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Comments 9151 to 9200:

9151. zooplankton at 09:53 AM on 15 October 2019
      CO2 is just a trace gas
      

      For this topic, the arguments I see from friends revolve around "it's only .04% of the atmosphere". I'd like a simplified argument for them related to how thick the troposphere is and how small the air molecules are.

      I don't know how to do this, but perhaps one of you can...

      If we look at the "million parts" of air as a single layer of molecules, how thick would it be on average?

      Given the avaerage size of the molecules, if they are in one layer, what would be the area of that layer?

      (there would have to be some assumptions on air pressue and humidity, changing air pressure with altitude, and the vacuum space between molecules I presume).

      So the result I'm looking for is something like

      "based on [assuptions specified], a single layer of air molecules would be on average xx nanometers thick, and cover an area of y.yy sq meters. In the ~12km of tropshere a photon would have to travel through zzz million (billion?) layers. So while the trace concentrations are low, travelling through zzz million layers over a 12km thickness drastically increases the possibility of encountering CO2 molecules."

      It's kind of like the visability you experience on a clear day vrs a rainy (or smoggy, or foggy) day. Over a short distance, I can see my hand fine, over a longer distance my visibility is reduced even though the percentage of raindrops in the air is low, and I cant see islands/mountains which are only kms away.

      Am I making any sense? 

      (another angle would be to have a single stack of air molecules 12km high... how many would there be?)

9152. Eclectic at 09:32 AM on 15 October 2019
      Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
      

      JamesKL , I am not clear whether you are meaning average temperature for daytime, for nighttime, or for a strict average over the 24 hour day.  Then there are the monthly or seasonal averages (or for "annual average" ~ which is almost a meaningless concept for temperate regions).

      Speaking generally, deserts are "pale" (high albedo = high reflection of sunlight energy) . . . and rainforests are dark, low albedo regions, which absorb more sunlight energy ~ nevertheless much of their temperature difference comes from the cooling effect of evaporation from vegetation. And for deserts at night, the dryness of the land & air means more heat is lost to space.

      Thermometer temperatures are one thing.  But humans' sensation of regional temperature will be perceived according to the extremes of daytime highs and overnight lows, and we tend not to notice those periods when it's "comfortable".  As you know, a high-humidity "hot" day (or night) will be felt as hotter.

      I would imagine that the town of Adrar is quite pleasant, part of each day at least!  Except when the weather produces heat wave conditions

9153. JamesKL at 05:05 AM on 15 October 2019
      Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
      

      Eclectic - The Gobi desert is high in attitude, so will be colder. 

      I have found three places at similar latitudes, with average annual temperatures:

      Midway Atol (Pacific Ocean): 28 °N, 22 °C

      Taipei, Taiwan: 25 °N, 22 °C

      Adrar, Algeria: 27 °N, 24 °C

      Despite Adrar being at a slight altitude (258m), and a very dry climate compared to the other two, its the average temperature is higher! I can not think of anything related to prevaling winds cooling Taipei or Midway Atol which have humid climates.

9154. Tom Dayton at 04:02 AM on 15 October 2019
      Why the 97% climate consensus is important
      

      Naomi Oreskes has a new book coming out next week: "Why Trust Science?" She was interviewed on Science Friday a few days ago; the audio is available for free. A major message in her interview was that science always has included consensus as a core feature.

9155. Philippe Chantreau at 02:48 AM on 15 October 2019
      Why the 97% climate consensus is important
      

      You do have this wrong Jay. The non-existing lack of agreement in the science community has been touted by deniers as an argument about the fragility of the science. Then, of course, when it is shown that there is strong agreement, they launch other arguments some similar to yours, or others about forced conformism, or any other crap they can think of, because they are dishonest. And when one attempt to do a clean-cut, obvious explanation, a storm of obfuscation ensues. There is no good way to argue against bad faith.

9156. Jay1988 at 22:58 PM on 14 October 2019
      Why the 97% climate consensus is important
      

      I May have this wrong, because I got lost a little in the verbos nature of the article, but how is this anything other than a push for an appeal to authority fallacy? Your argument is, and again correct me if I'm wrong, that the most important part of a antiglobal warming argument is that You can tell any detractor that "the scientific community agrees with me". Shouldn't your main focus be on making the argument as clean cut and obvious as possible? Shouldn't you be focused on educating people about all of the misconceptions that they already have? isn't it more important that people understand that you can generate a greater amount of oxygen from a field of grass than you can from the same acreage of rainforest? Or maybe pushing the politicians to quit lying to the citizens and admit that a switch to nuclear would drastically lower carbon footprint a in a much more realistic fashion than any of these "green new deal" jokes?

      Maybe I'm just completely on my own with this thought process, but maybe people would take climate change more seriously if you didn't have so many figure heads for your argument being self-serving individuals that have no problem ignoring the actual problems as long as it gets them more notarity?

      Just some ideas

9157. richieb1234 at 20:20 PM on 14 October 2019
      It's the sun
      

      MA Rodger, Tom Dayton and Moderator

      Thanks for the thorough responses to my question about the medieval maximum.  Anyone not using this website is missing out on a treasure trove of information and assistance.

9158. One Planet Only Forever at 13:28 PM on 14 October 2019
      2019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #41
      

      As william says, changing how money influences politics is part of the required corrections.

      A more important action is limiting the ability of people to benefit from misleading marketing (and not just in politics). That would govern or limit the 'influence of money' in a helpful way regarding many issues.

      The lack of correction of the direction of development through the past 30 years has made the problem worse. The required actions to achieve the 1.5 C impact limit are now major corrections of incorrectly developed perceptions of status, all because of harmful self interest not being responsibly governed and limited by caring.

      Self Interest is one of many human thought and action drivers. Caring to not create negative impacts on others is another human thought and action driver.

      And the ability to learn and develop new actions that will result in a better future appears to be uniquely human, and sets humanity apart from impulsive-animal-like competitive barbarism.

      So, for humanity to have a sustainable improving future it appears that higher status needs to be limited to those humans who have higher degrees of Caring governing their self interest drivers. And the highest level leaders (the most influential, in business, political or story-telling), need to overwhelmingly care that their actions and the actions of those that they lead/influence do not negatively affect any others, especially the future generations.

      The challenge for the future of humanity is to get every leader to strive to improve awareness and understanding and apply that learning to achieve and improve on the Sustainable Development Goals. Any higher status person who is not doing that should rapidly significantly lose perceptions of status.

      Just one leader being able to maintain undeserved status can taint and corrupt a massive portion of the leaders, or at least seriously set back progress towards a sustainable improving future for humanity.

      In a nut shell, the threats to the future of humanity are any region or business that is able to maintain Self Interested leadership that is opposed to the corrections required by Caring about the future of humanity. Their unethical competitive advantage over Others (and there is undeniably a competitive advantage for those who do not lead the required energy corrections), can enable those people to unethically over-power those who care.

9159. nigelj at 09:21 AM on 14 October 2019
      2019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #41
      

      Regarding this concept of the fragility of modern civilisation. This is just my take: Western countries with their technology and complex societies have become very adept at dealing with natural disasters, but it's within a predictable range of extremes and cycles. The problem is climate change is changing this at a significant pace. Our societies while efficient and adaptable to short term crises, don't respond so well to negative changes that are new and  longer than a couple of years (eg the great depression of the 1930's that lasted ten years, and also the dust bowl problem of that period in America). A changing climate could cause some form of breakdown to our societies that is hard to get out of.

