If Climate Change Can Be Addressed, is it Truly an Emergency?
Spectrum Street Epistemology in Washington Square Park, NYC
During this Spectrum Street Epistemology session, Peter discusses both climate change and relationships with a young couple in Washington Square Park, NYC. Are we experiencing a climate crisis? Does it require immediate action? They also discuss relationships. Would you stay with your partner if they lost all of their limbs?
The debate should be
A) Is man's impact on climate negative and enough so to warrant change
B) If true then what kind of change is needed and are the costs of said change worth whatever is gained by those changes
This has been a 75+ year marketing campaign that started off as Global Cooling. When the climate went the opposite direction they re-branded as Global Warming. When the climate once again choose to take a different route they got smart and re-branded as Climate Change so as long as it changed they were right. Add to that the fact that the "Climate Catastrophe is just 10-15 years away" slogan has been constantly repeated during this period how can people trust those making the claim?
We have multiple cases of the sciences being more than a little dishonest in the past. There was the eugenics movement a century ago where many were blacklisted if they didn't promote it. Fast Forward to the 50's and we have Big Tobacco incentivizing the medical world to promote smoking as healthy. These are not conspiracy theories but history of conspiracies. It's not as if the sciences have never been wrong or dishonest and when $$ gets involved it becomes very easy to justify the means because of the ends. If promoting Climate Change means you can get Federal and or even private funding for your own research that you see as lifesaving, it's hard to resist the temptation to go along especially if you see others blacklisted for not going along. Science is not supposed to be "rule by committee" and yet that's how the Climate Change narrative has played out.
Let's examine the flip side of this, the proposed solutions. If there is too much carbon then why do the climate doomsayers claim that creating more tree's, nature’s own carbon removal device, is dumb but tinkering with Cows genetics to reduce farts isn't? How about their claims that we need to reduce food production which would almost certainly cause starvation around the world; a global famine? I could see the argument that the way commercial farming works is a problem so why not promote more decentralized farming? That’s an easy answer; because Big Food won’t allow it. There are efforts around the globe to reduce private/small farming, not to increase it. There is also the question of whether or not a higher level of carbon is actually harmful. It’s not as if the carbon levels have never been higher and long before man came along.
Nature has created this balanced circle of life. Humans take in needed O2 and give off CO2. Vegetation takes in CO2 and returns O2. The current level of CO2 is 427 PPM. The prediction is that if left unaltered it will go to 800PPM by end of the century. The highest recorded levels of CO2 was during the Cambrian period where it was at 4,000 PPM. Guess what happened during the Cambrian period? It produced the most intense burst of evolution known. That’s 4,000 PPM versus 800PPM or a ratio of 5:1 . Are we really supposed to believe that an increase in CO2 that is 1/5th of what brought about an intense burst of evolution is actually going to end life? For most plants, a CO2 concentration of 1200PPM - 1500PPM is beneficial, however the specific needs of the plants must be considered. The bare minimum for vegetation is debated between 100PPM and 150PPM.
Nature created this balance between animals and vegetation and we know from history that high levels of carbon, far higher than what is predicted, did not end life but caused an evolutionary burst. That’s not to say it wasn’t accompanied by intense weather, only that higher levels don’t equal the end of life on this planet. When looking at each direction, there risk of a life ending event falls more in line with CO2 dropping to low then going to high. CO2 levels become harmful to humans around the 5000PPM mark and it becomes lethal to vegetation at round 150PPM. Between the 2 which way has more wiggle room before life is threatened?
When looked at from the big picture it all just does not add up. The behavior of those promoting this does not align with their claims and the solutions range from hard to believe to non-sensical. Most of us who aren’t swayed by the AGW argument admit that yes we are probably having an impact but not to the extent that those promoting it claim and certainly not enough to bring about the climate apocalypse. What is very easy to see is that it might be an exaggerated con used to redistribute wealth and gain more power and control over the populace and what national leader and or Billionaire doesn’t want more of both?
There are far more realistic threats’ to humanity that are completely ignored because no one can profit from them like a Carington event which we are overdue for. A massive solar storm that when it last happened melted telegraph lines. We are an electricity dependent world and (at least in North America) none of our power grids are protected from this type of thing. It’s not because it’s too costly but because no one in power or who is wealthy can gain from it.
Climate has been changing all by itself for millions of years
Not an issue humans can change