Patching Holes
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Script
PART 1
Okay. . . Who’s got all the answers? Who likes being called names? Who’s all for a civil and reasoned debate? Great.
You know that “bitter debate” I mentioned in “The Most Terrifying Video You’ll Ever See?” Yeah. I don’t like being called names. I’m just this guy, see, sincerely trying to do what I can to bring about the greatest good for the greatest number. I mean, I know I asked for pointers where I’m wrong, but, geez, folks, do we have to be so nasty about it?
On Digg dot com, I even got called a condescending douche. So I was getting pretty down on myself. So, in an attempt to counteract both of those point, I’m going to wear silly hats for the remainder of this video.
I started addressing critiques singly, but quickly became overwhelmed, so here’s what I’d like to do. Now that I’ve got your attention, we can take some time to add back in some of the complexity that got smoothed over in the original video. So over the next few days, I’ll try to put together some videos to address the most common “holes” in the argument that have been gleefully poked.
Objections such as:
Say, isn’t that just Pascal’s Wager all dressed up?
There are actually infinite possible columns in between these extremes--what about those?
What if GCC is true, but it’s not human-caused, or we can’t do anything about it? What about that row?
The depression in this box could very well bring about all the stuff down here, making it just as bad, so the best bet is column B.
Shouldn’t global economic depression be in this box as well as this one, therefore making column B a better bet?
It’s deceptive because each box is equally-sized, implying equal probability.
I’ll try to get to those in the next few days as I have time and energy. If you share any of those objections and are curious as to my fixes, here’s a tip to see them sooner: I’m a big boy, but I tend to have more energy for responding if you’re not mean.
Gotta assign probabilities and numerical consequences. Given that this is a possibility, shouldn’t our best and brightest be evaluating this with all possible speed and resources?
If you disagree that it even merits such consideration, then here I’m going to venture into more inflamatory territory, and give you my take on the probabilities. Let me preface this by saying that I spend pretty much all of my time thinking about the nature of knowledge and how we know what we think we know. Not so much from a philosophical thinker’s standpoint, but from a process of science standpoint.
A big problem here is most people misunderstand the nature of science. It is tentative. The law of gravity is still being questioned to this day. Yet we use it, because it is the best that we’ve got. It is the closest we’ve got to an understanding of the nature of the universe. How do we know it is the best? Because it has been the most accurate in making predictions that we could test.
Science isn’t certain. We cannot know reality. Every scientific statement essentially comes with error bars--a statement of how confidant we are of that measurement or statement. One of the hallmarks of science--and the reason for it’s amazing effectiveness--is that it is self critical. This manifests in the peer-review process. It’s not perfect, it has made errors, and the results should not be taken as the “truth.”
There will always be dissenters. And just because they are outnumbered doesn’t mean they were wrong. Tons of examples. In fact, almost all science that has gone before us has turned out to be wrong. Good thing, too, or we would be stuck with 100-year-old science! Science makes observations, looks for patterns, builds models based on those patterns, makes predictions based on those models, and then tests the predictions with observations.
In climate science, you hear a lot about “computer models.” Why pay attention to what they predict about the future? Because they have been tested to see if they can reproduce the climate we’ve already seen. There have been a ton of them, and the best ones survive and are made better. In short, why believe what a computer spits out? Because it has worked before. But not just any computer, and not just any output--only the ones with a solid track record.
How to reconcile dissenters? Wait. The truth will out. The problem here is, the situation may not tolerate waiting. So you have to balance that, and perhaps make the best decision you can with the information you have. Because, really, that is all that science has ever done. We never get “the answer.” But we do get “the best answer we have so far.”
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. At this point, so much peer-reviewed science has supported the two propositions that:
1) the globe is warming, and
2) we’re the ones doing it,
that any serious dissenters who would like to have their answers considered “the best we’ve got so far” would need to have a comprehensive, well-established, peer-reviewed.
There is no consensus. I’ll let you in on a secret: you’re right! There is no consensus in the scientific community about climate change. But here’s the kicker: there is never consensus in science. And that’s because science is self-critical. Science says: “I want to know reality as well as I can, but I’m human and can make mistakes. So please, find the weak spot in my argument so I can fix it.” Science welcomes criticism! Why? Because that’s how it gets a better answer.