      It would then depend how fast people could learn to adapt and become self sufficient, a difficult thing for urban dwellers living in apartment dwellings so dependent on other people for all their needs.

      Poor, agricultural based societies are not good at dealing with natural disasters , but would likely survive better in an extreme climate change scenario because they know how to live a simple life. But their economic development will stop in its tracks and could well go backwards.

      Carbon tax seems the way to go, but will be a hard sell in the USA because taxes are ideologically toxic in this country. Perhaps government infrastructure programmes would be politically more viable.

9160. Daniel Bailey at 09:00 AM on 14 October 2019
      Greenland was warmer in 1940
      

      It's much warmer now in Greenland than it was during the 1930's.

      

      To Embiggen

      
      Let's look at that comparison graphically:

      

      Antarctica is not part of the topic of this post.

       

      For the interested reader, more info on Greenland historical temperatures are here.

9161. Daniel Bailey at 08:53 AM on 14 October 2019
      The upcoming ice age has been postponed indefinitely
      

      In response to your question about the timing of the next potential glacial phase inception, here's what the AR5, WG1, Chapter 5 has to say about that:

      "It is virtually certain that orbital forcing will be unable to trigger widespread glaciation during the next 1000 years. Paleoclimate records indicate that, for orbital configurations close to the present one, glacial inceptions only occurred for atmospheric CO2 concentrations significantly lower than pre-industrial levels. Climate models simulate no glacial inception during the next 50,000 years if CO2 concentrations remain above 300 ppm. {5.8.3, Box 6.2}"

      LINK

      Further:

      "Even in the absence of human perturbations no substantial build-up of ice sheets would occur within the next several thousand years and that the current interglacial would probably last for another 50,000 years. However, moderate anthropogenic cumulative CO2 emissions of 1,000 to 1,500 gigatonnes of carbon will postpone the next glacial inception by at least 100,000 years....under natural conditions alone the Earth system would be expected to remain in the present delicately balanced interglacial climate state, steering clear of both large-scale glaciation of the Northern Hemisphere and its complete deglaciation, for an unusually long time"

      SOURCE

      Looking beyond that, research has found that the ability to offset the next 5 glacial phase inceptions lies within the purview of humans:

      "Our research shows why atmospheric CO2 will not return to pre-industrial levels after we stop burning fossil fuels. It shows that it if we use up all known fossil fuels it doesn't matter at what rate we burn them.

      The result would be the same if we burned them at present rates or at more moderate rates; we would still get the same eventual ice-age-prevention result."

      And

      "Burning all recoverable fossil fuels could lead to avoidance of the next five ice ages."

      SOURCE

9162. bjchip at 08:47 AM on 14 October 2019
      Greenland was warmer in 1940
      

      It is now 2019.  We would do well to discuss this.  

      How much did Greenland actually melt in the 1930's and how much of that was happening at the same time as melting/warming in the Antarctic?  

9163. CO2 is good at 08:31 AM on 14 October 2019
      The upcoming ice age has been postponed indefinitely
      

      How much CO2 will we have to keep emitting to keep glaciation at bay for the next 10k years?

9164. steve501 at 06:33 AM on 14 October 2019
      2019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #41
      

      In order to rapidly replace fossil fuels we should cosider using GHG energy to power our civilization.The same energy source that heats our planet can be used to replace our existing dirty energy sources.

9165. william5331 at 04:53 AM on 14 October 2019
      2019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #41
      

      Doesn't it seem a little foolish to be talking about removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere when we are still subsidizing fossil fuel companies.  We will continue to do so as long as the election of politicians depends on money from these same fossil fuel companies.  Make this illegal and perhaps, just perhaps, the politicians could be pursuaded to stop these subsidies and we would pick up the pace of transition to renewables.  Already wind and solar are more economic than fossil fuel.

9166. MA Rodger at 03:09 AM on 14 October 2019
      It's cooling
      

      richieb1234 @306,

      The GISP2 ice core temperature record is Greenland temperature not global temperature. High Northern latitudes will have cooled more than global averages since the Holocene Climate Optimum (5,000 years ago). As a result, a reconstructed Greenland temperature would show today's Greenland temperatures still below those of the Holocene Climate Optimum.

      The GISP2 data is often recycled by denialists (the graph below is from your link) suggesting the final data point represents today when it is actually 95 years before 1950 = 1855. CarbonBrief have a recent factcheck of the GISP2 data's misuse by denialists, along with a Greenland temperature reconstruction from multiple ice cores and brought up-to-date with modern instrument data, the today's temperatures being Berkeley Earth 20-year averages to 2013.

      

      Your link also features the infamous IPCC FAR Fig 7.1c saying "it has become so 'inconvenient' they haven't mentioned it since & some scientists have tried to eliminate it." Again FAR Fig 7.1c  has been much misused by denialists. Yet it was always a “schematic diagram of global temperature variations” with the “dotted line nominally represents conditions near the beginning of the twentieth century.” If anybody reads the text of IPCC FAR, it would also indicate plainly just how schematic Fig 7.1c was. Additionally, if Fig 7.1c were meant to be an accurate global temperature record, the 0.15 deg C temperature increase shown for 1900-50 would be a bit of a clue.

      

9167. Tom Dayton at 01:35 AM on 14 October 2019
      It's cooling
      

      Richieb1234: Regarding the Medieval Warm Period, see this post. For a more recent and better temperature reconstruction see here.

9168. richieb1234 at 23:48 PM on 13 October 2019
      It's cooling
      

      Here is an example of an argument I see over and over between climate researchers and climate skeptics: https://www.quora.com/What-stage-of-which-Milankovitch-cycle-are-we-in-and-does-this-have-any-bearing-on-current-climate-change. (Sorry, I haven't mastered how to paste the graphics into my comment).  It relates to whether the current global average temperature is higher than the medieval maximum.  The dueling groups each seem to have their own set of facts.  Can someone clear this up for me?  Thanks.

      Moderator Response:

      [TD] In those Quora responses, David was correct. The GISP2 graph that Allen posted ends in 1855, which is why the spike at the right is absent. Just as problematic is the fact that GISP2 is from a single location and therefore not well representative of the entire world. GISP2 is explained in a three part series here. In the Search field at the top left, enter “Crux of a Core” to find them.

9169. swampfoxh at 23:27 PM on 13 October 2019
      2019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #41
      

      On another note, if it took about 120,000 years to produce the end Permian, and if estimates of 3 to 4 thousand ppm of "emissions" characterized a planet with a pale green sky and purple seas, whose to say that a much milder impact, say at the 2,000 year mark of that event hadn't already wiped out 97% of life forms? Or the 200 year mark? Seems to me that the outrageously rapid upswing in present GGEs could wipe out humans rather quickly...since humans are much more vulnerable to climate changes than are other lifeforms. We need houses, heat, air conditioning, three meals a day....we already had a very hard time surviving on a planet that, prior to the industrial revolution was, otherwise, a pretty hospitable place. But now? Tomorrow? In 2035 when CO2 equivalents reach, maybe 500ppm?

