From the "Wish I'd Said That" Department: Read it all, but today's OpinionJournal.com editorial, in these three short paragraphs, fairly neatly reflects my views and concerns on the global warming hysteria:
...those of us who take a skeptical approach to these doomsday climate scenarios aren't trying to end the discussion. The Earth is warmer now than it was in the recent past, and this may be partly attributable to human behavior. But everything else--from how much warmer, to the extent of mankind's contribution, to the cost of doing something about it--remains very much in dispute.Some of the Stern review's recommendations, such as carbon trading rights, are also worth debating. But most of its proposals are merely openings for government to expand its role in allocating investment, raising taxes and otherwise controlling economic decisions. Socialism was supposed to have died with the Soviet Union, but it is making a comeback under the guise of coping with global warming.
Meanwhile, there are far more urgent, and far less speculative, problems that we know how to solve with the right policies. That message may not get scary headlines, but it would improve the lives of more human beings around the world.
Those more urgent priorities are the focus of Bjorn Lomborg's Copenhagen Consensus project, which he mentions in this critique of the recent Stern report, also at OpinionJournal.com:
Last weekend in New York, I asked 24 U.N. ambassadors--from nations including China, India and the U.S.--to prioritize the best solutions for the world's greatest challenges, in a project known as Copenhagen Consensus. They looked at what spending money to combat climate change and other major problems could achieve. They found that the world should prioritize the need for better health, nutrition, water, sanitation and education, long before we turn our attention to the costly mitigation of global warming.We all want a better world. But we must not let ourselves be swept up in making a bad investment, simply because we have been scared by sensationalist headlines.
UPDATE 11/4: More on the Stern Report from The Business (U.K.) (via The Corner)
Posted by dan at November 2, 2006 8:41 AM