Pick the most well-established Law of Science you can think of. You probably thought of the Law of Gravity. Know what? There is no consensus! We’ve still got serious scientists testing it. They think it is highly likely to be true, but there is a satellite in orbit right now that is designed to observe whether are current Law of Gravity makes correct predictions. It’s the most hallowed law in science, and we’re still trying to break it! [MOND]
So what do you and I, as non-scientists do with that? We stop looking for certainty. Because science can’t provide it. Instead, we must tolerate some uncertainty, and go about our lives with information that we know to be incomplete.
If you object that AGCC is controversial or speculative in the scientific community, I would ask: what would it look like when we got a solid enough answer for you? Describe it. What would the test be for “good enough to go on”? When no one disagrees? Well, by that, don’t bet on the fact we’ve got a moon, because there are very convinced people who disagree with that, and they’ll present lots of evidence. How about: let’s take a poll. Reality by democracy? Who gets to vote? Only those with relevant degrees? Who decides what constitutes a relevant degree?
If a large panel of scientists in the field, looking at a large body of peer-reviewed evidence over a long period of time, with the make-up of the panel changing over time, making a quantitative statment that puts the probability at 90% doesn’t do it for you, then what would? It’s a serious question. What would be good enough?
How about this: I read a bunch of lay-science literature, stuff like Science News and Scientific American. Respected stuff that reports to the scientifically literate public what they heavyweights are publishing in the technical journals. And global climate change is no longer ever qualified by “purported climate change,” or “the possibility of global warming.” When mentioned, it’s just a given. What I take from that is, the people who do this for a living have decided that it’s just not worth wasting breath over whether it’s happening or not. They’ve gotten their “good enough” answer, and are moving on with it.
So here are some common objections to my treatment of the issue.
So how do you decide what to believe in the physical world (science)? I’ll tell you how I do it. I evaluate the source--how credible, what stake, what track record. Science, NAS, AAAS, professional associations. Does that mean it’s true? No! It means I weight it more than if I read it on someone’s blog or heard it from a friend.
So what would I decide on if it were up to me? I wouldn’t. I would hire a bunch of people way smarter than me, have them work on it as fast as possible. Then I’d have them explain to me how they got their conclusions, and then I’d make the call. Isn’t that what we should be asking for? Since climate change can’t be dismissed out of hand, don’t we deserve that?
Please don’t be content with a hit-and-run, whether you’re the victim OR the driver.
If you don’t believe me (which you shouldn’t--I’m just a random guy on the internet as far as you know), and you don’t believe a large body of specialists, then who do you believe? Ask yourself “What would it take for me to believe it’s probable enough to act on?” If you can’t come up with a reasonable answer. Then think of this: isn’t that evidence that your opinion is not based on evidence or experience, but on something else? That is, if you can imagine no evidence which would change your mind, then why do you trust the answer that your opinion is giving you?
How do you go about deciding what to believe when hearing opposite things from people with letters after their names?
. . .”expected value,” a well-established procedure in probability theory that--while flawed--still allows casinos and insurance companies to commit to paying huge amounts at unpredictable intervals, yet still be confidant of making a profit.
I know I said “tell me where I’m wrong,” but I also said “do this yourself.” It does all of us (you, me, and the rest of humanity) a disservice to point out an omission in this simplified grid, and then move on with the feeling that you’ve discredited it, and needn’t concern yourself with it any further. Grab a pencil and paper, and put the omissions back in there. Don’t you owe yourself that? Don’t we all deserve the most well-considered arguments we can possibly get? Catastrophic AGCC cannot be dismissed out of hand. That in itself implies we need to analyze more.
But let’s keep this civil, please. I’ve got no interest in joining the shouting match about climate change. Part of my sharing this was a hope that we could cut through the opinions on both sides that seem so entrenched that they won’t even consider the other’s argument, and see if both sides could find some common ground. Because like it or not, we’re in this whatever-it-is together.
Being dismissive of others almost never gets you what you want. So, let’s see if we can give each other the benefit of the doubt. I’m trying to listen to your comments. Please do that with each other, as well as with me.