9170. swampfoxh at 22:33 PM on 13 October 2019
      2019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #41
      

      Looks to me like a carbon tax/fee scheme would have to settle in at $200/ton to make a dent. That's only 50 cents/gallon at the pump. Of course, a 92% reduction in global population would solve the whole problem...which makes me bet it isn't going to get solved.

9171. One Planet Only Forever at 07:59 AM on 13 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      nigelj@38,

      As a follow-up to my comment@39 I think a more interesting, but missing, part of the comparison of the impacts of more aggressive correction by 2030 would be what the 'required responsible actions' look like from 2030 to be carbon-neutral by 2050, or more properly to be the 'same total carbon impact' by the time carbon-neutral is achieved.

      The actions that would be 'less negative to the economy' by 2030 likely require significantly more negative actions after 2030. That is an extension of the 'creation of someone else's problem' that was perpetrated by the self interested resistance to correction through the past 30 years. Not only will the challenge be bigger after 2030, the total accumulated impacts will be higher unless the challenge after 2030 keeps the total impact to the same target level rather than just continuing to meet a 'carbon-neutral by 2050' plan.

      And, back to the use of a discount rate, using a discount rate makes actions today that make bigger problems in the future "look better". And the bigger the discount rate the better the evaluation of the future looks.

      As Greta said (paraphrased), the concerned and aware youth today do not want to hear leaders today express admiration and confidence regarding how brilliant the future generations will be at solving the challenges they will face.

9172. MA Rodger at 20:17 PM on 12 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      Postkey @40,

      I'm not sure the relevance here of UK tax policies, but you are not correct.

      I'm assuming you are dividing household equivalised post-tax income by gross income to reach your 53% figure (when it works out as 55%). The big mistake here is mixing equivalised values and raw non-equivalised values. These two measures should not be combined in this manner within the same calculation. Note, the ratio tax(direct+indirect):gross income remains constant between the two measures.

9173. Postkey at 18:23 PM on 12 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      If I have 'worked this out' correctly?

      In the UK, the lowest decile pay 43% percent of their gross income in direct and indirect taxes. The highest pay 34%.

      If 'equivalised income'is considered, then the bottom 10% pay 53%.

      LINK

      Moderator Response:

      [DB]  Shortened link breaking page formatting.

9174. One Planet Only Forever at 13:17 PM on 12 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      nigelj@38,

      Regarding how negative it would be to implement more aggressive action regarding GHG emissions, the Canadian Federal elections are happening and as part of the election policy coverage the CBC just published a comparison of the Party plans regarding GHG reduction: Confronting Carbon: Comparing Party Platforms.

      The analysis shows that the Green Party plans (to do significantly better than Canada's current 2030 targets), will not put the Canadian economy into a recession They will reduce projected economic growth by about 0.5%. The compound annual economic growth rate through to 2030 for the Green Party plan would be 1.25% vs. 1.74% for continuiing with the plans of the current govenment that miss the target.

      Note that the Conservative Plan is to change things in a way that increases how much Canada misses the 2030 target from 110 Megatonnes to 134 Megatonnes but will only increase the GDP growth rate from 1.74% to 1.78%.

9175. nigelj at 12:48 PM on 12 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      Eclectic, well thanks, I'm glad someone understands what I'm going on about!

      Yes I can believe poor and rich pay about the same proportion of income as total tax. I checked this issue for New Zealand and I can't find anything much  and don't have the time to dig deeply, but this jumped out:  "As you can see, the richest tenth of New Zealanders pay 47% of all income tax, but that's hardly surprising when they earn 34% of all the income."

      We do have a pretty generous programme of income support for families that probably effectively  does reduce the tax of the very lowest income earners in a proportional sense, and maybe more so than America. But it has reduced serious poverty and we have had nothing like tent cities or trailor parks. Our problem is very high house prices and rents recently, similar to the isssue in California, and thats causing poverty to creep back. But I digress...

      Digressing back to the climate issue, I can't help but wonder if a massive "GND" style of programme would really reduce economic growth as some claim. During WW2 America undertook a rapid conversion of the economy to manufacture armaments, I think a staggering 30% of gdp went into this, yet economic growth was strong and surprisingly standards of living went up. I know the climate issue is a bit different because we are being advised to reduce consumption, but still its worth thinking about.

9176. Eclectic at 08:21 AM on 12 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      Nigelj , your post #35 was excellently well stated.

      One extra point (from the American scene) is the proportion of taxation burden.  The standard narrative is that the rich and the upper middle class pay the lion's share of revenue supporting the government (or call it supporting the social contract, if you prefer the term).

      That may not be entirely fair, as a description.  Earlier in 2019, I came across two graphs (but I can't vouch for their accuracy).  The first was the standard "income tax paid as a proportion of income" ~ where the rich in the top decile were paying the bulk of absolute tax dollars . . . reducing down to the poorest deciles paying close to zero income tax. [Disregarding social security benefits paid.]

      However, the second graph showed the effect of the addition of sales taxes, state taxes, local taxes of various kinds.  

      Remarkably: each decile from poorest to richest, paid close to the same percentage of their income, as total tax.

9177. One Planet Only Forever at 07:49 AM on 12 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      markpittsusa@34,

      I believe that your claim, that a diversity of political competitors would agree with my point, is incorrect or missing important clarification. Conservatives and Libertarians (if that is what you mean by far-left Liberals) who genuinely want to help any and all Others in ways that ensure that no one suffers a harsh short existence (a clearer example of a non-decent life) might agree, but not the New age of Populist Leaders or the self-professed Good Conservatives or Good Liberals who choose to support and defend them. Admittedly there are different opinions about what is Decent, and Yuval Noah Harari does a decent job of presenting that issue in his book "21 Lessons for the 21st Century". But Decent is not a term that is wide open to any Opinion. And there is far less room to dispute what is 'negative', especially regarding climate change impacts.

      My comment means that Opinions need to be judged against the achievement of and improvements on the Sustainable Development Goals, especially being judged on the fullness and accuracy of their presentation (more complete presentations of what is actually going on). I try to evaluate things that way, especially the actions of leaders (business, political, and purveyors of information - storytellers like the media).

      When evaluated based on the need to help improve awareness and understanding and its application to develop sustainable improvements for all of humanity, a variety of Opinionators (and their associates) do worse than score lower than others, they often fail to pass the test, often trying to dismiss or discredit the evaluation rather than be judged on that basis.

      I am quite confident that certain, not all, 'political and business entities (which by default include the less correct information purveyors)' would be more averse than others would be to being required to present the fuller story more accurately, no misleading marketing.

      I will close by adding a point I failed to include in my comment @33. Self Interest can cause a person to want to justify their desires through the Negative-Negative evaluation I commented about @25. And it can motivate them to go further and want that incorrect evaluation to be done with a higher discount rate.

      That leads to a response to nigelj @35. I accept nigelj's point about Self Interest needing to be governed or limited. I disagree that it is should be given a prominent moral standing. Parfit's arguments very powerfully leave no doubt about the understanding that Self Interest needs to be Governed by concern for Others, and that Others does not mean just Other Family members, or just Others that a person is aware of and likes.

