http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.c...8-3c63dc2d02cb
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I read the powers that be call this Climate Change now and no longer Global Warming. Something like too much evidence against global warming for it to stick.
The Powers That Be are modifying scientific findings to suit their political agendas.
Yeah, I could be talking about either Gore or Bush.
I really enjoyed
Quite an interesting essay wherein the author at one point discusses the debate over The Skeptical Environmentalist.
http://www.thenewatlantis.com/archive/17/adler.htm
The author has an interesting view of how science relates to public policy decisions.
^^^ Indeed ! From your link ....
(snip)"Stealth issue advocacy is endemic in environmental policy, particularly in the area of climate change. “The political debate over climate change,” Pielke observes, “takes place in the language of science” even though the debate is truly about the wisdom of various policy approaches.
While some stealth issue advocates exaggerate scientific certainty and consensus, others overemphasize the existence of scientific uncertainty. In this regard, the invocation of uncertainty is a proxy for an underlying policy position about the wisdom of adopting costly measures to reduce future environmental threats. Opponents of policies like the Kyoto Protocol may emphasize the uncertainty of climate forecasts, but in reality, Pielke rightly argues, “the basis for opposition for most of these folks has nothing to do with scientific uncertainty and everything to do with their valuation of the costs and benefits of taking action.” Advocates of emission reductions repeatedly claim the scientific debate over climate change is “settled,” yet there will always be uncertainties about the precise nature and extent of the human impact on the climate system. Uncertainty is a fixture in complex environmental systems.
Those who push for more aggressive climate policies are often afraid to acknowledge gaps in scientific understanding. But, Pielke counsels, “scientific uncertainty need not stand in the way of action.” Like many questions of environmental policy, climate change presents a risk-management problem—one for which the precise magnitude and probability are unknown, even unknowable. The uncertainty inherent in such risk-management problems need not prevent assertive policy steps, if such steps are truly worth taking. But the decision has to be made on the political playing field.
The case for or against emission reductions ultimately rests on certain assumptions about the value of preventive action. Those who accept the “precautionary principle” believe that preventive action is essential. Contrary to the claims of some of its advocates, the precautionary principle is not a “science-based” approach to policy; it is a policy strategy for addressing risks when the magnitude and likelihood of dangers are uncertain. Scientific research can inform judgments about the relative merits of different degrees of precaution, but cannot justify precaution on its own.
Pielke draws a provocative and somewhat persuasive parallel between the reliance upon the precautionary principle in environmental policy and the doctrine of preemption in foreign policy, as advocated by the Bush administration with regard to Iraq. In each case, uncertainty itself is not a reason for inaction. To the contrary, uncertainty can be a reason for action—it was the possibility that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction that justified preemptive action, just as it is the possibility that anthropogenic emissions might cause tremendous environmental harm that justifies precautionary climate policies. Preemption and precaution are policy responses to uncertainty, but when the potential costs of such actions are high—as with the Iraq war or global climate change policy—the argument for preemption or precaution may be difficult to make, so policymakers attempt to shift the debate to safer terrain.
Framing these policy debates as questions of science or intelligence can create incentives for the misuse of information. In the case of Iraq, “the quest for certainty required by a commitment to preemption elevated the role of politics in policy and diminished the actual role of information and intelligence,” Pielke argues. “It transformed intelligence into a form of advocacy.” Much the same phenomenon occurs in the debate over global warming. In each case, the expert information has been oversold and the underlying value judgments upon which the policy decisions rest are obscured. In this context, information becomes “an asset to be used to achieve victory in the debate over values, rather than a source of enlightenment.”"(snip)
Oh, no. It wasn't uncertain. We were told they were there. That's what was needed to get the support.Quote:
Originally Posted by a quote of a quote
Is there a policy for common sense? There's billions of tons of carbon that was locked up in the ground that we've put into the air. The planet is warming. We're not going to stop putting the stuff in the air, because we've grown to need the energy from that carbon. But the underground supply is finite.
So wouldn't it make sense to decrease the release into the atmosphere, bring our use of what's coming out of the ground to max efficiency, and look for other sources before the stuff in the ground is depleted? Do we really need twisting of science and politically driven conclusions to tell us that?
^^^ no we don't, but apparently the Chinese / Indians / Vietnamese and every other third world country does. That is the inherent flaw in Phaedrus' author's analogy.