PART 2
[desk]
Forgive me for the poor production values and the fact that I’m reading like a banshee, but I’m responding to over 2000 comments, so I’ve got a lot to cover.
Believe it or not, I’d anticipated each of those critiques—I just couldn’t fit all that into a nine-and-a-half minute video. I know that sounds kinda condescending and douchey, but it’s just that I’m a nerd about this stuff, and have spent A LOT of time thinking and reading about it, so I’ve done this debate already in my head literally hundreds of times. Sometimes I even win.
[At WB]
One of the main critiques was that I’d oversimplified. Well, the problem we face is this: things are either simple, or they’re complex. No, wait—that’s oversimplified. [cut]
Things fall somewhere in the spectrum between being simple and complex. Simpler things are quicker to express and understand, while complex things take longer. As a rule, complex arguments can be stronger than simple arguments. This is why everyone hates legal documents. And this is why everyone agrees we still need them.
So here’s our problem, you and I: here’s surfing the web, and here’s the issue of global climate change. And here’s how we get from one to the other:
I’ve got just a few minutes to catch your attention, so I “Hey, look at this!”
And then you say “That’s oversimplified. You missed a spot. I’m outta here.”
And then I say “Wait! I know. Fill it in yourself.”
And then you say “Well that’s just Pascal’s wager anyway. I’m outta here.”
And then I say “Wait! It only looks like Pascal’s wager cuz they’re both decision grids. This one isn’t sunk by the infinities his had.”
And then you say “Well, still, your argument could be used for any threat, like a flying spaghetti monster. That’s just ridiculous. I’m outta here.”
And then I say “Wait! You’re right! What we really need to do is assign some probabilities here.”
And then you say “Fine. Top row 99%, bottom row 1%.”
And then I say “Wait! I disagree!”
And then you say “Well then where are we supposed to get those probabilities? I’m not buying yours because you’re a dork.”
And then I say “Hey, let’s be civil.”
And then we have a long discussion about criteria for estimating probabilities, and after massive, bruising negotiations, we agree on some ranges.
And then I say “Ok, now let’s assign some numerical measure of desirability for each box”
And then you say “Crap!”
And then we have another frank and wide-ranging discussion to agree on some rough numbers.
And then I say “Okay, let’s take the expected value of this puppy so we can agree on the best bet.”
And then you say “But expected value is a flawed mechanism. What about the St. Petersburg paradox?”
And then I say “Yeah, but it’s good enough for casinos and insurances companies, so let’s use it here.”
And then by that time you haven’t even said the last half of those things, because way back here you’ve gotten distracted by a link in the side bar with a picture of mentos, or something blowing up, or someone in skimpy clothes, or all three, and--I admit--it, I’d do the same thing if I weren’t already a total nerd about this stuff.
[desk]
So what I’m asking you to do is: spend a few more minutes of your life exploring the complexities, watching this and following videos. Isn’t an issue this important worth a few minutes?
Trying to strike a balance, I’m going to give just a one-or-two line response for each of the main critiques, so we can get one step closer to the right. So, I am not being dismissive of any arguments—I am just being necessarily brief.
If that brevity doesn’t do it for you, leave a comment with a request for more detail on the YouTube page, and I’ll elaborate more in a later video.
Here we go.
[WB-small grid]
Objection: That’s just Pascal’s Wager, which has more holes than swiss cheese.
My response: It looks like Pascal’s Wager because they are both basic decision grids. What sunk his was the infinite payoffs, and assumptions without evidence. This one has finite payoffs, and assumptions based on evidence.
Objection: That grid could be used to conclude that action is required on every single threat, no matter how outlandish. Thus, if we buy the grid, then we go bankrupt preventing every possible contingency.
My response: You’re totally right! That’s why, to be useful, we need to get down and dirty and assign some probabilities here, which I guess I didn’t imply strongly enough last time, as well as some numerical measure of desirability for each grid. Then you can do a trick called the “expected value” from probability theory, and actually calculate which column is most desirable. This is how casinos and insurance companies can pay out huge amounts of money based on unpredictable events, and still be confidant they’ll make a profit. So it all comes down to assigning those numbers. We’ll address that in a minute.
[desk]
Objection: There are so many problems, but only finite resources. Why start with climate change?