      Moving out from under a falling piano is a Good Instinct, but it has nothing to do with ethics and their application to thoughtful processes like determining what to do about the harmful abuse of fossil fuels. Self Interest being allowed to influence that type of evaluation is Not Helpful.

9178. nigelj at 06:44 AM on 12 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      markpittsusa says "I agree with you completely. But then so would the most conservative Republican, and the furthest Left Democrat. That's because everyone has their own definition and opinion concerning what's "decent," "negative," etc. Also, everyone disagrees about who is being greedy and controlled by self-interest."

      These are real problems that must be resolved. The term self interest shouldn't be demonised, because if we didn't have self interest we would probably die pretty fast. Humans are self interested by our very nature, however we also observably mostly have a counter balancing altruistic side to our character. Helping others has some obvious benefits to our selves that don't need repeating here, and is a moral good, so we should obviously promote altruism but not by suggesting self interest is evil. A good moral and economic case can be made that altruism is a virtue.

      Greed is easier to define and to accept as a moral wrong and also a behaviour that destablises economies. For any group of people to cooperate to improve their circumstances clearly requires rules, and one rule is not taking more than your fair share of the resources by force, as in the basic resources of the land, and stealing from other people. In a free market economy people earn the rights to resources, and thats ok up to a point.

      The problem happens when people earn the rights to a lot of resources and others get left well behind working hard yet still living in poverty, or disabled etcetera. In this case most people agree to some level of income redistribution to help them enforced by government's The problem is those on the right of politics (in the main) that resent income redistribution being forced by governments (taxation is allegedly theft) and they resent other government impositions. Yet their objections create a situation where it become virtually impossible to solve poverty and other problems.

      Those on the left sometimes have artificially high expectations on what governments can achieve, and are very idealistic about human nature.

      Everyone is susceptible to accumulating wealth as a status display almost like a drug, and gaming the system to perpetuate this regardless of cost to other people and the environment. This includes left and right, business and government, although the left at least have the virtue of recognising the problem.

      There is a sensible middle ground. But its being lost in America in a tribal political war thats getting dangerous, and one big casualty is climate change mitigation.

9179. Doug Bostrom at 04:55 AM on 12 October 2019
      Video: Arctic Sea Ice Minimum Volumes 1979-2019
      

      Our drink is warming while we blather for decades. :-(

9180. markpittsusa at 03:39 AM on 12 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      One Planet,

      I agree with you completely. But then so would the most conservative Republican, and the furthest Left Democrat.  That's because everyone has their own definition and opinion concerning what's "decent," "negative," etc.  Also, everyone disagrees about who is being greedy and controlled by self-interest.

9181. One Planet Only Forever at 02:24 AM on 12 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      I offer the following higher level of thoughts for consideration as a follow-up to my comments in this thread (and almost every comment I have made on SkS). This is my latest developed way of presenting this, and it appears to align with the thoughts being expressed by others.

      “Everyone being sustainably decently self-sufficient, now and into the future” should be the Governing Objective.

      Self Interest can actually be a serious impediment to the achievement of that Objective. Derek Parfit explained the fundamental unacceptability of Self Interest in robust, very hard to reasonably refute, detail in his book “Reasons and Persons”.

      My two ways of presenting that point are:

      • Self Interest leading to Greed can result in people pursuing more personal benefit in ways that limit the ability of others to be sustainably self sufficient by taking a larger than required share of available renewable resources, damaging and reducing the robust diversity of renewable resources, and harmfully wastefully using up non-renewable resources. Those negative results of greed appear in many forms including the pursuits of 'cheaper and easier' ways to personally benefit. It produces popularity of harmful actions. And it can create less compensation for, or no employment of, significant portions of the population. It also results in a lack of decent affordable housing or a lack of access to decent food and water.
      • Self Interest leading to disliking of people who are harmlessly different is another negative aggravating factor, especially when it gets tied to the reduced opportunities for self-sufficiency that Greed produces.

      Requirements of that understanding include the following:

      • Within the whole of global humanity, different ways of achieving The Objective by any sub-set can be acceptable.
      • A diversity of ways of trying to achieve it can be helpful, as long as the actions of any sub-set do not cause negative consequences within the sub-set or for any Others.
      • The results of the sub-set actions must be monitored for negative impacts to achieving the Objective.
      • Collective governing actions will be required to effectively correct any resulting 'activity that has negative impact', including correcting for 'less than decent self sufficient life experiences' created in any of the many 'socioeconomic-political trials/experiments'.
      • Corrections need to be effective and rapid to minimize the negative impacts, ensure that the negative activity does not become popular or produce significant reward for anyone.
      • Corrections need to collectively help those who are unable to be sustainably self-sufficient. A person should only experience a less than decent basic life for a short duration before they are collectively helped.
      • Leaders need to constantly work to improve the understanding of how to govern and change the diversity of systems to better achieve the sustainable self-sufficiency Objective. On the Total Population issue - That would include understanding the importance of global awareness of effective birth control and the potential value of abortions to help develop Sustainable Self-Sufficiency - but the more important population related understanding being the need to reduce (eliminate) the negative impacts of the highest impacting portion of the population to make it easier for all others to be sustainably self-sufficient.
9182. Eclectic at 22:59 PM on 11 October 2019
      Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
      

      JamesKL , the answer is more complex, because there are different cases.

      For the classic "hot desert" (e.g. the Sahara, near the Tropic of Cancer) then it's true that the adjacent equatorial forests have a higher temperature at night.   During the daytime, the forests are cooler ~ presumably from the evaporative cooling effect ~ but I stand to be corrected if you have some good official data saying otherwise.  Since the air temperature is measured at 200cm altitude, you get variation according to shading from the forest canopy versus open areas of (moist) grasses/shrubs.   But then we get to the question of day/night averaging & how often in 24 hours the temperature is measured for calculating the average.  And seasonal or summer vs winter average temperatures for desert/forest.

      Then there's the case of a "cold desert" (e.g. the Gobi in Mongolia) compared with adjacent coastal forests having much higher rainfall.   The Gobi is indeed cold at night, and the coastal forests warmer.   But during the daytime . . . do you have any official temperature figures?  I could imagine if you scouted around, you could find some contradictory desert vs forest (or grassland) cases.  

      Difficult enough to find nicely matched cases, of similar latitude / altitude / ocean proximity / or exposure to prevailing or seasonal winds & rainfall.  (Monsoonal rain, or annually well-distributed rain.)

      To boil your question down, and over-simplify : you have to balance daytime evaporation in well-vegetated areas, versus nighttime cooling in dry (deserty) low-humidity areas.   So I am not giving a black-and-white answer to your original question ~ but I hope you can take consideration of the underlying physical principles involved.

9183. JamesKL at 20:07 PM on 11 October 2019
      Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
      

      If this were the case, wouldn’t you expect average temperatures in humid parts of the world (like rainforests) to be higher than drier areas (like deserts) at the same latitude?

9184. nigelj at 12:33 PM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      doug_bostrom @29, I agree, and I have had these sorts of discussions elsewhere. Humanity is mostly raiding the cupboard of the cheese, and not leaving much cheese for the grandkids . It could be severely problematic, and doesn't feel right to me as a matter of conscience.

      No doubt some people gamble that the gandkids will be smart enough to get the remaining cheese. Good luck with that plan.

