I was all geared up to recommend this review of Bjorn Lomborg's new book Cool It, written by The Weather Makers author Tim Flannery, but it turns out to be pretty bad. It's kind of scattered all over the place a makes no coherent, forceful critique.
Much better is Eban Goodstein's review in Salon, which drills in on the subject of tipping points, which Lomborg totally ignores:
But this really is not the point. The glaring error in "Cool It," and the one that disqualifies the book from making a serious contribution, is that Lomborg ignores the main concern driving the debate. Incredibly, he never mentions even the possibility that the world might heat up more than 4.7 degrees. Although he claims IPCC science as gospel, in fact the scientific body gives no single "standard" estimate as its official forecast for this century's warming. Instead, the IPCC provides a range of up to 10.5 degrees -- more than double the number on which Lomborg bases his entire argument.
The global warming "alarmism" that Lomborg finds so distasteful is motivated by a serious, science-driven concern that hidden within our global climate system are powerful positive feedback loops. So that as we inch up from 3 to 4 and then 4 to 5 degrees of warming, we may very well cross some temperature threshold that would trigger a couple of degrees of further warming, causing a catastrophic upward spiral in global temperatures.
See also this interview with Lomborg in Salon -- I'll give this to the guy, he gives good shtick.
And finally, see this Chris Mooney post on DeSmogBlog, on how Lomborg is twisting hurricane science to his own ends.
I understand McKibben's got a smackdown on the way. I expect it to be a doozy.
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Comments
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Sean Casten Posted 6:30 am
10 Sep 2007
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wiscidea Posted 6:46 am
10 Sep 2007
See...
http://www.scotese.com/climate.htm
Not only will it become 3 or 4 or 5 degrees C warmer, but it will become about 10 degrees C warmer. At that point some unknown negative feedback loop apparently kicks in, the temperature reaches a stable plateau for 10s of millions of years, and then it plumets again for a few million years.
Unfortunately, for us, our species emerged during one of those rare and brief cool periods. We might not survive the next swing upward, regardless of who or what triggered it. But Life will. We definitely facing a crisis, but let's not over-state it by suggesting there is going to be a tipping point that results in a Venusion atmosphere. It is just going to get really really balmy around the poles -- highs in the 80s F during the long summers, lows in 30s or 40s F during the winter -- for 10s of millions of years.
Geez... writing like your hair is ALREADY on fire.
Forward!
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mkayser Posted 6:47 am
10 Sep 2007
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sunflower Posted 7:07 am
10 Sep 2007
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carboncat Posted 7:42 am
10 Sep 2007
how can you say that? the review is a mere 500 words, and is simply a list of assertions (which the Cohen readily admits with the sentence "I would instead claim the following").
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Delay And Deny Posted 7:57 am
10 Sep 2007
Thanks, Grist.
I needed some new reading material...I'll be ordering that "Cool It" like today.
John Bailo
Sutext:
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Sam Wells Posted 10:50 am
10 Sep 2007
I've been in the geographic sciences for about two decades and our best and worst plans were like for a five to ten year horizon into the future. Beyond that, all bets were off because there is no degree of skill or certainty about any results.
Many times I have said I'm do not deny the forces of global warming, but will probably get ignored or attached again. The fact is, you're dealing with a whole bunch of certainty when dealing with time frames beyond 2030. Most of the extrapolations are based on linear or exponential curves with which you seem to have utmost confidence. Science doesn't work like that, baby.
I can tell you an interesting story about Noah and the Flood, however, since the Grist seems to be into religion these days. Seems like scientists found that a glacial ice bridge collapsed and allowed the Mediterranean to spill into the Black Sea - by maybe 50 to 100 meters deep. How do they know this? They found ancient ruins in the deeper waters and carbon dated some stuff. I forget what it was, like 1300 BC maybe. Interesting story.
Sounds like you are wishing for the equivalent of the ice bridge collapsing. Be careful what you wish for ...
Onward through the fog
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carboncat Posted 12:29 pm
10 Sep 2007
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Tom Athanasiou Posted 3:25 pm
10 Sep 2007
The strongest argument against significant action is not from cost-benefit analysis in the narrow sense, but simply that we are not very good at producing international public goods. Especially when it comes to extended, intertemporal collective action problems directed against small probability events, with unclear periodic feedback, and dealing with the Chinese and the Indians, who feel they have the right to pollute as much as we did, and also with the not-nearly-as-cooperative-as-they-might-sound Europeans (how's that sentence for a mouthful?).
This argument sounds immoral and indeed perhaps is immoral -- "we're ruining things for others, yet if we tried to fix things we would ruin the fixing, so let's do nothing." Yet I do not think this issue should be disregarded. If I can't open up my computer, dissemble it, and then put it back together again, surely my repair plans should take that fact into account.