While you apparently think it's totally impossible that the 'migration' of Iraqi nuclear materials across borders might have taken place, it is a proven fact that the 'migration' of air pollution and CO2 IS taking place across borders.
So while the concept of reducing carbon emissions is laudible, in the real world a reduction in US carbon emissions at a terrible cost to our economy / standard of living should be counterbalanced against China starting up two new unscrubbed coal fired power plants every week to power 50 new polluting factories that make products that US factories and workers USED to produce (with far less emissions btw), with the trade winds then causing the emitted air pollutants and CO2 from these Chinese coal fired power plants and factories to 'migrate' right back to the US west coast. As long as there is no practical method of segregating the air in China / India / Vietnam from the air in Los Angeles, America could bankrupt every single energy intensive industry via 'carbon taxes', throwing millions into unemployment, and not see the CO2 levels or air pollutant levels drop one bit ... because China / India / Vietnam will produce every bit as much in NEW emissions of CO2 and air pollutants as America is able to reduce ours.
In the real world, US gov't mandates on fuel economy that will result in SUV's being replaced with Smart FourTwo's should be counterbalanced against the extra 50,000 annual deaths of US drivers which will result when the 50mpg 'SPAM in a can' they are driving is squashed flat by a semi-truck.
As you say, I definitely support a policy for common sense.
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Check my signature. I don't go much for "totally impossible" in anything. But it's quite deducible that the "migration" explanation arose out of the inability to find stuff that we were told was there. "Gosh, we told you we needed to invade this country because of WMDs. But the WMDs aren't there. Hey, someone must've moved them!"
A policy that supports accelerated removal of renewable resources, accelerated emissions of carbon, and focusing on economic need without regard to environmental health isn't my idea of common sense. I guess "common" is relative.
Of course, a mere 50,000 additional traffic accident deaths as a result of gov't mandates for tiny cars that get 50mpg pales beside the estimated 10's of millions of people who have died as a result of malaria ... a direct result of a ban on DDT that was enacted without evaluating the actual risks versus the actual benefits.
(snip)"Take the group Environmental Defense (ED), launched 40 years ago to secure a ban on DDT and, in the words of co-founder Charles Wurster, "achieve a level of authority" that environmentalists never had before. Its high-pressure campaign persuaded EPA Administrator William Ruckelshaus to ignore his own scientific panel and ban DDT in 1972.
The panel had concluded that DDT is not harmful to people, birds or the environment. That's especially true when small quantities are sprayed on walls to repel mosquitoes and prevent malaria. But ED and allied groups continued their misinformation campaign until the chemical was banished even from global health-care programs.
The activists ignored DDT's lifesaving role, and focused instead on exaggerations and outright fabrications about how massive overuse of DDT affected birds and ecosystems, as alleged in "Silent Spring" by Rachel Carson (whose 100th birthday was commemorated on Sunday).
DDT helped eradicate malaria in the United States and Europe. But the disease still kills 2 million people a year, mostly in Africa. Since 1972, tens of millions have died who might well have lived if their countries had been able to keep DDT in their disease-control arsenals. Who will commemorate their deaths? "(snip)
I would guess that none of your 'relatives' died of malaria ?
Let's work on reducing emissions because they're bad for us. Let's work on slowing down our consumption of resources that will run out. Those are common sense to me.
Getting out of that, "Oh, so you like traffic deaths and malaria" isn't.
lmfao at that pic dlabtot. I was thinking just that about this topic
I guess everything is happening the way it should be? Well, for one thing I dont trust anything our government tells us. Welcome to the age of lies. Lies are everywhere, our histories, our sciences, media, religions, and unfortunately our very own families. As for global warming, what mankind has done and is doing to this planet is beyond a sin. And we're certainly contributing to the problem. But it may be a natural cycle of Earth and the effects of the sun. Whether you have faith or not, it's all there in black & white, read the Book of Revelation. Or you can read up on Mayan Calander, Chinese prophesy of the first emperor, and Nostrodamus. All coincide with 2012. If you really want to know where it's at, and be hip to the truth, and see the big picture, and see through all the bullshit, check out Alan Watt, It will open your mind up, learn the truth about global warming.
one good catch from Alan Watt's website is his recommendation of the H.G. Wells book (and 30's movie) 'Things to Come'. Arguably this is very much like the world that will result from the Kyoto treaty / 'carbon tax'
as to the ostrich with head buried in the sand picture, in the interest of equal time ...