      This generation can obviously help the situation by consuming less, wasting less, recycling more, and building products that last longer, and stock piling waste so its easy to recycle, and by having small families. I doubt that there's much governmnets can or should to to force those things on people. It is very much a case of us talking about it and spreading awareness. Governments can do a bit to encourage lower birth rates, and have good environmental laws,  and encourage recycling, but thats about it. There needs to be a mostly voluntary corporate culture change that goes beyond green washing, and its encouraging to see some green shoots of this. But I have no idea how far it might go.

      Of course we have a problem because capitalism in its present form tends to encourage the opposite of these better ways of behaving. Capitalism encourages maximum consumption and throw away products and is hostile to business regulation. But it may be possible to bend capitalism enough to solve the problems, without compromising it's main attributes.

      I also doubt that people would dramatically reduce their level of consumption for a problem thats well into the future and devilishly hard to quantify. Wasting less etc, and getting the size of global population down to reduce demand pressure looks like the least painful mechanism, although it's not without its own problems. If we all adopt a fertility rate of 1.5 kids in the following decade or two,  global population starts to fall in absolute size by 2100. Some countries are already near this level so its a realistic plan. With reduced demand pressure virtually all environmental problems improve, but  such plans are obviously not sufficient in themselves.

      Could all be a train wreck. The best plan is probably harm minimisation. Do what we can.

9185. One Planet Only Forever at 11:10 AM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      markpittsusa,

      My first thought is a more effective process to more rapidly identify and thoroughly correct misleading marketing (why I stay tuned-in to SkS). The achievement of, and improvement on, the Sustainable Development Goals would be a primary set of guiding principles for doing that (they were globally developed through decades of collaborative pursuit of improved awareness and understanding and continue to be open to improvement, expansion and correction).

      Marketing is great, as long as it is helpfully increasing awareness and understanding. New products and services need to be developed. And helpful promotion of new products and services is essential. Providing consumers with a fuller awareness and understanding of their choices is very helpful, but is very difficult to do when business interests or political interests can keep the reality of their activities 'secret' (people unaware) or 'misunderstood' (people misled by appealing misleading claim making, especially passion-triggering marketing).

      It would be best if everyone wanted to helpfully improve their awareness and understanding and apply that learning to helping others, by helping achieve and improve the Sustainable Development Goals at whatever level they are able to act at. But some aspects of human nature makes that universal dedication to helpfulness a fantasy. It will always be likely that some members of humanity will try to personally benefit in ways that produce negative consequences for Others. Vigilant and sustained global governing is required with the SDGs as the overarching Objectives, governing everything including governing the acceptability of laws, law-makers, judges, lawyers, policing, military, businesses, education (rule of law can be corrupted).

      Specifically for the matter of climate impacts, I believe that people like Stephen Gardener, author of "A Perfect Moral Storm", are leading in a helpful correction direction. He is pushing for international governing rules with teeth, not aspirations that can be Opted-out of without penalty.

      And if you want to better understand the reasoning behind my thinking you could try to read Derek Parfit's 1984 book "Reasons and Persons".

      Before I read Parfit's or Gardener's books I had independently developed a similar understanding by my own efforts to come up with explanations of what can be seen to be going on and reading a lot of other books by other people trying to do the same thing, specifically related to society and the environment and what had developed and why, especially why the resistance to understanding climate science was so persistent and powerful.

      My conclusion is that misleading marketing can be abused by harmful cheaters to unjustifiably prosper without risk of serious personal consequences. That is what I believe needs to fundamentally be corrected.

9186. markpittsusa at 10:19 AM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      One Planet.  Maybe a productive approach (for me at least) would be if you could explain what you would propose in order to fix the "fatally flawed socioeconomic-political system." I agree with your general philosophy.

9187. Doug Bostrom at 10:15 AM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      Reasonable people can disagree on the internet. Who knew (or remembered)? :-)

      What a great discussion.

      One point made here really resonates with me (among others) and that's the other big problem with fossil fuels aside from the CO2 emissions defect: the fossil nature of the fuel. Nobody's making fossil fuel these days. There's a limited supply of this material and substitution by constructing molecules from elements turns out to be a fairly tough technological problem, one of many we already face and one we don't necessarily have to take on.

      It being a fact that petroleum and natural gas  are useful for many things less caveman-like than setting them on fire, in general the faster we get past caveman mode the better. Imagining that there were not a climate change problem attached to fossil fuels and imagining that we have some applications for petroloeum and natural gas as raw materials in the future, we can hypothesize responsible rates of investment for eliminating crude burning of what we now consider primarily  as fuel.

      How fast should we do this? I expect many of us like to think about what civilization will be like in 100, 500,1,000 or 2,000 years. More and ideally most of us need to think this way if we're to collectively exhibit moral and ethical integrity, behave respectably as a group. What years in the future look like for people living in those times depends in large part— short of speculation entirely— on choices we make today. They can be easier years, or harder years. If we've dispersed all the easily obtained copper willy-nilly about the globe in low concentrations, how are people 1,000 years from now to wind electric motors? What gives us the right to take away options for everybody following us?

      Failing to take the future into consideration— negligent behavior with consumables— is arguably a form of theft. It seems to me that we need to act as rapidly as we can afford to so as to minimize our culpable actions. 

9188. Lithium Valley Rocks at 10:10 AM on 11 October 2019
      Geologists and climate change denial
      

      So I ask the question of causes of past climate nudges.... solar intensity, cosmic impacts, super vulcanism, tectonic forces, supercontinant creation/disintegration, chemical weathering of rocks.... so I don't recall any of these happening in the last 100 years, yet all the indicator of such an influence are present. Humans are impacting the planets systems to the same extent as a comet impact on a huge oil field or permafrost methane hydrate province.... 

      Which past event corolates to what we are seeing today? 

9189. markpittsusa at 09:53 AM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      @ One Planet & Nigel

      Thanks for your comments; I'm understanding your views better.  (I'd like to ask a few questions when I've had more time to digest your comments better.)

9190. nigelj at 08:57 AM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      I posted my comment @26 before OPOFs was on my screen. Sorry for any repetition.

9191. nigelj at 08:51 AM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      markpittsusa @22, I hope you don't mind but I will weigh in on some of this. You will see why.

      "1) Poverty kills. ....We also know that economic development is what cures poverty....So, we have a choice to make: (1) Put the brakes on development and/or divert massive resources to replace one form of energy with another, or (2) Keep moving ahead, limit carbon emissions, plan to adapt to some environmental changes....My assessment (which you may not agree with) is that we eliminate more poverty and save more lives with the second approach than the first."

      Let's examine western countries like America. Economic growth alleviated poverty in past centuries but has been ineffective in recent decades at this. The benefits of growth have been captured by certain groups. Poverty has been reduced in recent decades by income redistribution in western countries because they have plenty of wealth to do this. I have a copy of The Economist Journal September 28th, which has a huge article on poverty in America. The Economist finds that things like food stamps and the in work tax credit and entitlement programmess have been effective in reducing poverty but don't go far enough. 