My response: I had a professor of chemistry, oceanography, and atmospheric sciences—all one guy--who put it this way: “Paper or plastic? Doesn’t matter! Save the whales? Doesn’t matter? Toxic waste? Save social security? Pro-life or pro-choice? Doesn’t matter! If the worst of the potential consequences of global climate change come to pass, it will so dominate us as a species that every other conceivable issue will seem insignificant. It would be like re-arranging deck chairs on the Titanic.” Which brings us to our next objection:
[WB, small grid]
Objection: The consequences in the lower right hand corner are overplayed.
My response: They aren’t the most likely scenarios, but they are discussed seriously and increasingly in the scientific community, including in the Pentagon in a 2004 report on climate change as a threat to national security.
[WB, diagram]
To give you just a flavor of why, think about the feedback when you put a microphone in front of its own speaker. The smallest tap rapidly turns into a runaway screech because the output of the system feeds back into the input. There are a host of such systems in the climate. Here’s just a couple:
[WB, diagrams]
Carbon dioxide traps some of the sun’s energy. If something heats up the ocean just a little, it releases CO2 that was dissolved, into the atmosphere. The released CO2 traps more heat, heating the ocean, releasing more CO2, heating the ocean even more, and so on.
Or, heating the ocean melts some of the methane hydrates frozen at the bottom, releasing methane into the atmosphere, trapping more heat, heating the ocean further, releasing more methane, and so on.
There are a number of others.
Pile those all up, and presto--drastic and abrupt climate change is very feasible.
[desk]
Objection: What about China and the rest of the third world? What good will it do if the U.S. takes action and they don’t?
My response: Lots! With only 5% of the world’s population, we in the US produce 25% of its CO2 emissions. We’re a big chunk of the problem. Worried they’ll leapfrog us? We sell the clean technology to them! Plus, this isn’t necessarily all-or-nothing. There are probably intermediate conditions, and any action would probably improve the outcome.
Objection: Who’s to say a little warming is a bad thing?
My response: The climate is tremendously complex. It’s more accurate to think of “global warming” as “global climate change,” and even more descriptive to think of it as “global climate destabilization.” Who’s to say a light tap on the chest is a bad thing? It’s not, unless you’re standing on the top of a post.
[WB, list of objections by small grid]
Objection: It’s not that simple. What about the intermediates between no action and all-out action. What if climate change is happening, but we’re not the ones doing it? What if climate change is happening, and we’re the ones doing it, but our actions don’t stop it? Or they make it worse? What if the depression in this box were way worse than just a loss of jobs? Didn’t the Great Depression lead to Hitler? Couldn’t another one lead to nuclear war, or the dissolution of America? And if we accept that this hypothetical depression would be caused by the action in this column, shouldn’t it appear in this box, too?
My response: I tried to encourage you to play with the complexities yourself, but let’s go ahead and play together. So really, our grid should look like this:
[WB, big grid]
Holy sh*t, it exploded!
We’ve got five columns representing five different degrees of action, from all-out to status quo. Down the side, GCC stands for global climate change, and A stands for anthropogenic, the climate change “lingo” for human-caused.
So we’ve got scenarios that range from:
GCC false, but our actions negatively affect the climate
GCC false, climate not affected
GCC true, but not A, and actions cannot affect climate
GCC true, but not A, can be negatively affected
GCC true, but not A, can be positively affected
GCC true, A, can not affected
GCC true, A, actions negatively affect climate
GCC true, A, and our actions positively affect climate
Into each of these 40 boxes we put our different economic, environmental, social, political, and public health scenarios, including all these questions about a potential depression. And then we assign to each box a number to represent its payoff or cost. Then we assign a probability for each row. Finally, we can use those numbers to calculate the expected value to give an indication of which column is our best bet. Ready?
Juuuuust kiddin’. . .
There’s no WAY I’m qualified to do all that. And neither are you, probably. So what do we do with it? Here’s a suggestion: we hire a bunch of really smart people to do it for us and report back ASAP.
[WB, b/w list of objections and small grid]
We’ll get back to that in a minute, because I don’t want you to think that’s a total cop out. Here’s my best-guess to these concerns:
First, I think the feasibility of our action causing a global depression is very questionable for the following reasons:
A-- Was it runaway government spending that caused the Great Depression of the 1930s? I’m no student of history, but wasn’t there something about a stock market running away with optimism?
