Cato Scholar Comments on Warner-Lieberman Climate Security Act
Global Warming on Free Republic
Posted on 05/29/2008 10:06:12 PM PDT by The_Republican
I'm not a global warming believer. I'm not a global warming denier. I'm a global warming agnostic who believes instinctively that it can't be very good to pump lots of CO2 into the atmosphere, but is equally convinced that those who presume to know exactly where that leads are talking through their hats.
Predictions of catastrophe depend on models. Models depend on assumptions about complex planetary systems -- from ocean currents to cloud formation -- that no one fully understands. Which is why the models are inherently flawed and forever changing. The doomsday scenarios posit a cascade of events, each with a certain probability. The multiple improbability of their simultaneous occurrence renders all such predictions entirely speculative.
Yet on the basis of this speculation, environmental activists, attended by compliant scientists and opportunistic politicians, are advocating radical economic and social regulation. "The largest threat to freedom, democracy, the market economy and prosperity," warns Czech President Vaclav Klaus, "is no longer socialism. It is, instead, the ambitious, arrogant, unscrupulous ideology of environmentalism."
If you doubt the arrogance, you haven't seen that Newsweek cover story that declared the global warming debate over. Consider: If Newton's laws of motion could, after 200 years of unfailing experimental and experiential confirmation, be overthrown, it requires religious fervor to believe that global warming -- infinitely more untested, complex and speculative -- is a closed issue.
But declaring it closed has its rewards. It not only dismisses skeptics as the running dogs of reaction, i.e., of Exxon, Cheney and now Klaus. By fiat, it also hugely re-empowers the intellectual left.
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
Charles Krauthammer : "...Predictions of catastrophe depend on models. Models depend on assumptions about complex planetary systems -- from ocean currents to cloud formation -- that no one fully understands. Which is why the models are inherently flawed and forever changing. The doomsday scenarios posit a cascade of events, each with a certain probability. The multiple improbability of their simultaneous occurrence renders all such predictions entirely speculative.
Yet on the basis of this speculation, environmental activists, attended by compliant scientists and opportunistic politicians, are advocating radical economic and social regulation."
The following is a simple exercise anybody can recreate with a simple calculator, found on your computer Windows (Start-Programs-Accessories-Calculator; View-Scientific). Don't worry about your school math, I am very rusty myself. The following is indeed very simple.
If probability of an event is 1/2. And a probability of another event is also 1/2. Then a probability of these two events happen simultaneously is 1/2 x 1/2 = 1/4 (for example 2 coins both falling with a tale side up).
Now, lets take a climate model having 50 parameters (these models are complicated) with each parameter known to at least 99% (not a bad knowledge, isn't it?!). Probability of it being true is .99 multiplied onto itself 50 times. On calculator type .99 then button x^y then 50 then hit = The result is 0.6050, or 60.5%.
If this model has 100 parameters, then probability falls to 36.6%.
50 parameters known to 98%. The model's probability to be true is 36.4%.
Only 10 parameter known to 95% - The model's probability to be true is 60%.
You can play with numbers varying a number of parameters and their known probability.
Do we really know all variables in climate models so well? Even with the best knowledge, accounting for multiple factors reduces the confidence in the result. In reality many variables are extrapolated, assumed, etc. I'll take such chances if I play lottery, any time. But when we are talking about curtailing industrial progress and wasting trillions of dollars of our large but limited resources, I need more certainty.
Besides, if we are thrown back into 50th - we'll survive. Inconvenienced a lot, but we'll survive, People in the developing world will be hit much harsher. But caring about poor is never a concern for the so enlightened environmentalist luddites.
Cato Scholar Comments on Warner-Lieberman Climate Security Act
Global Warming on Free Republic
“The largest threat to freedom, democracy, the market economy and prosperity,” warns Czech President Vaclav Klaus, “is no longer socialism. It is, instead, the ambitious, arrogant, unscrupulous ideology of environmentalism.”
The Global Warming BS is a symptom of Socialism, IMHO.
How is this about carbon footprint when the issue is Peak Oil?
Very well & simply explained, thanks!
As far as peak oil is concerned, the reality is that were are at least 500 years from peak oil, although most of the "easy" oil has been found. In the last few years, Canada has gone from having the smallest proven reserves of oil in the world to now having one of the largest proven reserves of oil due to their successful extraction of oil from their tar sands formations! The real truth is that the obstructionists don't want any oil drilling at all in the U.S. They have managed to convince a large segment of the population that increased CO2 in the atmosphere will lead to a great environmental catastrophe. So even though most Freepers don't buy the CO2/Global Warming idea, it is the main successfully used argument of the emotional obstructionists.
In my mind, there is a great danger to allowing the enviro-fascists to control the debate. If they win, not only will it lead to the destruction of American manufacturing and energy production, but will eventually lead to a massive world war with China, Japan, and the U.S. as the major combatants over oil resources. Such a scenario is completely unnecessary, but possible, if we allow the liberals continued control of the dissemination of information on this issue.
That is all correct except this is Peak Oil now.
Charles Krauthammer's right - environmentalism's the newest horse to ride.
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