      Let's examine poor countries. They will need more economic growth to lift people out of poverty because in the early stages economic growth does this. However their emissions are quite low and electricity grids are limited, so climate mitigation is not really about a massive and rapid programme of replacing infrastructure. Its about building wind farms rather than building more coal power. Its an additive process. So its hard to see why climate mitigation in poor countries needs to be a huge brake on economic growth. You also mentioned the western world subsidising the climate mitigation of poor countries, so this would mean growth is not compromised.

      Its also a false dichotomy to somehow consider poverty reduction versus climate mitigation. There's clearly more to the issue.

      "2). A zero, or near zero, interest rate makes no sense."

      I dont think anyone suggested zero interest rates for the economy as a whole. It's a question of whether a discount rate at zero or near zero is appropriate to deal with an issue like mitigating climate change and it may well be. I support capitalism and interest rates etc in broad terms.
      This is my take. Discount rates make perfect sense applied to problems that have many possible solutions, and project planning, where one of the solutions may be just to invest money. The world will probably get wealthier ( we would probably argue about how much) and this alone may solve some problems. However some issues are different, for example a faulty bridge really needs to be fixed immediately because its life threatining, and as I said using the excuse that medical advances in the future may mitigate the threat would be pretty weak.

      Climate change is more like the bridge problem in that mitigation needs to be fairly immediate and done whatever it costs (although phased in) and the problem is life threatening and a huge issue. And its worse because we cannot rule out catastrophic climate scenarios. We also need to be cautious because there are signs that economic growth cannot continue forever. So discount rates seem a dubious mechanism to decide on a carbon price, and at least they would need to be set quite low.

      "5) The climate problem is more like “fix that old bridge that might hurt people in the year 2100”

      Climate change is already hurting some communities, an issue easily enough googled.

       

9192. One Planet Only Forever at 08:38 AM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      markpittsusa @22,

      I will start my response by presenting a clarification of the frame of reference (the context) for the discussion. It should then be obvious what the responses to your points are, but I will also respond to your points consistent with that frame-of-reference. The wording may be able to be significantly improved, but I am not inclined at this time to put more effort into 'improving the presentation'. The thoughts should be clear enough.

      Getting into debates about discount rates distracts from what needs to be understood. What is being discussed is the Future of Humanity. And the quality of that future depends on there being a robust diversity of humanity that sustainably fits into a robust diversity of other life on this amazing planet. This is not a dollar and cents thing. Dollars and cents fail to make sense of impacts that are outside of the made-up economic games that people play. The Sustainable Development Goals cover all of it rather well, and they are open to improvement based on input from anyone - including you and me.

      Back to the cost evaluations regarding climate impacts and the application of discount rates. The climate impact costing comparative evaluation is incorrectly comparing the 'perceived lost opportunity for benefit by people today' with the 'negative impacts on Others in the future due to the competitions in pursuit of personal benefit by people today'.

      That is a Negative-Negative evaluation. And it is understandably unethical. It is unethical to distract the discussion into an evaluation claimed to Fairly Balance such a Negative-Negative evaluation rather than admitting that one group must stop producing negative consequences that others will have to deal with. And those who are more fortunate can still have decent lives while leading that required correction and helping the less fortunate sustainably improve their lives. That basic understanding was established in Kyoto and has remained, because it is fundamentally ethically defensible.

      Even with a zero-discount rate the climate cost evaluation can be understood to be incorrect. In the past I have presented an example of neighbours to clarify the understanding. The neighbour example is a case where an individual has been doing something on their property that is not essential to their basic existence and that can be understood to have real negative impacts on their neighbour (not a perceived harm to their developed sensibilities, but a real negative impact). To defend continuing to do that undeniably unacceptable thing they evaluate 'their perceived loss of personal benefit if they had to stop doing that thing' and compare it to 'their evaluation of the negative impact on their neighbour' and then declare that they are justified in continuing to do their thing as long as 'their perceived loss' is a match for or greater than 'their evaluated impact on their neighbour'. That is obviously a repugnant argument (they should have no excuse for continuing to negatively impact their neighbour).And that is the result of using a zero-discount rate. Discounting part of the impact on the neighbours to reduce the 'perceived impact on the neighbour' makes it even easier to justify doing the undeniably unacceptable thing (and is more repugnant).

      In case you are wanting to claim that fossil fuel use is 'essential to basic existence' my response is that only the poorest could make such a claim. And since fossil fuels are non-renewable, and their use causes negative consequences to Others, everyone more fortunate should be helping the poorest sustainably improve their lives in ways that are not dependent on fossil fuels.

      Back again to climate change costing done with discount rates. Using a positive discount rate on the climate impact evaluations does the same thing as the neighbour example. It is worse than repugnant. However, politically, lots of opportunity exists for populist regional tribal misleading marketing to be appealing, because the starting point is 'the unacceptable thing that has developed'.

      What is required is the end of causing the negative impacts. The political argument is about not doing the correction, or how slowly can that correction be done, how much more harm 'is acceptable', most important how do the more fortunate get to maintain their status relative to Others. The actual ethical requirement is 'Stop the negative impact activity'. The lack of leadership action by 'all of the supposedly more advanced people' through the past 30 years has made the required correction more urgent while also causing more future harm to have been done, and increasing populist support to resist the corrections (manipulation of the citizens deciding how much they are willing to sacrifice, how much they will like unethical misleading marketing from harmful wanna-be-leaders).

      A related example to address the poverty issue is the example of a family situation evaluation where some members of the family have benefited and currently continue to personally benefit from actions that undeniably result in negative poverty consequences for other members of the family. Like the neighbour example, it is obvious that it is unacceptable for some members of the family to have been doing that. And it is worse if they try to excuse it and continue doing it by doing a similar negative-negative comparison. And it is even worse if they try to discount the negative impacts on the other family members. And the concept extends without any actual change when the frame of reference changes from Family to Community or Business of employment or Nation or Global Population. In spite of the reality that there should be no change of that understanding as a result of the change of the Group it is applied to, there is undeniably political actors appealing to greed and dislike of, or lack of concern for, Others who are different or far away, or in the future.

      Poverty does need to be ended. But perceptions of success on that front that are based on unsustainable and negative actions like the use of fossil fuels are not real. The following is a related understanding I developed through improved Fair Trade understanding. It is unethical to claim that a person has been lifted out of poverty if they have been forced from a subsistence farming/foraging life into new-age slave employment in operations like the Free Trade production zone in the Philippines that operate 'outside of the Philippine labour laws. Earning more than $2.50 a day that way rather than being able to live sustainably on a farm is not 'raising a person out of poverty'. And it is worse if they were forced out of their previous life by fossil fuel operations and if the need to end fossil fuel use would worsen their slave employment.

      Understanding the need to end the production of negative consequences cannot be allowed to be compromised by 'incorrect developed beliefs, actions and perceptions being maintained or protected from significant correction'. The related understanding is that the limit of 1.5 C impacts is already a compromise of that requirement that was established decades ago. And the establishment of a 2.0 C limit was a pragmatic political additional compromising of the future due to the lack of responsible leadership through the past few decades. Truly sustainable improvements of life for the least fortunate must be achieved and improved on. That means the already more fortunate must lead the correction. The most fortunate should be required to prove they deserve to be most fortunate by truly being seen as the leaders of the correction, as well as being seen to actually be most helpful to the less fortunate, helping them have lives that are at least considered 'neutral basic decent lives, not negative lives'.

