instead, they are buffeted about by the latest fads.

To the extent that something in the world needs to be "fixed," our resources are better spent developing the institutions of capitalism—private property rights, capital, and well-functioning markets—than on shot-in-the-dark attempts to prevent ultra-low probability (and ultra-overrated) "disasters."

A very good point. In past, I’ve suggested that you can tell the difference between a real ecologist and a fake “environmentalist” pretty easily.

A real ecologist has no need for drama, even when focused on an acute and critical problem. This is because the *cause* of the problem, *and* its solution are obvious. For example: Mountain gorillas are being killed by poachers. Solution: Stop the poachers. Easy.

A fake environmentalist has only theoretical problems, so they totally focus on drama. Plus they always only have one “solution”, no matter the problem. For example: Eek! The world is about to be destroyed by a meteor! Everyone must give me political power and unlimited money or we are all going to die! Another example: Eek! Apples are covered with ALAR which will kill all our children! Everyone must give me political power and unlimited money or we are all going to die!

An ecologist will often have a problem that can be addressed in any number of ways. So they listen when others propose alternative solutions, and will serious consider them and adopt the best plan.

But fake environmentalists have only one solution that they will tolerate, and will shout down any alternatives. This is because whatever the problem is, they believe it is caused by their not having power and money. And once they do have power and money, the problem is automatically solved.

An ecologist is practical. They are indifferent to “caring” about a problem or public awareness. But they also insist that obvious solutions to obvious problems actually be carried out.

Fake environmentalists believe that “caring” solves problems so much that actually doing anything to solve them is unimportant. This is why someone like Bill Clinton was constantly insisting he cared about things (unlikely as he is a psychopath and incapable of feeling real emotions), but never actually *doing* anything. He hated paperwork, avoided decisions whenever possible, held to no standards, tried to “triangulate” all issues, and continually tried to put himself in the center of attention. This showed he “cared”, and that was all his followers cared about.

Fake environmentalists are obsessed with “raising public awareness” about whatever cause celebre. They demand that the public conserve water, even if 95% of the water is used by industry and agriculture, and there is no water shortage.
This is because they are usually collectivists, and believe that collective action is more important than whatever is done.

A real ecologist doesn’t care about public awareness. If just three people can solve a problem, he is inclined to not care if anyone other than them knows about it.

A real ecologist is concerned with ecology. Anything else, including politics, is just a hobby. A fake environmentalist just embraces whatever issue on the spur of the moment, and loses interest in it just as fast, no matter what subject. The environment is just a tool to them.

A real ecologist is interested in conservation, so that our children and grandchildren can share in the things we enjoy.

A fake environmentalist wants preservation, with an eye to keeping the common man out of nature. They think that nature belongs to only them, and that others will just ruin it. Everyone else should just stay in the big cities with asphalt and concrete.

"It will raise awareness of the possibility that a race of hostile aliens may someday attempt to exterminate humanity."

The Possibility?

Ishaq:208 "When Allah gave permission to his Apostle to fight, the second Aqaba contained conditions involving war which were not in the first act of submission. Now we bound themselves to war against all mankind for Allah and His Apostle. He promised us a reward in Paradise for faithful service. We pledged ourselves to war in complete obedience to Muhammad no matter how evil the circumstances. "

Qur'an:8:39 "So, fight them till all opposition ends and the only religion is Islam."

They landed in Mecca about 1400 years ago, or were tossed out with the garbage by a passing Alien ship.

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