B-- Wasn’t there also something about huge government spending that actually helped bring us out of it?
C-- Here we can be very deliberate and controlled about our actions, minimizing any destabilization.
Second, if we did get a global depression, there could conceivably be serious problems besides economic ones. But if planned, controlled spending sparked a worldwide depression here, then panicked, last-minute spending in a crisis here would almost certainly do the same here. So down here we’d have all those problems, compounded by tremendous natural disasters in a destabilized climate.
Third: shouldn’t this depression show up here, too? Like I said, I don’t think there’s much evidence that it’s feasible. To further decrease its feasibility here, I’d argue that much of the dynamics of an economy is based on human psychology. If you question that, just listen to any daily report about how the market “reacted” that day. And since in this box, the spending and regulation would be perceived as justified and good, it decreases the likelihood that it would have a hugely negative impact. In fact, a strong argument can be made that innovation leads to a stronger economy.
[WB, big grid]
So back to the idea of hiring all those smart people to do this grid for us. . . . How do we know that’s worth the time and money?
The way I do it is look at non-advocacy professional associations that don’t have huge vested interests. Like the National Academy of Sciences, or AAAS, which publishes Science magazine, the gold standard of scientific journals. Both organizations recently released official, strongly worded statements about the necessity to address climate change. The one from AAAS started:
[WB, by quote]
“The scientific evidence is clear: global climate change caused by human activities is occurring now, and it is a growing threat to society.” And it ends:
[WB, by quote]
“The growing torrent of information presents a clear message: we are already experiencing global climate change. It is time to muster the political will for concerted action. . . . We owe this to future generations.” Wait, was that the Sierra Club?
No! It was perhaps the most respected scientific organization in the world!
Man, if that doesn’t sound like a conclusion, I don’t know what would.
[WB, big grid]
So back to our probabilities: if you look at what the scientific community is saying, not just individual scientists, it makes a very strong case that these rows are much more likely than these rows.
So I’d say yeah, we need to act. In fact, we need to get all of our top people on this right away.
I’m talking a project on the scale of the Manhattan Project and the Apollo Project put together. We’ve got a good start on the technology already. We can do this. And here’s a bonus, the sooner we act the smarter we can be about it, and so there’s a good chance we can make drastic reductions in CO2 emissions without drastic reductions in standard of living. But the longer we wait, the less likely that becomes.
I’m reminded of what the guy in charge of trash disposal for New York City said about the landfill crisis a while back. He was arguing for proactive action, and he said: “The problem will be solved. We can either do it now, or we can do it 20 years down the road, in a panic, at 20 times the cost, and 20 times the environmental damage. But it will get solved.”
I hope I tied up all the loose ends. If you want more details on a specific topic, please tell me, and I’ll try to respond. I’d be happy to talk more about:
- expected value, or
- how do you decide what to believe when different experts are telling you contrary things?, or
- the basic mechanisms of global climate change, or
- feedback loops, tipping points, and abrupt climate change, or
- why you and I don’t even need to try and figure out whether all those counter arguments are true or not: the ones about solar activity, warming on other planets, natural cycles, cosmic rays, and proxy data.
Let me know what you want to hear. Politely.
[Black screen briefly]
[desk, slower]
Remember when everybody tore into the FBI because it had all the information it needed to stop the September 11th attacks at the time, but it didn’t connect the dots that were so easy for us to connect in hindsight? I keep thinking about that.
Why don’t we see if the dots connect now? Instead of doing it in hindsight. Don’t we deserve that much? We can do this. Pass it on.
PART 3
Hi. Thanks for sticking with me this far. I tried to make this video short, but just couldn’t do it. So I thought if I periodically blew up some stuff for you, it might help keep your attention.[explosion]
The author Douglas Adams noted that “the most dangerous assumptions are the ones you don’t know you have.” I realize now that in my first video “The Most Terrifying Video You’ll Ever See,” I made some assumptions that it turns out weren’t shared by everybody. My bad. My goal was to get people thinking in terms of risk management, instead of just debating scientific statements that they may or may not be in a good position to evaluate.