      That understanding becoming 'popular' would compromise the ability of many of the wealthy to maintain their wealth. And it would make it more difficult for future wealthy people to be wealthier than others because it would limit how they can become wealthier than others. That would be a helpful sustainable compromise.

      With that clarification of the context, frame of reference I will respond to your 5 points:

      1. Poverty: Any perceptions of poverty improvement that are only due to fossil fuel use are not sustainable. And much more can be done to end poverty, but the developed socioeconomic-political systems resist making the obvious corrections, because they are harder and require a personal sacrifice of developed perceptions of status and opportunity for personal benefit. The most fortunate have to prove they deserve to be more fortunate by actually being the most helpful to the least fortunate.

      2. A zero, or near zero, interest rate makes no sense: The discussion is the use of a discount rates when determining how much negative impact can continue to be inflicted on Others in the future. See above.

      3. The 1.5C limit: The original established level of warming impact before the results become questionable has always been 1.5 C. The 2.0 C is actually the political number. It was 'pragmatically established'. The 1.5 C value was brought back because it is the real science based recommended limit, not 2.0 C (or 3.5 C that supposedly gets justified by Nordhaus).

      You should review the “Landmark United Science Report Informs Climate Actions Summit” OP 3rd item below this one on the SkS home page which includes the following:

      “The Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C states that limiting warming to 1.5ºC is not physically impossible but would require unprecedented transitions in all aspects of society. There are clear benefits to keeping warming to 1.5 ºC compared to 2 ºC or higher. Every bit of warming matters.

      Limiting warming to 1.5ºC can go hand in hand with reaching other world goals such as achieving sustainable development and eradicating poverty.”

      4. Continued world economic development: This is the first time in history that evaluators of economic activity have been forced to figure out what to do about a new developed understanding that a major part of the developed global economy is actually unsustainable and harmful. Their models are of no merit without sustainability as governing criteria. Any perceptions due to fossil fuel use are not sustainable.

      5. Regarding “I understand how the engineering approach of “fix the old problem” before starting a new project makes sense in most first world applications”:

      That is not what I said. It appears that you have been selectively reading what I shared (even attributing other people's comments as if their personal extrapolations of my comments were what I said - at no point in my comment did I use the word “Bridge”.

      The climate problem is more like “fix the developments of the fatally flawed socioeconomic-political system that is hurting people today and will cause more negative consequences the more it is left uncorrected” or “There will not be a sustainable and improving future for humanity”.

      Hopefully improving awareness and understanding will become popular enough to sustainably win everywhere, the sooner the better.

9193. markpittsusa at 07:54 AM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      Yes, Nigel, I think we should agree to disagree.  In the end, the citizens will decide how much they are willing to sacrifice, not you or I.

9194. nigelj at 06:48 AM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      markpittsusa @20

      "About 63% of all US families say they would have trouble coming up with $500 in an emergency, but you say spending $4000 would be no problem since they spend that much on entertainment, alcohol, and flash cars. Who’s right?"

      I think I'm right on this one. It's a fact people generally have a lot of discretionary spending, and of course its a fact that many have nothing much in the bank for emergencies. Its the way people live today sadly. It's equally a fact they could cut back on some of their discretinary spending if they wanted to. I have economised at various points in my life when I have had to find money for priorities.

      For example, if taxes go up people obviously have to economise. Now would they do this for the sake of the climate? The majority of Americans support a carbon tax according to some polls, (not all I admit) so they might cut some discretionary spending on this basis, and if you accept its going to be less than $4,000 then its not an insurmountable issue. 

      "The Sander’s program was for $16 trillion over 10 years, not 30. So, we’re talking about more than $12,500 per year for 10 years for each family."

      Correct, but you talked about a 30 year commitment therefore I talked about a 30 year commitment. Sanders time frame looks too short to me.

      “Government income support” for the poor is not free. Who pays for that? Where have you accounted for those costs?"

      The tax payer pays for it. It's old fashioned income redistribution from high to low income earners, and you already have this with things like food stamps, the in work tax credit etc. I think such schemes are useful provided rich people are not pilloried. Please excuse me I'm not American, so I'm hazy on some of the details, but I'm certainly right in principle.

      "Their is no evidence that families can save $4000 a year by “clever budgeting and wasting less.” If they could, why aren’t they doing it already? (I.e., Average people are not stupid.)

      I didn't say they could save all of the $4,000. I said clever budgetting and wasting less could make some big savings.There is massive evidence easily googled that better budgetting can solve financial problems because people waste a lot of money (I've been there). I agree people aren't stupid and dont always budget well, but if people really want to they will, and if they have to save a little money by better budgetting, say if there was a carbon tax scheme, they would probably seek budgetting advice.

      Carbon tax and dividend is another option that is gentle on people.

      "Average families do not have flash cars or spend that much on alcohol. (I.e., Average people are not degenerate."

      I think you are missing the point here a little. I picked a couple of random examples. Average families have pretty nice cars in America generally beyond what they really need, a lot of technology that is not essential, large screen televisions, eat out regularly and so on. The list is endless. And theres nothing inherently wrong with that, but some small economies would go a long way to helping the climate problem.

      "If government spending could be trimmed, then why do they never do so?"

      But 'they' do trim government spending when they want. Both Obama and Trump cut numerous programmes and so has congress. ( I do understand your point and your cynacism!)

      "Who pays for those higher corporate taxes? Families will."

      Yes but mostly it will be wealthier familes who end up paying most, so it will help poorer people. It's a similar thing with government borrowing programmes.

      "You say “quantitative easing” could be used to pay for the programs. This is more or less a subset of the idea of paying for things with borrowing. It’s like a money printing program, but does not create any goods and services that can be used for green projects."

      Quantitative easing is not borrowing. They are polar opposites unless specific arrangements have been made that the QA money be paid back. ( I think it does have to be paid back in Americas QE programme). Quantitative easing is money printing as you correctly said yourself, and it  has been used in America and Europe recently, and was used in my country to build housing for poor people in the 1930's. It is appropriate in a low inflationary environment ,and right now we have a low inflationary environment bedded in.

      Money printing can be used to fund anything you like, including green projects. This is self evident in the way the sun rises in the morning.

      Thank's for the polite issues based discourse and reasonable questions, but I probably won't pursue this issue much more. Most of your objections and questions have been made and answered many times before. We all need to listen better.

9195. markpittsusa at 02:24 AM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      @One Planet

      I appreciate your comments and approach, but let me explain why “luke warm environmentalists” like myself disagree.

      In no particular order (and with some possible duplication) here are my initial observations:

      1.
      Poverty kills. We know this. The poor do not get the medical care they need. The poor do not get adequate nutrition, or have sufficient housing or minimal sanitation. We also know that economic development is what cures poverty. In 1980 about 70% of the world’s population lived at or near subsistence. Today, it’s about 10%, and declining fast. That’s due to industrialization and economic growth.

      So, we have a choice to make: (1) Put the brakes on development and/or divert massive resources to replace one form of energy with another, or (2) Keep moving ahead, limit carbon emissions, plan to adapt to some environmental changes.

      My assessment (which you may not agree with) is that we eliminate more poverty and save more lives with the second approach than the first.