http://greenfield.fortunecity.com/cr...213/neolud.jpg
In case it's not immediately obvious, above is a portrait of a Neo-Luddite
(snip)"In no uncertain terms, this message is preached by neo-luddite sycophants who prophesize against sinful indulgences and predict the imminent demise of the old American dream; simultaneously, they glorify ‘the new European Dream’, which envisions a better ‘quality of life’ in place of expansive affluence. According to these missionaries of utopianism [5],
* “Europe…offers significant quality-of-life advantages. For most Europeans, the community's quality of life is more important than an individual's financial success. The more communities you join, the more options you have for living a full and meaningful life. Belonging -- not belongings -- is what brings security…the European sense of togetherness… Where the American Dream emphasizes economic growth, the European Dream focuses on sustainable development…[e]nvironmental awareness…[T]he European vision…[is]…one of a new type of power, based not on military strength but on economic cooperation and the construction of communities of conscience, a new kind of superpower based on waging peace…” (emphasis added).[6]
“[Within such ‘moral’ communities,] the ‘precautionary principle’ [is to be used to] regulat[e]…science and technology innovation and the introduction of new products into the marketplace…[It] is the most radical idea for rethinking humanity's relationship to the natural world since the 18th-century European Enlightenment…The EU is attempting to establish a radical new approach to science and technology based on the principle of sustainable development and global stewardship of the Earth's environment…[And,] [a]t the heart of the precautionary principle is a radical divergence in the way Europe has come to perceive risks compared to the US…" In Europe, intellectuals are increasingly debating the question of the great shift from a risk-taking age to a risk-prevention era” (emphasis added). [7]
Most profoundly disturbing about this trend, however, is that allegedly secular Europeans are religiously proselytizing precaution and a risk-averse negative brand of ‘sustainable development’ to impoverished developing countries as a moral prophylactic to be donned against the perceived excesses of American globalization. Arguably, the EU is abusing the United Nations Human Development Reports, which literally reflect a negative doctrine of overpopulation and excess consumption akin to that advanced by Thomas Malthus, and also exaggerating the significance of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Reports which warn us of the remote possibility of an impending global environmental ‘crisis’ - all as a legitimating ‘cover’ (i.e., as a false pretense) for more and more precautionary regulation.[8]"(snip)
(snip)"Moreover, it may be argued that certain EU Commission practices shaped by these social and environmental groups reflect the philosophy of political expediency and deception championed by Niccolo Machiavelli. This utilitarian philosophy, above all else, prioritizes “the means to assigned ends, regardless of whether the ends are considered good or bad” in themselves.[18] This is apparent in the way the EU has masterfully crafted its nontransparent strategy to unilaterally export its version of the precautionary principle internationally, as a means to both achieve the ends of sustainable development and to protect the means of its ailing, lagging or underdeveloped regional industries and technologies. The Commission has carefully selected particular international fora to work within and weak, economically dependent developing country trading partners to work with. It employs or supports indirectly the communitarian movements of prominent European and American-based environment and social groups possessing global reach and influence, the focus of which is to wage anti-globalization, anti-technology, and reputation disparagement campaigns against multinational corporations and individualists. And it has been able to accomplish this feat primarily through use of two EU governance mechanisms: ‘co-regulation’ and ‘self-regulation’.[19]
Considering that the ends justify the means, it is irrelevant whether these influential campaigns are factually and morally baseless. Similarly, it is irrelevant that the means the Commission has employed (incentives) to persuade developing countries to embrace the precautionary principle (financial aid, technical assistance and foreign direct investment) – EU ‘soft’ power – will likely foster their continued dependence on European aid (welfare dependence), and enhance only the welfare of European industry.
Lastly, the Commission’s political decision, to replace the current paradigm of exposure-based risk evaluation enshrined in WTO and U.S. law, with a formal precautionary principle that favors pre-risk assessment screening based on hazard profiles and public risk perceptions seemingly addresses an existential problem previously analyzed by French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre. He attributes this problem, to the feeling of individual and collective helplessness arising from the perception that one lacks control over one’s destiny and choice of outcomes. In the present case, anxieties experienced by older European citizens have arisen because of the public’s perceived inability to detect or control unknown health and environmental risks associated with their use of and exposure to industrial activities, new technologies and the products derived therefrom. This message has been brilliantly crafted by the social and environmental ideologues."(snip)
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hahaha. This is starting to remind me of those people who swear up and down that the planet is only 5000 years old.