It seems we do have to talk about rows after all. As one commentor put it: “You seem to have retreated from your claim that you have an argument that dodges the argument. Now you just have an argument.”
So here’s my goal for the next couple minutes: I hope to convince you that it’s in your interest to do what you can to increase public demand for policy action on human-caused climate change. If I fail to convince you of that, I have a fall-back plan. A sort of consolation prize.
[Break]
The problem of course is, if you’re not a climatologist yourself, how to do go about sifting through all those contradictory statements by different experts? Robert Lindzen vs. the IPCC, the Oregon Petition vs. The World Scientists’ Warning to Humanity, the Leipzig Declaration. How do you decide what to believe and what not to? One of the dangers we should all be aware of here is that it’s just human nature for us to hear the evidence that supports what we already believe, and downplay the evidence that contradicts it.
So, I hope I can help you sort that out. As a science teacher, I’m sort of halfway in between being a Joe Schmoe and being a scientist. I have some understanding of the workings of both worlds, and maybe can help translate some stuff for you. Some people have asked about my specific qualifications, and maybe I’ll do another short video on that if enough people express interest.
[What, the shirt’s not enough??]
The short answer is, it shouldn’t matter what my qualificaitons are, cuz you shouldn’t take what I have to say at face value. That’s what Google is for
.[Explosion.]
As we--the Joe Schmoes of the world--try to decide what to do with the different things that scientists are telling us, one of the problems we run into is this: we think of science as being the most precise and certain of human endeavors, so we expect it to tell us the “correct” answer.
But the surprising irony is: science is never certain. Uncertainty is inherent in all science. I’d be happy to explore this in greater detail in yet another video if you’d like, but the upshot is this: science is based on measurements, and every single time a measurement taken, the scientist aknowledges that neither they nor their instrument can be perfect, and therefore they make an estimate of how big the error--or uncertainty--might be.
And then they put the idea out there and invite criticism, so that weak points can be identified and strengthened, and the uncertainty reduced. That’s why it’s so important to ask if the statement you’re hearing about climate change has been “peer-reviewed”--that’s the official process that science uses to try to get closer and closer to “the truth” about the physical world. But it never claims to actually gets there.
So where does that leave us, if every statement from science is accompanied by an implicit “but I could be wrong”? How do we decide what to go on?
[Break]
Here are two rules of thumb: The first is, if you have the inclination, you can look at what scientists are saying to each other. I regularly read some scientific and lay scientific literature, and I’ll tell you, for a number of years now, the tenor about climate change has been not at all controversial. Generally when it’s mentioned, it assumes the reader is on board with the idea that humans are causing the climate to change. The hot debate is on what exactly that will look like, and how fast it will happen. That should tell you something.
The second rule of thumb--and the easier of the two--is to see what statements float to the top of that whole bruising process of peer-review and scientific debate. You do that by looking at what the professional associations are saying, because generally, only the most robust, well-tested, agreed-upon ideas will be adopted by those organizations of scientists. Their pronouncements are about as close as we can get to a gold standard of “What science knows.” Unfortunately, that process takes time to play itself out.
Fortunately, on the subject of human-caused climate change, that’s largely already happened. In the last couple years, two of the world’s most respected scientific bodies--the U.S. National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)--have both published statements essentially saying: the climate is changing, humans are the ones primarily doing it, it’s gonna be bad, and we’d better get started doing something ASAP.
I shared this in a previous video, but it’s worth repeating here. The AAAS statement said: “The scientific evidence is clear: global climate change caused by human activities is occurring now, and it is a growing threat to society.”
It also pointed out that:“The longer we wait to tackle climate change, the harder and more expensive the task will be.”
You catch that? More expensive. This isn’t a bunch of hippies. This is as close as you get to the Science Establishment (capital letters). These are the nerdiest people on the planet.
The NAS statement said:“The scientific understanding of climate change is nowsufficiently clear to justify nations taking prompt action.”and calls on world leaders to “Acknowledge that the threat of climate change is clearand increasing.”
Why are we still talking about this? In matters of science, you don’t get any more authoritative that the National Academy or AAAS. I gotta tell you folks, if that’s not good enough for you, then nothing from science ever will be.