      2.
      A zero, or near zero, interest rate makes no sense. Here’s why:

      We all agree that many investments made today will more than pay for themselves in the future.

      Ethically, with a zero interest rate, people in the world today should live at a bare subsistence level. After all, $100 of goods and services consumed today deprives the future of more than $100 (because of all those good investments we could have made with that $100). So how can we ethically consume $100 and deprive the future of more than $100, since the present and the future are more or less “equal.”

      Also, a zero interest rate ignores uncertainty. If you look at expert forecasts of the future over the last 50 years, you’ll have to agree there’s been plenty of errors, and thus uncertainty.

      3.
      You say the 1.5C limit is “pretty well established.” That’s not true. It’s not in the 2018 IPCC reports, or the 2018 US government report, or the Lancet report. (Those are the recent scientific reports that I have mostly read.) Please explain why 1.5C is so important.

      The 1.5C limit was a last minute political concession made to the island nations. The original idea was to state the objective at 2C.

      You go on to use expressions like “acceptable” climate impact, and limits being “well established,” and “required.” But those are opinions, not facts. Obviously, most people don’t agree with those opinions. (Look at their actions, not their words.)

      4.
      With continued world economic development, today’s poor nations could be as rich in 2100 as Europe or the US is today. That has been the result of economic development in the last 100 years, so that is what we should expect.

      Thus, those nations will have the economic wherewithal to adapt to many of the climate problems coming their way.

      (And if those nations don’t continue to develop, their carbon footprint will be low, so there will be much less climate change.)

      5.
      I understand how the engineering approach of “fix the old problem” before starting a new project makes sense in most first world applications. But that’s not applicable to the climate problem.

      The climate problem is more like “fix that old bridge that might hurt people in the year 2100” or “build a new bridge so we can take food to people who are starving on the other side today.”

      It’s a tough decision, and one answer is not necessarily more ethical than the other.

      I’d appreciate your perspective on my comments.

9196. markpittsusa at 01:24 AM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      @doug

      Very insightful comment.  I think I sometimes over-react because so often people dismiss perfectly good analysis because they don't like the source (e.g. the Koch Brothers, or the DNC, or whoever they disagree with.)

       

9197. markpittsusa at 01:18 AM on 11 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      Nigelj 16

      Thanks for your comments. I think many people agree with you, so let me explain why many people disagree.

      From my perspective, there are a lot of small and medium sized errors in your numbers:

      About 63% of all US families say they would have trouble coming up with $500 in an emergency, but you say spending $4000 would be no problem since they spend that much on entertainment, alcohol, and flash cars. Who’s right?

      An upfront payment ($P) over x years, is Not the same as $P/x per year. It’s much more.

      The Sander’s program was for $16 trillion over 10 years, not 30. So, we’re talking about more than $12,500 per year for 10 years for each family.

      “Government income support” for the poor is not free. Who pays for that? Where have you accounted for those costs?

      Their is no evidence that families can save $4000 a year by “clever budgeting and wasting less.” If they could, why aren’t they doing it already? (I.e., Average people are not stupid.)

      Average families do not have flash cars or spend that much on alcohol. (I.e., Average people are not degenerate.)

      If government spending could be trimmed, then why do they never do so?

      Who pays for those higher corporate taxes? Families will. People own corporations, so people pay those taxes. (Roughly half of the US stock market is held in pension and retirement accounts. About another quarter in individual accounts, and the rest in “other”, like sovereign wealth funds and quasi-government owned institutions - owned by all citizens.)

      You imply that “borrowing programs” do not impose a cost on families. Who pays back those loans? Who pays the interest on that debt? What other programs get crowded out by that debt? If borrowing is free, why not borrow enough to make everyone rich?

      You say “quantitative easing” could be used to pay for the programs. This is more or less a subset of the idea of paying for things with borrowing. It’s like a money printing program, but does not create any goods and services that can be used for green projects.

      These are the questions your “opposition” would like answered.

9198. sgbotsford at 00:57 AM on 11 October 2019
      How the Greenland ice sheet fared in 2019
      

      @william In #6:  

      You could also get increased snow too however.  Some years ago, there was a pre-computer model of ice age triggering that was based on an open arctic ocean.  
      
      * Increased evaporation led to increased snow fall on surrounding land.

      * Ungava penninsula has later springs and earlier falls.

      * Increased albedo makes Ungava area cooler.

      * Two randomly cooler summers in a row result in not all the snow melting.

      * Because ground is pre chilled, snowfall accumulates faster.  

      * Cold air moving from the snowfield to surrounding area prepares that area for snow pack.

      At the time they figured a permanent snowfield could advance at about 200 km per year.

      No idea if this notion is still credible.

      But:  An arctic ocean will evaporate whenever it's open — slower winter, as I assume at least pan ice will form.  But if the arctic is open while greenland is still 2 miles thick (and high) then soggy arctic air will cool and drop lots of snow.  

       

      If the latent heat comes from the formation of dew/frost, then your figures are correct.  But it may form in the air, which means it's heat that ends up being radiated to space, no?  If it comes down as snow, it melts nothing.  If it comes down as rain, it melts some ice depending on the rain temperature.

9199. Eclectic at 22:54 PM on 10 October 2019
      There is no consensus
      

      MA Rodger @842 ,

      thank you for the link to Doran & Zimmerman (2009).  My memory of it had faded ~ so it was good to see it freshly.

      It was an online survey, and managed by a third party, and had a 30% "return rate".   So, a respectably large return for that sort of thing.  Large enough to make it highly unlikely (from what we already know of the minuscule numbers of contrarian scientists, even back in 2009) for the survey to be severely distorted by "random omission" of contrarians.

      Yes, the Doran survey was not as unassailable as the subsequent "gold medal"  two-in-one consensus study carried out by Cook et al., in 2013.   Even so, the Doran study leaves no leg for (upthread) poster CThompson to stand on.    Notably, Doran gives much the same result as Cook ~ indeed, all the consensus studies confirm the very high level of consensus.

      CThompson's claims are clearly out of touch with reality.  And he seems to have abandoned the idea of demonstrating the "large" and consensus-busting number of climate experts who are truly contrarian.

9200. nigelj at 19:19 PM on 10 October 2019
      Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40, 2019
      

      Postkey @18, while it's fair comment that mineral reserves are of course limited, the numbers you quote on mineral reserves do not describe the complete picture, and they vastly underestimate reserves. The information you quote is  based on known land based reserves of these materials at current prices and current quantities extracted.

      It's almost 100% certain more discoveries will be made, and there are many more known reserves that are not currently economic to extract, and the data you quote omits billions of tons of each of these metals dissolved in sea water (and several have already been extracted in experimental operations at reasonable cost).

      We are not going to run out of metals this century or next century, even at higher use rates than presently, and of course metals can be recycled almost forever. There are enough minerals for  solar and wind power and electric vehicles etcetera and other applications. List of some of the minerals in sea water and their concentrations.

      "Altogether, there are some 50 quadrillion tons (that is, 50 000 000 000 000 000 t) of minerals and metals dissolved in all the world’s seas and oceans. To take just uranium, it is estimated that the world’s oceans contain 4.5-billion tons of the energy metal."

      Of course we have to be sure not to waste resources and to get population growth rates down, but population growth is falling in many places anyway.

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