But this is both lucid and ridiculous. The first para is the lucid part. The second is ridiculous. The fact of the matter is that "producing international public goods" is exactly what we have to do, that plus having a green tech revolution. So his argument essentially reduces to "we can't do what we have to do, so do you feel lucky kid?" Which is defeatism, right?
Oh, and by the way, the Chinese and Indians don't necessarily think that they have as much of a right to pollute as we did. They think that they have as much of a right to develop. And they are right to think so.
-- toma
Tom Athanasiou
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caniscandida Posted 5:20 pm
10 Sep 2007
I have no intention of reading the book, and do not know what Lomborg writes, exactly, about the fate of polar bears. He surely is quite wrong, if he says that the melting of Arctic sea ice is not threatening the bears. But I entirely agree that the trophy hunting of polar bears is a highly undesirable pressure on them, and should be banned.
Chickens are our cousins!
So are other sensitive animals!
Enough is enough!
No more factory farms!
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mseall Posted 12:25 am
11 Sep 2007
...or we may not. However, I'm glad to see that the doomsayers are starting to admit that they might be wrong. That can only be good for public debate, and for science."
That is a very big "may not", the answer to which we cannot afford to be wrong about. If you are wrong then we are in serious trouble. If you are right then we have implemented a whole host of changes, most of which have positive benefits in any event.
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amazingdrx Posted 12:34 am
11 Sep 2007
All while pretending to be on Bjorg's side.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog
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Biodiversivist Posted 1:59 am
11 Sep 2007
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world
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carboncat Posted 6:33 pm
11 Sep 2007
or, he might not.
Gee, you might say, a very big "might." Every time someone denies God, they're gambling with their soul.
Likewise for global warming. Although I'm gambling with Baby Earth if I'm wrong, I refuse to believe until I'm presented with compelling evidence for the global danger.
Argument by fearmongering needs to stop.
(btw what's the single most compelling piece of evidence that the Earth's climate is in danger? I want to know)
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trock Posted 1:11 am
12 Sep 2007
Pascal argued for people to become Catholic Christians or they may go to hell and it would be better not to, so become Catholic. As far as I know, we can't describe the "method" for going to hell or heaven. If you can't describe the "mechanism" or "pathway", I would become suspectable to every claim to my going to hell (or heaven.) What about non Catholic claims to hell? What about other religions?
I like Thomas Jeffersons ideas on thinking, "the first chapter in the book of wisdom is honesty," and when he wrote to his friends before he died, "I die without fear or hope." His way of saying he wasn't christian. Claims like Pascal's Wager wasn't honest to Jefferson and a dishonest god wouldn't be a god at all.
We should discuss Global Warming, like other subjects, with honesty.
Global Warming has the method described to it, although you might not agree with it.
Would it be fear mongering for a doctor to tell his patent "you're overweight, you may come to a catastrophe end." Well, he couldn't because that would be fear mongering. "Hey, stop drinking beer until you nearly pass out and get into a car and drive." Nope. Can't say that, I might be fear mongering.
Global Warming is a complicated subject. Just because you want it to be simple doesn't mean you can understand the problem that way.
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David Roberts Posted 2:32 am
12 Sep 2007
The vast majority of the scientists in the relevant research areas say so. The people who say otherwise are a tiny group of well-funded cranks backed by an army of online chatboard warriors like you.
You're trying to get us to relegislate the science in an online discussion -- the oldest contrarian trick in the book. But we don't need to know the details of the science. We have scientists for that. All we need to do is listen to them.
grist.org
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carboncat Posted 10:23 am
12 Sep 2007
Argument by authority pure and simple.
But we don't need to know the details of the science. We have scientists for that. All we need to do is listen to them Um, that's called religion, not science.
They're not communing with God or anything, you know. The whole thing is 100% transparent.
But at least you're honest. Not interested in questioning what you are told, because you trust them, and because it fits with your worldview. Can't say I blame you, because quite frankly, that's a potent combination.
However, I get tired of discussions ending in either "the science is settled, don't you know" or "hey you must be a Republican". Time to go. It's been fun, folks. For the most part you've been quite enjoyable to debate with.
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garyduell Posted 2:47 am
18 Sep 2007
See, Borg is a statistics teacher. He is neither and environmentalist nor an environmental scientist. He is not an economist. He is not a meteorologist or climatologist. Hell, he's not even a scientist.
Like his apostles, he merely has a set of preconceived notions around which he marshals uh, well, assertions (I was going to say "evidence".)
Borg lovers fawned and drooled over the inch-thick references section of "Skeptical Environmentalist". But if you actually check practically any of the references you'll find that they don't quite correspond to the conclusions Borg draws from them. Need I say "term paper" again?
I suspect Borg just turned his teenage students loose on this project and didn't even edit the resulting mess himself. I'm sure Cool It will be just as crappy.
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