Sometimes you hear “there is no consensus amongst scientists about global warming.” New flash! There is no consensus amongst scientists on anything. There will always be scientists who disagree. You know why—because science is uncertain!
Pick the most well-known, well-established scientific law you can think of. The Law of Gravity, right? Guess what? There’s no consensus on it! We’ve got a satellite up there right now, Gravity Probe B, testing to see if we can disprove our current understanding of gravity. If you’re waiting for there to be no dissent at all, then you’ll wait forever, no matter what the scientific issue.
Science is never certain. So why listen to it all? Because it’s the best we’ve got. And the best science we have, articulated by the most well-respected organizations in the world, is that: the globe is warming, we’re the ones driving it, it’s gonna be bad, and we’d better do something about it quick.
If you’d like to argue any of those points, feel free. But you better come loaded for bear, because you’ll be going up against two of the premier scientific bodies in the world. So you’d better bring with you some extraordinary evidence, and not just a couple ideas that sound good, like “Mars is warming too, you know,” or that CO2 lags temperature in the ice core record. Both true. Both irrelevant. Do you think these guys don’t know what they’re doing?
You can think what you’d like about what the future might hold, but you can’t deny that we are essentially running an experiment right now on what sorts of effects we can or cannot have on the global climate. The kicker is, whatever the outcomes of the experiment, you’re in the test tube.
And that’s why it’s in your interest to do whatever you can to increase public demand for policies that take significant and immediate action on climate change. Make no mistake: anything less, and you would be explicitly denying the best that science has to offer.
[Beat]
Okay, I see you’re still not convinced. You’re a tough nut to crack. How about this:Imagine you’re back in WWII, and the new possibility of an atomic weapon was public knowledge, instead of top secret. Would you have insisted on understanding the finer points of atomic physics before agreeing to the funding for the Manhattan Project? Would you have been against it until every scientist interviewed by the media said that it was possible? No. You would have agreed that just the potential of Germany possessing a super weapon was a great enough threat to justify putting our best and brightest on the job. To have them work with the greatest urgency towards an end that no one was certain they could achieve.
Well, if the possible threat of an atomic weapon in the hands of Germany—just the possibility—was enough to justify the Manhattan project, don’t the statements from AAAS and NAS—our most authoritative scientific bodies--give us enough already to justify a similar project for climate change? To get our best and brightest and have them do this grid, with numbers and all, right away.
Let’s not kid ourselves anymore. You can ask about solar activity, or natural cycles, or proxy data, but the climate is way too complex for you or me to do armchair evaluation of this stuff in the face of so much peer-reviewed science Let’s get the big boys (and girls) on it. Don’t we deserve that? I am not talking about forming another commission to “study the problem further.” We’ve been doing that for 20 years, and the statements I shared earlier make it clear that that time is past.
I’m talking a project on the scale of the Manhattan project and the Apollo project put together. We could even call it the Manpollo Project. One with the greatest national urgency and resources, drafting the best scientists, political economists, historians, and analysts on the planet to bring their greatest effort to bear, to work round the clock on what our best scientists say may be the greatest challenge we’ve ever faced.
In fact, there’s a silver bullet! Both sides of the debate will agree that we should have such a Manpollo, project, and here’s why: because each side thinks the project will get us closer to the truth, and dispel the untruths that the other side has spun. So we all want this, because everyone thinks they’re right, and would love further ammunition to prove the other side wrong. Wouldn’t that be worth the cost?
Because a Manhattan Project is not going to cause a global depression. An Apollo Project is not going to going to bankrupt the US, or lead to government control of your life. So what’s to lose? If we have a Manpollo project and it finds that human-caused climate change turns out to be bunk, then hey--okay, we diverted some government jobs from one sector to another.Isn’t reducing the uncertainty about this at least worth that cost? Let’s get to it!
[Break]
If you find an error in my assumptions or reasoning, please tell me where. And if you can’t, then for Pete’s sake, don’t just sit there! Spread the word! Talk to your friends! Forward this to others. Get clickin’! Let’s make this the chain letter that maybe ended up saving our collective ass!
[Beat]Sorry. I get kind of worked up about this. Anyway, that’s my understanding of things. But I could be wrong.[Reverse explosion.]
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