June 29, 2009
Op-Ed Columnist
Betraying the Planet
By PAUL KRUGMAN
So the House passed the Waxman-Markey climate-change bill. In political terms, it was a remarkable achievement.
But 212 representatives voted no. A handful of these no votes came from representatives who considered the bill too weak, but most rejected the bill because they rejected the whole notion that we have to do something about greenhouse gases.
And as I watched the deniers make their arguments, I couldn’t help thinking that I was watching a form of treason — treason against the planet.
To fully appreciate the irresponsibility and immorality of climate-change denial, you need to know about the grim turn taken by the latest climate research.
The fact is that the planet is changing faster than even pessimists expected: ice caps are shrinking, arid zones spreading, at a terrifying rate. And according to a number of recent studies, catastrophe — a rise in temperature so large as to be almost unthinkable — can no longer be considered a mere possibility. It is, instead, the most likely outcome if we continue along our present course.
Thus researchers at M.I.T., who were previously predicting a temperature rise of a little more than 4 degrees by the end of this century, are now predicting a rise of more than 9 degrees. Why? Global greenhouse gas emissions are rising faster than expected; some mitigating factors, like absorption of carbon dioxide by the oceans, are turning out to be weaker than hoped; and there’s growing evidence that climate change is self-reinforcing — that, for example, rising temperatures will cause some arctic tundra to defrost, releasing even more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Temperature increases on the scale predicted by the M.I.T. researchers and others would create huge disruptions in our lives and our economy. As a recent authoritative U.S. government report points out, by the end of this century New Hampshire may well have the climate of North Carolina today, Illinois may have the climate of East Texas, and across the country extreme, deadly heat waves — the kind that traditionally occur only once in a generation — may become annual or biannual events.
In other words, we’re facing a clear and present danger to our way of life, perhaps even to civilization itself. How can anyone justify failing to act?
Well, sometimes even the most authoritative analyses get things wrong. And if dissenting opinion-makers and politicians based their dissent on hard work and hard thinking — if they had carefully studied the issue, consulted with experts and concluded that the overwhelming scientific consensus was misguided — they could at least claim to be acting responsibly.
But if you watched the debate on Friday, you didn’t see people who’ve thought hard about a crucial issue, and are trying to do the right thing. What you saw, instead, were people who show no sign of being interested in the truth. They don’t like the political and policy implications of climate change, so they’ve decided not to believe in it — and they’ll grab any argument, no matter how disreputable, that feeds their denial.
Indeed, if there was a defining moment in Friday’s debate, it was the declaration by Representative Paul Broun of Georgia that climate change is nothing but a “hoax” that has been “perpetrated out of the scientific community.” I’d call this a crazy conspiracy theory, but doing so would actually be unfair to crazy conspiracy theorists. After all, to believe that global warming is a hoax you have to believe in a vast cabal consisting of thousands of scientists — a cabal so powerful that it has managed to create false records on everything from global temperatures to Arctic sea ice.
Yet Mr. Broun’s declaration was met with applause.
Given this contempt for hard science, I’m almost reluctant to mention the deniers’ dishonesty on matters economic. But in addition to rejecting climate science, the opponents of the climate bill made a point of misrepresenting the results of studies of the bill’s economic impact, which all suggest that the cost will be relatively low.
Still, is it fair to call climate denial a form of treason? Isn’t it politics as usual?
Yes, it is — and that’s why it’s unforgivable.
Do you remember the days when Bush administration officials claimed that terrorism posed an “existential threat” to America, a threat in whose face normal rules no longer applied? That was hyperbole — but the existential threat from climate change is all too real.
Yet the deniers are choosing, willfully, to ignore that threat, placing future generations of Americans in grave danger, simply because it’s in their political interest to pretend that there’s nothing to worry about. If that’s not betrayal, I don’t know what is.
- posted on 07/02/2009
An "Intelligent Squared" debate on this issue:
http://www.intelligencesquaredus.org/TranscriptContainer/_GlobalWarming-edited version 031407.pdf
A key question is what is your ideal temperature for the Earth, for which you are willing to spend a fortune to maintain.
Looking this way, you can see a fundamental problem with the agenda of the Global Warmers.
Personally, I share the opinion that the Global Warmers have diverted our attention from protecting biodiversity and habitat.
One century ago, there was a global movement to transform human society in the name of science-
"scientific communism". Now we see another global movement to fundamentally transform our economic activity in the name of another half baked science.
- Re: 方桌讨论:全球暖化,尊重科学是唯一出路 Betraying the Planetposted on 07/02/2009
或者应当说尊重科学是唯一*可能*的出路,也许根本没有出路呢?只是没有出路也不因为科学的介入才没有出路的。
好了,方桌已经坐满了:) - Re: 方桌讨论:全球暖化,尊重科学是唯一出路 Betraying the Planetposted on 07/02/2009
悲观主义不是出路。乐观地走进绝灭,不是好一点?;)
这贴根本不是意在讨论。搞玩子呢。其实我很想听大家讨论美国和其他国家的医保体制的,而不是“科学的工具理性”这样不通的概念。;)
浮生 wrote:
或者应当说尊重科学是唯一*可能*的出路,也许根本没有出路呢?只是没有出路也不因为科学的介入才没有出路的。
好了,方桌已经坐满了:) - Re: 方桌讨论:全球暖化,尊重科学是唯一出路 Betraying the Planetposted on 07/02/2009
同意奥主席许多, 但要讨论需要的细节太多。 我这两年一直在为老年保险公司做软件。 前几年为奥主席发表讲话的AMA做系统。现在美国医保最大的问题是模型不对, 美国最大的问题是要建立一个健康系统,将人民的健康放在第一位,而不是医生为赚钱, 乱开药,美国人依靠药物到了可怕之极的地步。 医生逍遥法外。美国最终会被目前的医保制度拖死拖垮。
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