UPDATE BELOW
I just saw Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth. His site is here. Roger Ebert wrote: “In 39 years, I have never written these words in a movie review, but here they are: You owe it to yourself to see this film. If you do not, and you have grandchildren, you should explain to them why you decided not to.” He is right.
It is powerful. And beautifully and sensitively produced. From a long run perspective it may be that Gore can do even more good for the human race and the world as spokesperson for fighting global warming than even president of the U.S., where much that he could have done would have been stymied by the moral monsters who dominated Congress for the past six years. It is always risky to say we see greatness in another because we are so often disappointed later, but I think I saw greatness in Al Gore.
I have been following the global warming debate for many years, having started out as a skeptic. As time went on I ceased my skepticism. The bulk of scientific opinion has kept shifting in the same direction. See here and here for example. A tiny number of reputable scientists still think it is not caused by human beings. Richard Lindzen is the chief credible skeptic, a man I have met and like. But Lindzen is ever more completely a man apart, supported by the likes of Riush Limbaugh and Michael Crichton, the best the opposition can find: men who have no training in these matters. The burden of proof is now on Lindzen, and he has failed to persuade his fellow experts. Only the likes of Limbaugh and Crichton, and other right wing ideologues, who needed no persuading because they are impervious to reason. Gore quotes Upton Sinclair’s perceptive comment regarding similar skpetics towards the inconvcenient truths of his time: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”
Science is not fool proof. Mistakes are made, dead ends explored. It is called discovery and learning. But unlike most of global warming’s opponents, scientists are not in their field to make money, and do not pick their positions in part by its impact on their pocketbooks. Nor do they insist the world fit their ideology. We have nothing to compare with science as a way of understanding how our earth works, and science speaks today with a pretty unified voice, which is why AEI has to try and tempt scientists with $10,000 grants to attack the most recent scientific findings regarding global warming. This is the best evidence outside of Iraq for the utter moral and intellectual collapse of that obscenity that calls itself contemporary conservatism.
Happily, we already have the technology to make a huge difference in the amount of CO2 released into our atmosphere. We do not need to sacrifice our economy for the well being of our children and their children. That is a lie promulgated by Exxon and their allies – and it is true that THEY will lose money if we change. Not the economy as a whole, only certain corporate oligarchs. It is the same mentality as those who love war because it makes them rich, no matter how many die in the process. And of the tobacco industry that for decades did the same encouraging doubt about cigarettes and cancer.
National defense issues alone are sufficient to urge us to reduce our dependence on oil. Anything to reduce the importance of the Middle East to the rest of the world is a good thing, for us and for the people in the Middle East. Oil profits prop up undemocratic governments abroad as well as corrupt corporations and governments here at home.
But global warming is the most important reason.
See the movie even if you think you already understand the issue. That is what I thought, and I finally saw it anyway because of the urgings of friends who had done so. They were right.
UPDATE
As I pointed out above, science is a discovery process. The Times has just published an interesting article by Nigel Calder, former editor of the New Scientist, suggesting an alternative theory for global warming, one that has some empirical support. I recommend reading the piece. He and Henrik Svensmark, who did much of the initiual research, have a new book describing the evidence for their argument.
Having said that, I emphasize that have no personal expertise as to whether the warming that is going on is human caused or otherwise. Neither, I suspect, do most if not all the people who read this post. We are all in the situation of confronting a problem with profound policy implications that we lack the expertise to really evaluate for ourselves.
When an issue is both important and contested, and involves complex issues we are unable to personally evaluate, it seems to me we have little choice but to look at the judgments of scientists. They are fallible, and certainly can form bandwagons that head off in the wrong direction (land bridges anyone?) But their fallibility is more deeply informed than our own. And science has a much better track record of admitting error and shifting its position than any alternative form of acquiring knowledge. Particularly ideologies. Further, many – probably most – become scientists to search for scientific truth, not sustain a sociopolitical agenda.
Over many years the trend within the scientific community has been towards increasing agreement that global warming has a human component. Taking a position on an important scientific issue based on whether or not it is ideologically convenient seems to me foolish – as it was for the Pope in responding to Galileo or current “Christians” on evolution or the age of the earth.
Is this new theory in this forthcoming book the right one? Or perhaps an improvement on the growing consensus that there is an anthropogenic element in global warming. Beats Hell out of me. And I suspect it beats Hell out of you too. Calder himself is careful – saying of the new theory:
“Where does all that leave the impact of greenhouse gases? Their effects are likely to be a good deal less than advertised, BUT NOBODY CAN REALLY SAY until the implications of the new theory of climate change are more fully worked out.” [my emphasis]
One easily accessible discussion of this theory from a perspective that seems to me open and careful is here.
And the New Scientist has a tendency to publish more speculative articles than does the other, and more established british scientific journal, Nature. In short, it should be taken seriously, but with caution. For an example, see here.
It seems to me that the truly wise position is to ask: if there is human caused global warming, and if the consequences are likely to be unpleasant, what approach to the matter is least invasive of freedom while still likely to help ameliorate the worst effects? If there is uncertainty, but the likelihood of making a wrong decision in one direction is very costly and one in the opposite direction far less so, should not prudence dictate the second over the first?
It also seems to me thoughtful environmentalists already have such an approach in mind – a carbon tax. It could easily be revenue neutral – for every dollar collected by a carbon tax a dollar in other taxes could be eliminated. That would reduce tax based distortions in productive activity. Basically all such a tax would do is better internalize an externality.
Oil is also the major cause of our war in the Middle East. This war amounts to a massive subsidization of Exxon and similar oil companies as well as the defense industry. It is also enormously strengthening the American state.
The more a carbon tax pushes energy production into other realms, the less pressure there is to go to war or to steal oil. Also, the lower the income to Arab and other despots. And if it were revenue neutral, the less distortion of investment would be involved since even if there is NO human caused globval warming, it would be a cheap way of reducing defense costs while avoiding creating a vested interest in arms and war.
In short, an oil based economy
1. Keeps Arab and other dictators free from having to generate wealth from the productive energies of their own people.
2. Encourages the further militarization of the US because we are dependent on oil from unpleasant places abroad.
3. If the growing current consensus of science is correct, it may do serious damage to the quality of life for many people in the world.
Adn finally, even if the problem is presently over stated, as is possible, because CO2 build up is cumulative, there will almost certainly come a time when it is a problem – and wise people will seek to encourage research into alternatives sooner rather than later because we do not know when there will be a tipping point on climatic issues.
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